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A nasty gust of wind roared its way past, rocking the Death Nugget back and forth.
I knew I had that umbrella in the back seat somewhere, so I fumbled around until I found it and yanked it forward. Another gust of wind sideswiped the car, and I had a feeling that the umbrella wouldn’t really help. The rain was sweeping down sideways.
I tried to be calm and thoughtful.
Sure, Mother Nature was raising hell; and I was now effectively trapped miles from home; and, yes, the city was in an uproar; and, of course, Christ was down by the river possibly drowning even as I sat there; and obviously I’d told Jamie I’d meet him in half an hour, a deadline which had passed twenty minutes ago. Never mind the fact that Harry and Malachi had chosen this particular weekend to try and visit, and they were down there somewhere now—not in town yet, I hoped. I could only pray they were running late. It was the only thing that would save them.
I was increasingly afraid that I was going to have to stand them all up, but I was determined to do my best. If I made it to the pedestrian bridge, I’d be closer to Christ than to Greyfriar’s. I’d have to check the undersides first.
I wished to God that I wasn’t alone.
At least when I’d gone tearing through the battlefield, I’d had Benny and Dana with me. At least then, if I stumbled, there was someone to know what had happened and someone to keep pushing me forward. Not here. Not now.
So, all right, it was me against the world. What should I bring?
My cell phone was lying forlorn upon the passenger’s seat. I picked it up and shoved it into its protective holster—but the holster wasn’t going to keep it from getting wet. Thanking heaven that I didn’t clean out my car too regularly, I reached down to the floor and found an empty potato chip bag. I shook out the leftover crumbs of salt and snack, then dumped the cell phone into it, holster and all. I rolled this up and stuffed it into my purse, zipping it into a side pocket.
The purse itself was a large bag with a strap long enough to sling across my chest for hands-free carrying. It was black leather and slightly worn, but it had been treated with a protective spray and would keep out most of the wet so long as I didn’t go swimming.
Again I looked outside, through the waterfall window.
Swimming might be in my future whether I liked it or not. But the cell phone couldn’t stay in the car.
I picked through my purse and pulled out a small notebook, a checkbook, some makeup, and my wallet. I stuffed the notebook and checkbook into my glove compartment, and put the wallet back inside. Most of the contents were plastic anyway, and unlikely to be damaged in case of baptism by immersion.
In the glove box I found my tiny, trusty flashlight. It was made to be durable and maybe even waterproof, but I’d have to take my chances on it regardless. I chucked it into the bag. I also found a knife—one of my old favorites, the one with the leather sheath that snapped shut around it.
I’d started leaving it at home or in the car because the blade was too long to be legal, but thinking of the chaos at the bottom of the hill, I decided that it was worth the risk to carry it. I undid my belt and slipped it through the loops, then fastened myself up.
Better than nothing.
I had to use my leg to help pry open the car door, which was resisting because of the wind. I knew in an instant that the umbrella wouldn’t do me a bit of good, so I left it. I climbed out of the car, crawled through my purse strap, and locked the doors behind me.
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Standing there, overlooking the river and the city from the top of that hill I wondered what I was doing and how I planned to do it.
But I couldn’t just stand there, so I braced myself against the slashing, driving rain, and started to run.
13
The Gauntlet
Crowds were forming, milling, and moving in an agitated fashion up and down the hills of north Chattanooga. People were coming together, chattering angrily, swelling into big groups, breaking into smaller ones. Cars were abandoned at every juncture as the obvious hopelessness of the situation became clear.
I was only a kid when the Berlin Wall came down, but I’ve seen old movies about people who were trapped on either side when the barrier rose. Those movies were what I was thinking of.
People were angry and frightened, and here were the police and the emergency services folks—here were the officials in charge of protecting us. Here they were, not letting us go home, or go to work, or simply go.
I used to joke that you never know how many people live here until Riverbend, that ridiculous festival that consumes the downtown area for a week each spring. In that week, it seems that the Tennessee Valley residents number in the millions, and every goddamn one of them wants to loiter inappropriately. And this was even worse than Riverbend: so many people and so many vehicles—and so much noise.
They were furious at being stopped and they were blaming the people in uniforms because it was easier than blaming the river.
But any fool could see that it was the river rising between us; any fool could stand still and stare for a minute and see what was happening. Any fool could tell that trouble was coming. I could smell it in the fear, in the confusion and desperation that made the throngs crowd forward towards the river—even as the river stretched itself up and out to meet them.
There were men and women at the river’s edge with their backs to the water. They were trying with megaphones and sky-aimed gunshots to spread a little sense. It was such a simple message—get away from the water; here it comes.
It took my breath away.
