Excavation

Chapter 33

Those last minutes on the roof. The water was so loud, filled the air so completely, everything seemed strangely nullified, silenced, and Reed felt as if he were huddled in the quiet heart of the world.

But there was still this roaring inside his ears; the giant waterfall had slipped into his head and was raging there. He had to get Carol and the children away from this angry, insane waterfall, but where could he put them? He jerked the soggy handkerchief out of his pocket and thought about wrapping them up in that. He’d wrap them up safe and they’d be there in his pocket, warming his damp cold body, for all time. He couldn’t bear to think of them drowned, or kept from him forever.

Once as a boy he’d gotten lost in a heavy rainstorm, only a mile or maybe less from home. He’d become hysterical, convinced he was forever lost in the fury of the storm, and alarmed that he could not feel his own tears in the angry rain. His parents could not hear him above the angry rain. And the angry rain blinded him so he could not find his way.

He’d spent almost a lifetime in that rainstorm; he was in the center of that raging storm even now. All the people who had died here, all the people who had been betrayed. They wouldn’t rest. He knew; he had betrayed himself.

Reed saw his shadow in the rain, straddling the rooftop and mocking him. He thought he should jump, let himself drown, but he could not. As long as he lived there was a chance he might see Alicia and Michael and Carol again. Alicia with all the questions, Michael with the dark hair and burning gaze so like his own, Carol with the arms to hold him and make him feel part of the human race.

Animal fear escaped him as the shadow approached. He wet his pants, and felt absurdly grateful that later no one would be able to detect a urine stain on his corpse, so wet and soggy he would be. Like cotton. Like morning fog. Like a drowned rag doll.

The shadow came closer. He tensed and crouched. Reed wasn’t going to make things easy for it.

Reed leaped, and saw the toothy grin in the pale face filling the storm. Lightning flashed, and he could feel his own face lose definition…

As Charlie went over the falls, it was as if the whole world went down with him in an earthshaking explosion of water. The flood escaped from behind the trees and rapidly surrounded the old Taylor house, pulling it apart in seconds with a thousand invisible claws. The water level dropped immediately with a roaring all around Ben, Inez, and Audra, who ran as far away from the edge of the cliff as they could. Then the hollow filled up again, great waves splashing over the edge of the cliff, almost swallowing Ben’s pickup. It rocked near the edge, but stayed.

After a few more minutes the storm subsided, and the new lake grew calm. The three half-drowned former citizens of what had been Simpson Creeks looked out on a long valley filled with miles of water.

Big Andy’s become a serpent, Ben thought, and began to shake all over. Inez was tugging at him.

Floating out in the distance was a large piece of wall. And his nephew Reed was on it.