Chapter 1

“Oh God, please let her be alive! Please let her be safe and alive!” I said in a silent plea.

I immediately resumed digging through the shambles that was left of her parent’s home.

It had only been a little over 30 minutes since I left my house, located next door to her parents.

Just a quick trip to the post office to pick up a package I had to sign for since it was certified mail. The post office was supposed to close in less than an hour. If I didn’t get the package today I would have to wait until Tuesday, since Monday was a holiday.

I had called Jessie before leaving to let her know I would be right back and even offered to take her with me.

“I will be FINE, Sam,” she stressed, “I’ve just got one more school paper I have to finish and I will be FINE!

“Then we will have the rest of the long weekend ... together.”

Graduation from college was less than two weeks away, and I knew how important her school work was to Jessie. So against my better judgment, I listened to her.

CRAP – Why the hell did I listen to her?

I mean it’s not like our part of Georgia never had bad storms before, but this particular storm – according to the weather prognosticators – was supposed to be especially intense.

This line of storms had already produced tornadoes in Mississippi, Alabama and other parts of Georgia but who would have ever believed it could come so quickly – and so savagely?

When I left the house, the sun was still shining on what was the warmest day of the year.

In fact, The Weather Channel said it was the warmest day in May in over 50 years.

Just a beautiful Saturday morning.

The post office was only about five minutes away, and there were only a few people there, so I only had to wait in line for about 10 minutes. Add a few more minutes while they locate my package, then sign for it.

Even so, when I walked back outside I could not believe how much conditions had changed.

Before I left my house, there were some strong wind gusts but the sun was still shining and it was HOT!

Now, some 20 minutes later, the difference was startling. The wind was blowing hard enough to rock my pickup truck where it stood, the temperature had dropped 10 or 15 degrees, and dark, angry clouds obscured the sun.

I jumped in my truck and turned on the radio as I raced back to my house.

“Winds are gusting up to 50 to 60 miles per hour, folks, and this is becoming a major storm,” I heard the weatherman say on the radio.

Then I heard the “beep-beep-beep” that signified an emergency bulletin.

Almost immediately, I heard the weatherman begin to report the “tornado watch” which we had been under for the last few hours has been upgraded to a “tornado warning.”

He again explained that tornado watch just meant that conditions were right to possibly generate a tornado, while tornado warning meant that a tornado has actually been spotted.

I was almost halfway back home when two things happened.

First, it began raining so hard I could barely see 10 feet in front of me, and second my cell phone rang. It was Jessie.

Due to the wind and rain, I had to slow to a crawl while trying to talk to Jessie on the phone.

The rain was pounding so hard on the outside of my truck that I had to struggle just to hear her

“Sam, where are you Sam?” she cried out when I answered.

I could hear the fear in her voice.

I explained I was only about a mile away, but was having to drive at a snail’s pace because of the conditions.

“I’m scared, Sam. I mean, really scared,” she blurted out. “I have never seen anything like this before.”

Despite the conditions outside, I started driving a little faster.

She said the trees outside were bent nearly double, and that some of the wind gusts were actually rocking the two-story house her parents owned.

“Jessie, are you upstairs in your room?” I asked.

When she said, “yes” I had to start nearly screaming in order for her to hear me over the howling winds on both ends of the phone.

“Jessie, go downstairs NOW!” I told her.

She said she would, after grabbing her laptop.

“No, Jessie,” I yelled, “Go NOW!”

It only took her about 30 seconds to reach the downstairs level, and she asked, “Now what?”

“Go to your parent’s room, grab the blankets off the bed, jump into the tub in their bathroom and cover yourself up. NOW, Jessie, NOW!”

Since her parents didn’t have a basement in their home, I knew this was probably the safest location left in the house.

By now, even as slow as I was driving I couldn’t have been more than a half-mile from our two houses.

Abruptly, the wind and rain stopped. I could also hear over the phone that it must have stopped raining at Jessie’s house as well.

The sky now turned a sickly yellowish-green in color.

Unbelievably, I heard Jessie laugh.

“Get in the tub?” she said, “I think you just want me to take my clothes off.”

I could hear the laughter in her voice.

I decided that humor was better than the fear I had been hearing, so I began to respond in kind.

I knew what the sudden cessation in wind and rain, and the yellowish-green tint to the sky meant. I had been through one tornado before, years earlier.

“Well, that would be one way to get you naked,” I quipped.

“Anytime you want to get me naked,” she said, only now I could hear how her voice had turned serious, “all you have to do is ask. I promise it won’t be like last time.”

I was just about to respond when I saw a car, about 100 feet in front of me, suddenly go airborne.

I never saw a funnel cloud, but one second the car was driving along, then it was flying about a foot off the ground. It dropped back onto all four wheels, but was now sideways across the shoulder of the road.

Seconds later, I actually felt my truck lift slightly off the ground, then drop back to the pavement. It couldn’t have risen more than a few inches, but it was still enough to almost make me lose control.

At almost the same instant, I heard a loud roaring sound (like a freight train) coming over the phone, then a horrible crashing sound, along with Jessie’s scream!

Then ... nothing!

“JESSIE!” I yelled, over and over into the phone, but there was no response.

No sound, no dial tone, nothing!

I frantically began hitting the redial button, but there was no ring, nothing at all.

Just a few seconds later, a large tree toppled onto the roadway, completely blocking it. Some of the limbs actually hit the hood of my truck before I could slam to a stop.

I continued trying to call Jessie over the cell phone, to no avail.

Finally, I just put the cell phone in my pocket, leaned over and took out a pair of leather gloves from the glove compartment, then opened the door and ran over to the other car. The driver assured me he was fine, just a little shaken up, so I started running to Jessie’s house.

It had started raining again, but not nearly as hard as it had been. Even so, before I was halfway to Jessie’s house I was soaked.

I continued running, trying to dodge downed trees and tree limbs, plus wreckage I knew was from other homes in our subdivision. Luckily the power lines and phone lines were buried underground, so at least I didn’t have to worry about downed power lines.

I live in a four-bedroom, single-story ranch-style home with a separate two-car garage. A covered walkway about 10 feet long joins the house to the garage. My house, unlike Jessie’s, also had a large basement.

Jessie’s parents live in a large, four-bedroom, two-story house beside mine in a cul-de-sac. One other house shared the cul-de-sac with us, a single-story, like mine.

In the few seconds I stopped to look, it appeared the other house looked fine. I couldn’t see any damage at all to it.

My house had a lot of the shingles ripped off, but the roof looked okay.

My garage was gone.

I don’t mean it was destroyed or demolished or just in a pile of rubble.

I mean you could not tell there had ever been a garage there at all.

My late wife’s Mercedes and my riding lawn mower, both of which had been inside the garage, appeared unharmed.

Amazingly, the covered walkway, which is just held up by some flimsy two-by-fours, appeared undamaged.

Jessie’s house ... Oh, God, Jessie’s house!

The entire upper story was missing.

It was almost as if someone had taken a giant knife and sliced off the upper part of the house.

It seemed impossible to believe that anyone ... anyone could have survived in what was left of the house.

The destruction seemed so complete I was almost paralyzed with fear for several seconds before my training as both a former Marine and a present day fireman/EMT kicked in and I forced those thoughts deep inside.

I began running again until I reached her house then ignored splintered wood as I began frantically digging through the rubble that was all that remained. The entire front door and much of the wall around it was simply gone.

“Oh God, please let her be alive! Please let her be safe and alive!” I said in a silent plea.

I’m not sure how long it took to reach her parent’s bathroom where I was hoping Jessie had managed to take cover. It probably only took 10 minutes, but it seemed like I was digging through rubble and tossing splintered wood aside for hours.

Within a few minutes my forearms were covered with numerous little cuts and scratches. Luckily, the gloves extended well past my wrists.

There was no floor left above what remained of the house. From the moment I entered the house, open sky was above me.

Finally I reached the door to the bathroom.

Amazingly, the door opened although the wall nearly fell forward when I started to swing the door open. I grabbed the door jam and pulled it towards me, and the entire section of wall just collapsed. I barely ducked through the doorway before the wall fell.