Toto watches the sky, ears pricked with alertness, as I pop the door to the cellar and find Yori and her boyfriend halfway to third base. Gross. I wrinkle my nose.
“Hey.” My voice snaps the two of them out of their hormonal bliss and draws their attention my way. “The witch wants you out. Dinner’s in fifteen.” I shrug my shoulders in a loose apology, and Yori groans dramatically. Must be tough to go home to your three sisters and two loving parents. I’d do anything to have my siblings … parents … and grandparents back.
But they’re all dead.
Everyone I knew and loved, gone. Every living family member on my dad’s side of the family (mom never had any herself) gone in an instant. The only person I have left on this earth that’s blood-related to me is Aunt Em. That’s it. And there’s no love lost between us.
“Can’t we hang out for a little longer?” Yori whines, tossing her raven-black hair over one shoulder. As if in response to her question, tiny pieces of hail begin to come down in icy sheets. Uh-oh. “Never mind,” she amends, grabbing the tattooed guy by the hand and dragging him toward the latch. “Might be a cyclone coming, and I am not getting stuck in here. No Wi-Fi.” Yori pulls him up the steps and past me, waving a quick goodbye before climbing in her green VW Beetle and taking off down the winding road toward the highway.
I whistle to grab Toto’s attention and head back toward the house, wiping mud off my feet at the front door.
Before I go inside, I pause and turn, enjoying a brief moment of alone time on the porch. When I look out toward the empty fields, I can feel this energy in the air, this tingle in my fingertips that makes me want to … oh, shit, I don’t know. Dance in the hail? Steal my uncle’s trunk and run away? Run as fast and far as I can with my bare feet digging into the gray mud?
“Dinner’s ready!” Aunt Em calls, and the moment is broken.
But if a cyclone is coming: bring it on.
I’m ready.Uncle Henry never laughs. Yeah, he works, but he starts drinking in the morning and goes till night, and he most definitely doesn’t know the meaning of joy. He’s as gray as everything else in this forsaken county, from his long beard to his rough boots. He’s stern and solemn, rarely speaks.
I’d say I hated him, but hate isn’t a strong enough word.
When he comes in from the barn—just in time for a hot dinner, god forbid if Aunt Em is late—I’m sitting on the smaller sofa, phone in my hand, scrolling through Instagram posts of places far, far away from here. Toto lifts his head up and growls, lip curling over his teeth.
“Shut that mutt up or I’ll shut him up myself,” Henry grumbles, but he knows better than to get close to Toto. Last time, the dog made him bleed. I curl an arm around Toto’s thick neck and dig my fingers into his ebon fur.
“He’s not a mutt; he’s papered,” I say, which makes Henry’s shit brown eyes widen. That’s about as much sass as I can get away with, without starting a full-blown war between him and Aunt Em. Unfortunately for her, when Henry gets mad at me, he takes it out on his wife, either by hitting or fucking her so hard that the sound of the headboard hitting the wall gives me nightmares.
Dinner is served at the table, no electronics, no music, no background TV noise, just the clatter of hail on the tin roof, and the sound of the whistling wind from outside the old front door.
“Looks like we’re gearing up for a cyclone,” Aunt Em murmurs, rubbing at her sore shoulder and looking up toward the rattling windowpanes. “Might not be a bad idea to turn the radio on for the weather.”
Henry grunts, scooping up a spoonful of casserole and shoving it into his mouth. My toes curl into Toto’s fur, and I have to resist the urge to put in my two cents. Only an idiot forgoes media when there’s a possible storm warning coming. Luckily, I know my cell will go off if we need to take cover.
When Uncle Henry’s finished eating, he just gets up and goes to plop in front of the TV, not bothering to help Aunt Em clean up or put away leftovers. Instead, I get to help her out while we listen to the news blasting in the background—news, that, I might mention is the opposite of all my political views.
“I fucking hate it here, Toto,” I whisper when we’re safely ensconced in the bed upstairs, my gaze focused on the window and the storm beyond. Part of me hopes the cyclone really does come and tear the farmhouse to pieces. Then maybe I could leave sooner, rather than later, and still get access to my trust fund.
