Chapter 8
8
It doesn’t take me more than a few minutes to realize that my sister was right.
This water is disgusting.
Brown and murky. And surprisingly swift. Debris is scattered across the surface, bits of leaves and branches, all moving quickly along this street-river.
At least dawn is breaking, so there’s some light for us to see by. It’s not bright by any means, but it’s not the pitch-black darkness of night either. Nikhil is counting out the strokes behind me, shouting above the noise of the wind. One, two, three. One, two, three .
I look up, but with the rain falling around us, I can’t quite tell if any of the neighboring roofs sustained damage, though the felled tree in one of the yards shows just how strong the wind had been. It knocked the tree flat, and it looks kind of sad that way, flailing on its side, its roots all scraggly as they stick out in the air.
Nikhil’s count continues, and I face forward again. I’d balked when Nikhil had instructed me to sit in the front, but he’d said the more experienced canoeist was supposed to sit in back. Something about it being easier to steer or control things from there, but since I can’t see him, it’s making it hard to follow his lead. I have to rely on his verbal cues.
We falter at first, zigging and zagging, unable to maintain momentum. And the current certainly doesn’t do us any favors, pushing us in the opposite direction of where we want to go. But after a while, I get the hang of it. Though I can barely hear his count anymore. He’s at full volume, but it’s no use. The wind is quieter, no longer the angry monster I’d heard outside the guest bedroom window, but it’s still a force to be reckoned with. It seems to want to remind us of that, as a sudden gust blows our way, making the canoe rock slightly. It doesn’t do more than that. Just a wobble. But it’s enough to send my heart into my throat.
I can’t help but feel like the storm is toying with us. Like the spider that lured the fly. We stepped into its parlor and now it’s going to play with us before it has its meal. It wants to have some fun.
I peer over the side of the canoe as I draw my paddle through the water. I don’t know how deep it is here. I can’t see the concrete of the street at the bottom. Can’t see much at all really. The water’s too cloudy to make anything out.
The next stroke takes me longer than normal, but I push through. My fingers are starting to feel numb, my arms burning. For the first time in my life I wish I’d used that strange rowing machine at the gym. I’d never understood it before. Never understood why anyone would want to sit on a bench and pretend to row a boat. Now I get it. I’m never going to skip over that machine again.
“You okay?” Nikhil shouts. “We’re almost there.”
“I’m good,” I try to shout back over my shoulder, but I’m clearly not because my lungs hurt from the effort, the words coming out in a wheeze.
Nikhil slows the count and his pace, but it’s no use. My arms are like jelly.
We’re off count, zigging and zagging again, being pushed by the current.
“Put your paddle up,” Nikhil says. “Take a break.”
Relief sweeps through me. I yank my paddle out of the water, placing it across my lap. Nikhil starts alternating strokes, and we continue moving forward, but I barely notice. I slouch a bit, taking deep, long breaths, and getting my bearings.
We’re smack-dab in the center of the cul-de-sac. Not as close as Nikhil has said we were. More like halfway there.
The street has never felt this long before. But then again, I’ve never traveled it by boat.
“Okay,” I call out, a minute or two later, looking back at Nikhil. “I’m ready.”
His mouth flattens. “I’ll get us the rest of the way there, okay?”
I shake my head. “I can do it.” I force my fingers around the paddle, trying not to wince at how tender my skin is. My palms are sure to blister tomorrow.
The current takes us a little off course and I turn to see Nikhil stick his paddle in the water. He does something fancy with it. It looks like a normal stroke, but then he keeps the paddle in longer at the end and twists it a bit, like a rudder, which miraculously turns our canoe back in the right direction.
Before I can ask how he did that, he thrusts the paddle back in, resuming his strokes.
I move to do the same, but he’s stopped counting. I try to catch the rhythm, try to get the timing right before I begin again, but then he pulls his paddle out, pivots, and begins paddling on the other side.
Oh. He’s alternating strokes. He really is planning on doing this alone.
“I can help, Nikhil,” I shout. “I’m ready now.”
“No. It’s fine. I’ve got it,” he calls back.
Frustration flares in my chest. I’m about to yell back that I can do it, but then he says two words that stop me in my tracks. “Trust me.”
That’s the whole problem, isn’t it? The whole reason why we’re in this mess in the first place. I don’t.
How do you trust someone when they never lower any of their defenses? When they never let you in? How can you trust someone who expects your trust, but clearly doesn’t trust you in return? How can you trust someone who pulls away when you need them most?
I stick my paddle in the water and put my whole body weight into it, giving the hardest push I’ve managed so far.
We careen forward, the canoe shaking slightly, and Nikhil raises his voice. “Meena! Stop.” I pivot around and watch his eyes flash, his tone hard and bitter when he says, “I know you think I can’t do much, Meena, but I promise you, I can do this. I can get us there.”
What is he even talking about? Of course he can get us there. That doesn’t mean he has to do it without me. I’m prepared to say as much, but the current takes us again. Moving us sideways. Undoing the progress Nikhil had made on his own.
He glares at me, then lifts his paddle. He’s probably about to do the same maneuver from before to correct our course. The rudder one. The one I wanted him to show me.
“Wait,” I say. “How do you—”
Lightning-fast movement catches the corner of my eye. My gaze follows. Something’s traveling across the surface of the water. Moving far faster than the branches and leaves and debris I’d seen before.
I frown. It’s strange. It’s not moving in a straight line. It’s curving. From side to side. Almost like a…
“Wait,” I shout. “Nikhil, wait.”
But he doesn’t listen. His paddle slaps the water loudly, accidentally striking the thing that had been heading straight toward us. The creature lets out a hiss, recoiling for a moment before reacting to the blow.
Fear chokes me as I witness the most terrifying sight I’ve ever seen. The wide-open, completely white mouth of one of the most venomous snakes in North America.
A cottonmouth.
Every muscle in my body goes still.
“Nikhil,” I say through my teeth. “What do we do?”
But Nikhil doesn’t respond. He doesn’t say anything. His jaw is tense, his eyes locked on the snake to our right.
Like me, the snake hasn’t moved. It’s just frozen in that position. Its head raised. Its mouth open.
It hasn’t tried to strike, which I’m taking as a good sign. I scrounge up every memory of every nature documentary I’ve ever watched. I can’t remember any specific ones about snakes, but I do remember the general takeaway lesson about wildlife that was hammered home in almost every episode: animals are more scared of us than we are of them.
That doesn’t feel real at the moment. I can’t imagine that this wild, fearsome, venomous creature could be terrified of two people huddled in fear in a canoe. Clearly, it has the upper hand in this situation, but maybe it doesn’t realize that.
“Nikhil,” I try again, but he doesn’t register the sound. His skin is ashen. Slightly gray.
If I saw a snake like this on land I’d back up. Take a few steps away. I wouldn’t freeze in place. I’m pretty sure that advice works only when the predator is a T. rex and you’re in the middle of Jurassic Park.
But since we’re in a canoe, I’m not sure how we can manage it. How we can paddle backwards. And Nikhil doesn’t seem like he’s in a place where he can take command of the situation.
“We’ve got to get some distance, Nikhil,” I say. “Do you hear me? We need to give it some distance.”
After a long beat, Nikhil’s chin dips. Just slightly. And relief creeps through me. It’s not much of an acknowledgment, but that little hint of a nod is better than the nothing I’ve been getting from him so far.
“Okay, so how do we do that, Nikhil?” My question is gentle. And soft. He’s clearly not doing great right now, and as panicky as I feel, I’m not going to let any of it show.
The current is still moving the canoe, but it’s moving us and the snake together, so it’s not exactly helping the situation. And I’d try to propel us backwards, but I’m far from a pro at this. I could shift the canoe unintentionally. I could accidentally make us get closer. Or even worse, make us bump up against the snake, agitating it further.
But I don’t think Nikhil’s going to be able to do this either. His eyes are squeezed shut, a bead of sweat running down his forehead.
“We’re going to be okay, Nikhil. You hear me? It’s going to be okay. Just tell me what to do.”
“The reverse.” His voice is hoarse. Scratchy and dry. “Paddle in reverse. Back to front.”
“Reverse. Okay.”
“On the other side,” he adds. “Left of the boat. In a straight line, but you’re going to need to twist and push a bit when you reach the end of the stroke. Like a small curve away from the boat. That’ll keep us straight.” His eyes shoot open. “We need to keep it straight.”
“Right.” I glance back at the snake. It hasn’t moved. Its mouth is still open. In warning. It must feel like we’re still too close to it. I wish I could tell it that the feeling’s mutual.
“Twist it how?” I ask calmly, even though my hands are shaking.
He walks me through it, describing the motion, how my top hand should pivot, which way my thumb should be facing at the end, and how the blade should move through the water. And even though his voice is a little shaky, the sound of it is reassuring. I repeat his instructions in my mind and try to picture the whole thing.
I lift my paddle slowly, saying a silent prayer as I dip it into the water to my left. Holding the blade the way Nikhil had showed me back in the garage, I push it, back to front. I keep it steady, imagining a crisp, straight line in my head, and then I twist and push it the way Nikhil had described.
The canoe moves back a bit, not in an entirely straight line, but straight enough that we don’t collide against the snake, and it gives me the courage to try again. Another stroke. Back to front. Calm and sure. Ending with that same hooklike movement.
The snake’s stayed in the same spot, but now that we’ve backed up, it’s more toward the narrow tip at the front instead of the side of our boat. Much closer to open water. Once it sees that path, hopefully it will just swim away, and leave us alone.
“Should I do one more?” I ask, but before Nikhil responds, the snake disappears, ducking underneath the surface of the water, underneath our canoe. I suck in a breath, and I’m still holding it when I see the snake emerge on the other side.
I wait for it to lunge at us, to open its mouth back up, to strike, but it does just as I’d hoped. It darts away, traveling across the brown, murky water the way it came, going farther and farther into the distance.
Nikhil’s knuckles are white, his hands clasping the seat beneath him. His eyes are open, but they’re glazed over. Slightly vacant. Staring out in the direction the snake left.
“It’s gone,” I say. A shaky, jittery sensation travels through my chest. And a strange laugh bubbles out of my mouth. “It’s finally gone.”
Nikhil’s shoulders jolt at the sound of my laughter, though his hands remain tightly clenched.
I have the strange urge to place my hands on top of his, so I do. Setting my paddle across my lap, I turn and slowly unpeel his fingers from the bench, entangling them with my own.
“We’re okay, Nikhil,” I say, squeezing his hands in mine. “It’s gone now. We’re okay.”
He lets out a loud breath. He’s quiet for a moment, then looks up at me. “I hate snakes,” he says.
“I know.” Or at least I know that now . He’d never mentioned it to me before.
Shame creeps into his eyes, and it triggers some long-dormant instinct inside me. Something defensive. Or maybe protective.
“But everyone’s scared of something,” I say. “And snakes are a normal fear. I’m scared of them. A lot of people are scared of them. It’s a…a…dashing kind of fear.”
“Dashing?” he repeats skeptically.
“Yeah, you know. Heroic. Like Indiana Jones. Snakes, why did it have to be snakes? ” I put on my best Harrison Ford impression, which really is me just dropping my pitch a bit lower.
Nikhil’s forehead shines with sweat, and his cheeks have an unhealthy pallor, but slowly, one corner of his mouth rises. “Like Indiana Jones?”
“Yeah, absolutely. What would Indy be without his fear of snakes? Just this perfect adventurer-slash-professor, and who would want to watch that?”
His smile grows. “Well, he’s not that perfect. Wasn’t he basically stealing artifacts from the global south and putting them in Western museums?”
“Uhh…huh.” He’s absolutely right. “Yeah. Good point.” I shake my head. “Okay, so not like Indiana Jones, like someone better.”
“You think I’m better than Indiana Jones?” he asks, a sly, teasing note in his voice, his thumb gliding across the back of my hand.
My mind unhelpfully recalls other times he used that voice. Other questions he asked me in that tone.
I scoff, choosing evasion instead of a proper response to his question. Because, yeah, the truth is I think Nikhil’s hotter than Harrison Ford, even when he was at his Indiana Jones prime, but I’m not going to tell Nikhil that.
“So,” I say, nodding toward Alan’s house. “You ready to get going?”
He drops my hands, and I tell myself that doesn’t sting. That I don’t feel the loss of it. That I don’t miss that brief shared connection.
“Yeah,” he says. “I can take us the rest of the way there. Really, it’s the least I can do after you saved us from certain death.”
I snort. “Nah. I’m good. I can do it.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. Honestly, I’ve got some excess energy in me after that deadly encounter. I need to burn it up somehow.”
His brows furrow. For a second, I think he’s going to argue with me, but then he clears his throat. “Okay. Ready, then?”
I confirm, facing forward again, but Nikhil doesn’t start up our count. I turn to check and see he hasn’t picked up his paddle. He hasn’t moved at all.
“Thank you,” he finally says after a few more seconds of silence. “You did…I couldn’t.” He shakes his head, and I can’t make out his expression. I can’t understand what he means . “Thank you,” he says again, and before I can tell him there’s nothing he needs to thank me for, he resumes his count.
One, two, three. One, two, three .
The paddling’s much easier this time. Neither of us is fighting for control, or trying to put in more power than the other, or take on the other’s job. It’s still an adjustment at first, getting back into rhythm, but soon we find it. Soon, we’re in sync.
The rain has started to slow down, which is helping visibility quite a bit. The wind is still loud, still making its presence known, but it’s growing more and more infrequent. At least it feels that way to me.
The water level seems the same here. I know that it’s deeper in this area only when I look at Alan’s house. At Nikhil’s the water comes up through the yard, but it’s not at our doorstep. The river is mostly contained in the street.
That’s not the case here. Alan’s house looks like it’s partially submerged. None of his front yard is visible. And the bottom part of his front door is definitely underwater. I can’t tell by how much, but at least a few inches.
“We’re going to head to the gate,” Nikhil says. “I’ll tie us there, all right?”
We paddle in that direction until Nikhil can reach out and wrap a hand around the metal gatepost. Keeping one hand on the canoe and one on the gate, he steps out, making a small splash as the water rises to his knees.
He secures us in place with a small length of rope, checking and double-checking the knot before letting it go.
“I’m going to try to go through the front. You stay here.” He takes another step away, the water rising past his knees, concealing his lower thighs.
“What happened to rule number two?” I call. “The buddy system? We have to stay together.”
“Yeah, well, rule number one is more important. You stay in the boat. Remember?” He continues walking, the water steadily creeping up his body.
“I don’t remember promising to do that.”
“Well, you did,” he shouts. He’s almost at the door and I tell myself I’ll be less nervous once he makes it. Once he gets inside, gets Alan, and gets back. But right when he’s within reach of the doorknob, he staggers back, letting out a loud cry.
“Nikhil!” I stand up in the canoe. Foolish, I know, but I’m not thinking straight. The boat rocks, and I grasp at the gate to regain my balance. “What happened?”
He’s waist-deep now, swatting his arms at something. But he’s turned away. I can’t see his face. I can’t see if he’s okay.
“Nikhil! I’m coming. Hang on!”
“No, don’t come out here,” he cries. “I’m fine, I’m… OW . My god!”
That’s it. I’m knee-deep in the water before I even realize what I’m doing. I push my way toward him, but it’s like I’m walking in slow motion. Or through Jell-O. The water slowing down every step I take.
“I’m coming,” I tell him.
He swivels in my direction, a wild expression on his face. “No. Meena, go back. You can’t be here. You’re—”
Ouch . A sharp pain strikes the back of my calf. I try to look for whatever I hit, whatever hurt me, but I can’t see a thing in this water. I shake it off, taking another step. Then another. But now my left arm is stinging. And a spot on my right shoulder. And my lower back. And…now I can’t keep track. Little pinpricks of pain pop up all over my body. Over and over and over. But they don’t just hurt. They burn. Almost like fire. Almost like…
“You’re allergic,” Nikhil continues. “Go back. Go back now.”
“Too late,” I say, picking up the pace, swatting at the water as I move. The pain is unbearable. My skin is hot. And so, so itchy. Though I know what these bites are going to turn into later will be much worse.
Nikhil’s reached the door, but he’s waiting for me. Visibly flinching with each new bite. “Hurry!” he tells me, extending a hand in my direction. But I’m still too far away.
“Go inside,” I tell him. “I’ll be right there.”
“Not without you!”
Each step burns, but finally I’m close enough to reach for him. He yanks me toward the door just as a floating reddish-brown mass sails past. “Is that—?”
“Yeah,” he confirms.
I stare in horror, a full-body shiver going through me. It’s been years since I’ve seen one of these in person, but I know exactly what it is. Fire ants do something weird when water sweeps through their home. They band together. They lock arms and legs, or whatever their appendages are called, and they form a strange kind of raft. And then…they float.
They survive.
And they bite.
I hadn’t seen the raft when I’d been pushing my way through the water, but I’d experienced the stragglers. The ones that must have fallen off into the water on their own. Biting at anything in their path. And from the painful, itchy sections of my skin, I can tell there were more than a few.
Nikhil opens the door, dragging both of us into the house, but it’s unfortunately not much of a reprieve. The water here is the same level as it was outside, except in here it’s dark. Making it much harder for us to make sense of our surroundings.
“Alan,” Nikhil calls, just as a beam of light appears.
I turn toward it, thinking it’s Alan with a flashlight, but it’s just Nikhil and his ridiculous headlamp. I can’t quite make out the look on Nikhil’s face, but I can just imagine his smug expression. See? I told you this thing would come in handy.
I blow out a breath, taking a step farther into the house. “Alan? Where are you?”
“Alan?” Nikhil tries again. “Hello?”
“Over here,” a voice calls back.
We venture toward the sound of that voice. And I blink at what we find. Alan is sitting crisscross applesauce on top of his kitchen table. An assortment of snacks surrounds him, as well as a water bottle, a flashlight, a backpack, and a radio.
“Nikhil made it,” Alan says into the radio with a loud whoop. “I’m saved!”
“This is what you get, Alan,” a woman’s voice replies, fuzzy and unclear as it travels through the airwaves. “I told you to evacuate. In fact, I told you not to buy your house. I told you there was a reason it wasn’t selling. If you’d just listened to me…”
“It was a good deal, Betty. You know that. And how was I supposed to know the land here was a designated flood zone?”
“The mandatory flood insurance requirement should have tipped you off!”
Nikhil clears his throat. “Alan, if you’re done we’ve got to get—”
“Yeah. Of course.” Alan scrambles off the table, now wading through the water like we are, holding the radio and backpack above his head. “Nikhil, this is my sister on the line. Betty, Nikhil’s here. And Meena. His…”
“Friend,” I supply.
“Thanks for saving my worthless brother,” Betty replies.
“Hey!” Alan exclaims. “That’s uncalled for.”
I stifle a laugh.
We push through the water, heading for the front door, and the two siblings bicker the whole way.
“I thought the two of you didn’t get along,” I say when there’s a lull in the fight. Nikhil and I had largely tuned out Alan’s monologuing about his sister earlier, but from the few parts I heard, none of it was complimentary.
“We don’t,” Alan and Betty say at the same time.
Nikhil snorts.
“Yeah, I guess…I just assumed y’all didn’t talk anymore,” I say.
“He wishes we didn’t talk anymore,” Betty says.
“That’s true,” Alan whispers.
“I heard that!”
We’re outside now, getting closer to the canoe, and to my relief, I don’t feel any stinging bites this time. The ones from before itch like crazy, and I’m sure they’ll double in size later, but at least my allergic reaction isn’t life-threatening.
Betty’s talking about how Alan should have heeded her advice, but Alan abruptly interjects. “Got to go, Betty. Talk soon.” He flips a switch on the radio, places it and the backpack on the floor of the canoe, then climbs inside, shaking his head. “We really haven’t talked to each other in forever,” he tells us. “But she overheard almost everything I told you guys earlier.”
“She’s on the neighborhood frequency?” Nikhil asks, his eyebrows raised.
“Yeah. She lives a couple houses down from you.”
Nikhil pauses. “That was Elizabeth? Elizabeth Jeffries is your sister?”
Alan gives a loud, long-suffering sigh. “Yeah. That’s how everyone reacts.”
“How did I not know y’all were related?”
Alan shrugs. “Different last names. And we don’t talk about it much.”
I remember Elizabeth from before, but her full name…Something about it is so familiar. I search my memory, trying to place it, but come up short. “Who is she?” I ask as I settle into my seat and grab my paddle.
Nikhil looks our way, confirming we’re all situated before untying the rope connecting us to the gate.
“She used to be county judge,” Alan replies.
Oh. Right. She wasn’t actually a judge, but for some reason that’s the title the county uses for its version of a mayor. I remember her name was bandied around a lot during the last big storm we had. She was on local news constantly, telling us to either evacuate or “hunker down.” But that would have been years ago. Back when I was in high school.
“You ready?” Nikhil asks, lifting his own paddle, and I nod. He begins counting, but after a few strokes, we don’t need it anymore. We’re sailing across the water smoothly.
“What is she up to now?” I ask Alan.
“Betty? I’m not sure. She went back to her old law firm after her term was up, but she’s also involved in a lot of nonprofit work. Still, I don’t think she wants to do that forever. I’m sure now that Congresswoman Garcia’s retiring, she’s thinking about that seat, but Betty doesn’t exactly share her future plans with me.” He sighs. “I should have remembered she’d be tuned in to the neighborhood frequency, but I was so panicked I wasn’t thinking straight. She eventually interrupted and asked if the two of us could switch to a different frequency and then…we talked.” He pauses. “We’d never talked about any of that stuff before, but it was good, I think.”
We’re halfway down the street, moving so much faster now that the wind’s died down and the rain’s let up. More light is breaking through the clouds, and it gives me hope. That the worst of the storm has passed. That the worst is almost over.
“I guess it’s true what they say,” Alan continues. “That communication is key.”
Nikhil casts a sidelong glance in my direction, and I pointedly ignore it.
“She asked if y’all could take me to her house, so we could keep talking, but I’m not sure—”
“Oh, it’s no problem,” Nikhil says quickly. “We can take you there.”
The eagerness in his voice almost makes me laugh. He’s obviously thankful to have an alternative to being stuck in the house with Alan chattering away. But me? My feelings are mixed. I’m not exactly a fan of Alan’s stories, but at least he’d provide some kind of buffer. Something to cut through the tension between Nikhil and me.
I chew my lip, anxiety growing as I think about it going back to being just the two of us. With the storm on its way out and Alan close to safety, there’s nothing to distract us anymore. Nothing to distract me from my purpose. From the reason I’m here.
My brain whirs, thinking about possible ways forward. Negotiation tactics. Strategies I can try. Different scenarios. I play them through in my head, trying to envision one that gets Nikhil to sign off on the paperwork in the quickest way possible.
It’s only when we reach Alan’s sister’s house that I process an important piece of information Alan just shared.
Congresswoman Garcia is retiring.