Chapter 1 #2
But I’m not your son. Neither are Tripp and Knox. Brodie was glad he had just thought the words and hadn’t spit them out.
He still hadn’t moved a single step when all seven of his sisters surrounded the three of them, all talking at once and getting soaked by the drizzling rain.
“When we drove up and saw that the house was gone, we were scared that y’all were in it when the tornado came through,” Parker said.
Mary Jane gave Brodie an extra-tight hug before she turned him loose. “Y’all are coming home with us. There are seven empty bedrooms at our house. You have a place to go.”
“Knox has a travel trailer…” Brodie paused.
The sun was in front of him. The storm clouds behind him.
Did that have some significance? How was he supposed to look forward when all he had to do was glance over his shoulder to see nothing but destruction.
Then he looked over to his left and saw that Audrey Tucker’s place was still standing.
It didn’t look like even a single shingle had been disturbed.
Of all the luck, he thought. She’s been a thorn in my side ever since I bought this place, and all she has is some debris lying around in her yard and a few blooms blown off a rose bush.
The oldest sister, Ursula—the tall one—draped her arm around his shoulder. “Did it take your vehicles? We’ve got an old work truck y’all can borrow if it did.”
Remy pointed toward the edge of the orchard. “There’s three all crammed up together at the edge of the orchard. They look like they’ve been in a losing battle, but they might still run.”
“Thank you, Ursula. We might take you up on that offer if our trucks aren’t running when we get all that trash off them.”
He wondered how he sounded so calm and collected when he wanted to shake his fist at the sky and demand that God explain to him why this had happened. He wanted to stand in the middle of the place where the house used to be and scream until his voice gave out.
Mary Jane raised her voice above all the clamor. “Okay, everyone, let’s dig these boys’ trucks out enough and see if they are drivable. Once we do that, they are all three going home with us until they can rebuild.”
“We could drive into Nocona and get motel rooms,” Tripp suggested.
“Or live in my travel trailer. It’s tiny even for one, but we can make do,” Knox said.
Joe Clay shook his head. “Family takes care of family, and besides there’s not a one of y’all—me included—that will go up against Mary Jane.”
“That’s the truth,” Ursula said with a smile.
Too bad that family included Aunt Bernie, Brodie thought when he was finally able to take a step forward. He followed everyone to the three trucks that had been pushed up against a barbed-wire fence that separated his farm from Audrey Tucker’s.
Considering all the experiences Brodie had had in the past, he should have been prepared for anything life could throw at him.
But he kept replaying the events of the past hour in his mind—the funnel cloud coming right at them, hearing what sounded like a freight train passing over the old cellar, then coming out to find total destruction just plumb knocked the wind right out of him.
“We are three lucky dudes,” Brodie whispered as he threw pieces of boards and bits of shingles away from Tripp’s truck.
“Our house is gone,” Tripp looked back over his shoulder at the place where their home used to stand. “Where’s the luck in that?”
“We are all three alive, and it looks like the storm left us with three vehicles,” Brodie reminded him. “And only a few leaves are blown off my orchard trees. From what I can see, the gardens look good. That makes us lucky.”
“And we are about to move into the Paradise,” Knox whispered for Brodie’s ears only.
“Where Aunt Bernie is in and out all day with her matchmaking business. Still think your lucky Irish blood is calling the shots? She’s going to have you standing at the front of the altar waiting on a woman in a big white wedding dress before you can whistle ‘The Eyes of Texas are Upon You.’”
“Watch and learn, little brother,” Brodie said with half a smile and then wondered how he or either of his brothers could find a bit of humor in their hearts.
“You can bet I will be watching, but I’ll be the one picking out the women for my own dates.
” Knox had always been able to lighten the mood—evidently even in the aftermath of a tornado.
He was the outgoing twin, the life of the party, and ready for a good laugh.
Tripp was the introvert, happy to be left alone to do his leather work or even help out in the orchards and strawberry, watermelon, and cantaloupe fields.
“Don’t worry,” Brodie sighed. “Aunt Bernie seems fixated on finding a woman for me, and if history is repeating itself, Tripp will be next. So, you’ve got a little while to bask in your self-proclaimed bachelorhood.”
“Did I hear Aunt Bernie’s name?” Ursula asked.
“Where is she? I’ve seen everyone here but her.” Knox asked.
“She’s watching my baby take his afternoon nap,” Ursula answered and then lowered her voice. “Don’t try to live in a travel trailer stacked up like sardines or go to a hotel. The Paradise has lots of empty rooms, and the folks have been lonely in that big house, so let them help you.”
“Are you sure?” Brodie asked. “We don’t want to impose.”
Ursula laid a hand on his shoulder. “You would probably offend them if you didn’t take them up on the offer.”
“Okay, then,” Brodie agreed. “We’ll go for a couple of days until we can make up our minds what to do, but before that, we need to make a run to Nocona and get a few things. Everything we had was blown away.”
“I understand,” Ursula said. “But don’t be late for supper. Tertia is bringing over food from the restaurant. They had to close down early because of the storm, and there were lots of leftovers.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Brodie replied with a nod.
***
Brodie slid into his truck and grasped the steering wheel until his knuckles were white. His heart pounded and his pulse raced as he turned the key. It seemed like an hour went by before the engine started up and purred like a kitten, but in reality only a couple of seconds had passed.
“All three are running, but they look like they’re the losers in a fight with a briar patch,” Knox said when he crawled into the passenger’s seat. “We can all go in one vehicle, right?”
“Right,” Brodie agreed.
Tripp settled into the back seat. “Beware the Ides of March.”
“Amen!” Knox agreed.
“I had forgotten that it was the fifteenth of March,” Brodie whispered.
“I bet none of us ever forgets again,” Knox said. “I thought for sure the tornado would suck up the cellar and dump us in the Red River. I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared.”
“Me, either,” Tripp said. “Good thing that Brodie stayed calm during the whole thing. If he had freaked out, I would have started bawlin’ like a baby.”
“I was terrified,” Brodie said. “I just couldn’t find my voice to say anything. My whole body felt like it was frozen.”
“Thank God!” Knox said with a long sigh. “If I’d known you were scared, I would have lost it.”
“Me, too!” Tripp said from the back seat. “When Brodie’s feet left the ground, I just reached out and grabbed him. I didn’t even think about the fact that the tornado was strong enough to take us both and suck you up out of the cellar.”
“Whew!” Knox gasped. “I’m glad y’all didn’t tell me that while we were still in the cellar.”
“Why would it scare you more then than it does now?” Brodie asked.
“There’s no bathroom in the shelter.” Knox’s tone was dead serious.
“There’s not one anywhere on the property right now,” Tripp reminded him.
Brodie backed out away from the trees and fell in behind all the other vehicles. When the oncoming truck from the electric company passed them, he chuckled.
“What’s so funny?” Tripp asked.
“What do we look like all going slow like we are down this gravel road?” he asked.
“A funeral procession,” Tripp answered.
“No people were hurt in the filming of this disastrous tornado,” Knox joked. “Do you think they’ll put our names on the credits when they roll?”
“It’s not something to joke about,” Brodie barked.
“We just saved about ten thousand dollars,” Knox snapped right back.
“We were going to have to tear down the old house anyway once we got the new one ready to live in. The tornado did it for us except for the bathroom, but I don’t expect any of us want to use the toilet or take a shower right out in public, do we? ”
“Depends on the level of desperation,” Tripp muttered.
Brodie had always been calm under fire—either the kind with blazes or with bullets—by keeping it bottled up inside. But like all volcanos, every now and then everything erupts and comes flowing out.
He slapped the steering wheel in anger, gritted his teeth, and growled.
“Let it out, brother,” Tripp said. “If you don’t, you’re going to explode all over this truck and wind up killing me and Knox when you have a wreck.”
“I hate this,” Brodie said with a long sigh, “and I can’t do one thing about it.
In the blink of an eye, we lost our home and everything we own except for three trucks that look like they’ve been beat all to hell with green briars and boards flying out of the sky.
We don’t even have socks and underwear, or a clean shirt. ”
Tripp reached up and patted his brother on the shoulder. “We can buy what we need for a couple of days and go have supper with your family. That’s two things we can do about what just happened.”
“They are not my family. They are our family,” Brodie snapped. “They took me in because Joe Clay is my biological father, and y’all both got kind of adopted a second time since you are my brothers.”
“At least you know who your father is,” Tripp said. “Our father died in a car wreck before we were born, and our mother died from complications two days after we came into this world. Like I’ve told you before, I’m a little bit jealous.”