Chapter 1: Storm
This is the story of how Jessica and I met. Jessica read it and added some notes. Her notes are in double brackets like this:
[[You poor bumpkin!]].
Jessica was one of those rare intelligent, attractive women who were genuinely friendly and acted like they did not know that they could make men do stupid things. Over time, Jessica and I became close friends. I found her when I was back at school working on a master's degree. It's one of those underappreciated advantages for the corporation to send a person like me back to graduate school: back door recruiting. I get to size up each year's graduating class and steer the promising ones toward interviews with my company.
I didn't find her on my own. One of my friends from high school had become a professor at the University. We played chess and handball at least once a week. Jessica was writing software for him. He thought that she would fit in with my group; he was right. Jessica was a jewel.
She transferred in from a state technical college in the Midwest. She was finishing up here because some lucky guy named Andrew convinced her to marry him and he had just taken a job with my company. She was predisposed to come to work for my company too, but I was lucky enough to get her for my department.
I finagled her assignment to my project. Life is not a series of tests; it's a series of projects. The test is getting the right people onto the project. My life was good at the moment. Jessica handled everything with speed and competence. She worked so fast that I ran out of work for her, so I arraigned for her to work temporarily on other projects on a short-term basis. It was excellent career experience for her and deposits in the favor bank for me. Everyone loved her.
A couple of years later, I was having lunch with Jessica and Andrew, and he was complaining about her like she wasn't there. My confident, bubbly Jessica had become quiet and downtrodden. I wanted to tell him to not to talk about my friend like that, but it would have made it worse. Later she said to me that it happened a lot. It was old territory for me. The terminal phase of many marriages is surprisingly similar. I listened without trying to influence what comes next; after all, I might have been wrong.
About a year after that I found her crying in one of the conference rooms. I asked what was going on, and she said, "Andrew wants a divorce, but he's willing to give us another chance. I don't know what to do."
I asked, "Did he say he would give it another chance, but you have to change?"
She replied, "Yes he did. I don't know how to change or what I'm doing wrong. How did you know?"
"It's normal. He emotionally disconnected about a year ago. He probably stopped complaining around the same time. You probably thought things were getting better."
"That's right."
"He's an idiot for not holding onto you with both hands. You can give it another chance, but in a few weeks, the same old patterns will emerge. He's not worth it. You deserve better."
Of course, she tried to change and make it work. She even changed her beautiful natural caramel hair color to a platinum blonde. After six weeks he moved out and on.
I am 12 years older than Jessica; I must have seemed to be a wise old sage. I have been divorced twice, and I knew the pattern. I talked her through it, got her to get a lawyer and helped her demand her half. I pushed her to act when she wanted to curl up and die. We had numerous lunchtime discussions about the divorce and how it was going and what was fair and what was not fair.
She moved on to a different company; she could not work at the same place as Andrew. After about a year, she recovered, started dating. She eventually met the Dave, love of her life, and married him and had twins. They were doing very well financially.
After that, we met for lunch three or four times a year to keep up our friendship. I would tell her about mutual friends that were still with the company. She would tell funny stories about Dave and twins. She was happy.
A few years later, Jessica and I and some other friends met for lunch at a restaurant that was partly overhanging a ravine. The view was fantastic. It got more interesting when a norther blew in while we were eating. There was a lot of wind and noise and some rain. It was still pretty wild when we finished lunch; we thought it was a good time to sip some margaritas.
Finally, the rain stopped, and though it was still windy and noisy, we thought that we could get to our cars without getting too wet. The sky was ugly. Jessica and I hugged like we always did which gave Jessica a chance to see what was behind us. I heard her exclaim "Oh my gosh, look at that."
"That" turned out to be an enormous tornado that was headed toward us. Later, everybody just called it "The Tornado." I frantically looked around for shelter. The restaurant was hopeless as were the cars. Then I spotted a concrete culvert. It was big enough to crawl into it. If there had been much rain, the culvert would have running water in it, but it was dry except for a trickle.
It wasn't perfect since it had an opening at each end and an object with just the right trajectory could fly in. "Come on, let's get in there," I yelled at the others, but they ran back inside the restaurant. Jessica started to go with them, but I would not let go of her hand, and so she came with me.
"Hurry, hurry. Back-up into the hole."
"What?"
"Go backward into the hole. It's better your ass should be toward the other hole than your head."
She did as I told her and I came in head first. That way we both had their heads toward each other and our butts toward the openings.
The tornado approached. First, there was wind and then wind with blowing rain and then with rocks and sticks and assorted objects. The noise was incredible. We would have held each other if could have figured it how. With only 36 inches all we could do was support ourselves on our hands and knees with our cheeks next to each other, saying it would be alright. From the reconstructed track published by the weather bureau later, I determined that the center of the tornado passed near us. The low pressure left the oxygen thin. I felt it as a sort of depression, and a kind of heaviness and I had felt like I could not get enough oxygen, but I did not lose consciousness. I suppose the depressive effect made it harder to be afraid. Fortunately, the disturbingly low pressure did not last long.
The tornado's approach was such that the wind never did line up with the culvert, but a half dozen rocks ricocheted into the opening and hit me in the rear. It wasn't serious, but I did get bruises. I figured that the first one was a fluke. I got worried about after the second one. I managed to cradle Jessica's head between my chest and knees. She probably did not know why; she probably thought it was just a way to give comfort by closeness. It was far too noisy to try to explain. She figured it out when one of the rocks bounced past me.
Finally, it passed, and we came out. Her nylons were shredded from crawling on the rough concrete. When we looked around, we saw that the cars were gone, and the restaurant was gone. Our friends were probably gone. She had her phone, so I told her to call 911 and tell them that the restaurant with people in it was blown away.
No one in the restaurant survived. We did not know that at the time. They found our friends over the course of the next few days. No one knew for sure how many people were in the restaurant, but in the end, there was no one missing.
After calling 911 and giving them endless detail, she called Dave. She told him to find out if the twins were OK and then come and get us. He had already checked the children. They were in second grade. They were at school during the tornado, but it never came close to the school. Dave also said that their house had not been harmed. He was on his way. She hugged me and said. "You were protecting me from the rocks."
"We were protecting each other."
"There weren't any rocks coming from my side. You exposed yourself to cover my head. I know you did." That's all she said, and she hugged me again.
Heavy, cold rains started. We considered the culvert again but ruled it out because water started coming through it and with this much rain, the culvert could quickly fill with rushing water. The immediate area was scoured clean. There was no apparent shelter, so we just stood and hugged and shared some body heat and partially protected each other. I tried to put my back to the worst of it, but the gusts were coming from many directions.
She started to cry. I didn't ask her why. It might have been about our friends. It might be relief that the children were OK. It might have been the miserable cold rain. It might be the realization that she almost died. I just held her until Dave arrived in his SUV.
