Looking at the sky as the headed back to Reisner, LaFiamma asked his partner if they had many tornadoes down here. Joey had been watching the sky all afternoon, and several cloud formations were beginning to worry him.
"Yeah we get a few," Lundy replied, "Not a lot. Not big ones like they get up in the Panhandle country. Never had an F 4 down here that I know about. Why, you worried that one might disturb your weekend?"
"Sky tells me there might be one." Joe answered with authority.
"Might be one?" LeVon laughed glancing over at his partner slouched in the passenger side of the Jimmy. "You an authority on tornadoes now, LaFiamma?"
"Been in a few," came the quiet answer. "Texas isn't the only place that has them you know."
Levon realized his partner was serious, but glancing at the sky it didn't seem any different than any other day to him.
Pulling into a parking slot, Lundy watched his partner get out and walk over to Officer Harry Landon, one of the city's motorcycle officers, who was looking upward to the clouds forming over head.
As LeVon got out of the Jimmy, he called to LaFiamma, "See you upstairs."
"What do you think, Harry?" Joey asked quietly, "Think we should be heading for the basement?"
Landon, a recently displaced cop from Michigan, gawked at the gray-green sky. "If I was home, I'd already be there. But here ... most tornadoes are only F 1 or 2, or 0. They don't get the force of the ones in north Texas, or Oklahoma. I read up on them before I got transferred. One of the reasons I picked Houston. Really just big winds down here. Not three miles wide like where we come from."
"Always a first time," Joey answered nervously.
Landon's hand went to the back of his neck to rub off an invisible touch. "We're on the edge of it, I'd bet on that. Haven't checked the weather to see what is happening."
"I'm heading home, LaFiamma, want a ride?" Lundy called heading back to the Jimmy.
"Doesn't the sky bother you Lundy?" Joey asked, remembering the last time he saw this kind of sky. It was the day three tornadoes touched down in Barrington, Illinois, skipped across Lake Michigan and went through parts of Western Michigan. The same weekend he and his twin cousin had decided to go and see Joe's late mother's family. Instead of a get-acquainted party, they sat in a basement listening to sirens going off, and the loudest locomotive Joe had ever heard roar past right over the house. Only when it was over, did Joey and Richie discover it was no train. It was one hell of a tornado that uprooted trees, displayed houses - took Uncle Devo's garage including all the bikes and toys of his six kids - all the tools from his hardware store - and, one of his cars. Joey had never seen such destruction, and he hoped he never would again.
"It's tornado weather, Lundy." LaFiamma remarked in a low tone.
"Listen, LaFiamma, if'n there was one comin' sirens would be blowing your ears off. We take tornadoes seriously here, but like I told you Houston don't get really big ones. Lots of construction that side of the city, probably stirred up a dust storm." Levon replied opening the driver's door of the Jimmy.
Joey studied the sky. It's coming from the North, he figured. "It's hovering somewhere close," he mumbled. "Hasn't dropped down yet. This mustard, green, barf color ... "
"You getting in or not, LaFiamma? I ain't waitin' here all day." Levon bellowed as he started the engine. "I got to get home an' check on Fooler. She's in the corral, and tumbleweed blowing around makes her plum nervous."
"If I recall," LaFiamma replied slowly, "dust storms are brown, kind of beige looking, and you can see the rolls of dust coming through the sky. This look like that, Lundy?"
"You telling me you're gettin' a ride with someone else then?" Lundy blasted back, putting the Jimmy into gear.
"I'm asking you to stay a while, Levon." Joey said walking up to the window of the Jimmy.
"Can't do. Got things to do."
Joey jumped back as his partner gunned the engine and peeled out of the parking lot. Joey stood and watched the red vehicle disappear around a corner. He was still standing there when a long, distant sound of a siren began to blast.
Harry grabbed Joe's arm. "Come on, Joe. Inside! He's on his own now."
Joe and Harry jogged back towards Reisner, shouting at others to take cover. To get their units inside the parking garage. LaFiamma figured if the garage collapsed, at least the cars might be repairable, instead of picked up and dumped in some field or the Gulf.
"Come on!" Harry shouted.
"Best take cover," Joe said into their startled faces. "Lundy says those blow only when a tornado is sighted."
"Murphy!" Harry hollered at the top of his lungs. "Sound the alarm for whatever you have to get everyone into the basement shelters. Sirens say a tornado has been sighted. This is NOT a drill!"
"Where's Lundy?" someone asked.
"The damn fool took off for home. Damn stupid redneck is going to run right into it?" Joey lamented. "Probably find him and the Jimmy upside down in some tree."
"LaFiamma is such a jerk," Levon mumbled to himself as he drove towards the freeway that would take him back to his ranch. "Yellow sky don't make a tornado." Up ahead he saw flashing lights and noticed the ramp was blocked off. As he got closer, Levon saw that HPD had the ramps closed. It would take him longer to go the old way, but he reckoned that was what he would have to do. The police unit at the ramp cut through his thoughts when their siren and another unit behind him, brought him to a halt.
"Sir, I am afraid you --- LUNDY! Hey... we had a tanker jack-knife on the freeway. Traffic is at a standstill, and we just got word over the radio that a tornado has been sighted. You'd best take cover." Patrolman Jimmy Lee Ralston shouted as the wind began to pick up."
Levon's eyes widened as they focused on black sky ahead of him. Jimmy Lee followed his gaze, and then shouted to the others to get going and get to cover. "Better find cover Levon, the radio is saying this baby isn't like the usual ones we get around here that touch and ..."
Levon watched the two police units roll up onto the freeway to warn motorists of the impending danger. "Damn it, LaFiamma, I hate it when you are right!" Levon growled pounding his steering wheel. Then he spun rubber, turned and headed west. "I have got to find a path around it. Make sure Fooler is okay. She'll be plumb scared out of her wits with the noise of the thing.
The cowboy's thoughts were interrupted by the Houston Police dispatcher running a check on all units, and repeating that a tornado had touched on north west of the city and was heading in.
Levon knew right a way that when they got to "9214" he wouldn't answer. Don't want to give Joe cause to worry. Don't want to admit he was right. Then he heard LaFiamma's voice over the radio.
"Lundy! - 9214 - answer me!" Joey pleaded concern etched deep in his voice.
"Freeway's blocked, I'm taking the old road, heading home."
"West? You can't go west, Lundy!" Joey's voice barked over the microphone, in a tight yet nervous quiver. "Levon. You cannot outrun these things. It's moving fast. Forget about trying to get home. Reports are it's already past your place. Head for cover - a church, a school, a drainage ditch but don't stay in the Jimmy!"
"Like you know?" Lundy shot back, angry at himself for not trusting his partner's instinct.
"I'm from Chicago, remember? Tornadoes run through there and Michigan like you run through beer. Relatives in Michigan have had to rebuild their house three times in the last ten years. I've spent many a time sitting in a basement just waiting to see what one was going to do. Damn it, Levon, I don't want to lose you as a partner. Now get off the road."
Levon tossed the mike on the seat behind him, looked up and discovered that he had subconsciously taken to the country road he used to travel before the freeway was built. The wind was getting worse, and the Jimmy bounced a bit on the road. The Texan put more pressure on the gas pedal and picked up speed. He knew there were farms along this road, or use to be. Hopefully they had root cellars he could get to before ... before he became Dorothy from Oz.
"Joe," Lieutenant Beaumont said quietly from behind the Italian, 'You did the best you could. It's up to Levon whether he listens or not."
"Trouble is, Lieutenant, he was probably on that road as we talked, which means ...." His voice drifted off, unable to think about where he partner might land, let alone be alive.
Joe and a number of other people turned their attention to a battery operated radio, listening intently to a local radio station that was giving a blow-by-blow report of the funnel cloud and the neighborhoods it had already touched.
"Joey," Annie Hartung asked quietly, 'you've been in one of these before haven't you?"
"Yeah, Annie I have."
"You want to tell us about it?" She questioned, wondering if that would get his mind off Lundy.
LaFiamma looked up, about twenty people sitting around on folding chairs were looking at him. "Yeah, suppose it's better than ... In Chicago growing up, there were a lot of times when we spent a few hours huddled in a corner of the basement. My Mom and Aunt Theresa both had kind of a family area made up so younger kids would keep busy. Aunt Theresa's was more like a bomb shelter. Mostly in Chicago they just passed over and hit the outlying areas. The first time I met one head-to-head was a few years after my mother passed away. My cousin and I had gotten into some trouble, and Aunt Theresa thought a summer there would help straighten me out."
Joe stopped a minute to take a sip of bottled water and then continued, "I always called Richie my twin because we were born on the same day, same year, same hospital, within seconds of each other. Anyway, Aunt Theresa figured Mom's folks who were retired military could whip us into shape."
"They didn't know what they were getting when we 'city boys' arrived. But then we weren't prepared for them either. Rising at 6:00AM for a morning five mile run was the last thing we expected!" Joey said with a laugh, grinning at the thought.
"It was Easter weekend. We'd been to Good Friday Mass, and were just getting ready to start broiling salmon and fresh perch when these sirens started going off. Loud. I mean loud! Much louder than here. Richie and I looked at each other and the next thing we knew we were being shoved down some stairs into the basement. All the salads, desserts, everything that had already been made or cooked was taken down too. I guess my Aunt Millie wanted Richie and I to be relaxed, because they pulled the ping pong table into a small room near the furnace, pulled chairs up and told us all to sit down and start to eat." Joey paused and looked around, everyone and some others who had joined them were listening intently to his every word.
"I noticed my Aunt kept looking over her shoulder. I was just about to ask her what was wrong when the back door slammed. At least I thought it was the back door. I found out later the back door was locked. What the noise was... was the tornado taking the roof off the garage. I've heard trains before. Grew up near a track with trains that ran every hour on the hour. Never heard a train this loud before. It's equal to standing next to a jet engine revving up for take-off."
Joey paused again, and took another sip of water. "When the roar passed, it was quiet. Richie and I wanted to go up and see the damage, but my Aunt and Uncle told us to stay put. That's when the hail started. It sounded like someone was throwing golf balls at the house. My Uncle was the manager of an Ace Hardware store. He and Aunt Millie were a blended family and had six kids between them. When they finally told us it was safe to go upstairs, we discovered upstairs wasn't there anymore. At least the second floor wasn't. My uncle's garage was gone! Including the kid's bikes, toys, scuba gear, three months supply of assorted nails, screws and bolts for the hardware store. It took them six months to do the inventory of what was in the garage - for his family, and then his business. The house behind them was moved a foot off the foundation. We could look right down into their basement - but not a light or a plate in the house was cracked. At the same time, someone down the street had been moving. Their truck was turned completely around in the driveway, and everything in it was gone. Their house was untouched. We had a car in the neighborhood, sitting in front of someone's house that didn't belong to anyone we knew, and was finally hauled away by the police. The house on an opposite corner of my Uncle - they had a basket weave wooden fence. One side of the fence was missing every other slat. One side was gone altogether; one side wasn't touched at all. And - one of the slats ended up through the wall of a house across the street. It was sticking into their living room with the other half still outside. Another neighbor took two barrels of drywall and wallpaper out of their bathroom that had come in one small bathroom window, yet a huge wall mirror was unscratched. These things are weird, wicked, unforgiving and unbelievable. One house can be in perfect condition and the one next to it is flattened."
"Wow, how old were then?" someone asked.
"Seventeen," Joey replied, "I was ordered to see them, and given the choice of two years jail time, or two years in the Marines. That uncle was retired from The Corps. I wanted to see what it was like before I told the judge in Chicago my decision. Now I realize if I'd done jail, I probably wouldn't have been a cop or gotten into law school."
"Jail time?" Beaumont questioned, giving her detective the eye. "what did you do?"
That sheepish grin crossed Joey's face. "I - ah - hot-wired a friend's Jaguar to take a girl for a ride. When I was stopped they found stolen property in the trunk. Took some doing before they believed that it was only the car that I took."
"Marine?" Someone echoed behind him. "Damn, LaFiamma, what other secrets you got hidden inside you?"
Joe grinned. //Lundy should have stayed, he could have learned a lot about me.//
A chill ran through Lundy when he realized he wasn't on the road anymore. In fact, he thought as he looked out the window, that he was actually airborne. "Damn! Fooler's probably safe and sound munchin' on hay and LaFiamma is laughing his head off at Reisner." Though somehow Levon knew different. He knew from the sound of fear in his partner's voice that he had lived through one of these. Levon just hoped that he would.
Ahead of him, Levon saw a steeple and recognized it as the old Congregational church on Baldwin. "Hell, Baldwin? I'm six miles off.... Lord have mercy, set me down there please, I kno they have a basement. Caroline and I helped to paint it."
The words were barely out of the Texan's mouth when the Jimmy hit the front double doors and landed half in and half out the old church's foyer. Turning off the engine, Lundy scrambled out of the vehicle, crawling along on his hands and knees in the direction of the stairs. At the sound of a loud creaking noise, he got to his feet and fought against the wind to the stairwell, feeling his way down the stairs to the bottom. He fumbled with the old wood door and was startled when it began to open. He squeezed his thin frame through the opening and came face to face with three kids ranging from six to fifteen years old.
"Any more of you here," The blond shouted over the wind. "Okay - head for the kitchen - over there ..." LeVon shouted grabbing the six-year old around the waist. Lundy knew the kitchen had reinforced concrete and was built into the side of a hill. They would hide in the cupboards if they had to.
As Joey told his story about the roaring freight train, Levon and the kids heard it first hand. Lundy hugged the young ones close, wondering who they were and where they were from. Obviously the older one was in charge, yet yielded to him as soon as he entered the room.
"Are we going to die, Mister?" the middle child, a girl, asked in a whisper.
Before Levon could answer, the teen answered, "Like Grandpa said, Sarah, it's up to God not us."
"Reckon that's about right," Levon responded, knowing it had to be a miracle for him to have landed where he did, and these kids were the reason why. "Your Grandpa from around here?"
"He was the first pastor of this church. He's real sick. Had a heart attack or something. We're visiting from Colorado and told him we'd walk over and take pictures of the church for him. I'm Ray. Ray Banfield." The teen replied extending his hand to Levon.
"Banfield? You related to Josh Banfield?" Lundy questioned. Damn the Lord sure has a sense of humor, having me protect the kids of a man who threatened to kill him more than once.
"He's our uncle. We came for his funeral," Sara said in a small voice as the wind began to quiet down. "He got in one too many fights, and someone shot him. It happened just as everyone was planning a 90th birthday for Grandpa Banny. That's what we called him. What's your name?"
Levon looked around the basement to make sure no one else was around than introduced himself, "I'm Sergeant Lundy, Houston Police Department. I was on my way home when I got cut off by the twister."
The six-year-old, sizing Lundy up with his cowboy boots and hat, asked, "You got a real horse, Mister Lundy?"
"That's Joey," Ray answered, "He loves horses. Got a collection of about thirty of 'em already and he's only six."
"Joey?" Squawked the Texan. No matter where I go, I can't get away from that guy.
"You think we can leave now," Sara asked, 'it sounds like the wind has stopped."
"We'll wait a'while yet,' Levon answered, "it ain't over yet. It's like a hurricane. Quiet for a spell and then the other half comes. Tell about your horse collection - Joey."
"What did you do in The Corps?" Murphy asked moving closer to LaFiamma. Joe did not like the fact that people moved so this overweight desk sergeant could get to within a couple of feet of him.
Joey eyed the man. "Can't exactly say ... I was a good shot ... and was put to good use."
"Special Ops, right?" Murphy questioned, pushing for more information. "How many men did you kill? How good are you? Why didn't you stay in? Will...."
"None of your business, Sergeant Murphy," Lieutenant Joanne Beaumont remarked in a loud voice. "He can't say, and we aren't going to ask him."
"But Lieutenant, it's not often we get a Special Operations Marine in our midst."
"If I told you Murphy, then I'd have to kill you. And then Special Ops would kill me for breaking the code." LaFiamma replied in an even voice.
"I heard about that code. Would they really ....?"
"They would. And they have!"
>>>>> ALL CLEAR - THE RADIO IS SAYING ITS ALL CLEAR.....<<<<<
Trudging up the stairs to fresh air and sunshine, Joe wondered where Levon was and if he was even alive.
After the sound of rain stopped, Lundy gathered up the kids and they slowly moved toward the basement doors. As he approached them, Levon noticed they sagged inward. Figuring part of the church might have collapsed into the stairwell, Lundy asked the kids to stand next to the wall as he slowly tried to open one of the doors. As the door swung open, he was narrowly missed being hit by a huge beam that was part of the sanctuary's roof.
Sarah screamed as it zoomed past them into the basement corner they had just vacated. "Are we going to die here?" she whispered.
"Not if I can help it, Sarah?" Lundy answered, knowing the Lord would not have brought him this far to have that happen.
"This here beam is from the roof. That means the church is probably collapsed and laying on top of us. We have to be careful getting out."
"I can go first," Joey remarked cheerfully, "I'm light on my feet. I can see what's ahead of us."
Lundy's head jerked twice, staring at the six-year-old. In his head, he heard his partner saying 'I go in first Lundy!' and damn if there wasn't a kid telling him that same thing.
"I'm always picking my way through junk piles and stuff looking for things that people throw away. I can do it!"
And before Levon could stop him he was gone.
"Mister Lundy! The church is gone but there is a red truck here!" Joey shouted from above them.
Levon followed Ray and Sarah up through the pile of window frames, stained glass, broken pews to the top of the stairway. Joey was right. The main part of the church was gone, but the foyer where the Jimmy proudly sat was untouched.
"That yours?" Ray asked as they picked their way to it.
"Yup, reckon I better call in and let my partner know I'm okay. Then we'll have them notify your folks that you're okay," Levon answered.
"9214" ... Levon waited. It seemed like forever though it was only minutes before dispatch answer backed.
"9214 where are you?"
"I'm at the old Baldwin Street Congregational Church. I've got three grandkids of Old Man Banfield with me here. You might call them, and tell them everyone is okay. And you better, tell Joe...."
"Lundy. Thought I'd lost you for sure. Next time...."
"Not going to worry about next time, Joe. This time I needed to be here. Reckon you needed to be there too. See you in the morning." Levon concluded with a smile, motioning the kids into the Jimmy.
"You got that right, cowboy."
THE END
Everything on this page is fiction. Any resemblance or reference to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.