Landfall
by Kenneth Meeks

I’m ready to drown. I have no fear. I’m ready for death. I’ve heard stories of people who have survived near drowning. The stabbing pain in the eyes and ears. Feeling like your head is going to explode. I don’t believe I’ll experience the shutting down of my organs one at a time. I should die quickly, when the force of the storm surge hits me. Hurricane Dave has drawn a bulls-eye on my hometown. Estimated seven to ten foot surges. Perfect timing. People are evacuating. I’m staying. Time to end this pain.
    I did a good job of lashing myself to the leg of a fishing pier. I stood in two feet of water. No one could see me. I spotted a couple of idiots playing football in the breaking waves. They stopped when one of them almost got caught in the undertow. I felt an odd peace as I watched the waves gradually become more animated. Just the sound of my breath and the crashing Gulf. I used to think that the sound of crashing waves was one way God talked to us, a reminder of the beauty of creation. I stopped talking to him a while back.
    What could he say to me? Two years ago, he let that bastard get into his car after a night of hard drinking. He was already drunk by nine o’clock. Police say his pickup T-boned my wife’s car at 80 miles and hour. Her car rolled about seven times into a ditch. During one of those rolls, my sweet precious 3-year-old Anna was ejected. They found her face down still in her car seat. Maria actually lived for about 10 minutes. As they tried to cut her out of the mangled dashboard, they say she was whispering something. I know she was praying. Did you hear her prayers, Lord? Was this part of your plan? A three year old? Dead? Screw your plan. I’m taking things into my own hands.
    After burying my family, I descended into my own version of madness. I rarely would even drink a wine cooler. I quickly developed a taste for all kinds of drinks. I became partial to Long Island Ice Teas and Tequila. It wasn’t really the taste. It was the numbing of the pain. The wincing, cutting pain I felt every time I looked at a portrait of us on the beach. Disneyworld. Our wedding day. Things spiraled. I lost my job and house rather quickly. Relatives offered to help. I was too disconnected to accept.
    I began to think of ways to end the pain of loss. Not having a chance to say goodbye. They were here. They were gone. The drunkard is still here on earth. I thought I would handle it better, but it never got better. One sober Sunday, I read an article about J. W. Asher. Asher was a well-regarded Galveston science teacher. In 1898, he lost his wife, two sons and a daughter to “the broken bone fever” now known as Dengue. Right before the Hurricane of 1900 hit Galveston’s shores, a still distraught Asher strapped himself to pier post and waited for the waves. Several men from his church formed a group to go out and clear people off the beaches, a routine they did for every storm. Through the downpour, two of the deacons spotted a lone figure out on the pier. They yelled warnings to no avail, made their way over to him, leaning into the hard blinding rains. Asher was there, tied to the post, staring at the waves, feet dangling in the water. When they tried to physically take him, he reached into his vest and pulled a hunting knife, slashing Deacon Schmidt on the forearm. “May God have mercy on your soul. There’ll be no room in heaven for cowards who take their own lives,” yelled Schmidt as they ran away from the pier. Asher reportedly yelled back, “Good!” The pier was demolished. They never did find the body, although some people swear the wire-rimmed glasses that washed up on shore a week later were his. What a way to go. Now I’d get my chance.
    The water was up to my waist now. My breathing started to become labored. I closed my eyes. I smelled the brine. The sound of the waves and the lashing winds became violent, reminding me of just how small we really are compared to nature’s fury. I also smelled my daughter’s freshly washed hair. I heard my wife’s soothing voice calling me to dinner. I smiled as my tears mixed with the rain. Suddenly I felt the water drain away from my chest as if suctioned by a vacuum. I looked down. The water had dropped to a few inches. Rocks, sand, a license plate, crushed beer cans and a fish corpse were evident. I knew. When I looked up, the Gulf horizon rose to about 10 or 15 feet. A massive, overwhelming wall of greenish-brown foam and fury blotted out the gray skies. As it crested, it seemed to pause for a few seconds. During those seconds, I heard nothing. Time stood still. It began its descent. Thank you. Wash me away.
    I only remember the impact in snippets. Water displaced the air in my lungs. The paralyzing pressure in my ears. The strain of my muscles and flesh trying to adhere to my skeleton. Lungs on fire. Eyeballs straining against my eyelids, ready to leave their sockets. I twisted and shook as my body fought for life. The rope held tight. It’s human instinct. Even though I wanted to die, my biological brain kicked into survival mode. As I convulsed, I saw objects floating by. Pieces of a ship. Dead fish. The silhouette of a shark being swept inland. I stopped struggling. I suddenly felt calm. I was now about 8 feet from the surface of the surge. I saw a glowing, shimmering white light about near the surface. I lost my peripheral sight. I could only see the light as it descended down toward me through a hazy tunnel. The light grew brighter and it warmed me. I started to blackout. As darkness enveloped me, I felt myself floating. Something grabbed my shirt as I lost consciousness.
    I was coming to. My face rubbed against something rough like tree bark. Tree bark? Thunder and lightning jolted my eyes open. The bark was definitely from an elm. It was daylight again. Still raining. I was draped faced down like a wet towel on a strong, thick branch, looking away from the trunk. My lungs were burning. I coughed up an explosion of seawater with bits of sand and seaweed in the mix. Head swirling like a hangover from hell. Hell. Is this it? Or is it purgatory? An eternity stranded, by floodwaters, on a branch. I was level with most rooftops. Houses seemed to be peeking out of the water. I could only see the tops of street signs, the very tops of tall pickup trucks and eighteen-wheelers. When I moved to get a better view, I realized a rope constricted me. With much pain, I was able to reach the small of my back. The rope was secured with a big knot. I didn’t have the strength to even begin to undo it. I placed my head back on the branch, staring at the brown churning waters. A sofa floated by, followed by its cushions like a mother duck with its ducklings. A flat screen TV. A football helmet. A crumpled shotgun shack, ripped from its foundations, wobbled toward the Gulf. Mangled fast food drive-through menu boards. A Golden Retriever collided with the tree and started trying to claw his way up the tree. He saw me and yelped. The current took him. From my left, I heard coughing and gasping. I could tell it was a woman.
    My neck was stiff, but I managed to find her. She was tied to a branch at the same height facing slightly away from me. Her legs were scratched and bloody. Her hair slicked back away from her chubby face. She was breathing hard; her eyes would open periodically. Seawater dripped from her open mouth. What the hell is this? I turned to gaze at the water beneath me and my gaze was met by another set of eyes. A man submerged up to his chest. Staring into my eyes. He wore an old-fashioned white dress shirt and a black vest. His hair was parted in the middle, wet from the rain, not soaked like someone who’s been swimming. His complexion was a ghoulish pale tinged with light blue. Wire rim glasses. A well-groomed moustache hid his upper lip. A long van Dyke beard. What the hell was he standing on? The surge was still running at 7 to 8 feet, moving cars and small houses in its path. He stood there unaffected. Staring at me. He looked familiar. Very familiar. My heart began to pound. My head swirled. Asher?
    Hell no. I’m dehydrated, half-dead. Major hallucinations. I’m seeing dead people. I dug my fingers into the bark of the tree and a few pieces landed on him. He sighed and brushed them off his shoulders. Can a ghost interact with physical matter? Is he man, ghost or zombie? Is this his punishment for suicide: an eternity in community service saving people who’ve lost the will to live? Where’s Rod Serling? I looked left. There was a woman, water up to her neck; her red hair pinned up in a bun like a stereotypical librarian. Hair pinned up in a hurricane? Who is she? She stared at my tree mate. She caught my gaze before I could look away. The same pale complexion but with pretty, piercing green eyes. She cocked her head, slowly nodded towards me and smiled as if to say, “you’re welcome.” She turned and effortlessly floated over to Asher. As she got closer, I could see her white sleeved shirt buttoned all the way to the top. “Who are you people?” I just had to ask. Asher gave me a one-sided smile, raised his eyebrows, and slowly bobbed his head affirmatively. The look he gave me was one you give a friend who’s in on the inside joke. I looked at my fellow tree dweller. Tears and rain traced her cheeks as she looked at me in confusion. The look on her face told me she was as perplexed as I was. I turned back; Asher and the librarian were floating away. They moved with ease. The surge seemed to be flowing through them. They slowly disappeared under the swirls.
    We spent another half a day, in and out of consciousness, tied to this tree. Her name was Diane. She was ashamed to admit it, but she actually dove into the storm surge in a suicide attempt. Her only child was swept out of her arms during the landfall. She remembered reading about a woman who took her life in the storm of 1900 when her baby was swept right out her arms and out to sea. I told her my story. For some reason, the pain wasn’t as severe as usual. It was starting to fade.
    I heard the outboard motor in the distance. We both screamed, through the pain and hoarseness, as loud as we could. Two first responders in an eight-seater found us. They pushed their hats back in confusion. “What the . . . Are you kidding me?” The guy with the megaphone chuckled, “You know once we get you down and hydrated, we gotta ask.” Yeah right. We’ll tell you how the ghost of two people who died exactly 108 years ago saved our lives. Just get us down. It wasn’t our time to go. I guess we’ll live on to see if the pain ever goes away.

back to archive