It began yesterday, and continued throughout the night. Brad loves thunderstorms and was thrilled. Ever since moving here, he was feeling short-changed in that department. Not anymore! We’re under a flash flood warning, and have been since the time Em texted during the night, FLASH FLOOD WARNING!!!!! I texted back that she was fine. She was, after all, on the second floor. That did not reassure her.
For the next several hours I received updates from her each time she received a notification on her iPhone. It didn’t take long before I was ready to take that iPhone and hurl it into the storm, but that would require getting out of bed and climbing the stairs. This kid is not used to rain, thunder, lightning, or flash flood warnings, and her desert roots were showing. She’s not used to tornado warnings, either. AHHHH!!!!!!! There is a tornado warning in our area!!!!! was the message I received around 4:30 AM.
The night was short on sleep, and long on interruptions. At one point she begged me to come get her, she was too scared to sleep in her room. The logic that she was safer from a flood there than she was on the first floor, did not calm her mind, or buy me any additional minutes of sleep. After several heated texts on my part to “quit being ridiculous and go to sleep, I’m tired!” I stormed up the stairs to collect her. She and her cat were in her loft bed, all the lights in the room on, and Em’s panda cap was on her head. I don’t know what defense that would be against a flood, but… maybe she knows something we don’t. She certainly thinks so.
Once she was downstairs with us, she stopped texting every time she got an alert. The alerts themselves, which better be disabled now, and being sandwiched between her and her Dad, still didn’t allow for restful sleep. Any, actually.
I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t sleep, though. Star, my cat, took the opportunity to sit on Em and pat her face until Em gave up and decided she’d rather be back in her room, with her own cat, who does not tenaciously demonstrate how to pet a cat until finally she gets petted. Em didn’t know that’s what Star wanted, and gave up on waiting her out. Finally, someone more stubborn than she is.
It would take an entire Starbuck’s to perk me up, but Em became quite cheerful and decided floods aren’t so bad, when the text came in at 4:45 AM stating that school is closed for today. So is Brad’s office, so they’re both home. And very cheerful to be here. I guess I’m cheerful too, but I’m also tired, and so are my characters. Miles and Anika would much rather go back to bed than put together puzzle pieces and solve mysteries right now.
I like the rain though. And if this is a flood, then floods aren’t all that bad. I’m sure there are parts of Houston that are getting hit hard, and there are roads closed. But here, the water is draining rather than accumulating. For a little while this morning, I had a stream outside my window. I thought that was kind of cool. It’s all but gone now, but the rain may be here for a while. All the way through Thursday, I was informed, via a panic stricken text in the middle of the night. The offending iPhone will end up outside long before that day arrives, if I get any more of those texts. I should probably warn her first.
“Depart the Darkness” has passed the 1/3 mark. Only 36 pages to reach the halfway point, which is always exciting for some reason. Unless Miles and Anika wake up, that’s not going to happen today though. I’ll try a latte and see if that does any good.
Happy reading, and I’m going to start drinking. Lattes.