To me…
It’s a really fuckingbadSunday.
Perspective.
I tip my head back and close my eyes and silently apologize to Casey and George, because I know they have to be going crazy right now worried about me.
And I can’t remember either of their numbers to call them from someone else’s phone.
* * * *
We stop at several other staging areas to pick up more survivors. They all wear the same stunned look, unless they’re crying.
Most of the kids are crying.
There are three other dogs on leashes and four cats in carriers added to the passengers. In some cases, all the survivors carried out with them were their pets.
I hug my new best friend a little more tightly. There’s a phone number on her tag.
You better believe I plan on calling these assholes as soon as I get my hands on a goddamned phone. If they thought their lives went to shit when the flood waters rose, they ain’t seen nothing yet like a pissed off attorney with a grudge to burn and state law enforcement resources at his lover’s beck and call.
It’s nearly one in the afternoon when we’re deposited at a church that’s serving as an emergency shelter. I register first thing, and one of the volunteers comes up with a piece of paracord I can use as an emergency leash for my new best buddy. I get a couple of towels and blankets, too, and I can change into dry clothes, so I’m finally warm even though my sneakers are still wet and squishy and I feel absolutely gross from having been in the flood waters.
I also get some warm soup into me, snag some bread for Petula, and water for both of us.
Then, and only then, do I finally hunt down a Metro cop who’s stationed at the shelter entrance. “Can you please get in touch Lt. Carlton Payne from the EPU for me? I’m with the governor’s office. I need to get in contact with them.”
He warily eyes me. “No offense, sir? I’m going to need to see some ID.”
I wearily sit on the floor and Petula is all over me, happily licking my face. “It’s buried in my bag. I’m going to open it. I am not armed.” Thankfully, I left my gun locked in the small gun safe bolted to the shelf in my closet. I can only imagine the shitstorm that would cause if I was armed.
He warily nods and watches me, his hand on the grip of his sidearm.
Moving slowly, I pull the zipper bag out with my wallet in it and let him see it before I open it. I hand him my wallet, my state employee photo ID badge, and he tells me to hold on while he calls it in on his radio.
I take some satisfaction in the way his eyes widen at the response he gets from his dispatcher when she comes back on the line. She demands to know if I’m safe, and orders him to leave his post and immediately transport me to another location.
Post haste.
As in he’d better move his fucking ass and run lights and siren.
Yes, I’m smug when he returns my wallet and ID to me. “Sorry, Mr. Howard,” he says. “Let’s get you where you need to be. Sounds like they’ve been looking for you.”
“Yeah,” I say as I shove my stuff back into my bag. “Let’s justdothat.”
I’m having to ride in the back of a marked police unit for the second time in my life, and he’s running lights and sirens, but this time I don’t mind so much.
Petula is absolutelylovingthis shit. The girl is all over the backseat, bouncing around and happy, wagging her tail.
When we roll into the shopping center parking lot where the National Guard is being staged, we drive up to a mobile command RV. The MNPD officer no sooner opens the back door for me and helps me and Petula out when the front door of the trailer explodes open, and George, followed by Casey, runs out and practically tackles me against the side of the squad car.
“Oh, thank god!” George says. “Do you have any fricking idea how worried we’ve been?” I’m pretty sure he’s going in for a kiss, but Casey pulls him up short withthatsound, even as she’s hugging me from behind.
“You’re soooo getting spanked,” she mutters in my ear. “Fuck, you scared us to death.”
“My phones died,” I said. “They fell in the flood water before I woke up. Sorry I scared you.”
They finally get the hugging out of the way and process I’m uninjured and not alone.
