Nikhil opens the door, dragging both of us into the house, but it’s unfortunately not much of a reprieve. The water here is the same level as it was outside, except in here it’s dark. Making it much harder for us to make sense of our surroundings.
“Alan,” Nikhil calls, just as a beam of light appears.
I turn toward it, thinking it’s Alan with a flashlight, but it’s justNikhil and his ridiculous headlamp. I can’t quite make out the look on Nikhil’s face, but I can just imagine his smug expression.See? I told you this thing would come in handy.
I blow out a breath, taking a step farther into the house. “Alan? Where are you?”
“Alan?” Nikhil tries again. “Hello?”
“Over here,” a voice calls back.
We venture toward the sound of that voice. And I blink at what we find. Alan is sitting crisscross applesauce on top of his kitchen table. An assortment of snacks surrounds him, as well as a water bottle, a flashlight, a backpack, and a radio.
“Nikhil made it,” Alan says into the radio with a loud whoop. “I’m saved!”
“This is what you get, Alan,” a woman’s voice replies, fuzzy and unclear as it travels through the airwaves. “I told you to evacuate. In fact, I told you not to buy your house. I told you there was a reason it wasn’t selling. If you’d just listened to me…”
“It was a good deal, Betty. You know that. And how was I supposed to know the land here was a designated flood zone?”
“The mandatory flood insurance requirement should have tipped you off!”
Nikhil clears his throat. “Alan, if you’re done we’ve got to get—”
“Yeah. Of course.” Alan scrambles off the table, now wading through the water like we are, holding the radio and backpack above his head. “Nikhil, this is my sister on the line. Betty, Nikhil’s here. And Meena. His…”
“Friend,” I supply.
“Thanks for saving my worthless brother,” Betty replies.
“Hey!” Alan exclaims. “That’s uncalled for.”
I stifle a laugh.
We push through the water, heading for the front door, and the two siblings bicker the whole way.
“I thought the two of you didn’t get along,” I say when there’s a lull in the fight. Nikhil and I had largely tuned out Alan’s monologuing about his sister earlier, but from the few parts I heard, none of it was complimentary.
“We don’t,” Alan and Betty say at the same time.
Nikhil snorts.
“Yeah, I guess…I just assumed y’all didn’t talk anymore,” I say.
“Hewisheswe didn’t talk anymore,” Betty says.
“That’s true,” Alan whispers.
“I heard that!”
We’re outside now, getting closer to the canoe, and to my relief, I don’t feel any stinging bites this time. The ones from before itch like crazy, and I’m sure they’ll double in size later, but at least my allergic reaction isn’t life-threatening.
Betty’s talking about how Alan should have heeded her advice, but Alan abruptly interjects. “Got to go, Betty. Talk soon.” He flips a switch on the radio, places it and the backpack on the floor of the canoe, then climbs inside, shaking his head. “We really haven’t talked to each other in forever,” he tells us. “But she overheard almost everything I told you guys earlier.”
“She’s on the neighborhood frequency?” Nikhil asks, his eyebrows raised.
“Yeah. She lives a couple houses down from you.”
Nikhil pauses. “That was Elizabeth? Elizabeth Jeffries is your sister?”
