Page 114 of The Mistakes I've Made
“Well, unfortunately, I’m not calling to give you good news.”
“Oh?”
“I’m stuck in Georgia,” she said, as if that was supposed to mean something to me.
“What the hell are you doing in Georgia?”
“Coming to see you, obviously.”
A faint smile tugged at the corners of my lips. “You’re coming to see me?”
“Of course I am! Do you think I’d let you get knocked up without me?”
I laughed. “Well, that part has kind of already happened.”
“You know what I mean, dork. I’m not letting you go through this without me.”
“You know, if my father catches you out here—”
“He’ll what? Fire me for taking vacation time? Besides, that hotel isn’t even his anymore, so I don’t give a shit what he thinks.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” I said before following up with, “So, why are you grounded?”
“Haven’t you seen the news?”
I looked around, like that was some sort of explanation. “I’ve been shacked up at the hotel for days, trying to pack up and force myself to leave.” I let out a small huff. “No, I haven’t seen the news.”
“The tropical storm—”
“The one that is supposed to brush by the tip of Florida? They grounded you for that?”
“No,” she said. “It turned. And it’s headed right for the Carolinas.”
After talking Piper into going back home and convincing her I’d be okay without her, I pulled up a local news channel on my phone, hoping to get some more details on what we were facing.
As a native of Hawaii, I’d had some experience with hurricanes and tropical storms, but it was extremely limited. The last major storm to pass through had happened when I was very little, but I remembered the stories.
And they were terrifying.
Homes ripped right from the foundations, people stranded for days, the loss of life.
As the website loaded, I clicked on a video and held my breath.
“Officials are calling this storm a late-season killer. Not only because of the timing—coming at the very end of hurricane season—but also due to its deadly force. What once was a tame tropical storm has now grown to a Category Two, and meteorologists warn it could get even bigger.”
“Damn,” I whispered.
The video cut from the anchorman to a satellite photo, and I got my first shot of the monster coming for the Carolina coast.
“No word from state and local government on mandatory evacuations, but they appear to be imminent.”
Evacuations?
I looked around at the hotel, the one place I felt safe, and a sudden wave of panic took hold of me.
Where would I go?
I couldn’t stay here, not with…
