Serpenteens excerpt

I wasn't sure what to post today, so I decided on a small excerpt from Nature's Forces, the first installment of Serpenteens.

                                                          (copyrighted material)

One

Twisted Twister

 

I woke up when I first heard the thunder.  I’ve always been like that.  I would wake up because I heard thunder, even before I realized I heard thunder.  The others say they have always been the same way.  I guess it was just a part of being one of us.

I had been in such a deep sleep I was surprised that anything could have woken me.  The events of the past few months had really taken a toll on all of us.  There were times when I wasn’t sure how much more we could take.  But those moments never lasted long.  We didn’t have a choice in what we did.  As I reminded myself over and over again: It was what we were born to do.

I don’t think I was dreaming anything before the thunder woke me (surprisingly enough).  If I was, I couldn’t remember.

I looked over at the clock; it was almost three in the morning.  Ugh, I hated being up at that time of morning.  It always messed with me.  I knew by one in the afternoon the next day, I would be walking around in a daze.  Too awake to take a nap, but too tired to function properly.

I sighed and was about to roll over in an attempt to grasp hold of that precious slumber, when I heard the thunder again.  But this time it was closer.   A lot closer.  I sat up in bed and listened, suddenly alert.  My heart began to race.  I could hear it pulsing in my ears.  Thunder and lightning had taken on a whole new meaning for me lately.  No longer was it simply a natural phenomenon to be awed at or impressed by.  Now it seemed whenever it was around, I was in trouble.

The rest of the house was quiet—of course, it was three in the morning.  My room was pitch black, except for the dull red glow from the digital readout of the clock.  I could only just make out the edges of my bureau and the small desk that is always too cluttered with papers to actually use properly.   But the darkness was interrupted by a flash of light.  Before another thought could cross my mind, the thunder came again, but this time it was right outside my window.  It vibrated in my chest like a train passing by too near to the house.

The time span between the thunder and lightning had diminished rapidly.  Which meant one thing: It had gotten too close, too quickly.

Suddenly, I was wide awake.  All remnants of sleep had been immediately purged from my brain.  In one sweeping motion I tossed aside the sheet that covered me and got out of bed.  I ran to the window but didn’t have time to reach it before the first sound of hail hit the glass with a loud tick.  It sounded as if someone had thrown a rock.  In another story it might have been a secret lover standing on the front lawn tossing stones to get my attention.  Some love-struck beauty who had sneaked out of her house in the middle of the night, risking serious punishment, simply to see me one more time under the romantic cover of night.

But this was not another story.

Another tick, this time louder.  I was surprised the glass didn’t break.  It was followed almost immediately by yet another—tick, then another—tick, and another—tick, tick, tick.  Before I could react, sound encircled me, and the entire house seemed to shake as it was bombarded by hail.

The clamor was almost deafening.  It couldn’t have been any louder if the entire neighborhood began pounding metal trash cans on our roof.  I raced to my bedroom door and pulled it open just as the pane in the window could stand no more abuse and crashed in.  Shards of deadly glass sailed at me.  I was able to block the assault with the door and avoid any serious injury.  Before I went into the hallway, I turned toward the now empty window as another noise reached my ears.  It was a noise ten times louder than the ice pounding on the roof.

It sounded just as they always said it would.  “They” being all those people you saw on the news the morning after a tornado hit their town.  Those people who stand amongst the rubble of what used to be their homes.  What used to be their neighborhoods.  The ones with that look of loss on their faces.  The ones with the mismatched clothes and house shoes.  The ones who search aimlessly for loved ones, only to find grief and sadness.  “They” always said the same thing:  It sounded like a freight train.

And it did.

😏

Sorry, but you're going to have to grab the book to find out what happens next. Hope you enjoyed the little snippet. 

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