Nightmare (9)

I was riding down the road in Lafayette, Indiana. 

No, no it was Anadarko, Oklahoma: tornado country, and the storm was coming, just over our shoulder, cool breath on the back of our neck, inhaling eternal. Inhaling everything. It was the farmer and me in the pickup truck speeding as fast as we could, down endless farm road, telephone lines running quiet for miles. We knew it was coming, we knew it was out there, we were driving away from the tornado. Or maybe we were driving toward it.

The cloud, start off soft and sweet, start to spiral out of control when heaven connect to the earth in vacuum pipeline, interrupting the Summer day, break the work week wide. The funneling fury of the cyclone, growing behind us, gaining in speed and suction: the violent side of God. He pokes down his finger and breaks his own laws of gravity.

The tornado absorb everything it touches.

And we could hear the insects in the field as we sped away: a sound unholy and perverse, these creatures of pestilence suddenly gaining the power of speech. They spoke in nervous chirp, in throaty croaking, in extended static moan… they were pleading with us. They were asking to be saved.

But the farmer in the driver’s seat and me, we couldn’t save them, we had to save ourselves. The man was kind enough to pick me up, let me sit in, give me a fighting chance to survive. On the side of the road the bales of hay were lifting off the ground like cotton balls, pulled easy into the storming vortex without a sound. It was getting closer. On the floor of the pickup was a cloth babydoll. I didn’t ask about the owner.

The heat of the sun had baked us good, dried us out, and then- as fast as you can blink your eyes- the sun was gone. It was devoured by a massive dark cloud, and we watched as it chewed the star and swallowed, leaving us in a darkness deeper than night. And it seemed that the faster we drove the slower we moved.

I was riding down the road in Anadarko, Oklahoma: tornado country, and we knew it was coming, we knew it was out there. We were driving away from the tornado. Or maybe we were driving toward it.