Kyle. I need Kyle.
As if my fingers have known all along where it is, my hand slips into my pocket and pulls out the cell phone I've been unable to find. Thankfully, the battery is fully charged.
“Come on, come on,” I mutter as I type in Kyle's number and put the phone to my ear.
Nothing. Not a ring, not a tone, not even a We’re sorry but we currently cannot complete your call at this time. What I get is nothing. Absolute nothing. Just silence. Endless, echoing silence.
Frustrated, I rise and begin to wade about the house as again and again I try to get through to Kyle. But each time, it's the same damning silence that greets me.
It’s going to be fine. Just keep trying. You’ll get through. There’s time yet. You have to get through.
There was time yet. I had to remember that. No matter what happened, I just couldn't panic. The calmer I stayed, the better off I’d be. It was something Kyle and I had spent all night talking about on the phone once. Think about it, Kyle had said. The calm animals are the ones that live longest. The predators that are as cold as ice when they hunt. Elephants with their slow, steady heartbeats. The calm ones are the ones who can think, the ones who save their energies for survival.
I return to the couch, making sure to avoid the pan this time as I plop down. Its contents emptied, its metal bottom pings with every drip, marking time like I'm living in some sort of half-hearted musical nightmare.
Three more pings and I have to swat the pan away because I can't take another drip. Besides, I ask myself, what’s the point of worrying about the couch getting ruined when it’s already halfway underwater? There are bigger fish to fry right now.
For the next hour and a half, every minute on the minute, I call Kyle. Only once in the sixty-plus calls I make does it actually ring, though it’s cut off mid-trill as on the second ring the line goes dead.
At the end of the hour, sick and tired and more scared than ever, I set the phone aside and push myself up from the couch. Even though I’ve checked everything there is to check a thousand times, as I watch the water steadily rise, I can’t help but feel that I’ve missed something. So to the kitchen counter I wade to unpack my memories to make sure they’re all there before putting them all away once more. As ever, the rain dances tirelessly over my head. It sounds softer than before, though I know this is just wishful thinking. I was just used to it by now.
Everything as it should be (for some seconds I'd panicked when I hadn’t been able to find my favorite portrait of my mother as a girl, only to realize I’d been holding it the entire time I'd been frantically searching through the stacks of photos), I take a moment to replace the battery in my flashlight. The entire hour I’ve been working to reach Kyle I’ve had it shining bright. With plenty of spare batteries, and with how fast the water’s been rising…well, it seemed pretty safe to say there was no need to worry about running out. Even so, for good measure I grab a couple of extra pairs and slip them into my pocket before returning to my favorite vigil spot – the couch.
Another hour passes, no different in form from the one that's come before. This time my luck—if you can call it that—is a little better, at least at first. In the first fifteen minutes alone, I’m granted three partial rings, though each time the line fritzes out after the first ring. After this comes a dry-spell that leaves me at the end of the following the hour choked with frustrated, angry sobs. The water has continued its inexorable rise and is lapping now at the topmost edge of the cushions.
“Shit!” I scream, twisting as best I can without dipping my feet into the swirling water in order to punch the back of the couch. But the effort makes me lose my balance and I nearly tumble off, catching myself just before I roll off the cushions. I blink back a fresh parade of tears as above me the sky roars anew with hateful thunder. From the ceiling, a drop of water drips onto my forehead, making me flinch.
You have to keep trying.
No, I need to get out.
There is no way out. No one except Kyle knows you’re here. And as far as he knows, you're A-okay. You have to get through to him.
But—
“Listen to me!” I think this so forcefully that the words come bursting out of my lips, their echo between the water and the roof making it seem like I’m in a half-submerged cave.
Listen to me, Shannon. There is no other way out. It’s either you get through to Kyle or you die.
I don’t want to die.
Then you have to keep trying. Two more times. At least try two more times. Make it an even sixty. If he doesn’t pick up, then we’ll leave.
“Ugh.” Pushing myself up from the sofa, another droplet from above grazing my hairline like the missed shot of a sniper, I reach for my phone on the windowsill. Clicking it open, I hit redial and turn it on speaker.
Silence. For five, ten, fifteen seconds I sit there, hardly breathing as I listen to the big, fat nothing coming from the other end of the line.
“See?” I say ruefully to myself, my thumb reaching to hang up.
Brrrrrinn—
I hit the button before my mind can register the rich, hearty ring emanating from the speaker. In the aftermath of my mistake, I sit there with my mouth hanging open and my mind and heart sputtering in utter disbelief.
“No…”
I can’t believe it. How unlucky could one woman be? A sob grips me, the world shimmering as tears swell in my eyes. I lift the phone and am just about to chuck it into the growling, swirling maelstrom at my feet when a more sensible part of my brain stops me.
Wait, that’s a good sign, isn’t it? Call again and this time be patient.
It takes ten minutes and another six tries before I finally succeed. When on the sixth attempt the same life-affirming ring I’d hung up on greets my ear, I almost can’t believe it. Imagining things, I tell myself. You’re imagining things.
But with the second ring comes confirmation. As the trill fills my ear, I click the phone onto speaker and sit back with what is undoubtedly a premature sigh of relief.
Come on, Kyle. Come on. Pick up. Pick up.
“Hello? Shannon? Shannon, are you there?”
Kyle’s voice is so lovely to hear after what has felt like an eternity that even though I register his words well enough, for several seconds I’m too overwhelmed to respond.
“Shannon? Hello? Hello? Shannon? Are you there?”
“H-hi, baby,” I stammer finally, my voice quavering. “H-how are you?”
“Baby? What’s wrong? Is everything okay?”
“I…”
“Baby? Baby, are you okay? Baby, answer me!”
“I…I need you.”
“You need me?”
“I need you, Kyle. I need you now.”
“Don’t you worry, baby. I’m on my way. You just hang tight, okay? I’ll be there soon. I promise.”
10.
Kyle
The call comes through just as I’m climbing into my truck to head home. As usual, it’s been another excruciatingly long day, this box on the calendar an exact replica of the day before: ten hours spent toiling under a blistering sun in the middle of some remote field dropping endless pipes into endless ditches.
Must be a text message, I think when the phone in my pocket only buzzes once. I’m sitting with my head leaned back against the headrest, my eyes closed as cool air blows into my face.