Any Day Now Read online

  “Funny how that never happens to me. Of course, I don’t sit on my feet.”

  “Shut up.”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  “Tony?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “Tony?”

  He still didn’t answer.

  She gave him the look.

  “What? You told me to shut up.”

  “I didn’t mean it.”

  “Oh. Of course not.”

  “Tony, what do you think about moving to Alaska?”

  He stopped short and looked in her eyes.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “Honey, we don’t qualify. We don’t live in the evacuation zones.”

  “I’m not talking about the government program. I’m talking about selling our house and buying some land up there and becoming bush people.”

  “Bush people?”

  “Yes.”

  “Honey, what I think is that you’ve been watching too much television.”

  “Tony I’m serious. You and I have watched those shows together. We’ve talked about how cool it would be to live in the wide open spaces. The last frontier. Well, I spent some time on the internet while you and Bud were in Washington taking photos and I think it’s doable.”

  “What do you mean, doable?”

  “Well, right now we can sell our home for five times what we could get a year ago.

  “And land in the Juneau area, in the northern part of Alaska, is still incredibly cheap.

  “We could take the money from our house and buy twenty acres of land and have enough left over to buy all of the plumbing and electrical things we needed.”

  “The plumbing and electrical? Honey, you need more than plumbing and electrical to build a house.”

  “No, the house would be logs. A log cabin. We could cut down trees and build an old fashioned log cabin, just like they do on those shows.”

  Tony suspected he knew what was really going on.

  “You know what I think?”

  “What?”

  “I think once we get the baby back you just want to run away. You just want to get as far away from civilization as we can so people like Rebecca and Marilyn can never darken our doorstep again.”

  She fell into his arms and bawled… outright bawled.

  She soon had him crying too.

  Chapter 27

  Rocki woke up to the pitiful sound of a dog retching in the bathroom.

  It was still dark outside and as she stumbled to the bathroom she stepped in something cold and wet and undoubtedly disgusting.

  “Eww…”

  Darrell never heard Penny throwing up.

  It was the “eww…” that caused him to stir and to sit up in bed.

  “Honey, are you okay?” he asked as he reached over to turn on the bedside lamp.

  “Oh, I’m just peachy.

  “I just stepped in Penny’s vomit. She’s throwing up again.”

  They found her lying on the bathroom floor, looking as miserable as a dog could possibly be.

  They cleaned her up and pampered her.

  Darrell went down to the motel’s desk and got the number for a local vet.

  “They don’t open until nine,” the clerk was careful to tell him.

  He was obviously distraught, and she got the sense he wanted to rush right over and park themselves at the vet’s front door.

  Penny was a special dog with a long story behind her.

  She followed their granddaughter Meadow home from school one day.

  She was sickly and skinny and appeared to be on death’s door.

  Meadow took her in and nursed her back to health.

  They bonded immediately and had been pretty much inseparable since.

  Meadow had a brother and a sister. Autumn and Sam. And Penny had great relationships with them as well.

  But no matter who coaxed her into bed with them at night, Penny always woke up at Meadow’s feet.

  “She thinks you’re her mom,” Meadow’s own mother told her. “And her savior too. She knows she was near death with parvo that day you found her. And she knows that you’re the one who saved her life. She’s devoted to you for that. And in your whole life you’ll never have anyone that loves you more faithfully and unconditionally as that dog does.”

  The thing was, though, that Meadow loved Penny exactly the same way.

  It was their habit, when the “chitlins” were out of school for the summer, for Rocki and Darrell to take a break from writing and to take the grandkids on vacation instead.

  They had a deal with the chitlins. They could choose where they wanted to go, provided… and it was a very big provision… that they all agreed on the destination.

  Sometimes they wandered around the country for two weeks, going places Rocki and Darrell wanted to take them, before the kids finally agreed on a place they all wanted to go.

  On such journeys Penny Fourpaws always went along.

  The Winnebago was always crowded, but not overly so, for the three grandkids together weighed no more than a couple of pounds soaking wet. They were tiny tots, you see.

  They always had great adventures, no matter where they went or what they saw.

  Even when Rocki managed to sneak in some “learning experiences” along the way.

  On this trip Rocki talked Meadow into letting Penny come without her.

  “She misses you all day while you’re in school,” she reasoned. “She sits alone and mopes for hours waiting for you, and then when you get home you don’t have much time for her because you’re practicing your clarinet or your cheers or you’re doing homework.”

  Lately Meadow also spent a lot of time on the phone with boys, but Rocki didn’t mention that. Meadow was trying to keep that part a secret.

  Rocki went on, “If she comes with us we can pay her a lot more attention than you can, and then you won’t have to feel guilty about her being neglected.

  “But who will I sleep with at night?”

  “Sleep with your sister if you get lonely.”

  “Eww.”

  “Or your teddy bear. Or Slimeball. I know Slimeball’s a cat. But cats need to feel loved too.”

  “Double eww.”

  She finally relented.

  This trip was a test.

  Penny could go with her grandparents for a couple or three weeks. Until they were close enough to Meadow to take a detour and take Penny home.

  If she had a good time, and if Meadow didn’t miss her too badly, she might be able to do it again at a later time.

  But whether the second solo trip ever happened was Meadow’s decision and hers alone.

  Knowing all that, it just wouldn’t do for Penny to be miserable or not have a good time.

  Otherwise Meadow might never let her darken the doorway of the Winnie Minnie again.

  They had to take the poor dog to the vet and find out what was ailing her.

  The pair left Penny sleeping in the room while they snuck down to the breakfast buffet and tanked up.

  Darrell wisely resisted the urge to sneak a couple of sausage patties up to his favorite dog.

  She loved them and would wolf them down in a heartbeat.

  But they likely wouldn’t stay down.

  An hour later they were sitting in the waiting room of Arley Benton, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine.

  They weren’t the only ones there.

  The room was filling fast.

  All the other dogs, and a couple of cats, appeared to be suffering from the same malady. They were listless and lifeless and throwing up everything they ate.

  When they finally got their turn to see the good doctor, he had some distressing news.

  “There’s nothing I can do.”

  “What? You mean she’s going to…”

  “No. she’s not going to die. What I mean is there’s nothing I can do to make her feel better. Only you can do that.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It’
s what we’re calling the ‘Yellowstone Effect’.”

  “You mean the ‘Yellowstone Event’.”

  “No. I’m talking about the effect the volcano is having on animals.

  “You see, even though we’re almost three hundred miles from Yellowstone, animals feel the rumblings and vibrations the volcano is causing deep inside the earth. Of course the closer to Yellowstone they get, the more it’ll affect them.”

  “But how is that possible, doctor?”

  “All of an animal’s senses are way more finely tuned than a human’s.

  “It comes from living in the wild for thousands of generations. Animals whose instincts are to hunt for their survival have very keen senses of smell. In most cases incredible night vision, better than human hearing and senses of direction.

  “In short, dogs can sense and feel things we can’t.

  “The rumblings and vibrations in the earth are causing them stress and uncertainty. And in many cases it’s causing them motion sickness, which is making them throw up.”

  “What can we do to make her better?”

  “The best thing is, if you don’t have to go to Yellowstone, turn around and go back the other way.

  “I can give her something to help with the motion sickness. But she’s still going to be lethargic and troubled. And if you go on I’m afraid it’s going to get worse.”

  “How so?”

  “I’ve been hearing stories of dogs and cats who live near the park being so frightened they’re acting very strangely. Sometimes they’re trying to chew their way out of their houses. Some are howling all night long and driving their owners nuts.

  Rocki and Darrell looked at one another.

  And they agreed, without muttering a word.

  They’d been looking forward to their trip to Yellowstone National Park, and to meeting and interviewing Julianna.

  But neither was as important as the well being of Penny Fourpaws.

  Chapter 28

  “Oh sure, I completely understand. The doctor’s absolutely right,” Julianna said on the phone. “All the animals here are behaving very strangely too.

  “And not just dogs and cats either. Yesterday Dave and I were driving down Highway 22 and had to stop for two skunks sitting in the middle of the road.

  “They just glared at us, as though we were the ones who were causing the vibrations.

  “They actually scared me. I was glad we were in the vehicle because I got the sense they wanted to attack us.

  “And I’ve been hearing about dogs and cats… family pets that’ve always been gentle, biting and scratching their owners just out of the blue. It’s all very bizarre.”

  “Can we just do an interview another time?” Rocki asked. “I mean, as in after you finish your work there and evacuate out of the danger zone yourself?”

  “Sure. That would be fine.”

  “Good. Stay in touch, and let us know when you’re out of there and in a safe place.”

  “I will. I promise.”

  Rocki almost hung up the phone and ended the conversation.

  Something deep inside her forced her to ask one last question.

  “Julianna?”

  “Yes?”

  “Should we be worried about you? I mean, the government says the volcano won’t erupt for months. But they also say they can’t be sure.”

  “Oh, that’s sweet of you. But don’t worry about me. We’ll get out of here as soon as we finish notifying everybody.”

  “How long do you think that’ll be?”

  “I’m hoping no more than a couple of weeks.”

  Rocki hung up and told Darrell, “I’m worried. I don’t think she’s going to make it.”

  “Honey, she’s at ground zero. She’s not going to stay a day longer than she has to.”

  “That’s the problem. Nobody really knows when that date is.”

  Julianna didn’t want to share it with Rocki, but she was having her own concerns.

  In the wee hours of that morning, while poor Penny was in the motel bathroom puking up her doggy treats, Julianna had a very vivid dream.

  It was a dream in which she was reunited with a stodgy old man she’d only seen once in her lifetime and never expected to see again.

  Yet there she was, reunited with a man who cursed her for being there.

  And as she stood before him the ground rumbled beneath their feet.

  Julianna had been through earthquakes before.

  But this was different.

  This one was way more intense than any she’d ever experienced.

  This one almost knocked her off her feet.

  She and the old man reached out for one another.

  They were in a clearing; there were no trees nearby to grab onto for support.

  They held onto and supported each other.

  Over the old man’s shoulder she saw, in the distance, a growing cloud of thick gray smoke.

  She heard a deafening roar.

  But only for a split second.

  After that she saw nothing.

  Felt nothing

  She and the old man were dead.

  The dream was so vivid it shook her awake.

  She sat up in bed and looked at her hands.

  They were trembling.

  Her heart was beating rapidly. Her breathing was just as rapid.

  Julianna, her friends said, had nerves of steel.

  She was seldom rattled, seldom afraid.

  But this morning she woke up terrified.

  She stumbled out of bed and made herself some coffee.

  She sat on a chair at her kitchen table and cried.

  Cried because she hadn’t had a real honest-to-goodness nightmare in years.

  Cried because she knew she came from a long line of gypsy seers. What others called fortune tellers.

  She cried because although her mother estranged herself from her family in an effort to keep her daughter out of the lifestyle, Julianna herself knew the truth.

  That it was in her blood.

  And lastly, she cried because she strongly suspected the dream was somehow not a dream at all.

  It was a premonition.

  Chapter 29

  Julie Hamlin walked into the den to find her husband feverishly working in a sea of paperwork.

  Part of it was the data his friend Bud Avery sent him from Washington, D.C.

  The very same data he’d reviewed and then released to every senior geology professor at every major university in the nation, and many overseas as well.

  They were the documents the National Archives had already asked him to preserve, so he could ship them for inclusion into the library’s permanent records.

  They were the same documents the Smithsonian Institution wanted to put on display in their Modern History Museum.

  It was a major head rush for Dr. Hamlin that two such distinguished institutions were battling over the documents, and he told his wife so.

  Julie brought him back down to earth, saying, “But they weren’t even your documents. You just got them from Bud and forwarded them to your friends.”

  He stubbornly debated the point.

  “That’s like saying all Paul Revere did was ride a horse and yell a lot. I played an integral role in saving millions of lives.”

  She said, “Yes you did, honey. You certainly did.”

  Added to Bud’s documents were hundreds of sheets Wayne had printed himself since he got out of the hospital.

  Research regarding past geological data at various sites around the Yellowstone Caldera.

  Sulfur readings, sub-surface temperatures, asthenosphere pressure readings and the like.

  Things that non-geologists would yawn over, but which told a valuable story to someone who knew what he was looking at.

  Julie, of course, didn’t have a clue what he was doing as he feverishly shuffled through one stack of papers after another.

  But she wanted to help if she could.

  “Honey, is there anything I
can do?”

  “I’m looking for the submagma temperature readings by month, as they relate to the pressure readings at the same depths.”

  She half-smiled, than said, “Maybe I can just get you some coffee.”

  “That would be nice. Thank you so much.”

  She checked on him periodically and refilled his coffee cup as needed.

  She also dragged him kicking and screaming into the living room a couple of times, making him sit in his easy chair and take a break.

  “I’ll not have you put yourself back into the hospital because you’re too damn hard-headed to pace yourself properly.”

  At first he took offense to her being a mother hen and tried to object.

  “Darn it, don’t you think I know how to take care of myself?”

  She struggled for the right words to explain her concern.

  “No I don’t, Wayne. I think you’re a… you’re a… you’re a… man!”

  And there it was. That one word summed up their impasse.

  Wayne felt that as a man he should be trusted to know how to care for his own health.

  Julie felt that because he was a man he was inherently incapable of doing so.

  Perhaps because he was a husband he felt a duty to give in, as he usually did.

  Perhaps she felt that as a wife she was inherently right, as she usually was.

  In any event he relented and took a break in his easy chair occasionally, fussing and fuming and trying to relax.

  “Why on earth are you pushing yourself so hard?” she asked him during one such break.

  “I want to review all the data I’ve found before my news conference. I want to make sure I get things right. It’s important I be accurate.”

  Most of his words went right past her, as she was stuck on only two of them: “News conference.”

  “Honey, why in the world would you want to subject yourself to a news conference? A man in your condition, who’s recovering from a major heart attack, certainly doesn’t need the stress of a dozen reporters throwing questions at you faster than you can answer them.

  “The President has committed to having a weekly news conference on the Yellowstone Event until everyone is out of the area and safe.

  “Just let him do his thing. He gets paid for stuff like that. You don’t.”