Before the Storm Read Online Free PDF Page B

it.”
    “And then what happened?”

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    “We were outside.”
    “And what did you see outside? Did you see any person
    out—”
    “One question at a time,” I reminded him.
    “What did you see outside, Andy?” Agent Foley asked.
    “Fire. Everywhere except by the metal box. And Emily was
    screaming that nobody could get out the front door because
    fire was there. I saw somebody did get out the door and they
    were on fire. I don’t know who it was, though.”
    “Oh God.” Maggie buried her face in her hands, her long
    dark hair spilling in waves over her arms. I knew she was picturing the scene as I was. Sitting there with Andy, it was easy
    to forget how devastating the fire had been for so many people.
    I thought again of Keith. Where was he?
    “Did you see anyone else outside beside the person on fire?”
    the agent asked.
    “Emily.”
    “Okay. So you went back in.”
    “You went back in, Andy?” I repeated, wondering whatever
    possessed him to reenter the burning church.
    Andy nodded. “I climbed on the metal box and got into the
    boys’ room and then called for everyone to follow me.”
    “And they did?” the agent asked.
    “Did they what?”
    “Follow you?”
    “Not exactly. I let some of them, like my friend Layla, go
    first.” He pulled the cannula from his nostrils and looked at me.
    “Do I still have to wear this?”
    “A little longer,” I said.“Until the nurse comes back and says
    you can take it off.”

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    diane chamberlain
    “So you let Layla go out the window first?” Agent Foley
    nudged.
    “And some other kids. Then I followed them. But some were
    still following me, too.” He wrinkled his nose. “It’s hard to
    explain.”
    “You’re doing fine, sweetie,” I said.
    “How did you know the…metal box was there?” the agent
    asked.
    “I don’t remember.”
    “Try to remember,” I said.
    “I saw it when I went to the bathroom.”
    “When was that?” the agent asked.
    “When I had to pee.”
    Agent Foley gave up, closing his notepad with the flick of
    a wrist.
    “Sounds like you are a hero, Andy,” he said.
    “I know.”
    The agent motioned me to follow him. We walked outside
    the curtained cubicle. He looked at me curiously.
    “What’s his, uh, disability?” he asked. “Brain injury?”
    “Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder,” I said, the words as
    familiar to me as my own name.
    “Really?” He looked surprised, glancing over my shoulder
    as though he could see through the curtain. “Don’t those kids
    usually…you know, have a look to them?”
    “Not always,” I said.“Depends on what part of them was developing when the alcohol affected them.”
    “You’re his adoptive mother then?”
    The police on Topsail Island know me and they know Andy

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    and they know our story. An ATF agent in Wilmington,
    though, was a world away.
    “No, I’m his biological mother,” I said.“Sober fifteen years.”
    His smile was small. Tentative. Finally he spoke.“You’ve got
    a year on me,” he said. “Congratulations.”
    “You, too.” I smiled back.
    “So—” he looked down at his closed notepad “—how much
    of what he says can I believe?”
    “All of it,” I said with certainty. “Andy’s honest to a fault.”
    “He’s an unusual kid.” He looked over my shoulder again.
    “You don’t need to tell me that.”
    “No, I mean, in a fire, seventy-five percent of the people
    try to get out the front door. That’s their first reaction. They’re
    like a flock of sheep. One starts in that direction and they all
    follow. The other twenty-five percent look for an alternate
    exit. A back door. Bash open a window. Who’s the bald-headed
    guy he was talking about?”
    “I have no idea.”
    “Anyway, so Andy here goes for the window in the men’s
    room. Strange choice, but turns out to be the right one.”
    “Well,” I said, “kids like Andy don’t think like that first
    seventy-five percent, or even