Helga Blows

Helga, though still many miles out to sea, had let it be known…she was coming to America.  The storm was already being called ‘The Hurricane From Hell’.

She already packed wind gusts of over 220 MPH, and some meteorologists predicted that Helga might drag a couple of smaller but equally angry storms into shore with her.  All in all, an enormous weather system - the only good thing about it. 

Helga’s very mass was slowing her progress significantly.  This gave people preparation time.  How much time, no one could really say, but that didn’t stop  them from trying.

The storm, was now being tracked by every weather bureau and news affiliate.  They did agree that this storm’s track was totally unpredictable, so many factors being at play. 

But for a solid week now, every radio program, every TV channel, cable, satellite and broadcast was predicting the storm‘s track, 24 hours a day. 

Day after day went by with no real change, the over-tired, weathered weather personalities just started making things up to fill the time.

The thirty towering palm trees  lining  Tremont Street were identical sisters.
They all bent to the fierce wind as if blow drying their green hairdos; primping for the storm.  Things were finally starting to happen.

Mrs. Lee Teitlebaum of 99 Tremont St., Bay Shores, Miami Beach, Florida appeared to be completely unworried about the predicted storm.  She’d say,
         “She’s a big fatty; dragging’ her rear.  Please; we have plenty of time. 
I’m not worried.” 

Most people in Florida had been through a monster storm, or heard enough about them to be cautious, and prepared.  But Lee simply felt that after living in South Florida twenty-nine, almost thirty years, she was an expert on predicting the weather.

And to her two darling granddaughters who’d been living with her for over a year now, she said,
         “Come on girls; who‘s going to deal the cards?  It‘s too ugly out to go anywhere”

Nervous described the general aura of these 12 and 14 year-old girls.  Babs ‘the baby’, was glued to “Weather Control” on TV, Mackzine to her cell phone, repeating forecasts and facts that her friends were feeding her.

         “But Gram, when are we gonna put up the shutters?”  they both asked simultaneously and snickered a bit at this.

         “Kittens, this is just one of the outer storm bands.  We have time.  I need one of the neighbors to help.  So lets play cars while we wait, no?  But please, no one let out the cat.”

Instant giggles from the girls as they hung up the phone, turned off the TV and ran for a deck of cards.  The very number of times Gram yelled “Don’t let the cat out” calmed the girls down a bit.  It was the older woman’s only concession to having some nerves over the storm too.  It didn’t matter in the least how many times they promised to be careful of KittyGalore, Gram’s cat.

They sat round the card table in Grandma’s big bedroom upstairs. 
         “Babby, stop dreaming and through down a card or pass”

She was a dreamer.  Currently Babs was showing herself a mind movie of KittyGalore sailing around the house, legs crossed with a tiny drink in her paw.  The cat would fly round and round the 2nd story of the house, in a different pose each time she passed the master bedroom window.  Sometimes she waved.

Babs just muttered
         “Hi Kitty! Bye Kitty!  Hi… bye!”
And then the doorbell rang.

Just before, a ways up their street, was another sort of ‘storm person’ altogether, Bob Morrow, of UPS.  He not only had has place ready for a storm; he kept it that way year-round.  And just now, he only had two more stops as he searched the boarded, shuttered-up street for an address.

Rob had one thing in mind all day - he was just waiting for the call from UPS, (‘uhps’ as they called it) and it was coming.  The sky was turning black and the voice of the wind began to shriek.  “All deliveries are cancelled until further notice.”  is what the short wave would say.  Not long now.

Street numbers were always hard to find around here, but with most people having closed up their houses it was ridiculous.  Ah, finally one house not shuttered up at all.  Fantastic.  He could ask directions and  make his drop.


His place was ready all right, but way past the storm shutters and plywood covering all glass on the duplex.  He also had all of the ‘House on Elm Street’ movies, and the two ‘Matrix’ films ready to go by the DVD.  He’d even stocked up on Hoffman Grape Soda, Ice House Beer and Burritos.

‘All deliveries are cancelled until further notice‘ words sweeter than his mama’s when he was a kid.  In  delivery, Christmas vacation was just spent mending from the crazy Holiday sending season.

But a hurricane…from out of the sky, all the way from the West African Coast
came a juicy paid vacation.  He waited all year for the storms to come, and this one was truly promising. 

From out of the Big Brown truck Rob jumped, with a nice soft landing, considering his size.  Years of practice.  And up to the big door, which undoubtedly had big chimes.

Downstairs, the doorbell played its tune; the first nine notes of Swanee River.
Lee T., looking through the loosely woven greige linen drapes down at the street in front of the house she saw the familiar big brown truck; UPS.  Her whole tiny person seemed to grow in excitement.
         “Gloriosky!  It’s my new Wend Mark piece, I’ll bet anything.” 
And she started down the stairs, her mouth never stopping

         “Oh, I love TV shopping!  What did I just buy?  Oh yeah, the Cheshire Cat, .  The big Kitty’s here for me!  Those pieces; so elegant, so adorable.”  A bit louder,
         “I’m Cahhh-ming!”  And to herself, “ Oh, don’t let out the cat, no.”
Over her shoulder she called, “No cheating while I‘m gone you two villainous sneaks.”

And she floated downstairs as if the wind weren’t howling through every plank of  the impressive and land marked, but lopsided and old, 2-storey  wooden house.

         “Oh my gawd, it’s like she thinks they’re valuable or something,” from little sister Babs (no longer allowing anyone to call her ‘Babby Baby”, though it never stopped Grandma Lee.)
         “Gram, Gram, Gram” from Mackzine, in a world-weary tone of voice.  It seemed a lifelong contest for Most Jaded  with these two. 

They’d been unceremoniously been dropped at their granny’s ‘for awhile’, said their Mom and their lives had to change in so many ways.  But they had each other, and they had their Grandma.

Gram called back up the stairs, just before she opened the front door,
“We’ll see what you think when I’m dead and they’re collectibles!  And no one deal the cards ‘til I‘m back up there!”
This finally got the sister’s sarcastic eyeballs together, and a giggle.
         “Okay Gram!”  They dissolve into giggles, almost forgetting the storm outside.

It wasn’t easy, but together, Bob, the UPS guy and Lee Teitlebaum, the Grandma got the front door open.  And then, the wind seemed to die down.

         “Young man, you are a lifesaver, you really are“, said Grandma, still half hidden by the door, but sizing of the delivery person on the other side all the same.
         “I’m trying to find an address, everything’s covered up on this street.  Except you.  Could you tell me where 99 Tremont Street is?”

         “Oh!  Are you in the right place…I’m sorry, your name, oh Bob, come with me”  and the tiny lady actually began dragging the big guy into to house.

         “Please lady, I have a delivery here.  Just sign right here” as he labored to get his hand back to point to his clipboard and restore normalcy to the scene.

She whirled on her heal and looked up at Bob with something close to tears in her eyes.
         “Bob, I’m all alone here.  I just need a little wood up on the big window here.  This place is all I’ve got, and my son-in-law, who used to do it for me, took off with a, well, with a woman and I haven’t made preparations.  And then you show up!”

         Ominous big eared silence from upstairs.

         “Lady this storm is about to get very ugly.  I don’t have the time to help you, I really don’t.”

         “But look, the band is passing.  The sun’s coming out!”
         And it was.  The sky cleared from gray to white.

         “Lady…”
         “Please, call me Lee.  Everyone does.”
         “Lady, Lee, please take your package at least.  It’s marked Very Fragile.”
And taking the clipboard and speed signing by the X, she then took the package and threw it on the couch.
         “Now Bob, can I get you something to drink?”



The two girls stayed at the card table in Gram’s room upstairs, listening with dread and hope to their Grandmother haggling with the stranger. 

Suddenly,  the elder, Mackzine, suddenly stood  and made an announcement to the whole house.
“Helga’s gonna head north of here!  To Lake Ockeechobee.  It’s the only large water mass within Florida, and then she can grow after leaving the ocean.  She’ll head there.”
She spoke in absolutes - truly comforting to her little sister, and her grandma, if truth be told. 

Mack had reason to be definite, because she saw it in her head like a big headline: 
Big Saltwater Lake Calls Bigger Storm in Watery Friendship!
Bob was not amused.  “I thought you were all alone here.”

“We are.  Two little girls?  What can they do?  Bob, it’s just one piece of plywood.  I’ve got it in the garage.  I’ll pay you, of course, for your trouble.”

And after a beat, she looks earnestly up into his eyes and says,  “Please.  I’d never ask, but just the one room, to have a safe place for me and the girls”

Rob was trying to move his mouth, but couldn’t, as if the hinges had just rusted in the face of this tiny force below him.  Asking him to risk messing up his cherished storm plan. 

Of course, it was clearing up, and she had offered to pay.  Into the silence, Lee was forced to venture further.

         “My late son-in-law always came by and secured the house.  Have you any family?  It’s so sad for the girls, he just up and left; what could their mother do?  Please come, I have so many refreshments.“

         “Did he die or leave?  Forget it.  Lady, where’s this garage?  I have to go back to the truck and put this down.”  And Rob found his heading back to the front door.  He was going just jump into the truck and take off but then he heard the wail from upstairs.  A real one.

         “GRAM!  I’m scared!”  Appearing at the top of the half stair case  was  an adorable 12 year-old girl hugging a cat very tightly.

Reaching up for the bottom corner of the man’s clipboard, she managed to make him hesitate long enough so that she knew he’d help them.

         “You’re a doll, Bob, right?  You really are an angel sent here from heaven.”

Gruffly he said, with her hand still on his clipboard, leaving through the front door,
         “Yeah, I guess.  Okay, meet me at the garage.  Over there, right?”

Back at the garage, her sparse white hair blowing in the wind that was just picking up again, Lee shouted to Bob,
         “Can you lift the door?  I hasn’t worked in years; I keep my car out front’

He’d already lifted the door and grabbed a gigantic piece of plywood, sliding it out the garage, with Lee grabbing a bit of the front.

Shouting back into the wind, Lee told him,
         “I know just how to do this!  Just prop it up against the front of the house.  I’ll go upstairs and open the window!”
With all his weight and might, Bob pushed the plywood in front of the large living room window and ran to the middle to hold it there.

He knew he was crazy, dreaming or both, both dammit, he really had to help this bunch.

The wind was tuning up again with the next storm band beginning to play when the little old lady opened the upstairs windows.

         “Just hold on Bob!  Y’think you can hold on?”

She actually had holes in the top of the board and a coil of rope with her.  They actually got it tied  across the top, the three of them working together.

         “Okay, Bob!  Come inside.  That was great!  The door’s open!”

He started for the front door, and the wood was holding somehow.  But a giant motor had started somewhere in the sky that told Rob, this was no storm band anymore.

Upstairs, Grandma Lee leaned out once more to make her plea:
         “Please Bob, whatever you do, don’t let the-e-e…’
But an impossibly powerful inverse wind sucked at her tiny frame up there in the window…sucking her right out!  Off she flew into the sky like Mary Poppins or something.

Still, she was able, with all eyes doubting the scene above them, to finish,
         “…cat out!”



THE END