FLORIDA
The Takeoff
“Hello, sorry I missed the first two calls. What’s up?” Alan managed, gasping, coughing and wheezing.
“Al, the firm just burned down. Harmony Davis showed up out of nowhere and none of us have a clue what to do! Oh my, are you all right?” Shelby, the famously tough softball player, looked closer to tears than she had ever been before, at least in recent memory. “Al, Hawaii just blew up! What about”
“Shelby. Look at me.” When Alan spoke, he seemed to lose his premature white hair, a hard edge could be heard in his voice, and there were cold flames in his blue eyes. “I will be with you all in an hour or two. Three at max. Get out of the city limits, find a wide open space, text me your latitude and longitude, and stay. Get the Cresses, Derek, Seth, the Murrays, you three, and anyone else you see fit. Go where I said, and DO NOT MOVE! Understand?
“Yes, sir. You’re the boss.” Shelby’s eyes sparkled with gratitude, relief, and unshed tears.
“All right. I will see you in a bit.” Alan ended the call.
Al glanced around at the transportation options from his seat on the bench in front of the courthouse in the town square. After a minor earthquake had rocked the town, toppling the house, with debris snapping Phillip’s arm and severely injuring Al’s leg, the two families had rushed to the center of town for a bus, only to find all of the drivers missing. Paige, Brooke, and Phil had insisted he rest while they hunted a vehicle.
“Alan, get over here! We’ve found someone!”
“Someone” turned out to be two people driving a city bus . . . and neither of them were bus drivers. Melodie Hunt, a former Korean ambassador whose former husband had gambled away the family fortune before dying in a gunfight while she was in Seoul, had returned to the states and become a secretary for the bus company. She and Lawrence Campbell, a garbage truck driver, offered their services on the half-hour trip to New Smyrna Beach, the winter home of Jeremy and Lexes Cress. In return, they would be given safe transportation to New York City, with the Perrys and Woods.
Arriving in new Smyrna, Alan moved to the front of the bus, which was heavily laden with supplies, clothes, food and other necessities, because no one knew when the climate would finish the changes, and began giving directions.
“North Causeway Bridge, left off of Flagler . . . there, maple Street. 911 Maple. Everyone off, now! Over there where 914 used to be, there’s a helicopter pad. Load everything in; we’re off to NYC in ten minutes. Chop chop!
As the eight people stepped off the bus, seven jaws immediately dropped.
“Wow! That’s a nice helicopter! Paige, how long has Al been holding out on us?” Phillip asked, stunned.
“I’ve never seen it before, why would you have known?” came the tart reply.
Of course you lot have never seen it before, it belongs to the Cresses. Jeremy emailed me directions, a picture, and the address of the house and helipad a few months back. He said he hired a man to be the pilot, caretaker, and mechanic who lives out back, and that I could use the craft whenever I had a need. Now load everything on, fast. I want to pick up the folks in New York so that we can get out to see about the Stewarts and Cooper. I’m beginning to get worried.”
“Oy! Who’s ‘ere?” A man in grease-stained oily overalls, a once-white shirt, and a tattered red flannel shuffled out of the dark garage, throwing down his newspaper. His Scottish brogue stuck out like a sore thumb.
“My name is Alan K. Woods, and I have express permission from the owner of this vehicle to use it anytime I need. I take it you’re the mechanic? Good. I need this craft ready for a lengthy trip at top pace in ten minutes.” Alan said, in a crisp, no nonsense tone. “Here’s the signed paperwork. And you all,” he said, turning back to the rest, “aren’t you all supposed to be loading? We’ll only have about two hours to get to New York if we get this tub off the ground in ten minutes. Jump to it!”
As he limped off, leaning on a broom handle rubbing his thigh, Brooke leaned over and asked Paige, “Do you think we could borrow him sometimes for the kids? He’d get them to behave!” Paige gave her a wry smile.
“Aye, that ‘e would. And I be thinkin’ he’ll be yellin’ at us if’n we don’t be getting’ a move-on soon!” the mechanic, who had introduced himself as Roald Beckum, chuckled.
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NEW YORK CITY
Due to much urging, prompting, and even some yelling, at precisely 1:00 p.m. the Symphony left the ground, streaking due north towards New York City. The passengers tried repeatedly to make contact with their friends in Hawaii, but to no avail. They did, however, manage to learn that all of the evacuees who had landed in the Bay Area had registered their temporary locations with the office of the San Francisco Daily, a small local paper.
At exactly 2:30 p.m., the copter landed outside of New York, in a field with a good many people waiting anxiously to board. They immediately began loading on, with Harmony Davis and Lyric Jordan in the lead. They were followed by Derek and Shelby Mastin, owner of the law firm and famous athlete with their children, Ben and Maggie; Seth Meade, a superstar athlete, and Emily, Derek’s assistant, with twins William and Elizabeth; Savannah Blackwell, a nurse; Lydia Jett, a waitress; and a very disgruntled cabbie who had to make two trips to bring everyone here named Ethan Cox. Three of the last ones to board were a very famous couple- Isaiah Murray, a popular rapper, drummer, and a cappella artist with his wife of two years, Amanda Murray, formerly Amanda O’Neil. She was known for starring in seven major Broadway productions. With them was Amanda’s daughter by her now deceased first husband, Jill.
As they found seats and the helicopter started up again, another couple and their son pealed up in a scarlet convertible.
“Wait! Do you have room for three more?” Yet another famous woman in the realm of the arts, Natalie Morris, a contemporary pop singer herded her 18-year-old son Adam and her husband Christopher in front of her.
“Just barely. Good thing I had the Symphony refitted as a passenger craft at Christmas,” Jeremy Cress, instrumentalist and owner of the helicopter chuckled as he, his wife Lexes, and his two-year-old daughter Kate boarded and shut the door. “All right, Roald, ready for takeoff.”
“Mmph. I’m no bein’ sure if’n we cain lift off with 32 passengers.”
“Of course it can, it’s a retired refitted military helicopter. It seats 25 passengers, plus the pilot and the co-pilot. The younger children can go on the parents’ laps or in the floor. Do you think I would let all these people onto my helicopter if they wouldn’t fit!?!”
Just as the helicopter burst through the clouds, Roald muttered something suspiciously like, “Ya never know wid you, yer stark crazy.”
“What was that?” Jeremy’s jovial tone became quite sharp.
“Oh, nutin’. Nutin’ at all.”
