Amber's Secret

Part 14

"Holy shit!" Julie yelled as they saw the funnel begin tossing cars and other debris into the air. Amber grabbed Julie and pulled her to the floor of the building as the windows shattered. Amber and Julie got to their feet and started towards the back of the store.

A large chunk of golf ball sized hail hit one Amber's crutches;knocking her to the floor. Julie Yelled as loud as she could in order to be heard over the noise of the tornado and smashing debris. "We need to get further back or we may end up getting sucked out. Head for the rear of this aisle as fast as you can Amber, and don't look back."

Amber gave her friend a thumbs up and started to crawl towards the back of the store where they would hopefully have a little more shelter from the terrible storm. Halfway Down the aisle they heard a loud groaning type of sound and then more debris flew over them as the roof partially disintegrated over their heads. Still they kept on moving further back as fast as they could.

They reached the back of the store and huddled together against some shelves as the storm raged on for what seemed an eternity. The rest of the roof blew off as bags of diapers fell off the shelves and onto them. The last thing either of them saw for a while was the shelf falling down over them as the wall behind them collapsed.

Amber was the first to regain consciousness. She was awakened by a sharp pain in her ankle and a terrible odor coming from her diaper. Through the little bit of light that was filtering through to her, she was able to Julie still unconscious and lying next to her. One of her crutches was missing, but the other one was right in front of her and holding up a pile of debris.

She was barely able to move with all the stuff laying over her and was wondering if anyone was going to be able to get to them any time soon. No sooner had she thought that than some of the debris was lifted off of her by someone. She was carefully pulled from the wreckage and put onto a stretcher. Her friend Julie was then also uncovered and brought out of the wreckage as well.

Julie was beginning to come around as they were both loaded into the back of a large four-wheel drive truck. Amber was able to see that the entire building had been destroyed except for the back area where she and Julie had been buried under debris. Amber looked out the back of the slow moving truck as they slowly made their way through the piles of debris towards the hospital on the far side of town.

The whole trip took only about 20 minutes, but it was like a war zone in some of the areas they passed through. The two of them spent their time looking out through the back of the truck in shock and disbelief at the wreckage left behind by the tornado. Amber felt like it was something you would see in a bad war movie or maybe a horror film,but never expected to see in real life.

Afield nurse was just finishing changing Amber's diaper when they arrived at the hospital. Her and Julie were carefully lifted down out of the truck and taken into a huge tent that had been set up in the parking lot to help handle the numerous minor injuries coming in. As they lifted them both onto a makeshift bead Julie screamed in pain as someone accidentally bumped her right hip.

Amber saw them take Julie out of the tent carefully and heard them screaming at some orderlies to help get her to the x-ray department immediately. She did not see Julie again for almost four hours. She saw numerous people come in and get treated for minor cuts and few for some stitches. As she looked around the tent she spotted her mother moving through the crowds of injured people and helping to treat them as she went. It took her nearly an hour before she finally made it over to her daughter.

"How bad are you hurt honey?" Amber smiled and replied, "I'm all right but I can't exactly go anywhere at the moment since I don't have any crutches to help me get around without messing up my ankle more. How is Julie doing mom? I saw them take her out and heard them saying something about taking her to x-ray. She got hit really hard when the shelves came down on us at the drugstore."

"I don't know honey. We are pretty busy here at the moment with so many people coming in and needing treatment. The tornado touched down by the drugstore and went through that whole are of town in under five minutes. It hit us hard and fast before moving on. We are going to be really busy here in the next few hours as they bring in more patients from the resort lodge as well. The tornado ripped it apart just a few minutes before finally going back up into the clouds."

Their conversation was interrupted by one of the orderlies bringing Amber some crutches as well as a bag of adult diapers. Amber turned red a little but was grateful for the crutches as well as the diapers. She thanked the man and turned to her mother again. "I want to wait for word on Julie if you don't mind mom." Her mother told her it was fine if she waited, but to try to stay out of the way as best she could.

Her mother went back to the busy task at hand and began to help people with their injuries. Amber hobbled off on her new crutches with her diapers in hand. She stopped at a small relief booth that was handing out hotdogs and drinks to everyone there. She felt sorry for the lady running the booth so she decided to lend a hand and at least be somewhat useful while waiting for word on Julie. The lady was surprised to see Amber come hobbling up on crutches and carrying adult diapers, but was grateful for the help.

As they served the people, Amber began to write down their names so that if anyone inquired about them, she could let them know that the person was alive and would be all right. She went through almost 25pages in a notebook she found as she wrote down names and helped serve the people who came in to her. By the time she saw Julie come hobbling out on crutches, she had helped assure over 100 people that she had seen and even served the person they were looking for.

Julie hobbled over to the side of the booth and told Amber that she had dislocated her hip when the shelves fell on them. She got a chuckle as she told Amber that they had been saved by diapers. It seems that the numerous bags of diapers had helped to cushion them and protect them from too much harm. She herself then chipped in and began helping out as well.

Amber and Julie helped out for most of the night before finally being told to take a break. With help from Julie and Amber's list of names, they had reunited a lot of people with one another. Amber and Julie found a secluded spot to change Amber's now soaking wet diaper before going back to help out for another few hours.

It was almost 11 AM the next morning before the three of them took down the booth. Everyone had finally found everyone else with some help from the two girls on some occasions. The lady thanked the both for their generous help with the relief booth once again before leaving.Amber and Julie were both exhausted and were glad to be shown inside the tent to a couple of makeshift cots where they both collapsed into sleep as soon as they laid down. It had been a long and eventful day for them all. Amber was so tired she never even felt it when someone changed her out of her wet diaper and put a clean one on her.

END PART FOURTEEN