"Fuck! This is one hell of a storm!"
Randy always said this when there was a supercell thunderstorm, but this time it was warranted. He looked at the Doppler radar on his computer at his desk at the National Weather Service, chewing intently on a donut. This was a truly awesome storm, a perfectly circular cell of cumulonimbus clouds forming a storm of great severity. The little hook at the edge of the storm suggested rotation of tornadic activity. All signs pointed to funnel cloud formation. At the time, it was nearing Wilderness Lake. The outer rings of the storm were already pummeling the area with heavy rain, high winds, and small hail.
"Must you swear at work? We get it, this storm's big, bigger than we've seen in quite some time. Looks like there could be a tornado in there."
As though it were cued, there came a voice over the radio. "Yeah, Randy, there's been a tornado spotted out on Wilderness Lake. Let the guys know."
"Fuck me sideways," Randy muttered, then spoke into the radio. "Yeah, I'll let them know. You boys stay safe out there." He sat back down, and sighed. His lover was braving that storm. He had the bravery (and looks) that Randy couldn't muster. But Randy complemented him with his down-to-earth loyalty and kindness. They were a good match. He said a short prayer for Jason, and went to tell the office the news.
"In all the years we've been coming here I've never seen a storm like this," Sebastian said to his wife Amy, staring out the window of their lake house near the shores of Wilderness Lake. Outside the rain was coming down in almost horizontal sheets, and lightning lit up the lake and surrounding areas every few seconds.
There was a bright flash and a loud clap of thunder soon after. It startled Amy, and she turned to her darling husband for protection. Sebastian laughed kindly. This was a common reaction of Amy's. Having no personality or mental stability of her own allowed him to project himself onto her. She idolized him, and he ate it up. So it had been for almost a decade. He knew she would never leave him because she needed him, but to help cinch it he often lavished her with expensive gifts. He could easily afford them at his job as a wealthy architect. Tonight he had for her a necklace consisting of a diamond wrapped in two teardrop shaped swirls of metal. It was made by Kay Jewelers, part of their Love's Embrace collection. The thought occurred to him that this sudden show of fear and emotional weakness on Amy's part would make for excellent timing. He sprung into action. pulling out the necklace case from his pocket.
"I'm right here," he said, pulling out the necklace case from his pocket. Amy slowly looked down at the case.
"And I always will be." He opened the case, revealing the necklace within. Amy's face lit up with excitement, like a small child on Christmas. She threw her arms around her husband, and he reciprocated with contentment. She would be okay until Christmas.
Another bright flash illuminated the lake outside, and all of the lights in the house went out. Amy cried out in surprise and fear.
"Shit!" Sebastian let go of Amy and stumbled around the living room, searching for the drawer where he usually kept a flashlight. He kicked over a table and stubbed his toe on the couch, feebly attempting to get across the room. Amy stood perfectly still, still paralyzed with anxiety.
"Where the fuck is this god damn- aha!" he opened the drawer, rummaged around inside, and produced a flashlight. He clicked it on, and it shined in a bright circle on the ceiling. After a few seconds, the light went out.
"God damn it these batteries are useless!" he continued swearing, trying to search for some batteries. As he continued to trip around the room, Amy stood, frozen, staring outside at the darkness occasionally lit up by a bright flash of lightning.
"Sebastian," Amy said. He paid no attention.
"Sebastian," She said again, a little more fervently. Again, he gave her no mind.
"SEBASTIAN!" this time she was shouting. He looked up at her, but then saw what she was looking at beyond. In the light of every lightning strike, he could make out in the distance what appeared to be a dark column out in the middle of the lake. After a moment of staring, he finally realized he was looking at a tornado on the lake, moving in their direction.
"Oh fuck me Amy we have to get to safety!" he grabbed his wife and started heading for the bathroom.
"There's no basement on this house! What are we going to do?" She was now in tears. As a child she had watched a documentary on tornadoes. They destroyed houses. That scared her, because she was in a house. Such were the inner machinations of Amy's mind. She ran over to Sebastian, and held him tight. Sebastian looked visibly annoyed.
"We'll get to the bathroom, it's the most interior room in the house." Amy nodded, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. As they walked out of the living room, Amy turned around and screamed. In the bright light of the lightning she could see the tornado was almost to their house, much closer than they had thought. The two turned and ran into the basement and quickly shut the door. Sebastian climbed into the tub, pulled Amy on top of him, and pulled the shower curtain over them both. They had been intimate in the tub many times before, but now the feeling was not of joy but of terror.
They heard a faint rumbling sound, which sounded like a nearby a freight train. It grew louder and louder, until it seemed like the sound itself would overcome the house. Soon there was the sound of breaking glass. The floor-to-ceiling windows in the living room had shattered. Sebastian thought of the cost of all of this, but then remembered he might die. Still, those were some damn expensive windows. The tornado was now over the house, tearing it to shreds with sheer natural force. The door to the bathroom was ripped open and the wall was pulled away from the rest of the house. The shower curtain flew up out of Sebastian's grasp into the funnel above them. He looked up in horror and realized he was inside of the funnel. Debris was flying everywhere. The two were only holding on by a mere bar on the side of the tub. Amy's legs were lifted into the air by the tornado.
"Sebastian!" she screamed, holding onto him by his hand.
"Don't let go, ever!" she screamed again. He didn't let go of her hand, but could feel her grip on his loosening. He unwisely let go of the bar to grab her arm with both hands, and felt himself get pulled up into the air. The two of them went flying into the funnel. Their screams were completely drowned out by the roar of the tornado. The house was completely obliterated, nothing but a memory. Suddenly, a cow that had been picked up by the tornado earlier came full circle around the funnel and hit Sebastian and Amy, killing them both instantly.
"That truly was one hell of a storm, man." Jason said to Randy as they surveyed the damage done. The tornado had had a very brief, narrow, but destructive path. It had quickly dissipated after destroying only one house on the lake and leveling some trees. Jason was fine, and in fact thrilled to get some excellent pictures of the tornado that, when sold, could help offset the noticeable hail damage done to his car. Randy didn't care about any of that. He was just glad to have his partner back in one piece. The two helped the rest of the cleanup crew sort through the house.
"It's amazing that this was the only house that was destroyed." Randy said thoughtfully, pulling apart some planks of wood atop a pile of rubble.
"Yeah, nature does odd things sometimes." Sharon was looking at some stumps of trees that had been leveled in the storm. "Does anyone know if there was anybody here during the storm?"
"There were no vehicles on the property, and we haven't found any bodies yet," Randy said. Unknown to the search party was the location of the car 50 feet out into the lake where it had been thrown the night before. The convertible hood had been down; Sebastian had forgotten to raise it before the storm. Randy sorted through more of the rubble before noticing something shiny. He pushed away some broken glass to find a small necklace.
"Hey, look, there's a diamond necklace here!" he lifted the necklace up. It sparkled in the morning light.
Sharon walked over and examined it. "That's not diamond, that's cubic zirconia. That thing's probably worth less than 80 bucks. I feel sorry for the wife whose cheap bastard husband bought her that." She dropped it back into the rubble. Randy looked at it, then walked away. They left the site. Nothing of importance had been found, and even when all of the rubble was cleared, there never would be.
But hey, it was a hell of a storm.