Chapter 47: Lily

The drone of rain against the rooftop slowly awakened Mary from her bittersweet dreams. Jack's warm firm body was pressed tightly against her. He was already awake, but he hadn't moved, instead choosing to let Mary continue to sleep on top of him. Now that she was awake, he didn't have to be still anymore. One hand that had been resting on Mary's lower back moved up to stroke her hair, "Good morning Mary."

With a sudden flash of embarrassment, Mary sat up and pulled her dress to cover herself. Even though he was her husband, and she had slept against him bare-chested the whole night, it still felt as if she had done something wrong. She slide one arm at a time back into the sleeves, being careful not to expose herself.

She didn't say anything, the dawning realization of the absurdity of her embarrassment was only making her face turn redder still. The loud constant beating of the rain made the silence between them even more obvious. Finally, she brought herself back, "Sorry Jack."

"For what?"

She moved to sit on the edge of the bed, with her legs off the side, "For sleeping on top of you. You must be awfully sore."

"Nothing a little moving around won't fix." He stretched, "You want something to eat? You've been sleeping in. I think it's almost noon."

"Really? Wow, I've never been much of one to sleep in before."

"Well, maybe you felt really safe tonight."

"Yeah."

Jack got up and went over to the kitchen, "How does eggs and toast sound? I'm not much of a cook."

"Well, just let me get changed, and I'll be in to help."

Jack worked making breakfast while Mary got out of her wedding dress and into some more normal clothes. He never realized before how long it took women to get dressed. He had already finished cooking by the time Mary was finished. They sat down at the table and ate. A loud thunderclap sounded for the first time, and the conversation quickly changed to the storm outside.

"Jack, do you think the animals are going to be okay in this storm?"

"They should be fine. I'll go check on them if you like. Make sure the barn is all properly closed up and stuff." Jack crammed the last bite of food into his mouth.

"The storm only seems to be getting worse. So, make it quick. I'll check the weather, see what this thing is supposed to be doing and if it's going to be getting any worse than it already is. Don't stay outside too long, or you'll get a cold from getting all soaking wet."

Jack got up and grabbed his cloak before he went out the door, "I'll just be a minute."

Outside, there was a strong wind that nearly made Jack lose his cloak right off the bat. He pulled it tight around him as the rain pounded away. Jack check the barn and the chicken coop, and being satisfied that they were all safely locked inside, rushed back into the house.

He took off the dripping cloak and laid it over a chair, "The animals are fine Mary, don't worry. No harm is going to come to them." His clothes were still pretty heavily soaked despite the cloak, and his pants were coated in mud. He looked over at Mary, "Sorry for bring in a mess, I'll clean it right up," Mary looked at him with a horrified stare that chilled Jack far worse than the rain, "What's wrong?"

Mary looked at Jack unblinkingly and raised one hand to point at the television. The voice of the weatherman could be clearly heard, "The good news is that it is headed towards a relatively uninhabited part of the coastland. But for those of you that have been following closely will know, there is a single town directly in huricane Lily's pathway. All telephone and radio communications to the small farming village, Mineral Town, seem to have been mysteriously cut off, and officials say that they have no way of knowing if the citizens have evacuated or not.

"Hurricane Lily, which only two days ago seemed like it was going to go safely out to sea and die out quickly changed it's course. Increasing in power rapidly, it has gone from a category one hurricane back up to a category four as it took a 180 degree turn back towards land. At this point, Mineral Town, the town which the whole country has been praying for has no chance to evacuate if they have not done so yet. They have just begun to feel the edges of the storm sometime early this morning. Hopefully, they realize the storm is a hurricane and will be able to batten down some before it hits and minimize loss of life. The full force of the hurricane will likely hit them sometime around midnight tonight."

"Midnight!" Jack cried out. "A hurricane? We have to warn the townspeople. We have only hours to try and make a building secure enough to survive the storm."

"Jack, what are we going to do?"

"I know what you are going to do. You are going to stay right here, where it's safe for now, and I'm going to go try and warn everybody." He grabbed his soaking wet cloak. What good it was going to do him, he didn't know, but he guessed it was just force of habit to wear a cloak in a storm.

"Jack, don't leave without your scythe."

"What? Why?"

"Because, it's the one of the basic points from my defensive plan. In a chaotic situation, the murderer is more likely to strike, and thus you should be on guard."

"Yeah, that sounds like a good idea." What else could Jack say? That there was no need for him to carry his scythe, because he was safe? No, he couldn't let Mary know. Everyday it seemed like she was getting closer and closer to finding out. He had to get them away from the town, "Mary, if we make it through this, I want us to leave this town. I want us to be safe, away from the killing. I don't want to lose you. I want us to be safe together."

Mary looked at Jack somewhat surprised, "You want to leave? But you love the farm!"

"I know, but I love you more, and I want to stay with you."

Mary didn't have to think about it for long, "If that's what you want to do, than we will leave. Now go, the town needs their hero." Jack couldn't help but admire the irony as he left.