"We Inch Forward" by Sloan Davis
Survivors of Hurricane Hugo said to take only sentimental things, things that can't be replaced with money, like photographs. This made sense. But at the time, everything seemed sentimental. Things, like the oak and iron bakers rack, which Tammy and I both pointed to at the same time at an antique market in Savannah, were all the more important because they wouldn't make the trip. The bakers rack was old, and we just knew somebody's great grandmother must have scooped ground hominy into her favorite bowl to make grits, some of it collecting into the thin wooden cracks.I pulled up to our house in my faded red truck, sucking on boiled peanuts and thinking of the time I taught Tammy how to bake French baguettes—how to lean her hip against the rack's oak shelf for balance while sifting flour through a strainer. In our quiet neighborhood plywood covered every window of every home, including our little white house, which made it look more like a crack house than a home. We had all moved barbecue grills, umbrellas and lawn chairs inside, as if we had given up on summer.The day before, I had to cut down Sam's tire swing from the mimosa tree. He was only five, so it was difficult to explain why it needed to be done, and how a hurricane could turn a tire swing into a flying missile. I promised him I'd put it back up when we returned, but I lied. I didn't plan on coming back.I stepped out of my truck and waved to Sam who played in the front yard. Wind whipped the mimosa branches, and the sweet scent of oleander rode the air. As I walked up the driveway Sam ran to the metal fence and put his little fingers through the gaps. Already at five he was a looker, with bright green eyes, and sandy blond curls that crawled all over his head, which made every woman that met him coo and cry with jealousy. Max, my drooling basset hound, stood on his hind legs and leaned against the fence next to Sam. They were buddies. I stepped over and rubbed both their heads.“Hey,” I said, “Mom still inside?”“Yes. Where were you?”Under Sam's smile, and around his tired eyes, I saw the tension of the last few days. Tammy had done a good job of scaring the hell out of him, not on purpose but by simply being stressed out herself. She'd been chain-smoking, telling us her Hurricane Hugo stories, about her friend drowning in the storm surge, and how we might lose everything we didn't take or nail down.“Had to get a few things. Here.”I handed Sam a little sweetgrass basket I picked up at Jimbo's store where I got my peanuts and a twelve pack. I had decided to leave the beer stashed in the back of my truck. “You can keep important things inside of that like your cat's eye marbles.”“Thank you.”He was a polite kid. If he had been mine, I would have taken him with me, but he was the incredible creation of Tammy and her old boyfriend, Curt.Curt had run off to St. Thomas a few years back to mix drinks, hoping for a ship, which is to say a rich lady. I never met Curt, but Tammy described him as a lazy son-of-a-bitch. Whatever Curt is or was, didn't really affect me, but it pissed me off that he ditched Sam.Sam rubbed his thin hand over the sweetgrass. I watched him finger each blade, as if it was his little guitar, and I felt a pang of guilt knowing I too would be going the way of his father. I would miss Sam walking around playing that plastic guitar of his. Seemed like only a few days before that I bought it for him.He was still in diapers when I first spotted them sitting on the patio of El Guapo's with the Charleston Harbor shimmering in the background. Tammy sipped a frozen margarita, and fed Sam soggy tortilla chips that she dipped in her water glass. I watched them from the inside bar, taken by that moment. Later, I would buy Sam's guitar at a side-street toy shop.“Are you ready?” I asked.Sam let Max sniff the basket. “Yes,” he said, but I could tell he was agreeing to something he was not completely sure of, even though we had explained the evacuation several times to him.“Good. Stay out here while your mom and I pack up the rest.”Sam nodded but kept his little eyes on me, as if to make sure I wouldn't leave again. He had this way about him, a look as honest and mature as anything I've ever seen from any adult, but purer, in that innocent way kids seem.I couldn't keep his gaze, and ducked under the carport into the kitchen through the side door. The plywood made our home feel like a sealed box. It was dark except for the living room light, and there was no air flow. I switched on the kitchen light, opened the fridge, and grabbed a soda. Against the wall, the bakers rack sat naked, with all of the canisters and cookbooks packed away. I rubbed my finger along the red oak.At the living room entryway I stopped. Tammy sat on the ottoman with her back to me. Her left leg shook violently over her right and the ashtray was filled with cigarette butts. The Weather Channel reported the latest hurricane news. The living room looked as though we had just moved in with boxes torn open or packed, and our furniture wrapped in plastic. On the TV screen, a satellite image of Hurricane Floyd showed the outer bands hitting Florida, but the eye was still out in the Atlantic. It was moving north, towards us.Tammy wheeled around. “Where have you been? Are you aware we're evacuating? You are a selfish son-of-a-bitch.”“Tammy, relax. I had to get a few things.” I looked at the TV but didn't mention the boiled peanuts or beer.She had been on me for days, ever since I lost another cooking job. I had a problem with commitment. At least that's how it was explained to me, and she didn't buy the fact that I might have been in the right. True, it was my third cooking job in under a year, but damn if I was going to commit to some strict military pecking order. I knew I was the best sauté cook in Charleston.“Doug, it's only our safety, but don't apologize or even worry about Sam and me. You do what you have to do.”“I'm here, okay? Let's just drop it.”We turned to the TV, and I sensed it was the only thing we shared anymore. It seemed that not only did I have a problem with commitment, but I never said I was sorry, about anything.The day I first met Tammy I could tell she was a single mother, the way she played with Sam as if the rest of the world didn't exist, and yet casting eyes from time to time. She was only twenty three. I was twenty eight and single again. Tammy's brown hair fell over her shoulders, and she flashed a nice overbite when Sam made her laugh. They reminded me of when my mother and I sat on a wharf on Long Island eating fried shrimp and raw clams. I wasn't much older than Sam at the time, but I recalled visiting my father's parents who wanted something to do with me even if he didn't, and I distinctly remember the salt air, the seagulls squawking overhead, and my mother laughing after she fed me my first raw clam. I guess my face said it all. It was under that recollection that I decided to walk out onto El Guapo's patio and buy Tammy and Sam's lunch.But that was forever ago, and we had hit that proverbial wall where all of my relationships ended up—splintered and ruined. I doubt she was even that upset about me losing another cooking job but just tired of me in general. All that week we had argued hard, and all the while Floyd went from a tropical wave off the coast of Africa to a fully charged hurricane. But we finally came to an understanding, or at least I did. I'd help her and Sam get out of Hurricane Floyd's way, and then I'd move on.The Weather Channel went to an interview with some government official. Tammy changed it, and we caught the local weatherman flipping through charts. He was overly excited, a bead of sweat glistened on his bald head. He set down the charts and said, “If you haven't already left you must do so. A mandatory evacuation means no emergency services will be available. This is not a storm you want to try and ride out. Get inland as far as you can. To put this into perspective, Floyd is now larger than Texas.”“Holy shit,” I said.Tammy turned to me and pointed to our disturbed home. “All this is gone. All of it will be swallowed up.”“Don't worry things will be fine.”Tammy watched me a second, shook her head, and turned back to the TV.I went and unloaded the fridge. I piled water bottles into the cooler, along with a few beers, and made sure all of our bags and boxes in the back of my truck were safely tied down. I found Sam waiting by the gate.“Run through the house and do a quick look over,” I told him. “Make sure you don't leave your toy guitar. And tell...” I stopped short. The memory of him first playing his little plastic guitar, in all seriousness, his little fingers plucking away while Tammy and I sprawled on the grass, her head on my lap, leapt into my head.Sam put his hand on the gate, as if to come to me.“Tell your mom it's time to go,” I said, and turned away. Tammy and Sam crammed into the Subaru hatch-back. It was me and Max in my truck, like the old days when we drove around the Smoky Mountains. I checked to make sure the handheld radio was turned on. We didn't have cell phones back then. My plan was to caravan until we got to Ashville, North Carolina. Once they were settled in a hotel, I'd drive to Knoxville.We drove down our quiet street. Tall palm trees stood sentry, guarding our retreat, and I felt kind of sad leaving them behind. We hit Dorchester Road and stopped—traffic. I looked up through the windshield and noticed a thin group of clouds coming from the south, but otherwise it was a windy summer afternoon. I glanced into the rearview mirror. A cigarette burned between Tammy's fingers as she held the steering wheel. I turned up the truck's radio and adjusted Max's window. The DJs reported traffic jams everywhere. While we were stuck, I spent the time looking into the rearview mirror and watching a dramatic battle take place between two action figures on the dashboard of Tammy's car. This went on until one lost, which I guessed when Sam opened one hand and dropped a defeated figure.I stroked Max's head and tried to find a way around the mess, but there was no jockeying for position. We couldn't move. Hundreds of cars were stuck in line to get onto the interstate.Nearly an hour passed before the DJs announced that County Road 52, which ran parallel to the interstate, was moving. I grabbed the handheld. “Are you listening to the radio? They say 52 is open. Should we turn around and take it? Roger-Victor-Over.”I tried for humor, hoping Tammy would catch onto the Airplane reference and joke along. It was one of our favorite films, or, used to be, before.“Fine.” No joking around.I swung a U-turn. We had to backtrack before we went north, but it felt good to be driving and all the lights flashed yellow, so we reached 52 faster than under normal conditions. It was crowded but moving.“Not bad,” I said into the handheld.“It's fine.” Tammy flicked a butt out the window.I got up to 35 mph and Max stuck his head out of the window. I could see I-26 to the west. It was log-jammed. The DJs reported that all traffic was at a standstill.“Not us pal,” I said, “we're moving.”But just as I spoke those words, the car in front of me slammed on their brakes. I slammed on my brakes. Tammy slammed on her brakes. Cars stretched into the distance. I stared out the windshield, looked to my left, and noticed the interstate was moving. I shook my head and grabbed a handful of boiled peanuts.Outside, something large fluttered above. I leaned out and spotted a military helicopter scouting the scene.Another hour went by and we might have moved the length of a house. Tammy and Sam handed a piece of paper back and forth—tic-tac-toe, Sam's favorite. The DJs announced the governor was considering opening I-26 southbound lanes since all of Low Country was tied up on the northbound lanes.I grabbed the handheld. “Let's take the exit and head back over to 26. We stand a better chance of moving over there.”“Jesus Doug, why?”I took a moment before I answered. “They're talking of opening the southbound lanes.”“Whatever, just make up your mind.”I ignored her, and pulled onto the grass to get past the three or four vehicles that were in the way of the exit ramp. Tammy followed. We were moving again and a few cars followed our lead. We cruised down Aviation Avenue, turned onto the entrance ramp, and didn't even make it onto the interstate.“Now what? Roger-Victor-Over.” I heard the sarcasm in Tammy's voice.“Just wait,” I said. “When they open the southbound lanes, the traffic will move.” I threw the handheld on the seat.Clouds built up, rolling in off the Atlantic in long bands. Time seemed to go into slow motion. We barely made it onto the interstate before stopping again. I grabbed a beer from the cooler—what the hell.People fretted on the radio because we were stuck, thousands of us, on a wide-open interstate with an enormous CAT-5 hurricane about to bear down. The wind was constant. On the radio, the DJs advised calm. They interviewed emergency personnel: head of police, directors of all sorts, the mayor, etc. It didn't work. People were scared. They leaned out windows, or stood next to open car doors, looking for answers. I wasn't as stressed as some. Maybe it was the beer. Because in a weird sense, a botched evacuation seemed appropriate. Leaving Charleston, leaving Tammy and Sam, should not have been easy. It should have been messy and mean.The bands of clouds grew thicker and darker. I glanced back and saw Tammy and Sam ignoring each other. They looked frustrated and tired. I picked up the handheld. “Tammy, you want to let Sam walk Max for a bit?”“That's fine,” she said. She lit another smoke and stared out her side window.I slapped my truck into park, got out, and put Max on a leash. Winds from the south blew steady, and there was a strong stench of car exhaust. I stood in the middle of the clogged interstate. From that vantage point I could really see what a strange scene it was. Every vehicle was packed with suitcases and bags. Some tied their possessions atop their car's roof. They reminded me of Okies in The Grapes of Wrath, heading to the promise land. Others walked around aimlessly, while others leaned into the windows of stranger's vehicles to chat. A couple of young guys threw a Frisbee over both lanes of stuck traffic. They had beers too and were making a party of it. Up and down the line people laid into their horns.I got to Tammy's passenger side window and knocked. Sam unrolled his window. “Want to take Max for a stroll?” I asked.“Can I, Mommy?”“If you're careful,” said Tammy. She didn't look at me.Sam leapt out of the car, took Max's leash, and ran for the ditch. Behind the ditch was a long stretch of woods. The traffic moved, so I went and pulled my truck forward before I walked down the slope, past Sam and Max, and headed over to the trees to find a quiet place to take a leak. On my way back, I tilted into the wind, and wondered how much time we had left. How much longer until we were up against Floyd? What should a person do if they were stuck on an interstate during a massive hurricane? I didn't think anybody prepared for that scenario.At the truck I grabbed my beer and leaned on the tailgate as if standing in the driveway. An old couple ahead of us argued as if they were in the privacy of their own home.“You don't know what you're talking about,” the old man said.“I know what I'm talking about, William. It's you who doesn't understand,” his wife countered.Man, I thought, a lifetime of fighting? No thank you.A police car flew up the southbound lanes with its lights flashing, while news helicopters fluttered about, reporting to the world our great neutered escape from Floyd. On the radio, an official warned that Floyd was moving directly up the coastline, and was now approaching Georgia. The storm's eye would arrive soon. It seemed surreal, almost like a war zone, and we refugees escaping an oncoming enemy. Another official called it the largest evacuation in American history. I looked at the bare southbound lanes and wondered who was in charge of our lives. Now and again, cars turned around in frustration and headed back to Charleston. The thought crossed my mind, but I knew Tammy would have nothing to do with it, and I had promised to get them to safety, so we were stuck.Tammy stepped out of her car, lit a cigarette, and leaned on the hood, and I thought, God, we look like two cowboys meeting in the center of town for a showdown—she leaning against her hood, me leaning against my tailgate. I waved for her to join me, and pointed to my beer. She didn't respond, but then, as if jerked awake by the absurdity of our situation, she strolled up slow and tentative.I finished my beer, dropped the can in the cooler and got two more. The clouds kept rolling in. Men stood at the tree line relieving themselves. Women walked shyly into the woods, and a bunch of kids chased each other in the ditch. Sam and Max checked out a black lab whose owner let run without a leash, and, I thought, that was kind of cool because the ditch had turned into a public park.“They should open the other lanes soon,” I said, and handed her a beer.“God, I hope so.”“Isn't it amazing though? I've never seen anything like it.”Tammy shrugged. I pretended not to notice her disinterest in my observations. I stared out over the endless line of automobiles. “We should be on our way soon enough.”“You can't wait to get out here, can you?” Tammy asked from behind her shades.The traffic moved and I used that as an excuse not to answer.We went to our vehicles and moved a car's length, no more. At the back of my truck, I pulled out the bag of boiled peanuts.We sat on the tailgate for a while and cracked peanut shells. I snuck glances at Tammy now and again as she watched her son play in the ditch. She set her sunglasses on her head, and wiped her eyes. I knew she was thinking how hard it must be on Sam. Tammy had always been a good mother, that was one of the things that drew me to her. She and my mother would have gotten along just fine, had my mother not passed away.“Hey,” I said, “I know it's been hard on you. I wanted you to know.” I stopped short, unable to get to what was on my mind.Tammy kept her eyes on me.I raised my head and stared at the growing cloud cover before taking a long sip of beer, and then went to the front seat and pulled out some crackers and spray-can cheese. I offered her a cracker.Tammy studied my face. “Well, aren't you romantic, big spender. It's almost like a date.”I sprayed cheese onto her cracker and smiled because I knew that teasing voice. “Well, I didn't want you to figure it out, but yeah, I set this all up.” I waved my arm around at the madness surrounding us.“You did good,” she said, “except for that old man who dropped his pants to his ankles to pee. That, I could have done without.”We laughed and sipped our beers, and I felt that uplift again. Tammy always made me laugh.We both kept a wary eye on the darkening sky, but didn't say anything. A man came on the radio screaming his head off in frustration. The DJs triedto explain, but couldn't get a word in.“Tell Mayor Riley he can forget my vote!” shouted the man. “Tell the governor too!”“We're sorry, sir,” apologized one of the DJs as if the mess was his fault.“Hang up,” the other DJ said before the radio went dead.Tammy and I laughed, looking straight at each other, laughing harder because the other one got it. But a second later, we both caught that Sam had stopped playing with Max and instead studied the darkening sky. Tammy set her beer down and ran into the ditch. My stomach did flips and I knew I should apologize for being a selfish jerk. Hell, even the DJ apologized.Tammy occupied Sam's attention while I pulled out Max's water and food dishes. The radio was nothing but complaints. Most hadn't expected this. They hadn't prepared to be stuck on the interstate for hours: no food, no water and many wouldn't use the ditch. Floyd was about to land on South Carolina's shore, and there was nothing we could do.I got out the egg salad and water that Tammy had prepared for us, and waved them over. Max sat underneath the tailgate waiting for Sam to rip the crust off his sandwich. Bands of Floyd, like long witch's fingers, stretched across the sky and wrapped around. We ate quietly, when all of a sudden Tammy set her sandwich down, walked over to the car behind us, and held the driver's hand. The woman had been crying. Tammy said something and the other woman laughed. A warm feeling ran over me. Tammy was something else.But the old couple in front of us interrupted.“William, you really are a helpless man, aren't you?”“Shut it, Lois, I've had about enough.”I shook my head and packed our little picnic. I considered walking over to the old couple to give them a taste of my mind, to let them know how hard it was on all of us, but Sam threw his arms around my leg and I froze, taken aback by his sudden affection.I rubbed his head. “Why don't you take Max into the ditch for one last walk?”“He's going to miss you,” Tammy said. I jumped because I hadn't heard her walk up behind me, but what I did hear was her honest voice, the one that always used to calm me because I knew Tammy was seeing things clearly for the two of us.I nodded, and looked away. The sky darkened as thicker bands made their way inland. I sat in my truck, and Max slept on the seat next to me. Tammy tried to get Sam to nap in the hatch-back.The handheld crackled, “Sam's too restless. I'm going to let him explore the ditch. Can he take Max?”“Fine by me.”I put Max on his leash, and handed the leash to Sam. I leaned back and rested my head. I nodded off. I tried to fight it for awhile, thinking who in their right mind could sleep at a time like that, but the long day and beer pulled me into sleep.I dreamed of the three of us boogie boarding at Folly Beach when a loud banging jerked me awake. Tammy pounded on the roof of my truck. The violence of it made me jump and lean away from her. Her eyes were insane, as if they had been ripped open. She didn't even see me.“What? What is it?”“I can't find Sam.”I looked around—no Sam. I climbed out of my truck and ran into the ditch.“Sam! Sam!” No reply.The wind whipped in circles, seeming to come from all directions. My stomach lurched. I ran toward the trees. At the woods I yelled until my voice cracked. All I heard was the tops of trees smacking against each other. I turned back to the interstate and almost got sick at the sight. The line of cars bended a little, straightened, and stretched into the horizon. North or south, it was the same thing.Tammy ran south, peering into parked cars. I ran back to the interstate and headed north doing the same. Rain hit my face. It was surprisingly cool. The cars moved forward a few feet and stopped. Panic raced through me because I knew if they open the southbound lanes Sam would be lost forever.I turned into the middle of the interstate and ran back toward my truck. The wind pushed against me. “Sam! Sam!”I pressed my hands against cars with tinted windows. Shadow faces looked astonished through the tint, but I didn't hide my fear of Sam being thrown into the back of a van.I looked toward the woods. It was dark and hopeless, but then something caught my eye. For a second I thought it might have been lightning, but I saw it again, a piece of reflecting silver. I knew what that was, and ran toward the woods as fast as my tired legs would carry me.At the tree line I lost sight of the flashing piece of metal. I plunged into the coolness of the woods. “Sam! Sam!” No response.“Max? Here boy. Max!”Max stumbled through the trees, dragging a large branch caught in his leash, the silver dog tag flipped back and forth as he struggled to walk. I untangled the branch, and looked Max in the eyes.“Where's Sam?” Max wagged his tail as if I was playing a game.I rushed through the woods. The wind thrashed the tree tops in a whirling roar, similar to thunder, and I thought, that's what a hurricane might sound like.I stopped to catch my breath and I heard something faint. I didn't breathe and listened hard—a quiet sobbing. I ran toward the voice, passed a large bush, and found Sam bent over a fallen tree, so only the back of his head and shoulders touched the ground.“Are you okay?”“My foot's stuck.”I leaned down, and sure enough his foot was wedged tight, held there by his own weight. The skin on his calf had been scraped pretty bad. I pulled him up, adjusted his leg, and slowly twisted his foot from its trap.“How the heck did you do that?” I asked, trying to sound funny, to make the poor kid feel better.He didn't answer, but sat down and rubbed his leg. Max walked up and nudged Sam's head with his nose. This caused Sam to cry and hug Max.“I don't want to leave,” he said. “I want to go home.”I sat next to him, and he leaned into me. I put my arm around him, and pulled him close. “It's only for a little while.”The wind and rain broke through the tree canopy, a roaring sound and instantly we were soaked. I jumped up. “But we have to get out of here, Sam. No time to lose.”He didn't move.“We'll be back before you know it and I'll tie up your tire swing just like before,” I said.“I promise. Okay?”Sam barely nodded.“Come on.” I pulled Sam to his feet, and grabbed Max's leash.We walked fast, hand-in-hand to the edge of the tree line and found Tammy standing in the ditch scanning cars. She too was drenched. The rain came down hard, blinding my sight. I yelled twice before she heard me. She ran straight for Sam.“I thought I'd lost you.” She dropped to her knees and kissed his cheeks. Then she pulled him into her, so close, that for a second I thought he disappeared again. And I was reminded of my mother holding me tight while we waited to load our bags into the bottom of a rumbling bus that took us away from my father's parents and back home.“Thank you,” Tammy said. She stood, pulled Sam up onto her hip, and kissed me. I closed my eyes at the feel of her wet lips, and though the world was exploding around us, I felt it rest just a little.I laid my arms over her shoulders. “I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.”The words, which I had been trying to say all day, came falling out under wind and rain. Tammy squeezed my hand and I felt something I hadn't felt in a long time, like something inside of me had been put to rest or smoothed out or opened up.From the south a loud whirling sound approached. I opened my eyes. A dozen police cars flew past, going north on the southbound lanes, their lights swirling, their sirens blaring—behind them thousands of cars. We were finally getting out of there, and not a moment too soon. Across the ditch from where we stood people up and down the line honked horns and flashed headlights in anticipation. Max barked at the noise as the four of us made our way back.