The Destruction

In my dream I hear the unmistakable sound of fighter jets. Outside Diane's small shack of a one room house and down her few rickety wooden stairs I watch, both fearful and excited, as one then another emerges from the horizon over the city, flying low enough to graze the ground.

The pilots are singular and robotic. On a mission, focused. They fly toward the ocean with such strange ferocity, I know something unimaginable and terrible is occurring.

Another sound, smaller but just as unsettling. A boater, civilian probably, blasts past us headed in the same direction.

Then the people start coming, yelling and panicked. No one will stop to tell us what's wrong. I think of turning on the TV, but imagining an alien invasion, I don't hold much faith in them telling me anything. Besides, there is no time, judging by the frantic exodus before us.

Finally someone yells, "There's a 100 foot wall of water coming. Nothing can stop it, we're all dead!" Nonetheless, he runs for safety.

Diane and I run up the stairs into the house to pack a few essentials. With less than 55 minutes until it hits, we are stuck trying to figure out what to pack.

"Take plastic bags, water bottles, food and a book!"

We search the shelf for the right book, the last one we may ever read, the one we may read over and over endlessly if we survive.