Staring into the storm as it lowered on down through the heaving clouds, I imagined a whole desertful of sand up there, flying about. About to slice right through us. Everything living would be torn to shreds. Wild grit was flying through the air and landing in our hair, stinging our exposed skin. Ma tucked Hannah into her arms.
‘How long have we got?’ she shouted at Da. ‘Do we have time to get home?’
Da looked like he knew he’d cut it fine. He’d kept us out till the very last minute. He frowned and shook his head. ‘Of course we’ve got time. If we go now, and we don’t stop.’
He kicked the beasts into action. They were lazy, slouchy lizards but with the weather coming up even they were keen to get going. I’d never seen them so swift.
So we hastened home with the storm behind us and as much of our crops as we could carry in our baskets.
Al came walking alongside me. ‘Sometimes I could really hate Grandma,’ he said, softly, so that no one else could hear. ‘Not for all that she’s crazy and she shouts at us and does weird stuff. I mean, I could hate her for coming here in the first place. She had a good life on Earth. They were rich, weren’t they? And yet they had to come to Mars. Our lives could have been so different on Earth…’
Of course I’d heard Al going on like this before. He would start imagining what his life could have been like. On Earth, he would have been like a prince, maybe. He would have worn a cape of gold and gone walking in the rain. He would have had a yacht and gone sailing their oceans. He often came out with these dreams. That was just Al, though. He was my little brother. He was OK.
2
We only just made it.
The dust storm came roaring across the plain even earlier than we thought. We were loading the baskets into the store shed. First we knew, my brother Al gave a squawking shout of fear. We turned about and there they were: the worst storm clouds we’d ever seen. They rushed billowing out of the skies and they were in the fields of crops now. Destroying everything as they came.
Da spurred us on to unload the baskets and quickly secured the barn. I saw him look worriedly at the building. He was hoping it would stand up to the dust. If it didn’t, then we’d been wasting our time. And what about the Homestead? Would that stand up to the storm? But it had to. There was nowhere else to go.
We got home in time. Just as the eerie howling of the wind and dust could be heard like a threat rolling up the valley towards us. Ma hugged Hannah to her chest as she flung open the door of our home and we all toppled into our small house, finding it dark and still inside. I had never been so relieved in all my life.
Da was tethering the lizards into their pen at the back of the house. The creatures would have to take their chances in the storm.
Inside the Homestead, we found stuff ruined, flung down, torn into bits. Some of Ma’s good rugs and wall coverings had been rent apart. Pots and dishes had been smashed on the tiled floor of the kitchen. There was a strange, nasty smell.
None of us had to wonder who had messed the place up while we were out. It was always Grandma who did bad stuff like this as soon as our backs were turned. Although we were used to her strange goings-on, the wreckage was worse today. Da said it was likely the old lady had been super disturbed by the scary noises of the rising storm. I saw Ma break down in tears in her kitchen when she thought no one was looking.
Al and me went round upstairs, finding more damage, looking for Grandma in her favourite hiding places. Toaster was busying about already, putting things to rights and cleaning up the mess she’d made. ‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ we heard him say in his singsong voice. ‘Someone has had a busy day. Oh dear!’
Upstairs, through the thin roof covering, the sounds of the approaching dust storm were louder. Closer. More ominous. Al looked pale as he lit the lamps. He knew that the natural daylight coming through our windows would vanish, all of a sudden, very soon. None of us wanted to be sitting in the dark when the dust came.
‘Grandma, are you in there?’ Al asked, sounding such a scaredy-cat now, I wanted to push him aside and yell at her myself. I didn’t feel like she was venerable or historical. I felt like she was a dumbass old woman who was making our lives hell. She was giving Ma way more work and heartache than she needed to have.
‘You better get out of there, Grandma,’ I said, pounding on her door. ‘Come on. Open up. Da says it’s best if we’re all together, downstairs. He wants us all gathered together.’
‘Go away,’ came the old lady’s voice. Now she sounded weak. But I knew she was just weaseling. She was scared we’d be mad about the mess she’d made. Now she was turning back into being the sad old lady who wouldn’t do nothing wrong.
‘Please, Grandma,’ said Al, in his most winning voice. He knew that Grandma had a special soft spot reserved for him. He knew he was the best at getting her to behave. Apparently he was just like her brother at that same age. Her lost brother, the fantastic hero, Thomas. Sometimes when Grandma was crazy confused, not even knowing what year she was in, it was like she thought her Thomas was still with her. Al didn’t mind.
The door opened and she stood there, in her nightgown smeared with ashes. She had eyes only for Al.
‘Dust storm’s coming, Grandma,’ Al said, though it was kind of pointing out the obvious. By now the noise was pounding through the whole house. The windows had gone dim already. When I looked at the landing window there was a grainy fuzziness out there, like the haze on a broken monitor.
Grandma’s expression went clear like she briefly stopped being mad. She said, ‘Did you rescue the crops?’
Al nodded. ‘Yes! Yes, we did it. Well, we got some of them. Enough, Da thinks.’
Grandma looked down at her hands. ‘That’s good,’ she said. ‘I wish…’
‘Come and sit with us,’ said Al. ‘Ma’s making some broth and some soda bread.’
As he led her away, Grandma said, ‘I wish I could have helped you all.’
‘Hush, now,’ Al said, taking her towards the wooden stairs. I followed on behind, listening to the skittering and tapping noise on the tarp roof of the house. I was feeling bad, I guess, because I couldn’t feel sorry for Grandma. I felt kind of cold inside about her. I just didn’t care as much as Al did anymore and I thought that probably made me bad.
Downstairs Da had gathered everyone around the table where we ate our meals and prayed together each day. ‘Lora,’ he told me. ‘Come and sit down with us. Look, we’re all here. You sit with us now. Remember – nothing bad can happen to us. Not when we’re all together.’
That time, at least, this was true. Nothing bad happened to us that night. None of our family was hurt or killed by the storms that raged till the next dawn light came.
I don’t think any of us slept except Hannah and Grandma. We stayed together in our kitchen as the walls were battered. It was as if wild creatures were out there, trying to come inside to get us.
I think we sang every song we knew that night. When it seemed we had run out of singalong songs, Ma played her harp. It was a miniature harp, all gold, and she kept it wrapped in cloth underneath her and Da’s bed. It always made me feel drowsy, and half-awake, the liquid strings sent me dreaming of the rivers and seas of Earth. I had heard the grown-ups talk of such things, and I had even seen pictures. And I dreamed about them on music nights.