Haven from the Storm (Storms of Life #1) Read Free Page A

I would never…”
    I shrugged my shoulders in confusion.
    “You, my dearest grandson, have your head buried in the sand up to your rear end and are in for the shock of your life. I know you care for that girl and at one point in her life she cared for you. Now whether you can get back to that place is the question. However, this is not the time nor place to discuss it. C’mon, you can take me home and we’ll get you settled.” She turned to take her items to the clerk.
    “When did you become such a blunt know-it-all?” I asked with as much humor as I could muster.
    Grandma Violet just laughed as she paid the clerk. “You’ll find lots of things have changed around here. Dean, meet Adley. She lives in our house now.” She pointed to the clerk who was beaming at me.
    “Nice to meet you, Dean,” she said, jumping up and down with excitement.
    “Living with us? What happened?” I quietly asked.
    “Forgive Dean, Adley. I did teach him manners, I promise. He just seems to have left them behind at college.” She reached up and smacked me on the side of my head. I creased my brow at her in complete confusion. “I told you, things have changed. Death and destruction have a way of putting an end to many of the pointless pleasantries in life. You better get used to it, dear.”

Why was Dean back in Kolby? Why would he bother to come back to this God forsaken town? There was nothing here for him; he’d escaped this place and should have never looked back. Why show up now? Why show up when my resolve was set and my sentence was almost complete? I wouldn’t let seeing him put any doubts in my mind. Only five months left until graduation and then I’d be out of this town forever. I was sure I’d be a distance memory to him before that time; maybe I wouldn’t even have to see him again.
    I can’t believe he called me Sunflower! I didn’t want to see him again, especially after those comments I made. Did I really talk about how much time and energy I’d put into forgetting about him? Feeling that way was one thing, but I was completely embarrassed that I’d said it in front of him. But I had gotten M&M’s and a Heath bar. The chocolate would make me feel better, it always did.
    Violet hid his visit from me and I knew that she probably had this entire thing planned for months. No wonder she’d stopped trying to fill me in on Dean’s great college experience, but why didn’t Adley tell me he was coming? She lived with Violet, so she had to know he would be here. Violet owed me more chocolate.
    I had to stop focusing on him. I didn’t have the time or the energy to worry about his visit. I had my own life to deal with and that alone was enough.
     

     
    I hid in my secluded bedroom, doing my best to remain alone and far away from my father. After the tornado he had put all his efforts into remaining drunk and our house had never been fully repaired. Luckily volunteers from the Red Cross came and patched up the smaller damage, so it was at least livable. All except for my parent’s bedroom. That room was open to the outside where a small part of the wall was missing. Nothing in that room had been touched since Easton and Mom’s bodies were removed.
    Our little red farm house had never been the same.
    We were able to get items from the Red Cross so my father didn’t need anything that was still in that old room. I didn’t go to that end of the house. I didn’t look at it from the outside. I avoided that room all together. It held too many hurtful memories and too much regret, regret for what I could have done and how things could have been.
    My father stayed in Easton’s old room and I had taken over the den on the other end of the house, as far away from my father and all the old memories as I could get. When you looked at most of the house you could see remnants of the disaster, but my room didn’t look that way. I had completely transformed it so it served as more of a makeshift one room house than simply