I love this time of year. The longer nights are easier to take when there are twinkling lights and candles to brighten the dark. Good food, family and friends – it’s a time for hygge and cozy sweaters and warm cocoa.

This is the last month I’ll be offering a free story here on this website – but stay tuned for news about my soon to come Substack newsletter. Supporting members will have access to stories as I work out the story arcs in my urban fantasy series.

For now though, curl up with a warm drink and enjoy this December story set in a small town on the plains. The winds are blowing and the tumbleweeds are rolling down the streets.

No Ill Wind

by Heather Ormsby ©2022

Young Jake stood on a chair at the kitchen window and watched, mesmerized, as the gales of wind tore through his neighborhood streets. The west end of their street was open to the Rocky Mountain ridgeline and the winds seemed to be blowing straight down the mountain sides and across the prairie fields and right to him.

The whole month before had been dry with no snow, or even a drizzle of rain, and landscape that had been dust and brown grasses and weeds was now blowing all around his house. 

Tumbleweeds were rolling down the road at fifty, sixty miles an hour, as though they were race cars zooming past. And they would not stop. Where could they have all come from, Jake wondered, as he watched the tangled bundles of dry plant stems and branches, ripped free from their roots, and fly through the air.

Some were nearly as tall as he was at four feet, and they would get caught against fence lines and sides of houses and under cars. But most just flew by in a straight line from west to east in the constantly gusting wind.

There were other things blowing by as well. Jake saw neighbors trash cans, Christmas lawn ornaments, porch chair cushions, even some plastic planters crashed by. He watched a bird, a young falcon, try to navigate its way across the wind before it just went down – likely to hunker in a tree.

Hopefully that tree would remain standing. The Johnson’s wood fence across the street was starting to fall over. Treetops and bushes were whipping back and forth in the air and getting an unintentional trimming.

Jake looked west and could see a line of clouds that were a light gray move towards him like a wall. Beyond them was blue sky all the way to the mountain tops.

“Here, Jake. Sit down and eat your oatmeal.”

His mother sat down on a chair near him with her own breakfast, and he turned to his bowl full of oats, cinnamon, butter, and a sprinkling of brown sugar. His mouth watered and he picked up his spoon and dug in.

While they ate, they would hear things hit the house and windows as they blew past. His mother would flinch each time, but she never looked up. “Time enough after the storm to tally the damage,” she’d said when he first mentioned they should check on the shed in the backyard that had always been a bit flimsy. She had already brought in the Christmas wreath from the front door, and it sat now propped up against the wall in the hallway.

“Is this what it’s like to be in a hurricane?” Jake asked as he took a sip of his orange juice.

“I’ve never been in a hurricane, but they said on the news that these were hurricane strength winds. I’d imagine a hurricane would have rain too to reckon with. I just hope these don’t turn into tornados.”

“Have you ever been in a tornado?”

“I’ve been close and have seen a funnel cloud from a distance. And I’ve seen the damage. That’s why we live in a house with a basement we can run down to if that should ever happen here.”

Jake lay his spoon in his empty bowl and his mother picked up the dishes and took them to the sink. 

“I’m going to have another cup of coffee and then I can help you with that school science project.”

“Awww.”

“You can play your Minecraft game when we get some work done. Just because it’s Saturday doesn’t mean you don’t have things to do. You’ll be grateful when it’s the night before the project is due and you’re not up until midnight racing to get it done like your friends.”

Jake’s shoulders slumped. “Okay.”

That’s when the power went out. There was no playing computer games anyway with the juice off. The science project was more of an arts project with painting Styrofoam balls to look like planets for a model of the solar system.

By six that evening, the winds had died down. The power wasn’t back on yet, but Jake’s mom called the area restaurants and found a few that still had power.

Jake was excited. They didn’t usually get to eat out. And when they did, Jake was able to order things that his mother would never fix, like French fries. 

When his dad came home from work, he first had to check the yard, shed, and fencing to see what had blown in and what had blown away. They were lucky their fence had stayed put. They found a package that had been delivered to a neighbor two blocks over that had blown into their yard. Jake thought they’d be pretty happy when they dropped it off on their porch. It might be a Christmas package.

There were a lot of tumble weeds that had gotten stuck to their fence or were bunched up against the west side of the house. His dad said he could help him with cutting and mulching the weeds up the next day when the sun was up. 

“Can I wear leather gloves when we do the yard work tomorrow?’

“Yep. The tumbleweeds will be stickery. Gloves will be a good idea.”

Jake like working with his dad. And if the power comes back on, there will be football to watch in the afternoon. Sundays were good days.

They got cleaned up and got into the car to drive to the restaurant. Dad decided on a barbecue place and Jake thought he’d ask if he could get a whole slab of ribs. The sauce was so good – sweet and spicy.

There was a bit of a line when they got there – other people had lost power and couldn’t cook dinner either. They sat on the lobby chairs and waited for their table to be ready and talked about the day.

“Did you see the video posted on Facebook?” someone asked Jake’s Mom.

He showed Jake’s parents and then Jake saw it to. It was video of the tumbleweeds blowing down the street as fast as anything. His dad, who hadn’t been home to watch it, was impressed by the spectacle.

“That’s something to see,” said a young woman standing near them. “I heard that the big tree in the town park blew over in that wind.”

Jake jerked his head up. “The one with the lights? The town Christmas tree?”

“That’s the one. It just couldn’t stand up to that wind.”

His forehead wrinkled in thought. It didn’t seem right that a Christmas tree should get blown over.

“It’s ok, bud,” his dad said. “We can always replant a tree. Some people had real damage done to their homes. We were pretty lucky.”

“Yeah,” Jake said, without conviction. He had loved that giant tree. And when the twinkle lights were on, it lit up the whole square where people gathered to hear carols and drink hot cocoa bought from a nearby stall.

He was subdued enough at the table that he didn’t argue when his dad said he could order only half a rack of ribs. As it was, he was stuffed from eating those and the coleslaw and biscuits. It was probably best he hadn’t had more.

When they got home the lights were back on but it was late and Jake was tired, so he didn’t push for any television time. When his dad came into his bedroom to say goodnight, he pushed the hair back from Jake’s forehead.

“Are you feeling alright, Jake?”

“Dad?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think we could help those people tomorrow? The ones you said who had more damage done to their homes?”

His dad looked down at him thoughtfully. 

“It might cut into our football time.”

“That’s ok.”

“Sure, then. It’s a very generous thing to do, son.”

The morning was bright and cool, and blessedly free from wind, other than a gentle breeze. His mom fixed them all scrambled eggs with ham and toast. 

“You’ll need a good breakfast before going out and working hard.”

Jake nodded and ate everything on his plate.

After breakfast, he jumped down and ran out to the garage to get the leather work gloves his dad had given him. His dad loaded a chain saw, clippers, his toolbox, and a big ball of twine into his truck. Then they were off to visit some people at the other end of town that their pastor had said needed some help with cleanup.

When they pulled up to the address, Jake saw that a tree had fallen onto the house and garage. It took all morning, but his dad and several other neighbors got the tree cut up into smaller pieces and off the roof so that a repair crew to get to work. Jake helped with bundling up the small branches and putting twigs into a slash pile to be burned later in a fireplace or made into mulch.

The elderly couple that lived there were very grateful for the help and Jake felt good about helping them out.

When they were ready to leave, Jake sat in the truck while his dad chatted some with the other men. Then he climbed into the truck, smiled at Jake, and drove home. When they got there, his dad said to go on inside and help mom out with getting dinner together. 

“There’s something I’ve got to take care of, but I’ll be home in a couple hours, in time for dinner. You can finish watching the football game for me and let me know how it goes.”

“Ok, Dad.”

Jake was a little disappointed. Watching the game was a ritual he and his dad had together on Sunday. But he saw that his dad was taking his tools with him, so maybe he had someone else to help.

Jake went in and told his mom that dad would be back a bit later. He sat down to watch the last quarter of the game, but he was worn out from the work outside, and with the crowd noise setting a soothing background, he fell asleep on the couch.

His mother woke him after the game ended and he helped with dinner by peeling the potatoes and setting the table for dinner. She was just setting some bowls of food on the table when the truck pulled into the driveway.

His dad came in and smiled. He looked tired, but when he sat down to eat he suggested that they go down to the town park after dinner.

“Just to see how things are down there. Honey, this sure looks great. I’m so hungry I could eat a whole steer.”

Jake’s mom smiled.

After dinner, they cleaned up and then they all got into the truck

When they came close to the park, Jake could see a glow of lights up ahead. He looked anxiously out the window, wondering if the tree had been okay after all.

When they parked and then walked to the park’s center, he could see then that the lights weren’t from a tall tree. It was a giant wreath of evergreen boughs placed on a stand and platform. The wreath was lit up with twinkle lights and it had a big red bow at the bottom.

Jake looked, but he couldn’t see the tree anywhere. All he saw was the remains of a stump behind the propped-up wreath. The air was thick with the scent of pine.

“What happed, Dad? Where’s the tree?”

His dad chuckled. “You’re looking at it! Me and the guys worked on this the rest of the afternoon. Put up the tree and arranged it all out as a wreath.”

His mom wrapped her arms around his dad’s waist. “That’s a real nice thing to do.”

“Wow, Dad.”

“We’ll get a new tree planted this spring. But it will take some time to get as tall as our old tree.”

“Yeah. This is cool, though.”

They went and bought some hot cocoa, and then walked around the square, visiting with others who had come out to see the lights. A group of carolers from the high school started to sing and lots of other people joined in when they knew the words.

Jake wondered how such happy feelings could come from a destructive windstorm. But he had enjoyed the day and looked forward to Christmas coming. The lights from the wreath should light up the dark prairie enough for Santa to see their town for sure.

The End