Sea by Heidi Kling Page A

I leaned in to hear the rest.
    “I had no choice but to run. To leave her behind. I climbed up a banana tree and hung on tight as muddy ocean rose around me. Many people go past me. And some already quiet.”
    She lowered her voice. Her face was broken.
    “Finally, when I cannot hang on any longer, the water falls back to the sea. When I climb down, for days and days I look in the camps for my mother and for my sisters. One of my sisters is here at the pesantren with me. But not the sister I lost. I never found that sister again.”
    Vera put her arm around the girl and spoke quietly, letting her talk and cry.
    “It’s not your fault,” Vera said in English before translating. “You were a hero for trying to save your sister. You are a hero for saving yourself.”
    The girl’s eyes widened. I could tell Vera’s words really helped her and I believed they were true too.
    I set the camera down without taking a picture.

THE TEMPEST
    I screamed. But this time not from a nightmare.
    Lightning flashed through the pitch-black room like a strobe light, followed by a massive crash of thunder.
    It had to be the middle of the night.
    After a long first day of the emotional art therapy with Elli and then the super-sad teen therapy group, I was completely drained by bedtime and quietly cried myself to sleep replaying the girl’s story in my head to the melancholy beat of the rain pounding on the roof
    And now this.
    Rain poured through the narrow slits in the shutters, leaving half my bunk soaked. Elli was so afraid, she jumped up onto my bunk and clung to me.
    “It’s okay, sweetie. It’s just a thunderstorm,” I said, but her face was soaked with tears. The sounds of the other girls’ cries were drowned out by the heavy thunder. Rain hammered against the window so hard, I was afraid the shutters might blow off their hinges. “We better move,” I said.
    I slid down, Elli clinging to my neck. I yanked on the string and the light sparked once, pulsed and then fizzled out. Great. Following the whimpers, I stumbled across the floor, finding half of the kids huddled together on a lower bunk, looking scared to death. Meanwhile, the rest of the kids were slowly waking up wondering what all the fuss was about. They didn’t seem to be fazed by the storm at all.
    Strange.
    Then I realized my bare feet were wet. Water was leaking in from somewhere. “Crap,” I muttered.
    I sat Elli down with the other kids and investigated the leak with my flashlight, which thank goodness was easy to find under my balled-up hoodie pillow. I pointed up at the ceiling, but aside from old water damage and mold it looked okay. Then I shone the light at the front door.
    “Get some towels—uh, get some clothes.” The girls didn’t understand me, so I grabbed a bunch of my stuff—T-shirts, one sweatshirt, an already-damp striped towel—and shoved them into the crack of the front door, hoping to stop more water from pouring in.
    There was a loud crash of thunder and the girls shrieked; it sounded like it was right outside the door. Lightning flashed across the dorm room again, the shutters flapping open and then slamming shut with the heavy wind. My barricade wasn’t working: the water was soaking right through the material. What was I supposed to do?
    I bit my lip and made a decision.
    “Okay. Everybody up. Move over and climb onto that bed; it’s farthest from the window and the safest place to wait out the storm.”
    The huddled girls didn’t budge, so one at a time I picked them up and carried them across the room, setting them on the top bunk. Elli wouldn’t let go of me, so I was doing double duty, balancing two girls on my hips. The rain beat the roof like hail.
    “Okay,” I said as I got the last girl on the top bunk. “You guys stay here.” I held up my hand for emphasis. “Stay. Here. I’m going to go find some help.” My dad said the storm might be bad, but I didn’t think he meant this bad.
    Elli was still clinging to me,