Free What Stands in a Storm by Kim Cross Page A

exquisite that they had been buried during World War I to protect them from the bombings, and later shipped to America. Inside, one of the largest pipe organs in northern Alabama echoed off the vaulted ceilings. Michelle had always dreamed of getting married there.
    Danielle worried about her sister. A student at Mississippi State University, Michelle lived in Starkville, a college town eighty miles west of the University of Alabama. Storms forming in Mississippi would hit her at least an hour earlier. The state had more than half a dozen warnings in effect, and an EF5 was pounding Philadelphia, a tiny town about sixty miles south of where Michelle sat studying in her apartment. Danielle’s phone was broken—the caller could onlybe heard on the speakerphone setting—so she texted her sister to check in.
2:52
Danielle
have u seen the storm in cullman?
2:52
Michelle
no.
2:53
Danielle
theres a huge tornado in downtown cullman we’re watching it right now on abc 33 40  go online
    Michelle and Danielle had a relationship straight out of a Hallmark card. Michelle, two years younger and two inches taller, looked up to Danielle, figuratively at least, and called her “my little-big sistor.” As military brats, the girls had seen each other through the hardships of deployment and relocation. Their father, an air force ground crew chief, had been sent to Iraq during the first Gulf War, and their hardworking air force mother held the family together when he was away. By high school the girls had lived in three states, and during the many moves they had learned to make friends easily but also let go and move on. The one constant was each other. When Michelle was a baby, her parents could not understand her first garbled words. Three-year-old Danielle would translate, and Michelle would nod as if to say, “Yep—that’s what I said!” When they were older, they’d test this unique ability in the bathroom mirror while brushing their teeth. Michelle would mumble through a thick lather of toothpaste; Danielle always knew what she said.
    Danielle had become like a second mother to Michelle, whom she had potty-trained, taught to ride a bike, and guarded fiercely. They were two sides of the same coin. Michelle was the sweet one, tall and willowy with sky-blue eyes, a guileless smile, and more book smarts than common sense. Danielle, shorter and built like a swimmer, had knowing eyes the color of almonds, a disarming smile, and the ability to smell bullshit a mile away. Danielle stood up to bullies and broke up fights, and got in the face of anyone who dared to tease her sister.Michelle hid behind her, followed her, and admired her for the traits they did not share. Danielle was a coxswain on the rowing team. Michelle played clarinet in the marching band. Danielle picked the biggest school in Alabama. Michelle preferred smaller Mississippi State. They had briefly considered sharing an apartment halfway between the two but couldn’t afford the commute.
    The sisters texted almost daily, but the last time they had spent time together in person was during Christmas at their parents’ house in Priceville, a small town on the outskirts of Huntsville. A rare Alabama snow had closed the roads, so Danielle couldn’t go back to work. The sisters pulled on parkas and ran out to catch snowflakes in the front yard. Feeling like kids again, they built a real-size snowman—not the dirt-colored midgets made with spatulas, which is usually all that can be made from a Dixie snowfall. They posed for a photo on either side of their “rock-star snowman,” made with pinecone eyes, a carrot nose, and a pine-needle mohawk.

    Danielle watched the funnel grow on the screen. Suddenly it appeared to divide into three, with two small tendrils swirling diagonally around a large central column. The weatherman called it a multiple-vortex tornado. It looked like a dancing strand of DNA, with a strangely