I’d been a nurse for a long time, so I knew a little bit about death and dying. How the body deteriorates and falls apart. But I’d always heard that floaters were different. By now I would have been a bloated carcass, discolored and distended. Maybe nibbled on by enough fish to be indistinguishable as either a man or a woman.
“Ugh.” I didn’t like the thought of being mistaken for a guy, even in death. I sat up. Lucky was still beside my bed. He’d become amazingly loyal to me.
Since the water wasn’t working, which meant no flushing, I went into the yard with the dog. That’s when I noticed that the fence had collapsed between my yard and the one behind me. The one with the swimming pool. So I got a bucket, a towel and a bar of soap, and in short order I was bathed, my hair was clean, and I had two big buckets of water sitting next to my toilet, ready for action.
Now what?
I knew there were some people still around. I’d heard voices this morning, and the sound of a truck engine. But I’d lain low. That’s because I’d also heard gunshots last night, and whether it was the good guys or the bad guys, I didn’t want to be a part of it. So I sat in my front window and peeped through the blinds, not sure what to do with myself until I saw old Mr. French open his shutters and lean out his door to peer up and down the street.
I yanked up my mini-blinds and waved to him. He shrank back at first, then waved when he recognized me. “You okay?” I yelled.
“Yeah. But there’s no water to flush the toilet.”
“I’ll be right over.”
I brought him my pail, then took two buckets he gave me and filled them from the pool. It turned out that he and I, plus the hippie couple on the corner, were the only ones still in our block. I knocked on their door and told them about the swimming pool. In turn they told me that Washington Square Park in the Marigny had become a sort of Rescue Central. There wasn’t a lot of food and water, but what there was, people were sharing. Despite the panic and looting during the first few days after the storm, things were calmer now, and the vibe in the park was good.
“What about the evacuation order?” I asked.
Enoch, skinny and dreadlocked but with a baby face, grinned. “As long as you have ID with a valid address and a dog, they don’t hassle you. They don’t know what to do with the dogs, so most of the time, unless you’re homeless, they just look the other way. The National Guard dudes are cooler than NOPD, though. The cops are, like, totally wigged out.”
“That could be because they’ve been on duty a lot longer,” I said. “Plus a lot of them probably lost their homes, too. With the phones down, they might not even know where their families are. The National Guard soldiers don’t have to worry about any of that.”
“True,” his girlfriend, Sarah, said. “But the cops are still out there, and every one of them is ready to snap. So avoid them whenever you can. Stick to the streets that cars can’t drive down.”
“We’re heading down to the park in a little while,” Enoch said. “Want to come with us?”
So I got Lucky and we went.
There’s something strangely disconcerting about seeing mega-armed soldiers patrolling your neighborhood, especially with helicopters buzzing overhead like ominous mosquitoes. We zigzagged through lower Marigny, trading our storm stories.
“It was supremely hairy,” Enoch said. “People streaming through our neighborhood, coming up from St. Bernard and the Lower Ninth Ward. They were, like, totally freaked. Terrified.”
“It was awful,” Sarah added. “Some of them had seen their own relatives and neighbors drown. That’s how fast the water came up down there.”
“We gave them stuff to drink, but most of them kept going.”
“To the Superdome,” Sarah said with a shudder. “And then to the Convention Center.”
“Man, that was one bad scene.”
“Have you had any trouble with looters?” I asked. “Stuff like that?”
“It was pretty scary at first,” Enoch said. “Gangs with guns just roaming around.”
“My friend, Katya, lives in the Quarter,” Sarah said. “She told me that when some radio station announced that there was no more 911, that the cops couldn’t come to help you, right away people passed the word, shouting down the streets like telegraphs or something.”
“Yeah,” Enoch said, gesturing with his hands. “The scumbags passed the word. ‘There’s no 911. The cops won’t come.’ That’s when the serious looting started. Not food and water, but stereos and TVs, cell phones and computers.”
“And liquor and drugs and guns,” Sarah added, her brow creased.
Enoch nodded. “For a while there it was like the Wild West. We heard some serious gun battles.”
“Between gangs?” I asked.
“Yeah. And between cops and thugs, too. But in the last couple of days the shooting has eased up,” he added.
“That’s good,” I murmured. “I guess I was lucky to be in a flooded area. Everybody was worried more about not drowning than about looting their neighbors.” Except, of course, for me. I had wanted to drown. But not anymore. At least not at the moment.
Finally we reached the wide neutral ground on Elysian Fields and crossed to Washington Square. I’d been in the park many times, but not this Washington Square. The calm, shaded green space was littered with live-oak branches. At least the iron fence around it had survived without much damage. But the gates were padlocked shut around its green devastation. A lot of the branches had been cleared away. But no one was in the square. Instead, a series of impromptu tents, tarps, tables and chairs had sprung up on the sidewalks around it wherever there was shade. A big Red Cross flag marked a first-aid station, and a military truck filled with water jugs had a line in front of it.
The main thing, though, was the smell of coffee. Coffee!
We agreed to meet in an hour or so and walk back home together. While they headed for a circle where a trio of guys were playing drums, Lucky and I followed our noses to the food tent. There a tattooed guy and a nun were serving up coffee and sympathy. The guy poured a saucer of water for Lucky. “He’s a happy fella.”
“Yes. Considering that he almost drowned, he’s doing pretty well.”
“And how about you?” the nun asked.
“I’ll be better once this coffee gets inside me. Thanks.”
“What about food?” she asked. “Are you eating enough? We still have grits and oatmeal left, and there’ll be red beans and rice in another hour or so.”
I shrugged. “I haven’t been too hungry lately.” In fact, my pants were getting pretty loose on me. “But I have a small stash of food at home, so save your stuff for someone who really needs it.”
I stood there a while, sipping my coffee—strong but with no milk—and getting the lay of the land. It reminded me of Jackson Square, where artists gather alongside the fence. This was an odd mix of people, locals and military. But after my several days alone in Sherry and Bradley’s house, it felt good to be around other folks.
“Say,” the tattooed guy said. “If you’re not doing anything, you want to help out?”
“Sure. What do you need?”
He thrust a tray full of coffee cups at me. “Take this over to the medical tent. We try to keep them supplied. Then if they need water, go stand in line at the water truck.”
It felt good to have something to do. Lucky was an angel, sticking close to me in the shifting crowds, and I didn’t spill a drop. The medical personnel, distinguished