The closet allowed her a moment of respite. A break from the sea of humanity bulging through the convention center doors since sunup. At 6 a.m. there were around 2,000 people collapsed on cots and standing numbly in registration lines, by noon roughly 5,000, and numbers like 8,000 were floating around by early evening when the Chronicle called. Eight thousand frightened people clutching children, cradling pets, crying loudly without shame or too shocked to say anything at all, everyone wringing water from their clothes and hair.
The media vest she wore bore the red cross signifying international aid and because of this, the weary approached her. They pled for wheelchairs, they begged for medications, they worried aloud about family dogs gone missing in flood-filled ditches. At some point a child was lost amongst the throngs but eventually located by a police officer.
Wendy was woefully unprepared for this sort of thing…this crushing need. It was bigger than her, larger than anything she had experienced. She had been naïve to think she’d be helping in her own way by giving interviews about one of the greatest natural disasters in US history. Sure, she’d spoken with ABC, CBS, NPR and the Wall Street Journal, but she had no idea where those wheelchairs were. “Wow, look at you” texts from her husband made it worse. She was an imposter humanitarian; a fake.
Wendy hastened toward the closet door when the Chronicle reporter called. She pried it open, maneuvered around some supply boxes and sat on the floor, the weight of the day in a heap on dark gray carpet. She ran her pen back and forth over her notebook, doodling while insisting to yet another journalist that yes, there were sufficient cots ordered for flood victims.
She was wrapping it up when he entered. A man of about 30, with brown hair and dark eyes, wet like everyone else but very much in control of his emotions. Confident. In fact, she assumed he was a Red Cross volunteer, but there was no vest. He carried a large box in his arms and a duffle bag was looped over his shoulder.
“Hi, I’m Larry.” Wendy glanced at him and motioned that she’d be off the phone momentarily. When she finished the interview she returned the greeting. He sat next to her on the floor, dropping the sleeping bag and box.
“Hi, I’m Wendy. Are you a volunteer?”
“No. I just came in.”
“You mean, from the floods?”
“Yep.”
Wendy looked again. Absent from this man’s face was the stress bearing down on the thousands of other faces she had seen all day. He was almost happy.
“Are you okay?” she asked.
“Well, it’s been a tough day,” he reflected. “A tree went through my roof, killing my dog. I’d have stayed at my girlfriend’s but she broke up with me last week. So I thought I’d hang out here.”
Larry shared these things like he was recounting what he had for breakfast. No grief for his pet, his lost relationship, or even what was left of his house.
“Would you like a Bible?” he asked, shuffling through the box. Wendy’s eyes immediately darted to his arms, lost in the box as he quickly grasped for what he said was a Bible but what she was hoping wasn’t a gun. No firearms were permitted in shelters but if he carried himself out there as he did in here, a well-meaning volunteer could mistake him as one of his or her own.
“I’m good. I have a Bible at home,” she replied.
“Oh, please take one. I have plenty. This one is a paperback and easy to carry.”
Not wanting to offend, she accepted the stranger’s gift.
“You know,” he said, eyes intent, voice lowered, “storms will come and man’s plans will die, but the love of Jesus Christ goes on forever. We don’t need to fear anything when we have God.”
Wendy glanced at the door, wishing someone, anyone would walk in. Larry seemed harmless enough, and that born again experience in college helped her understand his thinking. But she was uncomfortable alone on the floor with this man. How had he gotten past registration? It was probably easy enough as the numbers of flood victims crushed through the doors.
“Will you do me a favor,” Larry asked. “Will you pray with me?”
Well, this was a first that day, Wendy thought. Wheelchairs, lost children, reporters already trying to dig up dirt on what was going wrong when so much was going right. Now a stranger on the floor of a closet wanted her to pray with him.
Then she remembered: Imposter. Fake.
She allowed him to take her hands. They bowed their heads. Perhaps she could offer comfort. Yes, Wendy could make one person out of 8,000 feel just a little better that night. This is why she was here, right?
Maybe...just maybe she wasn’t a fake after all.