They say that to live through this, we find the most central room in the house and lock ourselves in. Fresh water is a must, and my sister-in-law calls and tells us to buy bottles and freeze them. They'll work like an icebox, she says, keep those perishables, at least for a while. My husband nods and says oh my and shakes his head and says oh what a good idea that is, keep the milk from spoiling. And I'm thinking that we're an hour away from cramming into a half bath with our four-year-old. I'm thinking about how we'll be there at least a day and that I wouldn't have moved here if I had known this could happen and I could give a shit about the milk.

Bob has this frantic look on his face and he boards up the windows like he's never picked up a hammer before. I want to call him honey or sweetheart and tell him that it's okay, that the windowsills are expendable and that every nail, every piece of wood, keeps us safer than the preceding one.

But I let him keep working, and instead guide our son from room to room. We take down everything on the walls, and to him, it's a game. I tell him to find good hiding spots for anything I hand him: small picture frames, tiny knickknack animals, a plate my mother gave me when I moved out of her house for the last time. I put what I can into boxes, as though that will protect anything. I watch my son slip photo albums behind the dressers and tuck a glass lion between the couch cushions. I think about months from now, how we might find something unexpected in a jacket pocket. A good mother wouldn't resent any of this, so I'll do my best and smile and line everything up neatly again someday.

Bob keeps pounding away and I hear the rain beginning to fall. There are full seconds between the drops hitting the ground outside, and they sound plump and lovely, like something out of a movie. Bob's sister insisted that the storm would beat through our house like a freight train, but I know she's wrong. She's one of those people who talks about the end of the world like it's this bad thing, but that's because she doesn't pay attention. I think that the roof could blow away or everything I own could float off to sea, and it wouldn't so much matter. I'm more worried about the three-dozen toys we'll have to use to keep my son occupied and the way Bob will insist on taking up more space than he really needs and whether all our supplies can fit under the sink. I know his sister is wrong. It's not the end of the world: it's the right before, those seconds or minutes or hours that can really break a person.