• She never thought she'd fall in love. In particular, she never thought she'd fall in love with a human. But love comes upon you suddenly, hard and fast as gale-force winds.

    She devoured houses, and fields, and livestock and so many bodies, men and women and children, were left mangled in her wake. Look, she wanted to say, to that dark-haired little Texan girl with the grey-green eyes. Look how beautiful I am. Look how strong I am. Look what I have done, for love of you.

    But she lacked the mouth to speak, and the language with which to form such declarations. So she roared her love in the only way she knew, and plowed on through plains of dust while radio broadcasters crackled in tin-can voices, Hurricane Celia has touched down near Corpus Christi, Texas.

    Love is what makes for the worst hurricanes. Love makes them fierce, and their passion leads them to scrawl indecipherable valentines upon the landscape, in hopes that the object of their affection might discover how they were so adored by an unstoppable force of nature.