LYING on a mattress in front of what’s left of her Hurricane Melissa-battered home, Marvanine Anderson held her seven-year-old son, Khalique Campbell, who is still traumatised after the storm destroyed his bedroom and left their house in Retrieve, Hanover, balancing on columns that threaten to give way at any moment.

For 24 hours after the weather system made landfall last month they huddled in the kitchen of their half-concrete, half-wooden house, listening as a gush of water from a culvert ran down the hillside and started to erode sections of their land.

In the darkness they heard pieces of zinc banging against the house, while some took flight in the hurricane-force winds which also took precious items they’d bought over the years with it.

As the wind howled and the structure shook, Anderson said she held her son as he cried and questioned when the nightmare would end.

“He is still saying, ‘Mommy, I am traumatised,’” Anderson shared with the Jamaica Observer on a visit to the community on November 5, just over a week after the Category 5 hurricane hit.

“When the wind picked up last night — because that’s his room, and you see the zinc that we used to batten the window, the window is gone and the zinc is still there — so when the wind picked up last night it was banging and he was saying, ‘Mommy, is that Melissa coming back? Is that Melissa?’ And I said, ‘No, Papa, it’s just the wind.’ It’s just rough, and the fact that the land is no longer good makes it worse,” said a clearly distraught Anderson.

The mother of two said she is trying to stay strong for her son and 21-year-old daughter, Kesani McLean, fearful that if she breaks she may never recover.

“Mentally, I have to stay strong. I haven’t shed a tear all now. I have to stay strong because the moment I break, I think that will be it. She [McLean] has been crying; I keep trying to tell her that it doesn’t make any sense,” said Anderson.

“I have to be strong. I have to stay strong, because I cannot afford to break. I cannot afford to break,” she repeated, seemingly as a reminder to herself as she recounted the events of October 28.

In what might have been described as perfect timing to provide some comedic relief, her daughter walked by with a photo of herself. The picture had travelled with the wind to a neighbour’s who found it at a section of the roadside and returned the precious item to McLean.

As Anderson looked at the photo, a small smile flashed across her face and she chuckled, finding joy in the fact that something lost had been returned.

The mother told the Sunday Observer that she’d experienced Hurricane Ivan in 2004, but nothing came close to Hurricane Melissa and the trail of destruction and loss it left in its wake.

“…It wasn’t pretty. My son, he cried almost the entire time. He was scared. He [kept] saying he wanted it to go [away], ‘Melissa, please go.’ When we came out on Wednesday morning [after the hurricane] to assess the damage, we didn’t know it was this bad. We realised that this entire room was gone, and basically everything was wet — we still have a bunch of wet stuff inside there. This mattress and that bed were down there [on that hill]. If you can look, the back door is still down there, the wardrobe was down there, the dresser is still there because that is gone — that is no longer good,” she said.

“We can’t find most of the stuff. Most of the stuff is gone — everything. I’ve been trying to see what I can salvage from last week. I’ve been washing from last Thursday (October 30). I wash every single day to see the amount of things I can save. I have some down there that I have to just throw them away but, all in all, we have to give God thanks we were able to salvage some things. Some persons were still worse than us,” she said, looking out onto the mountain range.

Anderson said that had it not been for her kitchen, which is made of concrete and is closer inland, they would have nowhere else to go.

“We retreated to the kitchen, and the fridge was our door at that point. We stayed in there and we kept asking when it’s going to end, when it’s going to stop. How long? I kept saying, even before it came, that the issue was that it was so slow, and at the speed it was going I knew it was going to take a long time to move on. When it’s actually here and you are in it and you realise, it seems like it was never going to end,” Anderson recounted, looking up to the sky to prevent tears from rolling down her cheeks
— the gesture an apparent reminder of earlier resolve: “I cannot afford to break.”

Khalique watched as she spoke. Unlike his mother, his eyes betrayed him, and the tears flowed freely. At one point the seven-year-old snuggled up to his mother, his face laced with concern. When asked if he was willing to share his experience he quickly shook his head, hid behind his mother, held her arm, and buried his face into her side. However, McLean was more willing.

The 21-year-old told the Sunday Observer that while she was not at the house during the passage of Hurricane Melissa, she sat in constant worry for days because she could not reach her mother after the storm.

“I had service for a while, and then when I tried to call her, her service gone, so I was like, ‘Maybe she is okay.’ My roads were blocked, so after a couple of days I got through to her [and she sent me a video]. When I loaded the video, cold bumps [appeared on my skin]. I broke down… I had to check my [blood] pressure as well, because I had to ensure I was okay.

“I [had] called everybody in the lane to see if she was okay. When I came and saw [the house], he [Khalique] broke down because he was saying he wants to come with me, but I was saying to him there are a lot of persons staying where I am as well, so he can’t come with me,” McLean recounted, her eyes filled with sadness.

The 21-year-old said she has since reached out to everyone she can for assistance for her mother and brother, who are now forced to live in ruins as they pick up the pieces.

“I don’t want her to be here and heavy rain, and then she loses her bathroom, and then she loses her kitchen, and then there is just nothing. It’s expensive to start housing,” she said, worry etched across her face.

Anderson shared that the rooms at the back of the house had caved in, and the soil that supported the back and side of the structure had washed away. She also said that they have another portion of land that is in better condition and that belongs to her great-grandfather, but building costs are expensive.

As they try to figure out their next move the family said they would like some assistance to at least have a safe, temporary shelter.

“Right now, food is not our issue. Our issue right now is the front here, because we don’t know how long the column foot is going to be able to hold, so that’s our main issue right now,” said Anderson.

“What we need right now is to get a roof over our heads… we have the other side of the land… that part is not as steep as this part so we have that section, but we will need help to get material and stuff in order to get something solid before we know we will be safe,” she said, pleading for assistance.

The Hurricane Melissa-battered home of Marvanine Anderson and her seven-year-old son Khalique Campbell in Retrieve, Hanover. (Photos: Garfield Robinson)

Kesani McLean embraces her brother Khalique Campbell as they ponder the effects of Hurricane Melissa on their house in Retrieve, Hanover.

Marvanine Anderson looks off into the distance as she sits outside what is left of her Hurricane Melissa-battered house in Retrieve, Hanover, recently.Photo: Garfield Robinson