Riley would be asleep. Mia too. The ranch would be quiet and dark and safe—everything where it belonged. Nothing shattered. Nothing missing.
I almost called anyway. Just to hear her voice. Just to remind myself that somewhere in the world, the people I loved were still whole.
I didn’t.
Some calls leave marks. You learn that early. You learn how to carry them, how to let them harden into something you can work around. That’s the job. That’s the deal you make when you put the gear on.
But some calls cut deeper than others.
And sitting there in the thinning dark, watching the sky start to pale toward morning, I knew this one wasn’t going to fade. I’d carry it with me for a long time—quiet, heavy, and permanent.
Back at the station, 4 AM.
The crew moved through post-call rituals in silence. Gear cleaned and stored. Equipment checked and restocked. The engine washed down, hoses re-racked, everything returned to its proper place. Order from chaos. Control where there had been none.
I showered until the water ran cold. Stood under the spray with my eyes closed, trying to wash off the smell of smoke and gasoline and copper. Trying to scrub the images from my brain the way I scrubbed the grime from my skin.
It didn’t work.
The smell always stayed. It settled into your hair, your pores, the seams of your clothes—like a reminder of the job you couldn’t wash off. And the memories of the ones you didn’t save lodged deeper still, carried not on the body, but somewhere heavier. Permanent.
Cal called a debrief. His voice stayed steady as he walked us through the call—what went right, what was out of our control. No room for mistakes and no space for second-guessing. We’d followed protocol, moved as fast as humanly possible, done everything by the book. We’d saved everyone who could be saved.
But sometimes, some people couldn’t be reached.
And when that happened, it never felt like enough.
The crew filtered out slowly. Owen clapped me on the shoulder, said something I didn’t quite catch. Someone mentioned breakfast at the diner. I shook my head. Couldn’t stomach the thought of food, of fluorescent lights and cheerful waitresses and the normal world going on like nothing had happened.
I should go home. The ranch needed tending. Dawn feeding was in an hour, and the horses didn’t care about multi-vehicle accidents or pink car seats or the way grief could hollow you out from the inside.
Riley and Mia needed… something. I just wasn’t sure yet what that was.
I couldn’t face the quiet of my room. The bad thoughts were already there, waiting in the dark. I could picture it too clearly—the pink shoe, small and perfect—burned into my vision, waiting for me every time I closed my eyes.
So I sat on the bench outside the station and watched the sky lighten. Pink and gold bleeding across the horizon, the mountains turning from black to purple to blue. Beautiful. Obscenely beautiful, given what had happened. The world didn’t stop for tragedy. Dawn came anyway, indifferent and relentless, and you either kept moving or you didn’t.
I sat there and tried to remember how to keep moving.
Tires whispered over asphalt behind me. A slow, familiar sound.
Her car turned into the lot just as the sun crested the mountains.
Riley stepped out, backlit by the dawn, two bottles clinking softly in her hands. She crossed the parking lot with that efficient stride of hers—no hesitation, no wasted motion—and dropped onto the bench beside me like she’d always planned to be there.
One bottle nudged against my knee.
“Cal texted me.” Her eyes stayed on the horizon. A beat. “Bad one?”
I just nodded. I wasn’t in any shape to talk—much less to put words to what that call had been.
To my surprise, she held out a beer. I took it, and she cracked open her own without a word.
No follow-up questions or empty comfort. She did not sayI’m sorryordo you want to talk about it—none of the well-meaning phrases that would’ve made my skin crawl. She just sat there, shoulder close enough to feel, drinking cheap beer at five in the morning.
She met it her way.
The silence stretched between us. Not uncomfortable. Not heavy. Just quiet, the way the land got quiet after a storm passed through. Like the air itself was recovering.
