“The boat,” I say. “It’s tied to the dock.”
Seton follows my gaze to where the motorboat tugs at its line. “What about it? That’syourboat. Didn’t you bring it over from your place?”
“I wasn’t the one who came in the boat,” I say as the events of the morning begin to take shape in my mind. “Reid ... your mother ... I don’t know who’s here.”
A shadow crosses Seton’s face. She stands and faces the flames, shielding her eyes as she takes in the scene—the burning house, the bobbing boat—as though for the first time. She shouts into her radio and takes off down the shore toward the fire. My head spins as I struggle to stand and lean over my knees.
“Mom!” Seton shouts. “Reid! Where are you?”
I fight nausea as I stumble after her.
“Stay back,” Seton says as she rips off her hat and coat and dives into the lake, emerging from the water with her uniform clinging to her body. “The water will protect me from the fire.”
We both know that’s not true.
“Someone made it out of the house and collapsed by the courtyard,” I say. “We need to get them away from the smoke.”
“Wedon’t need to do anything.” Seton snaps her fingers. “Except give me your shirt.”
I pull the blue running jersey off and toss it to her. She douses it in the lake, too, and wraps it over her nose and mouth. “Move back to where we were. The fire department’s coming in their boat.”
Seton squeezes my hand, takes a deep breath, and runs forward until she’s swallowed by smoke. I wait, ignoring her instructions and feeling useless as the heat of the fire sears my bare skin.
Off in the distance, a siren sounds. Thirty seconds later the local fire boat speeds into the cove. One volunteer firefighter tosses the anchor overboard while two others set up a hose that sucks water from the lake and sprays it toward shore. I wave both arms, directing the water toward the courtyard. Then I dash forward. Smoke burns my eyes. I keep low to the ground, crawling as heat and smoke and a lack of oxygen begin to overwhelm me. I nearly turn back before a torrent of water cascades from above, cooling my skin and forming a pocket of air close to the ground that I breathe in deeply.
Ahead, Seton stands against the fire. I crawl toward her. Her eyes are bloodshot, and she coughs through the running jersey.
“We’re almost there,” I say.
“Go back!” she shouts before succumbing to a fit of coughing.
A few yards farther, my hand lands on wet cloth. I recognize Andrea Haviland’s hockey cap at once. “Mom!” Seton says, shaking her mother’s shoulder and pressing her ear to her mouth. “She’s breathing.”
A wall collapses, showering us with heat. Another rush of water from the fire hose cools the air. “Get under one arm,” Seton says. “Stay low. Keep moving.”
Somehow, we drag Mrs. Haviland’s limp body across the ground and away from the fire. Behind us, flames shoot in the air as the house falls in on itself. Fifty yards down the shore, Seton kneels over her mother, checks her vitals, then speaks into the radio. “Where’s the ambulance?”
“Five minutes,” the dispatcher says.
“Make it one,” Seton snaps.
“She needs oxygen,” I say.
Seton shoves me. “Are you a doctor now? Thanks for stating the obvious. And next time, do what I tell you. You could have gotten yourself killed.”
“So could you,” I say.
She yanks the running jersey from her face and flings it at me. “Getting killed ismyjob, not yours.”
Behind us, footsteps approach as my aunt jogs along the shore, dressed for the part in scrubs. “Give me an update,” Hadley says as she kneels beside us and takes over the scene.
“Smoke inhalation,” Seton says. “Maybe some burns.”
Hadley puts an ear to Mrs. Haviland’s chest and uses the flashlight on Seton’s phone to check her breathing passage. “Vitals seem okay, as far as I can tell. Her skin’s turning pink from the smoke, but no burns, thank God. She’ll need oxygen as soon as possible.”
Unlike me, Hadley doesn’t get admonished for stating the obvious. In fact, Seton seems perfectly comfortable deferring to her. I slide away to give them room, leaning my back against a tree and slipping the jersey on as a coughing fit racks my body.
A few moments later, the ambulance arrives, sirens blaring. The EMTs hurry along the shore with a gurney, then follow Hadley’s direction as they strap an oxygen mask over Mrs. Haviland’s nose and mouth. Eventually Hadley leaves them and crouches beside me. “You scared the bejeezus out of Seton,” she says as she checks my pulse, her bony fingers resting on my wrist. My lungs tickle, and I suppress another nagging cough.
