“There was… and they…” I’m completely naked. Waving my arms about. Trying to explain why they just witnessed a scream that could’ve only come from a three-year-old girl gust from my lungs. But the sentence dies on my tongue.
“Did I forget to mention fire doesn’t kill ants?” McCafferty winks at me as he ducks his head back in his tent.
The rest of the guys go back to sleep after some more ribbing, but as for me?
I stay up.
“Rough night there, Morgan?”
Jack materializes out of nowhere at dawn. The sensation to scratch my face overpowers my reflex to jump.
“Are you going to be ready for today?” His eyes crawl all over me as I scratch incessantly.
“Like a cat in heat,” I tell him.
His eyes follow the pattern of my hands. “Well, all right then. Let’s move out.”
The first mile of our hike is mostly flat. The next four are at a steep slope and require us to clear brush. Burn it too. It takes hours, the same motions over and over. McCafferty and I are paired on a saw team. He’s the swamper, and I’m the retriever. Any clippings he cuts I toss in a giant burn pile behind us.
We work in hand signals, the only form of communication possible with the grind of steel against wood. But when the fuel runs out after forty-five minutes, he’s the one to strike up a conversation.
“I never asked you… are you from around here? You’ve got the tan for it.”
“You haven’t asked me much of anything.” I keep my tone light so he knows I’m joking.
While we aren’t exactly friends yet, he no longer treats me like someone he despises. I’d like to keep it that way.
“There’s a first for everything.” He grabs a red Dolmar fuel can and unscrews the top.
“Bear Lake,” I answer.
Why I tell him that, I have no idea. I should have said Park City. Bear Lake is the last place I want to be thinking about right now.
“I’ve heard of it. Doesn’t it have that restaurant with the famous raspberry milkshakes?” He removes the saw’s fuel cap and wipes debris from the rim with a cloth. Then he tips the spout in a slow pour. The gas leaks into the power tool.
I swallow, forcing down the knot that tries to lodge in my esophagus anytime I think about that town. I nod. “LaBeau’s.”
Why do I picture Teddy dunking her pickle into that milkshake and laughing in the free-spirited way I loved so much? Or her bright green eyes that stood out beneath her strawberry blond bob? Or the way she would lose herself when she sketched?
I was always in awe of her talent and how much I felt when I was with her, never knowing how to express it. It’s hard to let go of.
I always knew she’d never be mine. I saw the way Miles looked at her. She painted the stars in his sky. I’m not afraid of much, but I was afraid of losing my best friends. And that’s exactly what I did.
“I’m gonna get back to work,” I say to him, and he studies me with a million-questions look.
He knows I can’t do the job without him. But he lets me go anyway. Stays behind to screw on the cap and return the empty bottle with the rest of them. A gesture that feels more like friendship than either of us cares to admit.
“Hot buckets!” Murphy yells.
A helicopter idles overhead, dropping a box of brown paper sacks on the side of the hill we’re working on. After my brief conversation with Dean this morning, I’m not in the mood for small talk. So, I study the fire while I eat myburritos.
From our steep slope, everything looks bigger: the column of smoke, flame lengths, destruction. The haze blankets the treetops and licks the open air above them. Flames crackle and dance for miles. Drenched in pink retardant powder, unburned fuel fights against an aerial attack. It’s hard to imagine this beast ever getting under control.
Jack interrupts my wandering eyes with his situation report. “For those of you who’ve lost track, we’ve got two days left before R&R. Trends are staying hot, dry, and wind driven. Division wants us to keep working the right flank toward the head. If you were on a saw team, you’re now cold trailing. I don’t want anything left unchecked. Let’s get back to work.”
Our teams work side by side, churning up the mineral soil and digging into roots in a single file line about ten feet apart. The wind beats at the side of my helmet, my fire shield rapping against my neck. But the direction keeps the smoke out of our eyes.
I drop the wooden handle of my tool in the dirt to run my bare palm over the ground I just tilled, my knee connecting with the blunt end of a log as I kneel. A flash of yellow flicks past my periphery. Before I can check for residual heat, I turn to see what it is.
