We both chuckle.
“Why do you stay with her?” I ask. It’s a fair question now that I know this isn’t her first offense.
His posture wilts with his upside-down smile. “Why does anyone stay when their person wants to be with somebody else?”
The answer to that one is simple.Because you love them. But I don’t think that’s what he needs to hear. “Because it’s hard to let go.”
He nods.
“And you don’t just get over your first love because they want somebody else,” I add.
The hem of my shirt catches on a sharp stick, snagging a hole in the fabric. With the constant stream of sweat gathering along my hairline and pouring toward my eyes, I work my finger through the circle and tear a strip.
“You let yours go, didn’t you?”
I nod, fashioning the homemade bandana around my forehead. Much better.
“Add that to the laundry list of reasons why I’m jealous of you.”
“Jealous?” My jaw hinges open. “Ofme? The screw-up who will never live up to his parents’ expectations?”
“Dude, have you seen yourself?” he argues.
“You mean with all the mirrors out here? Not lately. Why? Something wrong with my beard?” I stroke the short stubble of my five-o’clock shadow.
“What beard?”
We laugh together.
“Notwhat you look like, yourlife. You’ve got this gorgeous girl who can’t take her eyes off you and a superintendent who you’ve managed to win over in less time than I ever did. For the record, man… I’ve seen the way you doubt what you deserve, and it’s not true, that lie you tell yourself. That if you show up as you, somehow it won’t be enough. You already are more than enough. You’re one of the best guys on this crew.” He throws a small branch near my feet. “Don’t tell the others I said that.”
I smile. I didn’t know validation could feel like this.
“Thanks, man.”
He taps our saws together. “Don’t mention it.”
With a clean slate between us, we spend the day talking. He tells me about his cowboy ranch plans, and I tell him all about Bear Lake. I remember what it’s like to have a friend again, and for the first time in a long time, I let go of the fear of being myself with someone else.
“We need to call it,” he eventually says as the fire pumps thick charcoal clouds toward the moon. We made a 95 percent dent on our line today, but it’s way past dinner and becoming increasingly difficult to see.
“Tac 3, descending the hill,” Dean blows into the radio speaker.
“Roger that,” Jack’s voice transmits back.
I catch a glimpse of the sky as I hoist on my line pack. Arethose storm clouds? It’s looking ominous now with the fading light.
Crack.
I squat to the ground, shielding my head. A snap, a whoosh, and a gust of wind domino behind me. Then a thud and a scream, like they happen in the same breath, rattle the black earth beneath my feet.
I turn around, and my own scream lodges itself in my throat.
It wasn’t thunder but a twenty-foot fallen pine. And the screams are coming from the body trapped beneath the trunk. Dean’s scratching and clawing at the bark with his gloves. He compresses the sides with his palms and shoves against the weight of the limb like he’s trying to bench press it toward the sky, but it doesn’t budge.
I drop everything I’m carrying and run to him. I straddle the trunk, wrapping my arms around its girth, and bury my weight into the heels of my boots.
Come on, come on, come on.
