Old friends, I think.
“You don’t think you peaked at seventeen?”I ask.
“I sure as hell hope not,” he says, and smiles his most charming smile at me.“You think I did?”
“I don’t think I’m in a position to judge,” I say.“I don’t know what you’ve been up to.”
He gives me a long look.We turn right, onto my block, and I start to feel like I’m under a microscope.I keep my eyes straight ahead, suddenly too nervous to look over at him.
“I did two more tours after the last time we talked,” he says.“And you know how I always said I was gonna go to college after?”
I just nod.
“I lasted less than a semester,” he says.“Then I applied for the Hotshots, went to training, and here I am.Summers, I dig fire breaks and set controlled burns.Winters, I stay with my parents and I work on their dude ranch.”
“You’re a firefighter half the time and a cowboy half the time?”I ask.
“It sounds better when you put it that way,” he says.
“You’re half the Village People all by yourself.”
“That’ll look good on my resume,” he says.
We’re almost to the house I share with two other forest rangers.It’s big, creaky, and could use some fresh paint, but the rent is cheap since it’s owned by the forest service, and it’s in a good location, right on the edge of town.
Besides, I spend half my time out in the woods, doing my job.I don’t need all that much house.
I stop in front of it, and Hunter looks up at it, then at me.
“This is you?”he asks.
“This is me,” I say, rummaging in my purse for my keys.
He laughs, and I look up.Hunter jerks his thumb over his shoulder.
“They put us in the old bunk house,” he says.
I blink.Then I turn and look at the house next to mine.I know it used to be some sort of lodging, and it’s owned by the Forest Service too, but I didn’t know they were having people stay there.
“We just got in this afternoon,” Hunter goes on.
“How long?”I ask, finally pulling my keys out.
He’s next door?I think.I’m going to see him all the time, whether I like it or not.
“Probably four, five days,” he says.“Just enough time to rest up before something else catches on fire.Don’t worry, you’ll be rid of us soon.”
I make a face at him.
“That’s not what I meant,” I say.
“I know,” Hunter says.
I don’t know what to say to that.I can’t find the words forI like that you knoworthis is more okay than I thought it would be,so I just look at him for a long moment, his deep blue eyes nearly black in the dark.
“You look good,” Hunter finally says, his deep, raspy voice softer now.“And you seem happy.”
“You look the same,” I say, because he does.He looks a little older, maybe his face looks a little leaner, his hair a little shorter, but all that’s minor.In all the ways that count, he’s still the handsome, all-American jock who got assigned to be my lab partner in eleventh grade.
