“Tom’s job was to help William. Together they managed the horses, mowed the lawn, insulated the attic, built fences, tended to the apple trees—whatever needed to be done. William would tell me they talkedas they worked, about nothing and everything. Tom, as I recall, loved basketball.”
Some things don’t change,Diana thinks.
Grace stops in front of an iron bench under a large maple tree. She sits, motioning to Diana to join her. Diana shivers as her body makes contact with the cold metal. The house is off to the left, a crest of trees is in the distance to the right, and the mountains are on the far horizon. West, she realizes. The bench faces west to take in the sunset. This spot must have been where Grace and William together ended each day, and she bites down the sadness that surges within her.
Grace continues, “William encouraged Tom’s plans after high school; he even wrote him recommendations for college. William saw Tom as an adopted son of a sort. We never had children, and while William said he was at peace with that, a part of him still dreamed for a son. Tom’s father was gone. It’s almost as if they needed each other.
“Our niece, Jessica, was here that summer. She’s the daughter of William’s brother. A handful, that one was. She’d been talking back to her parents and hanging out with the wrong sort of kids. Her parents were worried she was getting into drugs, so they asked if she could come here for the summer. They had four younger children at home in Portland and needed help. William and I said yes, of course. We thought the farm would be good for her.”
“Was it?” Diana realizes who Jessica is: She’s the first person Tom ever slept with, possibly his first love. He never said much about her, certainly not her name, only that his first time had been the summer before college with a girl from Maine. He dismissed Diana when she asked for specifics, back in the early days of their relationship.This was years ago,he said.I barely remember her.
“At first, Jessica seemed happy. She listened to us, did as we asked. Then we discovered she was sneaking out of her room at night. To go where, we never knew,” Grace says. “Did anything happen between Jessica and Tom? William thought yes; I wasn’t sure. Tom was easygoing and never gave us any trouble. Jessica? She was angry at the world.”
Diana remembers the rage she felt over Tom’s letter. How easy it is to be angry, a much more attractive option than being sad.
“When I look back, I realize Jessica was clever, biding time with us until she could go back home. She never gave being here a chance. I suspect, if I’d been a sixteen-year-old girl sent off into exile, I wouldn’t have either. At the time, I didn’t identify with Jessica’s anger. It wasn’t until later, after I got out of the hospital and returned here, that I began to see how anger could be all-consuming,” Grace says, echoing Diana’s thoughts.
“And the fire?” Diana appreciates these details but anticipates there’s a limit to how long Grace will talk. Diana is afraid if she doesn’t ask directly, Grace will avoid the topic altogether.
Grace begins to walk again. Diana follows, her purse swinging with each step. Grace pauses briefly by the birch trees to pick up bark lying in the snow. As she begins recounting the night of the fire, she shreds the bark into silvery, gray curls that fall at their feet, making Diana think of the breadcrumbs Hansel and Gretel leave behind in the witch’s forest to find their way home.
“When the fire started, William and I were sleeping. It was hot, and we’d left our windows open to let the breeze circle through. Something, maybe a noise, woke me up. The moment I opened my eyes, I knew something was wrong. There was too much light, and the air was filled with smoke. At first, I thought I’d left food on the grill, but I remembered scraping it clean, removing the burned ends of the chicken we’d eaten for dinner. I looked over William, through the open window, and I could see the barn was on fire.” Grace shudders and her sure steps falter.
“I shook William awake, and he ran to the window. He stood there, clenching the sill for a second or two, before he raced from the room, yelling for me to call the fire department. I could hear his footsteps pounding down the stairs, and a crash followed, the sound of glass breaking. I fumbled for the phone on the bedside table and called for help.”
Terrified that William had gone ahead without her, Grace retains no memory of the phone call. “Though I do have a very specific recollection of running after William and finding him in the yard. I stopped at his side and watched the flames consume the barn. It was clear the Hamilton volunteer fire department wouldn’t arrive in time to save the building. I didn’t understand William had already formulated a plan. An insane, risky plan. That night, though, it was the only option.” Grace’s voice catches but she continues: “He said that he had to get the horses. Before I could say anything, he turned, pulled open the doors, and plunged inside.”
Smoke poured out into the night. The barn sizzled and burst as the beams and siding caught and then exploded. The fire threw off so much heat that, even at a distance, Grace’s skin tightened, as if she were at the end of a long day at the beach, a sunburn blistering across her chest.
Suddenly, above the flames, Grace heard a crash, and two horses ran out through the smoke, their gasps frantic and shallow. They galloped across the yard, as far away from the barn as they could get. “I watched them melt into the darkness. I knew I should follow them, to make sure they didn’t run back toward the blaze, but I couldn’t move. That’s when William fell down next to me, coughing. I crouched beside him and cleaned off soot from his face. I was so grateful he was alive.”
Grace stops, her hands continuing to strip the bark, her eyes looking back to the broken paddock fence. “Four more horses remained in the barn. William was wheezing so hard it was difficult for him to speak. He managed to explain that he hadn’t been able to get to them.” Grace shakes her head. “Those poor, poor animals. They were so good. They didn’t deserve to die like that.
“I didn’t deliberate over what happened next; rather, my body chose for me, instinct taking over. I kissed William and ran into the barn.”
All Grace remembers from being inside the blaze is darkness and heat. Fear, too. So much fear.
She saved two of the horses. When Grace tells that part to Diana, she flexes her hands, the skin layered in scars, scorched by the metal locks of their stalls.
“The other horses, a gelding Irene recently brought to the farm and Daisy, my favorite of the mares ... I couldn’t get to them. I can still hear their screams, high-pitched and ear-piercing. The fire was too hot, too fast, and the smoke was everywhere.”
When Grace was well enough, her sister filled in what happened next, repeatedly detailing what she knew, so by the time Grace was discharged from the rehabilitation facility, she assumed Irene’s stories as her own memories.
William somehow found her lying on the barn floor, unconscious. He carried her out onto the grass, beating the fire from her body with his own hands.
“Then my beautiful, stubborn husband went inside one more time. When the firefighters rescued him, he was a few feet away from Daisy’s stall, barely alive. Carson’s body wasn’t far from William’s, but the smoke likely prevented the two of them from seeing one another.”
The pain hovering around the older woman intensifies, thickening the air with a grief so endless Diana finds it hard to breathe. Her instincts tell her to comfort Grace, to tell her she’s said enough; yet a hungry, reckless voice whispers that doing so would put her own healing at risk. So Diana remains silent, pushing down her rising guilt to listen to the rest of Grace’s story.
“The fire ruined our lives,” Grace says. “My sister said it was like William and I were a building in the middle of an earthquake. We held together as best as we could, until our broken pieces collapsed onto one another, and only the memory remains. William’s death, months after the fire, was when everything fell apart.
“I meant to be with him, but my doctors were concerned that my own healing was behind schedule. They’d convinced me to go to physical therapy. One morning away from William would be fine, they assured me. They were wrong. As I struggled to get my damaged legs toremember how to walk, William’s heart gave out. By the time I made it back to his room, he was gone.”
Grace finishes talking, and the last splinter of bark lies shredded at her feet. She tips back her head, the sun highlighting the lines on her face and the scars on her neck.
Diana is speechless, which, for the first time, gives her sympathy for all those people who shied away from her after Tom died. Some of them, she guesses, had been scared off; others, she suspects, had no idea what to say that wouldn’t sound trite or useless.
“Everyone—the doctors, the nurses, Irene—worried I wouldn’t make it, that losing William would be a setback I wouldn’t be able to survive,” Grace says. “I pushed my grief to the back of my mind, choosing to deal with it later. I never really did, though.”
