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“Mateo’s out. Says the rest of the house is clear.”
“I’ll be damned… she almost looks like…”
“It’s her. Almost did a double-take when I saw her. Didn’t realize she was back in town.”
The mask was removed from my mouth. When I opened my eyes, I saw a fireman crouched over me.
“Nobody else inside, right?” the man asked. He had an interesting accent, almost British. “No dogs or cats or other pets?”
My throat burned from the smoke, so all I did was shake my head.
There was a crashing noise which made everyone jolt. The roof of the garage was collapsing in on itself, sending up a blast of flames that scalded my cheeks even from a hundred feet away. Now that I was seeing it, I couldn’t look away. Flames shone in every window and danced above the roof, bright orange against the black sky while sick shadows danced across the lawn. A trio of other firemen were maneuvering a hose, but the water didn’t seem to be doing much. The neighbors on the next three houses I could see were all standing in their lawns, watching with shock and despair.
I hadn’t wept when our mother died, but now my tears flowed freely. Then the mask was placed back over my face, and I was lifted up into an ambulance and taken away from all the horror.
4
Jack
Alyssa fucking Ford.
None of it sunk in until I was back at the firehouse, letting the water from the shower wash away all trace of what had happened on this night. Alyssa fucking Ford, the neighbor from my childhood. A woman who was difficult to describe—part foe, part friend, part obstacle. A beacon in my life, both good and bad, like a lighthouse that occasionally went dark for no goddamn reason.
I couldn’t believe she was back.
As the scalding water gave me new life, I thought about how long it had been since I had seen her. It was eight years ago, before we both left for college. A backyard pool party with all the recent graduates. A private moment shared in my brother’s room upstairs, unseen by anyone else. At the time, I was certain I would never see her again. Hell, I had hoped I would never see her again. Eight years of avoiding social media had further confirmed my suspicion.
And then there she was, prone on the floor of the house she grew up in, barely conscious from smoke inhalation. I was more shaken from seeing her than I was from the destructive fire.
The emotions rushed over me, and I had to grip the shower door to steady myself. A few quick heartbeats later, it was gone.
“You all right, bud?” Liam asked in his chipper New Zealand accent. He was toweling off in front of the mirror, his yellow hair matted flat against his head. “Look like you’ve seen a ghost. Though I guess you have! Heh.”
“Tell me about it.”
“You avoided the question. You all right?”
“I’m fine,” I lied.
“Breakfast, then? Sun’ll be up soon. Could use some pancakes from Diane’s Diner.”
“Not today,” I said.
That made Liam flinch, his eyes regarding me in the mirror with concern. Diane’s was a tradition after a bad fire. “Shit, you’re really shaken, aren’t ya?”
“I said I’m fine.”
“Know what ya said. More worried about what ya are. ‘Cause it ain’t fine, bud.”
I dressed quickly and headed home. The sun was coming up over the palm trees in my yard as I pulled into the driveway, brilliant orange beams that scattered through the early clouds like frozen motes of flame. Across the road, the tide was washing up on the shore—good conditions for a swim. But I wasn’t in the mood for much except my bed.
Smoke, my shaggy grey German Shepherd, was sitting on his haunches when I walked through the door. I opened the back door to let him out, but he stayed close to me, licking at my hand with concern. He was always clingy when I came back from a fire. Like all animals, dogs knew that smell deep in their DNA.
“You’re a good boy,” I said, crouching down to hug him. “Come on. Do your business so I can feed you and get some sleep.”
I knew that I should eat too. I had been up all night at the station before we got the call, and I needed food. But my stomach was too tight to eat. I went right upstairs and crawled under my covers. Next to the bed were a pair of perky ears, so I patted the covers once and Smoke jumped up with me, curling into a large ball and resting his snout on my calf.
I was bone tired, weary in a way that only a night of fire and smoke and trauma could cause. But my mind was racing too much for sleep. I usually liked to lose myself in the throes of physical passion after a bad fire, reminding myself that I was well and truly alive, but I didn’t feel like texting my girlfriend. I told myself it was because she was probably on her way to work, and not because there was another woman occupying my mind.
