TWENTY-EIGHT
EMMETT
It’s official. I’m a fucking dog.
Sure, I’mworkingon the Jeep, but I’m long past doing anything worthwhile today. Each day brings me a little closer to getting this thing running, I’m just wasting time, having tested a few things and replaced a worn part without success. There’s nothing more for me to do.
But I’m lingering, delaying as long as I can, hoping to catch Aspen when she comes home from her shift.
Hoping, for once in her life, she won’t work overtime.
I put away the tools, organizing them and cleaning up before I cross the garage to the utility sink, wetting my hands and forearms, scrubbing at the grease until there’s nothing but red skin.
Glancing over my shoulder, I scan the road and then check the time on the dusty clock hanging from the wall.
She should be home by now.
I can still hear her soft sigh as I tucked her into bed two nights ago and placed one lingering kiss on her soft lips before I forced myself to leave.
Hell, I had wanted to stay when she asked—more than I let myself want anything in a long time. But Aspen was exhausted, and I’m not exactly a peaceful sleeper.
So I left her pouting, knowing it was for the best.
Now I’m waiting . . . like a dog for a bone, because kissing her felt like finding myself—like finally coming home after years away.
Home hasn’t been anything more than an abstract concept to me for a long time. I’ve only ever had one. The trailer I grew up in wasn’t safe enough to call a home. It was just walls and a roof.
Before I burned it all down, my grandparents and Rory taught me what home actually felt like. It wasn’t the ranch or the house itself, it was belonging. Safety. Knowing there were people waiting for you at the end of the day.
Life with my parents wasn’t like the one I found on the ranch or the home Aspen built—there were no friends or sense of community.
There was a time when I could’ve had that, but I’ve long since given up on it.
The worst of it was losing Rory-=--watching what it did to my grandparents. But that wasn’t the end of it. One night changed all of us. The damage just kept spreading.
As if thinking about my past triggers it, my phone rings.
Not many people call me, few even have the number.
The ones that do are Carl and the nursing home where my grandma lives. Now Aspen, and begrudgingly, Denver, with all his horseshoe memes. Atlas, too.
Honestly, I’m surprised they haven’t called sooner. A vise tightens around my ribs the same as it always does when the nurses call. This time though, it’s tighter, and twined with shame. I’ve been gone longer than normal with my injury stacking itself on top of the fire season.
And there’s only one reason I haven’t checked in sooner.
Somewhere along the way, Timberline Peak stopped feeling like just a place to heal.
That should’ve scared me into leaving sooner. Instead, I’ve been standing here, pretending I can hold onto both lives at once while people still count on me somewhere else.
My crew. My grandmother.
And I’m failing both.
Visiting her is difficult these days, but I still make a point to go whenever I can. Most of the time I’m not even sure it helps her anymore. Maybe I just do it to ease my own guilt.
It’s been months since she recognized me consistently. Some days she thinks I’m my father, and I never correct her. The truth only confuses and upsets her more.
Worse than that are the days she asks if Grandpa and Rory are coming too.
