Chapter 30 Loving Me #2
Then he started talking and... he really could talk.
It came easily to him, one thought slipping into the next without pause, as if silence never quite found a place to settle.
Strangely, he didn't seem to mind that I barely said anything in return.
His voice carried the conversation on its own, warm and steady, moving from one topic to another so naturally it felt less like jumping and more like drifting.
It was soothing.
"And I think my parents realised something was a little off when I started bringing rocks home like they actually meant something," he said thoughtfully, a faint smile forming.
"Not occasionally, not as a passing phase, but consistently, with a level of commitment that probably should have been questioned. "
I glanced at him.
"I had a system, which in my mind made it completely reasonable," he continued. "Pockets, backpack, sometimes both if the situation required it, because it felt irresponsible to leave a good rock behind."
A small breath of laughter slipped out of me.
"They were very supportive about it," he added. "They asked questions, listened carefully, and treated every rock like it had a personality, which really encouraged me to continue."
He exhaled softly, amused.
"And the worst part is I escalated," he went on.
"I started placing them around the house like decorations, adding more little by little until it stopped feeling charming and became something else, a quiet takeover.
They turned into my version of letters and notes.
My parents never said anything, but they kept them exactly where I left them.
.. which, in hindsight, probably says more than words ever would. "
I smiled, lowering my gaze.
A few minutes later, he was still talking, and I found myself genuinely enjoying his stories. Now he had moved on to a full rant about a movie, completely invested, like it personally offended him.
"I watched that volcano movie last night," he went on, already sounding mildly offended. "A disaster. Not in the entertaining way but in the deeply irresponsible way."
I glanced at him. That was all he needed.
"He outruns a pyroclastic flow, April. Can you imagine?" he said.
I blinked. He stopped walking.
"See, that reaction right there is how I know you don't fully grasp the scale of the problem," he said, looking at me like I had unknowingly sided with the movie.
I pressed my lips together, trying not to smile.
"It's not just wrong," he continued, resuming our pace.
"It's scientifically ridiculous. A pyroclastic flow moves as a dense, ground-hugging cloud of superheated gas, ash, and rock fragments at speeds that can exceed a hundred kilometers per hour, sometimes far more.
It also carries temperatures that can reach several hundred degrees Celsius.
...You don't outrun that. Your muscles don't even get a meaningful chance to respond before the heat and pressure catch up. There's no sprinting away, no clever angle, no second attempt. You're already within it before your brain finishes the thought."
I smiled softly at his enthusiasm.
"And of course," he added, warming up now, "he has a jeep. A very committed jeep that is apparently faster than physics, logic, and basic survival."
I glanced at him again, smiling.
"I don't understand why movies do this," he went on. "Just once, I'd like realism. The volcano erupts, everyone looks at each other, and someone says, 'Well. We had a good run,' and the movie ends."
Another quiet laugh escaped me.
"And it's never just the volcano," he continued. "It's everything. The injuries, the timing, the dramatic speeches while things are exploding. No one is ever out of breath. No one forgets what they were saying. Meanwhile, I go grocery shopping and forget the one thing I went in for."
I huffed a laugh.
"Seriously, I forget things so quickly it's almost impressive," he said. "Like I'm speed-running confusion. But no, this man this man is outrunning a collapsing mountain and still thinking clearly."
I shook my head.
"I take this very personally," he said. "For professional reasons, obviously."
We then reached a beautiful view, a quiet lake stretched out below us, framed by tall trees that caught the light and reflected softly on the water.
"This," he said, straightening, "is where I say something life-changing and poetic. Something you'll remember forever."
I looked at him. He paused. Two seconds. "I have absolutely nothing, but it is a good view."
I huffed and nodded.
We kept walking, the path settling back into its quiet rhythm around us, the sound of our steps soft against the ground.
Then I stopped.
He noticed immediately and slowed too, turning toward me with that easy half-smile of his.
"Okay," he said gently, a hint of amusement in his voice as he lifted his hands slightly, "I understand, I will stop talking, I'm sorry, I got carried away."
He shifted like he was about to keep walking again, but before he could, I reached out and touched his hand. He froze a little, surprised.
"No," I said softly, then exhaled, finding the rest of it with more effort than I expected. "Talk..is... calming."
There were other things I wanted to add, words that didn't quite form properly, so I let them go instead of forcing them into shape. He smiled, not his usual teasing one, but something softer.
"Your voice," he said, pausing briefly, "has a kind of beauty that stays in the air after you've stopped talking." Then he looked at me and said, "Thank you."
After a small pause, he asked, a little more gently, "So... what do you like doing in your free time?"
I took out my pad and wrote, Walking. Writing. Reading. All boring stuff.
"Boring?" he repeated, scandalized. "How dare you? That's not boring. That's elite introvert excellence. That's main character recovery arc behaviour."
A small smile tugged at my lips. I looked up at him, then wrote again, And you? What do you do to treat yourself?
He didn't answer right away. For once, he actually paused.
"This," he said finally, softer now. "Talking to you, walking with you, just getting to look at you... moments like this. That's how I treat myself. Being with you is a privilege."
His gaze drifted briefly to the lake, the trees, the quiet around us, then back to me and added,
"Just sharing the same space as you, April... it feels like something I got lucky to have. It feels like warmth I can rest in."
I didn't know then how tightly I would hold onto those words, or how much I would come to need them later.
Chapter 19: Ash and Altitude
The call came just after dawn.
"Station Four, possible ignition on the north ridge. Likely lightning residue from last night's storm. Small fire, but unstable terrain. Hartley and Moss are tied up on search and rescue—hiker off-trail near the falls. You're closest."
I was already pulling on my gear before the radio finished speaking.
The north ridge wasn't just a reported fire zone that morning.
It had become a dual emergency site after last night's storm—lightning had ignited dry brush along a slope I had already flagged as structurally unstable, and the drainage corridor beneath it had a history of partial collapses during heavy rain.
Station Four sent me in not only to contain the fire but to assess whether the ridge itself was at risk of failing and cutting off the only access route to the hikers near the falls.
Smoke met me before I even saw the fire. There was a thin and uneasy thread rising from the brush. The wind carried it across the slope in uneven breaths, and beneath it the ground felt wrong. It was soft in places it should have been firm and hollow in places it should have been solid.
By the time I reached the access point, the fire had already begun to spread in slow, deliberate pulses through dry brush left brittle by weeks of neglect.
It wasn't large yet, but it didn't need to be.
The ridge itself was the real problem and the slope beneath it holding tension like something waiting to give up.
I radioed in my position and began cutting a fire line alone, settling into the steady physical rhythm of the work.
For a few minutes, it was only heat, smoke, and movement.
Then the ridge stopped pretending to be stable.
It shifted first in sound, a deep low groan rising from beneath the surface as if the land were adjusting its weight.
After that came the sensation, subtle at first, of movement where there should have been stillness.
And then it broke.
The ground beneath my boots fractured in uneven lines, the soil giving way in sections that collapsed into each other like a structure forgetting how to hold itself together.
I tried to step back, but the slope had already decided otherwise.
The world tilted sharply, violently, and for a moment there was nothing stable enough to hold onto—not earth, not air, not direction.
I remember the feeling more than the sight: the sudden absence of control, the way my body understood before my mind did that I was falling into something that had already begun to move without me.
And then the fire changed. It wasn't just smoke anymore. It was heat rising from below the surface, drawn upward through exposed pockets in the collapsing ridge.
I tried to move, but the ground kept refusing me. That was when I heard him.
"April!"
Ellis.
I turned my head through smoke and dust just in time to see him coming down the slope with urgency that left no space for caution. His voice cut through the noise before anything else could register, sharp and strained as he called my name over the collapsing ridge.
"Don't move," he said when he reached me, already dropping beside me and bracing a hand on my jacket to steady me against ground still breaking beneath us. "Stay with me. Just stay with me."