13. Aria
THIRTEEN
ARIA
A distant buzzing sound cuts through my thoughts, not that different from Brodie’s chainsaw that irritated the piss out of me.
No, that’s a rhythmic buzz. My phone. No one calls me. This must be an emergency. I take stock of the people in my life. Richard. Granny. My ex?
I spring out of bed to where my phone charges across the room. I get there in time for the voicemail to come through from an unknown number.
“Hey, Ari. It’s Brodie,” his raspy voice comes through, sounding like he’s trying to stay calm. “I’m here at the hospital with your granny. They’re getting her checked out and she’s alert, but there was a fire at her house.”
Panic washes over me and I don’t even listen to the rest of the message.
I scramble to put on some pants and race for the front door.
I grab my fleece and keys off the hook, but when I step onto the porch, I fall.
Pain bites into my knees and I look back to find Brodie’s basket overturned on the mat.
Just as I’m cussing him out, I see a folded up paper with my name on it.
Whatever that is, I don’t have time for it right now. I stuff the paper in my pocket and head for my car, barely thinking on the drive to the hospital.
I’m Granny’s only emergency contact. She’s alone in life without me. Her house caught on fire and I’m just hanging out with Richard like the little brat I am. I could be in an entirely different city or state.
And for what?
To prove I’ve made it past my humble beginnings? To prove that there are people out there to love me who aren’t Brodie Campbell? To show my worth?
I do an absolutely rotten parking job when I get to the hospital a couple towns over and jog into the ER.
“I need to see Alberta Johnson. I’m her granddaughter.”
Time moves like molasses through the hourglass as I wait for them to pull Granny’s information, then lead me back to her. But just before I get there, I hear her chuckling.
Chuckling? And it’s accompanied by a lower laugh. I’m so stunned that I just wait on the other side of the curtain. The nurse who walked me back here is miffed at my confusion and slides the curtain open for me.
It reveals Brodie sitting next to Granny’s bed.
They look like they’re sharing some inside joke, even though I have no clue what that could be.
The smile wipes off her face in an instant, and she purses her lips under the cannula delivering oxygen to her nose.
“‘Bout time you got here. This good-for-nothin’ let my children burn.”
Brodie stifles a laugh, the sudden betrayal taking both of us by surprise. “It was you or the dolls, Mrs. Johnson. It’s our job to choose you.”
“I told you to get back in there!” she protests.
“Our priority was getting you to safety and containing the fire,” he says slowly, his patience fraying.
I move into the “room,” a collection of curtains around a bed, a sink, and some monitors. “Granny, what happened? Are you alright?”
She is getting high off this drama, thriving as the center of attention. “Well, I didn’t know anything about it. I was just sleeping and then Muscles over here threw me over his shoulders and hauled me out of my own house.”
“That was on fire. And it wasn’t me. I took you when you got outside,” Brodie adds. “I wouldn’t go into a fire dressed like this.”
Granny finally shows a small sign of weakness, her lips flattening into a line and her eyes shimmering.
“Oh, Granny,” I say, sitting on the edge of her bed and hugging her. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
She starts to cry, and a large, gentle hand lands in the middle of my back.
“I’ll give you two a minute. Go get us some coffee,” Brodie says, the swish of the curtain casters announcing his exit.
“My house,” Granny cries, and I squeeze her a little tighter. “Our house.”
“I know,” I whisper, and it surprises me that a tear squeaks out of my eye too.
I can’t give voice to the most devastating part of it for me, afraid it will upset her too much.
That house was a living memorial to Gramps, and now we don’t have that physical place that is so full of him. “You’re alive, though.”
Granny sniffs and pushes me back, wiping under her eyes. I grab us each a tissue off the narrow counter by the sink. She laughs as she dries her tears. “Your man was something rescuing me.” She rounds her shoulders and makes her hands into fists. “Big and strong.”
I laugh and dab my nose. “Yeah, he’s known for that, I think.”
In a rare moment of non-snarky sincerity, she sobers. “He was so sweet when I couldn’t breathe.”
Granny’s face crumples again. She’s really shaken up and it’s weird to see it. I hug her tighter and let her sob. I cry some more too because if the worst had happened, who would I have? Richard? Some colleagues?
Brodie?
The nurse comes in to check on her. Her blood oxygen levels aren’t great, so they’re going to keep her overnight. They’re just waiting on a bed to open upstairs.
“So she’ll go home tomorrow afternoon?”
“That’s the plan,” the nurse confirms, and I have a whole other problem to consider. Where do I take her? Where is home now? Even if the whole house isn’t burned, it will be a long time before it’s safe to be back in there. “We’re going to do a nebulizer now to open her lungs up some more.”
I thank her, and Granny leans back like she wants to rest. “I’ll be back,” I say. “Going to let Brodie know he can leave.”
I find him in the hallway, walking toward me with two cups of coffee. He looks so hulking and big in his firefighter uniform, the navy jacket on top since it’s pretty cold out tonight. He extends a cup my way, which I accept. “Thank you.”
He lifts his cup in a cheers-style salute. “Sorry it took so long. The machine is broken, so I had to sweet-talk my way into the staff lounge.”
“Why do I not find that hard to believe?” I take a sip of the coffee. “Thank you. For being here. She could have been here alone, but . . .”
Brodie shakes his head. “It’s nothing. I’m glad she’s okay, even though she is meaner than a snake.”
We both laugh. “She really is.”
“Wonder where you get it from?” he says with a wink, and I just sigh.
I fold my arms in front of me and rest the coffee cup in the crook of my arm, trying to hide my shivering. I ran out of the house with no bra under my fortunately big t-shirt, and even though I’ve got a jacket on, I’m both sweating and shivering. “What started the fire? Do we know?”
“Not 100% sure yet, but it looked like it started in her front window with?—”
“The dolls? I always knew those damn things were cursed!”
He grimaces. “They might actually be cursed. And now their faces are melted, so it’s extra . . . yeah. You can imagine.”
I tut. “Poor Granny. She loved those things.”
“It’s hard to lose things. The house you grew up in, Ari. I know it’s not easy.”
I nod, doing an absolutely shit job of being stoic. I fall apart so fast, tissue paper in water. Brodie takes my cup from me, setting both of ours on top of the soda vending machine behind him.
Then he holds me. No questions. Just his arms and us together and his warmth and his cheek resting on the top of my head. He smells faintly of smoke, and he carries that smell because he saved my grandma. “Sorry,” he whispers.
“Who called it in?” I sob.
“A neighbor saw it when they got up to use the bathroom.”
That should be a consolation, but instead it’s a reminder of how bad it almost was.
“I don’t know where to take her,” I sniff. “Where is home now?”
“We can figure all that out,” he assures me. “I know all kinds of people around here.”
“What do you mean ‘we’? You have to get back to the station, don’t you? I was just coming out here to tell you to go.”
Brodie stiffens, and I pull away enough to look up at his face.
His cheeks are so red they accentuate his red hair even more. “I’ll actually need a ride back to the ‘Boro. I rode in the ambulance with her.”
“What? You’re not . . . working?”
He gives the slightest shake of his head. “I heard the address on our radio and got there as fast as I could.”
I stare at him, probably looking like a fish with how my mouth hangs open. “You . . .”
I lunge at him, wrapping my arms around his neck as tight as I can get them.
And he holds me just as forcefully, almost lifting me off the ground with how his arms circle my waist. Maybe he would do that for anyone in town.
Maybe it has nothing to do with me and everything to do with Granny. Or just him being a good guy.
But none of the whys matter. He did it because that’s who he is. Because even with his mistakes and fumbles, Brodie Campbell is a good person. One of the best, even. Not for show. Not to brag or get some weird high off giving.
He’s just that wonderful.
Right now, I don’t care so much about how he’s hurt me and how little he’s apologized. I nestle my nose against his shoulder and take a deep inhale.
“You smell like Outside Brodie,” I whisper. “And a little smoke.”
He chuckles and murmurs in my ear. “What’s Outside Brodie?”
“How you smell in the woods.”
Brodie whines, like it’s the sweetest thing I could say. He plants a tiny kiss on my neck before hugging me even tighter. This massive hunk of a man saved my grandma and went out of his way to be here for us.
If I didn’t think he was hot from his thirst traps, I sure do now. I’m starting to think how great it might be to kiss him again when a voice cuts into my thoughts.
“Miss Johnson?”
We break our hug to find Granny’s nurse.
“Sorry to interrupt. We’re taking Mrs. Johnson up to her room if you want to follow.”