Chapter 19 Parker
Chapter Nineteen
PARKER
I kissed Luna fiercely and reluctantly forced myself to break away.
“That means we’re going out to a fire.”
She blinked, her brow creasing with worry as she whispered, “Okay.”
“It’s my job.”
Luna sashayed through my thoughts over the following days. I loved my job. I truly did. The wilderness of Alaska was where I felt most at home. It was nature’s cathedral and mine. Whenever I was out in the wilderness, I knew there was something greater than humanity. I felt it in my bones.
When the wind blew, birds called, trees rustled, and fire blazed, I felt connected to something so much more than myself.
I felt like a speck in the universe. I loved that feeling, and I loved my crew.
The kinship of being connected to each other and counting on each other, protecting both the wilderness and anyone in harm’s way from a fire, was a powerful force.
Even with all of that, for the first time since I’d become a hotshot firefighter, there was an ache in my heart.
I missed Luna, something fierce. The memory of that night with her, and those moments before I left, was a warm ember in my heart, something I held onto.
Tangled within that was a hint of doubt and worry.
Intellectually, I didn’t have much faith in the concept of commitment. Not for myself.
Way back when I’d gotten in trouble, my probation officer had set me up with a therapist. That was part of the deal with being on probation and staying out of trouble. My therapist had tried to talk to me about my feelings about my mom, which could be best summed up as “fuck her.”
She’d dumped me when I was just a kid. I loved my dad, and he had totally stepped up to the plate.
My therapist had gently pointed out that I might have some issues with feeling abandoned and not having faith in others to be there when it mattered.
Specifically women, because of what my mom had done.
But this was Luna, the girl I’d met all those years ago on a pebbled beach in Alaska. I felt safe and comfortable with her. Every time those doubts tried to clamber up and make noise, I swatted them away.
Our crew was dealing with a massive fire that had exploded and grown rapidly in size.
Alaska had another dry summer and was still dealing with the aftermath of years of spruce bark beetle kill.
Those beetles that had landed in Alaska via overseas shipping and decimated swaths of forest, leaving behind dead trees just waiting to catch fire.
We did our best with signs and prohibitions on campfires in certain areas, but people were people.
This fire appeared to have been started by some hikers who decided to have a campfire.
Nights were cold this time of year, but that was a bad fucking plan.
A branch fell, and I barely dodged it. Glancing over my shoulder, I caught Hudson’s eyes. “What the hell, man?” I called, flashing a smile.
We were working our way through, cutting down dead spruce trees.
They were dry as a bone. The whole crew was stretched out along this line in the forest. It was a section of the forest that had been logged, probably a few decades prior.
This part of Alaska was in the central part of the state.
As the crow flew, we were a few hours north of Willow Brook.
It was a premier area for hunting and fishing.
Several hours later, with the sound of chainsaws finally off, we gradually made our way to a fire stand.
These stands were monitored by volunteers and park staff.
An alert volunteer had reported this fire.
With most of Alaska sparsely populated, the wilderness was vast enough to get lost in.
Beside this outlook post was a convenient cabin, occasionally used for hunting, but for us it was a place to shelter for the night.
Between the fire outlook and the cabin, we didn’t have to sleep outside.
Although by most standards, the rustic shelter would be considered rough camping. With Graham and Jonah organizing us, we got our gear propped up, checked on the status of our various tools, and plunked down to scramble up some food for the evening.
“What’s on the menu tonight?” Griffin asked. He was seated on the ground, leaning against a boulder.
Our crew had a good vibe. Graham and Jonah were superintendents, and they both had an easygoing but authoritative approach.
Firefighting took nerve and confidence. Sometimes that meant people being total assholes, but that was not the leadership here.
It was organized, confident, and clear. Graham, who’d been superintendent the longest for this crew, didn’t tolerate any bullshit.
He was respected by all of us, along with Jonah and everyone on the crew.
“We have a pretty good perimeter, so we can use our camp stove,” Jonah commented.
Smoke shimmered in a haze in the sky in the distance.
We’d been managing this fire for days now.
That was the life of a hotshot. We worked collectively with help from planes and helicopters flying above and dropping fire retardant and water.
After we’d all tossed out our food options, we settled on freeze-dried mashed potatoes with beef jerky and a dessert of granola bars.
Most of us rested against fallen down logs or our packs, chatting casually while we ate.
“Do you know if Tate has any cabins available?” Graham asked me before taking a bite of his granola bar.
I shrugged. “Come winter, the one beside me will be available. Why do you ask?”
Graham thumbed toward Kincaid, one of the newer guys who’d joined our crew. “Kincaid needs a place. He’s staying temporarily at one of the short-term rentals through Wildlands, but he needs a longer-term place.”
I caught Kincaid’s eye. “I’ll check on it. Tate says he prefers to do long-term rentals for locals.”
Kincaid flashed a smile. “That’d be awesome. Have I met Tate?”
“Maybe? His crew has been out for the last two weeks. This is your first fire with us, right?”
Kincaid nodded. “Yep. Can’t beat this view.” He lifted his hand, gesturing forward.
“As long as it’s not on fire,” Jonah chimed in.
I chuckled. “But that’s what we do. We make the fire go away and enjoy the view while we’re at it.” I took a bite of mashed potatoes.
“You know these are damn good.” Hudson glanced at me, waggling his brows. “I gotta give you some credit. We went from plain instant mashed potatoes to mashed potatoes with beef jerky and spices.”
I grinned. “We need some protein. We worked our asses off today.”
Conversation drifted along. When we were offering Kincaid background info on Willow Brook and the surrounding areas, he asked, “So, how bad is winter? People keep warning me to be ready. I’m from Northern Minnesota, so I think I should be able to handle it.”
“Oh, you’ll be fine,” Graham said. “The southcentral part of Alaska is no colder than northern Minnesota. We probably get less snow than you did there. Might be a little longer and darker, but it’s not like the Northern part of Alaska where they don’t see the sun for a few months and it’s brutally cold the whole time. ”
Kincaid snorted. “Yeah, I can do without complete darkness for a few months. I love snow, though. Always have.”
“Well, Alaska will give you snow,” I commented. “This is the time of year when we should see more northern lights. If we luck out tonight, hopefully we’ll get a show.”
“What brought you to Alaska?” Hudson asked.
“Aside from the job, I always wanted to see Alaska. So, I’m here. It’s that simple,” Kincaid said. “Maybe I should have a more exciting reason, but I figure moving to Alaska is worth it.”
“Oh, definitely,” Hudson chimed in. “I grew up here, but Alaska is so beautiful it never wears off.”
“I completely agree. I feel lucky. Even the flight out to the fire was amazing,” Kincaid said.
“Seriously,” I said. “Alaska is God’s country. Flying over the landscape is mind-blowing.”
“Can I bunk up there?” Kincaid thumbed up toward the lookout. The single room was situated on a tall stand with windows on all four sides.
“Go for it. There’s enough room for maybe four people to sleep up there. Down here, it’ll be crowded, but we can easily fit half the crew in there. Everybody else, we’re outside,” Graham said with a shrug.
“Should we draw straws?” Hudson quipped.
“I never mind sleeping outside,” I offered.
“Same here. Unless it’s raining, in which case we’re happy because that helps put out the fire,” Jonah chimed in wryly.
Cooper plunked down on the ground beside us, returning from a bathroom break. “There’s a stream not far away, maybe half a mile. Should we aim for that, for anybody who needs to take a bath?”
“You call that a bath?” Hudson teased.
“I call it less stinky,” Cooper replied with a chuckle.
Hudson pulled out his cell phone, eyeing it. “No fucking reception.”
“Usually isn’t. They don’t have a lot of cell towers out here. You missing Stella?” I asked.
Hudson glanced over. “Always. How about you and Luna?”
I glanced over, trying to read his gaze. “What do you mean?”
Leo rolled his head to the side, where he sat nearby with his head leaned against a stack of gear. “Casey,” was all he said.
Casey was Leo’s girlfriend and one of Luna’s good friends.
Of course Casey might know what was going on with Luna and me.
It was unsettling to feel my heart kick into an unsteady beat.
The way I felt about Luna was disorienting.
I wasn’t used to worrying about someone else, thinking about them and missing them when I was away.
At all. In fact, it was safe to say I’d never done that.
“I don’t know,” I finally replied.
Hudson, who knew me well, narrowed his eyes. “You are freaking out.”
“I’m not freaking out,” I insisted, wishing my voice didn’t sound defensive.
Leo’s brows hitched up. “I might not’ve known you as long as Hudson has, but you seem a little, well, something.”
I leaned back, running a hand through my hair and glancing down as it dropped to my lap. There were some scrapes and streaks of soot visible from days of dealing with a fire. “I don’t know. I’ve never been serious about anyone.”
“Are you serious about Luna?” Leo asked slowly.
“I guess maybe I’m thinking I might be serious about Luna,” I finally said.
Kincaid glanced from me to Hudson to Leo before he shrugged. “I’m the new guy here, but either you’re serious about someone, or you’re not. I don’t know. I’m not prone to giving romantic advice, but you should probably settle on something there.”
Hudson snorted a laugh while Leo gave me a knowing grin. “Oh, hell, I like Luna a lot.” My heart felt as if the ground underneath it was wobbling.
When I didn’t add anything else, Hudson caught my eyes, a sly glint in his. “You’ll have to figure that out.”
“He’s not wrong,” Leo said simply.
Not much later, Alaska decided to show off a little more. Although the northern lights mostly occurred when it was colder, from late summer into autumn, there were often gorgeous shows of lights, and tonight gave us one hell of a show.
“Wow,” Kincaid commented, his tone reverent.
The sky was shimmering with streaks of pink and purple and silver. It looked as if translucent curtains were ruffling in the breeze as the lights glimmered against the backdrop of a mountain range in the distance with the stars and the moon visible behind the colors.
“Never gets old,” Hudson said quietly at my side.
Coming from a life that had filled me with doubt, it was moments like these, out in the wilderness, when I felt most connected to the universe.
My dad, definitely not a regular church-going guy, used to joke that his church existed in the trees, the mountains, and the ocean.
Whenever the northern lights were showing, he would come wake me up, and we’d sit outside to watch them no matter where we were.
Just now, I felt more settled than I had in a long time, a sense of peace gusting through me like a refreshing breeze. We watched the lights until the brightness started to fade. Coyotes were howling in the distance.
“Think they’ll come close?” Kincaid asked.
“We’re not their midnight snack, but they might come nose around for food.” I chuckled. “They should be pretty well fed this time of year. Early spring, they’re a little more reckless.”
The guys who were sleeping in the lookout clambered up the ladder, a few others headed into the cabin, and the rest of us stretched out on the ground.
We all had enough gear and comfort to keep us warm through cold nights.
Even in the summer, it cooled off quick once the sun was gone.
The sheer exhaustion of our work knocked me into sleep.
At some point during the night, I woke up and slipped out of my sleeping bag to take a bathroom break a little ways away from camp. Although the fire was in the distance, I could still see the flickering embers in the darkness.
Once I was back in my sleeping bag, I hooked my elbow behind my head and stared up at the stars.
Luna sashayed into my thoughts with her riot of curls and her freckled cheeks.
I contemplated Kincaid’s observation that I should settle on something with my feelings.
As Hudson had astutely noted, he wasn’t wrong.
The problem for me didn’t lie within my feelings for Luna, but in my own scarred heart.
Getting abandoned by your mother isn’t a great feeling, if you didn’t know.
When I landed in my dad’s world, he somehow instinctively understood he needed to be a balm to the gaping wound in my heart.
Maybe things hadn’t been the best with him, but from day one, he’d been so enthusiastic to have me there.
If he ever got impatient with all the silly things a little boy wanted to do, I never felt it.
It was a contrast to the first years of my life with my mom. My memories were spotty, but it was more a feeling of uncertainty and harshness.
The cutting lesson my mom taught me was not to count too much on anyone, especially on life.
Though I didn’t doubt the power and depth of my feelings for Luna, it was the very power of them that frightened me.
She could hurt me in a way that would cut deeper than anything I’d ever experienced.
That was the other lesson of being rejected by one of your parents.
It could make you doubt you were worthy.
Intellectually, I knew that wasn’t how it worked, but it was difficult to talk my heart out of that belief.
When I thought of Luna, my heart wanted to smile because everything about her was good. The muted call of an owl reached me. I fell asleep to thoughts of Luna and wondered if I could give her what she deserved.