Chapter 2
PRESENT
Somewhere southwest of Spokane, WA
Pinafore Creek Wildfire.
Most people get up every single day and go to a job they hate. Day in and day out, just dreading that 7 a.m. alarm. Maybe they’re living for the weekend, living for their holidays, trying to make their husband or wife happy, all the while never really knowing true fulfillment, or what their purpose is.
I get why they do it. There’s comfort in the expected. It’s safe. Not to mention, the need to make a good living, pay for their kids’ soccer, their dance lessons, the newest video game, that fancy car in the driveway.
But living that rat race?
Shit sounds like my worst nightmare. Give me my old pick-up truck, some vintage vinyl in my simple house, and the rush of being dropped right into the center of nature’s biggest bonfire with the task of figuring out a way to shift its course.
It’s not predictable. It’s not safe, but I know without a doubt that it’s my purpose. There’s no bigger adrenaline rush on earth and I get paid to do it every single day.
“You’re gonna head back up the other side and start a line there,” Cal, my captain, calls to us over the noise of the ship we’re riding in.
We’re about to be dropped deeper up the mountains, a higher point than we’ve been working the last few days and I’m already exhausted. We’ve been at it sixty-five hours of the last eighty on the back end of almost a month away from home. The start to this season has been rough. It was 4 a.m. when our spike camp came alive for those of us who were sleeping, and the bosses told us we were moving up the mountain. Cal and Xander—my captain and sup—are smart as hell. I swear to Christ; Sup has a sixth sense with the weather. We say he can command the wind to work in his favor half the time, but this bitch of a blaze is mighty. It’s burned up over nine thousand acres already.
“They’re fighting me, want us to head northwest,” Sup calls to Cal, talking about the federal powers that be. It’s easy to guess the best course of action when you aren't the one on the ground. We aren’t the only ones here either. There are two other hotshot crews working with us from out of state. Bitching about territory and protocol is always a thing. Sometimes it’s easy to work with other crews, sometimes it’s not.
Sup fiddles with the chin strap on his helmet as the part of the forest we’re about to be dumped into comes into view. I can almost feel the heat from here.
“They want us up here for a reason. This blaze is acting a lot like the one in Oregon,” Cal says, and we all nod, remembering.
I watch Sup as he nods and analyzes below.
“I just know it’s gonna crown that ridge and head toward town,” he says, looking out the window assessing the enemy.
“We’ll burn out this side of the mountain so when she comes over that ridge like a bat outta hell, there’s no fuel for her to hang on to,” Sup says.
We nod, the other part of our crew is in the chopper behind us, and they’ll have to be filled in when we land.
“You good and ready?” Cal asks. He’s asking me specifically because he expects me to keep the guys with me on task. I’m our lead sawyer today.
At twenty-eight, I don’t have an official title yet, but that’s my fault entirely. I’ve prolonged my promotion as long as I can. I’ve had my Firefighter Type 1 qualification to become a squad boss since the red card committee approved my task book in April. Becoming qualified isn’t easy, so I should be proud, but I just haven’t taken the plunge yet. Everybody knows it’s a terrible middle management position, but it’s a stepping stone.
Trouble is, the idea of being responsible for anyone but myself still torments me.
I lean my head back against the seat. The intense smell of smoke hits me as the ground gets closer. I reach my arms out in front of me, interlocking my fingers in a good stretch, willing my Nomex shirt to loosen. It feels like it’s sticking to me already. The temperature will be 104 degrees today on the ground, and it’s already hot at sunrise.
The choppers hit the earth and our boots are immediately on the ground, crunching the still roots and debris of the forest floor under them. Sometimes, the silence in the green—the area the fire hasn’t touched yet—is deafening. Almost peaceful. The weight of knowing it’s our job to keep it this way and live to see the other side rests on every single one of us. I look around and assess our surroundings. The sounds of wildlife are almost nonexistent, anything living was smart enough to get the hell out of here a long time ago.
“Let’s get on it, boys, we’ll start the line a hundred yards south. Anchor in the creek bed,” Sup calls to us.
“ Fucking rights,” and “ let’s fucking do this,” mixed with standard chatter ensues as we all begin our hike to location. The mood is always high energy but laser focused.
Twenty minutes later we’re spread out and settling in to get our fireline going. I start pulling out my Pulsaki ax and my STIHL saw, so I can begin cutting brush. The embroidered patches that are sewn into all our packs catch my eye.
In memory – Jacob “Big T” Taylor. I reach back to pat it and nod reassuringly.
“We’ve got this one, brother,” I mutter to Jacob, as if he can hear me while I start to work.
Some days it’s less difficult to go up against the unpredictable flames of a wildfire than it is to battle the five years of blame and regret in my gut.
I fire up my STIHL and the adrenaline I chase fills my veins with the rumbling sound. I look to my left, facing the beast we’re here to take on and smile wide.
Do your best, motherfucker.
“The blaze just…wasn’t laying down. There was wide open grassland and tall dense junipers as far as we could see. Jacob went up to the ridge to look out. We were talking to him as he went on the walkie…” Xander, my sup swipes a tear from his face as all seventeen of us sit in the hospital waiting room with Jack and Mae Taylor.
Every one of us except Jacob. What’s left of him is down the hall. A reminder that I failed. I couldn’t protect him, and I couldn’t save him.
Grief, disbelief, shame. It all weighs inside me, fighting a losing battle. Twisting and turning in a never-ending nauseating cycle. I’ve thrown up twice. Once when we pulled Jacob’s body out of the ash pit he fell into, and once when they got him loaded up in the medevac.
Mae is a brick wall sitting beside her husband. She’s either on the verge of a breakdown or in total disbelief that her son is being worked on and near death down the hall. His twin sister, Violette, is encircled in the arms of Jacob’s girlfriend, Laney, as they cry.
I feel my chest tighten. It takes everything in me not to go to Violette and take her in my arms, but I know this isn’t the time or place for that, nor would she let me. Hell, I can barely even get her to talk to me.
None of this is right. He was just supposed to be looking out, then a brutal wind none of us saw coming carried a tsunami of flames toward him. In the blink of an eye, it covered the entire ridge Jacob had gone up to. We assume he was running back down the ridge, to us in the black, when he fell into the pit. Medics said they thought it was a badger or coyote den. Jacob must not have seen its telltale signs, he just went through it, and it took us too long to get to him.
“You owe me a beer for this,” he had said, looking over his shoulder at me as he started his climb up the side of the ridge. I had laughed and called him a cheap fucker.
I owed him a beer. Because I was supposed to be the one to go to lookout. But I wasn’t quite done chipping a burning birch tree apart, so when he offered, I let him go.
Sup’s words return over my thoughts as Jack cries openly across from him. Sup doesn’t have any sons, but he knows what it’s like to lose his dad this way. Fuck, our crew hasn’t even gotten over that loss from a few months ago.
The sliding glass door opens to the waiting room. A doctor and two people with clipboards come through it. They don’t even have to speak for me to know why they’re here. Mae lets out a curdling scream that I’ll never forget as long as I live, and I fall to my knees as they confirm what I already know. He never even saw one full season. Jacob is dead. My best friend is gone and it’s all my fault.
I sit up, drenched in a cold sweat, smacking my knees on the seat in front of me. The buggy taking us back to base is disorientating and in complete contrast from my recurring dream. The mood is electric and celebratory for a bunch of men who haven’t slept in almost twenty-four hours. It’s not very often we’re fighting a fire so close to home.
I pull my phone out. It's already early evening. My mom has texted me three times to check in. Aside from that, no one is worrying about me, but that’s okay. That’s the way I want it. No attachments. Hotshot life doesn’t support relationships, which is why I don’t have any other than my squad. Some of the guys make it work with girlfriends and wives, but it just seems like a fuck ton of work, and I haven’t had a woman hold my interest for more than one night in a really long time.
I look over at Cal, he’s currently sitting across from me texting his girlfriend, Scottie. Never seen him so obsessed with a woman. He’s definitely one of the ones making this relationship thing work. I shake my head and chuckle as I take in the lovesick grin on his face.
Someone has “Back in Black” by ACDC playing. Caleb, a crewmate, is rocking a mean air guitar, Tex, Bobby, and Curly are talking football over the music, and two other crewmates, Dixon and Roycie are arm wrestling. Through all this chaos, I’ve been sleeping, oblivious to the commotion around me.
I try to take a deep breath. The char I feel in my lungs is worth it—we did our job, and once again, Sup was right, and the wind was on our side this time. We managed to mull out a perfect line, good looking enough for Mike Opperman—Opp as we call him—to take a picture.
“Twenty to home,” Sup says over his shoulder to everyone. Some cheers go up.
Christ, home . I’ve barely seen it this month, I can’t wait to shower, eat, and just stretch out on my sofa. I know I’ll be awake for hours. My dreams about Jacob always come in spurts, so for the next few days, every time I close my eyes I’ll see his face just before he headed up that fucking ridge. That vision and the same thoughts of blame rotate through my mind with a vengeance. The memories are like the embers of a fire that aren’t fully extinguished. One gust of guilt and the whole thing tries to roar back to an inferno.
I should’ve gone with him. I should’ve been there. It should’ve been me ? —
“You all right?” Cal asks from across the aisle, setting his phone down. I realize as he asks that I’m breathing heavy. I wipe the sweat from my brow.
“Just hard to get Jacob’s face out of my head sometimes,” I tell him, running a hand through my knotted hair.
Cal sighs and looks out the window, a pensive look on his face as he scrubs a hand over the soot covered scruff of his beard.
“Probably always will be, it’s hard to get ahead of that, thank fuck for grief therapy.”
I nod. “Damn right.”
Cal is a man who tells it like it is and doesn’t feel the need to push, and right now I’m grateful for it.
“Hey. We got this one and we’re all whole. One fight at a time, yeah?” he says, his face serious.
“Yeah,” I say, taking a deep breath as the town limit of Sky Ridge comes into view. The land here is so green, so full of life and even though the night is warm, it feels cool after what we just worked through.
Our base is a shit shack—it’s a large, glorified metal pole barn just outside of Sky Ridge but it’s ours. The greenish paint is worn but there’s lots of room for all our equipment and space to hang out. Sup’s field office is here, along with a makeshift kitchen, a pool table, a decent gym, and common areas.
It takes us an hour to unload our gear and change. Sup pats me on the back as I’m hanging up my gear in the open room where all of our lockers line a white cinder block wall. Our motto is painted above them.
Fight for those who can’t. Protect those we can. Honor the ones we’ve lost .
I turn to face him.
“You did good out there this week. You know you’re ready,” he says gruffly.
I nod and feel my body tense, avoiding his eyes.
“King. You’re already doing the job; you might as well get paid for it.”
I turn and pull a fresh black Sky Ridge Hotshots T-shirt from my locker and pull it over my head. I’m still wearing my green Nomex pants from the mountain and my boots.
“Yeah…uh, can this be a tomorrow conversation?” I ask Sup with a smirk.
“It’s been a tomorrow conversation for months.” He levels with me. “Look, I know the idea of an official crew of your own seems like a big responsibility. But we need you and the only way you get over it, is to try to get over it.” He lifts a heavy boot up on the bench in front of me and tightens his laces as he talks.
“Cal said you had another dream. I still have them too, we all do. But Jacob knew the risks and he’d tell you just like I am right now that it’s time. He’d want this.” He gestures to the room of joking, light, and rowdy hotshots. The air in here is almost festive after putting down that line. Normally, I’d be as happy as they are with a job well done, but, fuck, sometimes those dreams take me right back to that moment I let him go.
I put my hands on my hips and look at my sup as he sets his jaw.
As hotshots we all have standards we have to meet regularly when it comes to physical fitness, so my Sup is a beast of a man. Nothing really rattles him, so when he gets serious and emotional I know he means it.
“Don’t dismiss the job because of him. Take it for him,” he says simply. And for some reason, something in me finally clicks. I look around the room. This is my chance to make it right, to make losing Jacob worth something. But after I agree, there’s no going back. This was supposed to be Jacob’s job. He always wanted to make squad boss.
I blow out a deep breath and drop to the bench behind me. I know I can’t drag this out anymore. I can’t live in the past and not take on more responsibility because of my fear. Maybe being a squad leader will help me save someone. I can’t believe I never looked at it that way until now. I can almost hear Jacob’s voice telling me to stop being a pussy and to do his job when he can’t. You owe me that much after letting me die, I imagine him saying.
“Shit, fine. I’m all in, Sup. Whatever you need,” I say firmly.
He just stares at me for five seconds like he can’t believe I’m finally agreeing, then pats me on the shoulder as his grin grows.
“Did I hear what I think I just did?” Cal asks, coming up behind me and gripping my shoulders, giving me a shake.
“Yeah, you did. Your boy here is moving up!” Sup adds, loud enough the entire room hears.
“Fuck yeah, that’s the fucking spirit,” Cal says, giving me one last pat on the shoulder.
“Now”—Sup looks around the room—“put on a fresh shirt, boys. Food and drink, it’s happening!” Sup says to the room as he backs away. “We’re celebrating our new Crew Boss.” He points at me. The room explodes with my crew hooting and whistling for me.
I can’t help it. I shake my head and smile wide.
Fucking hell, guess I’m gonna be a squaddie.