Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
AUTUMN
Three consecutive nights.
That's how long I've been sleeping in Nash Deveraux's arms. One night on the ridge, tangled in his sleeping bag while the wind howled outside the tent.
One night back at the station, in my apartment, where he came upstairs at ten PM with the excuse of checking the lock he already fixed and didn't leave until his five AM alarm went off.
One night at his cabin on the ridge above town, where his sheets smell like him and the second pillow hasn't been used in so long it still had the crease from the packaging.
His toothbrush is next to mine in the apartment bathroom. He put it there on night two without asking, and I didn't move it.
Bobby knows. Bobby's known since we hiked back into the station parking lot with my hair loose around my shoulders because the braid tie broke on the trail and Nash's hand was on the small of my back as I stepped over the tailgate.
Bobby took one look, pulled out his phone, and texted Maria.
The response was audible from across the parking lot.
Screaming, then laughter, then Bobby saying, "Maria! You owe me twenty bucks!"
Now it's Thursday. Nine PM. My apartment.
Nash is on the floor with his back against the bed, fuel moisture reports spread across his thighs, reading glasses on. My feet are in his lap because he pulled them there twenty minutes ago without looking up from the data, and his thumb traces absent circles on my ankle while he reads.
My preliminary assessment is open on the tablet. Fuel load data from the north ridge. Defensible space compliance maps. Prescribed burn recommendations with cost projections. Everything I came here to evaluate, organized into a report that will go to the state by the end of the month.
"Your prescribed burn proposal is good," I tell him. "State should approve it with the supporting data we collected. Spring timeline, start with the east drainage, work north."
"Mmm." His thumb moves to the arch of my foot. A move that should not be this distracting. "Torres said he can clear brush on the Hernandez property Saturday if Mrs. Hernandez agrees."
"She won't."
"She will if Maria brings empanadas. Bobby's already working on it."
A laugh escapes. He glances up from the reports, reading glasses sliding down his nose, and the smile that crosses his face is small. Quiet. Real.
God, he's beautiful when he smiles. The reading glasses, the worn department shirt, the burn scar catching the lamplight. His hand wrapped around my ankle like he's been doing this for years instead of days.
My phone buzzes on the nightstand.
Owen:
you haven't called in a week. either you're dead or you're getting laid. hoping for the second one
Rolling my eyes, I type back.
Me:
busy with the assessment
Owen:
uh huh. how's the grumpy fire chief
Me:
he's sitting right here
Owen:
OH so you ARE getting laid. tell him I said hi and also if he hurts you I'll drive there
"Your brother?" Nash asks, reading my expression.
"He says hi. Also that he'll drive here if you hurt me."
"Sacramento's seven hours. I respect the commitment." He squeezes my ankle. "Tell him I said noted."
This. This easy, comfortable, fits-right warmth that's settled into every corner of the last week.
Morning briefings where his knee presses against mine under the table.
Windshield surveys where his hand finds my thigh on the drive back.
Bobby pretending to gag while simultaneously giving me a thumbs up behind Nash's back.
Tuesday night, Nash cooked dinner at his cabin. Rotisserie chicken, salad from a bag. We ate on his porch looking at the mountains, then I pulled him inside by his belt loop and we didn't make it past the kitchen counter.
This morning, I woke up in the apartment with his arm heavy across my waist, his breath warm on the back of my neck, and his radio on the nightstand next to my tablet.
Our things. Mixed together. The reading glasses he keeps forgetting on my counter.
The hair tie he picked up from the bathroom floor and put on the doorknob.
My chest aches with it. The wanting. The knowing this is temporary.
The email arrives at nine forty-seven.
My tablet pings. State forestry commission, official correspondence. Subject line: Q4 Rotation Planning.
From: Nevada State Forestry Commission, Rotation Coordinator To: A. Blake, Prevention Coordinator RE: Q4 Rotation Planning
Ms. Blake,
Please find below your updated rotation assignment effective November 3rd.
Next Assignment: Hawthorne District Report Date: November 5 Rotation Briefing: October 28, Carson City
Please confirm receipt and attendance at the rotation briefing by September 30.
Nash's thumb stops on my ankle.
"What?" He's watching my face over the reading glasses.
"Rotation notice." The words come out flat. Professional. The voice I've used in six districts when the email arrives and the duffel needs packing. "Hawthorne District. November third."
His hand leaves my ankle. Sets the fuel moisture reports on the floor. Takes off the reading glasses. Every movement deliberate, controlled. I've watched him do the same thing on a fire line. Compartmentalizing.
"November third."
"Standard Q4 rotation. Assignment closes here October thirty-first, I report to the briefing in Carson City on the twenty-eighth, then drive to Hawthorne."
"So you've got. What." His jaw works. "Six weeks."
"About that."
Silence. The apartment feels smaller. The thin walls, the two-burner stove, the duffel that's still open on the bedroom floor because I never unpack.
"Ten days," he says. "Good to know that's how you're counting."
"What?"
"We've been together ten days. You've been here three weeks. And the first thing you do when that email hits is calculate the timeline for leaving."
"That's not fair."
He stands. The fuel moisture reports scatter. "Isn't it? You walked in here with a duffel bag and told me you don't unpack for seasonal assignments. I heard you, Autumn. Didn't want to, but I heard you."
"Nash." Standing too, I face him across the tiny apartment. His shoulders fill the space between the kitchenette and the bedroom door. "This is my career. This rotation has been scheduled since before I got here. Before I knew you existed."
"And now?"
The question is a knife. Clean, precise. He's not yelling. Nash Deveraux doesn't yell. He goes quiet and focused, the same way he does when a fire is threatening structures and every decision matters.
"I can't make a decision about my entire career based on ten days. That's not fair to either of us."
"You keep saying fair." He takes a step back. Creating distance. "What you mean is easy. And I'm not easy, so you're already looking at the exit."
"That's not what I'm doing."
"It is exactly what you're doing." His voice is steady. Low. More devastating than shouting. "Six districts. Six duffels. You told me yourself. You almost stay every time, and then October comes, and you tell yourself this is what the job is."
"Because it is what the job is."
"The job is an excuse, Autumn." He picks up his reading glasses from the floor. Folds them carefully. Puts them in his shirt pocket. "The job is how you keep moving so you never have to decide if somewhere is worth staying."
My throat closes. The twelve-year-old girl carrying stuffed animals to the neighbor's driveway flashes through my head. The six apartments I never furnished. The father who retired to an empty place in Sacramento because the job was all he had left.
"You don't get to psychoanalyze me because we slept together."
"No. I don't." He moves toward the door.
Stops with his hand on the frame. The same doorframe where he almost kissed me four days ago, back when this was still a question instead of an answer.
"But I'm also not gonna stand here and pretend November third doesn't matter. Because it does. And you know it does."
The door closes behind him. Quiet. Controlled. No slam.
His boots hit the exterior stairs. Each step getting fainter until they reach the engine bay floor. Then his truck starts in the parking lot. Headlights sweep across the apartment ceiling as he pulls out.
The apartment is silent.
His toothbrush is still in the bathroom. The reading glasses are gone. The fuel moisture reports are scattered across the floor, pages bent where he stood on them.
My phone buzzes.
Owen:
hello? did the fire chief eat you?
Setting the phone face down, I sit on the edge of the bed. The duffel is at my feet. Half packed because it's always half packed. Six years of living out of a bag, six districts, six goodbyes.
Every time, I almost stay.
And every time, I tell myself that leaving is the job. That roots are for people who didn't watch their house burn. That loving a place means losing it, and losing it is the only thing I'm not trained to survive.
Nash's pillow still has the dent from his head. His shirt from yesterday is draped over the bathroom doorknob because he changed here this morning. Through the thin wall, the engine bay is empty. Quiet. No wrench on metal, no Bobby's laughter, no radio chatter.
The rotation email glows on my tablet.
Hawthorne District. November third. Report date November fifth. Briefing October twenty-eighth.
Six weeks. Standard Q4. Pack the duffel, drive to the next town, write the next report.
The tears come without warning. Hot, furious. My hand presses against my mouth, holding in the sound because the walls are thin and I'm alone, but being alone in a station that still smells like Nash Deveraux is worse than being alone in every furnished apartment I never had.
My father did this. Chose the job until the job was all that remained. My mother packed a car and drove to Phoenix, and he let her go because he didn't know how to give her a reason to stay.
Am I the one leaving, or am I the one being left? The answer depends on which side of the doorframe you're standing on, and Nash is already gone.
Owen:
Autumn. seriously. call me.
Picking up the phone, I type with shaking fingers.
Me:
I'm fine
Owen:
you are the worst liar in the family and there's only two of us
Me:
I'm crying in a fire station apartment over a man I've known for three weeks
Owen:
that's more like it. gonna call you in five minutes. pick up.
Setting the phone on the nightstand, I pull his shirt from the doorknob. Press it to my face. Breathe in.
Wood smoke. Just wood smoke. And underneath it, the faintest trace of something else. Something that smells like staying.