by Cadle, Lou
She managed to turn around in less than a minute and found the road, only a few dozen feet back. She’d steered into a meadow. Probably a damp one in rainy seasons, but now just a flat, hard area of potential fire fuel. She got back onto the road and drove on a little more slowly, not wanting to leave the road again. The war inside her continued, the panicked animal wanting to drive faster and the rational person who did not want to wreck her car, her best means of escape, by driving into a tree or culvert.
I think I’d rather die by plowing into a tree full speed than by being burned to death.
It was a calm thought, and she hated the tone of it, too accepting. No! she told it. I will not die out here! I’m going to continue on this road, and past the river, and beyond the river there will be a paved road, and I’ll drive away from the fire. There was an outside chance she could drive west, toward the highway, and the fire might not be there yet. Then she could drive north on the highway and out of the fire zone.
She thought about times she’d heard people second-guess anyone who hadn’t fled a fire, or who’d turned the wrong direction, and who had died. They had no damned idea. Neither had she, not until today. It was not like you had a TV report going on in your head, with clear maps and shots from news helicopters. Down here, you didn’t know one damned thing. You could see a few feet ahead of you, and that was all. Everything else, everything more than a hundred yards away from you, was a mystery.
She’d know more when she got to the paved road and could see better. She thought she’d likely turn west, back toward the highway, and hope.
West, too, was the cult town. Maybe they had a concrete bunker. Bunkers were the kind of thing cults built, right? Waiting out a fire in a concrete bunker with a bunch of weirdos might not be her idea of a pleasant afternoon, but compared to the alternative? She’d hug them and pray with them and lie and promise to join them and whatever they asked, if they had a safe place to ride out the fire.
Though the thought of the highway, with its smooth surface, and the car moving at 65 mph or more—that was a wonderful thought. Even the image of it calmed her down, made that panicked voice in the back of her mind shut up for a second.
The smoke grew thicker ahead. She drove into it, having no other choice, and once again she began to cough. She made sure her vents were all closed, but it didn’t help. The smoke was already in here, trapped with her.
She jumped as something hit the window to her left with a loud bang. What had it been? There wasn’t a crack forming, though it had felt hard enough to crack a car window. Maybe a bird had flown into it? But no, any bird with a functioning brain would have flown away long ago.
She wondered how many birds had to abandon nests of unfledged chicks, and if it hurt them to do so. Probably did. Maybe some of them refused to leave and burned with their babies. Or was their self-preservation instinct too strong to allow for that?
A jog to the left in the fire road ahead took her within sight of more flames. As she drove on, she saw that they had reached the fire road already, though no fire burned right now. It had burned and retreated.
I should have stayed in town. Maybe that line of cars was moving by now. Maybe everyone was out on the highway except for her.
But no, there was no reason to second-guess her decisions now. She was where she was, and she had this to deal with now. And maybe everyone in that line of cars back in town was dying right now.
She pushed aside that thought and kept driving, and the road straightened out. And then she saw ahead what she had most feared. The fire had made it to the fire road and was across. Both sides burned with dancing orange flames.
She made the decision almost without thinking it through, and gunned the car, foot pressing hard on the accelerator. The car jumped forward, and she flew through the fire at a good fifteen miles per hour. Flames licked at her windows, trying to reach her. She hoped the road was straight through this section, because she was steering straight. She couldn’t see the road ahead.
The crackles and pops of the fire were loud, and then she punched through the flames and was out. The road was blackened here, the leading edge of the fire already through, and she wondered how much her tires could take before the heat of the smoldering remains melted them. Everything around her still smoked, even as the flames disappeared in her rearview mirror.
Better keep going fast, then. At least the road was easy to see now, despite some smoke hovering over it. The fire had cleared off any debris, and the line of the packed dirt road was obvious.
She drove as fast as was safe—faster, probably—and steered back and forth as the road wound downslope toward the river. Again, she felt a brief wave of relief, the thought of the cold water of the river ahead like a promise of safety.
And then she came upon the cars.
A line of four cars—a jeep, a truck, and two cars—was stopped in the road. They were burned. Burned badly. And still smoldering.
And they were blocking the road ahead.
Chapter 11
The best she could guess, the river was about a mile ahead. She could hike a mile on a fire road in a half-hour, even with a backpack on.
But she didn’t have a backpack. She had a briefcase, and tote bags, and two suitcases.
What was most important? She thought the papers might be. She’d try to save all that paperwork that you needed to get along in this world.
If you die today, it might be better to do it in the car. So they can find your body.
Not a panicked voice. A new one. A calm one. It was far too sanguine about her death. “Shut up,” she snarled at it. She turned around and found the briefcase, leaned over the console to grab it, and prepared herself to flee on foot.
Sylvia took a deep breath, and then stepped out of the car. She left the keys in it and the door open, worried much less about auto theft than about a hundred other dire scenarios. The fire had been through here and burned the easy fuel, but it might come again. Or the tall trees might finally alight, and it’d be round two right here. The road ahead seemed safest, and the river would be better than here. Again, she could see herself in the river, submerging herself as flames passed overhead, driven by the winds. She could see herself popping back out of the river after the fire had passed, still breathing. Still alive.
On foot, she took to the road, but as she approached the first car, it was putting out so much heat, she had to walk well to the side, right next to the trees. The heat of the fire’s embers pushed through the sole of her shoes. It wasn’t enough that she’d be burned, but it was enough to make the panicked voice inside her scream at her to run.
Instead, she walked, a quick but careful pace. It was important not to give in to the panic. Not until there was no other choice. She passed the back of the pickup truck and lurched to a halt.
Through the window, she could see a human hand on the steering wheel. It was as if it were mummified. Dark, wrinkled, it sat where its owner had put it. He’d stopped the truck. Put it in park. And waited until the fire swept over him and killed him.
The hand was still smoking.
She turned away, backtracked and went around the truck to the other side, keeping her head down, knowing that if she saw what was in that truck above that hand, the image would never leave her mind again, and she’d wake up from nightmares every night, probably forever. Don’t look. Don’t look. Don’t look.
Possibly even the memory of that hand would haunt her. But there was no reason to force herself to see more. No reason. Whoever had been in there was dead.
Why had he—or she—stayed? Stayed and let the fire sweep over them? It made no sense. Unless the fire had surrounded them. Or maybe the person was disabled. There were plenty of older people in Pinedrops, and if you needed a wheelchair or walker…maybe you’d think, it’s better to try to ride it out in the truck than to join a footrace you knew for sure you’d lose. If so, what a terrible, terrible last few minutes the person would have had. She tried to push that thought out of her mi
nd, but it was like a rubber band, and kept snapping back. Those last few minutes, the fire roaring, the heat.
Sylvia did not intend to lose her own race to safety. She began to jog, the briefcase banging irritatingly against her leg. If she thought it was slowing her down, she’d drop it. Nothing was as important as her own life, not insurance papers or her marriage certificate or old photos or anything. She made it past the last car without seeing anything else grizzly, though the last car had all of its doors wide open, so she thought the passengers had fled up the road. Or through the woods. She had no idea why they hadn’t driven. Was the fire too great? Had they run out of gas or something like that?
On every side of her, the undergrowth of the woods still smoldered. Her feet were hot, and she wondered how long these athletic shoes would hold out before they melted. And she was coughing more frequently now, her lungs demanding better air than she was giving them.
When does a person die of smoke inhalation?
No. I won’t die. I’ll get to the river, and I’ll be safe.
She picked up her pace, but stopped when the jogging made her cough harder. A quick march was best, and moved her forward almost as fast as she could run. A turn in the road, back toward the west, the wrong direction. All around her was devastation.
She passed a solitary car, empty, not quite as badly burned as that group of four had been, but the front bumper was smashed all to hell. It was probably the one that had taken down the fire road gate. In her mind, she thanked the driver, though so far this road had not been her salvation.
Back in town, had the fire passed through? Were the people in those cars coughing but safe from flame? Or were they like the poor soul in the truck back there? Had they taken to their feet and run through the woods?
She heard the fire again before she saw it. But she kept walking forward, as fast as her struggling lungs would let her.
Ahead of her, the fire was still burning. It had burned out the road for the last half-mile and moved on, but ahead, it was still raging.
Chapter 12
There was no way she was getting around this one. Not on foot. Not even in the car. There was a thick wall of flames visible through the trees ahead. To her right, she could see they snaked through the hillside in that direction too, toward the northeast. And they were coming up from ahead on the left, moving southward fast as they gobbled up the dry fuel.
She felt a burning sensation on her arm, dropped the briefcase, and slapped at the burn. There were pine needles falling, like snow. Like a red, glowing snow, blown before the force of the wind, falling on her. Somewhere, trees were burning now.
She should be wearing her jacket. And her hair! She had no idea what had made her think of it, but she had, and good thing. She slapped at her hair, feeling hot pricks. She didn’t want to end up bald.
Stupid woman. You don’t want to end up dead! Bald would be a bargain price to pay for life.
The way ahead was blocked. The woods were burning. Behind her, she feared if she turned her car around, the spot of fire she’d driven through earlier would have engulfed the road by now. And between the stopped cars and that spot, the fire had been approaching the road. It was probably on top of it by now.
The only safe place she could reach was back into the burned area. She could sit there and wait, and hope for the best. Hope the trees didn’t ignite, and fall on her, burning. Hope she didn’t succumb to the smoke.
Maybe that’s what had gotten the man in the truck. Or woman, she realized belatedly. Sexist of her, but truck equaled man in her mind. The person in the truck might have been very much like her. A woman who waited too long. Who’d made the wrong decisions. And then sitting there, the smoke had overcome her. And then the flames had come.
She shook off the grizzly speculation. It was doing her zero good.
Think, Sylvia, think!
Option one, go back to the car and wait and hope for the best. Option two, go back to the car, turn it around, and try to get back to Pinedrops. Option three, go through the woods far to the right and try to outrace the fire to the river. Through the trees, and get lost and turned around or not be able to outrace the fire? That was out too.
Could she hike cross-country into the burned area, and come out on the highway? Possible. If the smoke didn’t get her. If the trees didn’t catch fire.
She might get out in hours of hiking. But she didn’t have a compass, and she might get lost. Worse, if she got lost and was burned to death, they might never find her body.
She at least had to give James and her mom that. A body to bury.
Despite knowing it wasn’t the right solution, she tried hiking into the burned-out area to the west, just as a test. There was so much heat, though, it was miserable, and little spot fires still burned. After only a few minutes, she was bent over from the coughing, spitting out mucus. No. Not that way.
Something punched her in the back, and she whirled around, thinking she was going to have to fight off a bear or a man or a buck. But there was no one there. She saw a glowing orb fly at her and jumped back. It hit her chest—and hurt!—and fell off. It was a burning pinecone. Ejected from the fire with the speed of a rock thrown from a sling, it really hurt! The burning forest was shooting fiery missiles at her.
And the burning pine needles kept falling on her as well. This was not good. This was very, very, very not good.
She returned to the road and walked briskly back, retracing her steps, back toward her own car. She had to try going back to town. Without a single ounce of faith that this would work, she hoped for a miracle anyway.
When she reached the car with the doors wide open, she remembered to not look up, to get past that truck behind it without seeing what was inside. She might not live long enough to have any nightmares, but if she did live, she really did not want to see what was in that truck.
Her car started. At least her luck was that good. She climbed over the back seat to put her briefcase back there, reached the bottled water and tore one out. She gulped down a whole one. That long drink cost her oxygen, which made her cough hard again for a full minute after. She took out a second bottle and sipped, not realizing how parched she’d let herself become.
Probably thirst wasn’t making her think any clearer. As if the fire itself, bearing down on her from all directions wasn’t enough of a mind-killer. That she’d been able to think at all was amazing. She might have really made a mistake when she’d fled from the paved loop road and come up this fire road.
It had felt like being trapped, though, back there in town. That’s what she was running from, the sense of not being able to flee, and the fire bearing down. But now here she was, back in that situation again. She’d fled from bad to worse.
Gotta try to get back out. Back home. It would take her a half-hour to an hour to retrace her route and get to the loop road, if she even could make it all the way back. But what other choice did she have? None.
Putting the car in gear, she got herself turned around. The car’s motion felt funny. She put it in park, opened the door, and looked at her tires. They were smoking on one side. But inflated still.
That, as much as everything up until now, told her how much trouble she was in. Her tires melting. What next? Could they burst into flame soon? Whichever they did, sag into molten rubber or burn, she had to drive as far as she could on them while they held. And then, if they were gone, she’d drive on the damned rims. The car wasn’t important. She was. She and the people who would grieve her if she didn’t fight her way out of this situation.
She drove carefully up to the point where she’d had to drive through that wall of flames. It still was burning, though less strongly. Small favors. She stopped, backed up the car several feet, and gunned it, punching through the flames as fast as she could. She got only a little bit farther before she saw more flames ahead, raging ones, accompanied by that same awful roar. She couldn’t get back to Pinedrops.
Shit. Shit and damn, I am going to die out here!
She pounded the steering wheel in anger. Anger felt far better than fear. Or than regret.
Again, she turned the car. It stalled. She coaxed it into running again and revved the engine, readying herself for a final punch back through the burning section of road. The fire roared. Her car engine roared back.
A third time, she drove through the burning patch.
And then there was an explosion and the car tilted, and for a second nothing made sense at all.
Chapter 13
Sylvia came to consciousness a minute later. Or maybe she hadn’t been knocked unconscious, just knocked into pure, stupid confusion. She was on her side, because the car was on its side, with the driver’s side down. She could feel the heat of the smoldering forest under the door, crazily enough, and through the window. She released her seatbelt to hunt for her phone, which had gone flying, and within a few minutes she found it. Lucky. Her only bit of luck in the last hour.
She pocketed the phone and tried to think. Why was the car on its side? And what the hell was she going to do now, without a car?
The flames were visible not far away, through the rear window. She needed to exit the car. That much was clear. What did she need? The phone. Some water. The briefcase, not for the papers so much but because she could shove four more bottles of water in there.
And her keys, because the house key was on the ring
If she had a house. It was possible that she didn’t. And hey, dead people don’t need houses, do they?
Sylvia waited for an optimistic voice to pipe up and say, “I’m not going to die!” But it was silent. No panicked voice. No shaming voice. No other voice but her main voice inside her head.
And it was making sense, depressing as its message was. She might actually die. And soon. Wouldn’t take long, would it? Part of her wanted to lie down where she was and wait for it. Or she could join her friend with the mummy hand and sit by him and share the end. Okay, she was late for that party, but he certainly wasn’t going to complain.