Falling for the Fireman

by Allie Pleiter

  “I don’t know,” he said, feeling absolutely helpless to bring her to the conclusion currently clawing at his brain. “We need time to figure it out.” He’d used “we” again. He was involved, invested, determined to see this boy and his mother out of the valley he’d now have a hand in making. “We need to help him figure it out. Fire becomes something…different…to people who’ve survived it. Especially kids. They either run to it or run from it. You ran from it,” he said, his mind racing back to the feelings he had watching her light that birthday candle, “maybe Nick’s run to it.” He was thinking out loud now, searching desperately for some other, less darker explanation that would suit her mindset. He couldn’t abandon her to cold, hard facts—not only because they were cruel, but because he didn’t have any yet. “Maybe he lit matches to prove to himself he wasn’t afraid of fire. Or prove it to kids who were teasing him the same way you had to prove it to yourself with the matches. We’re going to have to let him tell us what’s going on inside his head.”

  “We?” It was a small, frail syllable. He was truly sunk: she’d noticed.

  Chapter Ten

  Jeannie sent Nicky straight to his room once they got to the apartment. He made it quite clear he wasn’t in the mood for conversation, keeping his face away from her and slumping down in the car seat as they drove home, and Dr. Billings told him to keep the ice on his mouth another half an hour anyway.

  Jeannie wasn’t feeling talkative, either. She prayed for wisdom the whole drive home. Or just grace, perhaps, to keep from doing further damage until she could untangle her thoughts and emotions. The laundry lay half undone where she’d left it, and dishes sat in soapy water long gone cold. She hadn’t had the chance to eat lunch, but she had no appetite anyhow.

  One look at her kitchen calendar told her there wasn’t much time for quiet contemplation; she was due at a church committee meeting in an hour. “Not doing that.” Jeannie sighed as she hit the speed dial button on her phone, thankful the committee chair was Abby. If Abby hadn’t already heard—and news might have spread quickly enough that she had—maybe recounting things to a good friend would bring some clarity.

  “I practically had my hand on the phone,” Abby said when she picked up on the first ring. “I almost called you but I figured you’d call when you came up for air. Suspended for fighting. What a mess. I’m so sorry all this is happening.”

  “‘Mess’ is a good word.” Jeannie picked Nicky’s jacket up off the hallway floor where he’d dumped it, but once she noticed the bloodstain on the collar she tossed it toward the laundry pile still on the floor rather than the coatrack. Having to go downstairs to the apartment basement to do laundry was just another part of why she disliked living here. “I thought I could handle whatever Nicky threw at me, even on his worst days.”

  Abby sighed. “This is a bit more than your average teen parenting bump, isn’t it?”

  Jeannie couldn’t decide whether to ask Abby if she knew about the matches. Matches sounded so…criminal. This was no bump. This felt like a solid brick wall she had no idea how to climb. “Have I fooled myself, Abby?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Was I wrong to think we’d come through this unscarred?” She leaned against the wall, feeling trapped in the narrow beige tunnel. Not one square inch of her new place would be beige if she could help it. “I kept being so thankful God granted us some kind of emotional immunity, had protected us so well through all this.”

  “You have. You’ve been amazing. People are inspired by how well you’ve handled things.”

  “But that’s just it. I’ve been so busy looking for evidence of how well things were going that I didn’t see signs that might have pointed to this.”

  “I don’t think anyone could have been prepared for this.” Abby’s voice grew soft. “I would have come to help if you called. In a heartbeat. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I do. It’s okay, Chad was there at Dr. Billings’s office.”

  “Chad was there?”

  Jeannie really hoped Abby had enough sense not to make anything of that right now. “He was giving a talk to the kids when the fight broke out.” She still couldn’t believe she had to use phrase “fight broke out” when discussing her son. “I’m not coming this afternoon.”

  “Of course not. You’ve got more important things to worry about than the Thanksgiving Food Drive. If you want, I’ll tell Frank to make his own dinner and I’ll come by after the meeting. If you need some time to talk.”

  “No,” Jeannie surprised herself by answering. “I think I’d better start by talking to Nicky.”

  “Okay, but call me if you need me.”

  “Thanks.”

  Jeannie hung up the phone with the sad realization that she had no more clarity than before. Talking with Abby almost always made things better, but right now the knots in her life seemed to be far too big for any hope of assistance. She’d been blindsided by the entire day: Nicky getting into fights, suspension, matches and Chad. She pulled the stopper out of the sink drain.

  Chad. Honestly, Jeannie didn’t know if Chad’s involvement made things better or worse. Did his offer of help simplify or complicate things? It had felt so good to have him there in the dentist’s office. She was starting to feel a serious attraction to him, but she believed what she told Abby; this wasn’t the time to add a relationship to her life. Today had proven she needed to focus on Nicky now more than ever.

  She finished the dishes in the sink, hoping for a small sense of orderly accomplishment that never came. Taking a deep breath, Jeannie dried her hands and walked down the hallway to knock softly on Nicky’s bedroom door. A grunt was her only reply. She pushed open the door to find Nicky sprawled on the corner of his bed, looking nothing like the sweet boy she knew. He’d abandoned the ice pack and was fiddling with a rubber band. At her entrance, he sat up, leaning back against the wall alongside his twin bed. He’d had a wonderful, big bed in their old place but already this borrowed twin bed looked too small for him. He avoided her eyes.

  Jeannie sat down on the bed, moving the ice pack from its damp spot on the drab brown comforter. She wiped the last of the dishwater from her hands across the jeans she’d thrown on in her hurry. They had ketchup on them from last night when she and Nicky had laughed endlessly at one of his dumb jokes at the diner. That boy seemed a complete stranger to the one before her now. “You want to tell me what happened today?”

  He let his head fall against the wall. “I’m sure Mrs. H. told you all about it.”

  “I want to hear it from you.”

  Nicky fidgeted, looked everywhere but at her for a long time, then said, “Scott Collins is a jerk.”

  Jeannie started to say “And we always punch jerks?” but she stopped herself, trying to think of what Henry or even Chad might say instead. “Why?” seemed the best choice.

  “He thinks he owns the world. Like he’s better than everyone, knows everything and the rest of us can just go… We don’t stand a chance. How come everyone believes what he says even if it’s stupid? I hate him.”

  His eyes flicked up to Jeannie, knowing she usually didn’t like him to say he hated anyone. He looked like he hated Scott. Jeannie chose to let it slide, glad he had at least looked at her for the first time in an hour. She scooted herself back on the lower half of the bed, so that they both sat side by side at the head and foot of the bed, feet dangling over the side. For some reason, her brain chose that moment to notice his legs were not much shorter than hers now. How many years before he would tower over her, a lanky high school teen? “What could he say that would be stupid enough to make you hit him?”

  Nicky dropped the rubber band and pulled his knees up, wrapping his arms around them and looking away from her. “Stuff,” he said softly. He was still looking away from her, and she noticed he flexed the fingers of his right hand. His knuckles were still red from the punch.

  She waited for him to offer up the details, but he didn’t. He barely moved, jus
t jiggled one foot nervously. She was going to have to pull it out of him, but it was going to have to be slow and gentle even though she wanted to take him and shake him to his senses. She shifted on the bed to face him. His shoulders seemed so broad and so small at the same time. “What’d he say, Nicky?”

  “He said…” He stopped, and Jeannie raised her hand to put it on his shoulder, but something stopped her with her hand in midair. She waited, praying. The phone rang, but she let the machine pick it up, unwilling to move. “He said I was a freak. A pyro. Said I burned down my own house and that I should just go ahead and burn down the whole school. That I acted weird at the fire drill because I knew they were coming to get me. I hate him.”

  So much for one young man to take. How do kids learn to be so cruel? The pain in Nicky’s voice sliced at her, making her want to lash out at anyone who would do something so awful as say “arson” to a kid whose house had just burned to the ground. Jeannie wondered for a second if she, too, wouldn’t have punched Scott Collins if she were in Nicky’s place. That wasn’t a helpful sentiment.

  “Mrs. Hunnington found matches in your locker.”

  No response.

  It had to be asked. “You don’t start fires, do you, Nicky?”

  He whipped around at that. “What do you think?” he snarled out before getting up to sit in a chair on the opposite side of the room.

  She pulled her legs up to sit cross-legged, exhaustion pressing down on her shoulders. “I don’t know what to think. I know how I thought you behaved. But that boy doesn’t punch people.” She made herself hold his gaze, even though his eyes looked dark and foreign. “Tell me if what I know isn’t true anymore.”

  “I know you’re too scared to even light a match.” His chin jutted out as he declared it. “I’m not. Yeah, I lit the matches. But I don’t start fires. I didn’t start the fire.”

  “No one thinks you did,” she replied quickly, firmly. She didn’t want Nicky believing Scott Collins’s accusation for even a moment.

  The look he gave her in reply sent a chill down her spine.

  Chad kept looking at those ridiculous yellow sparkle pens every ten seconds, no matter what work he tried to do. Hoping distance would help, Chad started to drive home, but only got halfway before he pulled off the road and stared at his cell phone for a solid minute. Don’t do that. They need to be left alone to work this out for now. They need time. He sighed and tossed the phone onto the passenger seat unopened, only to end in the parking space in front of Jeannie’s apartment ten minutes later.

  The lights were on inside. They were finally home and safe.

  The thought of her in there grappling with Nick’s issues all alone bothered him. He’d seen things in Nick no one else could see, and yet he’d failed to be there when Nick needed him. Twice.

  He dialed the apartment phone number Nick had given him. I’ll just make sure they’re okay, then go home.

  No one answered.

  He lectured himself on the dangers of any further meddling the entire walk up to her door. He rang the bell even as he told himself what a bad idea it was. All of that evaporated in the look of relief that warmed Jeannie’s face when she opened the door.

  “You all okay?” he blurted out, thrown by how much her and Nick’s pain had affected him. “You didn’t answer your phone.”

  “I can’t handle this.” She leaned back against the doorway, clearly trying not to cry. She’d always been so feisty; this tearful delicacy had all but undone him. He’d let her into his world, let both of them in not because he wanted to, not because it was wise, but because he simply couldn’t fight it anymore.

  “Of course you can,” he said. “You can pull Nick through this, Jeannie, you can.” It wasn’t empty platitudes; he believed she could.

  He looked down, realizing he’d grabbed her hand without meaning to. Her gaze traveled down to his hand on hers, then slowly back up to meet his eyes. A feathery lock of her hair fell from the messy ponytail she wore. His heart seemed to drop out of his chest altogether, leaving a hollow, precarious feeling that stole his breath. She knew. He could no longer pretend nothing had sprung up between them.

  She clearly felt the same tug he did, that unending pull toward each other that had kept him up many nights and unhinged him for the last hour. Now what?

  “Um…why don’t you come in?” she asked, turning a shade of pink that tickled him somewhere inside. She started to turn. “Nicky’s in his room. I think he’s asleep.”

  “Jeannie…” he began, not even sure of what he ought to say.

  “Please,” she pleaded, and that was the end of it. He couldn’t help but follow her up into the small, sparse apartment that looked nothing like any home Jeannie Nelworth would own. She’d tried to make the haphazard collection of borrowed furnishings comfy, for there was an afghan thrown over this or a picture leaned up against that wall, but the whole apartment felt keenly out of character for her. He wasn’t surprised when she blurted out, “I hate this place. Nicky hates it, too. Now can you see how badly we need to be out of here? This is no home. It’s not what Nicky needs.”

  Jeannie had said so before, but here it was palpable. He could see, now, what drove her urgency. She walked into the tiny kitchen, where she paced like an animal in pain. “He told me he lit those matches. What am I supposed to do with that?”

  He was glad Nicky admitted to at least that. “Face it, I suppose. Get him help.” He hated what those words did to her eyes.

  “I’m not strong enough to face this.” Her voice sounded thin and frail.

  “You? You’re the strongest woman I know. You’re not weak, Jeannie. You’re just…tired.” She was weary. I could be strong for you, he longed to say but knew that wasn’t a promise he could keep. She deserved so much more than what he could give her. He allowed himself to put one arm around her. Not a hug, just one arm.

  She looked up at him, and Chad recognized how dangerous it was for him to come here. His brain was already dreaming up lies he’d love to believe. She could be the woman who pulled him back to faith. Nothing short of her relentless buoyancy, her absolute unshakable faith could rekindle what was left of his. What if…?

  A thump caught his attention, and he turned to find Nick standing in the kitchen doorway. He hadn’t even changed his shirt, and the sight of the red bloodstain on his sleeve felt like a punch to Chad’s stomach. The boy’s red-rimmed eyes flicked from Chad to the hand Chad still had on Jeannie’s shoulder. When his gaze came back to stare darkly at Chad, Nick’s face looked at once too old and too young. “What are you doing here?”

  Chapter Eleven

  Jeannie couldn’t say which was worse; the “gotcha” feeling in her stomach, or Nicky’s searing gaze. She could easily explain that Nicky hadn’t seen anything but an arm offered in comfort, but on the inside Jeannie knew her emotions went much further than her actions. Weary and frightened, she’d very nearly lost control of her feelings when Chad touched her. She knew, down deep, that had they been alone she might very well have kissed him. And that while he would have hesitated at first, he would have kissed her back. All of which was making it hard to think and breathe at the moment.

  “I came to see if you and your mom were okay.” Chad sounded casual, stable. How did men do that? Separate things and lay them aside as if life could be peeled into neat segments like an orange? Her thoughts were scattered and her breathing raced, but his voice held no hint of any emotional struggle.

  “We’re fine,” Nicky barked, not looking at Chad. He headed for the fridge. “What’s for dinner?”

  Jeannie huffed and sat down. What’s for dinner? As if it were a perfectly ordinary day. “I don’t know. I haven’t gotten that far.” She tried not to make her glare sharp, but Nicky’s subsequent eye roll told her she’d failed.

  “Well, I’m hungry, that’s all.” He fished a gallon of milk out of the fridge, still acting as if Chad weren’t in the room. “Can we get a pizza?”

  “No, we cannot get a
pizza. This is not a ‘let’s go get a pizza’ kind of day, Nicholas.”

  “Fine,” Nicky grumbled. “Whatever.”

  Jeannie kept her exasperation barely under control. She hadn’t even thought about what she’d do with Nicky for the two days he was suspended. There were loads of work to do at the shop, she had set aside time in the church kitchen tomorrow to make several batches of candies for internet gift basket orders, but right now she and Nicky couldn’t seem to be in the same room without arguing. “And just what exactly are you going to do tomorrow?”

  Nicky sidestepped her and pulled a glass from the cabinet, pouring himself milk. “Stay home from school. I thought we all knew that.”

  Oh, how she hated that snippy tone of voice he could use. Harmless words but soaked in a nasty attitude. Half of her wanted to hug the poor wounded boy who was lashing out while the other half wanted to yell at the foolish young man who’d tried to solve things with his fists. “You did not earn yourself a day off here.”

  The idea came to her in a heartbeat. The firehouse might be the best place for him. Chad had a connection with the boy that went far beyond their mutual experiences of loss. She truly believed Chad could help Nicky sort out his feelings if they spent time together. “Chad, is there anything he can do down at the station? Chores or such?”

  Nicky actually looked up. “Like for pay?”

  She narrowed her eyes at her son. Did he really not grasp the seriousness of what happened today? “Absolutely not. I see this more like community service.”

  “You mean like a giant detention?” Nicky didn’t share her optimism.

  Chad, despite his look of surprise, didn’t seem entirely unwilling. She’d sprung this imposition on him, but she didn’t have loads of options and he’d clearly offered to help at the dentist’s office. She raised her eyebrows at him, pleading for cooperation.