by Anne Pfeffer
Terra, I knew instantly, was not into men. She just had that low-estrogen vibe. “Greetings!” She waved a ladle at me, her smile showing a gap between her two front teeth. A scarf held back a mountain of curly black hair.
People started to pour in. Within a few minutes, Zoey had put away the marker and labels and focused on getting the lunch out, helping some of the more confused guests get into line and find tables, answering our questions, solving problems in the kitchen and on the serving line.
It was pretty obvious where the weak spots were, one of them being Charlotte, who stood next to me, ladling vegetables with glacial slowness. Before long, in addition to running trays and serving the mac ‘n cheese, I was doing half of her work, too, just to keep the line from bogging down.
“Thank you,” Zoey mouthed to me. I watched her move around the dining hall, her hair like a bright spot of light in a dim room.
As lunch ended, I noticed the creepy Alligator Lady with the ice blue eyes. She was headed for freedom, clutching a large grease-stained shopping bag to her chest. Zoey powered after her, a determined look on her face, but the lady had a big head start. In a couple of long strides, I made it into the doorway, where I hung out, casually blocking the exit.
The lady ground to a stop, Zoey pulling up behind her. “Travis,” she said smoothly. “This is Hilda. Hilda, this is Travis.”
“Hi, Hilda.” I tried not to look too hard at her, but I couldn’t help staring, trying to decide how old she was. Those young eyes in that old face. I couldn’t tell.
“Rhymes with Travis,” she said, then made a loud buzzer noise. “Bzzzt! There are no words that rhyme with Travis.” She pulled the bag closer to her chest.
“It’s all right, Hilda,” Zoey said, patting her arm.
“Bzzzt! There are no words that rhyme with Zoey.”
“Hilda.” Zoey spoke in a low, gentle voice. “What’s in the shopping bag? May I take a look?”
Hilda clutched the bag closer for a second, then held it out to Zoey. It looked like she’d poured an entire tray of cookies into it and was preparing to take off with them.
“How about sharing these with the other guests?” Zoey said.
Hilda set her jaw and snatched the bag back into her arms.
“I’ll make you a deal,” Zoey said. “If you go around the room twice offering cookies to anyone who wants them, you can take home whatever’s left over. Does that seem fair?”
Hilda began to shuffle around to the other guests, holding out the open bag while we watched. For the first time, I noticed she was wearing puffy bedroom slippers.
I sat down at a table, and Zoey sat next to me. “Thank you,” she said. “Some of these people are a little hard to handle.”
“Glad to help.”
Charlotte passed by on her way to the exit, looking for a moment like she wanted to join us.
“Bye, Charlotte!” I waved at her. Her lower lip came out in a sulky way, and she stalked off.
“Does Hilda have any place to go at night?” I asked Zoey.
She shook her head. “I’m trying to get her into this wonderful shelter. It’s clean and comfortable and just over on Pinecrest Road. It’s called The Haven and they help homeless women put their lives back together—find jobs and apartments, things like that.”
“That sounds great.” Here Mom was begging me to keep her out of the shelters, when this place, from the way Zoey described it, was nicer than our apartment.
The Center was almost empty now, so Zoey and I went out and sat down on the bench outside the entrance. A hot wind blew, rustling the trees and rattling the dry leaves on the ground. I’d heard on the news this morning that the Fire Department had issued red flag warnings for L.A. County. I’d have to get back to my other job soon.
“I’m glad I get to spend my lunch hours here, instead of on the mountain.” I spoke without thinking.
“Why?”
“It’s these two guys I work with. They’re stoned half the time, and go around the hillsides spying on people with binoculars.”
“You’re kidding!” She looked sideways at me. “So, like, what have they seen?”
“A lot of women out by the pool. Sometimes one of them goes skinny-dipping, which for these two freaks is like the Fourth of July and Christmas put together.”
I liked hearing her laugh. It was nice to feel like I could still keep a girl entertained. A sudden image of Zoey skinny-dipping flashed through my mind.
She stood up, since the After School program crowd was arriving. Her soft, clingy top revealed breasts that were round and small—just the right size for her little body. Apple-sized. Cute, like her.
I left, thinking how good it felt to talk and joke around with a girl. It was something new for me, but it was kind of nice. Maybe Zoey and I were becoming friends.
Imposter
Saturday morning I couldn’t get the car to start at first. Almost panicking, I tried the ignition a second and a third time, until the engine finally turned over. That did it. I was going to have to spring for some auto servicing.
I knew the price tag would probably eat up that week’s contribution to Mrs. M. Fear made me almost stop breathing for a moment. But the car was as important as the apartment—even more so. I couldn’t get to work without it, and if all else failed, we could always live in it.
I couldn’t believe that I was starting to see living in my car as one of my better options.
No matter how awesome it was, I shouldn’t be doing the Discoverers program, I thought, as I pulled into the parking lot behind the fire station. I should be doing a paying job. I thought of those perfect, sparkling fire trucks. Somebody had to wash them. I would ask Perkins about that today.
“Good to see you, Walker!” Perkins boomed. “Let’s get you started.” He took me out to the training area, where the group was gathered and Garret was just about to begin.
“You all remember Travis,” Perkins said. “He’s going to be joining the Discoverers as of today.”
I raised a hand in greeting to the group.
Garret had a burr up his butt about something. He shot a frown at me, then said “Chief… sir?”
“What, Hale?”
“Wouldn’t you like me to get his paperwork handled and clear him to enroll before he begins?” He glanced down at a phone in his hand and punched a button as he talked.
“You got a rule in your phone about that one?” Perkins shot back, giving Garret an amused grin.
“Probably, sir.” Garret stood his ground good naturedly. “As a matter of fact…”
Perkins waved a hand. “Relax, Garret. We’ll do it by the book. Later on.”
Garret’s glance at me showed he hadn’t forgotten about our last meeting. I tried to look friendly and non-threatening. I’d seen that guy go down the side of a cliff like he was walking to church, and I admired him. Seeing a space next to Brandon, I took it, siting down cross-legged on the ground.
“Dude,” he said. “I looked for you at school.”
“Oh, yeah?” Let him think I was still there. He didn’t need to know I had dropped out, thereby jumping on the fast track to loserdom.
“Listen up,” Garret hollered. “Today we introduce the Physical Ability Test, which everyone must pass to become a firefighter.” He paced back and forth in front of the group, his biceps straining under the short sleeves of his navy shirt. This guy worked out all right. I had done some pretty intense weight training myself, back when I was a normal kid who went to school and the gym.
Like all the firefighters, Garret looked like he’d spent half the morning getting dressed. The sun caught on his polished silver belt buckle, sending out little gleams. He had parted and combed his short hair, which was practically a buzz cut on the sides, but had a little length on top. His shirt tucked neatly into his pants.
I could do that. In my own way, I already did. Even in my old clothes, I tucked in my shirt and made sure my pants fit just right, particularly through the hips and ass,
where it mattered. My hair was groomed but rumpled the way girls liked, in a sexy bad boy kind of way. My teeth were clean, and I always smelled good, thanks to this great cologne I’d found. I frowned a little, remembering that I was almost out and couldn’t afford to replace it.
Garret talked on. “This test is extremely strenuous. It has eight elements that you must complete in ten minutes twenty seconds in order to pass.”
Next to me, Brandon fidgeted. “Man, this test’s a bitch,” he whispered. “I’ve seen people do it over at the station where my dad works.” He started to sweat before my eyes.
“Today,” Garret went on, “each of you will finish the test, no matter how long it takes. That time will be your benchmark for measuring future improvement.”
The candidates would perform alphabetically, which meant I would go last. Fine. I would watch and learn.
A guy named Adams went first. As he ran through the tasks, it was clear Garret meant it when he said strenuous. Task One was three minutes on a stairmaster. Adams started fine, but by Task Three, he trembled and sweated as he dragged a hundred seventy-five pound rescue dummy the length of the hot, sunny training yard.
Brandon jiggled his feet, shifting his weight around. “So you still going out with Brittany?” Before I could answer, he poked the shoulder of a guy sitting in front of us. “Austin! You know Travis? He goes to Perdido, too!”
“Silence!” It was Garret. He glared at the group of us. “Pay attention!”
Austin looked about fifteen. I’d never seen him, but Perdido was a huge school. I gave him a quick wave, hoping Brandon would shut up now. I wanted to watch, trying to gauge how I’d do on this thing.
While Adams was on Task Four, the second candidate, Jed Burrows, began. By Task Five, Adams, panting, stopped to rest for a good ten seconds. By Task Eight, which made him lift and lower a sixty-pound garage door twenty times, he was practically crawling.
“Travis is dating Brittany Sanders!” Brandon stage-whispered to Austin, who said Awesome!” and gave me a thumbs up.
Dating was not the word to describe what I’d been doing with Brittany. “She’s fun,” I told them. “But I don’t see her much anymore.”
Their faces fell. “Bummer.”
“You! Brandon Vaughn!” Somehow, he was the one Garret had seen talking. “Rule Number 81.7: A member of the Discoverers may be removed at any time at the discretion of the instructor. That goes for people who talk in class, capisce?”
Brandon went chalk-white. “Travis was talking, too!”
The little shit. I couldn’t believe he said that.
“All of you!” Garret yelled. “Quiet, now!”
I shut my trap, thinking I wouldn’t be turning my back on Brandon any time soon, and watched the others struggle through the test. Adams did the best, finishing in thirteen minutes. Burrows and the guy behind him both finished in about sixteen minutes.
Drops of sweat poured down Brandon’s forehead. His turn was coming up. “I bet you’re gonna be really good at this.” It was like he was trying to sound friendly, but deep down you knew he wasn’t.
I didn’t answer or look at him, wanting to be sure Garret had no reason to throw me out.
“My older brother won the Discoverer of the Year Award,” Brandon moaned. “He’s another dude just like you— Mr. Hot-Shit Firefighter with girls hanging off of him.”
That’s what Brandon thought of me?
“I promised my dad I’d do the program, just to get him off my back. He thinks I’m going to learn the joys of firefighting.” Brandon laughed bitterly. “I’m just trying to get through it.”
He probably wanted to get tossed from the class.
“Vaughn!” Garret called, pointing to Brandon. He held out the fifty-pound weight vest you were required to wear during the test.
Brandon struggled to his feet. “This sucks so bad,” he said, going off to meet his fate.
I would be next.
I rolled my shoulders and stretched out my hands and fingers. I’d always been in good shape, but my recent weeks in the Benny Sandoval School of Fitness Training had prepared me for this in a way that no fancy-boy gym ever could. I’d spent most of yesterday hauling Hefty bags full of grass down a steep hillside and lobbing them into a dumpster. I thought I could do a few garage door raises.
“Ready to go, Walker?” Garret asked.
Brandon wasn’t far enough along. I was going to run into him from behind and lose time.
“Do you mind if I wait a few minutes?”
“Okay.” Garret gave me a shrewd look as Brandon groaned and stopped to catch his breath. “If you need more time to prepare, I understand.”
“Thanks.” I waited, thinking about Mom looking forward to our soup kitchen food every night, me sliding down hillsides, arms full of branches, dirt creeping into my socks, and, then, like music filling a silence, Zoey’s low, husky voice.
Brandon had finished Task Five and lay flattened on the concrete of the training yard, catching his breath. I shook my head at Garret. Too soon to go. We waited as Brandon pulled himself up and kept going. When he was almost done with Task Seven, I said to Garret, “Okay, I’m ready now.”
I noticed that Perkins and a couple of the other senior firefighters had come out to watch. “This is the guy,” Perkins was saying to them, “who kicked Hale’s butt on that turn-out drill. He’s hungry.”
I slid on and buckled the weight vest, thinking I was hungry, all right. “Ready.”
“Go.”
I focused. Stairmaster. Three minutes at sixty steps per minute. Done. Legs starting to loosen up.
Hose drag. Pulling the nozzle over my shoulder, I dragged the heavy hose the required hundred feet, putting my back into it, then did the chain saw carry, thinking all in a day’s work. My breathing had deepened and my arms, back, and legs were now fully warmed up.
A month ago, this test would have taken me longer. But in my short time with Benny, I had stopped being your average guy. I was a beast of burden now.
Don’t run in between task stations. I could “walk with purpose,” but running would disqualify me.
Task Four. With smooth, long pulls of the rope, I extended and retracted a twenty-four foot ladder, then without missing a beat, picked up a sledgehammer and began to wail on a measuring device, picturing my target as — well, not Mrs. M exactly, but some anonymous landlord who I could take vengeance on. I was breathing deeply by now. Sweat plastered my hair to my forehead.
Next came a sightless obstacle maze. My already fast-beating heart sped up as they blindfolded me and led me to the entrance to the tunnel. Reminding myself that this was just a plywood-constructed tube and not a building on fire, I squeezed my way through the tunnel and went on to do the last two tasks. Muscles now aching, gasping for breath, I kept going, moving methodically until the last lowering of the garage door in Task Eight, when the whole group burst into applause.
I gave them a salute, my t-shirt sticking to my chest and back as the sweat trickled down. My arms and back ached, but it felt good, like I’d accomplished something.
My time was ten minutes fifty seconds. I’d missed passing the Physical Ability Test to become a firefighter by a mere thirty seconds. On my first day of training.
It was the coolest thing I’d ever done.
Brandon pulled off his helmet and threw it on the ground. He’d come in at nineteen minutes. Perkins came over, grinning broadly. “Great job, Travis!” He turned the Garret. “Better watch out. You’re gonna have Walker passing you up soon!”
“In your dreams, Walker!” Garret said. With a big smile, he reached over and gave me just enough of a push to knock me off balance, making me take a step backward.
“I’ll sign him up,” Perkins told Garret. He brought me into his small office and sat behind his desk. It had a blotter in the center, a stapler and letter opener lined up parallel with it, a cup for pens at forty-five degrees off the top right corner, and an in-box/out-box combo containing a small, ti
dy “in” pile and a large, tidy “out” pile.
“I’ve got an application around here somewhere.” He pulled open a file drawer holding a wadded up rain slicker. He threw it on the floor, then unearthed a catcher’s mitt and baseball, which also hit the carpet, and finally a stack of messy folders, with corners of pages sticking out in all directions.
I wondered which was the real Perkins, the perfect, orderly desk or the trashed drawer. Maybe they were both him.
“I’m glad you’re joining up, Walker. You have a lot of promise. I think you’d make a great firefighter one day.”
“Really? Thanks!” Me, a firefighter. It was an amazing thought. Because of the fire station, I’d had these special moments of pride and hope for two weeks in a row. One more week and I’d have a trend.
This Discoverers program was awesome. I pictured Garret and Perkins going down the cliff together. Could I really do that? I was dying to try.
I suddenly knew I wasn’t going to ask Perkins about washing trucks.
“I want you to know we have an open door policy here at the station.” Perkins wove his fingers together, resting his hands on the desk. His mustache, which was the old-fashioned kind you saw in TV reruns, a big one that almost covered his whole mouth, moved up and down while he talked. His tan was even darker than the day I’d met him.
“Especially for the kids in our Discovery program. We don’t want you out on the streets. You have some free time or need to talk to somebody, come by. If we’re not out on an alarm, we hang out and play cards a lot in the evenings.”
“Thank you. That sounds great.” It did sound great, especially since I’d stopped barhopping after the Suki disaster.
From one of the folders, Perkins gave me an application to fill out. Some of the sections brought me up short. Did they seriously want all this information?
I did the best I could, trying to disguise the shameful parts of my background without actually lying. Under “Education,” all it asked for was “Name of High School” and “Expected Date of Graduation.” That was good – they weren’t assuming I’d graduated. I wrote “Perdido High School” and left the date blank. That was true, right? I had attended Perdido. I wasn’t making any claims about graduation. I hoped it would be good enough.