“You might want to turn the heat on,” he said with a wry smile.
His eyes held mine for what I swore lasted one second longer than necessary. Or maybe I wished that. It hurts when you care about someone who doesn’t care about you, but it happens all the time—not that knowing frequency helps much. The smart thing to do would’ve been to write him off, but unfortunately, the heart doesn’t comprehend “smart.” What also didn’t help was that I’d given Glenn a piece of my heart last year, and he still had it.
I kept my voice casual. “I will. It’s cold!”
A long pause. “Okay, then.” He headed toward the office.
I carried my luggage into my former bedroom and hooked up my brand-new stereo. What to play? Linda Ronstadt’s “Heart Like a Wheel” drifted through the rooms, my tears falling as the lyrics hit home.
Sunday I returned from grocery shopping to find the house full of boxes, houseplants, and a dog. Out of the second bedroom strolled my roommate, as far from the outdoorsy type as I could imagine: Farrah Fawcett hair, eye makeup, and, as I’d soon learn, wearing contact lenses, which were forbidden for fire personnel..
Oh, brother. “So, is this your first Forest Service job?” I asked.
“Yes! I had to vacate my apartment, so I hope you don’t mind, but I brought everything.”
I could tell.
“Um, well, I’m not sure we have room for all of this,” I said, cringing when she set a fern on my new turntable.
“Sure we do. I’ll make room.” She unloaded and placed her albums beside mine in my wooden crate.
Alarmed, I said, “Hey, not there, they’ll get mixed up!”
“Phoo,” she said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “I’ll remember which ones are mine.”
Miss Prissy, I deemed her, swooped in and took over the place. I’d hoped for interesting and fun times here this summer. Only day two and already I had a bad feeling. Then I decided I shouldn’t be so quick to judge my roommate. Maybe we’d become friends.
Besides my roommate, I had several new people to get used to. Gary seemed outgoing and friendly like his sister Jodi, but how would he be as a supervisor? Paul made me wonder why an English major wanted a firefighting job. He had no muscle definition, and soft, uncalloused hands. Probably never held a tool in his life. Did he have any clue what this was about? Brian, the guy with a muscle-builder’s physique, spouted irritating bravado.
“Aw, heck, this is nothing,” Brian said during training. “I’ve fought structure fires for years. Wildland fires will be a piece of cake. After all, you don’t have a building about to fall on your head.”
“Granted,” I said, respecting his line of work. “Except that you don’t have to worry about firestorms, crown fires, blow-ups, steep terrain, slurry drops, falling trees, lightning strikes, rattlesnakes, or sixteen-hour shifts for days on end … do you?” Wait until his first fire. I’ll ask him if he still thinks this is a ‘piece of cake.’
When Joe came over later, I suggested we go somewhere, anywhere. I needed to get away. A few miles below the station, we built a campfire, munched crackers and cheese, and sipped red wine. Time alone with him was just what I needed. The sky shone white with stars; a meteor streaked toward the horizon. I made a wish. Let this be a good summer. If it hadn’t been so cold, we would’ve spent the night.
WAY TOO MUCH station duty and training took place over the first few weeks. Drove me crazy with boredom. Then I learned we’d take part in a “prescribed burn,” a fairly new practice to reduce wildfire danger. The Forest Service used to call them “controlled burns.” A few years ago, a control burn almost torched the Palisades Ranger Station. So much for being under control. I wondered how many similar incidents had prompted the name change. About the same time, Fire Control Officers became Fire Management Officers, too. At any rate, prescribed burning promised some excitement. At least there’d be fire involved.
Earlier in the spring, the crew had thinned dense stands of pinyon-pine in Gardner Canyon, located on the east side of the mountain, and stacked trimmings in piles. Now we’d set those piles ablaze. We started work at three in the afternoon, prepared for an all-nighter.
Ranches inside the national forest boundary kept cattle in check with multiple fences. I rode shotgun, so gate duty fell on me. Clark pulled up to the first Texas gate. I dreaded these stupid gates, made of barbed wire strung to juniper branches. To loosen the tension so I could unhook the closure loop, I wrapped my arm around the gate post, and squeezed. It didn’t budge.
“Hey, Linda, need help?” Clark hollered from the idling truck.
“No, I’ve got it.” Damn thing, get off there! I fought with it some more, squeezing even tighter. Every single time I did this, I swore it took ten times longer than it should. I could only imagine what the guys were saying while I struggled.
At last I got it open, and our vehicles drove through. Closing took more finagling, but without eyes on me this time.
Jostling over four-wheel-drive roads for an hour, my internal organs felt a bit rearranged when we finally reached the burn site. Sometimes I wondered if it would be easier to hike than drive.
Mark filled a drip torch. “I’ll light a few piles and see how they burn.” Then he laughed. “We sure don’t want to call dispatch to report we set the whole mountain on fire.”
When he lit my pile, I stepped back from the intense heat as it whoosh into a bright burst of orange—popping, snapping, and sending up tendrils of flame and smoke. I worked the perimeter, redistributing branches to make sure everything burned clean, keeping a close eye on where floating sparks landed. Soon the flames subsided, and the pile was reduced to a smoldering heap. Joe’s pile still had some major flames going on. I walked over. “Need any help?”
“Yeah, got any marshmallows?”
I laughed. It was hard to be near Joe, especially in the dark, and not be able to touch him. How did people manage to have a relationship with someone they worked with and not run into complications like this? A branch tumbled from the stack. I picked it up and tossed it back in.
“Want to come for dinner tomorrow?” I asked.
“Sure, I can do that.”
In the distance, someone sang “When smoke gets in your eyes …” A sliver of moon rose. Our bonfires simmered down. Mark lit some more.
What a long night. Weary, I opened my front door to find clothes draped on the couch, an overturned shoe in the middle of the floor, and dirty dishes in the sink. Jodi and I’d always kept a neat house. This would drive me nuts. The bathroom door swung open.
“Out all night?” Miss Prissy asked, padding out in her short terry robe.
I swallowed the confrontational words on the tip of my tongue. “Yeah, I’m kinda tired.”
“So what did you do?”
“Burned slash piles,” I said, opening the fridge. Uninspired by its contents, I debated on cereal. “Easier than a real fire.”
“Oh, yeah? Can’t be that hard. I happen to know a firefighter, and he said they never did anything but sit around and wait for fires, and when they got one, they squirted some water on it and went home.”
I froze with my hand holding the fridge door. She thought my job was easy? Did she and Brian know each other? Let me get her on a fireline. Or digging some ditches. Or building some fence. Or, dammit, hiking five miles to work trail, and then get a fire call and hike ten more miles.
She left for work, and I went to take a shower. I picked a soggy towel off the floor and moved her beauty products aside so I could brush my teeth. God help me, I want my own place.
I’D GONE GROCERY shopping and reached behind the car seat for my purse. Excruciating pain tore through my shoulder once again. This was happening way too often. With reluctance, because I hated admitting any pain was debilitating, I decided I’d have to see a doctor. First, though, I asked Eric to file a belated accident report. No way would I be paying for this myself.
The doctor asked a few questions, lifted my arm up and down,
took x-rays. “You dislocated your shoulder, overstretching the tendon. I could operate, but you could end up with a frozen shoulder.”
Dislocated? No wonder it’d hurt so much. But wait … Surgery? Frozen shoulder? I choked. “Isn’t there some kind of exercise I could do?”
He shook his head.
I would not let this injury affect me. I’d work through this. I wouldn’t have an operation that could possibly make me worse.
“FLORIDA ISN’T COMPLYING with new government building color standards,” Glenn said Monday morning. “Supposedly, they’re too reflective. I don’t get this. They’ve been the same for decades, and I never thought they stood out.”
Change the color? Why? I loved the pale yellow.
Clark squashed his first cigarette butt in the overflowing Smokey the Bear ashtray. “Don’t tell me we’re painting them redwood, or I’ll puke.” The Forest Service stained everything made of wood the same shade.
Glenn tossed paint chips on his desk. Brown and beige? I couldn’t imagine anything uglier. An awful roommate, Florida’s charm swirling down the drain … what if Joe ended up leaving for a new job? This summer headed downhill like a sled on ice.
On our first painting day, I volunteered to do the trim. Clark often teased that there never was enough time to do it right, but always enough time to do it over. Not in my world. Glenn had drilled a solid work ethic into me from day one. Make time to do it right. I scraped loose paint, swept cobwebs and washed off dirt. When the newbies slopped paint over flakes and dirt, I inwardly fumed.
That evening, I vented my frustrations to Joe. “The paint won’t stick! This is bullshit!”
“Cows do too.”
It took me a second, and I smiled.
“Don’t sweat it,” he said. “Do your job like you always do and ignore the idiots.”
That was hard for me. I didn’t get their attitudes.
Curled in the crook of Joe’s shoulder, before falling asleep I thought about how I needed him as my ally and friend as much as I needed his love. To think he might leave opened a hole in my heart.
OUT OF HABIT, I arrived at the office thirty minutes before anyone else. In past summers, I loved our pre-work meeting. I’d perch on a table, hardhat in hand, swinging my legs in anticipation of a fun day. We shared stories, laughed, and joked. This summer, there was little of that, but I had to get away from my roommate so I wouldn’t kill, I mean, strangle her.
Clark arrived soon after me and made coffee. Others meandered in a few minutes before eight. Miss Prissy, at eight-thirty. She was always late. Why didn’t anyone get on her case? She got away with things here that no one else could have. I’d witnessed her femme fatale performances:
“Could one of you strong handsome men lift this box for me?”and, “I’m afraid if I fill the gas can I’ll spill some on my uniform, would one of you sweeties help me out?”
Lord help me.Worse yet, the guys fell for it. For two summers, I’d fought hard to earn their respect, to be recognized as a hardworking crewmember. Would she undo all of that?
Glenn’s truck pulled in, the door slammed, his footsteps sounding hollow as they struck the wood floor. He headed straight for the coffee urn.
“You didn’t reuse yesterday’s coffee grounds, did you, Clark?” he said, winking at me.
Clark snorted. “Heck no, that was John’s lazy trick.”
Though not a regular coffee drinker, I still couldn’t imagine reusing coffee grounds.
Coffee and lit cigarette in hand, Glenn sat down behind his desk. He assigned a variety of tasks to everyone, and then turned to me. “You’re in charge of Paul today.”
I frowned. I didn’t much like Paul. I didn’t much like that next building up for painting was my place. I wished we could have painted it last—or not at all.
Paul and I set up in the shade of my backyard. Upside down buckets served as stools. I prepped the door, scraping and sanding. Paul took forever to even get the paint can open. Pausing, assessing, studying … What was he waiting for?
By nine o’clock, I’d discovered Paul’s fixation with time. Which would’ve been fine if he wore a watch, but he didn’t. Every fifteen minutes he asked, “So what time is it now?”
By mid-morning, his clock watching had already driven me crazy. I snapped. “It’s not break time, lunch time, or quitting time! When it is, I’ll let you know.”
He reared back, startled, and raised his brows. I muttered under my breath.
Right after our ten o’clock break, Paul disappeared. Where the heck is he going? Fifteen minutes later he returned, only to leave again shortly thereafter. At noon, I reminded him to wash his brush before leaving. Paul rose from his seat and glared at me, his mouth gaped open. What was his problem? If he didn’t like me being in charge, tough.
At one o’clock, I settled in to paint. No sign of Paul until one-fifteen. Just thirty minutes later, he set down his brush and walked away. I’d had enough. After not finding him anywhere in sight, I banged on the door of his quarters. “Paul? You in there?”
He opened the door wearing a ridiculous, stupid grin.
“What the heck are you doing?” I said through clenched teeth.
Paul folded his arms across his chest, his lips forming a ludicrous smirk. “I’m counting my fire shirts.”
Now my mouth gaped open. You’re doing what? “Get back to work, Paul.”
His grin vanished. As I walked away, I shuddered. I really didn’t want to know what he was doing in there. I mentally ticked off Paul’s annoying behaviors: no work ethic, showed up late, did as little as possible, and gave himself permission to take a break whenever he felt like it. What irked me the most was I thought Paul resented me. First chance I got, I told Gary.
“You’re being too sensitive,” he said, snickering. “He’s just teasing.”
Was I? I didn’t think so. Well, if Gary had no intention of sticking up for me, then I’d have to stick up for myself.
TWENTY-TWO
JOE CAME OVER to my quarters after work to tell me he got the job.
No! My eyes welled up. I choked back a sob.
His brow furrowed, and he took my hands. “If you don’t want me to take it, I won’t.”
I protested. “No, you must take it! This is your career.”
We talked much of the night. He didn’t understand how I could both want him to go and need him to stay. After he fell asleep, I lay awake. How often would we see each other? When? Even harder for me, I envied, and wanted, the opportunity he would soon have: a permanent Forest Service job. Would I ever get that chance?
Two weeks later, we spent our last night together at his place. The alarm clock bleeped at four a.m., but it didn’t wake me up. I hadn’t slept at all. I helped him load his truck, and we got into our respective vehicles. At my turnoff, he pulled over. I did too. He pointed a finger at his chest, drew a heart in the air, and pointed at me. I love you. I nodded and repeated the motions back to him. Tears poured down my face as I steered toward the station. Aside from Tom’s accident, this was my worst day at Florida. How would I manage without him?
Up early on my day off, I decided to do some housecleaning. Glenn knocked on my open front door. I invited him in, wondering what he wanted.
Voice firm, if not demanding, he said, “Something’s going on with you. What’s wrong?”
Did he ask this because he cared about me, or because he thought my emotions got in the way of work? Easier to lie. “Nothing, I’m fine.”
“Well, okay then. Just checking. You can talk to me, you know.” He left.
I stood in the middle of my living room, stunned. What just happened here? The last thing I needed was for him play with my emotions on top of Joe leaving. The more I tried to understand Glenn, the more I realized I never would.
THROW A BUNCH of emotions into a blender, punch high, pour into a glass, and let them settle. What would float to the top today? I’d lost my motivation, but still showed up for work early. Would my “I’m fin
e” mask succeed? I didn’t want Glenn asking me more questions, afraid I would read something into them that wasn’t there. Somehow I managed to get through another day. No word from Joe all week. Why didn’t he write?
Painting the buildings wasn’t near enough to keep my mind occupied. It left way too much time to think. I miss Joe. I hate it here, I thought, dipping my brush into the paint can.
Gary dashed from around the corner of the house, startling me. “Let’s go! We’ve got a fire!”
Moments later, crew-cabs loaded, we sped off to the Chiricahua Mountains, a forested range east of the Santa Ritas, where we’d join the efforts of several other crews on a slow-moving blaze in high timber.
“I’m going to put you in charge of a squad,” Gary said.
About time. With this being Paul’s and Brian’s first fire, I checked on them often.
“Down to bare mineral soil,” I reminded Brian. He grunted and scraped more.
There was no sight of Paul for quite a while. I found him way behind the rest of us, pawing at the ground with a McCleod, a firefighter’s version of a rake. I told him to pick up the pace, this was a fire, not trail maintenance. He laughed at me. Later, I caught him carrying a tool on his shoulder—a safety violation. When I spoke a few sharp words about the correct way to carry a tool, he gave me an angry glare. It was tough being a supervisor, I got that, but did I have to put up with this crap?
That night after we were released, I rode back wondering how I could’ve handled Paul better without Gary accusing me of being too sensitive. Should I have reported Paul on the spot? That would’ve made things worse. I wished I could ask Joe what he would’ve done.
Days later, four of us arrived back at the station just past five, with a truck full of fencing supplies. Late didn’t bother me, I figured it balanced the days when we knocked off a little early. As soon as Gary parked, Brian and Paul jumped out, heading for their quarters.
“Hey!” Gary said. “Where the hell do you think you’re going? You need to help unload.”
“It’s after five. We’re off the clock,” Paul shouted over his shoulder.
Summers of Fire Page 14