The tent is packed, still riding the high of a milder fire season after last year’s blaze that chewed through 12,000 acres and half a dozen homes, so he doesn’t see her until she trips over the cooler at his feet, a tray of chocolate chip cookies tilting hard enough to spill half into the dirt if he doesn’t lurch forward to catch the edge. Their hands brush when he passes the tray back, his calloused, scarred fingers catching on the soft, dough-sticky skin of her wrist, and the scent of vanilla and pine cleaner hits him so hard he almost chokes on his beer. It’s Marnie Hale, 58, widow of his old jump partner Jesse, the woman he’s actively avoided for 11 years, ever since he carried Jesse’s charred gear back to her porch after the 2012 Lolo Pass fire.
He freezes, already mentally kicking himself for not leaving 10 minutes earlier, already flooded with that familiar, ugly guilt—he’d been 10 feet from Jesse when the tree fell, could have pulled him out if he’d been half a second faster, had no business breathing when Jesse didn’t, no business even looking at his wife. He mumbles an apology, eyes darting to the dirt at his boots, but she doesn’t leave. She slides into the bench across from him, the packed tent leaving no room to spread out, her knee brushing his under the table hard enough that he feels the heat of her leg through his work jeans.
She holds his gaze when he finally looks up, hazel eyes flecked with gold, no pity, no anger, just a faint, teasing smile. “I was wondering when I’d finally catch you,” she says, pushing a warm cookie across the table to him. “Jesse always said you’d avoid me until you were 80 if I let you.” The band shifts to a slower song, a couple next to them sways into their space, and she leans forward to avoid being bumped, her forearm brushing his bicep through the thin flannel. He can feel the warmth of her skin seep through the fabric, can hear the lilt in her voice over the noise of the crowd, can taste the sugar on the cookie when he takes a hesitant bite, gooey in the middle, just how Jesse used to like them.
The guilt wars with the sharp, unnameable desire he’s been squashing down for years, the part of him that’s been so lonely he’s taken to talking to Elara’s old pothos houseplant when he’s home alone, the part of him that’s convinced wanting anything good for himself is a betrayal of everyone he’s lost. He opens his mouth to make an excuse to leave, to mumble something about an early morning fixing fence on his property, but she touches the scar on his eyebrow first, her thumb soft against the raised, pale skin, and he stops mid-sentence. “Jesse had a photo of you guys on the fridge for years, with that exact scar,” she says, her voice low enough only he can hear. “Said you were the only dumb son of a bitch he’d trust to have his back in a fire.”
He laughs, a rough, rusty sound he hasn’t heard come out of his own mouth in months, and admits he’s avoided her all these years because he thought he owed her a grief he could never pay back, thought he had no right to be happy when Jesse and Elara weren’t. She snorts, shaking her head, and shifts closer, their knees pressed firmly together now, no accidental bump this time. “Jesse would’ve kicked your ass for moping this long,” she says. “And Elara? I knew her, remember? She’d have marched over to your cabin and dragged you out of that rocking chair by your ear if she saw how you’ve been hiding.”
The noise of the tent fades out for a second, the only thing he can hear is the sound of her breathing, the distant chirp of crickets outside the tent flaps, the thud of his own heart in his chest. He doesn’t feel guilty, not anymore, not when she’s looking at him like that, like she knows every ugly, broken part of him and doesn’t mind. He asks her if she wants to walk down to the creek behind the fairgrounds, watch the fireflies that come out this time of year, says he has a wool blanket rolled up in the bed of his truck if she gets cold.
She grins, standing up, and holds out her hand to him. He takes it, her palm soft and a little sticky from leftover cookie dough, and tugs her gently out of the booth, ignoring the wolf whistles from a couple of the younger firefighters at the next table. He tugs her a little closer as they step through the tent flap, the cool summer air hitting his face, and he realizes he hasn’t looked forward to a walk this much in decades.
