Wildfire

by Toni Draper

  Peña took a good look at his second in command. Castillo was clearly exhausted. They all were. Sweaty and dirty, none of them had stopped to bathe or even put on clean clothes since they got there, and the fire was just heating up. At this rate, there was no way they’d be able to rest and rotate out for a while. Not that any of them would be lined up, waiting to go, no matter how tired they were or how bad things got. Like weary bull riders with no hope of winning a buckle at a rodeo, they’d reached a point where they just wanted to hang on till the buzzer went off, so they could say they had given it their all. But more than twelve hours a day with no real sign of progress had them all feeling down and out.

  Still, they forged on. As they did, they recognized the area they were entering oddly bore little resemblance to the one where they’d started out, whether they were in the eye of the storm or this was the calm before what was to come. Either way, they were soon bound to be where the action was. Had they had more time and space, they would have likely brought in bulldozers to do the job.

  Alas, Mother Nature waits for no one. Thus, with Reinharts and Pulaskis in hand, they got to work clearing brush, grass, and combustible debris from the dry and hardened ground. Soon after, they were joined by sawyers. Like proud cowboys, they saddled up and sunk three-inch-long metal spikes from their boots deep into the trees’ sides and climbed up. Their goal was to bring the biggest young timber down. The job of their sidekicks, the swampers, was to clear away their trimmings, tossings, and cuts, lest they defeat the purpose of the crew’s endeavors and serve as a prime tinderbox.

  With such a combined effort, it wasn’t long before they’d done their job.

  Peña’s radio went off as Becker reported in, “Base Camp. Come in.”

  “Peña here. Over.”

  “Joe. We’ve done all we can do here. Where to next?”

  “I think you boys have earned some time off. Make your way back to the field kitchen and call it a day. We’ll see you bright and early in the morning. Over.”

  That evening’s meal consisted of rib-sticking, greasy fried chicken, mac and cheese, and green beans. The food was as comfortable as it comes. With Peña busy back at base and Davila still on the frontlines of the fire, it was Henderson who, after grabbing a bite to eat and cleaning up, slipped out to check on Mendoza himself. He was sitting next to her bed in a chair when Salas walked in.

  He didn’t hear or see her, but she heard him as he whispered, “Mendoza, dammit! Why the hell don’t you just wake up? We need you out there. I don’t know if I’d say this if I thought there was any chance you’d hear me—hell, your head’s already big enough—but you’re one hell of a firefighter. You can’t quit. You can’t give up. You’re one of the best we’ve got. All those times I gave you shit and did my damnedest to piss you off, I was just trying to see what you were made of.” He struggled, his voice betraying him by breaking up.

  Salas moved back into the shadows and cleared her throat, as if announcing she’d just entered the room, giving the man a chance to dry his eyes and keep his soft side unknown to all but himself.

  Henderson stood, moved away from his chair and the bed, and said, “Hey, Salas. I just dropped by to see how Mendoza was. Has she been awake at all?”

  “In and out, off and on. Not much. The doctors say they’re concerned about pressure building on her brain, so they’re keeping her pretty doped up. When they’re sure she’s out of danger, they’ll lessen the meds they’re giving her, but until then, what you see is what we’ll get. She took a pretty nasty fall.” She stopped speaking and looked at Mena.

  An uncomfortable silence drifted into the room and wrapped itself around the two of them until Henderson said, “Well, I guess I better get back out there with the rest of the guys.”

  His words pulled Isa back to the reality of the rest of the crew’s situation. “How bad is it?” she asked.

  “It’s bad. We’ve got men jumping out of planes and helicopters, coming in from every which way on the ground. They’re dumping chemicals and water and doing everything they can. Hell, Boise’s even sent down three more crews that had been on another fire up in Montana. If we don’t get this thing under control soon, there’ll be no stopping it.”

  “I feel bad, like I should be out there too.”

  “You’re where you’re needed right now. If it’ll make you feel better, I can have an official order for bedside duty sent down from above.” He stood and moved toward the door, but before leaving joked, “Besides, someone’s gotta be here when Sleeping Beauty finally decides to wake up.” With that, he smiled and walked out the door.

  So the man had a heart, of some sort, after all, Salas thought.

  She moved to sit in the chair where Henderson had been and looked closely at Mena. Her breathing appeared regular; no alarms, bells, or whistles were going off. She looked like she was simply sleeping. Which, in essence, she was.

  Just then, a familiar face came into the room. Alex smiled at Isa and picked up Mena’s chart.

  “Is it normal for her to still be unconscious?” Isa asked.

  Alex finished writing, closed the chart, and looked at her a few seconds before responding. “Let me see if I can explain what’s happening with your friend. As you know, when you found her, she was just coming around from having been out for a brief period, we’re assuming knocked unconscious. At that time, her brain responded to injury by briefly shutting down. Think of it as what we do with the help of drugs when we put the body into an induced coma for surgery or some other invasive procedure. Because the body wouldn’t be able to bear the pain, and might otherwise react violently, we put it to sleep and then wait for it to wake up. Although in Mena’s case, initially it was her own body that took on the role of physician and pumped similar natural chemicals into her system to induce the same sleep-like response. We simply picked up where it left off,” Alex continued. “We did so because we need to make sure there is no swelling or pressure on her brain. We need to keep her from moving until the full extent of the injury to her head is known. The doctor has already cut back on the medication, so once the IV is removed and she’s completely taken off the heavy-duty stuff, she should simply wake up and stay alert, just like we all do after anesthesia wears off.”

  Alex smiled at Isa, hoping she hadn’t seemed too condescending with her simplification, then looked at Mena. “But I don’t see any sign of that happening in the immediate future, so why don’t you take a break and leave this place for a little while? Take a walk outside. Get a little fresh air and sun. I’ll take good care of her while you’re gone, and I promise to find you if there’s any change in her condition.”

  That change came sooner than expected, and the next time Mena opened her eyes, she stayed awake for more than a few minutes, a fact that was quietly celebrated by all the medical staff who knew her story and had tended to her during her stay.

  Mena felt much better than she had the other times she’d rejoined the living for brief interludes. This time, she felt present as she listened to the voices of visitors as they came and went through surrounding rooms. She awaited the regular routine of poking and joking from the hospital staff she’d grown accustomed to spending time with and donating blood to, but nothing could have prepared her for the jolt she received when she saw who followed Isa through the door.

  Rendered speechless, Mena thought surely, she must still be asleep and dreaming. She reached for the control to move her bed into a more upright position and swallowed with difficulty. Although she’d hoped and prayed she would one day see Sydney again, she hadn’t ever expected to. Yet here she was, at the foot of her bed. Or was it an apparition, a mere hallucination, a side effect of the drugs? In all their time apart, she’d had so many conversations with her in her head, but none of those well-planned words found their way anywhere near her mouth now. She simply couldn’t believe it, or who she saw.

  Shrouded by the intensity o
f the sustained silence in the room, Isa excused herself by mumbling, “I’m just gonna…I’ll be back. See you guys later. Uh, yeah,” before turning around and disappearing into the hallway.

  Mena and Sydney, alone in the room, silently looked at one another.

  Finally, Mena spoke. “Well, now I know how close to death I must have really come.” She raised her eyebrows and, with her trademark crooked smile that revealed those deep dimples Sydney had always loved, asked, “But how did you know?”

  Sydney nodded her head in Isa’s departing direction. “I’m here because your friend, Ms. Salas, called me to let me know what happened.”

  Mena’s forehead creased as she wondered aloud, “How did she know? About us? About you? I’ve never told anyone.”

  Sydney eased into a smile. “That’s one mystery I think I can solve. It seems that in all this time, you hadn’t removed my card from your wallet. Do you remember? The one I gave you on which I’d written—”

  “In case of emergency, call,” Mena finished. “Yes, I remember.”

  The silence between them returned and settled in, as if preparing to stay a while.

  This time, it was Sydney who broke the quiet stillness. “For a long time, Mena, I’ve wanted to talk to you about what happened between us. To explain to you, to try to make you understand why I did what I did.” Sydney was not one to easily share details of her personal life or self, especially in such a public space into which anyone could walk and interrupt such an intimate sharing. Yet, realizing this could certainly be her swan song, her final curtain call, her last and only chance for reconciliation…Sydney swallowed her pride and rallied resilience. “It was all too fast, so overwhelming, and different. You came into my life and turned my world upside down. Not that it was a bad thing. I just wasn’t prepared for it, for you. I didn’t have time to adjust.”

  Mena didn’t know how to respond, so she remained quiet, listening.

  “There’s so much I never told you.” Sydney pulled a chair closer to the bed. This would take a while, and she didn’t want to leave anything unsaid this time around.

  Chapter 5

  Three years earlier.

  Sydney approached the lectern, her reading glasses in hand. Looking over the audience, she took a drink from the glass of water she’d been provided and scanned the crowd. She had accepted the invitation to speak, concerned only a handful of faculty would be interested in what she had to say and that students, even with the bribe of extra credit, would not show up. Thankfully, she had been wrong. Surprised and pleased at the number in attendance for her talk, she relaxed, removed the microphone from its stand, and walked across the stage.

  “I’d like to thank you all for taking the time to join me on this lovely afternoon.”

  She paused to sip more water, giving the hum of the crowd a chance to settle and herself the time to take in the faces that had come.

  “I’m not sure I’d have done the same in your places,” she went on.

  The hall reverberated with the murmur of appreciative mumbles and laughter. After all, it had been a beautiful Saturday.

  As a visiting lecturer from the University of Maryland, Sydney had been invited to speak at San Diego State after publishing a well-received scholarly essay on Southern California’s neighboring Yuman tribe from the state of Arizona. The host professor, in an attempt to win the support of monies and endowments needed to boost her fledgling department off the ground, had all but pleaded that she come. Ultimately, it was Sydney’s own innate interest in indigenous peoples and cultures, coupled with her erudite ego, that had brought her to where she stood on that day. It was there she felt in her element, where she, at that moment, needed to be and belonged.

  She spoke at length to the enraptured and gracious crowd of the practices, beliefs, superstitions, and legends of the inhabitants of the Red Rock Canyons and caves on both sides of the lower Colorado River, from Pima Butte across the Trigo Wilderness region and into the Maricopa and Painted Rock Mountains. All were sacred areas to where many in the region still went to get in touch with the spirits of their ancestors, sages who were said to induce dreams to offer guidance and understanding during times of difficulty and trouble.

  Sydney soon found herself, as she often did, caught up in the sharing of her research. Perhaps that could explain why, as she neared the end of her talk and the floor was opened to questions, she drifted mentally away in response, almost as if answering without giving the questions much thought. That is, until a rather attractive woman with straight black hair that fell over dark, brooding, and intelligent eyes captivated her with a sonorous voice that demanded attention; the timbre of it was so forceful and strong.

  “Tell me, Dr. Foster,” the woman addressed her almost intimately from out of the crowd near the front. She stood and looked the speaker in the eyes with a penetrating gaze Sydney sensed could see through to her very soul. “You’ve obviously spent a great deal of time and effort studying the Quechan. I’m curious to know what it is about them, their history or ways, that has passionately captivated and inspired you to devote so much energy to the exploration of such a relatively small and largely unknown group of people, and so far from your home?”

  Sydney was rendered speechless for what, to her, seemed like endless moments, absorbing the burgeoning awareness that this woman was more than just a pretty face in the crowd. Her curiosity not the only sentiment aroused; Sydney floundered for another few moments before clearing her constricted airways. She attempted to regain her usually very calm and collected composure while carefully contemplating the woman whose words and being had challenged and moved her so.

  She reached down for the water she’d placed on a shelf of the podium, then looked up, and their eyes locked.

  “The Yumans, or Quechans, as you have pointed out by referencing that they were also widely known, among other beliefs, gave importance to the meaning of dreams. It piques my personal interest, especially the value they placed on somnolent symbolism and interpretation.”

  Sydney hoped no one else noticed her mental fumbling and crumbling.

  “It’s a well-documented fact,” she went on in what was to her perfectionist ears almost a disjointed rambling of sorts, “that the Yumans…Quechans…were fond of using jimsonweed root, both internally and externally as a—”

  “I’m more interested in knowing what it is about their beliefs that speaks to you personally, about your dreams, maybe? Have you had visions during sleep? Any that have come true?” She smiled, and the audience chuckled. “For instance, I can tell you that I’ve had a few, and without any herbal stimulant to help them surface from my subconscious.” The crowd made even more noise at that revelation. “What was it, or is it, that has attracted you to this culture so?”

  Their eyes remained on one another, again locked. Her inquisitor settled back into her seat, Sydney again paused, and a deafening hush came over the entire auditorium as each listener breathlessly awaited her response.

  Who is this woman? Sydney wondered. Never had anyone ever addressed her so casually and candidly. A well-known, highly regarded, and respected scholar in her field, she was accustomed to the questioning of seasoned colleagues and academics who never accepted anything at face value. Much less were they interested in any personal or emotional involvement. Well, apart from one tenured old codger who’d tried to philosophize his way into her bed one whiskey-enhanced debauchery of a night. This, however, was a vastly different, seemingly personal inquiry. Or was she merely reading between unwritten lines? Had she allowed her thoughts to be so distracted, go that out of focus?

  Sydney dared look at her. The woman smiled, pleased with herself. No, this woman had no interest in facts and figures. These she appeared to already know. She was after something more, but what? As she struggled to respond, Sydney felt what she feared was the heat of a visible blush.

  “Well, I, personally, believe wholehea
rtedly in the meanings and messages, the symbolism inherent in our dreams. Dear Sigmund… Although he had his faults, and there were many, he was definitely onto something with his id, ego, and superego psychoanalytical explanations, as well as his metaphoric iceberg allusion.” The audience rippled once again with muted laughter, and Sydney managed to fall into the rhythm, allowing the camaraderie to relax her enough to break out of the unfamiliar and uncomfortable box into which she’d slid and refocus her thoughts. “Quite honestly, I’m fascinated by the complex capacities and many mysteries of the human mind. And although this is one of my absolute favorite topics of conversation, I’m afraid we’re out of time, and I really don’t want to wear out my first welcome.” She smiled and winked at the woman, abruptly signaling the end of their discussion.

  The faculty head made her way to the center of the stage, and so commenced applause.

  “Thank you, thank you so very much, Dr. Foster, for such a lively, enlightening, and engaging talk.”

  Afterward, at a reception in the lobby, Sydney sensed the woman who had shaken the very foundation of her being quietly approach long before her eyes saw her. Her palms began to sweat, and her heart rate picked up.

  “I didn’t mean to distract you from the intent of your lecture, Dr. Foster,” the woman said. “Please accept my apology. But when I found out that you’d be speaking in the area, I couldn’t think of a better opportunity, or pass up the chance to help our paths cross.” The woman extended her hand in greeting. As if in response to an unasked question, she introduced herself. “I’m Jimena Mendoza.”

  Sydney nearly dropped the plate and glass she held in her hands. She was literally and figuratively astounded. So this was the mystery woman with whom she’d been exchanging emails for months. And she’d come all the way from Arizona to meet her.

  From that fateful moment, their relationship, like a wildfire, ignited and took off. Fueled by engaging discussions and delightful debates, a shared and appreciated intelligence, and an insatiable mental, emotional, and physical appetite, it burned intensely. First via email and snail mail, necessitated by the geographical chasm that separated them by more than two thousand miles. Then by phone, until, unable to withstand the unbearable absences between interludes of in-person intimacies, and the physical back-and-forths, they closed the gap, once, if not for all.