Lies Like Wildfire

by Jennifer Lynn Alvarez

  I squint at her. It’s the luck of genetics, of being born to the right family. Violet has everything: beauty, money, brains—and maybe Drummer too. We all love her, but she’s not like us. She’s an outsider. I slide on my dark-tinged sunglasses. Looking at Violet is like looking at the sun: it hurts.

  Mo ties back her dark red hair and calls out: “We’ve got to plan the rest of summer. We can’t come here every day. I made a list.” She withdraws a pen and a pink spiral notebook from her bag. “This is what I have so far: swim at the Gap, duh, day trip to hike the Vernal Fall trail in Yosemite—”

  “No way,” shouts Luke. “Too touristy.”

  “Just let me finish,” Mo says. “Movie night at Violet’s, shopping trip to Reno for clothes and college stuff, Escape Room—I’m going to make one—the rodeo in August, a spa day—that’s just for the girls—and a hunting trip for the boys.”

  “I like to hunt,” I protest.

  “But do you want to?” Mo asks. “Really?”

  Do I want to spend a couple of nights in a tiny hunting cabin with Drummer? Uh, hell yeah, but I let it go.

  “Anything to add?” Mo asks the group.

  “Camping in Death Valley,” Drummer calls out.

  “As long as someone else drives,” Mo says. “There’s still dust in my dad’s truck from last time.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” Luke grumbles. “Let’s do something unplanned.”

  Mo frowns at him. “I— That’s not something I can write down.”

  He splashes her from the water’s edge, and Mo narrows her eyes. “If it weren’t for me, you all would starve and die of boredom.”

  Drummer and Violet have emerged from the lake and Drummer tackles Mo. “I doubt that very much.” He nibbles on her arms and then her tummy, sending her into gales of laughter.

  Then Luke swims ashore and flops onto the blanket, exhausted because he smokes at least two packs of cigarettes a day and can hardly breathe. Violet and Mo dig into the snacks while my horses graze on the tall, dry grass behind us.

  Is this our last summer together, I wonder? Mo is leaving first, to attend Fresno State’s nursing program. Violet is going to Stanford to study biochemistry, I’m going to San Diego State to study criminal justice, and Luke and Drummer will work full-time somewhere.

  I wonder if Violet, Mo, and I will get jobs next year at school and stay over the holidays? Will we come home only when our parents beg us? Will geography be all that separates the monsters, or will it be education too? A shudder rolls through me at the thought of leaving Gap Mountain, of making new friends, of moving on….

  The wind kicks up and blows off Mo’s hat. “I’ll get it,” I say.

  Drummer squints at the sun beating down on us, his lashes creating spiked shadows on his cheeks. “This is fire weather.”

  “Don’t say that,” Mo warns, as if his words alone could call up a fire.

  Other than the wind, which is really gusting now, the day is perfect. Our futures expand before us like the Gap, beautiful and unknowable, and I vow not to forget a single moment of this summer.

  That’s when Luke stands up, pulls a bag of weed out of his pocket, and says the words that will change our lives forever: “Who wants to smoke?”

  3

  July 7

  Time: 3:00 p.m.

  “Why can’t you vape like a normal person?” Mo asks, groaning. “Go away. I don’t want that nasty smell on me.” Her cheeks have turned red in the heat, and her lips are chapped.

  “It’s too windy by the water anyway.” Luke snatches his backpack and heads toward the sheltered woods that meet up with the beach. Drummer follows. Violet watches them a moment, then pulls on her shorts, buttoning them low on her tiny waist, and slides on her Vans. “Be right back.” She skips after them, fingers dancing, head cocked.

  Mo rolls up her blanket and packs everything into her bag. “The party’s over, I guess.”

  “Or just beginning,” I grumble. “You know I don’t like Drummer when he’s high.”

  “Because he ignores you, right? You need to get over him, Han, there are other guys.”

  Heat sweeps to my cheeks. “Are there, though?”

  She laughs and slings her bag over her shoulder. Her large hazel eyes flick toward the woods. “Crap, we should keep an eye on them.”

  “They’re not babies.”

  She lifts her eyebrows.

  “Fine.” I pack my towel into Sunny’s saddlebags, leave the horses tied, and follow Mo onto an animal path through the pine trees.

  “Look, bear tracks,” she says, pointing. “I wish you’d brought Matilda.”

  “Me too.” My dog is old, but her bark is big enough to scare away bears. I haven’t drunk much water today, and a wave of dizziness washes over me. It’s hardly any cooler in the woods, and the dry wind reaches us between the branches, hot as devil’s breath. The brittle grasses and undergrowth are parched from the hottest summer in Gap Mountain’s history.

  I glance at my phone. The time is 3:12 p.m. Pine needles rattle beneath my feet, reminding me to watch for snakes. I hear laughter ahead.

  Mo and I find our friends standing in a small clearing. Luke and Drummer are gossiping in low tones about someone they both don’t like while Violet leans against Drummer, gazing up at him as he inhales off Luke’s pipe. I notice his arm slung casually around her waist, his fingers splayed over the rear pocket of her shorts. My heart stutters. This is not fucking cool.

  Mo notices too and glances at me. “The pact,” I mouth, but she shrugs as if to say, We were in sixth grade. Does it still count?

  My spine tightens in answer. Of course it still counts. We all agreed that monsters don’t date monsters. I stare at the pine needles. God, I’m still twelve years old inside, just taller.

  Drummer passes the pipe to Violet, and she takes it, sucking deeply through her kiss-shaped lips. His fascinated gaze lingers on her face in a way that’s familiar—not because he’s ever looked at me that way, but because I’ve witnessed it with a slew of girls over the years. Drummer and Violet are both single this summer, and this flirting—it feels dangerous. If he starts something with her, it won’t last. Violet could get hurt.

  When Drummer notices me watching, he breaks apart from Violet and slides his arm back to his side—looking guilty as hell, I might add. I know my disapproval isn’t fair. Drummer doesn’t belong to me. What we have is some twisted thing that sucks, mostly for me, but sometimes for him too.

  The pipe has gone out, and Luke pulls a book of matches out of the tin he keeps in his backpack.

  I gape at it. “Hey, you can’t light a match in the woods.”

  He glances at me, his eyes bloodshot and half-lidded. “Uh, yes I can.”

  “Not on a Red Flag day.”

  “I’m being careful,” he argues, and Drummer giggles.

  I shake my head. “Why don’t you use a lighter? Who uses matches anymore?”

  “He’s not old enough to buy a lighter.” Drummer giggles harder because Luke is still a minor.

  Luke nods. “But I can buy a shotgun.”

  “Hell yeah!” Drummer cries, bumping Luke’s fist.

  No one is looking at me. No one is listening. “You seriously shouldn’t smoke here, not today. I know; my dad’s the sheriff.”

  “My dad’s the sheriff,” Luke repeats—in perfect imitation of me—and they all laugh louder.

  Fury rises and swallows me whole. “Fuck all of you.”

  Luke flinches. “If anyone needs a hit, it’s you, Han Solo.” He strikes the match, lights the weed in the pipe, and takes a long hit. Then he blows the smoke in my face.

  It’s meant as a joke, I know, but my brain switches fully off and the sky turns blinding red. I grab Luke’s arm and dig my fingernails into his flesh. He’s strong, really fucking strong, and he
yanks his arm free. The lit pipe and the matchbook fly out of his hand, and the flaming red embers scatter across the dry grass. My voice rings like a gunshot. “I said stop!”

  “Shit, Hannah, calm down.” Luke turns in a circle. “Anyone see where the pipe landed?”

  Everyone stops laughing. “This is exactly how fires start,” I mutter.

  “You’re the one who made me drop it,” Luke snarls.

  “You’re the one who lit it,” I return.

  We drop to the ground and search for the pipe in the long yellow grass. “If we can’t find it, you owe me a new one,” Luke says. “I just bought that pipe.”

  “Guys,” Violet calls a few moments later. “I smell smoke.” We stand up and spin around, hunting for it. “There!” She points to a trail of white smoke and a series of small spot fires that are gobbling up the fallen pine needles and spreading west, pushed by the wind.

  For a brief moment, we stare at it, the thing we’ve been taught to fear since birth but have never seen in person: wildfire.

  “Oh my god, put it out!” I yell.

  We fly into action, ripping off our shirts and beating the flames, but the motion just adds oxygen and life to the fire. Luke grabs fistfuls of dirt and throws them, but the fire skirts out of the way. One blaze splits around a tree, creating two horn-like prongs, and we chase them. “Head it off, make a firebreak!” Drummer yells.

  We charge ahead of the fire and start yanking weeds and clearing the brush. “Do you have anything in your bag, Mo, any water?” I ask.

  “Yes.” She rips it off her shoulder and pulls out a half-full bottle of water. She tosses it on the flames, and they shrink away, sizzling angrily, then leap over the moistened grass.

  “That’s all you have?” I shout.

  “I have some beer left.” She opens those and pours them on the flames, but the blaze has grown too large to be doused. Mo drops the bottles.

  “I’ll get water from the Gap!” Violet cries. She grabs Mo’s sun hat to use as a container and takes off running. The wildfire reaches our break and leaps right over it, buoyed by the wind. Embers flutter ahead, starting more fires. The dancing orange flames speed west, climbing trees and swallowing shrubs. They spread faster than we can run. Large weeds and pine cones pop and send sparks that glide on the wind. Where they land, more fires ignite, hungry and newborn and squalling for fuel.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” says Luke.

  Violet returns with the sun hat, sees how wide and far the fire has already traveled, and starts to cry. The water she collected dribbles impotently out of the hat.

  Drummer swipes back his hair, panting. We’re all breathing hard, starting to cough.

  Mo pulls out her inhaler. “We can’t stop it. We have to get help,” she wheezes.

  Luke yanks out his phone. “Fuck, I don’t have a signal.”

  None of us do.

  Behind me, the horses whinny and I have an idea. “Drummer and I can ride the horses to the fire department.”

  Violet shakes her head. “No, I’ll go with you. I’m a better rider; I can ride fast.”

  It’s true. Like me, she’s been riding her entire life. We run toward the horses, but then I skid to a halt and turn to the others. “Mo, pick up all those bottles, get rid of everything that says we’ve been here.”

  For a second, no one understands. Then Luke nods. “Yeah, we didn’t do this.”

  “What?” Mo asks. Her red hair has come undone, and it whips around her face.

  “You heard Luke—we didn’t do this. We weren’t here. Don’t talk to anyone. Just head to my house! Violet and I will warn the town.” I nod to Violet and she stares at me, confused and terrified and high on weed.

  We jog to the horses, slowing when we get near so as not to spook them. Sunny prances and rears, but Pistol looks more curious than upset. I pull their slipknots, and we stick our feet in the stirrups, fling our legs over the saddles, and gather up the reins. “Give Pistol his head,” I instruct Violet. “You take the lead. Sunny likes to follow.”

  Violet and Pistol trot onto the main trail that leads from the lake and into Gap Mountain. The fire burns behind us on the ridge, gobbling brush, beginning to roar. Pine cones roll downhill, flinging hot pitch, starting more fires. Thick, pale smoke rises in a plume, and I bet the volunteer fire department has already seen it. We urge the horses into a gallop and race toward town.

  All the way to Gap Mountain, laws and penalties I’ve heard about from my dad flash through my mind: It’s illegal to start a fire, even accidentally. Reckless arson is a misdemeanor in the state of California. Bodily injury caused by reckless arson is a felony in the state of California. Death caused by reckless arson is murder in the state of California. We have to stop this wildfire before anyone gets hurt.

  I kick Sunny in the ribs. “Yah!” Both horses lower their necks and run faster.

  4

  July 7

  4:24 p.m.

  Violet and I gallop the horses into Gap Mountain proper. There is one main avenue, called Pine Street, and the volunteer fire department is located there.

  I guide Sunny onto the street, and his hooves slide across the asphalt. The horses whinny, upset by the fast ride and the tang of smoke in their nostrils. The wind at our backs blows their tails forward, and Pistol prances ahead of me. Violet steers him with one hand and grips the saddle horn with the other. She glances back, her eyes glassy and red-rimmed.

  “Violet, get on the sidewalk!” I call to her.

  She nods but pulls too hard on Pistol’s reins, and the Appaloosa rears at the same time a car turns onto Pine Street, driving straight toward them. The brakes shriek and Violet leans up Pistol’s neck, as if they’re going to jump over the car, but then Pistol drops to all four hooves. He snorts at the little Honda and its shocked driver.

  “Get off the street!” I shout at Violet, but she’s already guiding my horse to the sidewalk. The Honda drives slowly away, the driver shaking his head.

  I catch up to Violet. Her thick hair is matted to her forehead, her face is soaked with tears and snot, and her eyes are swollen. “You look terrible, V. Let me talk to the firefighters, okay?”

  “All right.” We glance at the mountain where the pale smoke has turned brown. It rolls out of the trees and spreads across the sky.

  I cluck my tongue at Sunny and guide him down the sidewalk to the fire department, but they’ve already spotted the plumes. Their double garage doors are up and the red engine is out, lights swirling. Firefighters scurry into their gear. Gap Mountain’s brand-new hi-lo sirens, which were installed for emergencies like this, sound from the trucks.

  Citizens spill out of the Wildflower Café, the hair salon, and the general store and line the streets, eyes fixed on the mountains that hunch over us.

  All at once, every cell phone in Gap Mountain pings, and the people on the street, including Violet and me, stare at the incoming Mono County sheriff Nixle alert:

  Vegetation fire on Gap Ridge.

  Firefighting resources deployed.

  Residents of Gap Mountain, prepare for possible evacuation.

  I gape at my phone. “Evacuation? Seriously?”

  “Hannah, this is bad!” Violet cries. She’s sitting on my spotted horse in the middle of downtown with her eyes closed, looking high and scared and guilty.

  I have to get her out of here. “Violet, look at me.”

  She opens her eyes, and her lower lip trembles. “We did that,” she whispers, glancing at the smoke billowing out of the forest.

  “Shhh, don’t say that.” The fire truck streaks past, startling Sunny. “See, they know. They’re on their way, and they’ll put it out fast. Let’s get the horses to my house. There’s nothing more we can do.”

  Violet nods and we trot south on the outskirts of town. Just then a police cruiser slams to a halt
beside us. The car door opens, and out jumps my father. Shit. The afternoon wind is really gusting now, ruffling his silver-blond hair. His sharp blue eyes flicker with worry. “Why are you two riding horses in town?”

  I fiddle with the reins so I don’t have to look at him. “We saw the smoke and came to report it.” If my dad knew I helped start the fire, he’d be obligated to arrest me, just as he arrested my mother. I can’t do that to him.

  Dad pats Sunny and glances at the flaming mountain. “Good, but we’ve got this now, and Cal Fire is coming to help. Get these horses home, Hannah. If we have to evacuate, head to Bishop. Here.” He thrusts his credit card at me. “Use this to book a room, and grab some clothes for me and get your mother’s pictures.”

  My back stiffens. “You mean my pictures.”

  He sighs. “Yes, your pictures.”

  Did I mention I was in the car when my mom drove drunk? Dad says she was too young for marriage and children, but that’s bullshit. She was seventeen and he was eighteen, and I was unplanned. It happens all the time. I think it’s simple: she was selfish and couldn’t be bothered to raise her little girl. That’s why the pictures are mine and not hers. Nothing is hers anymore.

  My dad’s radio blares at him, and I recognize Deputy Vargas’s voice: “We’re closing Gap Lake Road to traffic.”

  “On my way.” Dad squints at Violet, taking in the tears and bloodshot eyes, the fact that she’s not dressed for riding, and grows curious. “Did either of you see what started the fire? Or anything unusual, like unattended campfires or kids messing around with fireworks, anything?”

  I open my mouth. I should probably tell the truth, but I can’t. Monsters don’t rat on monsters, another of our pacts. Confessing should be a group decision.

  Violet speaks, making the choice for all of us: “We didn’t see anything, Sheriff Warner, just the smoke. That’s why we rode here.”

  My stomach tightens uncomfortably, like I’m on a roller coaster that just picked up speed, zipped around a fast corner, and is heading toward a drop.