by Sally John
Kevin smacked a fist against the couch arm.
Jenna jumped and started to cry softly.
Men. At least he hadn’t punched her wall. Tandy counted to three.
Kevin disentangled his arm from Jenna’s and wrapped her in a hug. “Sorry.”
Tandy leaned forward. “Kevin, I know you want to go do some-thing tangible. The best thing you can do, though, is take her to the house and don’t leave her side.” And while you’re at it, un-reenlist, or you’ll lose her. “Even Marines have to sit and wait at times, right? You don’t just charge the hill.”
“Yeah.”
“Ooh-rah!”
He gave her half a smile.
Jenna moaned and pushed away from him, her face toward the television.
Tandy looked at it. A banner with white letters ran across the bottom of the screen. “Vallecitos what?” She grabbed the remote and boosted the volume.
“We repeat. Vallecitos Canyon has burned, an estimated three thou-sand acres. The fire has spread to the north and west along the Kuphaall range. At this time, we know of several homesteads within the area. Residents had no warning of the second fire or the wind shifts. The two fires quickly converged. However, officials believe that people who had not evacuated earlier would have been on the alert and noticed any changes in conditions and been able to leave the area in time.”
Jenna ran from the room, a hand over her mouth.
Fifty-nine
Eddie the stranger pried Claire’s death grip from his arm and moved away from her.
She sank onto the steep, rock-strewn ground and laid her cheek against a big stone. Was she awake? Maybe not. Hopefully not. If not, then she could awake from this nightmare. She could stop thinking about the monster that now ate its way up through the rocks, devouring the ragged plant life between them.
Her throat burned. Her lungs ached. Her body still trembled in terror and, now, exhaustion. They had hiked uphill, climbing and stumbling over rocks for what felt like hours. The dim lights cast from lanterns and the firemen’s helmets did little to light the way. No stars shone. There was no path to follow, just Lexi’s insistent “Not far.”
She should check on Ben and Indio.
Where was Max?
I love you, Max.
The dog brushed past her.
“Claire.” Indio touched her shoulder and sat, holding a water bottle out to her.
She accepted it and twisted at the cap. It wouldn’t budge.
Indio undid it for her. She drank.
In silence they watched the others. Evidently they’d reached their destination. Ben, Lexi, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego pulled at a pile of rocks that looked like any other pile of rocks against the side of the hill.
Someone let out a whoop. Someone laughed. Someone helped Claire to her feet.
Smoke filled her nostrils.
She clung again to the stranger’s arm. He half carried her toward a small opening in the hillside. She heard the others’ conversation as if from a distance, their disembodied voices winding through the smoky night.
“In here.”
“Lexi! How did you and Danny ever find this?”
“We should cover the opening back up. The heat, if the fire reaches . . .”
“There’s a lot of vegetation here to burn.”
“Not enough time to remove that.”
“Look at this wood frame.”
“We’ll pile the rocks over it.”
Lexi said, “You have to crawl to get inside.”
“How far in can we go?”
“A long ways. There’s this tunnel, an open space, and then the shaft goes down. It’s passable too.”
“Where’s the other opening?”
“You can’t get to it from here.”
“It’s blocked?”
“It’s where the cave-in was. This is the other side of that.”
“Lexi.” It was Eddie’s voice, close by, above her. His was distinctive, an oboe’s singular clarity floating on the breeze. “You’ll get a medal for this.”
She laughed. “Just what I always wanted.”
“I thought every young woman wanted a medal. How about a ride in a parade? In a fire truck? Ticker tape and all.”
“Try a gift certificate to the mall. Mom, lie down flat. Look. There goes Samson. Good dog! Okay, follow Nana in now.”
Claire shook her head.
“It’s fine once we get further inside. You can almost stand up. It’s just the first dozen feet or so that you have to crawl.”
Claire took a step back.
“Lexi.” Eddie again. His arms slipped around Claire. “You go first. Let your mom hold on to your ankle. Okay, Claire? Come on. You can do it. You can do it.”
He knelt, pulling her down with him. Lexi crouched at the opening, a lantern in front of her, and went down flat. Eddie guided Claire’s hand to Lexi’s boot.
It moved.
She whimpered.
Eddie grasped her calf. “Go, Claire. Go. I’ve got you.”
“Okay, Mom, here we go. Let’s catch up to Nana. Look at her. She’s scooting along like she does this every day.”
Claire shut her eyes, her death grip now clasped on the boot at Lexi’s ankle, and dragged herself along by digging her elbows against the ground. A rock cut on the underside of her forearm. She brought her head up.
It bumped against something solid.
She cried out.
Lexi and Eddie began talking, their voices odd sounding, muffled by the small enclosure.
“So, Lexi, a mall certificate can’t be enough. What else can we do for you?”
“How about a weekend in Acapulco? Maybe that’s too much. How about a gift certificate to that new restaurant downtown? Did you read about it? Of course, I wouldn’t want to go alone.”
“Zak’s available.”
“Now what do you mean by that? Never mind! We’re here!” Her boot was yanked out of Claire’s hand. “Come on, Mom. You can stand up now. Well, almost. If you’re under five-two. Nana fits.” She laughed, tugging on Claire’s arm. “Mom! Open your eyes.”
Somewhere along the way, Claire had stopped breathing. She felt the heavy darkness like thick black tendrils. They coiled all around her, pushing her down, down into the ground, cutting off all light and air.
She’d been here before.
The long-buried scream rose up from a place deep inside of her-self. It tore through her lungs, up and out her throat, louder and louder until she had to clap her hands over her own ears.
Sixty
Indio perceived that Claire’s screams came from another time, another place.
The ring of terror in them went beyond what the current situation would provoke, dreadful as it was. The Claire she knew would be fighting for survival, fighting for her daughter even more than for herself. This total breakdown made no sense unless it stemmed from some unseen ugliness. Perhaps something from her daughter-in-law’s long-forgotten past?
Indio immediately began to pray.
Eddie, the gentlemanly fireman, sat on the ground with Claire, his helmet on the ground. He held her close to himself, like a father would a hurt child, sideways against his chest, with a slight rocking motion, his soothing murmurs lost in her cries.
The cavelike area was small. Talk was impossible while Claire shrieked. Hunched over, they all stood in a compact circle under the low ceiling. Samson huddled at Ben’s feet, Willow so close to the dog that she was almost hidden in his fur.
Fear replaced her granddaughter’s calm expression. She could face fire, but not her mom’s inexplicable breakdown. Zak, the cute fire-man, stepped around Eddie and Claire to reach Lexi, and then he put an arm around her.
Chad, the talkative fireman, crouched to pet Samson. He had graciously helped Indio and Ben on the long trek uphill. A couple of times he had placed his mask over their faces, letting them breathe from his tank, and sweet oxygen flowed into them, a respite from the increasing smoke that had begun to make them all
cough.
“Nooooo!” Claire screamed.
Indio knelt beside her and placed a hand on the back of her head. She leaned over to speak directly into her ear. “Claire, Jesus is with you. He was always with you. Time does not exist for Him.”
Convinced that Claire was reliving a past trauma, she prayed silently, asking God to heal the pain Claire now experienced as if it were for the first time.
At last her daughter-in-law’s shrieks dwindled to mewls. She hiccuped and began gagging. With a groan, she pushed herself away from Eddie, leaning forward on her knees.
For several minutes, the only sound was that of Claire being sick. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Shh.” Eddie helped her sit back beside him. “It’s okay.”
Indio pulled a fistful of tissues from her jacket pocket and handed them to Claire. Claire settled a glazed stare on Indio.
Indio whispered, “God’s taking care of it, whatever it is.”
“The basement.” Her voice was a hoarse whisper.
“Mom?” Lexi pushed her way in next to Indio.
Tears streamed down Claire’s face now. “I’m okay.” She shuddered.
Lexi frowned. “We have to move on.”
Claire wiped at her face, making smudges with dirt and tears. “I’m okay.”
“You don’t have to crawl anymore.”
She nodded.
“Zak says if the fire reaches the opening, the heat might—”
“Got it,” Eddie interrupted, helping Claire to stand. “We’re right behind you.”
Ben lifted Indio to her feet. As the others ducked into a tunnel and filed from the room, he halted, aiming his lantern at a spot along the wall.
At its base Indio noticed a neat pile of small stones. “Oh my.”
Ben smiled. “You’re thinking what I’m thinking.”
“It’s Max and BJ’s hidden stash! Where he gets a rock every year to put at the memorial.”
“Yep. I guess Lexi and Danny aren’t the only ones who know about this side of the mine.” He wrapped his big hand around hers. “Looking death in the face here, it makes me see what a fool I’ve been. Why wouldn’t the twins tell me about this place? Why wouldn’t my own sons?”
“Because you would have tanned their hides.”
“For sure. And they would have deserved it in that case. But in other cases, it just seems I’ve driven them away. I don’t allow them to be open with me. Why would Max ever want to confide in me about anything after the way I treated him? When he started the business, I told him he was an idiot, and I haven’t given him a lick of encouragement along the way.”
She squeezed his hand. It was a night for fighting demons of all sorts.
“And poor Claire. A basement? I got the chills when she said that. You just know she lived through hell as a kid. Probably buried a lot of memories. I should have been more like a real father to her. I’ve let her down.”
“She knows you love her.”
“I could have done more.” He pulled her into a hug. “Love, if we ever get out of here, so help me, God, I will make it up to all of them.”
From behind them came a rushing, thunderous noise.
“Ben! Indio!” Chad yelled from the tunnel entrance. “Come on!”
Ben hustled her toward him.
She questioned the young man with her eyes. He flinched and then gave a quick nod in reply.
The fire had found them.
Sixty-one
Max trudged behind his sons in the semidarkness along the shoulder of another road. Emergency vehicles were every-where, squad cars, ambulances, fire engines—blocking the way out, filling the parking lot. Up ahead a makeshift lighting system blazed, a white circle in the black night. Traffic exiting Santa Reina was no longer visible.
The police had directed them off the highway to this two-lane. A short bypass of the main road, it led to the Kuphaall Range lookout point, one of those inane Kodak moments that disrupted family trips up into the hills. He’d always voted to bypass the bypass, while Claire waved her camera, somehow communicating guilt in her smile. The kids really didn’t give a hoot whether or not they saw some view deemed relevant by film manufacturers. His vote carried the majority, most likely because he was behind the wheel.
Except for a few clandestine gatherings with his drinking buddies as a teen, Max never stopped at the place. One year, though, Claire had made Christmas cards with a photo of herself and their kids standing in front of the stone wall, the deep canyon behind them hidden from view, the mountain vista a blur. It was a good picture. He couldn’t remember who’d taken it.
He should be able to remember. He should have been in it. He should have stopped at the point every chance he had driving up to the hacienda with Claire and the kids.
“Dad, you okay?” Danny asked over his shoulder.
“Yeah. Stop asking.”
Erik shook his head, obviously in disgust, and muttered something.
An almost irrepressible urge to belt his older son flared in Max. That they irritated each other was no secret to anyone who saw them together. Tonight, though, that subtle undercurrent of antipathy rushed aboveground.
Danny shot a glance over his shoulder at Max. Even in the shadow, he read it as a warning. Danny was probably ready to let them both have it. Max felt as if he was the odd man out, the old man sent to pick blueberries while his sons took care of business.
They reached an outer circle of firefighters. What Max could see beyond them were more, in full gear, talking on radios.
“Press is over there.” One of the men turned to them and gestured toward their left.
Max looked and saw a gaggle of people calling out questions to a spokesperson. Cameras flashed.
Erik said, “I’m with the press, but that’s not what I want. We have to get to the Hacienda Hideaway.”
“Sorry. No can do.”
“Our mom’s there. Our—”
“Sorry. Now I have to ask you to leave this area. Either join the press or head back down the hill.”
Max shoved his way between Danny and Erik. “Look. My wife is up there. My daughter. My parents. I am not going anywhere except up that hill. The Hideaway is southeast of Santa Reina.”
“We know that, sir.”
“Then let me—”
“They probably have gotten out by now. Go home where they can find you.”
“Probably?” Max heard his voice rise. “Probably? That is not an acceptable answer. We’re going through.”
“Sir, there’s no way to get through.”
“You’re nuts!” he yelled. “Traffic’s pouring out of town!”
“I’m not talking about the town. Please, sir, just step aside.”
Another fireman approached, older, an obvious superior. “Is there a problem here?”
“His family was at the Hacienda Hideaway.”
The older man said to Max, “When?”
“Tonight! What do you mean, ‘when’?”
“What time exactly?”
“I don’t know!”
“Dad,” Danny said, “you talked to Mom around eight thirty.”
Max wheeled back toward the new spokesman. “What does the time matter? I don’t know where she is! I have to find her!”
“You can’t.”
“You can’t keep me from—”
“I mean you can’t. It’s not possible to—”
“I will go there!” He was in the man’s face now. “It’s my parents’ house! It’s our property.”
“Okay.” The fireman glanced at the younger one. “Show him.” He walked away.
“Show me what?” he yelled after him.
The kid touched Max’s shoulder. “Sir?”
Even in his frazzled state, Max noted the pained expression on his face.
“Follow me.”
He followed, Danny and Erik with him. They took a circuitous route between trucks and ambulances and firefighting personnel. At last they emerged in a clearing.
It was the lookout point that drew in camera-toting travelers . . . the place where Claire and the kids had grinned for a Christmas card photo that didn’t include him . . . the place he and his high school buddies had downed their six-packs while he cursed the hacienda that lay somewhere out there in the distant hills. He cursed it because it symbolized all that was not his: his brother’s charmed life and his parents’ acceptance.
And now as he gazed out on that scene, the horror of his curses descended upon him with a vengeance, and he roared with the agony.
The entire central portion of those distant hills and the mountains beyond them—the exact area that enclosed the hacienda—was ablaze with fire. All of it. All of it!
Max flung himself around and began running. He had to get to his car. He had to get to Claire, to his family. Now!
It took Danny and Erik and the fireman to hold him back.
Sixty-two
Claire shivered mere inches from Eddie. She wanted to curl up in the shelter of his arms again. But the terror had faded, and he was, after all, a stranger.
They all sat in a shadowy chamber of the mine. Hewn out of rock, it was clammy. But at least it wasn’t as tight as the first tunnel. Its ceiling was higher than the first opening they’d stopped in, that place where she had screamed.
The image floated through her mind again, the one that had set off the uncontrollable shrieking.
She was a little girl. She crouched on a dirt floor in a root cellar, a small room for storing vegetables in the basement. A bulb hung on a stringy cord from the low ceiling, but a three-year-old couldn’t reach it.
Until now. Somehow the screams had split open the long-buried memory. Somehow Indio’s prayers loosened the grief she had never vented.
“You okay?” Eddie asked.
She nodded. “A little shaky.” Her smile failed.
He smiled for her.
They sat on his turnout coat, a barrier between them and the dank rock and dirt floor. To reach this spot, they’d traversed a steep descent, her hand on his arm.
This irregular-shaped area was the end of the line, so to speak. A pile of rock from floor to ceiling covered much of it. Ben guessed it was the collapsed wall that had killed his great-great-grandfather. Claire wondered if the crushed bones had turned to dust yet.
