When a Fire Burns Hot

by Corey Richard

  “Just moppin’ up. How ‘bout yourselves?”

  “We put in some line down there and did a little backburnin’ yesterday,” Jim replied. He was glad to have started a conversation. He could tell immediately that these young men were his type. Their voices carried a hard, familiar, rural drawl, and their bodies maintained the physical but relaxed poise of men who had performed manual labor all their lives.

  “Shit, that’s more than we did in days.”

  “Fall any big ones?”

  The two sawyers looked at each other and grinned before smiling at Jim and the men around him. “Two hundred footer. Fucker must have been five or six hundred years old. Been a while since I got to fall one a them.”

  “Shit, been a while for me too. By the line?”

  “It was, oh, hundred feet in. Burnin’ in the middle... in a bird hole.”

  “How far up was the hole?”

  “’Bout forty feet.”

  All the sawyers and swampers gathered recognized that the tree would have been likely to survive the injury of a burning bird hole had it not been cut; and Jim easily calculated that even if the top had burnt through and fallen, it would not have been likely to cross the line.

  “I usually try’n leave those old ones,” Jim said with the same rough-sounding voice he had been using all along with the men. “Hate to see ‘em go to waste like that.”

  The sawyer who had been talking to Jim looked down at the ground briefly before looking at the other sawyer in his crew. He grinned slightly and said, “Hell, I don’t try and figure it out,” he said. “If it’s anywhere near the line, I cut it.” The two men chuckled, as if they were pleased at the cleverness of being so singleminded in their work.

  Jim quickly shifted the conversation to another subject. “So, you heard anything about the other fires burnin’?”

  One of the sawyers excited at the question. He felt compelled to impart some newly received information. “A crew in the Wallowas got burnt over.”

  “No shit! Any die?”

  “Seven.”

  “Fucking A!” George exclaimed, wincing.

  “How did it happen?” Randy asked, after a moment of silence.

  “Fuckin’ geniuses below ‘em lit a backburn that went uphill right over ‘em. They barely had time to get their shake and bake bags out. I guess some didn’t...”

  “Just never know...”

  “Yeah, they say that the guys who died were running. I figure maybe they could have gotten their shelters out like the rest if they hadn’ta run in the first place.”

  “Fucking idiots,” Jim said, figuring the dead men had panicked and run, violating one of the cardinal rules of firefighting, which was to stick with the crew.

  After a moment of silence, one of the new sawyers surveyed the Willamette crew conspicuously. “Diff’rent kind a crew you got here,” he offered, pejoratively.

  “They’re all right... Hard workers,” Jim replied, covering the offense.

  On Fast Horse’s command, the Willamette crew rose. Many offered cheery goodbyes to the other crew as they departed.

  The Willamette crew soon arrived at the top of the hill and entered a lush green meadow fringed with stately firs. Around the bend, they could hear indiscernible guttural commands being issued. As they walked, another crew came into view, their green packs giving away their otherwise hidden identity.

  “Move! C’mon!” The voice of the sergeant boomed in the quiet mountain air. “Show ‘em what we’re made of! Fire’s comin’, boys, let’s get this line in quick!” The sergeant, hands on hips, stood proudly over his frantically digging men.

  Laughter trickled through the ranks of the Willamette crew as each firefighter realized that the line these curious men were building ran alongside a lake fifty feet away.

  The Army crew soon took notice of the presence of the Willamette crew, and continually glanced up at them in paranoia.

  The sergeant approached Shroeder, and the Willamette crew halted. The man immediately dropped his gruff demeanor but not his formality. He stood, unsure of himself, as if wanting to salute or be saluted, something to define the relation between himself and the other uniformed man.

  Shroeder, in the relaxed and familiar style of the Forest Service, asked, “So, how’s everything goin’ here with you guys?”

  The sergeant’s face regained its authoritative sheen. “Excellent!” he answered loudly. “The men are moving along real well. We ought to reach our destination in approximately three hours I figure, sir.”

  Shroeder rather liked the novel manner in which the man had addressed him. “Great, well... keep at it,” Shroeder said, and waved his hand hesitantly around his head.

  “Yessir.”

  Jim could hold his tongue no longer. As the sergeant turned and walked back to his boys, Jim set aside his laughter and yelled, “Hey, GIs!”

  Most of the men under the sergeant’s command looked insecurely in the direction of the voice, abandoning the rules of their game.

  “I’m not sure you’ll be able to save that lake there.” Jim giggled and managed to get his next sentence out amidst the laughter of his crew. “Lakes are pretty dry up in these parts, ya know.”

  All the men in the army crew looked over at the lake and most stopped digging, much to the sergeant’s consternation. Being welldisciplined, they didn’t express anger to cover their embarrassment, nor did they evidence any humiliation. Instead, they stared at their leader, blankly.

  The sergeant squirmed for a moment and then yelled, “Get back to work! Asses and elbows is all I wanna see!” The sergeant, however, retained a slightly bewildered look on his face. He had been told to have his men construct an uninterrupted line, and that was what they were doing.

  The sergeant’s confusion registered with Fast Horse, and the agile leader glided over to the man and, too quietly for anyone else to hear, said politely, “You know, you could just tie your line into the ends of the lake and save yourselves some work. But hey, don’t sweat it, we’re all out here learnin’ new stuff.”

  The sergeant thanked Fast Horse with sincerity, which seemed out of character for him, and touchingly human to the few who cared enough to notice.

  The Willamette crew then left the Army crew and marched down the long and barely adequate line the troops had made. As soon as they reached a trail junction, they halted, and Fast Horse ordered them to construct a line next to his flagging. Fast Horse then walked into the unmarred forest, decorating trees and bushes with little orange strips of plastic ribbon as he walked. The sawyers soon followed, cutting their way forward. Then, one at a time, each member of the crew was back at it, stooped and digging, chopping and scraping, their butts all protruding upwards at different angles.

  After about two hours, the saws, which had been whining far ahead of the rest of the crew, stopped. The sawyers walked back toward the crew, having already cleared all they needed to as far as the road that was to serve as their end point. The trees were spaced far enough apart in the forest that their job had been easy.

  “Just take a break,” Fast Horse told the sawyers and swampers.

  The sweaty men sat down beside the line at the bottom of a small hill, arrogantly watching the rest of the crew work its way past them. Randy, now the only member of his squad digging line, shuffled by in a stooped position. With his back towards the resting men, he called out with indifference, “What d’you think, you’re too good to work?”

  “Too good to work with your fucked-up squad. Why, gettin’ lonely?”

  “Not for you, sorry,” Randy said, and dropped out of sight.

  The Mexican squad was next to pass, and then it was Alice’s turn to work her way by the resting men. She tensed in their presence, but told herself that she had to keep her mind on her work and ignore the fact that the sitting men behind her were likely to be staring at her with
little or no reservation.

  Alaska, next in line, noticed that those resting were nudging each other as they scrutinized Alice’s bobbing rear. Jim tossed Alaska a playful expression before looking at Alice, then back at Alaska.

  Alaska figured he might have a chance to get back on Jim’s good side, a side he had come to realize he was probably not on after what had transpired between them that morning. He knew Jim would be appreciative of any type of joke that involved such a popular target. He was sure it would go over well and saw no reason why he shouldn’t joke around a bit; he’d been so serious on the crew so far. Men he had worked with in the past had always accused him of being too serious on the job, and he figured it only served to further alienate him from the others. He caught the eyes of the four and flashed a viperous smile. “You gotta kinda bend into it more there, Alice,” he said, and then stepped next to his subordinate and demonstrated how he wanted her to dig: with her rear sticking up higher in the air.

  Alice felt distrustful of Alaska, but assumed she was just being overly paranoid. After all, she thought to herself, Alaska was pretty focused on firefighting and the job they were all doing. She reluctantly complied with his instructions.

  Alaska stepped back and looked at Alice in appreciation, like a sculptor eyeing his newly completed work. He glanced at the four men, whose wolfish grins told him that they too appreciated his work. Seconds later, the eyes of those seated were still glued to Alice. Alaska felt that somehow, there was something wrong in their staring so long, but he told himself the situation was just as he had intended, and left it at that.

  Jim held out his hands in an imaginary act of grabbing Alice’s hips from behind, and proceeded to poke his pelvis in her direction with several quick jabs. Young John smiled, delighted to be part of the ritual. He allowed himself to become sexually excited at the sight of Alice’s round ass as it bounced down the line. The ensuing desire fed his fantasies until they were almost tangible. Suddenly it did seem possible, that there were always ways to get a woman like Alice if he really wanted.

  After too long an episode of silence was punctuated by a boyish giggle, Alice automatically turned around. She saw the fiendish looks on the men’s faces, and was instantly seized by a familiar uneasiness. She held her Pulaski tightly and stepped slowly backwards across the hill, trying not to show her fear. She eyed the men warily as she moved, like a gazelle on an open plain might eye a group of lounging lions, knowing almost instinctively that they could pounce in a collective without a moment’s notice.

  After several seconds, the men had still not made a move in Alice’s direction, and she allowed that any danger that might have existed had probably passed. She willed herself to breathe normally. Hatred then replaced fear. She hated the men for what they were, but most of all, for having made her feel, so acutely, the sting of her own fear. She caught sight of Jim, who quickly looked in Alaska’s direction. She forced her vision to focus and found her enemy. It was Alaska. Against him, she could win. He was the one to blame. A flash of blinding fury compelled her to point the quivering blade of her Pulaski at her antagonist, but she resisted the urge to throw the tool at him, catching herself before she gave in to such destructive measures. “You bastard! If it’s a war you want, you’ve got one!” She yelled impressively, holding onto her anger as she if it were the hilt of a drawn sword.

  The sawyers and swampers looked at the condemned man and wondered what he would do next. Alice had already achieved one thing as a consolation: the men now took her seriously, and didn’t even dare try to joke their way out of the situation.

  Alaska stood in stunned silence. Most of the women in his home town would have laughed at his cleverness in setting one of them up like that. Everyone present would have gotten a good laugh out of it and then gone on working, the fun having taken its course. Now Alice, one of his own squad, was furious at him and actually seemed ready to do something about it. It baffled him, and he was suddenly scared that, with all the new rules that the Forest Service had in place, his job might actually be in jeopardy. If only he’d remembered that Alice was different, wanted to be treated differently, and always seemed to be ready for a fight.

  “Sorry,” he said to Alice’s back as she stormed down the line and out of sight.

  Chapter 17

  Alice stared out of the bus window, catching brief glimpses of the sun between the trees as it dipped below the horizon. She thought about what she had to do, and was gratified that she actually had some recourse open to her. She told herself, as she had many times before, that hers was not to reason with the unreasonable, educate the ignorant, or to ask for respect from men who hoarded it amongst themselves. She was in a war for self-preservation, and she wanted to hold onto what was valuable to her. She hadn’t asked for anything more than to be left alone, but she had been attacked. Why did things seem to end up this way so often? It was all too painfully familiar.

  She resolved to play the few cards she had been dealt. Alaska was definitely her target, though she would have liked to include all the men present at the incident. She would at least see Alaska suffer before this was all over, and she didn’t care if she had to go over people’s heads to do it. Alaska was to be removed. A sort of dishonorable discharge would do well to warn the other men that she was a woman to be reckoned with.

  She pictured Alaska in his moment of defeat, his face turning red and his irritation, which was always just beneath the surface, emerging in all its hideousness. She would relish seeing him so infuriated, while for the first time being unable to touch her. Yes, she would go to the Human Resource Specialist, who was almost always a woman, and demand justice.

  Back in camp, Alice threw her gear to the ground, ignored the stares from many on the crew, and marched straight into the proper tent. An understanding female face looked up from her paperwork. “Can I help you?” The woman asked and smiled courteously.

  “You the Human Resource Specialist?” Alice asked.

  “Yes, please sit down,” the woman said slowly, trying to conceal her swelling uneasiness.

  Alice sat and lit a cigarette, ignoring the rules against smoking inside the office tents. At last she was in the presence of a woman with power to do something for her. She imagined the woman to be much like herself. “Yes, you definitely can help me. I want to make a charge, or file a complaint, or whatever it’s called, against my squad boss.”

  “What happened?” The woman’s voice sounded sufficiently grave.

  “He engaged in sexual harassment on the fire line.” Alice stated flatly, with a mixture of anger and shame. She looked the woman in the eyes, expecting her to jump up and voice her support with the same vigor she herself would have exhibited. Instead, Alice received the same wan look of concern as before; only a scarcely detectable measure of genuineness could be seen in the woman’s eyes.

  “What did he do?”

  Alice was incensed that she had to explain herself to the woman. She was ready to state it all in the official report. “He just set me up so that everyone could check me out,” she said coldly, wishing she could sound more convincing. She racked her brain for something to add. “Oh, and one time he said that he wanted me to... play with his hose.” Alice spoke as if the words were tainting her mouth as they passed through it. “Great guy, huh?” Alice added, and waited for a reaction.

  “Well, I can definitely work with you on this. I’m sorry that happened.”

  “I want him out,” Alice stated firmly.

  “I understand that, and that might have to happen, but first I’d like for us all to sit down and talk about the problems you had out there.”

  Alice felt frustration quickly replace her faith in justice. Sit down with the Neanderthal and try and have a discussion with him! She felt wronged enough to come in here, didn’t she? Wasn’t that all that was needed? Did this bitch have any idea what she and other women like herself went through out there? She finally s
aid, tight lipped, “What do you mean? There are rules against what he did, so I want to use them to get him kicked out.” Alice took a long drag of her cigarette.

  “I understand your anger, and yes, you’re right, there are rules against that sort of thing, but I’d still like to talk to him about it. I don’t want to get my superiors to sign a paper terminating his employment without talking to him and trying to sort things out first.” The woman again offered a plastic smile, further infuriating Alice.

  “Look, you aren’t out there with me. How in the hell do you know there’s a chance that we can reach some kind of agreement? He’s a sexist bastard, and someone like him shouldn’t be doing that job - period. That’s all there is to agree on. He deserves the same fucking chance he gave me!”

  The woman appeared unfazed by Alice’s profanity and harsh tone. Alice saw the same ridiculous, understanding smile begin to surface. She couldn’t bear to see it again; nor could she bear for hopelessness and powerlessness to again fan her rage. She got up and, as she stormed out of the tent, said, “Fine, you won’t help me, I guess, but I know somebody out there will!”

  The woman’s eyes widened with alarm and her mouth fell slack, but Alice was not there to see it happen. “Wait, miss...” The woman said, hoping Alice would furnish her last name. “Don’t go... What crew are you on?”

  As she put more distance between herself and the confused woman, Alice’s thoughts spun madly in her head. She had to get rid of Alaska! She had to set an example! She was backed against the wall. “Fuckin’ bitch!” she said aloud. Probably just got the job because she was all calm and soothing to her male bosses. Like a mother! And malleable enough to fit into a stupid government desk job perfectly. “What a bitch!” she hissed.

  Dazed, Alice wandered aimlessly through the woods for over an hour, smoking cigarettes continuously. When she finally returned to camp, she found Frank waiting for dinner, and slipped into line next to him.