Light My Fire

by Lucy Snow

  Which made this trip all the more baffling to me now that I had had some time to think about it a little more, turn it over in my head. In the moment, back in Professor Stevens’ office, this had seemed like a good idea, but now the harsh light of the storm had changed that.

  I needed to sit them down and explain to them that I was not Naomi, and that I was going to live my life the way I wanted to. I was so close to finishing school, and after that a whole realm of doors would open up for me. These days getting a bachelor’s degree was pretty much the minimum required to start a professional career, and I was even thinking about grad school.

  Of course I’d like it if there was a guy in my life, but that wasn’t the goal. I was the goal — finding what I want, building a life for myself. And while I had dated around in school, none of it had stuck.

  I was OK with that — it would have been a little scary to fall deeply and madly in love at such a young age — like I would never be sure if what I was feeling was real or just a complex mix of hormones and freedom getting together for the first time.

  I just couldn’t imagine how something like love could work between people my age. It’s like…weren’t we just a little too young and immature for all that? Feelings changed, life changed, people came in and out of our lives so fast…how was anyone supposed to build a connection with someone if whatever you had could just disappear, when someone didn’t come home one night?

  There was no way I could be sure of any of that right now. Luckily, I didn’t have to make decisions like that any time soon — people waited till their 30s to get married these days!

  I couldn’t even imagine what being in my 30s would look like.

  To be fair, considering all I could see around me was the dimly light interior of a bus and the storm billowing outside around me, my powers of imagination weren’t exactly getting much help right now.

  Even so, I had plenty of time, and I wasn’t in any kind of rush. I had to make that clear to my parents, but at the same time, try and rebuild some kind of connection to them beyond a hollow and obligatory phone call or email every now or then. As much as we didn’t get long, I missed them deeply. It felt hollow, not having a link to my own family, or what was left of it.

  The bus wrenched around a corner just then, shaking me out of my thoughts and forcing me to sit up in my seat instead of banging my head on the window. The driver waved from the front. “Sorry about that, took that turn a little too fast. I’ll be more careful. Don’t know the old lady’s strength!” He chuckled.

  I nodded and pulled my jacket tighter around me.

  Suddenly it felt even colder than the outside in here.

  CHAPTER 04 - EAMES

  “You just gonna stand there?”

  I couldn’t move, I could only stare at the chaos in front of me.

  “A mute, eh? Useless.”

  A hand waved in front of my eyes and I blinked, hard, my head shaking.

  “Hello? Anyone in there?” Now the hand disappeared and a dark face replaced it, full of exasperated anger and hard lines worn by clear fatigue. “If you’re not going to help, then get the fuck out of my way.”

  And then he shoved me and at the last second I flailed my hands out behind me and caught myself. “Sorry,” I stammered, getting back up and dusting myself off, still trying to process what was going on. The heat, the humidity, the scared people, the smell of burning, the suffering…

  “Oh, he can talk, can he?” The man reached down and picked up a heavy case labeled ‘RATIONS.’ “Can he also pick things up and move them?”

  “Uh, yeah,” I got out before dropping my backpack and rushing to help, picking up another case. It was heavy, heavy enough that my shoulders were already hurting. The other guy made it look so easy, but I knew I couldn’t go very far with this weight loading me down.

  I couldn’t even remember being around such humidity. The sweat was already pooling around my lower back and I already felt like I needed a shower, and I’d just taken one on the boat an hour ago. I only vaguely knew where I was - I’d just gotten to the relief ship a couple days earlier, and this was the first time we’d actually stopped somewhere.

  “Good man, now come with me.” The man led the way off the dock and toward the village.

  Or what was left of a village; the only indication that there’d been a village here were piles of wood that suggested that maybe once they’d been parts of buildings. And the rubble, and the crying children. And all the other things that came with this kind of devastation.

  What the fuck had I gotten myself into? I could dimly hear my father’s voice in my head, asking me if this is what I had been looking for.

  We deposited our cases near a tent that was clearly being used as a makeshift hospital, before turning around and going back for more. It took hours to get them all moved, and as soon as we came back with new cases, the ones we’d left before were gone.

  The only other thing the man said to me during the entire day was “lift with your legs or back won’t make it through the day, let alone the week.” I took his advice and things got a lot easier.

  It was dark by the time we were done, the stacks of cases from the dock all gone. Something inside me knew that in the morning there would be more to move, whether it was cases of rations or something else. Someone made a fire and we sat around it, each of us tearing open one of the ration bags and digging in.

  I was bone tired, and could barely keep myself upright as I tried to eat the completely unsatisfying food. At the same time, I knew I needed to get the fuel inside me if I was going to keep from passing out.

  The other man looked at me from across the fire while we ate.

  “So,” he said, staring at me. “Why did you volunteer to help in disaster relief?”

  I drove through the twists and turns of the hills of northern New Hampshire a little faster than I should have, given the weather.

  I didn’t know why I was going so fast, because I most definitely was not looking forward to the inevitable conversation with my father that arriving would bring.

  My father had built a strong business, carrying it on his back for many years. He was the kind of man who understood the value of a hard day’s work, and reveled in it. Most of the early years running his business hadn’t involved all that much day to day management — or, rather, it had, but my father had gotten down into the trenches and worked the line along with his workers just as much as they had.

  Only during the evenings had he retreated to his office to make sure the company was still running and still growing. He hadn’t been around much, but I hoped he knew how much I appreciated how much work he’d put into it. We hadn’t wanted for anything we needed growing up.

  At the same time, though, the world had changed — technology and productivity had changed the game, so that people could start businesses that leapfrogged over my father’s in a short time and soon dwarfed it in size, and my father had stubbornly refused to update his company to make pace with the times.

  Sure, he still had huge customers, and loyal workers, but time wasn’t on his side — the writing was on the wall.

  It had taken all I was to get out of there and keep from following his footsteps in the family business. Even as a teenager walking through the assembly lines of one of his factories while he toiled away in his office, I’d known that this wasn’t for me.

  The computers I’d used in school only whetted my appetite for more, and as soon as I could I bought my own and started building things. My father had dismissed all my creations as toys, expressions of creativity, but he’d never thought anything would come of it - I’d graduate from high school, maybe go to college, then start in the factory and work my way up as far as I could go — no special treatment just cause I was the old man’s son. That whole cliche of the mailroom to the board room must have been my father’s fondest dream for me.

  That had never held any appeal to me. Why fight that kind of a losing battle against time and other people, when you co
uld be on the forefront of the next wave of progress?

  Of course my father and I had these conversations — we’d gone around endlessly about it. In fact, aside from cheering on the New England Patriots, we really had nothing in common, least of all our ideas about business and where the world was headed.

  He’d been furious when I’d left home right after high school. He’d ranted and raved and told me in no uncertain terms that I was letting down the family by my treachery, letting down the business he’d worked so hard to build, sacrificed so much to maintain.

  I didn’t want to hear any of it, and I would never have admitted to him that I understood his frustration even if I was the direct cause of it, but at the same time, it wasn’t me who was changing the face of business in America. It wasn’t me that made the internet a thing. I just wanted to be a part of it, rather than manage a building full of people making widgets for car companies.

  We had never seen eye to eye on it, and I didn’t think we ever would. So what was I doing barreling toward Meridian and an inevitable clash with my father, another front in our long standing war between tradition and moving forward?

  I didn’t really know. I just knew that my father’s voice had sounded different this time, and it had alarmed me, and his words still echoed in my ears — “this one time, you’re going to show up with your father calls.”

  Yeah, this time I’d show up, and we’d set each other straight, I’d show him all that I’d built, tell him all about what I’d seen in my travels around the world. The people I’d helped, the lives I had made better.

  Even if he didn’t understand all that, I’d show him the numbers from the business I’d built while on the road, from the computers he still hated so much. He’d have to understand that.

  We’d sign a peace treaty and end this war between us one way or the other.

  And then…we’d get to the other issue.

  Because of course, between a father and son, there never was just one thing.

  My father was old school. He’d built his business on relationships, both with his employees and his biggest customers. And sometimes sealing those relationships, inking them in ink that never ran, took a little more than just a handshake over a dinner table, or a big contract worth more money than either party could imagine.

  Sometimes they involved setting up your kids together and subtly and not-so-subtly trying to push them into getting married.

  I’d resisted. She’d resisted. Both of us had resisted, and lamented how super awkward all of this had been over the years. I’m sure she was a lovely girl, but we didn’t know each other, and there was no way in hell I was going to even test things out, not with our parents watching from afar and gleefully rubbing their hands together.

  We saw each other at parties and joked about it every so often. Sometimes it felt like an inevitability, but I could see it in her eyes and I was sure she could see it in my eyes — neither of us wanted this.

  Our parents didn’t seem to care.

  Nope. Not gonna happen. Not to Eames Beckett.

  I knew my father’s side of the equation - I’d kept up with news about his company during my travels. Things weren’t going nearly as well as they had in the past. People were buying fewer cars these days — ride sharing services meant that cars were lasting longer and being used more, which lowered the overall demand for cars.

  Car manufacturers were, in turn, buying fewer parts, both for new cars and for repairs. My father’s business was hurting; not quite on the rocks, but things weren’t looking great.

  Her family’s business was in a similar way, and made different parts that worked in conjunction with ours. If we were to merge, I knew, the company would be in a much better position to get better terms from its customers and keep things going as the dynamics of the market changed.

  But like I said, my father was old school. Her’s too. Neither of them liked the idea of a merger, not without each of them having some skin in the game, something to hold over the other.

  And if that had to take the form of my father’s only son and his business partner’s only daughter getting married, well, that would work out just fine.

  Except I wasn’t the kind of guy to go in for a marriage of convenience, so as soon as I turned 18 I dipped right out there and headed off to the first spot the globe stopped spinning, and hadn’t stopped for almost a decade. I was running away from two things that had been decided for me without my permission — a career and a marriage — neither of which I was willing to compromise on.

  And now I was headed back.

  What the fuck was I doing?

  Fixing this.

  The twists and turns of the hills came rushing toward me as I picked up a little speed.

  I just wanted to get this over with.

  I looked out the windshield up at the sky, keeping one eye on the road. This storm was going to get worse before it got any better.

  Hopefully I’d miss the bottom.

  CHAPTER 05 - AVERY

  The curves of the hills we passed through didn’t make this trip any easier. The driver had slowed the bus down, but it still felt like we were going a little too fast, and each time we went over a bump, the churning in my stomach caught some air like when you tossed pizza dough up and spun it around before catching it. Needless to say I wasn’t really enjoying this trip anymore.

  At the same time, as I pressed my face against the window to watch the storm batter the land around us and I marveled at just how much distance I had managed to put between me and Meridian when I had chosen to come to school here. It wasn’t that obvious all the other times I’d traveled along this road — which I didn’t do very often, because I mostly preferred to stay at school, but even so, this time felt different.

  I finally realized it was because this time we were making the trip so slowly — it was as if we were agonizing over every foot traveled between the two, as if asking the question each time — are you really sure you want to do this?

  I was more convinced than ever that going away to school was the right idea for me, if only to be away from the bright lights and constant sounds of the big city. Nature had its own sounds and lights, to be sure, but there wasn’t the sense of buzz around that never seemed to leave you alone while you were in Meridian.

  At school I’d managed to take long walks alone, just listening to the soft ambient sound of the regular world, untouched by hustle and bustle of city life. As we drove through the darkening hills, it felt like I was getting a slowly moving movie version of that through the window of the bus, only this time I had to stop every couple minutes and wipe off the frost that kept forming.

  It was absolutely worth it to be able to sit in this kind of heat, though - I was thankful for the bus driver for keeping the interior warm.

  Every mile we drove took me closer to my family, and the pit in my stomach got bigger and bigger. I knew the conversation with them wouldn’t go well, and might take days to really get out there. At the same time, I knew it was for the best - I needed them to understand that this was my life and that as much as I loved them and wanted them to be happy, I needed to find my own path.

  Naomi would be in the room, figuratively of course. Even though she’d been gone for years now, she still lived in the same house with my parents, and more than once I had wondered if, when no one else was around, they still talked to her like she was alive.

  I knew they’d never really fully recovered from her passing, and at the same time , I knew they never really would. I wondered if it were possible. Naomi was older than me, and our age difference was enough that she and I hadn’t been close in a long time. I felt her passing more as an idea rather than something concrete, and I suppose I’d never really wrapped my mind around it either.

  “How you doin’ back there?” I shook my head as the sound came piercing through the low hum of the bus’ cabin. It took me a moment to realize the driver was asking me — which made sense, cause I was the only other person here.


  “F-fine,” I said, meeting his smile in the center rearview mirror.

  “Gonna be just fine, rest of the trip,” the driver called back.

  I waved, and he smiled back at me.

  And then everything fell apart.

  The next thing I knew the driver was cranking the steering wheel as hard to the right as possible, curses coming out of his mouth in a wave as the entire bus whined, trying to turn right.

  I looked out the left side window on the other side and saw nothing but empty space filled with falling snow. Then gravity kicked in and I felt myself pulled to the side, straining against the seatbelt I was suddenly glad I was wearing.

  We turned a long corner going way too fast and the sounds of grinding gears got even louder as the driver fought against physics to keep the bus right side up.

  He was unsuccessful.

  The last thing I remember was the anguished look he gave me through the central mirror before all the lights came crashing down and then I knew nothing.

  ***

  Cold. The first thing I felt was cold.

  Everything hurt and nothing was alright. I could feel the pain lancing through my body, arcing all over the place.

  Even more than that, something was wrong.

  Balance.

  Gravity.

  Something was off.

  When I opened my eyes the world shifted from black to white in an instant. The sound in my ears was almost deafening and I felt more lightheaded than I ever had before.

  My arms were outstretched, swaying in the harsh wind that whipped around me. I blinked, trying to dispel this bad dream, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn’t make anything go away. It was all real.

  Finally my eyes focused and I was able to look around, and, slowly, when things finally started to fall into place and make sense, I realized that I was upside down.

  Where the hell was I? What was going on?

  The wind kicked up again and I shivered, clasping my hands together below my head to keep my fingers warm.

  I was hanging by a seatbelt, the belt I was wearing on the bus…the bus from school to…Meridian! The holes in my memory filled themselves in slowly as I swayed back and forth, shivering.