Love Reimagined

by Delancey Stewart

  “With Sam? Meaningful looks exchanged, and I swear I saw him touch your hair.” She smiled at me, lifting her eyebrows in question.

  I shook my head, the confusion I felt mingling with the fear and worry and all the tension that had been piling up since the fire began, and even before. “I don’t know what that was, really.”

  Maddie took my arm and steered me back toward the counter, sitting me next to my mom and going around the other side. “Tea?” she asked us, “or…?” She held up a beer bottle.

  My mother gave me an odd look, like she wasn’t sure she should be drinking in front of me, and then pointed at the beer bottle. “It’s been a long day.” Her tone was apologetic, and I bumped my shoulder into hers.

  “It has,” I agreed, my head still spinning. “I’ll take one too, actually.”

  Maddie nodded and then placed two more bottles on the countertop before she leaned on her forearms and fixed me with a direct stare. “Okay. Now spill.”

  I glanced at my mother, and the fatigue and worry on her face made a little hard place form in my throat. “It’s just…” I stared down at the bottle in my hands. “In the middle of what we’re all facing here, it’s nothing. It’s silly to even talk about anything but the fact that everyone we know might lose everything.”

  Maddie nodded and straightened up, taking a sip of her beer. And then my mother surprised me. She lifted her own bottle to her lips, took a healthy dram, and then looked between me and Maddie. “I don’t know what would be better actually, than to be distracted from everything going on around here right now. I, for one, could use it.” She took another long pull on the beer and I tried to remember the last time I’d seen my mother drink.

  “Okay,” I said, not sure how to approach this new side of my mom and equally unsure whether sharing my forlorn-girl drama with my mom was going to be helpful to anyone in any way. “Well,” I started. Maddie leaned forward again, a gleam in her dark eyes.

  “I’ve been in love with Chance Palmer my whole life,” I said.

  “I knew it,” my mother crowed. “I think we’re all just a teensy bit in love with Chance. Don’t tell your father.” Mom patted my arm lightly.

  “Of course not,” I said.

  “My lips are sealed,” Maddie added.

  “Well,” my mother said, cocking her head to the side and then turning to look over at Connor Charles typing away on his laptop in the far booth. “Maddie might not be in love with Chance. She’s got Connor.”

  We all took a moment to stare at Maddie’s fiancé as he worked. He was pretty glorious, with his determined chiseled jaw and his dark red and gold hair. Sensing our eyes on him, Connor looked up. When he caught us all staring, he made a comical face, scrunching his nose up and shaking his head slightly. We laughed and turned our attention back to the intimate space between us.

  “Anyway,” I went on, starting to find that I actually wanted to talk about the confusion I’d been feeling. “It’s always been Chance. I mean, he’s perfect, right? And then there’s Sam.”

  My mother and Maddie both nodded, though I didn’t think they had any idea where I was going with this.

  “And he’s always driven me nuts.”

  “Really?” Maddie asked, looking surprised. “I knew you liked Chance, but Sam is a good guy.”

  “I have a hard time deciding which one I like best,” Mom said. Her beer was almost empty, and she pointed at it, causing Maddie to run back to the fridge to grab her another.

  “Well, you’re not alone there,” I told her as Maddie returned. My mother’s eyebrows shot up, but she didn’t say anything else. “Sam was just always around, you know? We were in the same classes, always at the bus stop together. Our high school wasn’t exactly huge, so it wasn’t like there were a lot of other places for him to be, but it just seemed like every time I turned around, he was there.”

  “Right,” Maddie said, encouraging me to continue.

  “So he witnessed a lot of my most humiliating moments.” I corrected this. “My most humiliating moment, actually.”

  My mother hiccuped and then rolled her eyes at me. “Can’t be worse than showing your bloomers on television.”

  I laughed at the word ‘bloomers’—it was such a Mom thing to say. She meant ‘showing your ass’ but was way too polite to say it. Maddie gave me a questioning look and I tried to say ‘let it go’ without actually making a sound. A vivid reminder of my mom’s own most humiliating moment, combined with two beers, might leave my mother in tears, and that wasn’t the goal. She had enough to worry about with Dad heading back to the fire line.

  “I was only seventeen, so it felt pretty horrible,” I said.

  “Now you have to tell us.” Maddie widened her eyes at me, waiting.

  I sighed. I might as well. “I showed my boobs to the whole school at prom.”

  My mother choked on her beer, and Maddie screeched, “What?”

  “Not on purpose,” I said, glancing around to see if anyone else was listening. My mom stopped coughing, but she still looked horrified. “I tripped going up the stairs, and I guess I caught the hem of my dress and it pulled the whole thing down. Sam was right behind me on the stairs, and I jumped right back up and went onto the stage. I didn’t realize my dress was pulled down so low.”

  “And Sam?”

  “I don’t think he noticed right away, but then he totally did—mostly because the entire school was screaming in laughter,” I cringed as I relived the memory. “And he kind of grabbed me, like pulled me into a hug so his back was to the audience.”

  “He was trying to cover you,” Maddie said, grasping the obvious, something I hadn’t been able to do at the time.

  “I think so, but at the time, I thought he was making a joke of it somehow, or…I don’t know, I was already so embarrassed I couldn’t think, and then Sam was hugging me, and my boobs were still out, and it was all so horrible.”

  My mother’s eyes were filling with tears. “You never told me about this,” she said quietly.

  “What could you have done, Mom?”

  “I could have known. It’s a Mom’s job to know. Just…” she sniffed. “To know the things their kids have to deal with.”

  Wonderful. I’d managed to make Mom cry even without revisiting Sheetgate.

  “Sorry, Mom. I couldn’t bring myself to talk about it.”

  “How’d you get off the stage?” Maddie asked, clearly a little bit fascinated by my horrific high-school humiliation.

  “Chance saved me, actually. He was a chaperone, and he put his coat over me and walked me off stage.”

  “And did you and Sam ever talk about it?” Maddie asked while my mother continued to sniff and look sad.

  “No. Definitely not. Between that and the other freshman year humiliation,” I said, and my mother’s eyebrows shot up to learn there was another defining event in my life she hadn’t been aware of. “Sorry Mom,” I said, and then I explained about Chance’s party and the woodshed. “I guess I just have always felt like Sam’s role in my life was to humiliate me.”

  “But maybe he’s just always been too close to see clearly,” Maddie said.

  I nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Anyway, I’m confused because he kissed me the other day, and now I think I’ve been chasing the wrong Palmer brother all along.”

  Both my mother and Maddie gasped. “He kissed you?” Maddie asked, grinning.

  “Yes, but I didn’t react super well.”

  “How do you react badly to a kiss?” she asked.

  “I think pretending it never happened and refusing to talk about it qualifies,” I said.

  “Oh, honey.” Mom looked ashamed on my behalf, and my heart shriveled even more in acknowledgement of what a moron I was when it came to love. At least she’d quit crying.

  “And today he told me they don’t need me at Palmer anymore because once the fire is over both he and Chance are moving down to the valley.” The last part came out in a rush, and real tears spilled down my cheeks.
“And now I’m crying.” At least I’d mastered the obvious. I lifted a hand to wipe at my face and accidentally swiped the neck of my beer bottle, sending it toppling over, spilling beer into Mom’s lap. “Oh God, I’m a disaster.”

  We grabbed napkins and cleaned up Mom, the counter, and my face, and then resumed our tight little circle.

  “You want to know what I think?” Maddie asked. She didn’t wait for either of us to reply. “I think Sam’s always had a crush on you. He watches you all the time when they eat in here, you know.”

  “I always thought that was just so he didn’t miss a chance to make fun of me if I spilled something.”

  “Can’t have been easy watching you make google eyes at his brother,” Mom said.

  I sat up straighter. “I do not make google eyes.” What in the world were google eyes, anyway?

  “You moon over him.” Mom said.

  “It’s not nineteen-fifty, Mom. People don’t moon anymore.”

  “Whatever. You know what I mean. Poor Sam, watching you watch Chance all those years.” She made a dramatic frowning face and I couldn’t help but laugh a little bit.

  Maddie slapped the counter. “Well it’s pretty simple. When he gets back, you tell him how you feel.”

  “Sure, that’s simple.” I rolled my eyes at how not simple that was turning out to be. “I’ve tried to talk to him, but he’s avoiding me. And now he’s moving away. I think it’s just too late.”

  “It’s never too late, Miranda.” Maddie looked so optimistic I almost wanted to believe it might be that easy. If nothing else, it was worth a try.

  Chapter 22

  Sam

  Driving headlong into a raging fire seemed like a perfectly rational thing to do after telling the girl you’d always loved that you were giving up on her.

  Okay, so maybe I didn’t use those exact words. And maybe I’d never actually told Miranda a thing about how I really felt. But I’d always hoped that one day she’d notice. Of course with Chance’s shining persona always standing in the way there was little opportunity for that.

  “Shit,” Chance breathed as we rode with the Forest Service and Mr. George out the back fire road and toward the fire. The sky was glowing the closer we got, and the smoke was thickening around us. When we finally pulled all the way around the village, we could see the blaze roaring less than a half mile away, bulging and spitting like a beast just waiting to rush forward.

  “There’s a break back there that’s holding for now, but the other arm of the fire hasn’t been contained and that’s what we’re worried about. It might come down this way, and if it gets in here past the fire break, it’ll run right through the village.”

  I stared at the part of the fire that the Hotshot crew had contained. It didn’t look contained to me, it looked terrifying and ridiculously close. “This is insane,” I said. No one disagreed.

  We unloaded the bobcats from the back of the flatbed trailer and followed directions. The goal was to push all the debris down to the southern edge of the hillside, out of reach of the oncoming arm of the fire. The firefighters would burn just in front of the advance, hoping to deprive the flames of fuel so there was nothing for it to burn and they might finally be able to stop it. We were just a mile from the back of the village—the line was perilously thin.

  Sweat rolled down my face as I struggled to push broken branches and mountains of pine needles and other brush off the hillside and down the southern face. Mr. George and the Forest Service firefighters with us hacked at vines and roots with chainsaws and axes, and Chance and I pushed load after load out of the way with the track loaders. There was a sound—a steady roar—that I realized right away was the fire, and I had a sense of being in the path of an oncoming train. This thing was enormous. How the hell could we stop it by moving some twigs around?

  Still, I worked, and hours flew by as we carved a dirt path where brush and ground cover had been heavy before. This was the line, I realized. We were drawing the line that might save everyone and everything we loved. And if it wasn’t good enough, or if that roaring beast just ahead was too strong?

  We’d lose everything.

  And so would everyone we knew.

  So would Miranda.

  I couldn’t stand the images that kept flying through my mind of Miranda and her family sorting through the charred hulk of their home after the fire had burned through. I couldn’t let it happen. I might not be able to convince her that we were meant to be together, that I could give her a future—hell, if I was truthful, I’d never actually tried—but I could at least do my best to make sure she kept everything she had now.

  Memories of the moments we’d shared in the rain drove me forward. As the heat and horror of the fire seemed to draw nearer hour by hour, I pushed ahead, thinking about how it had felt to finally pull her into my arms. It was like years of longing had flowed out my fingertips, poured from my chest, filled that kiss. And she’d kissed me back. I knew she had, even if she didn’t want to admit it. Maybe that was enough—just the knowledge that for a few sweet minutes as the rain poured down around us, Miranda George had kissed me back and held me tight.

  Hell, no. That wasn’t enough.

  “Shit! Over there!” One of the hotshots was running past the bobcat as I pushed another load down the slope, and I looked to see where he was headed just as another sprinted past. I had no idea how they managed to move so quickly when each one of them carried three chainsaws and a mountain of other gear strapped to their bodies. I turned the bobcat and saw what they were running for—a spot of fire had erupted past our break, ignited by embers carried on the wind that rushed above us.

  They got the spot extinguished and came back to me a few minutes later, looking every bit as dirty and tired as I felt. “Keep an eye out for those. Drink plenty of water,” they advised as they stopped next to the tractor. “Easy to forget, and the heat’ll steal your hydration. Last thing we need is one of you guys passing out.”

  I dutifully lifted my water bottle to my lips and drank.

  “I don’t know how much more we can do back here,” one of them said, looking up. “Weather’s supposed to shift soon. The wind’ll probably die down when the sun comes up. If we can keep it back till then we might have a shot.”

  The night stretched out around us, dragging itself forward in shades of orange and red, and casting the men working near the fire in its eerie glow. When we couldn’t get the track loaders into a spot or the hill was too steep, Chance and I were on our feet next to Mr. George and the firefighters, working with axes, shovels, and chainsaws to get through the brush and get it out of the fire’s way. The gear they’d given us was heavy and hot, and after hours had passed, I began to feel like a zombie, working mindlessly as my brain cranked around Miranda and the idea of leaving Kings Grove. Her face when I’d told her the plan my brother and I had agreed on wasn’t exactly thrilled, though I wouldn’t have expected her to be. She had looked surprised… and was it wishful thinking to imagine she’d looked sad?

  A couple hours before dawn, we’d carved a pretty significant line into the hillside that stretched a good half mile around the back of the village. I was bone tired, and Chance didn’t look much better, leaning against the little Bobcat, swigging water and staring out into the crackling glow beyond us.

  “Surreal, isn’t it?”

  “Fucking terrifying is what it is,” he said.

  I couldn’t disagree with that. “I’m almost too tired to be scared now.”

  Chance looked at me and nodded. “You really going to be okay with everything? Moving? Taking the business down the hill?”

  “If the house burns, it’ll make the choice easy,” I said, not wanting to rehash our decision. I wasn’t okay with it, but I didn’t have a rational reason not to be. “It makes good sense. For the business, for us personally.”

  “For us personally,” Chance repeated thoughtfully. “You sure about that part?”

  “Something you want to ask me?” I was too t
ired for subtlety.

  “Have you told her how you feel yet?”

  I shook my head, watched Chance unwrap a stick of gum.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t leave until you’ve given yourself a shot with George.”

  “Don’t call her that.” I knew Miranda hated being called George. “She hates it.”

  Chance grinned at me and nodded, handing me a stick of gum.

  “How long have you known she had a thing for you?”

  “Since high school, for sure.”

  “And you were seriously never interested? Not even then?” My disbelief colored my words.

  “I could have been maybe,” he said, his eyes crinkling as he grinned at me. “But you were my brother. And I didn’t want to take your girl.”

  I shook my head at him. He hadn’t been oblivious—he’d been standing back for me.

  Some shouting had begun off to our side, but it was hard to hear the words because of the ambient roar around us. Chance and I both stared in that direction, trying to make out who was yelling, and why. We stood and started moving toward the sound.

  Just then, one of the hotshots came bolting toward us from the direction of the flames. We’d been on the far edge of the line we’d created, farthest away from the fire. Miranda’s dad and the other Forest Service workers were closer to the flames, and we hadn’t seen any of them in a while. “We got some spotting down here toward the leading edge,” he said, his voice tense through his heavy breath. “It got big before we could get it out and came back around. Ranger George is trapped back there.”

  Shock brought me upright and my bloodstream flooded with adrenaline. “What can we do?”

  “Nothing now. Get these tractors loaded up and get out of here. It’s too dangerous to have you guys back here at this point. He’s in a pocket back there, and we’ll get him out. We can’t risk having you guys in the line of this thing now. It’s moving.” He motioned toward the flatbed parked up on the fire road. “Get this equipment out or you might lose it,” he said, and began moving back toward the fire.