Renae stood over a white porcelain stove with her back to Jarrid cooking a hot breakfast he hadn’t asked for and didn’t want. He thought his wife was beautiful, even wearing her favorite threadbare robe and her hair a mess. She flipped the eggs expertly, clanking the iron skillet with an egg turner. Bacon sizzled in another skillet filling the little kitchen with a steamy, wet smell that made Jarrid sick. He wasn’t hungry, but he was glad she was with him, taking care of him before daylight, just before he had to leave. He didn’t want to go rock climbing. It was Renae’s idea. She thought it would do him good to join the boys and do something manly. She didn’t put it that way, but that’s what she meant. Jarrid felt pulled along like a stone sliding off the edge of a cliff. Renae never suspected that he had a fear of heights. He was too embarrassed to tell her, because her dad and brother were iron workers. Jarrid pictured them skipping along nonchalantly on eight-inch-wide I-beams hundreds of feet above the ground. He couldn’t tell her that he had frozen on the rock the first time out only thirty feet up. However, he figured she knew. Maybe Renae’s brother had told her behind his back; Luke was like that. When it happened, Luke had tried to smooth it over, told him that he would get the hang of it, but Jarrid knew he wouldn’t. Whatever the reason, Renae kept after him to go back out and try it again. The thought occurred to Jarrid that she was ashamed of him. So, when Luke called and invited him to give it another shot, he reluctantly said okay.
Jarrid sat at the kitchen table that had one side dropped down and pushed up against the wall in an attempt to make the room seem bigger than it was. The linoleum-covered floor glared up at him. Renae continued working at the stove, her pink cotton robe flapping up and down showing her supple curves each time she turned the bacon or flipped an egg. It was Saturday morning. Jarrid wished he could go back to bed. He felt like a schoolboy being forced to go to class on the first day of spring.
“It’s going to be better than last time,” she said. “I mean, the weather is getting warmer. It’s been three weeks.”
Renae took the eggs out of the hot grease and put them on a plate she’d warmed in the oven, and then she drained the bacon on a paper towel. She brought the bacon and eggs to the table and set them in front of Jarrid. He looked down at the plate. “You know what? It’s early. Maybe I’ll wait,” he said. “I’m really not that hungry. I think I’ll have a cup of coffee for now, if that’s okay with you.”
“Are you sure? It’s the brown sugar, thick-sliced bacon you always like,” she said.
“Why don’t you pack it for me? Make a bacon and egg sandwich. I’ll be hungry later on today. It’ll taste good then.”
“If that’s what you want. I just think you need some energy, a bite of breakfast to wake you up and get you going.”
“This coffee should do it,” he said.
“Do you have your climbing gear ready?”
Jarrid had a sudden urge to tell her that he didn’t want to go, but he couldn’t, not now. He noticed that she didn’t say camping gear.
“Yes, by the front door. The water jug is on the porch. It was chilly last night, so the water should be cold,” he said, trying to sound relaxed but he felt a tightening in his neck and shoulders.
“What about the chalk dust? Did you get the chalk dust Luke told you to get?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Okay then, good,” she said.
Renae poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down across from her husband; the table was so small that their knees touched. She held the coffee cup in both hands in front of her chin and smiled at Jarrid through the rising steam. “I’m glad you’re getting out for a couple of days. It’ll be good for you. You’ll see,” she said. “Everything will be fine now that your ankle’s healed.” She reached out and patted him on the back of his hand.
Jarrid had faked the ankle injury the first time out, when they hauled him down the beginner’s rock like a sack of potatoes. He’d gone around limping on a perfectly good ankle for a week, a ruse that was a constant reminder of his embarrassing failure. Renae’s brother and his pals had gotten a good laugh out of it. Jarrid watched them on top of the cliff, almost out of sight, gesturing and laughing. When Luke climbed back down, like an ape climbing down a ladder, he slapped Jarrid on the back and called him hero as Jarrid sat on a log with his boot and sock off, rubbing the “injury.”
“It doesn’t look bad,” Luke had said, frowning. Then looking again, he said with a broad grin, “Can you put weight on it?”
Jarrid and Renae had barely finished their first cup of coffee when they heard a horn blaring out front. Jarrid looked up at the cow clock hanging on the wall and felt numbness in his arms and legs, like the blood had drained out. It was 6:30 a.m., no doubt Luke had arrived in his F-350 Ford diesel, honking his horn, yelling out the window, and waking up the neighbors. Things were set in motion, and Jarrid felt carried along like a twig in a turbulent mountain stream.
Renae packed the sandwich and a coffee thermos then she went into the front room with Jarrid to say goodbye and wave at her brother. She put her arm around her husband’s waist and kissed him tenderly on the mouth. “You’re going to do okay,” she said.
Jarrid held her firmly and stared at the furniture in the living room—his Lazy Boy chair, Renae’s rocker, Alyssa’s bookcase by the fireplace, and Evelyn’s Pack & Play near the window. He could see the entrance into the darkened hallway that led to the bedroom where the children were tucked in sleeping and at the other end of the living room the doorway into the kitchen where the light was still burning. He closed his eyes and tried to remember everything, every detail. He felt dread, like a strong man had a tight grip on his guts, like something was going to happen. Luke blew his horn again; it was time to go. Jarrid picked up his tangled gear and stuffed it into an old Army duffle bag that had belonged to his dad when he was in the 101st Airborne. He opened the front door and stepped out into the cold, spring air. He hesitated and turned back to his wife who was waving at the pickup truck. Her auburn hair lay on her thin shoulders. She was beautiful. He loved her; nothing else mattered.
“Go on, get out of here,” she said, with a smile and a gentle push.
“Wait,” he said, placing his hand along her warm neck. The honking sound faded in the distance. “I love you,” he said.
Renae dropped her hand and laid it on his outstretched arm; her smile turned into a frown. “I love you, too,” she said. She gave him a kiss and a quick squeeze then she stepped back into the doorway. “Goodbye,” she said.
The honking noise returned, and Jarrid walked down the sidewalk to the waiting truck. Luke yelled out the window, “Come on, Romeo!”
Jarrid threw his bag and water jug into the truck bed and climbed in the super-cab behind the driver. He looked out the side window and saw his wife disappear behind the closing door.
Luke and his buddies didn’t bother to say good morning. As usual, they were engaged in boisterous conversation. Jarrid was always amused with the seating hierarchy. Luke was in the driver’s seat. He was the top dog and, after all, it was his truck. Luke’s buddy, Matt, rode shotgun. Matt had proven his mettle in sports and other such things. In addition, Matt was a well-respected village alderman with higher political aspirations. Dropping down in the pecking order, but still third and always a contender for Matt’s seat was Steve. Steve was the pastor at the largest church in the area, the Agape Fellowship Church. Steve had the gift of gab. He’d been an all-around athlete in high school and college. His family name, Struheiser, adorned buildings, parks, and road signs throughout the county. Last in order of importance was Jarrid, practically unseen and unnoticed, going along only because Luke was his brother-in-law. Jarrid gazed out the window at the budding trees and tried to ignore Luke’s clamor.
“We were out in the swamp all night looking for the body,” Luke was saying. “We figured he was dead, three days in that country, alligators, quicksand, water moccasins, no one could survive.” Jarrid felt himself groan. Luke was an ex-Marine, as they say, but as far as Jarrid knew, Luke hadn’t left the States during his hitch. Even at that, he never missed an opportunity to recount his amazing Marine stories. Matt and Steve always listened intently, seemingly mesmerized. Luke was a good story teller. Ironically, Jarrid was the only one among the four who had experienced real combat, a fact the rest of them ignored, and Jarrid never mentioned. He wasn’t a self-promoter, so he sat in the least conspicuous seat, gazed out the window, and kept his mouth shut. He’d seen war, but it wasn’t what it was cracked up to be. There wasn’t any glory, not really. It was more like getting up and going to work, something you did because you had to do it, because it was expected, and because you were conditioned to do it, like jumping out of an airplane, for example. The Jump Master stands up, and everyone stands up. He gives the signal, and each man snaps his hook onto the static line. He yells, “Go!” and the line starts moving, the guy in front of you, the guy behind you, and you too. Suddenly, you’re stepping through a big hole in the side of the aircraft, and you find yourself falling to the ground. It’s that simple. That’s all it is. You never stop and look around. You never ask what the hell is happening. You’re afraid that if you stop, even for a second, that would be it. You’d be a coward. You’d let your buddies down. Maybe a coward was someone who stopped to think about what was happening and couldn’t get going again; someone who didn’t care enough about his buddies. Maybe a real hero was someone who kept going when no one else could. If they admitted it, most people were like Jarrid, stuck in the middle, not a hero and not a coward, despite conventional thought and verbose claims.
Jarrid happened to be in the National Guard when the war started, so he ended up with the rest of his unit doing a tour of duty overseas in the sand dunes. When he came back home, he expected that people, family and friends, people in his little home town, would treat him with more respect, if for no other reason maybe for the medals he’d received. They did, for a few weeks, but then everything went back to normal as though the war had never happened. It occurred to him, from time to time, how lucky he was that he had not been maimed or permanently scarred like many of the other guys he knew, nineteen and twenty year-olds with arms and legs blown away, or their faces burned off. That would have been tough to handle, especially when people didn’t seem to remember what the war was about a few months after it was declared over. He knew that his so-called acts of bravery had been mere reflex. He felt within himself that he was a fraud. Nevertheless, Renae got caught up in the euphoria of his return, talk of his medals, maybe it was patriotism, and since he loved her, had always loved her in high school and even before that, he asked her to marry him. On the spur of the moment, she said, yes. He knew his plan was wrought with peril, but he thought he could eventually make her love him for what he really was. For the time being, he was happy to have her, no matter the pretense.
Jarrid closed his eyes and tried to tune out Luke and the others. He thought about Renae and their warm bed. He was dozing when he felt Luke’s truck jerk to the right, then a jolt as the tires on the right side left the highway and plowed through gravel.
“Now what?” Luke said, gripping the steering wheel with both hands and struggling to keep his truck from leaving the roadway, altogether. A battered flat-bed truck piled high with wooden pallets tore around them, taking most of both lanes. “Idiot,” Luke said, as he coaxed his truck back onto the highway. Luke was a skilled driver, even if he was an obnoxious loudmouth.
“Wow! Where’d he come from?” Matt said.
“Out of one of these hollows—who knows?” Luke said.
“He’s breaking the law, stacked too high,” Matt said. “Speeding, too.”
“He’s going to kill someone,” Steve said.
“Probably,” Luke said.
Jarrid sat up and watched the flatbed disappear around the next curve, the pallets teetering to one side.
“Now that you bums are awake,” Luke paused to give Matt and Steve a chance to laugh then he continued, “let’s talk tactics. I’ll lay out the mission. We can skip the grandma hill today and go to something a little more interesting.” His eyes flashed from the road to the rearview mirror. Jarrid stared back at him and didn’t flinch.
“How about Devil’s Needle?” Matt offered.
“That’s what I’m thinking,” Luke said. “It’s a level two, maybe even a three on the east side. You can see it from where we were last time.” He looked at Jarrid again. “On top of the cliff.”
“I’m in. Let’s give it a shot,” Matt said.
Steve didn’t seem so sure. “I don’t think I’m good enough to tackle the Devil. Level three? That’s a challenge,” he said.
“All right then, we’ll stay on the south side, Pilgrim’s Point—how about that?” This time Luke focused his attention on Steve.
“Okay. I guess,” Steve said.
Halfway between Big Creek and Logan, in the middle of nowhere, a State Police car went around them at a pretty good clip, in one of the few straight stretches along Route 10.
“At least he didn’t run me off the road,” Luke said.
“He’s after the flatbed,” Matt said. “Maybe he’ll nail the driver with four or five citations and impound his truck.”
“Not likely,” Luke said. “That wacko’s long gone.”
“I hope he’s learned his lesson and slowed down,” Steve said.
They soon came upon the accident that had happened just moments before they got there. Dust from the airbags still floated in the air filling the police car like white smoke. Luke slammed on his brakes and slid to a stop a safe distance from the wreck. Everyone, including Jarrid, piled out and ran up to the scene. The tractor trailer was jack-knifed from the impact, and the cruiser was lodged between the tractor’s dual wheels and the left side saddle tank. The truck driver was climbing down, favoring his left shoulder, maybe in shock, but otherwise seemed to be okay. He hollered to them, “There was a pallet in the road. Looked like it got stuck under his car and pulled him over.” The trucker made a diagonal slice with his good arm to show how the cruiser had skidded. “I had nowhere to go. He’s still in there.”
Matt was on his cell phone calling for help, but they were at least twenty minutes away from the nearest fire station. Steve helped the truck driver off the highway and sat down with him on the bank between the guardrail and the Guyandotte River. Luke pulled on the driver’s door but the door was bent and jammed. He kept kicking the fender and yanking on the door. Jarrid was already in the police car through the passenger side. The dust was settling, and Jarrid reached out and put his hand on the trooper’s shoulder. “Are you okay? Can you move?” he said. “Hold on, we’ll get you out.”
The trooper groaned and lolled his head from side to side on his headrest. He was a young man, maybe only twenty-five. Jarrid noticed a photo of a pretty woman holding a baby clipped to the sun visor. The steering wheel was bent down and had the officer pinned. “Help me,” he said.
“Can you release the seatbelt?”
“Maybe. My right leg hurts bad.” He was struggling and pulling on his leg. “I can’t move it. I was responding on a burglar alarm.”
“Get the seat belt loose,” Jarrid said, firmly.
The trooper fumbled for the belt release, found it, and pushed the button, but the lock didn’t give.
“Hold the button down, and I’ll pull the belt loose,” Jarrid said. He gave the belt a yank and it broke free.
They tried to slide the seat back, but it wouldn’t budge. Luke stuck his head through the driver’s window. “I can’t get this door open,” he said. “The saddle tank’s leaking. I’m standing in diesel.”
“We’ll slide him out the passenger side,” Jarrid said. Immediately, he smelled diesel fumes coming through the window and up through the floor. He fought to hold back a panic he felt rising. “Luke, disconnect the battery. Disconnect the battery or cut the cable. Now!” he said.
“Right,” Luke said, and disappeared from the window.
When Luke got back with a pry bar, there was a thin wisp of black smoke coming up from the crack between the left fender and the hood. Luke noticed the smoke too and began prying on the hood frantically. By then, the trooper was fully conscious and having severe pain.
“I’m going to drag you out the passenger side,” Jarrid said. “Can you move your legs?”
“It feels like I’m stuck.”
“Let’s see what I can do,” Jarrid said. He put both hands around the officer’s right knee and pulled hard.
The officer groaned, “That hurts my leg. I can’t move it.”
Jarrid ran his hand down along the leg and found the problem. About halfway between the knee and the ankle a bone was sticking out. He reached down as far as he could and discovered that the foot and ankle were caught between the dash and the firewall. He looked through the cracked windshield to see how Luke was doing. Luke was squatting down, peering under the hood. He had bent one side up enough to get his hand in the hole.
“The battery’s on the other side,” he yelled back to Jarrid. I can’t reach it from here. I see sparks. We’ve got a problem. The wires are on fire.”
When the officer heard Luke say “fire,” he looked at Jarrid and fear replaced the pain on his face. Smoke was coming through the fire wall.
“Do you have an extinguisher?” Jarrid said.
“It’s in the trunk,” the trooper said, pointing to the rear with his thumb.
The release button didn’t work so Jarrid took the keys from the ignition and yelled for Luke. “Get the extinguisher out of the trunk. Save it. If things get bad, use it, but don’t waste it.” He turned back to the trooper. “We’ve got to get you out of here. It’s going to hurt, but I have to get you out. I need your help. Push with your left leg and your arms. I’ll pull you up by your belt. Do you understand?”
“Just get me out.”
The officer clenched his teeth and held on to the steering wheel with both hands. Jarrid pulled on the belt. The officer pushed and hollered.
“Come on!” Jarrid said. “Come on now. You can do it. Come on now.” It didn’t work. There was no movement. “Luke, bring your pry bar!” Jarrid yelled. “This steering wheel’s in the way. Try to get it off him.”
Luke reached through the window and wedged the bar under the steering wheel and tried to pry using the dashboard, but that caused the dashboard to collapse further. Jarrid slid out of the car and climbed on the hood. “Give it to me,” he said, “cover his head with your jacket.”
Luke did what he was told and stepped back. Jarrid swung the bar like a baseball bat and smashed out the windshield. He jumped off the hood to the other side of the car, splashing the diesel fuel. He put the bar through the steering wheel and used the door post as a fulcrum. “Help me with this,” he said. Jarrid and Luke put all their weight on the bar. The steering wheel moved less than an inch, but that was enough.
“It’s off me!” The officer yelled.
Now, smoke was pouring out from under the hood and through the firewall into the passenger compartment. Luke grabbed the fire extinguisher and stuck the tip into the hole he had pried open. The officer was coughing and trying to put his face out the window.
“Hold it! Not yet. Save it!” Jarrid yelled.
Luke panicked and wasted the extinguisher with one long burst. The smoke died down for a moment. “I got it!” Luke yelled. His face was smudged black and he was grinning ear to ear. He held the empty extinguisher over his head like he was getting ready to body-slam it.
Jarrid crawled back into the car. Smoke was already beginning to build again. It burned his eyes, and he could hardly breathe. He heard ominous crackling under the hood. “We’ve got some space under the steering wheel. Let’s try it again.”
The officer was coughing. His eyes were closed tight. “Don’t let me burn up! Don’t leave me! Pull my leg off if you have to.”
“I’m not going to leave you.”
Jarrid wrapped his fingers around the officer’s belt and pulled. He didn’t care about the screaming. He didn’t care about the leg. Damn the leg. He pulled as hard as he could, but it was no use. The paint on the hood blistered and then the hood was engulfed in flames. Black smoke swirled and flew into the air. Jarrid slid off the seat and reached up under the dashboard. He grabbed the ankle and tried to pull the trooper’s foot out of his boot, but it wouldn’t let go. Smoke and flames were coming through the firewall. The floor was hot and sticky. His hands and face were on fire. It was like being immersed in boiling tar. Every nerve ending in his body shouted for him to get out. He felt the officer’s fingers grabbing his shirt collar, clawing at his neck, pulling his hair.
“Help me! Help me! I can’t stand it. Oh God, help me!”
And then, Jarrid put his hand on it; a chunk of hot steel stuck to the tacky rubber floor. He wrapped his fingers around the butt handle and felt the trigger. He reached up and found the trooper’s hand and placed it there. He struggled to back out, pushing with his elbows and scooting backwards through the black smoke until he felt his knees hit pavement. With a lunge, coughing and gagging, he rolled from the cruiser and onto the ground. He heard the officer screaming then he heard a muffled explosion mixed in with the popping and crackling fire sounds, but louder, sharper, the left front tire, or something else, and the screaming stopped. He heard an air horn blasting, and people shouting, then he felt hands under his armpits and being dragged into clean, cool air.
***
When Renae arrived at the hospital, she found her brother along with Matt and Steve in the waiting room. They looked haggard and worried but otherwise okay, not a scratch on any of them. She went to her brother, and he gave her a hug. Matt and Steve stood up and waited and didn’t say anything.
“A nurse came out a few minutes ago and told us it’ll be a while,” Luke said. “You just missed her. She said they’re cleaning him up, assessing him, morphine pump, bandages, IV, that sort of thing. She said he’s going to have to stay in the hospital a few days.”
Renae wiped her face with a tissue. She looked at each of them standing there and didn’t say a word. Luke turned away and stared at the floor.
“That cop had no chance. He was a dead man when we got there,” Matt said. “There was nothing anyone could do. Jarrid should have known that.”
“That’s right,” Steve said. “Jarrid could have died for nothing. We all could have died for nothing. I hate to say it, but what was he trying to prove?”
Renae glared at Steve then she sat down and buried her face in her hands. Luke put his hand on her shoulder; she shoved it off without looking up. While they waited for the doctor, Matt and Steve went to the cafeteria to get a bite to eat. Luke stayed with Renae and kept checking with the nurse to see how Jarrid was doing.
It was an hour later when the burn specialist, Dr. Clifford, came out. He sat down and held Renae’s hand. He assured her that Jarrid was going to be okay. He told her that he was listed as critical because of where most of his burns were located, his face and hands. The nurse would help her gown-up, and she could go in and see Jarrid for a few minutes.
Dr. Clifford patted Renae on the hand, “He’s going to be alright, don’t worry. Try to be upbeat when you go in to see him. That’s important,” he said. “We’ve wrapped him up in bandages. It’s going to look worse than it is.”
Dr. Clifford’s words didn’t prepare Renae for what she saw when she entered Jarrid’s isolation room. She was glad she was wearing a mask so he wouldn’t see the shock on her face. Sterile dressings covered most of his head and face. His right arm was wrapped from his fingertips to his armpit. His right leg was wrapped from his ankle up to his groin. The areas not covered were red and looked like he’d been in the sun too long. He was wearing an oxygen mask. He had IV’s running in both arms. It appeared that he smiled when he first saw her, but she wasn’t sure because of the swelling. Renae went to his bedside and held his left hand in her gloved hands.
“Hi,” she said.
“At least I didn’t fall off a cliff,” he said. He could see her eyes tearing up. “It’s not as bad as you think. You know how hospitals overreact.” His voice was weak and raspy. She lifted his hand up to her face and kissed his finger tips through her mask. She remembered the accident scene she had passed on the way to the hospital. She remembered the charred metal and the sickening acrid stench, like hair burning. “Why did you do it? Matt and Steve said the cop had no chance. They said you should have known better.”
Jarrid stared at the IV bag. He watched the heavy drops fall one by one and didn’t answer. He pictured the young police officer.
“The others didn’t jump in. Why did you?”
“Luke tried to help,” he said.
“You’re the only one who crawled into that burning car. You’re the only one lying here in a hospital bed. Why?”
“I didn’t want him to be in there alone.”
She thought about Alyssa and Evelyn and how much they loved and needed their dad. “What about me and the kids?”
“I wasn’t thinking about that,” he said.
Her voice quivered. “You weren’t thinking about me and the kids, or yourself.”
There was no answer. Renae walked over to the large window that faced west. She stood there, with her back to Jarrid, and waited. The sun was going down and appeared as a misty red ball through a thin layer of low clouds. Pink light streaked the horizon. It was beautiful. She wanted to describe the sunset to Jarrid, but she didn’t know how. Red and pink light washed through the window and painted her face and gown. She turned to tell Jarrid. The colors filled the room with a warm vibrant glow that covered the walls, the bed, and her husband. She closed her eyes and tried to remember every detail. Jarrid’s nurse came in without a sound, seeming to float to his bedside.
“He’s sleeping now. He’s resting,” she said.
Jarrid’s finger pulled on the morphine button like a trigger. The nurse spoke to Renae, reassuringly. “Reflex,” she said.
Renae watched her husband’s oxygen mask contracting and expanding as his chest rose and sank. Each shallow breath brought her closer. She longed to embrace him.
