Rush (2 page)

“The Immortals,” I whisper, laying the jacket gently on an outcrop.

According to legend, each year at least one member of the underground firefighters' brotherhood must die. But all that's known is rumor, because dead firemen never speak, and the living strut around Brockton in their Immortals jackets just as tight-lipped.

Whoever they are, they live life short and wild. Like I do.

I stroke the jacket. “Remember how we used to pretend? We'd stick that yellow tape on all our coats?”

Troy nods. “That was before Salome's brother . . . What are you going to do with it?”

I say nothing.

“They're cursed. Cheyenne says if you put one on, the Reaper's at your door.” He slaps my shoulder. “You know she's right. I mean, I still see Drew hanging there. I have nightmares about that day.”

My heartbeat skips, slows. Death was here. Not the gentle guy who comes for grandpas while they sleep. The violent one, the too-soon one—the one who has a summer home in Brockton.

“It could have been Ray's,” I say. “Didn't they find him upstream?”

I close my eyes and see Ray's smile and hear his laugh. I stretch out my other hand and lay it on all that remains of the young firefighter.

Troy nods. “Or Allen. Did he ever show up?”

I shake my head.

“And no others went while I was gone?”

“Just Christian, but they found his body miles from here.”

I lift up the jacket and push one arm through.

Troy grabs my free forearm. “Don't!”

I wiggle into leather, cool against warm skin. “You know the difference between them and me? I don't need the jacket. I'm already immortal.”

Voices.

Troy glances at me. I give my head a quick shake. “There's nobody else down here.”

I strain to see ahead. Lightning flashes and thunder quakes the canyon.

I test my twisted ankle, wince, and peek at my leg. Rain traces pink down my calf, pools and swirls and washes away.

“Let's go,” I say.

I slosh forward. That leather scrap steals my will. The creature inside me that needs adrenaline to survive shuts up—it's time to go home.

“Dustin!” a voice shouts out from around the bend.

“Someone's really stupid,” I say to Troy. There'll be twenty feet of water before the voice knows it. Troy takes off toward the sound. I grimace and slosh forward and freeze.

Ten people huddle together. Turned out from the circle, a ranger bangs his walkie-talkie on his thigh, curses as water drops off the brim of his cap. Troy's gray-on-black silhouette approaches him. All this I see; I hear nothing. Eerie. The storm allows no noise but its own roar. We step nearer until I hear the ranger's words, see the desperation he hides beneath that brim.

Women cry, and a little kid shrieks from her seat on a granite slab. Men shine flashlights into the sky and holler. I follow the useless beams, look back at the girl.

“Jake!” Troy spins me around. “He says there's a boy stuck—”

“You're a firefighter. Can you get her, and all of them, out of here?”

Troy nods.

I hobble into the circle. “What are you all doing? In less than an hour, water will be above that girl's head.”

A man, drippy-faced and hoarse, grabs me. “My son. He's on that cliff—”

I squint upward.
There's no way a kid could climb—

“Daddy!”

I shield my eyes from the pounding rain, but the small voice is invisible. All above is shadow.

“Hang on, son.” Dad sloshes to the rock wall, reaches for a hold. His fingers slip. “Don't let go!” He runs his hands through soaked hair and stares around with wild eyes.

The little girl whimpers and rocks. I wade toward her perch. “Is that your brother up there?”

She nods.

“I'm Jake King. What's your name?”

“Nikki.”

I bend over. “Look at me.” She balls up, squeezes her knees to her chin, and peeks.

“I'm gonna bring your brother down. I prom—I guarantee it.”

Her small voice whispers, “I shouldn't have called Dusty a dummy.”

Troy grabs the shoulders of two rangers. “Hey! You have no time. Get the girl and the family and get out, now!” He turns to me. “You need anyone?”

“Dad,” I say.

Troy nods. “The father stays here!”

One ranger grabs the other's sleeve. “It's what I've been telling you. We need to get them out, or we lose 'em.”

I look to Troy. “Take them back the way we came.” I pick at the zipper on the jacket. “Please don't tell Salome about this.”

“What are you gonna do? Your ankle. Your leg—”

“We're leaving.” The drippy ranger gestures with his walkie-talkie. “Now!”

Anguish sloshes around me. A mother, heels dug in, fights off men, and Nikki wails.

“Why'd your friend take them away?” Dad speaks to me without emotion.

I walk by his question, stroke the sandpaper rock face. “Wait for Dusty here. And be sure to remind Nikki it wasn't her fault.”

I bear full weight on my bad leg, grit my teeth, and climb. Pruned fingertips search for crevices, boots plunge into nooks, and I press hard against the rock.

“Keep screaming, kid!”

“Daddy.” It's fainter.

Ten feet, twenty. I reach thirty feet, find a hold, and breathe hard. “More—keep talking! Can't see you.”

“Is Daddy coming up?”

I veer horizontal across the cliff and continue my climb. Forty feet. I peek down into the darkness. I've reached the Coffin Zone.

I scan the rock face—still can't see him. I close my eyes. The jacket I wear weighs heavy on my arms. Right now I'm one of the Immortals. I'm doing everything they do. Except die.

“Kid! Keep talking!”

“I didn't mean to do it.”

Rain pelts my eyes, and I push up. My hand slides onto a flat space, grazes a small pine and the small shoe of a small kid latched onto a tree. I scramble up and lean back against rock. My ankle screams, and my heartbeat slows.

The ledge is four feet wide, two feet deep, with a tree. Far as I remember, this is the only ledge on this rock face. This kid's life is charmed.

Dusty is in second grade, I bet. He doesn't look hurt; his jeans and Celtics T-shirt are nothing but wet. But his makeshift belt makes me smile—a long coil of climbing rope that snakes around his feet.

“Hey there.” I pat his back, and he tenses. “I'm Jake. Are you Dusty?”

He doesn't speak.

“I ask because Dusty's dad is down there waiting for him, and if you're not him, I need to keep looking.”

“I'm him!” He whips his head around, but he's not letting go of the tree.

“Do you like storms?” I ask. “You get quite a view from up—”

“I hate thunder!” Dusty cries. “It's too loud!”

“It sure is.” I lay my hand on his shoulder, feel the tremble. “There's someone waiting for me, too. And when I don't show up at her place, she's gonna smack me. Hard. Look here.” I slip off the jacket and roll up my T-shirt sleeve. “This bruise? That's what happened when I told her I was skipping school today.”

Dusty stretches his neck, gets a close look. “That's big. You let a girl do that to you?”

I grin. “More times than you know.”

Dusty's teeth chatter, and he turns back toward his tree. “You shouldn't skip school. Didn't your dad write you a note?”

My throat burns. “Nope.”

“My dad wrote
me
a note,” he says. “He'd probably write you one if you asked him.”

“Sounds like you have a great dad.” My burn is a dull ache, and I rub my neck. “Here's the only thing. I can get you down, but you have to leave your tree. You need to let go of it and hold on to me.”

Dusty shakes his head. “I didn't mean to get lost. Nikki kept calling me that name. I thought our rope would go to the bottom.” He stares at me with his serious face. “She called me a dummy.”

I turn my head and suck in a laugh.

“I tied it to a tree on top and climbed down. But I'm not too good at knots and I fell—”

“You are the bravest, luckiest fifteen-year-old—”

“I'm only eight!”

I tousle his hair. “Eight-year-old.”

I look over the rope: fifty feet and sound. “I'm wrapping this around you, around me, even this tree. Keep hugging it.” I thread and knot and weave a harness for Dusty. “Okay, big man. You're going to hate me for two minutes, but I guarantee, then you'll like me.”

“I like you.” He turns, and I yank his body toward me. He screams.

“Dusty!” Dad hollers up.

I stand, brace against the tree, and lower Dusty. He shrieks the entire way down.

Fifty feet below, screaming stops and crying starts.

“Thank you!” Dusty's dad hollers it again and again. I've never heard a man so grateful, but he's not leaving. Fool.

“How can I thank you?”

“You can get out of this gorge!” I shout down at them.

They head out the direction we came in, and I curl up to watch the storm. Thunder rumbles the ledge, and I feel it deep inside my chest. His dad wrote him a note. Nice dad.

IT'S SIX BEFORE
I scooter back into Brockton. Nestled in California's San Llamos Valley, the town shows no sign of the storm. No pooling in the ditch fronting Brass Rail Tack, no mud on the Bulldogs baseball diamond. The town is the same now as it was this morning—dry and tough, without much sign of life.

I accelerate, turn left onto Celia Street, and start past the paper mill. It takes a block to finish the job. Hanking's Mill is its own sprawling city, complete with on-site doctor, cafeteria, and sleepers for when workers need to double back or escape their homes for a night. Divided into eight separate buildings for fire-protection purposes, the mill anchors Brockton on the map and, as Dad owns it, secures most residents in his back pocket.

Hank King has seen to everything, just as Grandpa did before him. And he's earned Brockton's respect. Or maybe owns it.

It's shift change, and millers float out like clouds, break up when they get to the street. I slow and weave between them, pop out near the loop that snakes up One Rock Hill. I back-and-forth on the scooter, reach two brick homes with killer views. I pause and watch a helicopter fly low overhead. Its rhythmic thump softens into the distance. It flies toward the gorge—probably out looking for Dusty's mysterious rescuer.

Dad kneels in front of our Tudor and coils the garden hose. The manicured lawn, the Roman fountain, the vines climbing the trellis; there's nothing out of place.

“Dad!” I topple my wheels, wince, and hobble up the drive. “You won't believe this.”

He doesn't turn. Dad sets the hose aside and strokes the wildflowers in Mom's wildflower garden. Today, like every day, he spends hours caring for that garden—the last thing Mom created before she packed up her pottery wheel and anxiety disorder and left. I approach quiet and slow. “Hey, Dad—”

“Bell 205 or Bell 212?”

“I didn't pay attention. It was just a helicopter. Listen—”

“‘Just a helicopter.' Do you know how many times they saved my life?” Dad rises, looks me head to toe. “School called.”

“I know, but if you could've seen—”

He raises his hand. A huge hand, like mine.

Dad inhales long and loud. “There's nothing you could say right now to help your situation, so cut the excuses.”

I wish him dead. Right here on the front lawn. Then I wish him resurrected because I need him.

“You should let me finish.” I step toward him, peek down at the garden.

Scottie pushes out the front door, bounds down the steps.

“That was a 212, right? What's going on?”

Dad muscles his arm around him: my fresh-from-the-shower, perfect older brother. I look at myself, at the blood and grime and swollen ankle.

“Be proud of your brother. Mark the day. On January the twenty-first, Scottie King followed in the footsteps of every true Brockton man.” Dad tears up—an occurrence I've not seen in years—and my stomach turns. “He was picked up by Brockton Hand Crew Number One. After his two years in Montana, they took him on reputation alone.”

I stare at my brother and force a smile. “So you're back for good?”

He sets his jaw, steps out from Dad's grip. “Not just me. Kyle's back. Picked up by Mox's rappel crew. You probably already heard from Troy. Rumor has it he and Cheyenne will be based here, too.”

“Yeah, I just saw him, which brings me to what I was—”

“Quite a homecoming.” Dad steps forward and reattaches his hand to my brother's shoulder. “Quite a gain for Brockton and the Forest Service.”

I'm going to puke. The wildfire crews that spread out over California during fire season base in our town. My grandpa's grandpa fought fires in summer and lined his pockets at the mill. It's what we do. Who we are.

Well, who
they
are. With the triumphant return of Scottie and his crowd from their first two years of fighting, Dad will strut twenty-four/seven.

I glance at Scottie and nod. “That's good. That's great. Wildfires won't stand a chance.” I look back to Dad, slowly point at our house. “But if you walk in that door and quick flip on the news, I bet you'll see—”

“I don't want my evening ruined by whatever stunt you pulled. Not tonight. I'm taking this man out to celebrate. It's been three years since I turned full attention to the mill and lay down my Brockton ax. It's about time the next King picked it up.” He pats Scottie and steps toward me. “Maybe by watching Scottie's choices, some wisdom will rub off on you.” Dad walks toward his truck and gets in. The door slams.