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The fire shelter. When Tim Bradford looked around at the world burning all around him and Lucy Chen, he was aware their shop was unsafe if flames touched it, so the fire shelter could be their only saving grace. He pulled it out of the back, grateful for the thin, silvery material that both reflected light and brought them a glimmer of hope.
Lucy helped him unfold it as her lungs began to burn from the smoke and embers hanging thickly in the air around them. It was getting harder to see with her vision being filled with the yellows and oranges of a fire fast approaching them. Ever the perfect team, they threw the fire shelter over their heads in perfect sync then lowered themselves until they were flat on the ground. Suddenly, gone were the flames and all that remained was low lighting and Tim. The thin material did not offer them much space, so her knees knocked into his and their torsos were far closer than they had been since Valentine’s Day when their bodies reunited in a way her heart had been craving. To avoid thinking too long about that fateful lust-filled night, she asked him, “Is this gonna work?”
He looked up at the blanket that looked like aluminum foil to provide the only answer he could offer her confidently, which meant reciting the YouTube video he has watched about fire shelters, “It’s designed to reflect radiant heat, protect against convective heat, and trap breathable air, which is good, but it’s only meant for short-lived-”
“Yes,” she cut him off desperately while placing a grounding hand on his chest right over his heart. “Yes is the answer that I’m looking for.”
“Yes,” he said to assure her as she needed to hear, “it is definitely gonna work.”
Though she was relieved that he sounded so confident, she could not help but have her doubts, so she dropped her head almost touching the ground like if she could not see her surroundings and ignore the sounds of the raging fire around them, then none of it was real. Then she could pretend they were laying in bed with a sheet cocooning them the way they used to do when they wanted to hide from the rest of the world and stay together under the covers for as long as possible. Those were perfect moments, she thought. One she thought she could recreate a million times.
But then he broke her heart when he ended their relationship, and gone were the mornings spent whispering between kisses while burrowed under the sheets for five more blissful minutes.
Lucy could not believe that in the middle of a wildfire, she was remembering that.
Tim replayed the YouTube video in his head that described how the fire shelter worked best, and he was quite concerned about the fact that it was not meant to protect them forever, so barring a miracle, they were still likely to meet their end, and that could not happen. Not yet. “Listen, I want to tell you something.”
Her heart clenched. “No, no!”
“What? You got somewhere you gotta be?”
“God, you are gonna say something heartfelt, ‘cause you think we’re gonna die, and I don’t want to cry right now.” Whatever he was planning on saying would surely shatter her, and she was not strong enough to hear it, so she kept her gaze averted.
“I might say something hateful. You don’t know.”
“Yes I do! I know what you’re gonna say! You’re still in love with me!”
“Wow, the arrogance!” He shot back, slightly aggravated she knew him so well but did not want to give her the satisfaction when he wanted to use his words and not have them get taken away from him.
“Am I wrong?” She turned to him, needing to read his expression in response more than his verbal one.
“No! Okay, no, you’re not wrong. Of course I still love you! Do you?” His chest hurt, and it had nothing to do with the chaos outside and everything to do with his eagerness to hear her answer.
“It doesn’t matter!”
“So that’s a yes?” He knew that tone well; she only got that kind of exasperated when he was right.
“Oh, you are infuriating!” She hated everything about their situation. About the wildfire causing destruction in nature. About being stuck under a flimsy piece of material with Tim with nowhere to escape to. About being forced to confront her feelings that had not so much as wavered despite her best intentions to change her heart.
“I know! I know.” He rolled towards her as the flames grew closer, shaking the blanket around them more and more. He pressed their heads together and cupped the back of her skull in the only way he could manage to protect her in the moment.
For a few seconds, they breathed shakily together, a silence falling over them as fire roared around outside of their shelter.
“How much longer do you think we’ll have to stay like this?” She asked through gritted teeth.
“Am I that bad to be around?”
She picked her head up, and he did the same to catch her eye. “I didn’t say that!”
“What are you saying?”
“We’re not gonna die here. We can’t think like that.”
“It’s not like I want to, but…” His eyes flickered around her face, and he decided that if he truly was taking his last breaths, he did not want to spend them anywhere else than a place where he could share the air with her.
“Don’t,” she warned sharply. “This can’t be it!”
His lips curved the slightest bit, and his voice dropped an octave, barely audible over the din outside, “It’s not so bad.”
“Tim…” Her lungs faltered beyond the damage from smoke inhalation.
“I was pinned once in Afghanistan,” he shared to distract her. “I couldn’t see anything. There was so much smoke, and everything was so loud. I was damn sure I was gonna die.” He blinked at her, showing wordless appreciation as her palm stroked over his chest in silent support like she always did when he talked about that particularly difficult chapter of his life. “My only regret was that I never fell in love. Like I’m talking real love. Out of all the things I could’ve thought about, that was what popped into my head.”
“How did you get out of there?”
“No idea,” he admitted. “I got hit in the head with shrapnel and was knocked unconscious. Someone from my platoon dragged me out of there, and I woke up in a medical tent thinking that the second I got back home, I would find myself someone to fall in love with.”
“Isabel.”
“At the time…I thought that’s what I had been thinking about in Afghanistan. I thought…I thought she was it, but she wasn’t.” He took a deep breath as his eyes roved over her cheeks where he could make out the freckles he used to kiss until she laughed. “You are.”
She shook her head, her anger flaring. “Don’t make me cry!”
“I’m not trying to, but,” his throat shook, “I have to say this.”
“Why? Why now?”
“Because for once, neither of us can leave.”
“Would you be talking like this if there wasn’t a chance we could die?”
“Probably not,” he admitted, “but only because I wouldn’t be brave enough. I haven’t been. I’ve wanted to tell you so much so many times-”
“So save it for when we get out of here.”
“You’ll just bolt or shut me down.” He saw her open her mouth to object, so he was quick to add, “Not that I blame you.”
She tugged at the fire shelter to keep it taut against another wave of hungry flames. “I’m scared.”
His voice turned severe. “I’d never let anything happen to you.”
“Not this,” she looked around at their silver cocoon. “I mean, yes, this is terrifying, but you and me…that’s scarier.”
“Ouch,” he replied, trying not to take offense.
She playfully whacked his chest in the almost nonexistent space between them. “You know what I mean.”
“I do,” he whispered softly. Tim took a chance and covered her hand where it had settled between his pecs, and thankfully, she did not withdraw from his touch. “You were my second chance. You were the reason I made it out of Afghanistan and a million other near death experiences, because I fought to have another chance at life and do it right without my biggest regret. You’re my dream come true. I hate that I’m your nightmare.”
“You’re not my nightmare!” She screamed loudly.
The earth beneath them and the air around them felt warmer. The fire was intensifying instead of slowing or dying down. He knew the dry brush surrounding their little shelter must have not only caught but offered extra fuel for the flames. As he was taller than her, he felt some lick the bottom of his shoes. The YouTube video warned him what could happen to their blanket if exposed to too hot of a fire for too long. Thinking quickly, he threw his leg across hers and somewhat clumsily climbed on top of her.
“W-w-” She could hardly form a sound let alone a word, taken completely by surprise by their change in position. His face hovered right above hers, his galloping hurt thumping against hers, and his hips settled on top of hers.
“I need you to take Kojo.”
“What?”
“Genny will say she’ll take him, but Kojo would rather live with you.”
“Are you seriously making plans in case we die?”
“Not ‘we’. Me. Take Kojo for me, please.”
“Stop!” She whined. “I can’t…I can’t.”
“You’re a survivor, Luce. You’ll be okay.” He bit his lip to avoid wincing as a pain shot through his legs from heat exposure.
“Not without you!”
“You’ve been fine for months.”
“Is that what you think? I’ve cried myself to sleep so many nights I ruined my pillow. I don’t even know how I manage to breathe most days since we broke up.”
He swallowed as he balled his hands into fists in the silvery blanket, pulling it closer over them while also helping him control his reaction. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”
There was so much pain all over his face she began to worry it was more than heartbreak pulling at the corners of his mouth and the lines on his forehead. She caressed his cheek. “You were being an idiot,” she said sweetly.
He laughed dryly then seethed, the flames intensifying at his back. He felt her grab at his hips, and he immediately knew that she was trying to get on top of him like she used to fight for dominance when they were in bed together. But this was wholly different. Tim shook his head. “I won’t let you.”
“I can protect you, too.”
“After everything I put you through, you would still protect me?” When her eyes only shined up at him, a smirk began to form on his lips. “You do still love me.”
“I’ll tell you when we make it out of this.”
He screamed, unable to control his reaction to fire making contact with his skin on the back of his calves.
Lucy wiggled and struggled, doing everything she could to fight him and switch their positions, but he was overpowering her. “Please! Please!” She begged as she clawed at his chest. “Don’t sacrifice yourself for me!”
Tim took a deep breath as he fought every instinct to keep screaming. Though he could not school the grimace off his face, he did try to sound as normal as possible. “I am! Deal with it!” He bit out through gritted teeth.
“PLEASE!” She yelped as her eyes watered. She struggled, but he was as immovable as a boulder.
He chose his words carefully while his whole body clenched in agony. “If you’ve ever loved me, you’ll let me protect you!”
“Why are you doing this?” Her heart stammered as her voice cracked, since she had asked him the same question when he broke them up.
Tim dropped his lips to her forehead, hoping the small gentle gesture would calm her so that she would stop thrashing beneath him, and though she did not completely stop resisting his firm position on top of her, it was enough to mollify her slightly. He looked at her, really looked at her, the woman that stole his heart like she once stole his money clip. The person that made him smile more than he had ever managed to before in his life. The soul that soothed his battered and tired one. The woman that kissed his scars. The person that knew every skeleton in his closet and still loved him. His great love. The one he regretted not having found in the face of his first scrape with death. “I don’t have any regrets anymore,” was his simple answer, then he groaned as heat radiated through him like the fires had seeped into his bones. Perhaps they had. Tim could not be concerned with that.
She sobbed so hard her whole body shook. “Don’t say that! I still have some! I have so many! And I need you for them!”
“Yeah? What are your regrets?” He wondered then his jaw dropped in a silent scream of agony.
“What about kids? And-and grandkids? We need those!”
“So have them!”
“I only want them with you!” The fire grew so loud, the roaring was almost all she could hear aside from his voice. She could always hear him. Her beacon in any storm. “And I want to redo your backyard when I move in!”
“You can plant a damn tree anywhere!”
Lucy shook her head, her face saturated with tears. “I NEED A LIFE WITH YOU! WE DESERVE IT! AFTER EVERYTHING!”
“I GOT ONE!” He shouted back, half in distress and half in misery, mourning yet again the short lived ecstasy that was his life with her.
She saw an explosion of yellows and oranges as their fire shelter was set ablaze. Though unfair, she kicked at him to weaken him and rolled them over so she could cover as much of his body with hers as she could. Lucy saw suffering in his eyes, no doubt a result of some burnt skin. With nothing else to protect them but each other while flames continued to destroy everything around them, she was certain there was no more hope. “Fine!” She acquiesced. “I love you! You know I love you more than anything!”
A tear slipped down his face, a welcome drop of water over his hot skin.
She held his face and stared at him. If they were going to die, she wanted to savor him for as long as possible. Over the fire, she finally heard it; he was making sounds low in his throat, no doubt due to his agony. All she could do was stroke her thumb over his cheek, completely ignoring where the flames were in relation to her hand. “Hey,” she whispered. “Hey. I love you, Tim. I love you so much.”
“You waited…until I got…barbecued to say that?” He managed to joke as best as he could while smoke filled his lungs. He coughed, and then he gasped as her lips found his. Tim could feel the fierceness of her mouth and the wetness on her cheeks. For some reason, the pain had abated. It had been white hot only a second before, and then all he felt was her.
Lucy pulled away to cough inelegantly. Once she could partially catch her breath, she promised, “I’ll never hold back from saying it again. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“So am I,” he choked out.
His vision began to blur for some reason, and his head was dizzy.
She noticed something start to happen behind his eyes. “Tim? Tim? What’s going on?”
“I…I love you,” he exhaled.
“I love you, too.” She ran her left hand over the side of his face to wipe at some of the soot and noticed that some of her skin had blackened, but she could not pay it any mind as she read his expression.
“Lucy,” his voice quivered over those two syllables, wishing it sounded as fond as his feelings for her.
His blinks slowed, making her stomach lurch. “I love you. You hear me? I love you. We’re gonna make it through this! You’re gonna be okay! Because I love you! I love you!”
Over and over again, regardless of how her breathing became more labored, she kept yelling her love for him, making the ghost of a smile tug at his lips. Barely conscious and only holding on to keep looking at her, gorgeous as ever with the world burning down around her and soot on her; all he could think about was how grateful he was he had her. His dream. His great love. His joy. Nothing could burn that away. While anything else could get engulfed in flames, their love was and would always be fireproof.
Lucy refused to blink despite how her eyes burned. Because she knew. She knew what was about to happen, and she did not want to miss it. She would have his six until the end. “I love you,” she continued to whisper like it was a prayer that could save him. Tim exhaled weakly. And then he was gone. Once the life left his eyes, the most dreadful sound tore out of her throat. She shook his shoulders. She tried to speak. But all she could do was screech and weep so hard she had not realized that there was another source of water on his face aside from her tears. Lucy dropped her head back, and there was a helicopter spraying water on them. Angrily, she shook her head at the skies, bitterly wishing the fire took her, too, because along with the devastation to the forest, her entire world had been burned down. While trees and plants could be replanted, there was no hope of rebuilding what she had lost. There was no way to get him back.
No matter how often she cried for him.
Or dreamed of him.
Or thought she saw him out of the corner of her eye.
Or imagined she heard his voice when she woke up.
She lost the love of her life, and there was no replacing that.
Yet, sometimes, more often than she would care to admit, Lucy would reverently run her fingers over the rough skin on the back of her left hand. It had been mangled and warped as a result of a burn, so when others caught sight of it, they probably saw it as ugly. Her doctors certainly had recommended all sorts of procedures and treatments to fix it. Like that hand needed fixing. Like she wanted her skin to change. Except, Lucy thought the back of her left hand, the rough, uneven skin, was the most beautiful part of her. While others wore rings there to symbolize their love, she had burns. Skin forever changed. Permanence. Because his love for her deserved to be emblazoned on her. Rapping at het door snapped her out of her stupor, and she remembered where she was. In her office. At the station. “Come in,” she said.
Officer Byers half opened the door and shyly uttered, “You asked to see me, Captain?”
“Yes.” Lucy sat up straighter and smoothed a hand atop her head over the silvery grey hairs streaking her bun. “Your T.O. tells me you’ve been struggling.”
“I’ll do better, ma’am,” Byers was quick to assure her.
She gave the younger officer a kind smile and knitted her fingers together on her desk. “I know you will.” For only a fraction of a second, Byers’s eyes flickered down to her burnt hand; and it was so quick, but Lucy noticed. She rubbed the back of her hand tenderly like she was touching him. “My Training Officer was really tough on me. There were so many days I thought he was gonna cut me or I would screw up big enough to wash myself out.”
“You?” Byers could not believe the badass and accomplished Lucy Bradford ever made a mistake.
“I sure did,” she recalled with a half smile, which was the best she could ever manage anymore. “But my T.O. kept pushing me harder and harder, because he knew I could be better. He knew I could not just survive this job but do great things with a little nudging. I learned a lot from him, but one of the greatest lessons he ever taught me was to trust my gut, and mine is telling me you’re going to make a great officer one day. Actually, you remind me a lot of myself when I was a rookie.”
“Thank you,” she was honored by the compliment.
“Study your rook book every night, run every drill with all you’ve got, and listen to your T.O. no matter how…prickly he can be.”
“I know he means well,” Byers said, making excuses for her gruff Training Officer that tended to rub people the wrong way.
“Yeah. In his own way, he does,” Lucy confirmed. “He’s a lot like my T.O. was back then.”
“Did you two ever get along?”
Her chest ached. “Surprisingly, yes,” she answered wistfully. “I have a feeling some history is bound to repeat itself.” For a second, she got lost in her own mind then swallowed to recollect herself. “Anyways, it’s late. Go home and get some rest.”
Obediently, she went to the door and said, “Thank you, Captain.”
Before Byers could leave, Lucy could not resist the urge to offer a very hard earned piece of advice, “I know you probably can’t believe this right now, but please try to hear me when I say, if you ever find yourself in love with him, tell him right away and never stop saying it.”
Complete disbelief caused Byers’ eyebrows to shoot up. “Ma’am-?”
Her only explanation was, “My Training Officer’s name was Tim Bradford.”
Piecing it together aloud, she said, “But you’re a Bradford…you married him?”
As her stomach dropped heavily, she answered miserably, “He died before I got the chance to, but I took his name anyways.” She looked away, suddenly too overcome to make eye contact.
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“So am I.” She scratched the side of her neck. “I sure hope you don’t have to live with the regrets I do…but, stay focused on your probationary year first. You’ve got six more months, and then…,” Lucy met her eye, “the rest is up to you.”