“Hey, Hera, you see this?”
I grab the coffee pot off its burner and turn to face the old man sitting at the counter, who’s waving his phone at me. J.P. might be a zillion years old, but the man loves his technology. His phone has been blowing up since seven o’clock, just as the breakfast rush picked up. The buzzing in my pocket, coupled with the cacophony of whistles, bells, and J.P.’s old-fashioned car horn filling my restaurant, told me shit was going down.
“Not yet. Been too busy.” I wave at the crowded restaurant. All the tables are full. “Krissy didn’t show up today.”
“Fire up near Wilsden. Evacuation warnings for Nelson but nothing for us yet.” J.P. retired from Cal-Fire, so he’s routinely on top of fire news.
“Damn, J.P.” I take a deep breath to center myself. “Just what we need. The mountains are dry as hell, and the winds through Bottle Creek Gap are supposed to be over fifty miles an hour today.”
“Not good,” he says, shaking his head. “Not good at all.”
When J.P. goes back to his phone, I turn, pick up the decaf pot, and head out to the dining room floor. Those cups won’t fill themselves.
As I’m filling coffee cups, several of my customers leave their tables and join the growing crowd in the parking lot, staring at the sky. A glance out the plate-glass window in the front of my diner tells me everything I need to know.
If you’ve lived in California for any length of time, you’re unfortunately familiar with the sight. An ominous, billowing, blue-black column, rising to the sky like a demon escaping from hell. The light, while still bright, is flat and eerie. An innate, oppressive weight of foreboding settles in on my soul.
It’s unmistakable.
Wildfire.
An entire leaf, reduced to ash, swirls and lands on the hood of an old white Datsun pickup in my parking lot.
Another bleat of ah-ooh-gah, and my stomach sinks.
“What now?” I ask, whirling back to J. P.
“Crap,” the old man says, swiping at his phone. “Mandatory for Nelson, and they say a warning for the east side of Eden Station.” That’s us: Eden Station, a former gold mining town in the Sierra Nevada. Nelson is only five miles away, so the fire is moving fast to have covered the terrain in less than thirty minutes.
I fire off a quick text to my boyfriend, Matt. He should be off work by now.
Me: Where are you? Should we leave? Can you grab Luna?
Bobby, my head cook, sticks his head out from the kitchen.
“You seeing this?” He holds up his phone.
“Yeah, do you need to go?” Bobby’s house is on the east side of town.
“I, uh… Shit. I don’t know. It seems a bit hysterical. It would be only you and Enzo.”
“We’ll manage. Tell Zo you’re leaving and go.”
“Probably a precaution. It’ll be like the Kimshew Fire, and they’ll stop it before it crosses the river.
“Go,” I repeat. “Please.”
Bobby gives me a quick nod, and the kitchen door shuts behind him. If he weren’t concerned, he would have given me more resistance.
I glance at my phone. My text to Matt says delivered but not read. I wonder if he got stuck at the hospital because of the fire. If he works a double, he sends me a text. And he typically reads his messages promptly.
More unease swirls in my belly. Once, Matt told me heart attack patients often have a feeling of impending doom. I’m twenty-eight and in excellent health, but it sums up how I feel right now. Like things are about to shift.
“Holy fuck,” J.P. mutters, unable to pull himself away from his phone. “Mandatory now for east Eden Station.”
“J.P., go tell everyone to get the hell out of here. I don’t care about their bills. We can settle up later. If the fire is moving that fast, we all need to be going.”
I turn and stick my head into the kitchen.
“Zo shut it all down. We need to go. The fire’s coming right at us.”
Enzo’s surprise shows in his eyes. This late in the year, we should have had rain by now, but the forest is bone dry, and we’re sitting in the middle of hundreds of thousands of acres of tinder.
My phone vibrates again, and I fish it out from my back pocket.
Please be Matt.
EVACUATION ORDER: Due to a fire in the area, an evacuation order has been issued for Wilsden, Nelson, East Eden Station, Central Eden Station #OwenFire
J.P. stands at the door, barking out orders like the fire chief he was.
“J.P., you need to go too.”
“Not until you’re gone. I need to know you’re safe.”
“I need that from you too. Go. I’m locking the door and going out the back.” I press up onto my toes and buss his leathered cheek with a kiss. “Be safe, old man.”
“You too, beautiful.” He squeezes my hand and marches out into the parking lot, still shouting orders.
I lock the door behind him and turn back to consider my restaurant. I’ve worked here since I was fifteen, saved to buy it at twenty-four. The only job I’ve ever had.
My diner isn’t fancy. Lupine Bistro has standard diner décor, six deep blue vinyl booths along one wall, a half dozen four-top tables, and five seats at the counter. Some old photos from the historical society from the town’s gold mining days.
I cross the dining room and flip off the coffee pots and grab the cash out of the register. The dishes can wait.
I’ll be back soon. We’ve done this before. No problem.
I hope.
One last glance over the dining room, and I push through the kitchen door. Enzo did his job, and everything is off.
Another vibration in my pocket.
Please be Matt.
EVACUATION ORDER: Due to a fire in the area, an immediate evacuation order has been issued for Wilsden, Nelson, East Eden Station, Central Eden Station #OwenFire 1/2
EVACUATION ORDER: This is a very dynamic fire. Heed all evacuation orders without delay. #OwenFire 2/2
As I turn the key in the back door of my little restaurant, a voice in my head whispers, “It will never be the same.”
It takes no time to drive to my little cottage only a block away, and I make it there without too much trouble. I call out for Matt as I enter the house, but he’s not home.
Luna hops up on the counter and lets out a loud complaint of a meow. Her bowl is empty. Matt feeds her when he gets home in the morning from his overnight shift at the hospital. I don’t give it much thought; I assume he stayed at work to help with the evacuations. I’ll catch up with him later.
I snatch up the cat carrier and stuff poor Luna inside. The tweets are getting more dire and urgent, and I can’t waste any time. In my scramble, I forgo collecting anything else in the house and toss Luna’s carrier in the passenger’s seat and head off down the hill out of town. I’ll be back tonight or maybe tomorrow.
But when I make it out to Paxton Ridge Road, I find bumper-to-bumper traffic. The sky looks like Armageddon is upon us. No hyperbole here. Really. Overhead, the sky churns in a roiling black mass, and acrid smoke surrounds us. Off to my left, fire sweeps through, fueled by the dense underbrush of the low foothills and the strong winds.
I recall the Ray Bradbury book, Something Wicked This Way Comes. The Dark, manifesting itself in smoke and claiming lives, is coming. Something wicked is coming. I can sense it, but there’s no carnival to cover the evil, and no amount of love or laughter will deter it.
In the chaotic traffic, everyone’s desperate to escape the advancing conflagration, and both lanes of the narrow two-lane road are headed out of town. Tears stream down my cheeks, but I can’t tell if they’re from the dense smoke or the destruction being wrought on my beautiful town.
Focus, Hera. Just drive. Pay attention to the road and get the hell out of, well, hell.
I’m inching along in the bumper-to-bumper traffic when I spot a kid, late teens, maybe twenty, walking along on the side of the road carrying a black garbage bag. Car after car passes him by. Every so often, he glances over his shoulder, but not like he’s expecting someone. He’s hopeless, and he’s accepted his lot. Shit. I remember those days. I felt like that often enough when I was younger. Invisible.
I grab Luna’s carrier off the passenger’s seat and unceremoniously dump her in the back. She lets out a yowl of protest, but she’ll live. I make it alongside the kid and push open the door.
“Climb in!”
He stares at me and shakes his head.
“Dude! Get in the car!” The cars behind me are starting to honk. His eyes are a bit wild, and I see the panic in them. Get in a car with a stranger or face certain death. Not exactly a quandary in my book, but you know, stranger danger.
“God damn it, kid, get in the car. You’re not safe. I’ll drive you down the hill.”
He takes in the angry line of cars behind us and throws his trash bag on the floor, and jumps in. As soon as his butt touches the seat, I take off. I don’t wait for him to shut the door completely.
“I’m Hera. What’s your name?”
“Nolan.” He’s untying and retying the knot on his trash bag.
“Do you have family in Hillsborough?” Nolan shakes his head. “Are they still in Eden Station?” I ask in alarm. Another head shake.
“I don’t have any,” he mumbles.
“Uh, okay.” I’m mumbling now, trying to focus as the smoke gets denser, and the traffic reminds me of something from Mad Max. The monster four-by-four up ahead pushes abandoned cars off the road. Thank god for the bubbas up here and their ridiculous trucks.
Luna has decided she’s had enough. She’s singing the song of her people at full volume in the back seat.
“Can I try to calm your cat down?”
“What?” I’m paying more attention to the cars abandoned on the side of the road. Where are their drivers? “Yeah, the cat, sure.”
He scrambles over the seat, and I can hear him talking to Luna in soft, sing-song tones. I’m surprised, but it works.
I forget about Nolan and Luna and focus on getting the hell out of here. At least the tears have stopped. I have something more important to worry about right now. In this mess, I’m all Nolan has.
In the last few minutes, the smoke has become so dense the sky is blacked out, turning the world to midnight at eleven in the morning. We’re inching along through buildings and trees engulfed in flames when a towering Ponderosa pine goes up like a candle. The fire quickly makes its way up the trunk, and as it reaches the crown, all the branches ignite simultaneously in a sinister display of pyrotechnics.
The fire consumes everything. The burnt-out buildings we pass are reduced to nothing more than their metal and concrete skeletons. The husks of cars and washing machines still stand amid a pile of ash.
At the edge of town, we come upon the source of the bottleneck. There are powerlines down along the road. The only way through is to drive under the utility pole leaning out at a forty-five-degree angle across the street.
That’s where I find J.P. He’s directing traffic, and when I reach him, I roll down my window.
“Hey, beautiful, you can do this,” J.P. assures me. “You’re safe in the car, but do your best not to hit the wires.”
“J.P., you need to go, too.” Tears stream down my face again. This brave old man has been like a grandfather to me. “Please.”
“Cal-Fire’s on their way to deal with this, and I’ll go as soon as they’re here. Don’t worry. I’ve been doing this all my life.”
“Love you,” I croak out.
“Love you too, beautiful.”
I follow J.P.’s instructions and make it under the powerline. The traffic opens up, and we put some distance between the fire and my little Subaru.
It takes three times as long as normal, but we make it down to the valley. I pull into a parking lot once the traffic thins and take one last glance back towards my hometown. The plume of smoke rises as a sooty behemoth hovering over the mountains. I say a quick prayer to a god I’m not sure I believe in that everyone has made it out okay.
I check my phone, and still no word from Matt. I’m a little worried. I haven’t seen a single text from him but not surprising on a crazy day like today. I‘ll hear from him soon. I do have messages from all my friends, and I spend the next half hour telling everyone I’m okay.
Nolan sits in the back seat with Luna in his arms while I’m sending texts. When I ask him where he wants to go, he turns to me with alarm. I don’t think he thought that far ahead.
“Do you have any friends here? Or in Grafton? I’m happy to take you anywhere you need to go.”
“No. It’s okay. Take me to the park. I’ll be fine.” This kid is smoking some excellent weed if he thinks I’m going to leave him alone on the craziest day ever in this county. Besides, I am well aware of what fine means.
Fucked up, insecure, neurotic, and evasive. I’m fine. I’ll just sleep in the park.
Been there, done that. I shoot a quick text to my friend, Inge.
“Sorry, dude. Can’t do that. You’re coming with me.”
Three days later, the original plume of smoke has settled down on the valley, keeping the sky dark and the atmosphere a thick, jaundiced yellow-orange haze.
Matt is still MIA. His coworkers told me he left at his usual time, and no one saw him helping evacuate patients. Nothing on Facebook or Instagram. His friends haven’t talked to him either, so I’ve decided to put him on the missing persons list this afternoon. We’ve been together for three years now, and my mind’s been going to some dark places.
Everything is crazy here, but, seriously, dude, cell service still works. The entire town of Eden Station was evacuated into the neighboring community of Hillsborough. If you weren’t fortunate to have a friend to stay with or couldn’t get into the hastily arranged shelter, you were left to sleep in your car or in one of the tent cities springing up in the undeveloped lots around town.
“Hera Becher?”
I stand and head towards the stout woman from the Sherriff’s Office.
“Hi, I’m Shelia. I’m a volunteer with the Sherriff’s Office. Follow me, dear.” She smiles, but I can see the exhaustion behind her kind eyes. Days of this would be a weight on anyone’s soul. They’ve found six unidentified bodies so far, and there are hundreds of people on the missing list. Most of the Eden Station still burns, so “recovery” is days, if not weeks, away.
I focus on Shelia’s sensible shoes and follow her through the maze of tables set up in the former department store, now providing all kinds of services to the thousands of displaced residents of Eden Station and the other surrounding communities.
There’s a low hum of chatter as stories of loss and trauma are told to the representatives of FEMA, Cal-OES, insurance agencies, and, like me, the Sherriff’s Office.
“Would you like a bottle of water, hon?” I nod, and she sits the bottle on the table in front of me.
As I comprehend the gravity of what I’m about to do, a wave of emptiness passes over my body again, and I don’t think I can take any more of this. But I don’t have a choice. The only one is to keep going forward one step at a time, one day at a time.
I’m out of tears, so instead of curling up in the fetal position in Inge’s guest bedroom, I’m trudging forward, left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot, and trust shit will be different someday soon.
I take a deep breath and wrap my hands around the water bottle.
Shelia gives me a small smile. “Who are you looking for?”
“My boyfriend, Matthew Spencer Billings.”
She types for a minute and asks, “Date of birth?”
“March eighteenth, nineteen-ninety.”
A few more clicks.
“I don’t see that he’s been reported yet. When was the last time you saw or were in contact with him?”
“On the seventh. He left for work at the hospital at ten that evening.”
“Do you have access to his phone activity or bank account? Has he used them since the fire?”
Matt always had his own cell phone plan, but I didn’t think to check our bank account.
“Yeah, we have a joint account.” I pull out my phone and open the banking app.
Total balance: $216.43
I tap on the account list icon because I must be missing something. The restaurant account must not be showing. There should be almost fifteen thousand dollars between all the accounts.
The list expands, and I tap through the accounts. I shake my phone. I close the app. I reopen the app. I scroll through the accounts again, but the information remains the same.
“Honey?” The volunteer’s voice sounds far away. “Honey, what is it?” I can’t even formulate a response.
A chill settles into my bones, like all the heat my body can produce left through the hole in the pit of my stomach. I always thought people were making shit up when they said they felt a cold chill in response to bad news, but today I’ve learned it’s real.
Personal Checking Balance – $112.67
Business Checking Balance – $103.76
Savings Balance – $0.00
I open images of three checks cashed on the morning of the fire and instantly recognize Matt’s messy scrawl.
This isn’t a missing person case. This was intentional.
Matt stole my money. And left.
Everything is gone. My home, my business, the town I grew up in. My relationship. My money. I have no clothes, no photos, nothing. Fuck, I don’t even have a clean pair of underwear. Like Pearl Harbor for my great-grandfather or September 11 for my mom, from this moment on, everything in my world will be different.
