Page 128 of Burn

As a firefighter, I all have these subtle, sometimes not so subtle, reminders I’m not invincible. Right now is one of them.

Cap speaks the way a captain would when he wants us to know he’s there for his guys. “Take as much time as you need. Caleb . . . you’re on administrative leave until further notice. Your father is with the chaplain and your brothers are at the hospital. I would go there.”

I don’t shower. I change clothes and head to Harborview where my mother greets me, her sadness spilling over red-rimmed eyes.

From what they tell me, Evan was still breathing when they pulled him from the fire.

He was still breathing when they made it to the hospital.

An hour later, he gave his last breath with Jacey holding his hand.

I don’t talk to my parents when they tell me Evan’s gone. I don’t even talk to my brothers, all sitting together outside the room. And I don’t know why that is. I look at them, three men devastated by the loss of their brother. I can’t stomach to sit there with them and stare at the wall as the doctor says to us, “Take as much time as you need.”

I don’t go in the room. My mom sits beside him, holding his burnt hand, whispering to him and crying uncontrollably, begging for it not to be real.

It is real and their lives will never be the same because of it.

My dad stands next to her, his head bowed in silence, unable to comfort her with anything but a hand on her shoulder.

I can see from the hallway the man in the bed—no longer breathing, no longer existing in the presence of others—thatman doesn’t resemble Evan Ryan.

With tears rolling down my cheeks, I hesitate to leave, but I also can’t stay inside this hospital. The pain that once burned like fire through me at the station has faded to an icy numbness. It’s black, filling my vision and consuming my thoughts, the only sound my own heart beating. I don’t hear their cries, I only hear the ragged shallow gasps coming from me, trying to control the ache inside my chest.

I run from the hospital, through the emergency room doors and out to the street when I see Jacey’s Honda parked on the street, tires up over the curb. Outside, the sky’s gray, clouds enveloping the city and our lives, a reminder something was taken from us today.

Making my way to her car, I open the car door and sit in the passenger seat. I don’t say anything because there’s nothing to say. Nothing meaningful anyway.

We don’t say anything for close to ten minutes. I stare straight ahead and she grips the steering wheel.

The silence offers nothing for either of us.

“He held my hand and died. Right in front of me.” Choking on gasping sobs, she hands me a pregnancy test. “And I’m fucking pregnant.”

I give the stick a fleeting look, then move my stare to the passing cars, tears stinging my eyes because I know whose baby it is. Evan’s.

Barely able to speak the words through her crying, she raises her voice as she says, “The shitty part about this is this baby wasn’t made from love, Caleb. It was made in the backseat of this car and with a broken promise that he was going to marry me.”

I can barely get the words, “He loved you,” out.

She shakes her head, tears falling down blotchy cheeks. “According to Daphne, who I might add I bitch slapped today, that’s not true. He apparently told Daphne he loved her right before he went to that call. She told me he did.”

That pisses me off. “No, he didn’t. That call came through at four in the morning. He was never on the phone with her that night either, and I know because I was with him all fuckin’ day. He never even mentioned her.”

Jacey thinks about it while my mind goes back to my last conversation with Evan. She winces, looking up and to the left, trying to hold back tears. “I don’t even know how to feel right now. Everything in me says I shouldn’t feel anything because for years he used me. But my heart is devastated that I’ll never know how he really felt.”

I can’t offer her anything of comfort and she doesn’t want me to. There’re times when the pain needs to be left alone to settle and find a place in your mind where you can deal with it. That’s when you know words aren’t needed.

After I leave Jacey, my brothers and I head back to our parents’ house for the rest of the day where I drink, and Mom cries.

Gavin doesn’t show much emotion, lost in thought and a beer, while Taylor and Kellan cry, comforting Mom.

Me, I don’t say much of anything and stand shoulder to shoulder with my dad, neither one of us saying anything. The house becomes an endless flow of family shuffling through and for the first time in my life with this family, I feel out of place, an afterthought, an addition that wasn’t needed.

Evan’s words plague me.“Go, I’ll be right behind you.”

Tightness rolls through my shoulders and I shake away the lasting memory, nodding to Kellan. “Can you give me a ride back to my apartment? I need to get out of here.”

He looks at the whiskey in my hand, then to the door. “Sure.”

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