Page 14 of Ablaze

She didn’t just lose her husband and best friend that day, she lost herself. And though every firefighter’s spouse knows the risks of our job, they’re rarely ever prepared for the worst.

I stay in the foyer playing with Catherine for another hour before Jane puts her in her high chair with her lunch. Catherine giggles as I pretend to eat her sandwich and talk to her in silly voices. No doubt, the kid has warmed up to me again.

After lunch, when she starts rubbing her eyes, Jane has her wave bye to me before taking her back to her crib and putting her down for another nap.

I look around the living room while I wait for Jane to come back downstairs. Like the last time I was here, it’s still in disarray, with cups, plates, and toys lying about on every surface. A stack of unopened mail lies on the coffee table, along with an open album, showcasing pictures from one of Zander and Jane’s trips. From the looks of it, it seems like a trip they took before they got married.

A pit grows in my stomach as my eyes lift from the album, following the light coming off the paused image on the TV screen–a glimpse of Zander and Jane’s wedding. Their first dance as a married couple.

I remember it well, watching them from one of the tables around the dance floor. The intensity of the moment flits back through me as I study the picture on the screen. The way Zander’s hands wrap around his bride’s waist and her enamored gaze on him like they were the only ones in the room.

I remember that whole day clearly, in fact. The way they looked–like nothing could get in the way of spending the rest of their lives together. I’d never seen my buddy cry before that, not in the five years I’d known him. Hell, he was one of the toughest, most resilient men I knew. But one look at his bride as she walked down the aisle, and he almost broke down at the altar.

I remember wondering what it would be like to find someone who could bring you to your knees, turn you inside-out like that. I remember wanting that feeling for myself . . .

“Want me to get you something to drink? Tea, soda?” Jane’s voice pulls me to the present. I hadn’t even heard her come back.

“No.” I shake my head and she takes a seat on the other side of the couch. “I’m going to be heading out soon, anyway. Just wanted to check on you both.”

She smiles, though it does nothing to veil the misery that lines the corners of her eyes. “Thanks for stopping by and for Catherine’s gift. She loves it.”

“I’m glad.”

“How are you? How’s everyone at the station?” As if just realizing what her place looks like, Jane starts to collect a few cups and paper plates off the coffee table.

“Everyone’s good.” I clear my throat. “We still miss seeing you there once in a while.”

She shuffles to the kitchen, and I pick up a few magazines off the floor and stack them on her table. “Yeah, well . . . I don’t really have a reason to visit anymore, do I?”

I run my thumb over the piped edging on her sofa. “You have us–your friends. We were all like family, J. I know the others have tried to call and check up on you–”

“How’s Nora?” Jane busies herself behind the kitchen counter, changing the subject. “You guys still together?”

I take in a breath, not letting her dismissal bother me. I’ve never been great at expressing my feelings, either, so I get where she’s coming from.

Mala’s words from yesterday surface to the top of my head. Yeah, maybe I do feel a lot and feel big, but it’s putting those feelings into words that has always been my weakness. How the woman has gotten under my skin–figured me out in ways that surprise me consistently–in such a short time is beyond me.

She has this magnetic quality, a charm like I’ve never seen before, where just being in her presence leaves a smile on my face. The way she always has something to say, the way she can dish it just as much as she can take it–I swear, I’ve never felt more comfortable around a woman in my whole life.

But it’s not just the comfortability I feel around her that has me rapt . . . it’s something else, too. Something I haven’t quite gotten my arms around. Something that feels too big to even name.

Or perhaps it’s something too dangerous to be named.

“Nora’s fine,” I respond, internally shaking myself for the path my thoughts just took, reminding myself that those thoughts were for my best friend’s little sister and completely inappropriate. “We’re okay . . .” I let the comment hang. Jane doesn’t need the confusion of my dating life added to the already large pile of shit she has to deal with. “We’re good. Everything is good.”

Truth is, I don’t even know where things stand between Nora and me at this exact moment. Not that she has any indication to think things aren’t okay. I haven’t told her yet, but I plan to tonight, before I have to meet her parents–who I don’t plan to meet at all.

Jane smiles, coming back into the living room and taking a seat on the couch. If she knows I’m being aloof, she doesn’t question it.

I sit across from her, picking up one of Catherine’s toy alphabet cubes off the floor and rolling it in my hand. “How are you holding up, J? Nightmares still waking you up in the middle of the night?”

Jane shrugs. “Off and on. If it’s not the nightmares that wake me up, then it’s Catherine being sick or going through a growth spurt.” She chuckles. “Sleep is for the weak anyway, isn’t it?”

My lips tip up in a quick smile, knowing she’s trying to hide behind a veil of humor. I know that veil well–I’ve used it myself quite a few times. “How are you holding up, though?”

Jane leans back on the couch, running both her hands over her face, seemingly giving up the fight to feign the tough outer shell. “If you’re asking if it’s gotten any easier after three years, the answer is no. It hasn’t.” She looks around the living room before her eyes land on the TV. Within an instant, they pool at the sight of her late husband smiling broadly, effortlessly, at her. “I still see him when I close my eyes. I still feel him when I least expect it. I can still hear his booming laugh and that rumble of his voice.”

Jane’s bottom lip trembles and she runs the back of her hand over her nose. “There are days when I feel like I’ve got a handle on things, but then I have days–like today–where nothing feels easy.” She looks to the side, gazing out through her glass patio doors. “I don’t know when it’ll get easier, Dean, but it’s not easy now. It’s not easy being Catherine’s only caretaker. It’s not easy when someone asks where her dad is, or when I have to check off a box that says widow on an insurance form. It’s not easy when a holiday or a birthday or even Father’s Day comes around.”

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