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saying the placed obsessed you.”
He turned his gaze to her and searched her face. “While we worked there it
consumed our lives every minute of every day. It was almost as if I could feel all the evil.
The evil that drove those terrorists to decide to kill innocent people. To kill anyone. That
evil was still there.”
Autumn couldn’t ask him another question. Not yet. Not while she digested the
enormity of what he’d said.
She studied the contents of her glass. “I don’t think that’s crazy, Jack. They say
scenes of great trauma leave impressions on the world around them. Maybe in those steel
girders and in the concrete dust, the malevolence lingered.”
“You believe that?”
“I think it’s possible. Some memories are like a haunting. Did you feel the same
thing at each arson fire you’ve gone to? Evil?”
He shook his head. “Not like this.”
Another long pause gave them time to think. Then she swung the interview back to a
central point. “You said you got to the site on the fourteenth?”
“Actually, we traveled to New York on that day. Early the next morning we were
bused in with other volunteers.”
“What was the first thing you saw?”
His gaze hardened and the tightness of his mouth gave his answer. “War.” Another
ugly word hung in the air. “You know how your stomach feels when you’re on a roller
coaster and heading into that first drop? Shell-shocked doesn’t quite describe the
emotions you feel seeing something like that. When you see the destruction and
recognize the type of force it took to create this disaster, you have trouble imagining the
scope of it beforehand, but this … this was like the worst earthquake you could imagine.
The worst tornado.”
“What did you feel then?”
His gaze caught and held hers. “More rage than I felt the day my Dad died.”
She drank in every angle of his handsome face, and what she witnessed in his eyes
brought her a fresh wave of grief.
“There are two things I don’t think I’ll ever forget.” He turned a tired gaze upon her.
“The animal-assisted crisis intervention is the first thing.”
“Rescue dogs?”
“No. Animals brought to the site for therapy. So that people could spend time with
animals as a relief from the stress.”
“Did it help you?”
“Yeah. The unconditional love was great, at least in the short term.”
“What types of pets did you visit with?”
“A golden retriever named Buck, and this huge German shepherd called Tiny.”
An involuntary chuckle escaped her lips. “Tiny?”
Jack leaned his head back on the couch. “Yep. He was a great dog.”
Silence settled over them again for a short time. “What else won’t you forget about
what you saw in New York, Jack?”
He continued, his voice rasping and deep. “Seeing the pancake effect of the building.
They say the South Tower fell at the speed of one hundred twenty miles per hour. It took
approximately twelve seconds for it to come crashing down. Twelve seconds, Autumn.
You can see those buildings falling on television and can’t grasp the impact until you
hear statistics like that. Brings things straight home where it hurts. Those people never
had a chance. But there was more. I saw the overturned and crushed cars and rescue
equipment. I watched body parts carried away in Stokes baskets every day. I witnessed
front loaders and dump trucks carry away tons of debris day after day.”
She needed to give him a small measure of comfort; the necessity burned a deep hole
inside her. He stared into the fireplace, and the firelight reflected on his profile, turning
him golden. He disengaged his fingers from hers and speared his hand through one side
of his hair.
He said, “I remember hearing people say what happened that day was
unimaginable.”
Dry and tight, her throat almost refused to let her utter one word. “Did you imagine it
could happen?”
“Oh, yeah. In a way, I wasn’t surprised it occurred.”
“Why?”
“Because I have a tremendous ability to believe in the malice of mankind, I guess. It
was like I knew it was going to happen without really knowing.”
Interested, she leaned forward a smidgen. “Like precognition?”
He eyed the recorder. “Don’t put this part in your news report. It’s not something I
want to show up in the newspaper.”
“Of course not. Do you want me to shut off the recorder?”
“Let it run.” He reached for his glass and drained it in one long gulp. He placed it
back on the table. “What I felt might have been precognition. That sort of thing has
happened to me before. Not often. And it isn’t something you tell other firefighters.”
“I thought you didn’t care what anyone thinks?”
“Even I have my limits. It’s better if the entire firefighting community in Clifton
doesn’t think I’m one ladder short of an engine.”
She smiled as a glimmer of amusement slipped through his eyes. “No problem. I
won’t say anything.”
“I’m getting off-track here anyway.”
“No time limits, no content limits. I want to know it all.”
He shook his head solemnly. “No. You don’t.”
She slipped her hand over his forearm and squeezed. “Then tell me what I do want to
know. What I should know. Tell me so that other people can understand and never
forget.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. Once it’s all said and done—and it can never be done
for some people—once it’s said and done, we have to release some of it. If we don’t, it’ll
eat us alive.”
He stood and walked toward the kitchen, his footsteps muffled as he moved over the
carpet. She heard the refrigerator door open and then he brought the pitcher of sangria out
with him and sat it on a potholder in the middle of the coffee table. As he refilled their
glasses, she wanted to reach out and provide him some of her strength. Some instinct or
fear held her back, and so she waited for him to speak. He sat again and sipped his drink
with a thoughtful, almost detached air.
He gave her a fatigued smile. “It’s weird, you know? I’m not so sure I’m feeling
anything too powerful right now. Perhaps I’ve run out of emotions. Maybe I poured every
feeling I had into working the ruins of the towers, and now there’s nothing left.”
“You’ve got those emotions in there. You spent so much time staying strong and
keeping them back. You didn’t want to feel out of control or useless, so you didn’t cry
while you were there.”
“No. Not even when we found firefighters’ remains. Not even then.”
“Then you’re not so different from me,” she said.
Satisfaction and unhappiness mingled inside her, if that was possible. She liked that
he could understand her desire for control, but at the same time, she didn’t want him to
suffer.
His gaze altered, turning tender. “Not so different.”
He cupped her cheek, and the hot touch of his fingers sent pleasure rushing up and [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]