Page 106 of Into the Fire

Ramirez’s cousin handled the phones in Operations. They nearly rang off the hook.

I found Nash in the loft on the second morning. He was at the long bench supervising Fellhauer doing a cargo repack.

“I was wrong about you,” I said.

“You were,” Nash said.

Hollis caught me at the racks that afternoon with his clipboard.

“Winter training plan,” he said. “First draft.”

I read down it. On the third line, he’d written: Escape route selection & terrain reads—VEGA.

“Has he agreed to that?”

“He will if you make it part of his job.” Hollis took the clipboard back. “I’ve been teaching it out of the book for eleven seasons. The book’s fine, but it wouldn’t have gotten six men off that slope.”

I didn’t argue.

The ice machine was working again the next day. Shep had been unusually quiet, but the ice machine brought him back to life. I crossed the yard to the sound of it humming and found him standing in front of it with the panel back on and a cup of ice in his hand, like he was holding a trophy.

“Two-dollar part,” he said. “Eleven dollars for shipping.”

“Dwyer’s going to be disappointed.”

“He’s coming Monday.” Shep shook his cup. “I want it running when he gets here. I want him to stand in front of it and hear it.”

Dante was at the racks with Teller, walking him through something on a harness. Teller’s bandaged hands were slow on the buckles.

I watched. When they finished, Dante said, “Ramirez is threatening spaghetti again. Do you want to stay for it?”

“No. Come home,” I said. “Skip the spaghetti. I’ll cook.”

“No,” Dante said. “I’ll cook. I owe you.”

“I won’t argue. You know where everything is.”

***

Dante rode with me, and the lights were on when we came up the spur. Within twenty minutes, the house smelled of garlic and simmering tomatoes.

The stereo was playing New Order at a volume Dante would have called respectful and I would have called loud. He was at my stove with a towel over his shoulder, barefoot, stirring a pot with the wooden spoon I kept in the second drawer.

“You can chop the salad,” he said. “That’s the entire scope of your authority tonight.”

When he dropped pasta into boiling water, I said, “You skipped Ramirez’s spaghetti to make spaghetti.”

“I skipped Ramirez’s spaghetti to make better spaghetti.” He tasted his sauce from the spoon. “There were tomatoes dying in your refrigerator. I rescued them.”

We ate at the small table on the porch, with the valley going dark in stages. Dante waved his fork as he talked. The sauce was better than anything I’d ever made, and I told him so.

As I carried our dishes back to the kitchen, I saw the Joy Division poster was hanging level. It was the first time in at least a decade.

Dante came up behind me, hooked his chin over my shoulder, and looked at it with me. “It was crooked,” he said.

“Yes.”

“Now it isn’t.”