Things You Save in a Fire - Katherine Center Page 0,30

crouch on top of my mattress. The first face I saw was Case, who had been trundling toward me gleefully—but as soon as he saw me flip up into self-defense mode, he froze and put his hands up.

They all froze, actually.

I must have forgotten to mention I’d had a second job as a self-defense instructor.

In the still of that moment, as we all stared at each other, I got why they were there: Of course. They were hazing me.

I looked at their shocked faces. They’d clearly assumed it would be easier than this.

“Are you guys here to haze me?” I asked, lowering my arms.

Tiny gave a little shrug. “We’re supposed to duct-tape you to the basketball pole.”

I nodded and relaxed out of my crouch. Fair enough. “Okay, then.”

Tiny didn’t step forward, so I waved him toward me.

“Let’s get it over with,” I said.

He gave a little shrug and stepped closer, and I bent over his shoulder so he could carry me out the door, down through the engine bay, and out back to the parking lot.

Along the ride, I realized that they’d grabbed the rookie, too.

Next thing I knew, they had pressed us together, standing back to back against the basketball pole, running a roll of duct tape around us to keep us there. It was late summer and starting to get chilly. I’d been sleeping in a T-shirt and boy-shorts-style underwear. I felt glad in that moment that I always slept in my sports bra when I was on shift. I’d caught a glimpse of the rookie on the way down—and I felt pretty sure he wasn’t wearing much of anything at all.

Please, God, I thought. Don’t let him be naked.

We stood obediently as the crew duct-taped us from shoulders to hips, accepting our fate with as much dignity as possible, waiting for the guys to go back inside.

The guys knew their way around a roll of duct tape, I’ll give them that.

After they left, we were quiet for a good while. I could hear the rookie breathing. At one point, he coughed, and his elbow grazed mine.

“I’m spending a lot of time with this pole,” he said then.

“At least they didn’t turn the hose on us,” I said.

“That is lucky.”

“You knew they’d have to haze us.”

“Sure,” the rookie said. “Of course.”

“It’s part of the fun,” I said, starting to shiver.

“You bet,” he agreed.

“Rookie—” I started, but that was as far as I got.

“You can call me by my name, if you like.”

He hadn’t been on the crew list I’d studied. I didn’t remember his name. “I think I’ll stick with ‘rookie.’”

“Okay.”

I asked, “What temperature would you guess it is?”

“Sixty?” he guessed. “Sixty-five?”

“Kind of on the chilly side.”

“For sure.”

“What’s your clothing situation?”

“Just—” He hesitated. “Just, um, boxer briefs.”

So. Not naked. Relief.

But still pretty close.

I tried not to picture him in his boxer briefs, but my mind seemed bent on conjuring the image. He wasn’t a real firefighter yet, but he sure did look like one. An image of him with his sandy blond hair falling over his forehead—longer in the front, shorter in the back—just drew itself in my mind, despite every protest. In some ways, even as a total beginner, he fit in better than I did. Everything about his tall, broad, earnest demeanor shouted “helper.” He looked the part. He’d grown up in this culture. He was so … male. Even his Boston accent—mah-ket, gah-den, disappeah—was right out of Central Casting.

Not cool. And now my mind was drawing him shirtless. “Not even a T-shirt?” I asked, hoping to be wrong.

“Nope,” he said, awfully cheerful for a person who must have been covered in goosebumps. “But at home I sleep naked, so the underpants feel like a lot.”

Perfect. Now an image of him asleep in his bed at home, naked, curled up in his sheets, popped into my head. I squeezed my eyes closed to blot it out.

What color would those sheets be, anyway? I found myself wondering. White? Heather gray? Maybe like a faded blue chambray?

Just then, an upstairs window slammed open and the guys hurled a blanket down toward us—though it landed a good two feet away.

We both stood staring at the blanket.

“What do you think the chances are,” the rookie asked, “that the guys’ll come down and move it a little closer?”

“Nonexistent,” I said.

So near, and yet so far.

“I think we should work our way down to a sitting position,” I said, after a while.

I could feel his shoulders shrug. “Okay,” he said, and I