Page 54 of Where I Should’ve Been

We don’t mention Mom or the fact that the anniversary of her death was just a few weeks ago. We don’t talk about how Dad still hasn’t sold the house and has been splitting his time between it and Cal’s condo, the two of them basically bachelors again in their seventies. I tell him the sheep are fattening up for spring, thanks to them basically overfeeding themselves and making us run out of grain earlier than we should. And he tells me to call more often.

All in all, it’s exactly how I’d expect a call with my dad to go. But then again, he’s always been a good man, a good dad, and everything in between.

Eventually, we hang up, and the quiet that follows feels heavier than it should. I tuck the phone into my pocket and just stare down Main Street without any real focus.

But my attention is pulled when Sheriff Peeler turns the corner and heads through the gravel parking lot on foot with a Styrofoam cup of coffee that has CAFFEINE written on the side of it.

“Mornin’, Tad,” he greets.

“Sheriff,” I nod. “How’s it going?”

“Been better,” he says through a deep sigh when he comes to a stop in front of me. “Did you hear about the vandals?”

“Vandals?”

“The graffiti artists who keep painting wieners all over the side of the high school.” He lets out another deep sigh. “I swear, this is the fourth year of this shit, and I’m growing tired of trying to track these little hooligans down.”

I bite my lip to hide my laughter. Truth be told, the dick-and-ball masterpieces that appear on Red Bridge High every year are part of an ongoing senior prank. Everyone in town knows it to be true. Everyone besides Sheriff Peeler, the man responsible for tracking them down, that is.

You’d think he would’ve figured it out by now, but Red Bridge protects its own. Also, their law enforcement is too busy flirting with the ladies at the bingo hall on Friday nights to thoroughly investigate the matter.

“That’s horrible,” I eventually say, my face as neutral as I can force it.

The sheriff shakes his head and purses his lips. “Tell me about it.”

Before he can start in on the weather or some other random Red Bridge gossip, a fire truck

blasts past the feed store, lights strobing and horn rattling the windows.

My whole body locks up.

My lungs forget how to work, my throat seizes, and it’s like the air thickens in an instant with smoke where there is none to be found.

Sheriff Peeler stands right beside me, squinting toward the lights and sirens on Main Street like it’s no more alarming than a garbage truck. “Metcalf’s Diner, I bet,” he says, casual as anything. “That oven’s older than Moses. Bastard needs to replace it before someone actually gets hurt.”

I can’t tear my eyes from the red truck as it slows, sirens still screaming, men in turnout gear leaping down. My nails bite into my palms, and my spine grows rigid as the blood in my veins pumps through my body at a jolting pace.

“Did you hear about Old Man Gellar’s house?” Peeler keeps talking, oblivious to the turmoil that’s rumbling inside me. “The damn roof caved in from all the snow we’ve been getting. He’s staying over at the Red Bridge Inn while some of Harry Kyman’s boys are fixing it up.”

I can barely hear him. But that’s on account of my heartbeat hammering inside my skull.

The firefighters vanish inside the diner just as my phone buzzes in my pocket and startles my spine straight.

Breezy: You should make me dinner tonight.

The words ground me like a rope thrown across a cliff’s edge. I stare at the glowing screen, her words a cute reminder of her blunt confidence and bossy charm, and I inhale air that doesn’t taste like smoke.

Though, I can’t respond. Not yet. Not right now.

“I think they’ve got it under control,” Peeler says, nodding toward the fire truck. There’s currently no smoke pushing through the roof or flames licking the sky, but the firefighters who jogged into the diner have yet to come back out. “Probably nothing more than a whole lot of song and dance for an ancient oven that should’ve been condemned twenty years ago.”

After a quick pat to my back, Sheriff Peeler ambles over toward The Diner, his posture relaxed and his strides slow and easy. It’s the opposite of my tense body and legs that still feel like they want to bolt.

A few pounding heartbeats later, the sirens cut off, the sudden silence ringing louder than the noise ever did, and the firefighters who went into The Diner are walking back to their truck.

Instant relief is a whip to my nerves.

Thank fuck.