Power Slide (6 page)

ON THE WAY to pick up Gary’s car, I called Guthrie again. Still no answer. Any other time—but this wasn’t any other time. I wanted to go back and knock on Leo’s door and have him tell me Guthrie was okay, that now, after their talk, Guthrie was going to be feeling better and better. But Zen interviews didn’t work that way. They’re not salve. Often they pull back the scab and say, “Look!”

I hit redial. Again, the call went to his recording. There could be a dozen good reasons for Guthrie not answering or—

I left a message that I was on my way.

The wind was whipping down Montgomery Street, pushing handfuls of fog into my face. If I got across the bridge to Oakland in half an hour, I’d have at least a few minutes, see that he was okay, spend a little time before I had to tell him why I was abandoning him at the one time he really needed me.
If
I did.

But how could I leave Mom and everybody sitting around a table waiting like we’d all done day after day when Mike disappeared?

I turned the corner to the garage—the wrong garage! What was I thinking? Gary kept his big client car here, not the Honda he was lending me. The Honda was in a lot across from his office half a mile away. Talk about not focusing! Now there’d be no time to do more than say sorry to Guthrie.

In any other city I could hail a cab!
I turned and ran full out, beating the pavement so fast I couldn’t think. Sprinting, I made the light at Broadway and in twenty minutes was poking the key in the ignition. The heel of the key jammed into my hand. Pain shot to my elbow. I shook it off.

The Bay Bridge was crowded. I weaved in and out of traffic. The bandages cut into my palms. I loosened my grip, but in a minute I was back clutching the wheel.

Traffic just about stopped in the Treasure Island tunnel, and when I finally got onto the eastern span of the bridge it wasn’t much better. Cars were shifting right. In the low-slung Civic I was practically sitting on the roadway; every van and SUV that cut in front of me blocked the view. If there was an accident ahead, I’d never spot it. I was almost to the toll plaza before I saw the smoke spreading up, coming from the Port of Oakland.

Omigod, fire!
No wonder he hadn’t answered the phone.

Was it anywhere near his truck? Too hard to tell.

The van in front of me slammed on its brakes. I swung left inches in front of a truck and kept moving. The fire looked huge.

At the gateway, I waved my production company card as I raced through. Sirens blared, but I ignored them, and the smoke, too. I didn’t look at the plume. Instead I kept my eyes down, retracing the route I’d taken yesterday. It didn’t matter where the fire was; all I cared about now was Guthrie.

A giant red fire truck swung around me. I hadn’t even heard its siren in all the distraction of my panic. The smoke turned thicker. I could barely see anything but the fire engine’s flashing lights. It swung left onto the pier.
Our
pier.

I stared in horror as it raced to the burning white mass—a big light-colored eighteen-wheeler. Guthrie’s ride.

A police car came out of nowhere, blocking me. Red lights flashed.

“Get that car out of here!” It was a bull-horned voice. “Back up! Now!”

“Guthrie!” All I could do was scream his name.

The cop jumped out, instantly in my face. “Back up!”

“My friend!” I pointed to the burning truck.

“There’s no-one—nothing—in there. Nothing but gas. Understand?”

I got it. No one could be alive in a fire like that. If he was—but he wouldn’t have been. No way! “He’s not there!” I said aloud. “Not there.”

Before the cop could shout at me again, I shifted into reverse and shot back up the pier.

Something was behind me! I braked with a screech mere feet in front of a big white truck cab.

This
was Guthrie’s truck!
Thank God!
I jumped out and raced for the cab door. “Guthrie!” I pulled myself up to look through the window. “Guthrie!”

The cab was empty.

I raked my pocket for the key.

Behind me the cop was yelling.

Where was Guthrie? Was he in the back? I blinked hard against the smoke. “Guthrie! Are you in here?”

I felt for the flashlight beside the door, sprayed the room with the light. Empty.“What the hell are you doing?” a fireman yelled. “We got a blaze to fight here. It’s moving this way. You’re blocking our access. Get your truck out of here or we’re going to push it off the pier!”

It’s not my truck! I don’t know how to get the damn thing in gear!
I said, “Yessir!”

I jumped into the driver’s seat, balled up a jacket I found, and crammed it behind my back so I could reach the pedals. Then I switched on the
engine. My heart was hammering against my ribs. Turn the wheel wrong in a truck and you’re sunk. I could barely breathe.
Think!

Another fire engine swung around to my left. The sirens reverberated off the building on one side and the huge cargo ship on the other.
Think!

Where was Guthrie?

In the gag, he’d driven the truck around the corner, but I didn’t have to do that. I just needed to back out straight.

Tentatively, I shifted and very slowly let out the clutch.

The truck inched forward.

I slammed on the brake. Too hard. I stared at the gear stick. That had to be reverse. Had to! I shifted again, let out the clutch again. The truck jolted backwards.

What was behind me? Where was the rearview? I checked the side mirror and inched the truck backward, clutching the wheel as hard as I could.

Sirens screamed. The guy was yelling again. I didn’t have time for him. I let the clutch out a little more.

He yelled louder. “What the hell are you doing with my truck?”

I concentrated on the clutch.

“Get out of my truck!”

“Guthrie?”

He was black with smoke. Tears streaked down his cheeks.

He slid in the driver’s side and we passed the pedal so smoothly the engine didn’t even cough. In less than a minute the rig was on its way out, and the fire was receding behind us. The first thing he said was, “I gotta spend some time teaching you to drive.”

“Hey—” Then I was coughing.

“Listen, you were great. But when we’ve got a production company, we can really ramp up the truck gags. I’ve been thinking . . .”

Suddenly, his attention snapped back to the smoky landscape around us. “I gotta put some more distance between those flames and this rig.”

He was in his element, feet on the pedals, arms curved into the wheel, eyes straight ahead, an unconscious smile playing on his mouth. Like the fire never existed at all. Like we were on to the next scene. I was so relieved—giddy with relief—I almost slipped over onto the driver’s seat with him and snuggled under his arm.

He took the corners fast but nothing like he’d be doing in a shoot, moving through the gears the way I did with a standard four on the floor. I was making mental notes of the sequence, of his timing, of the pull of each gear.

“Always learning, eh, Darcy?”

“No novices in Lott and Guthrie!” It was way too early in our sudden relationship for that kind of commitment, but I didn’t care.

“Listen, this isn’t pie-in-the-sky stuff. There are great drivers—not like me, but, you know, good ones—”

I laughed.

“And there are great high fall artists—not up to your standard—” Even at this speed, his eyes never left the road. “But the combo—no one’s doing that, at least not like we can. We can cushion the roof of this baby so you could hit it at forty feet moving—piece of cake.”

He pulled over near the gate. In the side mirror the fire looked like a funnel cloud, just not moving. He gave me a quick kiss, and then, as if choreographed, we both jumped out to check the rig for fire damage. All stunt doubles are careful—at least those who have a long life in the business—but no one’s more obsessive than those of us who do high falls. One loose tie-down overlooked, and splat. We’ve all heard the tales of catcher failure, wind not factored in, or more bones broken than we even realized
we possessed . . . of death. I surveyed the trailer shell with that same professional obsessiveness while Guthrie squat-walked underneath where an ember could still be smoldering near a gas line and blow us into the Bay.

Even with my help, the check took an hour. By the time he declared the rig okay, the fog was moving in for the night.

“Another couple of minutes and I’d’ve been working by flashlight,” Guthrie said, emerging from under the bed. He straightened so slowly it looked like he was being cranked up by gears.

He slipped his arm around my shoulder and we leaned back against the siding. We stared at the fire’s black plume against the gray fog. The heat of his body flooded into me so only my right hand was still cold and I reached up to slip my fingers through his.

“You’re a different man than the guy who was so down on himself yesterday.”

“You suggesting I’m unpredictable?”

“I’m applauding.”

“You’ve got your guy Leo to thank.”

As if intuiting my thoughts, he repeated the sutra, “All my ancient, tangled karma I face up to.”

“Avow.”

“What?”

“You fully avow the karma, but I guess it’s the same thing.”

“I don’t know. It’s hard to believe I wasted all this time avoiding it. I sweated for weeks at a ranch in a hole in the desert trying to deal with it. And then I have one chat and all of a sudden it seems so clear that facing up to it is the answer. How could I not see that before? It’s crazy.”

“But us, being together, that’s crazy, and yet it’s not. It’s like you run toward a cliff for an hour and then in one step you’re over.”

“Pleasant analogy, that.”

I shrugged, scrunching closer under his arm.

“Whatever you—”

In a split second he’d shot a foot away from me. “Whatever I did? You want to know?”

“I didn’t say—”

“But you do, don’t you?”

“Hey, where’d this come from?”

He turned, strode off toward the fire.
Really unpredictable!

I raced after him, grabbed his arm, turned him toward me. “Yeah, I want to know. Because whatever it is, it’s okay. No, wait! Don’t start that business of my not being able to say without knowing first, just fucking tell me. Did you kill someone?”

He looked down at me and our gazes locked. “I used to think that ‘worse than death’ was hyperbole. Now I know better.”

I just buried my face in his chest and pulled him tight to me. I realized he was shaking. In that moment it was as if I was both present and also looking down on the scene. And then, providing the backdrop to his grief, like an over-the-top movie set, were the fire and the sirens and the flashing lights, and it was almost too much. “How?”

“I let him die.”

You stood there and watched him die?
“How?”

“I walked away.”

“So, you were a bystander?”

“I was in it up to—as high up as you can go. I could have . . . but I didn’t. If I had . . . but I didn’t. Because, see, I wanted to save my own skin. It’s the old story about guilt. A thousand plots make this point. My ancient twisted karma.”

A deafening bang came from the pier. Fire shot up.

“Lucky you got my rig out of there when you did. That fire’s going to eat up the pier. Look how fast it’s coming—”

“Omigod, Gary’s car! I jumped out of it to get the truck. It’s still back there! Gary’s Honda!”

“Flip me the keys!”

“They’re in the car.” I ran full out, but he was taller, faster. Smoke was filling my mouth; I could taste it. By the time I rounded the corner onto the pier, Guthrie was nearly at the door.

A police car—light bar flashing—sped toward us.

“Deal with them!” I yelled.

The cop screeched up five yards from the car. Guthrie was at his door before he could get out.

With a last burst of power, I dashed for Gary’s car, swung in, and did a 180, pushing the passenger door so it popped open right next to Guthrie. He leapt in and I hit the gas.

We rounded the corner, laughing.

He leaned over and kissed me sideways. I could just see over his ear to drive. “We’re going to make one helluva team!”

I pulled up next to his truck and reached for him.

My cell phone rang.

I shrugged it off and pulled him to me for a long, giddy kiss, the kind we’d be sharing a lot after triumphs by Lott and Guthrie.

The phone started up again. I shrugged and clicked it on.

“Darcy!”

My brother John,
I mouthed.

“There’s been a—”

“Do you have any idea what time it is?”

“—a fire—”

“We all waited for you. We sat around the table, Darcy, waiting for you. You get us all here and then don’t show.”

“I can still—”

“Too late.” The phone clicked off. I could picture him stabbing his thumb into the button and slamming the phone shut.

“Oh, shit, it’s after eight.”

Guthrie was staring at me. “What?”

“I was supposed to be at Mom’s at seven. Shit. There was a family meeting; they all think I arranged it. They’re . . . pissed doesn’t begin to describe it.” I squeezed his arm. “I’ve got to go.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“No. Trust me, you do not want to face this scene.”