“Okay, I’ll hold him. You up first,” Matthew huffed, out of breath.
Dane helped Matthew get a better grip on Tuck before she let him go and then hoisted herself up and onto the boat dock, dripping and out of breath.
“Okay,” she said and knelt down to get a good grasp of the wet, unconscious man as she and Matthew heaved his weight up onto the deck.
After Matthew pulled himself up as well, he said, “I can’t believe he’s actually alive.”
“Won’t be for long if we don’t get out in the middle of the lake—look,” Dane said, pointing.
“Dammit,” Matthew said, seeing how the flames already engulfed a nearby old two-story log cabin up a short hill and rushed up the nearby pines, which were falling down with the force of gravity, shooting up sparks and spreading as if fire itself were reaching its gnarly hand for them. They were in the center of an inferno and one sudden wind change from death. It was only a matter of time before one of the larger timbers would hit the pier. They needed to get in the boat and head farther away from the shoreline.
With their eyes burning from the smoke, Matthew dragged Tuck as Dane rushed around to the side of the boat, unanchored the ropes from the cleats and quickly pulled the cover away, yanking the snaps free.
“Pull the boat to the side—hurry,” Matthew said.
He didn’t need to tell her; she heard for herself the fire approaching with an audible roar from the dry wind increasing. Dane hauled the edge of the boat toward the dockside and Matthew stepped in and towed Tuck over the edge, laying him down on the deck as Dane stepped inside as well.
“Of course, there’re no keys,” Matthew said as he rummaged through the various cupboards for an oar or two.
Dane lifted the backseat cushion and within the dark cavern beneath she found two oars, though for the size of the boat, she wished they were keys instead.
“Here,” she said, tossing him one of the paddles, and they used the splayed tip on each side to push the boat away from the slip. Once out from the boat’s parking spot, Matthew said, “Look.” When she did, she saw the approaching embers from the flames already taking the canvas awning and the beginning of the pier when another tree whooshed to the ground nearby. Then Dane looked back at where they’d started from, finding it burned over already. They would have died, burned alive, or been forced to swim out into the water and drowned at the very least had they stayed there waiting for rescue. Sometimes life gives you little outs and you’re lucky if you recognize them as the gifts they are and damned if you don’t.
Matthew plunged his oar into the shallow water and pushed with all his weight to turn the boat out into the open lake. Once the momentum turned, Dane pushed them farther away from the dock and then they both rowed, each standing on opposite sides of the boat. Yet they still felt the heat of the flames from the carrying wind and when they both looked back again, it was as if the fire greedily reached again for them in a vain effort to quench its thirst. The dry wind kept up a constant gust, injecting fuel to the menace.
Without a word, they looked to one another and continued rowing, as if they had witnessed something phenomenal no one would ever believe had they explained. It was best left unsaid.
Fifty yards farther into the middle of the lake they finally stopped. More than a few boats were in the water, with a few survivors among them. Either they were residents who did not evacuate when ordered or they were, like themselves, fugitives from the flames.