Unlike most days after my shift at the mill, I’m not in a hurry to get home. I should be. It’s my last night alone with Hen for a while, for who knows how long. I can’t explain it. I’m just not ready to go back yet.

I feel like driving around, without a destination, just driving for the sake of driving, without anyone telling me what to do or where to go, for a change.

Hen always has suggestions for things I should be doing when I’m at home, little jobs that I can tackle if I have a moment. She doesn’t like me being idle. I take care of all the repairs around the house, even the ones I don’t enjoy doing. It’s rare for me not to have some kind of duty or purpose.

I send Hen a message:

Have to stay at work later than I thought. I’ll eat when I get home. You don’t have to wait.

I don’t like to lie, especially not to Hen. I rarely, if ever, do. But this is a small lie, a fib. Insignificant in the grand scheme of things. It’s for her own good. If she knew the truth, her feelings might be hurt.

Many of these back roads around here have been left to crack and crumble and disintegrate. It’s alarming. There’s no money to fix them, I guess, and even if there were, no one would care enough to make it happen. Our roads aren’t worn out from overuse but from neglect.

I know Terrance has continued to say that I should be excited, that I should thrilled for this opportunity of a lifetime. But I’m just not. This opportunity is a beginning. I understand that intellectually. So why does it feel like an end?

Maybe it’s me. Maybe there’s something wrong with me.

On a whim, I stop the truck on the side of the road and get out. The sky is streaked with reddish pink and hazy, thin clouds. The sun is fading but hasn’t set yet. It’s lovely. I have the bizarre urge to go for a walk, right here in the fields, because I can.

The canola is starting to bloom. The plants are over my head by a foot or so and make me feel like I’m underwater. The yellow gets so bright it’s almost fluorescent. There’s also a noise in here, nearly imperceptible, but it’s there when you’re this close. A subdued arthropod buzzing.

I don’t think I’m looking for anything. I’m just going farther into the field, the canola flowers brushing up against me. I’m so far in now I can’t see the truck anymore. It feels good to be in here, covered and hidden. No one knows where I am. I want to remove my boots, my socks, too, and I do. I carry them in one hand. I like how the dirt feels on my bare feet.

It’s getting darker, but I’m not ready to go back yet. Maybe I’m just delaying the inevitable. I continue on, walking slowly, straight ahead, moving aside the plants with my free hand.

I stop periodically to look up at the sky, the twilight. Another day gone. That’s when I see it above me, filling the sky to the south. I can smell it now. Smoke.

It’s billowing up into a thick cloud. I start to jog, then run. The smoke is everywhere all of sudden, filling the sky. It must be a massive blaze to produce this amount of smoke. There’s a barn in this field. That’s what must be on fire.

I’ve been told these old barns are physical reminders of an older life, when things were different. They need upkeep. They need to be restored. It would be a tragedy if the one in this field is ablaze. Another barn lost. I take my shirt off and wrap it around my face as a mask. It’s hard to see with all the smoke.

Barn fires have become more common over the last year or so. There is debate about who’s setting them on fire. Is it old farmers who want to protest the loss of their land, or is it the canola corporations burning down the remaining barns so they can take over more land? Whoever it is, it’s not good. Fires are dangerous around here. They can spread and burn for days.

I spot it up ahead. The barn. It’s fully engulfed in flames. The heat is immense. I might be able to help. I might be able to put it out somehow, or at least get it under control until help arrives.

I should have just gone home to Hen and spent the night with her. It was a mistake to come here. This isn’t good. But I’m here now. I can’t change that. Before this week, I would have turned around and fled. Things are different now. I feel my sense of duty expanding, and this, too, can be my duty. I can’t be a bystander. I have to be brave, take control. I have to act. I take a breath and run toward the fire.

Six or seven steps into my run, I’m hit on the back by something, someone. I’m helpless and fall onto my face. My shoulder strikes something hard, a rock. My forehead slams into the ground, the wind knocked clear out of me. I feel the full weight of something fall onto me. Or someone. I gasp for air. I can’t move.

What happened? It’s a person. A person is here with me? Who? Who did this? Someone must have been following me. The pain is stinging and severe. I taste blood. My lip must be bleeding from hitting the ground. I try to spit, but my face is too close to the ground. There’s a knee or elbow in my back, keeping me pinned down. I try to steady my vision but can’t. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust. I pull my head off the ground just enough to see a see a man ahead. Not the one holding me here. A man in a suit, wearing gloves. He’s talking to someone else.

“Don’t move it,” he’s saying. “Stay there. Don’t let him move.”

The person holding me down speaks. “I had to do it,” he says. “I had no choice.”

“This was for your own good,” the man in the suit says, lowering his voice, addressing me this time. “We thought you were going to run into the fire. We couldn’t risk losing you.”

I’ve never seen such a violent fire. I try to get up, but I can’t. I feel the pressure on my back relent. The person isn’t holding me down anymore, but there’s too much pain.

“Stay down. Stay where you are.”

It’s my shoulder. It’s both numb and throbbing.

Let me get up, I say, looking into the glare, feeling the heat.

Sweat is dripping into my eyes and falling onto the dry earth. I’m dizzy. I can’t see anymore. I close my eyes. I let my head fall down.

“Don’t worry,” the man in the suit says. “We’re here to take care of you.”