At least fire didn’t get him.
Macy wondered at that simple statement. Tim had changed in a lot more ways than she’d thought. He wasn’t only in better shape, he’d faced death. Death of friends, death by fire.
Macy knew some folks who had died. The suicide rate in the roadless villages to the north was especially bad. She’d bring in a piece of mail, and a parent or friend would come forward to take it. She’d learned to recognize the solemnity marking that the recipient was no longer alive, and hand it over with as little reaction as possible.
Sometimes she’d haul a corpse off Denali, or as good as, because they were too far gone for even the medics to save. And each one of those unmet and often nameless losses hurt.
But none had been close to her; she knew she’d been lucky.
Tim had gone
