Fault Lines

I worked crisis in Sagebrush City, a desert city in the Southwest. The earthquake hit at 4:17 in the morning, an hour when everybody is either asleep, committing a felony, or eating shredded cheese over the sink.

The names have been changed, and so have a lot of the details, to protect everyone, including me.

The power went out. The office phones went dead. The cops weren't answering, and the ambulances weren't coming.

Somewhere in the city were people no evacuation plan had remembered, because nobody had admitted they existed.

Frank pulled into the office lot in his ancient Buick. Cajun Jerry showed up wearing one leather glove, with bottled water, blankets, three crowbars, and a chainsaw in the bed of his truck. Tallulah arrived in a city maintenance truck nobody had issued her, wearing a city hard hat and a vest that said INCIDENT COMMANDER.

So we went looking. We pulled people out of damaged apartments, flooded camps, cracked motels, parking structures, abandoned houses, and places nobody had realized anybody lived.

We took twelve people to a shelter in the bed of Jerry's pickup, under a tarp that said HAPPY RETIREMENT, COACH DAVE.

Fault Lines is also about leaving. One of us married a nice, wealthy man who wanted her out of the trenches. The side diamonds on her ring looked like '80s headlights. We told her to go, and we meant it.

The book ends with my own answers to two questions: would I do the work again, and why did I stop?

Fault Lines is one of ten Sagebrush City books. Read them in any order.

Ebook (epub), delivered right after purchase.

Included free: Jukebox, a short bonus Sagebrush City book.