The girl climbs aboard, and the doors slam shut. The sirens come to life, and the ambulance pulls to the edge of the parking lot, hesitates for an instant at the intersection, and then races away at high speed.

Hannah takes a deep breath. She can’t believe what just happened. She hopes the girl is going to be okay, and she has a good feeling she will. The girl was breathing and was in good hands.

Hannah turns toward the lake. Everything seems incredibly vivid—like her senses are heightened. The colors of the trees and the water seem to stand out. The fresh air is delicious. Every sound—every birdcall, every bug chirp—seems to vibrate with discrete clarity.

The pilot of the boat comes walking toward her. He’s carrying her daypack, as well as Logan’s.

“Some morning,” he says, with a grin on his face telling her that he’s feeling the same intense adrenaline rush.

He asks if she wants a ride back across the lake to the trail head.

“No thanks,” she says. “I think my plans for the day have changed.”

She glances toward the path along the lake, expecting Logan to come jogging up. But there’s no sign of him.

The boat pilot offers her daypack to her, and then he holds up Logans pack, as if unsure what to do with it.

“I can put this behind the counter inside,” he says. “Or I can leave it with you.”

Hannah thinks for a moment and then tells him to put it behind the counter.

Before the kid walks off, Hannah tells him that she’s a reporter for the Lake Tahoe Gazette.

“Can I ask you a few questions?” she says. “For an article.”

He agrees, and he gives her exactly what she’s hoping for: lively, pathos-laden quotes about what they witnessed.

When the interview concludes, Hannah leans against her car and waits for Logan to come walking down the path. He has a two or three-mile hike to get back, and she’s surprised he hasn’t made it yet. He’s had plenty of time.

She pulls out her phone and watches the video. The images are incredible. She’s no professional videographer, but the camera is in focus, and she was in the right place at the right time. When Logan carries the girl out of the water, he looks like a movie hero. His shirt sticks to his chest. His arm muscles are taut. His expression is calm, yet determined.

She watches it again, mesmerized.

Now she feels antsy. She wants to get to the newspaper. The art department can extract an image from the video—a picture of Logan looking heroic—and put it next to her story in tomorrow’s paper. They can also have the article up on the website by this afternoon, along with the full video.