“Easy, Donnie. Your mother wouldn’t let me leave until I showed her a few of my tricks. Sorry about that.” I winked at him.
“Oh shit!” Corey sing-songed. “Not the man’s mother.”
A round of laughter from the guys except Don who gave a litany of “fuck yous” before we were able to settle down and get some drills going. We were about three quarters of the way through when the station’s alarm went off and we dropped everything to head inside for our gear.
“Carter, you’re up front with me,” Sean, one of our squad lieutenants, called out. I nodded, pulled up my suspenders of my fireproof gear, and ran around to the passenger side of the rig, climbing in. We were on the move, to a house fire. The biggest problem was that it was a row home, which had the potential to light an entire block on fire if the flames weren’t quickly contained.
“You can’t make this thing move any faster?” I growled at Sean, as I listened to the details that came in from headquarters.
“Moving as fast as I can.”
I pulled the cord that sounded the fire truck’s horn, prompting cars to pull over to get out of our way. Within seven minutes we were the first truck pulling up to the scene. There were three police cars already present, trying to set up a perimeter so we could do our thing.
“Anyone inside?” Sean asked one of the officers. Meanwhile, Don, Corey, myself, and another guy were pulling out hatchets and prepping to hook the hose up to the hydrant that sat directly across from the house that was on fire.
“Cop says there may be as many as three people inside, but they’re not sure. Owner is over there.” He pointed at a man who looked to be at his wit’s end. “He said his wife called him and said their house was on fire. He called 911 but hasn’t been able to reach his wife since she got disconnected.”
“Shit!” I stared at the house. It looked to be three stories and there were flames already shooting out of the third floor window. I hoped to God there weren’t any children on that floor.
“What’re you thinking?” Sean questioned.
“Looks like it started on the third floor. We should be able to breach the first floor, secure that floor, and get up to the second to check for anyone. Third floor’s gonna be hot, but we just might be able to do it.” I stopped, recalling to memory the layout of the row home’s on this particular block. Most of them were just about the same.
“Don and Corey can make their way around back, to secure the entry points and make sure we don’t miss anything.” I explained more of my strategy to Sean, who quickly agreed and began giving out orders based off what I’d told him. Logistics had been one of the skills I’d trained on and used a great deal in the Army, and it came in especially handy as a firefighter. We couldn’t just load up the hose and spray down every fire we encountered. Our first priority was always to make sure the sight or scene was free of any victims. To do that often meant we had to make entry, and that took careful planning on all our parts. While I didn’t have the title of lieutenant, my colleagues all valued my expertise enough to consult me when necessary.
As I’d planned, I took lead to make entry into the front of the house with Sean and another member of our squad at my back, while Corey and Don went around back to make entry there. If all went well, we would meet at the center staircase and move upstairs together.
Busting through the front door with my hatchet, I grabbed the front end of the hose and pulled it in with me as I entered the home. The entire first floor was blanketed in thick, black smoke. Not a good sign. I slowed my breathing, to consume as little air as possible from the oxygen mask covering my face.
“I’m checking the bathroom,” Sean tapped me on the shoulder to inform me.
I nodded at him and went the opposite direction to one of the downstairs bedrooms. Again, I had to move around by my knowledge of the layout of the home because of the smoke. Feeling around, I felt nothing on the bed or underneath it. I reached for the knob of the closet and pulled it open. The door flew open and something fell against my leg. A body. I knew the limpness of a body even if I couldn’t see it.
“I got someone,” I called into my walkie-talkie. I bent down to feel for the person. They were small, likely a child. I let my hand glide over the arm, up the shoulder, and to the neck, removing the glove from my hand to feel for a pulse. It was weak, but it was there.
“I’m coming out with one!” I yelled, scooping down to pick the child up, doing my best to keep low as I moved through the cloud of smoke. I retraced my steps back down the hall and out the front door, stumbling a little but making my way down the concrete steps.
“Timmy!” a male voice laced with agony and fear called out.
I looked over to see the distraught man from earlier running toward me. I rushed past the man to place the boy onto the gurney so that paramedics could tend to him. The man followed the gurney and I doubled back to the house to see if there was anyone else I could help, and eventually to beat back the flames.
It took another twenty minutes to get up to the second floor where we found an unconscious woman and another child. They were pulled out, and we finally moved the hose line in to put out the flames that had reached the second floor, and then made our way up to the third. We were there for another hour putting out the last of the flames. When we finally emerged, we were informed by the medics that the woman and her two children suffered from smoke inhalation and had been taken to the hospital. They would likely recover and be discharged within a few days.
“All in a day’s work,” Sean stated, clapping me on the back.
“Anyone hungry?” Don questioned.
But before anyone could respond in the affirmative, we were already getting another call for a fire a few blocks over.
“Duty calls.” I climbed back in the truck, and beat my palm again the outside, as my way of informing Sean in the driver’s seat that we were ready to head to our next fire.
****
“Mr. Townsend, sir, if you would just stay still for another minute or two, I can finish up.”
I growled in the back of my throat at my tailor’s insistence. My eyes roved over his bald head up to the mirror in front of me. My frown deepened. I wore a black tux and fucking hated it.
“This damn thing is stifling me,” I ground out, running my forefinger in between the collar of my shirt and neck, twisting my head.
