“Cole.”Captain Draven’s voice pulls me back.He claps a heavy hand on my shoulder.“Nice work inside.You got her out fast.EMS said she’s stable.”
Relief loosens something in my chest I didn’t realize was wound tight.“Good.”
He studies me for a beat through the slowing chaos.“Go get a bottle of water and get out of your head.”
“I’m fine,” I lie automatically.
He snorts.“You’re twenty-three and you think you invented brooding.Hydrate anyway.”
I huff a laugh and obey because he’s right and because he’ll ride my ass if I don’t.I shed my SCBA, crack a water bottle, and tip it back.The liquid is lukewarm and still tastes like the plastic bottle it came in, but it helps.
My hands don’t stop shaking.Not visibly.Not in a way anyone but me would notice.But I can feel it in my bones, that buzzing, low-grade electricity.The aftershock of walking through fire while your brain whispers about every possible way it could’ve gone wrong.
She could’ve been unconscious.The ceiling could’ve come down.I could’ve been too late.
I close my eyes for half a second and there she is again, big eyes, soot-smudged cheeks, mascara streaked like she’d been crying for a century.And still beautiful.Not in some delicate, breakable way.In a soft, real, woman way.Curves hewn by life.That mouth.Those hands fisted in my gear like she’d decided I was the only thing she trusted.
I’m in trouble.
“Yo, Cole.”Matt sidles up next to me, his shoulder bumping mine.He’s grinning, because he’s always grinning unless someone’s dying, and sometimes even then.“You look like someone smacked you with a two-by-four made of feelings.”
“Go away,” I mutter, but my lips twitch.
“Aha.He does have feelings.Knew it.”He unscrews his own bottle and chugs half.“Was that the homeowner you carried out?Cute.In a soot-smeared-librarian-pinup kind of way.”
Heat flares under my collar, protective and irrational and instant.“Watch it.”
He lifts his hands in surrender.“Hey, relax.Compliment, not insult.”Then his eyes sharpen just enough to let me know he saw the reaction I didn’t want him to.“Are you good?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re lying,” he says pleasantly.“And badly.”
I give up and shrug.“She was scared.”
“They usually are,” he says gently.That’s the thing about Matt—under all the bullshit, he’s one of the most solid people I have ever known.“You did your job.You saved her.”
It doesn’t feel like just a job.
There’s a line you’re supposed to keep as a firefighter.Professional distance.Compassion without attachment.Help, but don’t hold on.But she’s under my skin already and I know it.
“I’m going check on her at the hospital,” I hear myself say.
He nods like that makes perfect sense.“Good.Closure.”
That’s not the word for what I want.I want to see her breathing without the mask.I want to hear her voice again, not shredded by smoke this time.I want to know who the hell hurt her enough that ‘I’m heavy’ is the first thing she tells a man carrying her out of a burning building.
And, yeah.I want to see her smile.
We finish the overhaul, pack the hoses, and finally, eventually, climb back into the engine.The house still smolders behind us, a blackened skeleton against the night, and guilt sits heavy in my gut even though I know better.We saved what we could.Sometimes “enough” still feels like failure.
At the station, the familiar rhythms take over.
Gear hung.
Report written.
Shower.
