cover. In and out, provided nobody is injured.”
I focus on the road before me, nodding now and then. These are the moments I live for, the rush this uniform provides.
“You ready?” He grins, clearly also on an adrenaline high.
“As I’ll ever be. Buckle up, princess, it’s Showtime.”
Speeding through the darkened streets, all kinds of scenarios flash through my mind. How much damage are we talking about? How close are the other houses? Are they all upstairs in one area? I hit the gas, and my heart rate picks up the closer I get to it. In the distance, a large orange glow perpetrates the obsidian sky. We’re close. There are neighbors already gathered when we pull up. I hop out of the truck, leaving it running. The men get to work, dragging hoses toward the two-story house. It’s far enough away from the other properties. Flames lick through windows, and I hear shouting.
“Ma’am,” I ask a woman when we make it to the front of the small crowd. “Any idea how long this has been going on?”
She looks at me with frightened eyes, her blonde hair in disarray. “About half an hour . . . we live across the street.” She motions to her house. A tall, gangly man wraps an arm around her shaking shoulders, eyeing me in that protective way most husbands do who meet me.
“Thank you, ma’am, that helps.”
I jog over to Dan and Kyle, who are getting ready to enter the building. At least half of the first floor is ablaze; the windows glow a bright orange. I have no idea how much time they have before the fire spreads to the kitchen. I know it hasn’t because the house wouldn’t be standing if it had. “This inferno’s been going for half an hour now. You guys are pressed for time.”
“Got it,” Kyle shouts over the ruckus of the truck and the sirens from the police cars and ambulances. The two men check the door and kick it down when they think it’s safe to do so. Smoke tumbles out, engulfing them as they make their way inside. I know the anxiety they feel, and I am ready to move in if need be. There are days when all we do is sit around eating take out and watching sport all night, but it is these days, these moments that truly define who we are. The station is our home away from home. We have no idea when we will see the light of day in those seconds we’re in the fire.
Dan emerges ten minutes later, two kids covered in blankets in his arms. I take them from him, and he disappears inside once again. There is no time to give me status, no time to pause. I look down at their small tear-streaked faces. They’re trembling. The boy calls for his father and my heart aches.
“We’re going to get them out,” I try to assure him. When they’re in the capable hands of paramedics, I make my way back to the house.
“Come on, guys,” I mumble.
We could use some of that rain right about now. Thunder and lightning continue overhead, but the droplets are holding out on us. Freddy and one of the other guys strap on tanks and move in with a hose, spraying as they go. I hate being the one waiting, but it is the plan. I radio Dan and Kyle, just as Kyle bursts out of the front door with a coughing woman.
“My husband and mom. He went downstairs to get her . . . They’re trapped in there,” she wheezes.
“I’m going back in,” Kyle tells me. One of the guys wraps a blanket around the woman’s shaking form and helps her to the ambulance where her kids are.
After what seems like an eternity, Dan stumbles out. He and a man in soot-covered night clothes have their arms wrapped around the waist of an older woman. She looks frail and disoriented, and a paramedic hurries over with a stretcher. The man falls to the ground, and I move over to him. He’s blacked out, but he’s breathing. Smoke inhalation is the one thing more deadly than the flames themselves.
A medic straps an oxygen mask over his nose and mouth. I look up and realize it’s been five minutes and Kyle is still not out of the house. Loud noises have me pulling down my helmet and bolting inside. I can barely see anything other than the angry flames covering the walls.