CHAPTER THREE | JOSH
I slammed my truck into the Firehouse 56 vehicle bay. The sirens were wailing through the brick walls, and my colleagues were already fully dressed in their black turnout gear as they climbed aboard the red fire engine that was revving in front of the station.
I jumped out of my truck and bolted towards the set of metal stairs that led to the upstairs changing room. I knew I didn’t have much time before that engine left the station…maybe twenty, thirty seconds at most. That was barely enough time to climb into my twenty-pound nomex pants…let alone pull on the jacket and yank up my boots.
My heart was hammering through my ribs as I threw myself up the stairs. I bolted into the changing room and nearly collided with a flash of black: Duke Williams.
The designated ‘diva’ of Firehouse 56, Duke was usually one of the last to finish gearing up. And while I usually found that annoying, today I was just grateful that I wouldn’t be the last guy to leave the changing room.
“Hudson! Where the hell were you?”
“I was on my lunch break,” I grunted as I kicked off my sneakers and stumbled towards my spot on the wall of bright red metal cubbies. I jumped into my black turnout pants, then thrust my arms through the suspenders. I reached for my black nomex jacket. Across the back shoulders the word ‘HARTFORD’ was spelled out in 3” tall yellow reflective letters. And along the bottom of the jacket, in the same letters, it said ‘HUDSON.’
When Brady and I were in our turnout gear, there was no telling us apart. We were both just ‘Hudson.’ We were both equal.
I thrust my arms into the jacket, then I grabbed my boots and helmet. I’d have to put those on in the truck…there wasn’t time now.
Duke led the way towards the firepole and flung himself down it, landing one story below in the vehicle bay. Then he glanced back up through the hole in the floor and opened his arms to catch my helmet and boots. I tossed them down to him, then I slid down the pole.
My bare feet hit the concrete and we both ran towards the front of the bay, where the engine was rumbling impatiently.
“Hurry up!” another one of our colleagues, Walker Wright, yelled, craning his head through the driver’s seat window.
Duke flung himself into the rear row of seats, squeezing in next to two other members of the crew. I bolted around to the other side of the truck and took the empty passenger side seat next to Walker.
He flicked on the sirens and slammed on the gas, dragging the truck out of the bay and onto the main road.
“What’s the situation?” I asked as I stuffed my feet into my boots.
“Strip mall fire,” Logan Ford explained from the backseat. “Started in the kitchen of a restaurant, and just kept spreading. The first call came in fifteen minutes ago, and Engine 2 responded. Then they called us in for backup.”
“Anyone inside?” I asked.
“Dispatch wasn’t sure,” Logan said. “They think most of the businesses were able to evacuate, but there was a daycare center next door to the restaurant…”
“A daycare?” I gulped.
Logan nodded grimly.
“Fuck…” I shook my head slowly and sank back into my seat. My eyes glazed over as I stared through the windshield at the road ahead.
It was one thing to rescue adults that were trapped in a burning building. But little kids? Babies? That was a fireman’s worst nightmare…
“Brady just texted me,” Logan reported from the backseat, staring down at his phone screen. “He’s near the station…he offered to suit up and drive to the scene if we need an extra set of hands on deck.”
No way. With his wedding just a few days away, Brady was officially on ‘time off’ from the station. He wasn’t due back until after his honeymoon, and I was determined to hold down the fort in his absence.
“Tell him we’ve got this under control,” I said. I stuffed my helmet onto my head and flipped down the visor.
There were already three trucks spread across the strip mall parking lot when we arrived on the scene. I could tell where the fire had started: a restaurant in the center of the strip. The walls had been reduced to black ash, and orange flames poured out in all directions. A tall column of dense black smoke flooded the blue summer sky.
Walker pulled up to the curbside and I threw open my door, jumping out before the truck had rolled to a complete stop. The asphalt parking lot was streaked with ashy black water that had run-off from the building. The water splashed over my steel-toe boots as I stomped towards the flames.
My eyes traced the spread of the fire: after consuming the restaurant, it had spread in both directions. To the right, the flames had annihilated a law office. And when I glanced to the left, my heart sank when I saw what little remained of that daycare center.
The front doors had shattered, and thousands of tiny shards of tempered glass coated the sidewalk in front of the day care entrance like gravel. The metal-framed front doors had started to melt and warp from the heat, bowing to a bizarre angle. And just outside the front door, like a prop from a sick horror movie, there was a pink plastic rocking horse that had been melted and disfigured by the blaze.
“Fuck,” I murmured under my breath.
Just then, I felt someone grip onto my arm and squeeze desperately through my nomex sleeve. My head shot down and I saw a sobbing woman clutching onto my arm.
“PLEASE!” she begged. “Please, you have to help! There’s still someone trapped inside!”
“Inside where, ma’am?” I asked. My eyes flicked back towards the strip mall. I couldn’t imagine there being any survivors still inside the cluster of storefronts nearest the restaurant, but there might still be hope for the businesses and shops that were further away, at either edge of the strip mall.
“There,” she gulped. And when I glanced back down, I saw that her shaky finger was pointed straight towards the daycare center.
My heart burned and twisted in my chest, scorching me from the inside out.
“Ma’am…” I knew I had to tell her that there was no hope. It was my job to deal with facts; to know when things were outside of my control, and to have the humility to accept when it was too late.
But when my eyes locked on that abandoned pink rocking horse, I knew that there was only one fact that mattered: if there was someone still trapped in that building, then I was their only hope. I couldn’t abandon them…
“Please,” the woman sobbed. “She’s just a child! She’s probably terrified, all on her own…”
I gulped back the lump that had formed in the back of my throat. I had already made my decision, and there was no more time to waste. I was going in.
The wave of heat grew more intense as I pounded towards the building. I could hear my colleagues yelling after me to stop, but their voices faded away beneath the crackle and popping of flames bursting around me.
I ducked down and crawled through the warped frame of the shattered glass window, stepping into the daycare. Before I could stand up, a giant plume of blistering flames flared over my head. I kept my back hunched as I crawled into the daycare lobby.
Black smoke flooded the room. I could barely see my own two hands held out in front of me. Where there wasn’t smoke, there was fire. The ceiling was engorged with flames, glowing bright red and sinking ominously low towards me. It’d only be a matter of minutes before it collapsed…
I marched forward, hammering boot-shaped footprints into the melted carpet fibers that simmered on the floor.
The pastel walls were charred with streaks of ash and burn marks. I rounded a corner and found myself facing a wall of cubbies, not unlike the ones we had in the changing room back at the station. But these ones were about half the height; they were child-size. And instead of turnout gear, they contained Thomas the Tank Engine backpacks and Hello Kitty lunch bags.
I made it to the end of the cubby line when I heard a soft whimper through the crackle of flames.
I jerked around. At first, I saw nothing. Then, through a small clearing in the haze of black smoke, I saw the tiny body of a little girl, crumpled into one of the cubbies.
I lurched towards her, but she recoiled and screeched with fear, hugging her limbs close to her chest.
She was afraid of me, I realized. In a burning building…she was afraid of the fireman.
And I couldn’t really blame her. In my black turnout gear, mask and helmet, I must have looked like a monster straight out of her worst nightmares.
I knew what I had to do.
I ducked down onto my knee, so I was at eye-level with her. Then I stuck my thumbs under the rim of my helmet and slowly peeled it off of my head.
Without the protection of my helmet, I could feel the heat of the fire scorching the back of my neck and burning across my exposed face. But when the child glanced up at me, I saw that some of the fear had started to slowly dissolve from her face...
I didn’t know the first thing about talking to kids…but I knew that if I wanted any chance of getting this little girl out the building alive, I had to make her trust me. And fast…
“Hi,” I gave her a little wave from where I was crouched on the floor. Instead of stepping closer to her, I rocked my heels half a step backwards.
Don’t encroach on her space…I thought to myself. Don’t make her feel more cornered than she already is...
“My name is Josh,” I said. She looked unimpressed with this revelation.
A beam from the ceiling splintered over my head, and I heard it crash down just a few feet behind me. A wave of hot flames swarmed towards me, licking the bare skin on the back of my neck.
The little girl cried again and squeezed her knees closer to her chest, making herself as tiny as possible.
We’re running out of time…
“Do you like costumes?” I asked.
The little girl blinked at me a few times, then nodded slowly.
“Me too!” I said. I inched forward. “What do you think of my costume?”
Her face turned into a frown, but she didn’t move away from me as I inched another knee forward.
“Do you want to try on my helmet?” I asked. I reached towards the cubby and placed my helmet on the floor in front of her. She glared down at it, then her eyes flicked back towards me.
“I know it’s not as pretty as a princess tiara,” I said, “But it’ll keep your head safe.”
She slowly uncurled her arms and leaned out of the cubby, keeping her eyes on me the entire time. Then she lifted the hat between her two tiny hands and raised it towards her head slowly.
“Hey,” I smiled as she plunked it down over her head. “That looks really cool! You look just like a firefighter!”
Her face was hidden behind the helmet’s mask, but her tiny shoulders shook with what I hoped was a giggle.
I quickly peeled off my turnout coat.
“Here,” I offered it towards her. “You need this to complete the ensemble.”
She blinked through the mask at me, then she stood up slowly and stepped towards me. I opened the coat, holding the sleeves out as she slid her arms through them. That jacket nearly swallowed her whole, but she held the weight proudly on her shoulders.
“What do you think?” I asked her. “Ready to help me fight this fire?”
She lifted her arm and gave me a shaky thumbs up. I returned the gesture, and when a blast of heat ripped over the bare skin of my arm, I grit my teeth to keep the smile on my face.
We have to get the hell out of here...
“Do you like piggy-back rides?” I asked her.
The helmet nodded up and down slowly. I spun around on my heel, offering my back to her. She stepped towards me, then I felt the weight of the nomex sleeves wrap around my neck.
“Ready?” I asked. I felt the helmet nod up and down on my shoulder, and I looped my arms under her knees and hoisted her up onto my back.
I kept my back hunched low as I trudged forward. Her grip tightened around my neck as another section of ceiling collapsed from somewhere behind us.
“There!” her tiny voice squeaked, and she flung her arm towards a clearing that had formed where a wall used to be. Through the haze of smoke and flames, I could see a square of blue sky.
“Hold on tight!” I told her. I dodged towards the hole in the wall, trampling over burning embers that seared through my boots. I could feel the heat…I could feel the burning, blistering pain spread over my face and arms…
I closed my eyes and I took a leap. And then…
“HE’S GOT HER!”
I opened my eyes and saw Logan rushing towards me. I realized that we had made it out of the building.
An EMS worker was immediately at my side, lifting the child off of my back and carrying her towards an ambulance. My turnout coat fell off of her shoulders and landed in an ashy puddle of run-off water. She glanced back at me and offered a tiny wave.
“You did it,” Logan said. “You saved her!”
I turned around and glanced back at the daycare just in time to see the rest of the roof collapse, sending a bolt of heat over my bare arms.
“We’ve still got work to do,” I said. I swiped my turnout coat off of the ground and shook off the water as I slid it back over my shoulders. Then I ran to join the rest of my crew on the front line.