FIREFIGHTER’S VIRGIN
By Claire Adams
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2018 Claire Adams
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Chapter One
Phil
I woke up a little groggy and looked around my apartment. I sat up with a start when I realized I wasn’t even in my bedroom. It appeared I had just passed out on my couch…again. Groaning, I raised myself to a sitting position, realizing that I had slept on my arm funny and it would probably irritate me for the rest of the day.
I looked at the clock on my kitchen wall. It was six in the evening. My shift had finished at noon, and I had hightailed it home to get some rest after my exhausting night. The plan had been to wolf down the leftover macaroni in the fridge, have a quick shower, and then sleep away the last shift. But as usual, the best-laid plans fell to the wayside in light of my severe exhaustion. My body was still tired, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep now.
I tried to stretch away the knots in my back as I walked to the kitchen to finish off the leftover macaroni. My stomach growled with hunger, and I ended up just eating straight from the serving bowl without even heating it up first. While I was eating, I realized that I had messages on my answering machine. I pressed the little button on the side after putting a huge spoonful of macaroni into my mouth.
“Hi Phil, it’s Kendrick. Sarge changed the roster for tomorrow morning. Our next shift starts two hours early, okay? You’ll need to report at four a.m. See you tomorrow.”
The machine beeped, and the next message began to play.
“Yo, dude,” Brent’s voice sounded slurred, almost as though he had been drinking. “What’s happening? I tried calling your cell, but you weren’t picking up. I figured you were out there saving fires and putting out lives.”
I heard him guffaw with laughter at his own slip. “Ha…did you hear that? I said… I said…saving fires…and putting…putting out lives. That’s fucking hilarious. Anyway, come over tonight, kay? We’ll just hang out. And bring my jacket; I left it behind the last time I was over. I have beer at my place, so we’re sorted. Maybe if you’re up for it, we can go out and do something. Okay…see you soon. Don’t forget my jacket.”
I shook my head and then looked around the apartment for Brent’s jacket. It was lying behind the couch, having obviously fallen. I picked it up and put it by the door so that I would remember to take it when I left.
Since I was up, I figured a visit to Brent’s place wouldn’t hurt. The guy was crazy, but no one could accuse him of being boring. I didn’t really hang out with him as much as I used to. Since becoming a firefighter, my social life had been forced into the backseat. Most of my other friends understood, but Brent had never been the understanding type.
I finished the macaroni, had a quick shower, and headed off to Brent’s. I was halfway there when a police siren started flashing behind me. I groaned as I pulled over, wondering what I had done. I rolled down my window and waited for the police officer to appear at my window.
“Phil?” The voice was familiar.
I looked up. “Officer Manolo,” I said, recognizing his face from work. “How are you?”
“Oh, you know, not too bad.”
“I didn’t realize this was your area.”
“Has been for a year now,” Manolo replied. “They keep shifting us around.”
“Right.” I nodded.
“So, do you know why I pulled you over?”
“You wanted to say hi?” I asked.
“You have a broken taillight.”
“Fuck,” I groaned. “The right one?”
“That’s the one.”
“Fuck,” I said again. “Sorry, I’ve been meaning to get it fixed. It’s just… Things have been so busy at the station.”
“Hey, I understand—personal business takes a back seat,” Manolo replied.
“Exactly.”
“License and registration, please?”
Cursing inwardly, I opened the glove compartment on the passenger’s side where I kept my documents and pulled them out. My hand knocked over Brent’s jacket, and something fell out of the breast pocket. The package was concealed in brown paper, but I could make out something suspiciously green from a tear in the paper. Feeling nauseous suddenly, I prayed that Manolo hadn’t noticed.
The moment he disappeared from my window to walk back to his car with my information, I grabbed the package and stuck it back into Brent’s coat. A few seconds later, Manolo appeared again at my window and passed me my documents.
“There you go,” he said. “Listen, I don’t want to have to give you a ticket. You do a great service to our community, and it seems to me community could cut you a break here.”
I smiled. “You’re not going to write me a ticket?”
“I’ll let you off this one time,” Manolo said. “But you’re going to need to get that light fixed—as soon as possible.”
“It’s done,” I said.
“Good to see you, Phil.”
“Great to see you, Manolo,” I said, as I waved him off. “And thanks for doing me this solid.”
“Take care of yourself, Phil. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around.”
“Yep.”
The moment Manolo’s car had driven away, I scrambled for Brent’s coat and pulled out the package that had fallen out earlier. It felt light in my hand and instinct was telling me what I had. I pulled the package out of the brown paper and stared at the bag of pot.
“That fucking idiot,” I hissed under my breath.
If Manolo had caught this on me, I was pretty certain he wouldn’t have turned a blind eye. My whole sordid past came up in front of me, and I saw the work it had taken to distance myself from that kind of life. I knew that Brent wasn’t necessarily on the same path that I was, but I assumed he had at least a little common sense. He hadn’t even told me that he had pot in his jacket.
I hid the pot and started driving again. The whole way there, I kept thinking back to my childhood. I remembered staring down towards the living room from the staircase after dad had stumbled in from a night out with his friends. I saw her silhouette in the far corner of my memory, but she had long dissolved into shadows that no longer had any real shape or features.
Sometimes when I concentrated really hard, I could recall Paul sitting next to me on the staircase. But more often than not, I was the only one watching, a confused five-year-old boy who didn’t understand why everyone in his life was so unhappy.
I pulled up outside Brent’s apartment and headed inside, making sure to take his coat with me. As I walked down the hallway to his apartment, I transferred the bag of pot from his jacket pocket to mine. I knocked twice when I reached his door.
“Come in!” Brent yelled from inside. “It’s open.”
I walked inside where he was lying on his couch with both his legs kicked up on the table in front of him. He had a beer in hand and no shirt on.
“You brought my coat?” he asked immediately.
“It’s right here,” I said, throwing it over to him. “Excuse me for a second. Need to pee.”
I disappeared into his bathroom and got out the bag of pot, which I proceeded to throw down the toilet. I was just about to flush when I heard Brent outside the bathroom door.
“Hey, Phil?” he called.
“Yeah?”
“Uh…did you…was there…something in my jacket that you maybe left behind?”
I rolled my eyes and flushed. Then I walked back outside and fixed him with a glare. “You mean the bag of pot in your front pocket?”
“Fuck,” he said, smiling at me with a half-assed expression of guilt on his face. “Found it, did you?”
“Yeah, I found it,” I said, unable to keep the irritation from my voice. “I found it at the perfect time, too…just when I had been pulled over by a cop.”
“Fuck!” Brent said, his eyes going wide. “They took my pot?”
“Is that all you’re concerned about?” I asked. “Seriously?”
“What do you mean?” he asked, sounding clueless.
“I could have been arrested, you realize,” I said. “I’m a fucking firefighter. I could be fired if I’m brought up on charges of drug possession.”
“It was just pot,” Brent said flippantly.
“Still a drug, numbskull,” I said, pushing him out of my way as I headed over to the couch. “And still illegal. I can’t believe you’re still using.”
“It’s purely recreational, to relax from time to time,” he said, as though that made a world of difference. “I don’t do anything hardcore.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, knowing that Brent was a good liar when he wanted to be. “Then why was there so much of it?”
Brent smiled sheepishly. “I need to relax a lot.”
“That’s exactly what I mean,” I said. “It’s a slippery slope.”
“Ugh,” he moaned. “You’ve become so preachy lately.”
“Because I’m trying to make something of my life,” I snapped. “And it doesn’t help when my friend leaves drugs lying around my apartment. You could have at least told me.”
“You wouldn’t have brought my jacket back then.”
“Didn’t I just bring your jacket back?”
“Without the drugs,” he said, fixing me with an accusing glare.
“Oh…oops.”
“Fuck you, man,” he said. “Where’s my pot?”
“Must have misplaced it.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “You flushed it, didn’t you?”
“You’re smart for a drug-addled idiot.”
Brent groaned and threw his hands in the air. “That was high-quality pot,” he complained. “The best there is.”
“I wish I could muster up the strength to care,” I said, collapsing onto his sofa.
“Geez…it was something fun we could have done together,” he said, sitting down next to me and reaching for his beer.
“You expect me to light up with you?” I asked.
“Why not?”
“What part of ‘new start’ do you not understand?”
Brent rolled his eyes. “It’s not like you were a drug addict or anything.”
“You don’t have to be,” I said. “Doing drugs leads to bad decision making, and I’m not about to waste away my life. I want to do something important. I want to be someone important.”
“You’re such a choir boy,” he said sarcastically.
I turned to him without humor in my eyes. “You wanna fuck up your life, go ahead. But don’t involve me, okay? And don’t you ever bring drugs to my apartment again.”
He sighed. “Fine.” He nodded. “We’re even.”
“Excuse me?” I asked incredulously. “How are we even?”
“I used you as a drug mule, and you flushed down my pot,” Brent said, with a shrug. “Even.”
I almost laughed. “Fucking idiot.”
He laughed and punched me lightly on the arm. “We’re cool.”
I pushed down my annoyance and nodded. “We’re cool.”
“Good,” he said, clapping his hands together. “How about a beer? You still drink, don’t you?”
I smirked. “I still drink.”
As he was getting me a beer from the fridge, I noticed a small suitcase in the corner next to the couch. I realized that there was also a woman’s coat by the door and a couple of books on the table that definitely didn’t belong to Brent.
“Have you shacked up with a girl?” I asked. “I thought you and Carly broke up?”
“Fuck yeah, that break up is definitely sticking. She was fucking crazy,” Brent said.
I looked through the pile of books on the table, and then I held up one with a title that read Business in the Modern World.
“Then who does this belong to?” I asked. “Because you’re definitely not smart enough to be reading something like this.”
“Hey, I’m not going to pretend like I am smart enough for shit like that,” Brent said. “And even if I was, I’d be bored sick. Nah, it’s no one special…just Megan.”
“Megan?”
“My little sister,” Brent replied.
“Oh. I thought she lived in Virginia.”
“She was studying there,” he replied. “But she moved into town a couple of days ago and needed a place to crash.”
“Oh.” I nodded.
“What?”
I smiled. “Nothing…just somehow can’t imagine you with a younger sister.”
“I’m sure there’s an insulting reason why you think that,” he said. “So I don’t want to know.”
I burst out laughing. Brent might not have been the most responsible person I knew, but he was good for a few laughs. We didn’t exactly have a huge amount in common, either, but apart from the men I worked with at the station, he was the only friend I had.
And lately…I needed a friend.