The fire station was a fifteen-minute walk from my apartment. I walked there in a fog of gloom. I just kept repeating the number five hundred in my head and no matter how many times I said or thought it, it still felt like a gargantuan number. I wasn’t sure I could complete it in six months… not that I had much of a choice.

There were a million different things spinning around in my head. The apartment I rented was a two bedroom but considering my cash flow had been a lot better before my bust I had been able to afford it on my own. Now I knew that I would have to advertise for a roommate because there was no way I would be able to keep that apartment on my own. I had savings, but I knew that the pool would run dry in a few months’ time if I weren’t careful. I hated the idea of living with someone else… not only would I have to adjust to another person’s routine and rhythm, but I would also lose my workspace. I had used the second bedroom as my studio, and now I would have to move all my art supplies and canvases into my room and work from there.

I gritted my teeth bitterly as I realized I might not have as much time left over to work on my art what with my suddenly packed schedule. I didn’t have a job yet, but that was the next and most important thing on my list. I would need to get a job soon if I had any hope of keeping afloat. The problem was that not many places were very willing to hire a man who had been arrested on drug charges, no matter how minor the offense may have been.

By the time I arrived at the station, my mood was dark, and that was putting it lightly. But I had no choice but to make an attempt at co-operation. Any sign of defiance or attitude on my part could work against me. I had a swirling mass of energy floating around inside me, and I knew that if I had a canvas in front of me, and a paintbrush in my hand, I could have created something intense and brilliant. It sucked to know that my creative freedom had been stripped from me.

The fire station was chaos moving. Apparently, a team had just been dispatched to put out a fire in town, and the rest of the men were occupied with various other tasks. There was a certain rhythm to the station, despite the craziness that I was surrounded by. I tried to make eye contact with someone, but none of the men paid me the slightest bit of attention. I had to jump in front of one guy in order to get him to stop and talk to me.

“Can I help you with something?” he asked, eyeing me curiously.

“Uh… I’m here to volunteer,” I said.

“Volunteer?” he replied.

“Yeah… I need to check in first though,” I said, trying to avoid actually mentioning the community service part.

The guy looked me up and down and then he nodded. “Are you the drug dealer?” he asked bluntly.

I bristled at the word. Was that society would brand me as now? Somehow, I found that incredibly offensive. I was a person who had dealt drugs in order to support my passion for creating art, but that was not who I was. I was so much more than that.

“I’m here for my community service,” I replied shortly, realizing that the whole station probably knew I was coming anyway.

“Uh-huh,” the guy nodded. “Walk down from here and make a left. The chief’s office is the first door on your right.”

“Thanks,” I said.

The guy smirked. “Oh, don’t thank me just yet.”

Frowning at that not-so-veiled threat, I headed in the direction he had pointed out to me and found the chief’s office. I wondered if I was required to call him that or if I could get away with not addressing him at all. I knocked once, and a second later the door opened.

Chief Crosby was younger than I had expected. He was probably in his early to mid-fifties, bald and tattooed down the right arm. He had striking blue eyes and a sharp nose that made him look severe… even scary.

“Uh… I’m Devlin,” I said. “Devlin Danvers.”

The chief looked at the clock on his wall, saw that I was on time and nodded. “Sign here,” he said, without any formalities.

I signed where he told me too, and then he nodded. “If ever I’m not here, you can ask for Seth or Samuel. They will most likely have the book, and they will sign you in.”

“Got it,” I nodded.

“There’s work to be done all over this station,” Chief Crosby replied. “And not all of it is easy. See that you work hard and don’t give any of the boys reason to report you.”

I suppressed a sigh and nodded. “Ok.”

“You will address me as chief,” he replied curtly. “Or sir… whichever you prefer.”

I gritted my teeth together and nodded, trying not to show my annoyance on my face. “Yes, sir.”

“You can head to the vehicle maintenance bay.”

“Uh… where is that?”

“Ask one of the boys… one of them will direct you,” Chief Crosby replied.

I nodded. “Thank you, sir,” I said respectfully, as I backed out of his boxy office.

“Oh, and one more thing,” Chief Crosby said before I left.

“Yes… sir?”

“Don’t get in the way.”

With that parting warning, I shut the door and headed towards what I thought was the vehicle maintenance bay. I figured it was a safe bet to assume all the vehicles would be kept there. I had a little moment when I saw the fire trucks. It made me feel like the kid I had once been, the same kid who had dreamt of growing up to do something heroic.

“Is there a reason you’re standing there gawking like an imbecile?” a guy asked me, with raised eyebrows. “Or is that just your natural look?”

The guy was broad-shouldered, well-built and tall, probably around six-one or six-two. He looked a little shorter than I was and that gave me a small measure of satisfaction as I ignored his jibe.

“I’m going to be volunteering here for the next few months,” I informed him.

“Oh, so you’re the criminal?”

My jaw tightened but I didn’t respond to that either. “My name is Devlin.”

“Do you mind if I call you Criminal?”

I frowned. “I do actually.”

“Cokehead then?”

I knew he was having fun at my expense and on another day, I might have actually found it funny. But as it stood my spirits were running low and my mood wasn’t getting any better.

“I never actually sold coke,” I told him, unsure why I was making the correction in the first place. “Just pot.”

“Excellent… Pothead sounds funnier anyway.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’d prefer you stick with Devlin.”

“How boring,” he replied.

“Would you mind telling me what I need to do around here?” I asked. “And if not, maybe you could point me in the direction of someone who can.”

Then he walked towards me, but it wasn’t a threatening kind of walk. He was just sizing me up, trying to figure out what to make of me. He looked a little curious, maybe even interested.

“You don’t look like the dealers I’ve ever met in the past.”

“Met a great deal of them, have you?” I asked, with a small smirk.

“Sure,” he nodded. “Turning them in is fun.”

A couple more guys walked up to us, and all of them seemed to know exactly who I was. I knew immediately that they didn’t think much of me and they had decided that before I had even shown up. Before I knew it, I was standing there like some weird monkey at the zoo while everyone took it in turns to either insult or make jokes about me. It was hazing at its finest, but considering I didn’t really have a leg to stand on, I was forced to stand there and take it.

“What the fuck are you guys doing?” a voice asked. Then a moment later another fireman broke through the thin circle towards me. He had light blue eyes and thin blond hair that was bordering on being brown.

“We were just introducing ourselves to the druggie.”

“I’m pretty sure he’s a dealer, not a druggie,” someone corrected him.

“Is there a difference these days?”

“You guys are idiots. Get lost… I’ll take it from here.”

The crowd dispersed immediately with light laughter trickling through the boys. “Sorry about that… they may seem like jerks, but it’s only because they are jerks sometimes.”

I smiled at that one and held out my hand to him. “I’m Devlin.”

“Danvers,” he replied. “I know. Chief told me to give you a list of things to do while you’re with us. I’m Seth by the way.”

“Seth,” I nodded.

“I’ll talk to them and make sure they leave you alone,” Seth assured me. “That’ll make your life a lot easier.”

“Thanks,” I said gratefully. “I really appreciate that.”

“No problem.”

I looked at him suspiciously suddenly, wondering if I should be wary of Seth too. It seemed odd that he would be the only one to cut me some slack when all his colleagues seemed hell-bent on hassling me.

“Is there a reason you haven’t jumped on the bandwagon?” I asked.

Seth smiled, and he seemed to understand what I was feeling. “Let’s just say… I was you not very long ago.”

I frowned. “What does that mean?” I asked. “You sold?”

“Nah… I mean I definitely considered it back before I became a firefighter,” Seth admitted. “But I smoked up quite a bit, and I was heading nowhere fast… if I had continued the way I was going, I might have ended up here… like you.”

“Well lucky you,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound too bitter. “You managed to avoid it.”

“My point is… you made a mistake, and you’re paying the price for it. You should get a chance to wipe the slate clean and start over. You’re not a write-off just because you made a few bad decisions.”

“Thanks, man,” I said. “I appreciate that.”

Seth nodded and led me to one of the fire engines. “She needs a good clean,” he told me. “Inside and out. You’ll find everything you need in those tool cabinets to your left. Make sure you clean up after yourself when you’re done.”

“Got it.”

“I’ll be around; you can come to me if you have any questions.”

I nodded and then Seth left me to it. I got to work and tried to set a plan for the rest of my day. Maybe I could squeeze in a couple of hours of painting before I slept but I realized that I didn’t really even want to paint. I was mentally drained already, and I knew that I needed to unwind and blow off some steam. Painting usually helped me sleep, but now that I couldn’t invest the kind of time and energy into my work as I usually did, the motivation to start painting was somehow almost non-existent.

I decided to finish up my four hours at the fire station and then head back to my apartment and call in the boys. A little party was just what I needed to relax and try and forget the nightmare my life had become.