Now they didn’t even know about the fire or his fall. Sean thought it best if he didn’t put Gaspar or Cathleen down as his emergency contact. Not only did he not actually believe he’d ever be injured or killed, he also didn’t want them to come running to his side if he ever should find himself in a difficult predicament—say the drunken bender he was once notorious for back in New York. That was the last thing he needed: to fall off the wagon and wake up one day to find his indignant sister at his bedside in some California hospital. So James, his surfing buddy and fellow firefighter, was put down as Sean’s only emergency contact. That’s how he wanted it. Sean believed, however erroneously, that being independent and strong meant being alone.
Sean tried adjusting his position in the bed, but there was no way to get comfortable. He resigned himself to the pain for a second, but then pushed the little red button that was attached to his self-administered morphine drip and let the preset dosage flow. It was weaker than yesterday. They were tapering him. He could tell. But it was enough, for now. It was so easy, he thought. It was so easy to slip back into old habits. And so hard to break them once they got started. Impossible even. He knew there was no ending it. Once he got out of the hospital he knew he’d be hunting down the stuff, alcohol, oxycodone, whatever, just to feel this way all the time. It terrified him. And yet . . . and yet, he pushed the button again. Nothing came out. He knew it wouldn’t. But still, he wanted it. It was a good reminder to him. How easily one could, quite literally, push one’s own self-destruct button.
After a few moments, when he felt the morphine do its work, he leaned his head forward, and with the pen pursed tightly between his lips, tapped the phone number and TALK button before letting the pen fall on his chest and lifting the phone to his unmelted ear.
Chapter 4
IN ANOTHER GOOD SAMARITAN HOSPITAL ACROSS THE country, Dr. Gaspar Basu was standing in his scrubs in the middle of a dimly lit hallway just outside the door of a patient’s room. He was poring over an ultrasound of a congestive heart failure patient when he felt his phone vibrate in his chest pocket.
He pulled it out and recognized Sean’s number. He lifted up his wrist and checked the time. It was only 7:00 in the morning in New York City. Gasper inhaled and held his breath and braced himself for horrible news.
“Sean? Are you all right?”
“Why do you always expect the worst? Is that any way to answer a phone?”
“You’re right. I am sorry. It’s just that you only call once in a blue—”
“Is this a bad time?” Sean cut him off, not needing to be reminded that he was a terrible friend every time he called.
“I’m on my presurgical rounds. I head into the OR in an hour. Just trying to check in on my patients. But I have a few minutes,” Gaspar said, closing the laptop and walking down the corridor to find a spot to sit.
“So, how are things? Cathleen’s due any day now? Right?”
“No, she has about four weeks from being full term. But she has gone early both times before.”
“That’s good. That’s good. How are the kids?”
“Fine. Everyone’s great. Exhausted, but great. House is full. Kids are healthy. Knock on wood as you say.”
“Good. Good.”
“Sean, what’s going on? You sound, I don’t know, tired? It has to be four A.M. in L.A. You’re stalling. What is it?”
“Gaspar . . . I hate to do this. But I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.”
“Sean, are you drinking?”
“No, no. It’s nothing like that,” Sean said hesitantly, and breathing hard to muster up the courage to speak again. “I don’t know how to say this.” Sean paused again, searching for the words. “I was hurt. Injured pretty badly in a house fire.”
“When? How badly? Do you need me to come out there? What’s going on?” Gaspar asked urgently, without revealing a sense of panic. Though he went into physician mode, asking for the facts, as Sean’s friend he couldn’t help but feel worried.
“Six weeks ago,” Sean finally exhaled.
“Six weeks! And I am only hearing about this now? Why didn’t anyone call us? Why didn’t you?” Gaspar’s voice turned almost angry.
“I couldn’t exactly. I never told my commanding officers about you. They saw my parents as deceased and that I had no wife and kids on my records, so they didn’t call anyone. I was in a coma most of the time, because of some swelling in my head. And I had a few operations for my legs, back, hands, and face,” Sean said, feeling the thick bandage around his head as he spoke the words.
“My god, Sean. What happened?” Gaspar’s voice dropped suddenly to an almost inaudible whisper after he heard the words swelling in my head and few operations. Gaspar knew instantly Sean’s injuries could have been fatal.
“I jumped out of a three-story building that was about to explode. Landed feetfirst. They say I got lucky. Had I landed on my head, I’d be dead,” Sean said matter-of-factly.
“They’re right. In fact, it’s a miracle.” Gaspar stood shaking his head. Still in disbelief. “Tell me. How did the surgeries for your burns—for your legs—go . . . can you . . .”
Sean heard the anxiety in Gaspar’s voice and knew what Gaspar was going to ask. “It’s okay, Gaspar. It’s okay. I will be able to walk. Yes. I mean, at least they say I’ll be able to. I haven’t tried yet. Been on my back and rolled around mostly. But I have a shitload of pain. They tell me that’s good, because that means I’m not paralyzed. I’ll probably have a limp. I have a rod and screws in my back. I have them in each of my legs, too. I had some skin grafts for my hands and face. I’m looking at physical therapy and then—”
“Disability? Do you think they’re going to pension you off?”
“Maybe. They gave me options. I could have a desk job if I want it. The union guys came by yesterday to pay me a chummy visit. But I just don’t see myself trapped in an office all day or on dispatch. I don’t know if I can do that. Honestly, I don’t know what I am going to do, Gaspar. I feel so, I feel so . . .” Sean’s voice cracked. He hadn’t spoken the words out loud to anyone. He wept softly and then small waves rippled up through his chest and he began to sob. “I feel so, I feel so . . . alone. Alone. Gaspar. I know that’s what I wanted. I wanted to come to L.A. to just be alone. I know that . . . But I can’t do this. I can’t. I can’t do this alone. I thought I could. I thought I was strong enough. But I’m not. I feel lost and alone.”
Gaspar listened to his friend cry on the other end of the line and felt helpless. He had never seen or heard Sean cry. Not even during those horrific days beside Colm when everyone, including Gaspar himself, found it impossible to hold it together. Something inside his friend had changed. He knew that. There was a desperation he had never heard. A sense of hopelessness Gaspar had known himself. These were not the words his friend would ever say. If Gaspar could fly there this moment, he would. Nothing pained Gaspar more than being helpless in times of need. “Sean, I am so sorry. I don’t know what to say. I’ll come out there immediately. You won’t be alone for much longer. I promise you that. I’ll get to you.”
“No!” Sean suddenly stopped and inhaled, pulling himself together, using the back of his burn-glove hand to wipe the tears from his eyes. “I’m being an idiot. These drugs they have me on are making me depressed as hell. I am acting like a baby. Just forget it. I’m just tired. Please. Forget it. My sister and the kids need you.”
“Sean, you’re not being a baby. Stop it. You’re right, though, those meds are horrible. And being trapped in that room alone can’t be good for you either. I’ll make arrangements. Let me worry about that. Not you. I know your sister will want to come, but she can’t fly right now. She’s too close to her due date. She’d be on the next plane out there if she wasn’t pregnant. But I can come. I’ll handle the logistics. And I’ll try to be there by tomorrow. I’ll move some surgeries around next week and get someone to cover for me.”
“Thanks. I didn’t want to
do this. I didn’t want to make you guys have to adjust your lives again for me.”
“That’s what family is for. Sit tight. I’ll tell Cathleen. Expect a call from her. In the meantime, I’ll make arrangements and call you when I need more details about where you are.”
“Gaspar?”
“Don’t even ask me to lie to my wife—your sister. She loves you. So, no, I won’t. She has to know about this, Sean. I don’t know why you shut her out. I won’t be a part of it. I will tell her. I’ll do it in such a way that she doesn’t get too worried. But this is the last time. You two should talk. Really talk. It would do you both good.”
“Not now, Gaspar. Please. Not today. I just need a friend, that’s all. I need some help. I’ll talk to Cathleen. I will. It’s just been so hard.”
“I know. You’re right,” Gaspar said, resigned and not wanting to upset Sean further. “Get some rest and I’ll see you soon.”
Chapter 5
SEAN PUT DOWN THE PHONE AND LOOKED OUT HIS window for a long time. His eyes had fully healed, he thought with relief. He could see things clearly. He watched as the dark, predawn Los Angeles sky transformed slowly until a sliver of iridescent golden light just over the horizon broke through a purple-gray haze. The diminishing darkness was punctuated by buildings and streetlights, not to mention a few faint stars that were hastening to disappear as the golden light expanded and spread across the sky.
It was magnificent. It was the first time in weeks he had felt such a moment of peace.
He loved the sunrise. It had always been his favorite time of day. As a child, he remembered watching his small Irish mother, her dark hair pulled tightly back in a ponytail, sitting by the window in her rocking chair, saying her rosary as the sun came up behind her each morning. As a boy, he often woke up to this sight and climbed on her lap, snuggled into her neck, and rested there sleepily, while listening to the words rise up through her chest cavity and fill the room with her Irish accent. Hail Mary full of Grace, the Lord is with you . . .
Then as a teenager, he watched the sunrise each morning while he ran through Central Park with his sister, Cathleen, who was a college student though still living at home. He hated to run. His large body wasn’t built for endurance running. But Cathleen, small and slender and light as air on her feet, loved it. Their mother, ever the worrier, wouldn’t let her only daughter go out alone in the park in the dark morning. So it was Sean’s duty, as the man in the family, their father having died in a fire before Sean was even born, to protect his sister. And so each morning with sweat pouring down his head and soaking his T-shirt through, he ran beside his tiny raven-haired sister with alabaster skin who never seemed to break into a sweat as they ran full tilt into the park. Every step pained him. But the farther inside the park they got, the more it seemed as though the city disappeared and they only heard their inhalations, exhalations, and the sound of their feet landing in unison on the worn paths. He knew she was a much faster runner than he was, but she kept pace with him. Step by step. They usually never spoke on their runs, but one day, Cathleen said, “Look!” Sean did, and saw that she was pointing to the ground, where the sunlight had dappled the dew-covered orange and yellow foliage. “It’s like we’re running on a million golden stars, like a path to heaven itself.”
Later, whenever he was angry with his sister or frustrated by her constant worry and nagging, he remembered that moment. He remembered how big her heart was and how the very thing he loved most about her was the very same thing that saved him. She noticed the little things. First, it was things like leaves on the ground, but then, just as easily, she noticed his lies, his cover-ups, and his breath. It was also the best trait she passed on to her son Colm, the very same trait that made Sean want to protect the boy, wrap his arms around him, and never let him go. The boy saw everything so clearly when Sean had been so blind. Like during his drinking days, when he was so intoxicated he could barely make it home. Some nights, he would just sit on the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge and watch as the sun arched and rose over it, swallowing the whole of the bridge, and on many occasions hoped that it would swallow him, too, as it rose and took its station above the jagged, obliterated skyline. And even later still, he loved the sunrise. Even after AA and L.A. had cured him of his late nights and blindness, he wanted to be the first one on the waves to watch, while perched on his board, as the sun rose behind his apartment, a few minutes earlier than in the City of Angels behind it, and which rose three hours earlier over his sister and her boys back in New York, and which rose five hours before that over Chiara Montanari all the way in Florence, Italy. Everyone, it seemed to Sean, saw the light before he did. Though it didn’t stop him from trying to get to it first.
He could not only see things better now, he could feel things better, too. With the tapering of his dosage, he was feeling less groggy by the day. But everything felt raw. He felt as if someone had splayed him open and left him exposed. Every moment he lived with the realization of what his new life would be like felt as though someone poured a fresh dose of saltwater on him. Burning him over and over and over again. And there was no relief, save for God and fire itself.
For as long as Sean could remember, his life had been bookended by these two desires: fire and God. The former he believed he’d inherited from his father, a firefighter like him, and the latter from his mother, a devout Irish Catholic. He had spent his early life in the shadow of the monumental grief that the absence of a father brought to him, and he spent his twenties trying to run away from the pain that his mother’s death bored through him. He thought, however irrationally, that by being close to fire, close to a higher power, that he would somehow find his way to them both again.
He had lost God once. Lost the fire inside himself, too. And just as he was making his way back to God, back to the fire, he could feel himself losing both all over again. Faith and hope, Sean knew, were not things that one acquires with a lifetime guarantee. They are not a gift-with-purchase when buying into God. They are acts that take practice, patience, and fortitude. And he was tapped out of all three. Each time in his life that he thought he was close to having it figured out, close to being certain and resolute, life sent him to the back of the line.
Sean was feeling a new ache. It wasn’t in his leg or back this time. It wasn’t in his head or neck. It radiated deep within him. He couldn’t put his finger on the sensation, but he was starting to think what he was experiencing was a sort of death. He inhaled and exhaled, hoping that breathing would give him the answers he was looking for; would assuage the pain building up in his chest. He felt like he was losing everything. He had no idea what he wanted out of life. He had no idea what he was capable of doing. He had no idea what he was supposed to do without his job, the only life he had known for the past decade.
Fire, like God, had saved him once. If it were not for the fire department, the friends he made, the daily purpose the job gave him, and James’s friendship especially, he would be dead by now. The men and women who cared for him, looked out for him, both the ones during his drinking days and the ones now who made sure he didn’t drink, made him believe there were people out there besides his sister, besides his nephews and Gaspar, who cared about him, who thought he mattered. Who believed his life meant something to someone.
Sean had been looking for a place his entire life. He wanted to find that place where he belonged and stay there. He didn’t want much. He was not a materialistic person. He was content with the life that he had, and if he had his way, it would have kept on going in the way he had come to know.
Fire. God. Meet. Repeat.
But in a few weeks he would have to hobble out of a hospital and start his life all over again. He would have to find something else. Where? He didn’t know. How? He couldn’t even guess. What? There was nothing he could imagine he would ever want to do.
Sean shook his head in despair. Five years ago he might have yelled and strung profanities together in such a way that they would make a se
asoned sailor blush. He might have thrown a punch at someone; made someone bleed. Drink. Drink till his lips and fingers tingled, his liver burned, his mind blessedly dislodged itself from his cranium and floated somewhere above it all. God, he wanted a drink. The thirst never left him. But the new Sean, shattered and broken, did not move or cry or shout. He looked out over the vast city and suddenly remembered something he had promised to the darkness the night of the fire.
. . . I promise I’ll be better. I’ll be a better man. A better brother. A better friend. I’ll even . . . I’ll even do that thing I said I was gonna do, but never did . . .
Sean jolted in his bed with the realization and felt the sharp pain radiate down his back, through his leg, and down to his feet.
Sean remembered the light. He remembered what he had to do. What he must do. He remembered his prayer being answered. The light that guided him to the window. And he remembered the promise he had made to God in exchange for sparing his life.
“I’ll even do that thing I said I was gonna do, but never did,” he said aloud to the rising sun.
Chapter 6
GASPAR PULLED HIS SUITCASE BEHIND HIM AS HE walked briskly toward the taxi line outside the airport baggage claim at LAX. Once at the end of the line, he stopped, jammed the handle down on his suitcase, and sat on it. Finally at rest, he pulled out a handkerchief to wipe the sweat sluicing down over his caramel-colored cheekbones, collecting in his five o’clock shadow that appeared to be much grayer than his jet-black hair.
The past two days had been a blur of surgeries, patient complaints over rescheduled procedures and appointments, Cathleen’s cries and worries over her ailing brother, babies crying in the night, airports, mad dashes across terminals all to get here. Here. Los Angeles. Again. It hadn’t really hit him till he exited the sliding doors of the airport. Till he inhaled the air, though it was not so different from the noisome air he’d left back at LaGuardia. He hadn’t fully embraced what it meant to be back in the city that brought with it so many memories, not to mention the life he now had. The life he could hardly have imagined for himself just five years earlier.
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