Diamond in the Rough

by Peter Canning

  ***

  I cried alone in bed that night. I cried because I was pathetic, because I knew my girlfriend didn’t really care about me. I cried because my partner thought I wasn’t right. I cried because I felt puny and empty. I cried because I saw myself in the future—a pathetic old man taking cab rides into the North End to get blow jobs from crack whores.

  I lay in bed listening to the phone ring. It rang a couple times, not a few minutes apart, and then it rang no more.

  Chapter 24

  “When are you going to bring your girlfriend over for dinner?” my mom asked. “How about for Thanksgiving? Are you doing anything then?”

  “I’m working that day, Mom.”

  “You can’t get Thanksgiving off to spend with your family?”

  “Someone has to work on Thanksgiving. People don’t stop having heart attacks and strokes or stabbing people because all the EMTs are home eating turkey with their families.”

  “But it’s your family.”

  “I can come by and have Thanksgiving breakfast.”

  “What if we start dinner at noon?”

  “No, I go in at ten. You get double time and half on Thanksgiving too, and I need the money.”

  “You don’t have to contribute to the slot fund that week. Besides, you work so much as it is. You need a rest.”

  “Can’t do it, Mom.”

  “Well, at least bring her over some night. Check with her on what a good night is and we’ll set it up. I’ll do lasagna.”

  “Okay, but she’s busy too.”

  “Are you embarrassed about your mother?”

  “No, no, not at all. It’s just I’m so busy.”

  When Carrie and I first started going out I would have loved to show her off, but now things weren’t going so well. She was irritable most of the time and quick to anger. She was going through some family issues of her own. Like mine, her dad had left her and her mom when she was young and her mother was very cold and had never shown her much affection. Her mother had had a string of boyfriends, who had abused her. Now her mom was on psych meds, and causing Carrie lots of problems, always needing her to help out with things but never thanking her. Carrie was feeling very used by everyone, she said.

  I was only going over there once a week at most now. She said she had things she needed to do with her mother or extra projects from work. She had just gotten a promotion, which she labeled as more work for the same pay. I didn’t mind. I just worked longer hours myself, trying to earn money the old-fashioned way—good old long hard work.

  Chapter 25

  857 was sent to the corner of Main and Hudson for an unresponsive/possible ETOH. Tom and I were bored so we headed in that direction to back them up in case they needed a medic. They were on the other side of the ambulance when we pulled up. Tom’s cell phone rang then and since it was one of the girls he was after, he took the call, and told me to come get him only if the other crew needed him. I got out and went around the ambulance just in time to see Fred pop the man in the nose with his fist. His partner pulled him off before he could hit him again, and I rushed to block the man’s friend from jumping on Fred.

  “That ain’t right! That ain’t right!” the man protested.

  “You saw him. He came at me,” Fred said.

  I could tell by his partner’s eyes that Fred was not blameless.

  “Calling you a dickhead, ain’t no reason for you to punch a defenseless man.”

  I looked at the man on the ground. His nose was spattered wide open. He reeked of alcohol.

  “Shut the fuck up or I’ll take care of you too,” Fred said.

  “Get in the front,” I said. “Right now! Get up there!”

  I couldn’t believe Fred. I’d seen his temper, but not like this.

  I think maybe he realized what he’d done because he let me bully him away from the other man who was calling for the police now.

  “Jim will stick by me,” Fred said. “Jim will tell him.”

  I worked with Jim to get the man up and on the stretcher. A police car was already coming down the street at a slow crawl, and the other drunk was flagging him down.

  We had the man in the back and had staunched the bleeding from his nose. The cop wanted to know what the story was.

  “He popped him right in the face, hit a defenseless man,” the other drunk said to the officer, who held up his hand, and said, “Just back off.”

  “ETOH,” I said. “He was a little combative, and fell on his face. He’s okay, just a bloody nose. They’re taking him to Hartford, you want to catch them there.” I stepped out and tried not to be too obvious about standing between the cop and his view of the patient, as I closed the back door. “I was just helping them out.”

  The cop looked like he knew something was up, but he didn’t look like he wanted to follow it up.

  “I’m making a complaint,” the drunk said. “I am making a complaint.”

  “You can call this number,” I said, and gave him the supervisor’s phone. “That’s our supervisor. He’ll investigate.”

  “Investigate my ass. I want the police and the state investigating. This is cold-blooded wrong.”

  The cop ended up getting a statement from me, then went up to the hospital to interview Fred and his partner.

  “What the fuck was that all about?” Tom asked when I got back in the rig, finally hanging up his phone call.

  “You don’t want to know,” I said. “Fred popped a drunk and his buddy told the cop.”

  “Did he pop him good?”

  “Broke his nose.”

  “Did he deserve it?”

  “Probably not, but…”

  “Well, he’s a drunk, his story will be no good, but someone has to talk to Fred. He’s giving us a bad name. He’s wound too tight these days.”

  The supervisor came down to the hospital and suspended Fred on the spot. He talked to me and to Jim, Fred’s partner, and I told him I hadn’t seen anything, but said the man was drunk and combative and probably did slip.

  When the supervisor told Fred he could go home, Fred cursed him up a load and gave him the finger as he walked away. I thought for certain he’d be fired, but he wasn’t.

  The next day, while Tom and I sat in our ambulance on a street corner, Fred showed up in his private car and tried to get Tom to get the union to appeal his suspension. “Appeal? You’re lucky you haven’t lost your cert, you crazy psycho. You need to just chill the fuck out,” he said.

  “Com’on, he was just a fucking drunk!”

  “Com’on, you’re a fucking EMT! You’re not supposed to hit people, drunk or not.”

  “You’re the union president, you’re supposed to represent me.”

  “Listen, for all the crap I have pulled, I don’t come close to representing you. You want your union dues back? I’ll take a collection. People will be happy to donate to get you gone from our brotherhood. Here’s five dollars. That’s my donation. Now get lost!” And he rolled up the automatic window.

  Fred just stood there like he had been slapped, then head down, he walked back to his car. He sat in there with his head on the wheel. It looked like his body was shaking.

  ***

  A couple nights later, we were at the Brickyard sitting at the bar. Fred had exiled himself from the merriment. Though he hadn’t worked that day due to his continuing suspension, he still wore his work pants and boots, along with his “EMS in the Jungle” tee-shirt.

  “At least you’re standing by me,” he said. “Still, it ain’t right.”

  He nodded up at the TV. They were showing over and over again the footage of US troops pulling down Saddam’s statue. “I should be fucking there, beating some Iraqi Al-Qaeda slurpy-head instead of stuck fucking here.”

  “Count your blessings. You’re alive. You still have your job.”

  “I don’t fit the profile. That’s what they told me. They were so happy when I walked in to sign the papers. I just had to get a physical, take a couple tests—all rout
ine. Then when I go back they fucking tell me I don’t fit the profile. Hell, they let that guy who killed those two fucking clerks go and they don’t let me.”

  “But after they found out he killed those people, they put him in jail.”

  “He had a gun charge. I don’t have any gun charges.”

  “I feel bad for you.”

  “I’m willing to do what it takes. Why won’t they take me? They said I was unstable. How could you send someone stable? You need someone who’s not going to hesitate. You get fucking ambushed. Pow! I’d shoot first, answer questions later. That’s the kind of guy you need. I’m perfect. I will not hesitate to fuck the enemy up. Now all this bullshit with the state—that’s not going to help. I’m done for good now.”

  “At least no one is shooting at you. You’re safe here.”

  “Tonight, instead of being here, I’d be at Saddam’s Palace. There’s going to be a party there, you better believe that. It’ll be like a James Bond orgy. The big round bed surrounded by a moat, fountains coming out of the wall, mirrors on the ceiling. You can better believe we’d be raiding the liquor cabinet and the women—all those horny pent-up Iraqi women—haven’t had it in so long. Well, off come the veils! Talk about a striptease. I’d be fucking there in the middle of it.”

  “Maybe, or maybe you’d be freezing your ass off on some cold desert outpost.”

  “Maybe? Huh! This was going to be my moment. I mean talk about topping that story. You’d all be sitting here around the bar and looking up at the TV. And there’d be old Fred pulling down the statute, and then flashing you all the peace sign. You’d have to wait for the video of ‘Girls! Girls! Girls! Iraq!’ to see the party of course, but I’d be there front and center doing an Eminem military rap thang. Instead here I am drinking with you. Life isn’t fair.”

  “I guess not,” I said.

  Chapter 26

  “463, Fern Street. West Hartford. Signal 17, for the sick call. Priority one, but they request a silent approach.”

  “That’s bullshit,” Tom said. “I hate that. You either get lights and sirens or you don’t. What, they’re worried their neighbors are going to see? Maybe we should have unmarked ambulances for the rich so as to maintain appearances. Fuck it. They want us on a one. They want us to put ourselves at risk, hurtling over here, I’m using the sirens right up to the front door.”

  And he did. He used both sirens with the air horn for emphasis. People on the street were holding their ears as we passed. We raced down that residential street like we were going to a train wreck. Tom could be a dickhead when his buttons were pushed. I usually tried to moderate him, but sometimes it was just best to be silent, let him work his rage out.

  There was only a cop car out in front. If it was at all serious they would have sent the Fire Department. That got Tom even more ticked. “Sick call,” he muttered. “They can’t give us better info than that. They knew enough not to send Fire.”

  He backed into the drive without hitting off the backup alarm and left the lights whirling for good measure. “We’re taking everything in,” he said. “Take the suction too.”

  “The suction?”

  We never took the suction in.

  “The suction.”

  Already, I could see concerned neighbors standing at their front doors. Some walking over to see what was going on.

  A woman about fifty met us at the front door. “Really, you don’t need the lights and I told them not to send you with sirens. You just need the stretcher and one of those chairs.”

  “They just gave it to us as an emergency,” Tom said. “We came as quickly as we could. You did call 911.”

  “Yes, but…”

  “Well, here we are. What’s going on?”

  “My mother is ill. She has a fever and has been vomiting. The doctor wants her admitted to the hospital.”

  Tom grunted. “Any trouble breathing? Any chest pain?”

  “No, she just has a fever.”

  “Well, we’ll check her out. Where is she?”

  “Upstairs.”

  I was going to put the equipment back in the truck, but Tom gestured for me to bring it. I followed them into the house. I wiped my boots on the mat, even though Tom didn’t. He could be such a dick.

  The woman was in a bathrobe lying in bed. I saw trouble when I recognized the man standing over her. He was one of the town selectmen. This was his mother. The officer there tried to give Tom a knowing nod that said special treatment would be required.

  Tom felt her forehead, and she recoiled from his hand.

  “Your hand is so cold.”

  “Sorry, you feel a little warm. What’s her temp?”

  “101.3,” the woman said. “Dr. Collier wants her seen at Hartford.”

  “Tim, get the stair chair, and a Johnny top.” To the family, he said, “We’re going to do a few things before we go.”

  “It’s really not necessary.”

  “No, it is,” he said. “You called for a paramedic. My job is to do a thorough assessment for the hospital. It helps them determine where to place the patient. In a bed or in the waiting room.”

  “Dr. Collier said she’s going to be admitted.”

  “I’ll be sure to tell them that. The ED will enjoy that tidbit. Now we need to get this bathrobe off. I’m going to take your blood pressure now.”

  “But I’m warm like this.”

  “Please.”

  “Let him do his job, Mother,” the selectman said.

  She wasn’t happy when Tom had her take the robe and pajama tops off so he could put her in a Johnny gown. At least he let the daughter put it on her, while the rest of us averted our eyes. He did a thorough assessment all right. Lung sounds in eight fields, abdominal palpation—all nine sections. Orthostatic vitals. 12 lead. He put in an IV, drew blood, checked her sugar and her pulse SAT, which was 98%. “That’s good. No oxygen necessary for you,” he said. “You’re getting better oxygen than me. Of course I’m a smoker. I run marathons, but I smoke.” He was just talking out of his butt, trying to be both professional and a dickhead at the same time. I think he thought he was just being a dickhead professional, but you could make the case that he was instead trying out to be a professional dickhead. “12-lead’s good, vitals are good. Just a little fever. Nothing that some aspirin and some fluids won’t cure.”

  “The doctor’s worried she may have pneumonia,” the daughter said.

  Tom stared at her a moment too long. “Is he?’ he said.

  “Yes.”

  If we had done this call in a housing project in the North End, he wouldn’t have brought anything in. He’d have said, “Zapatos! Tarjeta medico! Vamanos! Get up, let’s go!” and walked her down four flights to the ambulance. But on the other hand, they probably would not have sent us lights and sirens or even sent a cop.

  She was a big woman, maybe two hundred and eighty pounds. We bundled her up in the stair chair. I took the feet. Tom, who was taller than me, should have taken it, but the lady said she was nauseous and he had a thing about getting puked on.

  “Keep your hands in,” I said as I secured the straps around her. “Don’t reach out when we go down the stairs.”

  We were halfway down, and I was struggling because they had paintings on the stairway wall. I liked to brace myself with one shoulder against a wall as I walked backwards down the stairs to support myself, but I was worried I would knock the paintings off the wall. I didn’t feel I had my balance quite right.

  Suddenly, the woman reached out for the railing. Tom wasn’t paying attention, and it threw us off balance. I was just stepping backward. I leaned hard against a painting, jarring it, and I jerked my right shoulder up to counterbalance the movement or we were going to lose her.

  “Don’t reach out,” Tom shouted.

  But I had already felt a rip in my shoulder.

  Tears were running down my eyes, it hurt so much.

  “Are you all right?” the cop asked. “I should have been spotting you.” />
  “We told you not to reach out!” Tom shouted at the woman.

  “I’m sorry. I thought you were going to drop me.”

  “I think I hurt my shoulder,” I moaned.

  The cop had to slide past the woman and take the chair, which I had balanced on my knee as I leaned against the wall.

  I couldn’t lift my arm.

  We had to get another crew to come out and help Tom with the call while a supervisor drove me to the hospital. I’m not a sissy, but I could have used a medic to get me some morphine for the pain.

  They gave me some at the hospital, along with the news I had torn my rotator cuff and would need surgery. On top of that, I would be out of work for up to two months or longer.

  They gave me some Percocet pills and sent me home. The Percocet made me nauseous. I called Carrie to see if she could bring me the prescription the doctor had given me over the phone to cure my vomiting, but she wasn’t home and wasn’t answering her cell phone. I didn’t want to upset or bother my mother.

  Fred stopped by in the ambulance to see how I was doing. In addition to going and picking up my prescription, he left me half a bag of dope he said he’d picked up on Garden Street.

  The reefer helped take away the pain and the nausea, and helped with my headaches too. I lay in bed trying not to think how being out of work was going to change my life. I let the merciful weed dim my brain and senses.

  Chapter 27

  I missed work. Once you get into something so hard, you inevitably go through withdrawal. You think you are a part of things, but then you go out and it’s like you were never there. The world goes on. You get lucky enough to come back and it is like you never left. People see you or they don’t. You’re not indispensable. You’re just a body. Someone to do the calls, someone to talk to. Not indispensable. Sort of visible and invisible at the same time. Meat in the seat.