I pressed my eyes shut and tried to trace back to my steps.
“The school was on fire,” I said slowly.
“Good!” Olivia said encouragingly. “What else?”
“One of my students was missing. I ran back into the building to look for her. The hallways were filled with smoke and I could barely breathe. I was running around in circles. And then I saw--”
Rory. His face flooded my mind.
“What?” the EMT pressed. “What did you see?”
I flicked open my eyes and his face disappeared.
“Can smoke inhalation cause hallucinations?” I asked. Then I added quickly, “Hypothetically speaking, of course…”
“What kind of hallucinations?” Olivia looked intrigued.
“I don’t know,” I shrugged casually. “Like… maybe an old acquaintance?”
The EMT frowned, and I had a feeling that I wasn’t exactly acing her series of questions.
“Did you see someone you know inside the building?” she asked.
“No,” I said quickly. Then, reluctantly, “But I think I saw someone I used to know…”
“And you think it was a hallucination?” she asked. “Why?”
“Because it’s impossible,” I said. “It couldn’t be him. I haven’t seen him in over a decade, and… it’s just impossible.”
Olivia’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully, then she leaned on the edge of my stretcher and asked,
“Could you describe him for me?”
“Umm…” I felt my cheeks turn pink and I swallowed nervously.
“Did he have black hair?”
“Yes…”
“Dark, kinda miserable looking eyes?” Olivia continued. “Thick beard?”
“Huh? Wha-- how did you know that?!”
“Was he dressed like a fireman?”
My eyes popped wide open and I jolted up on the stretcher. I was officially freaked out.
“Just… sit tight,” Olivia said, holding up a hand to calm me down. “There’s someone I think you should see…”
I watched as Olivia stood up and crossed the narrow ambulance, then she pushed open the door and poked her head out.
I couldn’t hear what she said, but almost immediately I saw the door open further. Then the EMT stepped aside and Rory climbed into the ambulance.
The bus shook with his weight, and he was so tall that he had to bend his neck to stand over me on the stretcher.
He looked so different, but the little pieces of Rory that I remembered were still there, that straight nose, those dark eyes…
I wasn’t hallucinating. He was real… and he was really here.
“I’m going to give you two some alone time,” Olivia said. She slipped around Rory, then hopped out of the ambulance and slammed the door shut behind her.
Rory’s eyes never left me. They held me tight, like a harness. I remembered how safe I used to feel when he was around; like I had a guardian angel that was always looking out for me.
“Long time no see,” he said finally. His lips twitched, and I could see the faintest hint of a smile through his beard.
My mouth fell open and I heard a soft exhale roll from my lips. There was so much that I wanted to say, and so many questions that I wanted to ask… but I couldn’t find the words.
Suddenly I had the chills. I wasn’t even cold, but my entire body started shaking and shivering.
“Oh, Des…” Rory noticed right away. His eyes filled with gentle guilt, and he pulled off his jacket and draped it around my shoulders. It was warm and heavy… so heavy that my shoulders sagged underneath its weight. There was something comforting about the pressure, and there was something even more comforting about the way it smelled like him; like cologne and ash, and something familiar… something that brought me right back to that night at the park.
My lungs still ached, but I took a deep inhale of him anyways.
God, I had missed that smell. When we were younger, I couldn’t get enough of it. I would lean close or drop my head on his shoulder, just so I could breathe him in.
For a second, I was lost, high on pheromones and whatever the hell was pumping into my veins from the IV drip bag… then I snapped back to my senses and immediately stiffened under the weight of the fireman’s jacket.
“What are you doing here?” I asked him bluntly.
“I work at the fire department,” he said. “Firehouse 56. We got a call this morning about a fire at the school, and--”
“No,” I stopped him. “I mean here, as in Hartford. What are you doing in Hartford?”
“Oh,” he said. “I moved back.”
“Why?”
He looked slightly hurt by that question, and he didn’t say anything for several seconds.
“Why?” I repeated. “Why now? After… how many years?”
I knew damn well how many years it had been, but I didn’t want to admit that. I didn’t want him to know that I cared as much as I did…
“Eleven years,” he said softly.
“Eleven years,” I repeated, “And you just… show up out of the blue?”
“It’s complicated,” he said wearily.
“Oh, it’s complicated?” I sneered. I knew that I was getting emotional -- worse, I was getting mean -- but I couldn’t help it. I had been holding the emotions in for so long, and now the dam had broken and everything was pouring out of me.
“What about when you left without saying goodbye?” I asked. “Was that ‘complicated’ too?”
His eyes ignited with hurt. I had seen that same look in his eyes so many times, but I had never been the one to cause it.
“Did you think I did that on purpose?” he asked me. His voice was so low, that I almost couldn’t hear it over the hum of the heart monitor. “Des, the Connecticut State Police were at my house. They had already arrested my stepfather for assaulting an officer, and they had my mother in handcuffs on the curb. I didn’t have a choice… they dragged me out of the house.”
I was silent. There had been so many times that I attempted to fill in the blanks about what happened that night, after the police showed up at Rory’s house. I had written and re-written so many fictional accounts of that night in my head, but it still remained a mystery to me.
“I didn’t want to leave,” Rory said gently. His eyes were burning, and his jacket was heavy on my shoulders. “And I never would have left without saying goodbye to you, Des…”
“But you did,” I whispered.
I knew that I couldn’t blame Rory for what happened that night. I knew that it was outside of his control. But Rory had eleven years to say goodbye, and he never did.
When he left that night, he vanished into thin air.
“Can we talk about this?” Rory asked me.
“We’re talking right now.”
“No. Not here…” he shook his head. “Can I meet you? Dinner, maybe?”
Do you know how many times I would have given anything for ‘dinner’ with Rory over the last eleven years?
I wanted to say yes… but instead, I found myself shaking my head slowly and glancing down at my hands.
“I don’t see the point,” I said. “We’re practically strangers now. I don’t know you anymore.”
“Des--”
“It’s been eleven years,” I told him. “The past is the past. Ancient history.”
He looked crushed, but before he could say anything the ambulance door opened behind him.
“Knock knock!” the EMT said, climbing back up into the bus. “Am I interrupting anything?”
“No,” I said firmly. “Rory was just leaving.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN | RORY
“What the hell happened out there, McAlister?!” the promoter screamed. “I had five G’s on this fight, and you stood there taking punches like a fucking blow-up doll!”
I tried to pull my head up, but my brain was doing somersaults inside my skull. The entire room was spinnin
g. My stomach heaved and I spit a mouthful of blood and bile into the bucket between my knees.
“Jesus,” the promoter grunted in disgust. “Look at yourself, McAlister. You can’t go back out there like this.”
“I’m fine,” I said. The words sounded slurred; my lips and tongue were swollen, and I was hanging onto consciousness by a thread.
I was far from “fine,” but I knew that I needed to get back into the ring. I didn’t have a choice… I needed to finish this fight.
“You’re fucking insane!” the promoter cackled, gnawing on the toothpick that was wedged beneath his gold-plated canine. “He knocked you out. Game over…”
“It’s not over yet,” I snarled, spitting another mouthful of blood into the bucket.
I forced myself to sit up on the stool, then I dumped a water bottle over my head to wash away the sweat and blood that stained my skin. I felt a stinging sensation ignite everywhere that my opponent’s fist had left its mark, but I ignored the pain… just like I ignored the second wave of nausea that was battling its way up my esophagus.
The skin on my knuckles was cracked and raw. The fissures had been sealed shut with super glue, but fresh blood seeped out as I re-wrapped my hands in gauze.
“You’re a crazy motherfucker, you know that?” the promoter said, shaking his head. Then he grinned and rubbed his palms together greedily, “Alright, fine. Let’s get you back in that ring, eh? Let’s see if you can win back those five G’s…”
That’s what this was all about, the money.
I couldn’t pry my eyes open without seeing double. My lungs were throbbing, the blood in my veins was ice-cold, and my skin was bruised and stretched tight over my swollen muscles.
After that last fight, I was fucked up… maybe even concussed. Getting back into the ring now was like feeding myself into a meat grinder… but I needed that fucking money.
I had just gotten accepted into the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy. Training to become a Boston firefighter wasn’t some sort of life goal or dream come true for me... it was an escape route. It was a steady paycheck with benefits and health insurance… all things I needed, now that I had a baby on the way.
I was going to be a dad, and that meant it was time to clean up my act. No more underground cage fights; no more going home with a broken nose and a bloody wad of cash.
The Firefighting Academy was my ticket out of this life, but that ticket wasn’t free… tuition was going to set me back a couple grand, and that was before equipment and test fees.
I needed cash, and going back into the ring was the only way I knew how to get it.
One last fight, I told myself. That’s all I need… just one last fight.
I forced myself up onto my feet and blinked through the cloud of blood that stained my eyes. I balled my hands into fists and ignored the pain as I cracked my knuckles.
My opponent was waiting for me in the ring, drenched in sweat and undefeated. The crowd was jeering and rock music was blaring through the speakers.
I stumbled forward and felt my stomach twist. I wanted to give up… but then I thought about my daughter. She was just a peanut-shaped blob floating in the middle of a black and white sonogram, but already she deserved so much more than I could give her.
I was doing this for her.
One last fight… I told myself. And then I’ll never have to fight again…
I ducked my head under the ropes as I entered the ring, then I raised my fists in front of my chest and slowly strode towards my opponent...
***
“UGH!” I grunted as I slammed the full force of my right fist into the leather punching bag. A dull, burning pain shot through my knuckles, but I ignored it as I twisted my shoulders and drove my left fist into the bag.
Over and over, I pummeled the bag with my fists.
Right, left, right, left…
I was in the Firehouse 56 weight room, waging a one-sided war on the 300-pound punching bag that was chained to the ceiling.
The chain rattled with from the impact and my knuckles screamed as they cracked against leather, each punch harder than the last. I was hoping that if I hit the bag hard enough, I could drown out the sound of Desiree Leduc’s words echoing in my head.
‘Ancient history…’
‘We’re practically strangers…’
The words got louder, and I punched harder; right, left, right, left...
I was so focused on the bag that I didn’t hear the weight room door creak open, or the sound of footsteps trampling into the room.
“UGH!” I grunted loudly, driving all of my weight into the bag.
Right, left, right, left--
“Holy shit!” a voice suddenly whistled out of nowhere.
That’s when I froze.
My boiling hot blood went cold and my muscles immediately stiffened. My knuckles grazed the bag on their way down, and I spun around to see a handful of crewmembers gaping at me from the opposite side of the weight room in stunned silence.
Troy Hart was the first to speak up,
“Who the hell pissed you off, McAlister?” he quipped as he strode into the room, then edged around me to the get to the weight rack.
“No kidding,” another crewmember whistled through his teeth. “The way you’re throwing your fists around, you’d think you just caught the punching bag in bed with your mother.”
We hadn’t been formally introduced yet, but I recognized him as the month of August. Between his cheesy spread in the calendar and his lame attempt at a ‘yo mama’ joke, I had a hunch we weren’t going to hit it off.
“Seriously though… you feeling ok, McAlister?” Duke Williams asked. “You sure you don’t need a Snickers bar or something?”
“I’m fine,” I muttered under my breath.
“You’re tense,” Troy countered, eyeing me from the weight rack. “Those deltoids don’t lie, brother.”
“And look at those veins bulging out of your neck!” Duke corroborated. “You could pluck those things like banjo strings!”
“Shit,” Troy cackled. “Hey Walker, do you think you could play us the theme song from ‘Deliverance’ on McAlister’s neck?”
“Fuck off, Troy,” Walker Wright rolled his eyes. “I’m from Texas, not Bumfuck, West Virginia.”
“Same thing,” Troy shrugged.
I realized how tightly I was clenching my upper body -- from my jaw, to my neck, to my shoulders -- but I couldn’t force myself to relax. The taunting words of my new coworkers definitely didn’t help...
“Come on, McAlister,” Troy grinned encouragingly. “It’s obvious that there’s something you’re just dying to get off your chest. Spit it out.”
“Yeah,” a voice echoed from across the room. “You can talk to us…”
“Hey,” Troy’s head cocked to the side and his eyes narrowed. “This wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with that damsel in distress you saved the other day, would it?”
My pulse thumped through my veins and a bead of ice-cold sweat rolled off my brow.
“Wait… huh?” Mr. August asked, flicking his eyes between Troy and I in confusion. “What did I miss?”
“McAlister rescued this chick the other day, at the Hartford High cafeteria fire,” Duke explained. “I think she was a teacher?”
“A smokin’ hot teacher,” Troy added. Then, realizing his unintended pun, he chuckled proudly.
“Anyways,” Duke continued, “She was unconscious when Rory found her inside the building. He had to carry her out, and--”
“He was doing his job,” Walker interrupted firmly. “A woman was trapped inside the building and needed assistance, and McAlister carried her to safety. Standard procedure.”
“Sure,” Duke shrugged. “But I don’t remember it being ‘standard procedure’ to camp out in front of the ambulance for thirty minutes while you wait for said woman to regain consciousness.”
“Definitely not standard procedure,” Mr. August agreed. “That’s what I call g
oing above and beyond the line of duty.”
“That’s what I call having a crush,” Troy smirked. “Sounds like someone was feeling… ‘hot for teacher.’”
Right on cue, Mr. August dropped to his knees and strummed at an air guitar as he belted out the chorus to Van Halen’s ‘Hot for Teacher.’ Troy just grinned proudly, then glanced towards me.
“Come on, McAlister,” he said. “Am I right, or am I right?”
You’re a fucking asshole, I wanted to shoot back. Instead, I clenched my jaw and glared down at the soft, spongy weight room floor as my hands balled into fists.
“Careful,” Mr. August warned Troy playfully. “You don’t wanna piss this guy off… you saw what he did to the punching bag.”
“Leave him alone, guys,” Josh Hudson snapped. His eyes flicked towards me as he strode across the room, and he flashed me a small smile before he hunched over the weight rack next to Troy.
“We’re just trying to help,” Troy shrugged innocently. “Firehouse 56 is a family. That means looking out for one another--”
“Being a ‘family’ also means knowing when to keep your mouth shut and mind your own damn business,” Josh snapped back. “I learned that the hard way…” he added under his breath as he shoved a heavy weight plate onto his barbell.
“Alright, alright…” Troy murmured, shaking his head in defeat as he stood up slowly from the weight rack. “I’ll drop it… for now. But the offer still stands, McAlister, if you need any brotherly advice on how to talk to women…”
“Dude, shut up!” Duke rolled his eyes dramatically. “You’re the last person that should be dishing out dating advice…”
“I don’t know about that,” he grinned back. “At the rate you losers are getting wifed up and locked down, I might be one of the last bachelors left standing at Firehouse 56!”
“You say that like settling down is a bad thing,” Josh challenged him with a scowl.
“Hey, man… if you want to give up your freedom to change dirty diapers and have boring sex once a month with the same woman for the rest of your life, then more power to you,” Troy shrugged. “I just hope it’s not contagious! The last thing I need is a kid…”
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