by Lynn, Davida
Besides his job, was there a future for us? I might not have been ready to have children that moment, but I was thinking two or three years down the road. Despite taking things slow on our second go around, I pictured Jonah as the father of my children. It was a vision that made me feel warm and comforted inside.
That was before I heard how he really felt, though.
The rest of the day, I spent icing my hand and worrying. I tried not to worry, but it was hard. Yes, Jonah and I were taking it slow, if you ignored the sex. Yes, we had only been on one date, if you ignored the time two years ago. Yes, I didn’t really know how he felt about children. No, it didn’t help me, any.
I dialed my phone, because I needed someone to ground me.
“Katie, I’m going a little nuts.”
After I explained to her what happened, she agreed that I was going nuts. It was hard for her to be objective, but I wasn’t exactly looking for objective. I was looking for someone to calm me down.
“Trust me, you don’t need to be worrying about what someone thinks of kids until two months in. Two months is when the puppy love starts to fade, and the real people start to come out. Then you see if he’s worth a damn.” I could hear in her voice that she didn’t think he was.
I nodded, turning in my chair to look out onto Detroit. “Maybe your right. I know it’s way early. I know that, but I’m still having a crisis. My ovaries are trying to take me over.”
Katie laughed, “Don’t let them, girl. Silence them with margaritas and birth control!”
I shook my head. Katie wasn’t a fan of Jonah’s, but she just wanted what was best for me and what made me happy. “I’m already on the pill, and as soon as the whistle blows, I’ll see what I can do about the margs.”
Katie wouldn’t have liked hearing that I planned on spending my Tuesday night with Jonah. I’d let her rest easy thinking I’d drink my problems away. I was nervous for me and Jonah. Would the discussion of kids linger between us and ruin the evening?
Not two minutes after hanging up with Katie, my phone buzzed on my desk, and I didn’t have to worry about anything ruining my evening with Jonah.
Have to cancel tonight. Something came up. Sry.
Great…
I sat at home drinking a beer. It was not how I had originally intended on spending my Tuesday night. The text was a cowardly thing to do, but I had to get my head on straight. I read things on Abbey’s face that had me worried.
I had to stop telling myself that we had only been on one date. We’d only been on one date in two years. We’d actually dated for three months and then taken a two year break. In that time, she’d grown up, and she wanted more out of life than the rush of adrenaline and the thrill of a rescue in the middle of the night. I understood that she had grown up, but had I?
That had me worried. I didn’t want to lose Abbey, but I wanted her to get everything that she wanted. I wrestled with that thought all night. Just when I had thought I was enough, I realized that the world was bigger than just Abbey and me.
After a fourth beer and no new answers, I called it a night. More than once I had picked up my phone intending to text Abbey. I set it down realizing I had no words. Nothing I could've said would help any. I felt stuck, and that scared me more than leaving Engine 37, more than dealing with Havens, more than all my fears combined.
The sound of four hundred kids in a gymnasium was a cacophony after the silence I had enjoyed just a half hour earlier. It had been peaceful as I set up my extinguisher and my bunker gear, but all of those kids yapping at once was anything but peaceful. It didn't do anything to help my nerves, either.
I pulled out my notecards, cursing myself for writing so little. At the time, I told myself that the shorthand would be easy to decipher, but as I stared at them, they might as well have been Greek.
“This'll be fun,” I mused to myself.
I forced a smile as the school principal stepped on stage with me. She extended her hand, and I shook it. I wonder how she was able to keep calm in this chaos. "Thank you again, Mr. Swain. The kids look forward to this every year."
"Jonah is fine. I'm happy to do it, but I can't lie. It's been a while since I've given the fire safety talk, and I don't know if I've ever given it to this many kids at a time." I looked out over the sea of tiny faces. Some of them were staring at me already. Most were talking to friends, fidgeting, and fighting with the person next to them. Little hellions.
The principal—I had already forgotten her name—looked out over them with me. "Sure, if you leave them to their own devices, the noise level climbs and climbs." She raised a hand with all five fingers extended, and as she slowly counted down, the entire school silenced. By the count of two, all I heard was rustling and the occasional cough. "But they can be trained, well enough."
She stepped to the microphone at the front of the stage and addressed her school, "Good morning, Bennett Elementary.”
All four hundred kids answered in unison, "Good morning, Mrs. Grayson." Well trained, indeed. Greyson, that was her name. Laura Greyson.
"We have a special guest this morning. Firefighter Swain is from the Detroit Fire Department, and he's here today to talk about fire safety." She had a slow and sing-songy voice that must have been a requirement for anyone teaching elementary. "I want you on your best behavior. Everyone, please welcome Mr. Swain."
It was strange not hearing “lieutenant” in front of my name. I could sympathize with the military personnel that had difficulty transitioning back into civilian life. It was the little things that tripped me up.
"Good morning, Mr. Swain." The four hundred well-trained terrors ushered me to the microphone. I felt silly for letting my heart pound as much as it did. Why was this scarier than cutting holes in the roof of a fully engulfed house fire? Why was this more terrifying than a rescue mission inside a collapsed structure?
I stepped front and center, eight hundred eyes trained on me. Game time. I cleared my throat in preparation, and it reverberated through the gym. Lucky for me, the clichéd feedback wasn't there. I turned to the side and coughed before facing the microphone once again.
"Good morning, guys and gals. Like your principal said, I'm a firefighter with the Detroit fire department, and I want to talk with you guys about staying safe. I've got a question for you. Now, don't all shout out loud. I want to see some hands. Who can tell me the number to call in an emergency?"
A smattering of hands shot up across the gym floor. After a few seconds, I pointed at one of the children near the front row. She was a little girl in a yellow and white polka dot dress with a matching beret. "Um, you call 911." Her voice was soft, and I'm sure half the room didn't hear.
I nodded, exaggerating my movements. "That's right. If there's an emergency, you dial 911. On the count of three, I want everybody to say it with me. One, two, three."
Every child in the room screamed the number out loud, as if just waiting for a chance to blow off some steam. The collection of tiny voices bounced up every corner of the gym, and I realized their idle chatter before the presentation started was nothing compared to their roar.
Something about it made me laugh, "That's right. Good job, kids."
For the next half hour, I had their undivided attention. I didn't reach for the cards once, and after they had all shouted back to me, my nerves seemed to float away. Talking to them wasn't difficult, after all. Use small words and keep them engaged: nothing to it. I asked other questions to give some students a chance to raise their hands.
By the time I stepped back, I didn't even feel like I was in a room of that many tiny ones. It didn't feel so big at all. When Mrs. Grayson stepped back up to the microphone, I looked around. Even though the principal was talking, I saw that most of the eyes were still on me. It was strange and powerful. I think I might've actually gotten through to them.
"A big round of applause for Mr. Swain, kids." Even the principal turned around to clap for me, so I couldn’t have screwed up that badly. "I want everybod
y to give Firefighter Swain a big Bennett thank you."
My heart leapt in my chest when the huge group of children in the gym all thanked me at once. Maybe they weren't germ-riddled little tyrants, after all.
After my big speech had ended, I got to stop into each classroom for a few minutes and let the kids ask me questions. I let them handle the bunker gear, and I even took a few pictures to go up on the classroom walls.
Interacting with some of the older elementary children showed me that I didn't have to tell myself down nearly as much as I thought. They were very intelligent, and they could understand a lot more than I gave them credit for. I was surprised to find out that they understood how dangerous it was to be a firefighter. They understood more about life and death than I would've imagined.
And they were like sponges. I asked some questions to see how well they'd paid attention at the big assembly, and it was all in there. They had heard everything I said, and they understood it. The excitement on the children's faces made me wonder why I had ever been nervous in the first place.
Even younger kids asked really great questions; some I’d never heard before. They wanted to know how long I worked, how big the fire trucks were, anything and everything related to the fire service. I tried to remember the community outreach events I’d done with Engine 37, but none of them went as well as my visit to Bennett Elementary.
When I left the school around two in the afternoon, my cheeks hurt. As I pulled the fire department SUV door closed, I realized that my cheeks hurt from smiling. I stared at myself in the mirror, giving myself a questioning look. What the hell? Abbey was the only other person who could do that to me.
Heading back to the station, I tried to wrap my head around the day. I wasn't expecting a bad experience, per se, but I was not expecting it to go well; especially that well. It was a late spring day filled with sunshine and warmth, and I headed back to HQ with all the windows down. I took an indirect route back, allowing me to roll past Engine 50, one of the busiest in the entire city.
A couple guys were hosing off a ladder truck as I passed. They both raised a hand to me when they recognized the SUV. It was equipped with lights and sirens, and I couldn't help but give them a whoop whoop as I passed. I didn't know them, and they didn't know me, but we were part of the same brotherhood. Their station might have had a bad apple or two, just like Engine 37, but the mission was clearer to me.
As I drove through Detroit, I realized that it needed protection even if that protection came from egomaniacs and assholes.
I wanted to tell Abbey how things had gone at my first event, but that meant an apology. Another apology. I knew I shouldn't have blown her off, and I knew "I was scared" wasn't a good excuse. I had been scared two years before, and that had ended terribly.
Parking at HQ, I fully intended to walk right into her office and explain myself. I had to tell her how I felt about kids, how they weren't as bad as I thought, and how it was immature of me not to bring it up when Abbey how she felt about children. I was very good at digging holes, and it was time to start filling them in so I could throw the damn shovel away.
I knocked on Abbey's door with a hand already on the knob ready to head inside. When she responded, I headed in. Her expression changed the second she saw me.
I started writing, "Look, I'm really sorry about yesterday. I'm not a lie, I got a little freaked out, and –"
"Jonah, I'm a little busy." Her voice was granite. There was no hint of familiarity or warmth at all. "I've been swamped all day, and it's not going to let up. Maybe another time, huh?"
For a moment, I stood there staring at her. I'm not saying I didn't deserve it, but damn could she be cold when she wanted to be. I nodded, knowing when it was best to let her be. "Okay, I understand. We'll talk later." I didn't know if it was a statement or question, and Abbey didn't give me a response that helped out. Her eyes were back to the computer screen, and I was back outside her office.
I forced myself to write a quick summary of the event. I thought it would keep my mind off things, but I was wrong. I had expected backlash from Abbey, but I had also expected a chance to explain myself. I couldn't blame her, though. I'm sure her nerves were pretty fried from everything I had done for the last few weeks. Jumping back into her life, asking her out, maybe it was all too much too quick. All the sensations felt heightened: the good felt great, but the bad felt terrible.
She needed time to cool down. I knew that, but it didn't make things any easier. I was itching for a chance to explain myself, but I had to give her the time she needed. I didn't see her in the lobby of our building come 5 o'clock. I didn't have any texts from her, and I forced myself not to send her anything.
On my drive home, the phone buzzed in my pocket. I almost swerved into the other lane trying to dig my phone out. I grossed myself, but waited until I got to a red light. The text was not who I thought would be from. When the name came up, adrenaline pumped into my veins. Havens was the last person I wanted to hear from.
U better get that woman under control. I won't be as forgiving next time.
Jonah knew I was a tough woman. He had seen that when we were on Engine 37 together, and he understood that even when I forced him out of my office. At least, I hoped so. Yes, he had caught me at that moment, but it wasn’t like he lied to me. He had every right to cancel plans, just like I had shot his plans them ??? the day before.
I thought about texting him and asking him to come over that night. The whole second chance thing really had us at each other’s throats. There was a lot of tension, there was a lot of sexual tension, and I think we were still discovering what had changed over two years.
At the same time, his comments about children were still ringing in my ears. It wasn’t like I outright asked him, but he wasn’t pulling his punches when it came to his feelings. I wondered how he had done on his first prevention event at the elementary school. He had a smile on his face when he had come into my office, but maybe he was just happy to be rid of them.
At the end of the day, I decided having the night to myself might not be a bad idea. A night without Katie, a night without Jonah; Abbey time.
The world was going to be put aside for a little bit, except somebody forgot to tell the world. About ten minutes after I got home, there was a knock at my door. Not one knock, exactly, but one steady stream of knocks until I finally opened the door.
Jonah was standing there with wide eyes, his hands already in a defensive position, “You’re mad. I get that. You probably don’t want me to be here. I get that, too. If you’ll just let me say my piece, I’ll go, deal?”
Jonah was sweet. He was also dumb, but the sweet kind. I rolled my eyes and shook my head, defeated. “Say your piece, then I’ll say mine.”
“What I said this morning about kids? That was just me a little nervous and stressed out about being swamped by them. I’m grateful for this job, but before today, I didn’t know if I could do it. This whole new schedule, new job, new old relationship, it’s got me stressed. I shoulda told you that.” Jonah’s eyes were darting all over. He looked like he was on the verge of a panic attack.
“Jonah, Jonah. Calm down. It’s all right.”
“No, it’s not all right. I’m rambling.” His eyes came to a stop, and for a second Jonah didn’t say anything. Then, he looked up at me. “Your thing this morning wasn’t a meeting, was it?”
I clenched my jaw, knowing I couldn’t lie to him. “It wasn’t exactly a meeting.”
He nodded, speaking a little slower with more deliberate strength in his voice, “I got a text from Havens. You want to tell me how the meeting went?”
With Jonah calmed down, I could feel how much he cared for me. Despite my trying to push him away, he knew it was better for us to talk about what had been going on. I smiled and raised my right hand with the knuckles facing him.
“It didn’t go so well for him. Actually, it didn’t go so well for me, either. I thought the swelling would have gone down by now.” I didn�
��t really know if Jonah would be charmed by the tough girl act. He would have taken it as an insult to his manhood. I tried to give him a cute little look as I waited for his reaction.
