He was in class. Again. First day. Subject: primary search.
The thing about primary searches is this. You’ll be going in for live victims, often before the first hose is full. It’s not like in the movies. Flames don’t dance around behind and in front of you, backlighting your fellow firefighters like goblins in a Halloween cartoon. The flames don’t show you stairs or furnishings, or holes in the flooring. There’s only smoke. You can’t see shit.
But you can feel things. Like heat. Lots of it pressing in everywhere.
And you’ll hear things. Some sounds can help you. Some you won’t ever want to hear again. And some will make you wish you’d never heard them in the first place.
The whole time the smart part of you will be telling you to get the hell out of there. My job is to teach you to manage, not ignore, that very good advice.
Safety is not part of the job. It’s how we do the job.
*
Coughs erupting from his throat woke Noah Glover. The short-breath hacking shot pain through his lungs and abdomen, cutting off the air supply coming through the mask attached to his face. Without bothering to open his eyes, he snatched it off. He felt like shit. Dizzy, nauseated. Throat burning from smoke inhalation. Throbbing in his head. The hiss of oxygen and the slow annoying beep of machines told him where he was. Hospital. He must have messed up. Whenever he’d made a mistake as a firefighter, he went back to school, if only in his dreams.
He was trained in how to extricate himself from dangerous situations. Yet his breath tasted like ash on his tongue. He must have lost his head gear.
You never get used to the smothering blindness of the smoke. And he’d gotten two lungs full.
Was that why he felt like he was dying? His thoughts kept sliding away from him. Couldn’t remember a thing about the fire. Wait. He had bigger problems. Just staying alive for instance. Instinct was telling him that if he didn’t concentrate on his breathing it would stop.
Old panic spiked adrenaline through his system. Been there. Done that. Every firefighter had had a moment, sometimes several, when he knew everything was on the line, his life versus his will to live.
He tried to lever himself into a sitting position. All that got him was a quick ride on a drunken Tilt-A-Whirl. His stomach heaved as he grabbed for the bed rail.
“Morning, Sleeping Beauty.”
Noah blinked the room into focus. Across the narrow length of the curtained private room, Merle Durvan, the informal head of the arson investigation unit had made himself at home in a straight-back chair. His legs were crossed at the ankle, showing the well-used soles of his steel-toed boots. His fingers were laced across his abdomen, admirably flat for a man of forty-nine. Behind his thick but well-groomed mustache, his face wore no expression. Only his squint revealed the intensity of his gaze.
“How are you doing, Glover?”
Noah grunted, trying to catch a thought. Durvan was the most experienced arson investigator and bomb technician in Fort Worth. He also headed the training program for arson investigators. If anyone in the unit had a problem, question, dilemma, Durvan was the man they looked to. His presence meant Noah had messed up big time.
Noah tried to clear his throat only to choke. He reached for the cup of water on the bedside tray and drank. Tap water felt like gasoline going down.
When he could draw breath again, he locked eyes with his boss. “I feel like I died.”
“Funny you should mention that.” Durvan reached for a computer tablet he’d stashed under his arm. “Dying a particular wish of yours these days?”
“Not funny.”
“I don’t think so either.” Durvan uncrossed his legs to lean his hairy forearms against his knees, the tablet held in both hands. “Tell me about last night.”
Noah opened his mouth and snapped it shut. Last night. What had happened last night? He didn’t have a clue. Couldn’t remember the call. The fire. Why he’d been called in. Who he’d gone out with to investigate a possible arson. Nada.
A chill ran over Noah’s skin. The sensation of trouble he couldn’t quite place told him to choose his words carefully. It wasn’t smart to be answering questions about events he couldn’t recall.