Ambulance Girl by Jane Stern

Author:Jane Stern
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
ISBN: 9780307419774
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-18T05:00:00+00:00

9

I have been so focused on the ambulance that I have forgotten that I am now a member of a fire department and I have about thirty-five new people in my life that I have to get to know.

Life at the Georgetown firehouse runs by a schedule. Every Monday night there is a meeting. The first Monday of the month is a business meeting where the secretary reads the minutes of the last meeting and new business is attended to. On the other Mondays we have drills, which can range from staging a mock mass casualty to being really lazy and going out in the ambulance for ice cream.

Between Monday nights there are work details. They are called whenever something needs doing, which can range from scrubbing the ambulance to sweeping out the fire engine bays to hauling the Christmas lights down from the attic.

I have showed up on a Saturday afternoon to help sweep out the fire bays. The engines are all pulled out, and I sensibly wear jeans and a work shirt and heavy boots. I am looking forward to hanging out with the firemen. I love firemen.

When Michael and I used to live in another Connecticut town many years ago, a batty old lady lived in the apartment above us and always fell asleep while cooking something on her stove. On a regular basis she would set off fire alarms in her house and the town fire department would race to our building to snuff out a blazing chicken breast or a scorched steak. I liked the old lady’s fires because I was mad for the firemen. They were out of Playgirl magazine, big handsome hunks of men, wearing skintight T-shirts and yellow fire pants held up with red suspenders. They knew they looked hot and they were big flirts, casting a wink at me, flexing an arm muscle lazily as they put on their gear. I dreamed of their bunk-house, of how spectacular it would be to sit with them at a long table and share a meal.

Now I had dozens of firemen of my own. I had seen them around town, racing to fires or washing the fire trucks in back of the firehouse, but never met them. I had admired their fire gear, the hats and jackets with their names on the back hanging on hooks, their boots and pants lined up and ready to leap into at the first call of trouble. The fire bay smelled like smoke and rubber; the huge fire trucks gleamed, the chrome polished like something in a jeweler’s case.

When I arrived on Saturday morning for the work detail, a dozen firemen were already scrubbing and sweeping the bays. I was the only woman who showed up. When I appeared everyone grew silent. Only minutes before I could hear the banter, the curse words, the happy chatter; and now with me there, they acted like a nun had walked in on their fun. They swept the floors grim-faced and with eyes cast downward.

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