Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
GRACE
I glanced at my reflection in the mirror. My wavy black hair cascaded down my back and shoulders. My olive complexion looked slightly wan under the brightness of the fluorescent lights in the fire station bathroom. My brown eyes looked large and lost. I hated feeling so hopeless. Despair tried to crawl into my brain and fester, but I refused to let it set up a permanent residence in my psyche.
I slowly brought my hands to my face and lightly pressed on my cheekbones to perk my features up a bit and bring some color back to my face.
"You can do this, Grace. You can handle him. You've had to deal with him for years — so why today of all days do you decide that you are going to reach your breaking point? You can't do that. Not today , Grace." I shot myself a look of perseverance, refusing to cave to an emotional breakdown.
I inhaled slowly and deeply, then I measuredly released the breath. I stared at my face in the reflection.
"He's not going to stop," I whispered. "No matter what you try to get him to ease up."
My expression mellowed, and my pupils dilated.
"I'm just not in the mood to deal with him today," I told myself.
So just ignore him, my brain told me.
I scoffed aloud. Easier said than done.
Normally whenever I gave myself pep talks, they worked about ninety percent of the time, but for whatever reason, I wasn't mentally buying it tonight.
"Maybe I'll get lucky, and the dispatch alarm will ring, and we'll have to go out to a job," I whispered aloud.
Not that I wanted to wish an emergency on anyone. I frowned, then groaned and turned around. I pushed the bathroom door open and stepped out into the snake pit. If I didn't force myself to do it, I'd dawdle in that bathroom forever trying to stall for time to avoid my problems.
Sure enough, the moment I stepped out of the bathroom, David was standing there in the hallway waiting on me.
He had his hands planted sternly on his hips. David was short — for a man. He claimed to be six feet tall, but I knew he wasn't. He was only five-ten. Not that height was everything, but when you had nothing else going for you as far as personality goes in David's case, there wasn't much else to back him up.
As soon as we made eye contact, David, the effervescent ego chaser, flexed his muscles and tightened his jawline quite acutely.
He had a nice, toned body, don't get me wrong.
He was handsome too, but his abrasive temperament made him impossible to get along with and dulled his attractiveness significantly.
He brushed a hand through his short black hair and then scratched the top of his head. He narrowed his dark eyes at me disapprovingly.
"You sure were in there a long time."
I tried to squeeze past him. "That's inappropriate, David."
David cuffed his hand around my arm and gently pulled me back toward him.
I glared at him and stiffened. " Stop, " I warned.
"I'm not doing anything," David protested and tried to sell me an innocent glance.
My eyes drifted slowly from his fingers that were coiled around my arm up to meet his steely gaze. I lifted my eyebrows with suspicion.
"Then what is your hand doing on my arm ?"
David immediately dropped my arm as if it was now spontaneously burning him to the touch.
He licked his lips and gave me an anxious look. "I just want to talk to you."
"That's funny." I crossed my arms over my chest and gave him a sullen, mocking glance up and down. "To you talking must mean you give yourself free reign to gripe at me over every little thing and put your hands on me without permission." I rubbed my arm in response to the current example.
"I haven't been griping at you," David said defensively, having the audacity to look offended by my accusation.
I leaned in close and gave him a resentful smirk. "Just because we used to date doesn't mean you can walk all over me."
David paused, frowning while he contemplated my statement. "I'm the second in command here at the fire station. I have authority?—"
" Don't go there with me," I said, raising my voice so high that I had to glance over my shoulder to make sure no one was listening.
"Don't push my buttons today, David," I hissed, staring him coldly in the face. "We have been broken up for a year. When are you going to move on and get a life of your own?—"
"Hey guys, come here and check this crazy shit out."
My protest was cut short by Mike Brass, the leader of our ladder crew of Station Twenty-Nine in the lower side of the Chicago precinct.
I glanced over my shoulder. Mike was waving us into the next room. He didn't seem to notice that David and I were arguing, which was a relief.
I brushed past David and into the 'hang out' as we called it, the upstairs room in the fire station that had a couple of couches — couches that had seen better days with sagging cushions and several chunks missing from the arms, but they were nevertheless still cozy after a long night out in the field. There were also a few chairs too, and a large flat screen tv that was attached to the wall.
The tv was on, and Mike was standing only a couple inches away — directly in front of it. His attention purely fixated on the news. His eyes were huge with disbelief at what he was seeing.
"What's going on?" I asked curiously, staring between Mike and the tv.
Mike had short, wavy black hair and large black eyes to match. He was wearing a long sleeved shirt, concealing his dark mocha skin tone. His mouth hung open with shock.
I stood next to him, my eyes panning to the screen to check out what had him so visibly disturbed.
A woman with fiery short, thick, red hair was holding a black microphone. Her green eyes pierced through the screen as she stared into her photographer's camera lens. Unblinking, she began to describe what sounded like a perplexing, albeit frightening scene outside in the streets of downtown Chicago.
"Authorities are advising everyone to stay in their homes or indoors at this hour until the source of these lights moving in the sky can be identified," the reporter explained with a professional, journalistic tone.
"What the hell?" David slowly approached. His eyebrows knitted with concern.
I laughed and pointed to the screen, at a large cluster of witnesses standing in a herd in the background of the camera.
"It doesn't look like people are taking the advice to stay indoors," I mentioned.
The reporter placed her hand to the earpiece plug in her ear and nodded swiftly.
"Folks, we have just gotten word that the source of the mystery in the sky might be meteorite showers that have hit five major world cities — Chicago included. The meteorites are being reported as large enough to inflict damage to life and property. Please remain indoors if you can, and don't venture out tonight unless vitally necessary," the reporter urged with large, pale green eyes.
My heart began to drum rapidly. I glanced at Mike — whose eyes were still rooted to the screen.
"Mike?"
"Huh?" Mike looked slightly startled as he turned his head to look at me.
"Why haven't we heard anything about this from dispatch?"
"I'm going to check it out," David said and jogged over to the balcony.
He opened the sliding glass door and stepped out onto the terrace, craning his neck as he curiously peered at the night sky overhead.
I took an apprehensive step outside too, followed by Mike and a few other firemen in our unit who were now popping up out of their beds to see what all the commotion was about.
Sirens wailed in the distance. Normally, this was something I was accustomed to hearing in this job — but not tonight. Something was eerie about the sound of these sirens tonight, and it made my stomach feel unsettled.
The police scanner crackled through the intercom speakers that were interspersed throughout the station.
"Structure fire on Third and Beckett Street. All units respond." The voice was that of a woman who seemed to be just as shaky and worried as I felt inside.
A moment later, another voice — this time male — broke out across the intercom. "Meteor shower damage is being reported to residential area in the Providence District."
"Shit," I whispered, more to myself than anyone else. I glanced at Mike. His features were marked with concerned. "This sounds bad?—"
Mike opened his mouth to give orders but before he got a single word out, a huge explosion boomed outside our station walls. We all raced back to the balcony and glanced out at the horrific scene unfolding in front of us.
An enormous fireball was incinerating the street about a mile away. Huge plumes of smoke billowed into the night air. Paper and other debris was blown to bits and dancing through the air like feathers floating back down to the ground.
I didn't even have time to react before another meteorite came barreling toward the ground at a mind bending speed.
A few seconds later, screams and shouts ensued from bystanders in the nearby vicinity. I glanced down in horror to see a crater the size of a small canyon in the middle of what used to be a heavy traffic intersection only a few blocks away.
"What the fuck is going on?" David shouted, his voice echoing hauntingly through the night air.
"Sound the alarm. We're rolling out to respond to those in trouble," Mike commanded.
He spun around and started shuffling toward the garage where our engines were waiting to be cranked. Mike was a little wobbly on his feet. He looked shell shocked and dizzy.
It was unnerving to see him so out of it. Mike was always the calm, level-headed one as our First Commander. We needed that kind of leadership because sometimes this ladder in particular could be an unruly bunch.
Mike was pushing forty. He had a wife and three kids and was an upstanding citizen — an amazing guy all around.
He was known as a neighborhood hero to the locals because he had spent a lifetime of servitude as a fireman — putting out fires and rescuing those in trouble for the past twenty-five years. Mike always put everyone else's needs in front of his own. There was no one on the planet less selfish than Mike Brass.
It was such a terrible misfortune that his number two, right hand man just happened to be David Ogata, my bitter ex-boyfriend and fellow fireman at this station.
Speaking of which, David came up behind me as we were leaping into our gear downstairs in the garage.
"Are you ready for this?" he asked with a patronizing smile.
I tried to ignore his subtle jabs. "As ready as I'll ever be."
"This is an emergency unknown — foreign. I just want to make sure you can handle it," David said.
I cut him an icy glare. "Let it go. I'm trained for emergencies of any kind. I know what I'm doing. Just because you still resent me for our breakup a year ago, doesn't reserve you the right to chastise me any chance you get."
Sure, I was slightly intimidated about what I might find out there in the streets tonight, but I sure as hell wasn't going to let David of all people know that. If you gave David an inch — he'd definitely take a mile.
The garage doors opened. The lights on the engines were turned on. The roar of the sirens began to flood the garage space, wailing and blaring through my ears. Adrenaline rushed through my veins and pumped through my heart.
We backed two trucks out into the Chicago streets with the lights flashing and the siren screaming through an already devastated and panicked environment. I took a deep breath and sat in the back, staring out the window — ready to investigate this strange phenomenon — and ready to get up close and personal with it.