3. Miles
MILES
“Adler!”
The booming voice of the chief rings out through the firehouse. Tracking the sound of his voice, I find him leaning against the railing upstairs after stepping out of his office. I can see the vein popping out of his forehead from where I’m standing and I know shit’s about to hit the fan.
“Fuck,” I groan under my breath.
“Ohhhh, someone’s in trouble,” Carter hums with a smirk. “What’d you do to piss off the principal?”
“I have no idea but—”
“Adler, now,” Chief shouts again, cutting me off. When I look back at him, he points at me and then disappears back into his office.
Sighing, I hang up the equipment I’m doing a quality check on and head for the stairs. I’ve worked as a firefighter for the last five years of my life—each of them under Chief—and know that you’re in some deep shit when he calls you by your last name.
“Something wrong, Chief?” I ask, stepping into his office.
Pictures of his family and group photos of past and current company members hang on the walls.
Well into his sixties, he’s seen a lot during his time at Firehouse Nine.
As acting chief for over twenty years, he’s run this firehouse with precision, care, and most of all pride.
He protects the men and women who serve under him like they’re his own children.
Maybe that’s why walking into his office now feels like getting a lecture from a father rather than my boss.
“Sit down,” he barks, jutting his chin towards the couch. I’ve found him sleeping on it more times than I have fingers. Whenever we’re called out to a bad fire or accident, he’s here waiting for us to come back no matter how late it is when we return.
I do as I’m told and lower myself down. The pads of my fingers press into the tops of my legs as I wait for him to speak. Chief is a good man, but a traditional one. You don’t speak until spoken to when he calls you into his office.
“How are you?” he asks after an awkward pause. The tone of his voice shifts into something more comforting than aggressive.
My eyes narrow for a millisecond before I catch myself. “I’m fine?” I respond as more of a question than a statement. I feel my heart pick up a few beats as he studies me, the crow’s feet in the corners of his eyes becoming more pronounced as he does.
“Don’t lie to me, son. I know what you went through is hard to recover from—”
“I’m fine, sir. I was cleared to come back to duty; you signed off on the paperwork yourself.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that you went through something traumatic.”
“With all due respect, sir, I’m fine. I’ve been through worse in the past and there hasn’t been a gap in my performance since returning.”
“You froze,” he replies firmly, folding his hands on the top of his desk.
This time I can’t stop my face from reflecting my confusion. “I—what?”
“You. Froze.” He says each word as a full sentence. “A few people came to me with concerns about your well-being. Said you hesitated at the apartment fire last weekend.”
I blink hard a few times as my mind tries to figure out who ratted me out. “I was assessing the scene, sir. Trying to figure out how to manage the fire and keep everyone safe.”
“That may be true, but regardless, there’s no space for hesitation in our line of work. A fraction of a second can mean the difference between life and death. I don’t think that fact is lost on either of us.”
The air in the room becomes grim at the mention of death. I bite down on the inside of my cheek so hard that the copper tang of blood trickles down my tongue. Shame and guilt overtake me and I can’t bring myself to look at the man sitting in front of me.
He sighs heavily before speaking again. “I’m requiring you to begin department mandated therapy.”
My eyes shoot up and my jaw hits the floor but he raises a hand before I can object.
“You will attend weekly meetings with the union’s approved therapist and only when they say it’s okay will you stop. You can continue to work while you see them but they will be reporting directly back to me on how things are going.”
“Chief, that’s completely unnecessary. I told you I’m—”
“You need to work through what happened or it will haunt you forever. You have people here who count on you, Adler. The men and women in this building look to you for guidance and direction. They can’t do their jobs safely if you aren’t in the right frame of mind.”
“Sir, I am—”
“Starting next week,” he cuts me off. “Here’s the card for the person you’re going to. Knowing how you would react, I made your first appointment for you. You start on Thursday.”
I stare at him in disbelief for a moment before leaning over and taking the business card he slid across his desk. I scan over it quickly, not fully taking in what it says. He can’t be serious; I don’t need therapy. What I need is to deck whoever the hell ratted me out.
“And if I don’t go?” I ask through gritted teeth.
“Then you’ll be station-bound until you get over your ego. Carter will step in and lead until you get your head right.” The finality in his words and the way he leans back in his chair tells me this conversation is over.
Pushing up from the couch, I wave the card at him with my lips pressed into a hard line and head for the door.
“Adler,” he calls out and I turn to look at him. “This isn’t a punishment, son. This will be good for you. We all need a little extra help sometimes.”
“Sure,” is all I can muster up before pulling the door to his office closed behind me.
Once in the hallway, I force out a deep breath and read the business card. The name ‘Hanna Smith’ with a million letters behind it is printed across the center.
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” I groan to myself. Before I know it, my best friend appears by my side.
“So, what’d you do?”
I quickly stow the card in my back pocket. “Nothing. He wanted to talk to me about the next round of on-site training.”
He raises a brow at me. “You’re a moron, you know that, right?”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I gruff, heading for the kitchen. It’s nearly lunch and a call could come in at any minute. Eating when we have the time is important in our line of work.
“You think I don’t know when you’re lying to me?” he scoffs. “What’s the card he gave you?”
Being slightly more agile than I am, he reaches for my back pocket and slips the business card out of it. I try to deflect him but he’s too fast. Growing up together, we know each other as well as we know ourselves. My hand reaches for the card but he manages to get away from me.
“Hanna Smith, psychiatrist?” He leans into the word before glancing back at me. “He’s sending you to a shrink?”
I sigh heavily and grit my teeth before pulling the card from his hand. Tucking it back into my pocket, I cross my arms in front of me and lean against the kitchen counter.
“Did you tell him about last week? At the apartment fire?”
I watch as his eyes scan the floor, trying to recall what I’m talking about.
“No? What’s there to tell?”
“Apparently someone narked about how I ‘froze’ at the scene. I didn’t freeze; I was just assessing the situation and trying to come up with an action plan to contain the fire,” I explain.
His face wavers between a grimace and a frown. “Well…”
“Well what?” I bark, taking a step closer to him.
He reacts by taking a protective step back. “Well, dude, you did kind of freeze. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t say anything to the chief about it but there was a hesitation there. You can’t act like there wasn’t.”
Leave it to him to keep it real with me like he always does. While he might walk around like he has the entire sun shoved up his ass half the time, he never fails to keep shit real when he needs to.
I roll my neck and move towards the fridge. “That doesn’t mean I need therapy. I’m fine; I wish people fucking believed that.”
A silence falls on the room and the only noise between us is the sound of me reheating the leftovers from yesterday’s dinner. When he doesn’t speak, which is unusual at best for him, I turn to look at him. A solemn expression has fallen over his face and he avoids my gaze.
“What happened to Wesley isn’t your fault, Miles,” he risks saying, sighing hard before bringing his eyes to mine.
A pit in my stomach opens up at the sound of his name. My throat feels tight as I try to come up with something to say.
“Accidents happen—”
“And it’s my job to make sure they don’t,” I bite, clenching my fists on top of the counter.
“You tried to save him.”
“But I didn’t, did I? And now Harper and the girls have no one. She’s a widow and those three little girls will grow up without a father because of me.”
Guilt and shame grow in my gut and the burning heat I feel when I think about them is scorching the back of my neck. I forcefully push the container of food back on the counter, no longer hungry, and storm out of the kitchen.
“Miles, wait, I didn’t mean to upset you,” Carter calls out, following behind me.
“You didn’t. Like I said, I’m fine.” I take a breath and turn to face him. I reach for his arm and give his shoulder a reassuring tap. “Food’s all yours; I’m not hungry anymore. I’m going to go change and go for a run. I’ll have my phone on me if we get a call.”
Then, I turn away from him and head for the locker room. I don’t care what anyone thinks, I’m fine and I’ll show them and my therapist as much.