11. Helmet Liner
Helmet Liner
KNOX
Every year, the fire departments in Las Vegas run charity events.
Fill the Boot on the intersections. Pancake breakfasts at the station with the bay doors up.
Toy drives in December where the engine rolls through neighborhoods with lights on and no siren, and kids come running out of their houses because a fire truck just showed up on their block with a bag of presents.
The one people look forward to most is the Badges.
It started as a pickup softball game between Station 110 and the cops at Northeast Area Command, back before anyone thought to put a name on it.
Somebody brought a keg. Somebody else brought their kids.
The departments put it on the calendar the following year, added a charity component, and it grew from there.
Now it fills half of Lorenzi Park on a Saturday in June.
LVMPD fields a team. The fire department fields a team.
The money goes to whichever charity the winning side picks, and nobody lets you forget the score.
Last year was embarrassing. LVMPD beat us by nine runs and the department's team photo ended up on the precinct bulletin board with a caption underneath that read: Better luck next year, boys.
Thompson had it taken down. It went back up the following Monday.
We were down three runs in the bottom of the sixth when Nora found me.
I was on the bench behind third base, waiting for my spot in the order.
Thompson was pacing behind us with his arms crossed, working through the lineup like he was running an actual operation.
His wife was behind him with a cooler, pressing cold bottles of water into the hands of anyone who came off the field.
Nora came through the crowd in a tank top and shorts, a baseball cap pulled low over her eyes, scanning the sideline until she spotted the Station 110 shirts.
The tank top sat low across her collarbones and left her shoulders bare, and the shorts ended high enough on her thighs that my brain stalled for a full second.
I watched her walk toward me and forgot about the game entirely. She dropped onto the bench beside me.
"How bad is it?"
"It's fine."
"You're losing."
"We're just behind."
In the circle, Andy Walsh lobbed another pitch in a high arc. Brandon was standing behind the plate, relaxed, his mitt up. The ball dropped into the zone and the batter popped it up to shallow left. Easy catch. Two outs, runners on first and second.
Travis dropped his head into his hands. "She's killing us."
On the LVMPD sideline, Doug Price was on his feet with his hands cupped around his mouth, shouting Andy's name.
His daughters were right beside him. Julie was clapping.
Katie was yelling something at the field that nobody could make out.
Diana sat behind them in a folding chair, shaking her head at all three of them.
The whole LVMPD bench was up, cheering every pitch Andy threw.
Andy fielded her position like she'd been doing it her whole life. She stood in the circle between pitches with her cap pulled low and her glove tucked against her hip, and the whole thing looked personal. She never said a word after a good play. That was worse than trash talk.
"Is that Andy?" Nora tipped the brim of her cap up.
"Yeah."
"She's good."
"She knows."
Thompson stopped pacing long enough to lean over the bench. "We need base hits. Smart at-bats. Stop swinging at the first pitch."
The batter grounded out to short. Jeremy Murray fielded it clean, fired to first. Three outs. We held them scoreless in the top of the seventh. Carl caught a line drive at second that surprised everyone.
Bottom of the seventh. Two quick outs, then two runners got on with back-to-back singles. The park announcer called Wyatt's name.
Travis sat up. "Oh, this should be interesting."
From the bleachers behind home plate, a small voice cut through the noise. "Go, Daddy!"
Birdie was standing on the bench seat with Barb's hands on her shoulders, her face red from the sun, screaming at a volume that had no business coming from a seven-year-old.
Wyatt had spent two months talking his way back onto the roster after Thompson benched him in April.
He'd made his case to Thompson privately, then publicly, then through a petition that Travis drafted and every member of A-shift signed, including Carl, who never signed anything.
Thompson relented on one condition: if Wyatt held back on a single at-bat, he was done for good.
Wyatt dug into the box and looked out at Andy. She looked back at him from the rubber. Then Andy smiled.
She lobbed the next pitch high and slow. Wyatt turned on it and sent it over the left fielder's head. The ball bounced once on the grass and rolled to the fence. Both runners scored. Wyatt pulled into second standing up and clapped his hands once. Down one.
Travis was on his feet. "That's my boy! That is my boy!"
The bleachers came alive. Station 110 shirts everywhere, standing, shouting. Nora was clapping next to me, her cap tipped back off her forehead. In the circle, Andy walked behind the rubber and kicked the dirt once. She picked up the rosin bag, dropped it, and went back to work.
Greene came up next and drove a single into right. Wyatt scored from second. Tied.
The park was loud now. Both sidelines on their feet. Thompson had stopped pacing. Everyone in the bleachers was standing.
My name came over the announcer. Greene on first. Tie game. Two outs.
I stood up and reached for the bat leaning against the bench. Nora caught my hand. Just her fingers, closing around mine for a second.
"Bring him home."
I nodded. There was no way in hell I was going to lose this at-bat.
I walked to the plate. Brandon shifted behind the mask. Andy stood on the rubber, turning the ball in her glove. She lobbed the first pitch high and slow. I turned on it and lined it into the gap in left-center. Greene rounded second, rounded third, and scored standing up.
The park erupted. Travis cleared the bench before I'd dropped the bat. Wyatt caught me at first base. Thompson was clapping with both hands over his head. Birdie came tearing across the infield and launched herself at Wyatt. He caught her under the arms and hoisted her onto his shoulders.
On the LVMPD sideline, Andy had her glove on her hip, watching the field empty. Doug Price said something to her. She shook her head once and smiled.
I walked back to the sideline. Nora was on her feet, grinning as I approached her. She threw her arms around me before I could say anything.
"You did it!"
I lifted her off the ground. Her arms locked around my neck and her bare skin was warm against mine. Her breathing came fast against my ear. Her mouth was close to my ear and her hair smelled like sunscreen and jasmine. I held her longer than I should have. I knew that. I held her anyway.
When I set her down, her hands slid from my neck to my chest and stayed there. She looked up at me. Neither of us moved.
Then Travis yelled something from the field and the moment broke. We were just two people standing on a sideline in June.
"Greatest day of my life!"
Travis said it to me. He said it to Greene. He said it to Carl. He said it to Thompson's wife, who smiled and handed him a plate.
The station was set up when we got back. Folding tables along the bay floor, coolers lined up against the engine, and a grill smoking in the parking lot behind the building. Someone had put speakers on the tailgate of a truck and the music carried across the concrete.
The crew and LVMPD filtered in together.
An hour ago they'd been on opposite sides of the field.
Now Doug Price was handing Greene a beer at the grill.
Jeremy Murray and Carl were arguing about a call at second.
Andy was at the table next to Wyatt, his arm around her waist, while the fire and police wives settled in together at the other end.
Travis intercepted Andy from across the table.
"I just want you to know," he said, "that that was the greatest day of my life."
Andy looked at him. "Enjoy it. I let you win."
"You let us win?"
"Travis, you have never beaten LVMPD at anything. Not softball, not football, not bowling, not the chili cook-off." She counted on her fingers. "I figured you needed one. For your self-esteem."
"She's lying." Travis turned to the room. "She is lying. Greene, tell her she's lying."
Greene didn't look up from the grill. "I'm not getting involved."
"Carl?"
Carl held up both hands. "I'm with Greene."
"Cowards. All of you." Travis pointed at Andy. "We beat you fair and square, and this is what we get from Las Vegas Metro?"
Andy took another drink from Wyatt's cup without breaking eye contact. "If it helps you sleep."
Nora was beside me, watching all of it. She was laughing. The sound of it carried through the bay. I let myself listen.
"Do you want to see the rest of the station?"
She looked up at me. "Yeah. I'd love that."
I walked her through the bay first. The engine and the ladder, side by side. She ran her hand along the side of the engine as we passed.
I took her down the hall. The bunk room door was open.
Barb was in the chair by Wyatt's cot with her reading glasses on and a paperback in her lap.
Birdie was asleep on the cot beside her with her shoes still on.
Julie and Katie were cross-legged on the floor playing cards.
Barb looked up when she heard us and put a finger to her lips.
In the common room, Brandon's three boys were spread across the couch, arguing over the remote.
The kitchen was on the other side of the same space.
A long table sat in the middle with six chairs around it, a counter along the back wall, and a stove that had seen more use than anything else in the building.
"This is where the shift eats," I said. "Three meals a day, every rotation. Breakfast before changeover, lunch between calls, dinner if the night cooperates. It's the one room everyone ends up in."
Nora walked to the stove and ran her fingers along the edge of it. "Who cooks?"
"Greene. Every shift. The rest of us pitch in for groceries, but nobody argues with Greene running the kitchen. He's the only one the whole crew trusts not to ruin a meal."
"What does he make?"
"Simple stuff. Enough to keep six guys fed and standing for a twenty-four-hour shift. Eggs, burgers, chili. Nothing too fancy. It's bad luck."
"Bad luck? To serve something fancy?"
"Cooking something complicated invites bad calls. The more effort you put into a meal, the better the chance dispatch interrupts it." I pulled out a chair and sat on the edge of the table. "Travis put a steak on the grill once. Got one flip in before the tones dropped."
She stared at me. "For real?"
"For real."
She gave me the look. The one where her chin dropped and her eyes narrowed and I could already feel the argument coming.
"What?"
"So you believe in that, but you don't believe in astrology."
"I've seen the steak thing happen. I've seen the tones drop every time someone says the shift is too quiet. I have years of proof."
"That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard."
I shrugged. "Don't know what to tell you. That's just what happens."
She shook her head, but she was smiling.
We walked back to the bay. The gear rack was on the other side, away from the crowd.
"This is where we get dressed." I pointed at the row of turnout gear hanging on the rack along the wall.
Coats on hooks, pants bunched over boots, helmets on the shelf above.
Each set staged in the same position, the pants folded down over the boot tops with the opening facing outward so you could step straight in.
Nora stopped and looked at the line of them. "They're all set up exactly the same."
"They have to be. You've got about sixty seconds from the time the tones drop to the time you're on the truck. Everything is staged so you can get dressed without thinking." I pointed at the boots. "Pants are already over the boots. You step in, pull them up, grab your coat, and go."
I reached up to the shelf above my coat and took down my helmet. I turned it over in my hands and opened the liner.
"Every firefighter keeps something in here." I pulled out a photograph. Small, creased at the corners, the color fading at the edges. Two boys and a dog on a front porch. "That's me and my brother. And that's Beckett."
Nora looked at it in my palm. "How old were you?"
"I was five. Gage was ten. Beckett was a puppy."
"You carry it every shift?"
"Yeah."
She looked at the photograph, then at me. She reached out and closed my fingers around it.
"He'd be proud of you," she said.
Nora was the first person I'd ever been able to talk to about Gage. Nobody knew about the photograph. Not Travis, not Wyatt, not anyone on the crew. Now, standing in the bay with the photograph in my hands, the weight I'd carried for years felt lighter than it had in a long time.
I looked at her. The late afternoon light was coming through the bay windows and catching her bare shoulders, the line of her neck, the loose strands of hair falling around her face. She looked the way she did in my dreams. Except she was real, and she was standing in front of me in my station.
My eyes dropped to her lips.
"Knox!" Travis's voice carried across the bay. "Poker! Price says he can take anyone on this crew and I need you to shut him up!"
Nora looked toward the other end of the bay. "We should go back."
"Yeah."
She looked up at me one more time. Then she stepped back, smoothed her hair, and started walking toward the other end of the bay.
I slid the photograph back into the liner, set the helmet on the shelf, and followed her.