Chapter 4 #2
By the end of my 24-on, I'm wiped out. It's been a gnarly 24 hours.
There was a freak snowstorm that came out of nowhere, catching everyone by surprise.
There were wrecks and cars in ditches all over the county, mostly non-injury or minor injuries, but it's kept us busy non-stop.
I've barely had time to snag a sandwich, let alone a nap.
Sitting in my truck as it warms up and defrosts the windshield, my stomach gurgles in noisy protest. I've got frozen microwave meals I could make, but after the shift I've had, I need real food.
The problem is, I'm too tired to cook, and if I go into any of the local places, I'll get sucked into conversation, and I just want to go home.
Fuck it. TV dinner it is.
I'm on autopilot, driving without really mentally recording the drive home, so when I see a red vehicle stuck with its nose off the road, half in the ditch, it doesn't register at first.
But then my brain kicks in, and my sense of duty does too, and I brake to a halt on the shoulder behind the stuck vehicle. The driver is rocking back and forth, but it's wedged onto a hump of plow-thrown snow. Without a push or a pull, it ain’t going anywhere.
I shove my beanie on my head, slip my hands into my insulated work gloves, and hop out.
The snowstorm seems to be working up for another round, the wind blowing snow in cutting, brutal sideways curtains.
I approach the driver's side and rap on the window.
The driver is a woman, I can tell, but not much more than that.
She's got a winter hat on with one of those puffy guys on top and a scarf around her mouth and nose.
At my knock, she turns and looks at me, and I realize it's Morgan.
She cranks her window down an inch or two. "I'm stuck!"
"I can tell!"
She cracks the window a few inches. “Heater conked out this morning."
"Shit timing."
Her shoulders lift, pause, and fall heavily. "Help?" It's quiet and muffled, frustrated.
I do a quick visual examination to see how stuck she is. And that's when I spot a bigger problem: she's leaking oil, and a lot of it.
I go back to her window. "Was there a, um, crunching noise, by any chance?"
"Fuck. Yes. Why?"
"You're bleeding oil. Somethin' tells me there's a rock or something in the snow."
Her head thunks back against the headrest. "Goddammit! Cherry! No!” It's a wail of grief for a beloved friend.
I laugh. "I doubt it's a fatal injury, Morgan. But best to leave it for now and come back with a flatbed after the snow lets up."
"Of all the motherfucking—" I lose the rest of her grumbled cursing as she twists in the seat to grab her purse from the passenger seat and then awkwardly hauls her big duffel bag full of gear through the front seats from the rear bench.
I open her door and take it from her, and a moment later, we're in my toasty truck and back on the road.
"Oh god, it's so warm in here," she says, unraveling the scarf and pushing her hat up away from her eyes.
"Sorry about your car, Morgan," I say.
She shakes her head. "Cherry has taken care of me for almost twenty-five years, Noah. Bought her new. Guess it shouldn't be a surprise that she's starting to show her age." She huffs a sarcastic laugh, twisting a tendril of black hair woven with strands of silver. "But then, so'm I."
"Pretty impressive, honestly. You've never owned a different car?"
She shakes her head. "Nope. Just Cherry."
"Well, no guarantees, obviously, but I'm hopeful it's something that can be fixed without too much trouble.” I glance at her. "Where am I going?"
"South on Elkheart Road, on the left just past McGovern's Taxidermy."
"Ah, Terry's, gotcha. You're the split-level with the pink front door."
She winces. "Yeah, that's me. Been meaning to repaint it for years, I just never seem to make time for it."
"Can I ask why a pink front door?" I say, grinning.
"When Mal was eight, she went through an everything-pink phase—shoes, hats, gloves, coats, underwear, blankets.
Everything had to be Barbie pink. She was demanding that I let her dye her hair pink.
If she'd been a teenager, I may have let her do temporary dye, but permanent dye at eight?
No way. So painting our front door pink was a compromise.
One I've regretted every single day since, whenever I drive up and see that peeling pink paint on my front door. "
"When Noah was six, he went through a cowboy phase.
He wore a hat, vest, chaps, boots, and an empty holster literally every day.
He wore the hat to bed, and I'm dead serious.
He put it over his eyes, like they do in the movies, y'know.
Every other kid his age, it was Ninja Turtles, Transformers, Power Rangers, shit like that.
Noel was stuck on cowboys. Cowboy wallpaper, and that shit took me two days to put up, and I about ripped all my damn hair out in the process.
Fucking bubbles and…" I shake my head. "Nearly thirty years later, and just thinking about it still raises my blood pressure.
We couldn't tell him it was dinner time, we had to say it was time for grub. "
Morgan splutters a laugh. "Oh, wow. He was really all in, huh?"
"You have no idea. The boots were the real big thing, though.
One day, he got out of the bath, put his wet feet into his boots, and went stomping around the yard in nothin' but the boots and his holster, firing his cap gun and yelling yee-haw, naked as a jaybird.
Thank god we didn't have any neighbors."
She laughs. "Okay, but is that cowboy wallpaper still up in the room?"
I grin. "Matter of fact, it is. We thought he'd want to take it down at some point, but even as a teenager, he was just like, nah, it's nostalgic. I think westerns are still a guilty pleasure for him, actually.”
She shakes her head, huffing a quiet laugh. "Kids, huh?"
No time like the present, I guess, right? "Speaking of kids, about the other day…"
She holds up a hand. "I shouldn't have snapped at you the way I did, Noah. That's on me, and I apologize."
"No, no, I butted my big nose in where it had no business being. I just love hockey, and I love watching kids find joy in it; that's all. I'd never want to get between you and your girl. Not my place, and I'm sorry if I caused trouble."
I make a left onto Elkheart, and we pass Terry McGovern's taxidermy shop.
Not a hundred yards further down is Morgan's house, a cute little split-level ranch—white siding, red brick, and a shingle roof in need of updating, a two-car garage, and a low upper story with navy blue shutters.
And the bright pink front door. All in all, the home is older, shows signs of age, and needs a bit of maintenance, but it's clearly well-loved.
I pull up into the driveway and twist the shifter knob into park.
"Here you are. I'm coming off my twenty-four, so hit me up tomorrow and I'll help you with Cherry. "
She sighs, nodding. "I will. Thanks, Noah."
My stomach chooses that moment of silence to let out a snarl that sounds more like an angry tiger than a stomach.
Morgan cocks an eyebrow at me. "When was the last time you ate?"
I shrug. "I dunno. I had a sandwich a while ago. I'm less than ten minutes from here, though. I'm good. I've got some microwave dinners I can nuke."
She shakes her head. "Yeah, no. C'mon. You rescued me—the least I can do is make sure our brave and noble fire captain doesn't starve…or eat frozen microwave dinners.”
I snicker. "Hey, I've got a Salisbury steak with mashed potatoes just waiting for its four minutes in the microwave."
She makes a disgusted face. "Okay, first, ew. Second, absolutely the fuck not. Third, just no. Salisbury steak isn't even good made fresh in a restaurant.”
"I mean, I can't say I disagree. I don't want to impose, though."
"I invited you, Noah. Now c'mon before I change my mind. I've had stew simmering since noon."
"Ahh, Jesus," I mutter. "Can't say no to that."
A keypad opens the garage door; within is space for two cars, just barely, and the usual assortment of garage detritus—bikes, balls, buckets, shovels and rakes, a push mower, brooms, old skates, and a small, rattling refrigerator likely full of soda and beer.
Three steps lead up and inside to a narrow mudroom clogged with coats, boots, shoes, and piles of hats and gloves.
"Sorry, we're a little messy," Morgan says, stepping in and to the side to make room for me.
A bench runs along the wall opposite the door, high enough to make room underneath for Morgan's gear bag next to another almost identical to it, the zipper open to show skates and tape and unitards and pads.
She tugs off her Uggs and shucks her coat, tossing her hat and scarf on a pile on the bench. I remove my coat and boots.
"You don't have to take off your—oh, too late." Morgan chuckles, seeing that I've already unlaced my calf-high work boots. "Sorry, I know those are a lot of work to take off and put on."
"Meh. Speed laces help. All good." I follow her past a half-bath on the right and a laundry room on the left, and then we're in the kitchen.
Nineties oak, Formica counters, and laminate floors, but newer appliances. Clean, with a single coffee mug on the counter beside the sink, upside down on a silicone drying mat.
As promised, there's a large stockpot on the four-burner gas range, steam escaping from the vent hole of the glass lid.
The smell is intoxicating; when I said I'd had a sandwich earlier, that was nearly twelve hours ago, because every time I sat down to eat something, the tones went off, and eventually I just gave up trying.
Some shifts are like that—you just give up on food at a certain point and wait for the craziness to subside. And some shifts, the crazy never does.
"Smells amazing," I say, leaning a hip against the island.