CHAPTER FOUR
JACK
Rodriguez, walking beside me, is grinning like he’d just won the lottery.
“You texted them, didn’t you?” I mutter.
“I don’t know what you could be talking about,” Rodriguez says, albeit without trying to look the slightest bit innocent.
We round the corner, and the station erupts into catcalls and howls.
The entire day shift crew materializes from various corners of the bay like they’d been lying in wait.
Which, I realize, they probably have been.
Some are pretending to check equipment, others have clearly abandoned whatever they’d been doing to witness this moment.
“JAAAAAACK!” O’Malley’s voice echoes off the concrete walls.
“Oh, Jaaaaaaaack !” Martinez calls in a terrible falsetto that would have made a drag queen weep.
“ Uhhhh…Jack?? ” Thompson adds, his impression of Sophia’s radio voice surprisingly accurate.
“Well, well, well,” says Kowalski, emerging from behind Engine 18 with a shit-eating grin. “Look what the Kiwi dragged in.”
I surveyed the scene, taking inventory of the damage.
The apparatus board now displays “Medic 402—Romeo Unit” in neat block letters.
My gear locker is “decorated” with heart stickers that look suspiciously like they’ve been liberated from the pediatric trauma kit, along with what appears to be gas station roses with a note reading “From your secret admirer at Metro General.”
Someone has even written “McKenzie ? Metro” in pink dry-erase marker on Engine 18’s bumper.
“You lot have been busy,” I observe.
“We’re dedicated to excellence in all our endeavors,” Martinez says solemnly, then immediately ruins the effect by snickering.
O’Malley cups his hands around his mouth like a megaphone. “Attention Station 2! McKenzie’s girlfriend is on the radio!”
“She’s not—” I start, then stop. There is no point. “Right, well, this is happening then.”
The chant starts somewhere near the back of the group and quickly spreads: “He buy you dinner first? He buy you dinner first?”
The rhythm is getting more elaborate, like some kind of demented marching cadence. Thompson is starting to add percussion by banging on a clipboard.
Rodriguez leans against the ambulance, arms crossed, watching the spectacle with obvious satisfaction. “You should see your face right now, hermano.”
“Traitor,” I mutter.
“Professional development,” Rodriguez corrects. “Character building. Very important for crew cohesion.”
The bay door to the station offices opens with a sharp bang that cuts through the chaos like a fire axe through drywall. Lieutenant Isabela Delgado steps out, clipboard in hand, her expression carved from granite.
The catcalls and laughter die so abruptly it is almost louder than the noise had been.
“Martinez,” she says, her voice carries the kind of quiet authority that makes grown men reconsider their life choices. “O’Malley. Don’t you have rig checks to finish?”
“Yes, Lieutenant,” they mumble in unison, suddenly fascinated by their boots.
“Thompson, I believe you’re on inventory duty this week. That supply closet isn’t going to organize itself.”
“On it, El-tee.”
“Kowalski, wasn’t there something about the hose bed needing attention?”
The crew scatters like roaches under a sudden light, leaving me standing alone in the middle of the bay with Rodriguez, who is trying very hard to look like he hadn’t been the ringleader of this particular circus.
Izzy’s gaze sweeps over the decorated locker, the apparatus board, and finally lands on me. For just a moment, I could have sworn I see the corner of her mouth twitch.
“McKenzie,” she says. “My office. Now.”
As I follow her toward the small administrative office, Rodriguez whispers loudly, “Don’t forget to use protection!”
Izzy stops dead in her tracks. Slowly, deliberately, she turns around.
“Rodriguez,” she says, her voice sweet but simultaneously terrifying. “Toilet duty. All week. With a toothbrush.”
Rodriguez’s face falls. “Aww, come on, El-tee—”
“Two weeks.”
Rodriguez’s mouth snaps shut.
Izzy gestures for me to continue into her office, closing the door behind us with a soft click that somehow manages to sound ominous. The small space suddenly feels charged with tension, though whether it is disapproval or something else, I can’t quite tell.
Lieutenant Delgado doesn’t sit down. She just leans against her desk, arms crossed, studying me like I am a particularly interesting species of insect.
“I don’t care what you do on your own time,” she begins, her voice low and controlled. “I don’t care who you date. I don’t care if you have a whirlwind romance with the entire nursing staff at Metro General.”
She pauses, letting the words land.
“But when your flirtations are broadcast over the entire county’s emergency radio network, it becomes my problem. When one of our crew members decides to make jokes over a recorded, public channel, it becomes a professionalism issue for this entire station. Do you understand?”
“Crystal, Lieutenant,” I confirm, making sure to match her serious tone. “I’m sure it was a slip on her part, not intentional. And I had nothing to do with Rodriguez’s commentary.”
“I know. I know.” Her expression softens almost imperceptibly. “I already wrote Rodriguez up for the radio comment. He’ll be cleaning those toilets with his tears.”
Despite the tension, I feel my mouth twitch. “Bit harsh, don’t you think?”
“Was it funny? Yes. My abuela probably heard it on that ancient police scanner she’s had since the Carter administration.
” Izzy shakes her head. “But this station—my crew—has a reputation for being the best. That means we’re held to a higher standard.
No more providing entertainment for the entire county’s gossip network. We clear?”
I study her for a moment, recognizing something in her tone I’ve heard before—the careful control of someone who knows they are being watched more closely than others.
She is having to have this conversation because she’s a woman, I realize.
If this was Captain Murphy’s crew acting up, the brass would just chalk it up to ‘boys being boys.’ But when it’s her station, every screw-up gets magnified.
She has to work twice as hard to get half the credit.
“We’re clear, Lieutenant.”
“Good.” She straightens, all business again. “Now get out of my office and go check your rig. And McKenzie? Try to keep the romantic declarations off the public airwaves. Some of us have professional reputations to maintain.”
As I turn to leave, I hear her add, so quietly I almost miss it, “And for what it’s worth…she could do a lot worse than you.”
I glance back, but she is already focused on her paperwork, the moment of vulnerability gone as quickly as it had appeared.
Back in the bay, Rodriguez is very deliberately inventorying medical supplies, his earlier smugness is replaced by the resigned expression of a man facing two weeks of intimate toilet acquaintanceship.
“So,” Rodriguez says without looking up from his clipboard. “Scale of one to ten, how dead am I?”
“Toothbrush dead,” I confirm, unable to keep the grin out of my voice.
“Worth it,” Rodriguez says firmly. “Totally worth it. You should have seen your face when you walked in here.”
O’Malley appears from around the side of the engine, still chuckling. “Don’t worry, Romeo. We’ll make sure to answer all your calls from Metro General with appropriate…enthusiasm.”
“Professional enthusiasm only,” I warn, but can’t swallow the smile I am fighting now.
The truth is, as mortifying as the whole thing is, there is something oddly warming about it. In the weird, twisted logic of firehouse culture, this level of elaborate harassment means acceptance. They care enough about me to put genuine effort into making my life miserable.
It is, in its own strange way, a kind of love.
Suddenly, the station PA comes to life with what sounds like a basketball buzzer, just as our radios crackle to life. “Chest pain, 57-year-old male, 3616 Michigan Avenue, cross street Maple, Medic 402 respond.”
I key my radio with deliberate professionalism. “Medic 402, responding.”
The timing is perfect—it gives us an escape route from the ongoing harassment. But as Rodriguez and I head for the rig, a chorus of voices follows us: “Tell Sophia we say hiiiiii!” “Ask her if she has any single friends!”
I wave them off without turning around, but he is grinning now. Rodriguez climbs into the driver’s seat, still chuckling.
“You know this is never going away, right?” Rodriguez says as they pull out of the bay. “Twenty years from now, they’ll still be calling you Romeo.”
“Could be worse,” I say, settling back in his seat. “Could be ‘McKenzie’s girlfriend is on the radio.’”
“Oh, that’s definitely sticking too.”
As Rodriguez hits the lights and sirens, I find myself wondering if Sophia finds the station’s reception party as mortifying as I do, or if maybe—just maybe—she is a little amused by it all.
Rodriguez glances over at his partner’s thoughtful expression. “You’re thinking about her, aren’t you?”
“Just wondering what she’d think about all that,” I admit, nodding in the general direction of the station.
“Oh, you’ll find out. I guarantee she’ll hear about it. Trust me. Hospital gossip travels faster than light.” Rodriguez grins. “Question is, what are you gonna do about it?”
I consider this seriously as we weave through traffic, sirens wailing. What am I going to do about it?
Maybe it is time to stop pretending this is just casual radio banter.
“We’ll see,” I say finally.
“That’s what I thought,” Rodriguez says, satisfaction clear in his voice.