Report From Engine Co. 82 - Dennis Smith [17]
The train stops again, and I look out of the window. Simpson Street. Freeman Street will be here next, and I’ll have to get off. The train starts and I try to think of something else to say to her, but I can’t. I wonder what kind of a night we’ll have. A Saturday night in the South Bronx is always hectic, and there is no reason to think this will be any different. I get up without taking a “good-bye-I-loved-you” glance, and stand with my back to her by the train door. The doors spring open, and I step into the cold of the Freeman Street Station. I don’t look back. It never makes any sense to look back, especially on the Lexington Avenue express.
It’s five-thirty as I walk toward the firehouse on Intervale Avenue. In the summer time Intervale Avenue is a concrete swamp. The constant running of open hydrants makes the street dank, and muddy. But now it’s just dirty. I can hear the choir practicing as I pass Mother Wall’s Baptist Church, and the high, quick sounds of the gospel music remind me in a curious way of a siren.
The firehouse is empty. As I walk up the stairs to the locker room I hear the sirens and the air horns coming down 169th Street. They pass the firehouse, and the sounds fade. They are coming from one alarm and going to another. I change clothes. There is blood on the sweatshirt I wore last night, so I fumble through my laundry bag for a clean one. Even with three small boys to care for, my wife always makes certain to have a clean change of clothes in my laundry bag. On the left side of the sweatshirt there is a six-inch maltese cross. In the circle of the cross, in bold letters, it reads: “ENGINE 82”—a mark of identification in one way, and a boast in another.
It is 5:45 P.M. now, and Ladder 31 and Engine 82 are backing into quarters. Engine 85 is still out somewhere, along with Ladder 712 and the Chief. I see Ed Kells and ask him how the day went. He says, “Same old crap—about ten runs, most of them rubbish. Engine 85 caught a good ‘all hands’ this morning on Hoe Avenue.” (An “all hands” is a serious fire, but not serious enough to call for a second alarm.) “Don Butts got a kid out,” Ed continued, “and they’re gonna write him up.”
“Lot of fire?” I ask.
“Yeah, a frame building fully involved. Don got the kid out a rear window with a portable ladder. It was a great job.”
“How’s the kid?”
“He’s in the hospital with second degree burns, but he’s O.K.”
The boy really isn’t O.K. What Ed means is that he will live. The Fire Department does not like to give medals for saving people who die, and since the boy is still living Don Butts has a better chance of getting a medal.
I go to the company journal to check that my name has been entered by the housewatchman. It has, and I’m officially on duty. I go to the rack on the side of the apparatus floor and get my rubber coat, my boots, and my helmet. I make sure I have a pair of gloves and a flashlight in my coat pocket. I put my gear on the pumper and go to the kitchen for a cup of coffee. Jerry Herbert is sitting in the comer. I’m ready for one of his inevitable wisecracks. He spots me and says, “I see you finally took that sweatshirt home for an oil change.”
“No Jerry,” I return, “I took it out to your house and your old lady did it for a dime. If you gave her some money once in a while she wouldn’t have to work on the side.”
“Ahhh, so that’s what kind of a night it’s gonna be,” Jerry says to the eight guys sitting around the kitchen. “Dennis must have ate a tough pill, and thinks he can hit flies with the big guys. Well, lemme tell ya pal,” he says, directing the words to me now, “you better go upstairs and eat about ten more of those pills ’cause I’m gonna eat you up.” He emphasizes the “up,” and everybody laughs. I know now that the joke is over so I pinch him on the cheek and say,