Page 27 of Never Alone
Cole
"Play it back," Martinez said. "I want to see the exact moment he forgets how to use his arms."
The crew had been at it for an hour. Davis had been the one to break it to me—twelve million views overnight. I'd pulled it up on my phone to see for myself. Martinez had grabbed the phone out of my hand inside thirty seconds. The three of them hadn't put it down since. I'd been pretending to inspect the engine the whole time. The wrench in my hand wasn't doing anything. I'd verified the engine twice. I was verifying it a third time because the alternative was looking up.
"I didn't forget how to use my arms."
"Brother, your hands are just hanging there. Like you've never held a woman in your life."
Laughter ricocheted off the bay walls. I didn't look up.
My hands were in the freeze-frame on the phone, the one Davis kept tapping back to, hanging at my sides. Davis wasn't wrong. I hadn't moved them because I hadn't known her yet—not in the second the kiss was happening, which twelve million people had now seen.
I worked the wrench on a bolt that didn't need it. My ears were hot. They had been hot for an hour.
Twelve million views.
That was the part working on me underneath the wrench. I hadn't known it was that big. I'd thought the video happened, and the internet would get bored of it the way the internet got bored of things. I'd been wrong.
I'd been wrong about the last week, too.
The woman at the gas station who'd asked me twice if I worked for the city. The man at the hardware store who'd looked at me, looked away, and looked back. The kid at the coffee shop yesterday who'd waved off my card.No charge.I'd said thanks and walked out. People did that for firefighters sometimes. I hadn't thought about it.
Now I was thinking about it.
"Cole's got a fan club," Martinez sang. He had a basketball spinning on his finger now, which was a whole thing, the basketball.
"She was scared," I said without looking up. "People do weird things when they're scared."
"Yeah, I get real romantic when I'm terrified." Davis clutched his chest. "Hold me, Martinez. I'm so scared."
"Get off me?—"
The three of them dissolved into shoving and laughter.
I should have seen this coming. The news crews showed up to half of our working fires. WBNC most of the time, sometimes the local affiliate, occasionally a stringer with a handheld and the look of a man hoping to catch something he could sell up the chain. They had to have their story of the day. A kid in a tree. A house off Westbrook. A man on a ledge. Whatever it was, they came, they shot, they went home.
I'd worked enough fires with a camera in my peripheral that I'd stopped registering them. The work pulled my eyes where the work needed them—the structure, the crew, the people we weregetting out—and the cameras lived past the edge of all of that. By the time I noticed one, usually I was rolling hose.
On the lawn that night, with Tessa's hand on my face, I hadn't thought about a camera. I hadn't thought about anything.
Then the bay went quiet.
The three of them were looking past me, toward the bay doors. Martinez had the basketball still in his hand, not spinning anymore. Davis was holding the phone at his side.
I turned my head to follow their eyes.
Tessa was crossing the asphalt toward me, her arms wrapped around herself against the cold, her shoulders pulled up around her ears.
"Oh—" Davis started.
"Don't."
"Lieutenant—"
"Martinez. Don't."
She came through the bay door and crossed the floor to where I was standing. By the time she stopped in front of me, her arms had dropped to her sides. Her face was paler than I remembered.
