The priority was getting that fire out; the smoke was acrid and the wind was hostile, blowing its load of carcinogens towards receptive lungs. Krish, already wearing his breathing apparatus, ran off the hose reel while Sal engaged the drive for the pump. The woman in the red car was visibly distressed, holding her neck; her car door was buckled beyond any chance of opening. Gaz escorted the old man to the sideline, noticing he had a nasty gash to his eyebrow that would need looking at; shock had probably stopped him from even registering he was injured.
‘The woman in the Fiat’s called Shirley,’ the old man told them. ‘She’s hurt her neck.’
The ambulance had just pulled up and Andy went over to converse with them before jogging quickly back to the others.
‘We’ll have to take the roof off because we can’t take the risk that she hasn’t got a spinal injury,’ he said to his team. They knew the drill. Krish disconnected the car battery, Dave and Jacko fitted blocks under the car to stabilise it, take out the suspension. Sue was already in the back of the Fiat, holding Shirley’s neck steady. Robbie and Deano were pulling out all the equipment they’d need. Andy set Pete on cutting; he should have her out pretty quickly. A more modern car wouldn’t have crumpled as much and an airbag would have been deployed, but at least with these old vehicles, the metal gave so much more easily.
Pete released the cutting tool from the fire engine and walked towards the Fiat. Another waft of white smoke blew in his face and through the haze the red Fiat became another car, Tara’s car. He saw it all again, as it was that day in February: Sal, crunching metal with the cutters, Krish ripping glass away from the windscreen, the paramedic working on Pete’s trapped, unconscious wife trying to stem the blood – the life – gushing from her femoral artery. Every desperate beat her heart made doing its best to keep her alive but bringing her closer to death instead.
Pete lost purchase of the cutting tool, it dropped to the floor and he stumbled to the side, only managing to stop himself falling by a lucky placement of limbs. He heard Andy shout at Gaz to take over. It clicked Pete from the past into the here and now. ‘I’ve got it,’ he said, back to being Pete Moore, firefighter. But Pete Moore, grieving widower was sharing the same body and dangerously hampering his detachment. Andy stood him down.
*
‘Can I have a word, Pete?’ said Andy, when they were back at the station.
Pete had been expecting it of course.
‘Shut the door behind you, lad.’
Pete did as he was told.
‘Sit down,’ said Andy. His voice was calm, avuncular. ‘You all right?’
‘Yes,’ said Pete. ‘I’m okay. I know what you’re going to say and it won’t happen again.’
Andy’s head made a slow nod. ‘We’ve seen much worse than we have today and we will see much worse than we have today. You know that.’
Pete opened his mouth to speak but Andy held up his hand to stop him.
‘Let me finish. I did wonder if you’d returned to work too soon, but you fell back into it and did a good job, you always do, but there was something not quite right. We’ve all spotted it. I let it go, but I’m not sure I should have.’
We’ve all spotted it. That shocked Pete.
‘I’m good, Andy. Please don’t force me to take leave when I need this job more than I need to sit at home thinking.’
Andy sat back in his chair, studied the man in front of him, for whom he had the most tremendous respect. He could easily see Pete in his shoes, running teams in the not too distant future. He had no weak spots in the job: he was careful, methodical and fast-thinking, he was a splendid ambassador for them. The public liked him, his peers trusted him and new recruits looked up to him. But Andy had a duty of care to his whole team as well as to the individuals within it.
‘I want you to be realistic, Pete, not brave.’
‘I know,’ answered Pete. ‘I do, really. You have my word. I promise it was a one-off.’
‘You can take time off for therapy, we’ll sort it.’
‘Thank you. I don’t need it though, An—’
‘I think you do. I want you to see someone. I don’t want to force your hand on this, but . . .’ The implication was that Andy was forcing his hand.
Pete rose from the chair. He was ashamed at his weaknesses being so obvious.
‘Six weeks leave was way too short in my opinion after what you went through,’ said Andy, as Pete opened the door to go. Pete didn’t reply. Better to say nothing than to lie.
*
There was an odd atmosphere for the rest of the shift that everyone tried to play down. Pete could feel it as heavy as the smoke was at the scene and he was the white van aflame in the centre of the crash giving it out. It was understandable that there would be interest in how he handled the first major RTC. He’d scraped a pass, he reckoned, but it had been enough to unsettle everyone, to show them that the Pete Moore of six months ago was not the same one that stood in their midst now.
At the end of the shift Sal walked out to their cars with him.
‘All right?’ she asked.
‘As I can be. Shit day and all that,’ said Pete, attempting to smile. Hard though now he knew that everyone could see the cracks in him. ‘I’m fine.’
‘Yeah and I’m Taylor Swift. How long have we known each other?’
‘Too bloody long,’ said Pete.
Sal grinned. ‘You know me well enough by now to be able to talk to me if you need to. In here . . .’ she poked herself in the chest ‘. . . I’m all sensitive woman, even if you look more feminine than I do.’
‘I’m fine,’ he repeated, but the words scraped their way out of his throat, as if they had been dragged out under duress, and he felt a slam of sadness hit him from left field. His vision blurred and he punched his fists into his eyes in an effort to grind the rising tears away. He turned from Sal in embarrassment.
‘Jesus, where did that come from?’ He didn’t realise he’d spoken the words aloud until Sal answered him.
‘Inside a wounded heart, Peter Moore, that’s where they came from.’
‘I’m good, I’m good,’ said Pete – the flash flood gone as quickly as it had arrived. ‘It’s you and your silky woman voice that did that to me, nothing else,’ he tried to joke, couldn’t pull it off.
‘Don’t bawl me out, but take this,’ said Sal, reaching into her jeans pocket and bringing out a business card.
‘What is it?’ He looked at the wording, ‘Molly’s Club’ and under it the name Molly Jones-Hoyland. It meant nothing.
‘Molly’s Club?’ he asked Sal.
‘I’ve been carrying this around with me for weeks ready to give to you. I think today’s the day.’
‘Who is she?’
‘She’s a neighbour of my mum’s. I’ve known her all my life and she’s a really lovely person. She’s retired, a pensioner and she runs a club where people in your shoes go and meet, talk.’
‘People in my shoes? Fuck-ups you mean?’
‘People who need help.’
‘A counsellor?’ Disdain leaked into his tone.
‘A listener. She’s good and I think you need her, Pete. Do yourself a favour and let her help to heal you.’