“Stay here,” Roman mutters as if anyone was thinking of going anywhere. He hops over the gate in a fluid movement, no awkward scramble for him.
“If it’s rabid …” Gage offers, stepping into the space beside me that Roman vacated. He yells toward the tree, “Has your pig had its shots?”
“I don’t believe in that kind of thing. Goes against nature,” the owner calls out. The owner who’s stuck in a tree, mind you, because the pig he’s keeping in a tiny Chicago backyard has driven him there.
“Great, we have an anti-vaxxer pig guy.” Gage says to Roman, “Don’t get bit!”
“That’s your advice?” Roman shoots back. “Christ, you should be in the fucking fire department.”
I lean on the gate, watching the pig with one eye and Roman’s careful approach with the other. “So we’ve got a wild pig, maybe a boar—”
“You think that’s a boar?”
“I told him it was, but he didn’t care!” The sister again.
Gage is on his phone and soon has pics. “You’re right, a boar. Is that even allowed in the city limits?”
“There’s no municipal ordinance prohibiting it,” the sister says, ever informative. “I checked.”
Gage is aghast. “Really? We’re leaving these decisions to the Chicago citizenry? The people, in case you haven’t figured it out yet, Abs, are the worst decision-makers on the planet.”
“We are indeed in the stupidest timeline,” I observe. If someone wants to keep weird animals in their back yards, they’ll do it. It’s almost unAmerican not to.
Roman is standing below the tree. “Can I see your injury?”
The owner shows his arm reluctantly, as if he doesn’t want to drop Betsey in it. Too late, mate, it’s a bloody mess. Tree Guy sways but manages to hold on to a thick branch.
“Catch him,” the sister yells after the fact, which only gets the pig more riled.
“Ma’am,” I say. “You might feel better if you moved back to the street.”
Gage is less tactful. “Your voice is pissing off the pig.”
Roman orders, “Need a ladder in here!”
Wozniak and Danny are behind us with the ladder. “Open the gate,” Danny calls out.
“Not a good idea.” I’m already scrambling over. “We can’t risk letting this animal loose.” Right now, it’s calmly sniffing some shrubbery at the other end of the yard except for the odd shriek whenever his nemesis, the sister, opens her mouth. Maybe it’s already satisfied its bloodlust by taking a bite out of Pig Guy’s arm. I’ll take my chances but don’t want to risk him running amok in the neighborhood.
“She’s right.” Following me, Gage hops over the gate and directs the crew to maneuver the ladder over the fence.
We two-man walk the ladder over to the tree and settle it against the trunk. Roman turns to me. “All right, Sullivan, up you go.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, you spent four years as a paramedic and it’s time you earned that fine salary the city is paying you. Be like your hero, Tom Cruise.”
I barely have time to register the fact he’s referencing a conversation we had in the before times because he’s already indicating how this will go. “I’ll brace the ladder and Simpson is going to run interference on our bite-y friend.”
Gage slams his dark blond eyebrows together. “And by run interference …?”
“Throw yourself in its path if it comes for us.”
“Thought that’s what you meant.”
Roman flashes a half grin and wow, I almost fall out of my own mental tree.
“No heroics, Simpson, just let me know if it makes any sudden moves. First, take a walk over to the gate and tell the New Wave Feminists to manage the crowd.”
I hide a smile, knowing he’s talking about Danny and Wozniak. Over at the gate, a queue of onlookers is forming behind them. A few faces can also be glimpsed at the windows of the second and third floors of the building. Firefighters often have an audience but we don’t usually think about that while the adrenaline is high and we’re working to save someone. This feels different, the kind of call that might make the news.
I can’t wait to tell Sam and Jude.
“Sullivan, why are you still here?”
“Okay, got it.” I head up the ladder, my supplies over my shoulder. When I reach Tree Guy, I pull my bag to the front and settle it on a ladder rung. “Hey, I’m Abby, what’s your name?”
“Colin.” The name is given reluctantly. Probably one of those anti-government types who hates the idea of the authorities being involved in his personal business. “You’re not going to hurt Betsey, are you?”
“Not if we can help it. Right now, we need to take care of you. Let’s take a look.”
It’s an animal bite, all right, and will definitely need stitches. For now, all I can do is clean it as best I can, apply antiseptic, and wrap it up so no more dirt gets in.
“How we doin’ up there, Abby?” Roman’s voice is low and soothing and designed to keep everyone, including the damn pig, calm.
“Just fine. We’re almost wrapped up and ready to come down.”
“I’m not going down,” Colin says because of course he wouldn’t want to make any of this simple.
His sister decides now would be a good time to get re-involved. “Colin, stop being an asshole and get out of that tree!”
“This is your fault,” Colin spits back. “You know she doesn’t like anyone who doesn’t respect her!”
Okay, time to call this. “I understand you might be a bit worried but you’re going to need stitches and I can’t do that up here. We need to get you out to the street to work with the paramedics.”
Colin looks torn, which is some mighty weird ambivalence for a guy trapped by his pig in a tree. But it seems circumstances are about to overtake us.
“Shit, she’s on the move,” Roman says quietly.
I have my back to the pig, but during the next eight seconds, all I hear is a thundering gallop and then a loud, “Oh, fuck!” from Gage. The weight of the ladder shifts and I look down to see Roman is three rungs up.
“Hey, there, you okay?” I want to laugh about this because Roman is obviously not okay. He had to leave the safety of the ground because it was no longer the place to be. The sound of running and gasps from the crowd Danny and Wozniak have not managed to control has me itching to turn. Out of the corner of my eye I see Gage clamber over the fence to safety.
Roman shakes his head and flashes me another heart-stopping grin. So much for moving on. That grin hurtles me back to that night and undoes all my hard-won progress.
“This might take a while, Sullivan.”
I’m starting to see that it might.
Thirteen
Abby
“Hey, Mom,” I whisper to the image on the wall. “How’s it going?”
She doesn’t answer, but that’s okay. It’s enough to know she’s watching over me. Or at least I hope as much.
I’ve stopped off to visit her on each shift for the last couple of weeks, trying my best not to look like a weirdo if someone happens by at the same time. All’s quiet right now, a lull after our triumphant return to the firehouse a few hours ago. Betsey the pig was finally taken into custody, Colin was patched up by the medics, and we spent the return journey giving Gage and Roman shit for running scared as soon as the pig decided to go for a jog.