I pause at the door to the engine bay, my head full of conflicting emotions, it's been a long time since I was last here. I inhale deeply, trying to still my jangling nerves "Get a grip, it's hardly a nine alarm" I tell myself sternly. The air that I breathe has that strange mixture of gasoline and smoke that is peculiar to fire stations everywhere. However, it's a lot better than the hospital smell of disinfectant and bed pans that I've gotten used to over the last couple of months.

The engine bay is empty, both the Engine and its accompanying Squad having been called out someplace, I know this because I watched them head out from where I was parked across the street.

I take a last drag on my cigarette and stub it out, immediately I shake another from the pack and light it, shielding the fragile flame in the palm of my hand. I look down at the glowing tip in disgust and grind the un-smoked filter tip into the ground; I scrunch up the remaining packet and throw it in the bin, inwardly congratulating myself on another little victory on the road to recovery. I look down at my hands and hold them out, the tremor is hardly visible, only I know it's there and at what cost.

I cast my mind back to the events of the last few months, it had started as usual with a fire and ended not unpredictably in a hospital bed in Rampart Hospital. I feel tears sting my eyes as I remember, Mike was a good friend and a top notch firefighter, we had known each other since I had got out of the Academy. He died saving me. I wasn't able to go to his funeral, I was still in hospital recovering from the injuries received on that day, the day that Mike saved my life and paid with his own. A few weeks later Dixie took me to his graveside and held me as I cried. Instinctively my hand goes to the scar on my right cheek, an everlasting reminder of that tragic day, an outward scar representing those on the inside which would take longer to heal.

"You need to do this," I remind myself, "You've passed all the medicals, you've done all the re-certifications, you need to go back."

"Yeah, but can I do it?" I ask myself, "What if I lose it during a rescue?"

Perhaps this was all a great mistake, I should have taken the in-service disability payoff, gone away, bought myself a little ranch and settled down. "Settle down to what?" I hear my inner self snort in derision, "A life of what if's and maybe's, come on let's face it this is what you do man, no one can beat you at this, this is you."

I hoist my kit bag onto my shoulder and enter the building, crossing to the locker room and open my locker. Nothing has changed, still the same pictures on the back of the door. I hang my spare uniform on the rail and start to get undressed, I reckon that I have a good half an hour before the rest of the shift turn up, half an hour to get my head straight.

Although perhaps this getting in early was a mistake as it gives me time to think and lord how I've had enough of that these last few weeks, what with the shrinks and their pysch-eval and post- traumatic stress disorder counselling, no I should've come in when everyone else was here and we are far too busy getting ready to share more than the briefest catch up, or am I just a bit, I dunno, embarrassed isn't the right word, self-conscious, although I'd never be described as the sort of guy who gave a damn what others think. They assure me that the scarring will fade in time, but at the moment the trellis of flame red scars on my shattered right leg isn't the most pleasant thing to see before breakfast.

Dressing over, I reach into my locker and retrieve the badge and pins which denote my profession. My hands shake slightly as I place them on my shirt.

"Get a grip Gage, get a damn grip on yourself." I admonish myself. "God I need a coffee."

And with that I give Smokey a good luck tap and head towards the kitchen and put on a fresh pot. Once it has brewed, I lean back in the chair and raise a toast to Mike Jackson, one of the finest, cradling my mug savouring the quietness, knowing that all too soon this fragile peace will be broken and I will be thrust once more into the maelstrom that is the life of a firefighter/paramedic.

And frankly, Lord, I wouldn't have it any other way.