"We all see it. We all feel it. We just don't let anyone know." Medic 681, Clay County EMS
Silence had prevailed in the squad for the last ten minutes as they drove back to the station, each paramedic was lost in his own thoughts. Very dark thoughts. There had been nothing they could do for the patient, the woman had been dead for quite some time, and that was bad enough. But the shape that she was in…Johnny closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the windshield for a moment, trying to block out the horrific crime scene from his mind. It didn't work. That left one option: talking it out with his partner. "Roy?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you ever wander why?"
"Why what?"
"…you know…just why?"
Roy sighed. He really, really didn't want to have this conversation, and especially not with Johnny. Johnny was so young, so naïve, and most of the time seemed so innocent. Roy felt like he had lost his own innocence so long ago that he tried to protect that in Johnny, just like he did in his own son. But Johnny was no child, and no matter how much Roy wanted to protect him, he was a paramedic who had to deal with the horrors of the job. "There were a lot of 'why's back there, John. You're gonna have to be more specific."
Johnny shot him a look. Roy was being difficult, and it annoyed him. He didn't quite have the words for what he was trying to ask, so he paused to gather them. It never occurred to him that Roy might be stalling to put the words together too. "Why do people, well, you know… Why do people do the horrible things they do to other people?"
When Roy looked over to him, for a brief second, Johnny could see the real pain in his eyes, the pain that every paramedic keeps hidden when they see something that might still be there whenever they close their eyes. "Johnny, I can't answer that. If I had an answer to that, I'd fix it and the worst thing you and I would ever have to deal with is old people with the flu! People do things…horrible things…to other people, and most of the time there is no good reason. Sometimes there's not even a reason at all. I can't explain it to you. I can't even explain it to myself."
Johnny seemed if not satisfied with the answer, at least unwilling to argue. He nodded. "That was bad."
Roy nodded. "The worst you've seen?"
"Yeah." He paused on the sympathetic tone in his partner's voice. Roy wasn't supposed to feel sorry for him, this was just supposed to be a mutual purging of demons. Unless… "Not you?"
"No," said Roy firmly, making no move to elaborate. Johnny didn't push. If his friend had seen worse than what they had just encountered, he didn't think he wanted to know.
There was another brief period of silence, but Johnny just wasn't through it yet. "As a fireman, I saw dead people. Smelled them. And I endured it. I'm not weak, Roy."
Roy looked at him, surprised. Without a word, he whipped the squad to the side of the road. Time for a serious talk. He parked the truck, and turned to look his partner in the eye. Not expecting it, the younger medic's eyes were wide, alarmed, afraid he had done or said something wrong. "Johnny, no one ever said you were weak. No one even thought it. Why would you assume I thought that?"
Johnny broke the staring contest and looked at the floorboard. "Because this stuff still bothers me. More than just sometimes. People in pain, people who are maimed for life over someone else's stupidity or malice. How long do I have to feel it? How long until I get used to it?" Like you, the unspoken ending hung in the air, and Roy winced at the implication.
Roy put his hand on his partner's shoulder and waited until he looked back up. "You're a good medic. And if you're going to continue to be a good medic, you'll never 'get used to it'. You'll never stop hurting for those that are in pain, those who's lives are shattered. When you stop feeling that, you're no longer a good medic. Do you understand that?"
"But you-"
"But I what? Do you think I wasn't fighting with my stomach back there? That I didn't see Joann's face or Jennifer's face on that woman? That I can forget that some father, brother, husband or boyfriend just like us is going to get a life-changing phone call in the next few hours and they'll never be the same again? That I won't go home from here knowing that I'm lying to Chris when it's bedtime and I tell him there's no such thing as monsters?" He shook his head. "Johnny, if you think good paramedics, strong paramedics, don't feel that pain anymore then I have let you down. I didn't give you the leadership that you needed, and I'm sorry. I still feel it every day, I just don't let it show. And any time you need to talk about it, Junior, do it! There's no need to suffer in silence. It'll eat at you, and you'll burn out quick. You really will stop feeling it, and believe me, that's a lot worse."
Johnny's eyes were wide as saucers, and Roy had a moment of panic. Had he misunderstood, and just scared the crap out his partner with this rant? "What's wrong?"
After a moment, his face broke into a tentative grin. "Thank God," he whispered, more to himself that Roy. "I thought I was the only one!"
