AUTHOR: trista groulx (the dustytiger)
DISCLAIMER: kim, faith, fred, joey, bobby, jimmy, bosco, davis, sully, none of these characters are mine, i'm just borowing them to play with them for a little while, they belong to their creator and the actors and actresses who portray them, i promise i'll be gentle, don't sue RATING: PG-13 tops currently
CONTENT: kim/faith friendship, fred/faith divorce, kim/bobby r, faith/bosco sex/ust SPOILERS: 32 bullets and a broken heart (missing scene/continuation)
SUMMARY: Kim and Faith become friends after they share their heartaches that Valintines day.
AUTHORS NOTES: kim's going back to worry kermit the frog style yayy! hope you enjoy, oh and just wee little warning twbasketcase's reviews may have slight spoilers, i warned 'ya don't blame juicy news!
Kim had finally gotten the all clear from her doctor to return to work. She was glad to finally be able to get out of the house and feel like she was doing something useful. Joey was off to school, and Bobby and Kim were sitting down having snack before they had to start they left that morning.
"Are you sure you're ready to go back?" Bobby asked, as always, concerned.
He had become very protective of her since she had gotten sick. Even though she thought it was sweet of him, it was starting to get on her nerves. Sometimes she felt like a child again, because he didn't want her doing certain things.
As much as she liked the idea of him caring so much about her, sometimes it seemed a little much. She loved, him, and she knew that he was only doing what he was doing cause he loved her, but some days she just wanted him to trust that she would tell him when she wasn't feeling all right.
She nodded. "Yeah, I want to be back at work," she assured him.
"I'm just worried."
"I know, but I'll be fine. I'm ready to go back. I want to get back into the swing of things. I feel like a bum being at home all the time."
"All right, I understand, really. I just worry about." He kissed her lightly. "You know it's cause I love you, right?"
She smiled, at him, kissing him again. "Yes, and I love you back, but you have to trust me."
"I know. Do you have enough snacks and stuff for today?"
Kim smiled. "Yes, I think I'll be fine. I bought a few extra of those shakes, too. I should be fine. If by some chance I'm not fine, you're going to be right there next to me, right? So what is there to worry about?"
"Yeah, I know, but I'm still worry," Bobby replied.
"I know you do, and I like it, but you need to turn it down a notch. I think you're more worried about my going back to work then I am." She laughed. "I'm a big girl, I can take care of myself though."
He smiled at her. "I know, and I'll try to act a little more, casual about it."
She kissed him lightly on the lips. "I know what I can and can't do right now. You just have to trust me when I tell you that. I'm going to be fine going back to work."
He nodded. "I know." He kissed her again, wrapping his arms around her waist.
She pulled away, smiling at him. He then pulled her back toward him, and kissed her again, deeper this time. For a moment she relaxed into the embrace, then she pulled away.
"How about we not get distracted?" she laughed. "I don't want to be late my first day back"
"All right."
They cleaned up their dishes, then started toward work. Kim was getting excited, she had actually missed working while she was off. They left the house earlier then usual, because she wanted to have time to chat with everyone before their shift started.
It didn't take long to get there. They entered the building together, she had missed going in there to start a shift. She felt like she was at her second home. She looked around to see who was there. Most of the of the guys were in the other room watching something on the TV.
"Welcome back," said Doc, coming into the room.
"Thanks, it's good to be back," Kim replied smiling.
"You're ready for you first shift back?"
"Yeah, more then ready."
"And you're sure you're up for it?"
She smiled. "Yeah, I'm sure I'm ready to be back."
"All right, come talk to me if you get overwhelmed, all right?"
She nodded. "I will. I'm going to go get changed."
Bobby followed Kim shortly after she went upstairs to get changed and ready for the day. It had been a while since Kim had been in her uniform, and she realized just how much weight she had lost as she got dressed.
She could get away with wearing it, it was just a little baggy, and she had to tighten her belt to keep her pants where they belonged. She would need to get a new uniform that a little smaller.
She knew she probably wouldn't gain back much more weight. She had to admit she felt good about having dropped a dress size, even if she had been sick. But she was looking after herself, and working out more too.
She came back downstairs, to find Lombardo going through the fridge.
"Who's sports shakes are these?" he asked.
"Mine," Kim replied.
"How can you drink those?"
"I just put a straw in it, and gulp it down." Kim laughed.
"No, I mean why would you want to drink those? They're disgusting!"
"I know they're pretty foul, but I don't have a choice, since the surgery. I have to drink them to keep my energy up."
"So do you have a scar?" .
"Yeah, a big one, actually." Kim replied.
"Can I see it?"
"I'm not doing this all day," she muttered. "Anyone else wanna see my scar!"
Most of the guys came over to see the scar. Kim lifted her shirt, to reveal not only a scar right down to her belly button, but also a very flat stomach, and nice abs from playing with the exercise equipment at home while she was off.
"Kim your six pack there is distracting me from seeing the scar," laughed Lombardo.
"I haven't had much to do, and the doctor said that after two months I could exercise. I was looking kind of anorexic so I decided that I'd try to see if I could get some muscle mass."
"Looks to me like you managed to do it quite well," Walsh told her.
"Yeah, I'm proud of what I was able to do accomplish in only four months."
"The real test will be keeping it like that when you're not at home working out all day," Jimmy reminded her, as he came in.
"True enough."
"It's great to have you back, Kim."
She went over and gave him a big hug. The only times she had seen him was when he was picking up or dropping off Joey. When they did see each other, he was almost cold toward her.
He wrapped his arms around her nervously. He still wasn't exactly ready for close contact with her, but he didn't know how to tell her. He knew it would open a can of worms he didn't want opened if he acted different in front of everyone.
He hugged her for a moment, then pulled away from her. She felt a little strange, and like he was still brushing her off, a little, but she thought it would be better not mention it in front everyone.
She smiled at him. "It's great to be back!"
"Have you missed it around here?" asked DK..
"Yeah I have."
"Hey, Kim now that you're back, tomorrow's your day to clean the bus," Bobby told her, before going outside.
"I didn't miss that so much," she laughed.
A petite blonde woman walked into the station house. Kim didn't recognize her, but realized she must have been her replacement cause everyone else seemed to know her.
"So you must be the infamous Kim Zambrano," she said, putting out her hand.
Kim shook the woman's hand. "Infamous? Hardly, you must be Alex, um, Taylor right?"
She nodded. "That'd be me. So you're the lucky girl that nabbed the guy I've been riding with these past few months."
Kim smiled. "Yeah, well that one's true."
"She also bagged Doherty," DK told Alex.
"Really?" Alex asked.
Kim laughed nervously. "Jimmy and I were married for a while. We have a son together."
"You've gotta teach me your tricks sometime."
"I'll see what I can do."
Kim laughed, Alex seemed to be a nice person. She thought she might want to be friend with her. She could use all the female friends she could get.
"Zambrano! Taylor!" Lieu called, coming out of the office, and motioning them to go over there.
"First day back, and I'm already in trouble," chuckled Kim, as she walked toward the office.
She walked in and realized that the circumstances of her being there could not be as bad as the last time she had been in there.
"What's up, Boss?" asked Taylor.
"I just wanna make sure you both know what's going on," Lieu said.
"I'm still riding with Bobby right?" Kim asked, having not heard anything different.
"Yeah, for now anyway. You two work well together, as long as there's no problems I'll keep you together."
"All right," said Kim. "We'll be on our best behaviour."
Johnson smiled. "All that's all I can ask for. As for you, Taylor, you're going to be riding with Doc today, and hopefully we'll get you on the squad tomorrow."
"All right, thanks Lieu."
"And, Kim welcome back," he said.
"Thank you."
The two women left the office. Kim was surprised to hear that Alex was also firefighter. Bobby had never mentioned that to her before, she wondered if Bobby knew.
"The squad, really?" Kim asked Alex.
"Yeah, I've always wanted to be a firefighter," Alex told her. "Decided to do the medic thing, and go from there."
"That makes sense. Once upon a time I wanted to be a firefighter."
"What happened?"
Kim laughed. "I married one, and got pregnant."
Alex laughed. "I've only done the medic thing so far, though. When you got sick Doc called me up, cause we used to work together. He asked me if I wanted to take a replacement medic shift for a few months, then he'd see if he could get me on the squad, here."
"Lemme guess you jumped at the chance?"
"Hell yeah! It's the closest thing I got to an offer since I did my training. Doc's a good ally, everyone loves him around here."
"Yeah, he's a pretty good person to know if you want to get ahead."
"So I've been waiting patiently for your return so that I could try my hand at firefighting."
Kim laughed. "I'm sorry I took so long to recover."
"You needed all that time, recovering from a surgery like that."
Kim nodded. "Yeah, probably."
"I feel like I know you already, Bobby had so much to say about you while we were riding together."
Kim smiled. "I hope it was good."
"All good, I don't think that man has an ill word to say about you."
"If you listened to him only you'd think I was perfect. I've got my faults, and I don't know how he doesn't see him."
"They say love is blind."
"In my case stupid would probably have fit better."
Alex looked at her a little bewildered. "Bobby seems like a great guy."
"He is, it's other choices in men that I wonder about sometimes."
Alex nodded. "Yeah, a few people have warned me to stay away from Doherty. You two were really married? I don't see him as the marrying type."
"He's really not the marrying type." Kim laughed.
"Oh."
"I'd have to give you the same advise on Jimmy stay away from him. We only got married cause I got pregnant, and we thought it was the best things to do." Kim explained. "How about we talk a little later? I'm kind of excited to get back into the swing of things."
Alex nodded. "All right."
Kim went off to see what Bobby was up to. She realized as soon as she had met Alex that they would get along really well. She would have to invite her to coffee with her and Faith sometime. She went into the parking lot, and found Bobby at their usual rig.
"Hey," she said, walking over to him.
He smiled at her, wrapped his arms around her, and kissed her lightly on the lips. "I missed seeing your beautiful face around here."
She laughed. "It's not like you didn't get to see it everyday when you got home."
He shrugged. "I just missed working with you, we always know what the other one needs when we're on the street.. Alex is good, but I don't have the same vibe with her as I do with you. It's like you're in my head sometimes."
Kim laughed. "I'm not sure if I'd consider that a good thing."
"It is when we're working, it makes things go a lot easier."
She nodded. "Yeah."
"So are you sure you're up for this?"
"Yes, Bobby I'm sure."
She was getting annoyed with people asking is she was ready to be back at work. She had felt ready to go back for months, but she knew that she should take some extra time just in case because of her line of work.
"If I don't feel right about something I promise I'll tell you."
"All right." He kissed her lightly one more time, then their radios went off telling them that they had their first call of the day.
Kim was excited to be back in action again, and at that point she didn't care if the call was just some drunk passed out in the park. She was just happy to be working again.
They pulled up to the scene, and sure enough it was just some drunk that Bosco and Faith had found in the park.
He wasn't a young man, but he wasn't a teenager either. He looked very disheveled, as if he had been on the streets for a while. Bosco, was arguing with the man who was on the ground.
"I ain't drunk!" the man protested.
"You smell like a damn brewery!" Bosco told him.
"Someone musta spilled it on me! I don't drink!"
"Why were you sleeping on the pavement?"
"I'm homeless, it's what we do!" the man spat.
"Most of you move when they see us comin' you can't even get yourself up!"
"I told you already! I hurt my leg!"
"Bos," Faith warned. "They're here, how about you just let them check him out."
Kim and Bobby walked over to them, with their med bags. Kim smiled at her friend, as she passed by. She knelt down to talk to the man.
"So if you hurt your leg, where does it hurt?" Kim asked him.
"The whole damn thing hurts," he told her.
"I'll see what I can do, but I'm sure the doctor's at the hospital will be able to help more."
"I ain't seein' no doctors!"
"All right."
Kim looked up at Bobby, who also kneeled down to the man's level. Neither of them could find anything wrong with the man's leg. He just screamed every time they touched it.
"What kind of bird is that?" Kim asked making the man turn away.
Bobby quickly touched the man's leg as his head was turned, and he didn't even react. Kim knew what Bobby was doing, and was not surprised when the man didn't react to anything when he wasn't looking
Kim and Bobby were both thinking the same thing, he was looking for free drugs. Kim went to go touch his leg one more time, and he screamed. They looked at each other, and nodded.
"I need to talk with my partner, alone for a moment," Bobby said, standing up. "We'll be just over there, tell us if you feel anything different, all right?"
"Yeah," the man muttered.
Kim followed him, and motioned for Faith to follow them as well.
"What's up?" Faith asked.
"He's probably a junkie," Bobby replied. "He's looking for some free drugs"
"How do you know?"
"When I saw that bird, there was no bird. Bobby touched his leg, he didn't react. But when he was watching us, well you heard him," Kim replied.
"Oh."
"So he's got two choices, he goes to the hospital with us, or he goes with you two to the station after he signs a refusal of treatment form. Either way it's not going to be easy," Bobby explained.
"So we'll go over there, and see what we can do, while you talk to Bosco," Kim offered.
Faith nodded, and called Bosco over. Bobby and Kim continued to examine, and talk to the man.
"I ain't goin' to no hospital! All them doctor's are a buncha quacks!" he yelled, after a few minutes.
"Look, Sir," said Bosco. "You got two choice, you go with them to the hospital, or you sign one of their forms saying you don't want any treatment, and come with us, till you sober up."
"I ain't drunk! I just can't move!"
"Then let them take you to the hospital. I'm telling you that's the only choices you got!"
All of a sudden the man got up and started running, realizing they were on to his scam. The four just watched as he ran off, not really caring where he went, as long as they didn't have to see him again that day.
"Still happy about being back?" Bobby asked Kim.
She laughed. "It was an, interesting, first call back," she laughed.
"That's one way of putting it," laughed Faith.
"Wait, you actually missed this bullshit?" Bosco asked Kim.
"Not necessarily, this kind of thing, but just being out here, helping people."
"Just like you'd miss chasing down, and getting a drug dealer if you were off for a while," Faith told him, then cleared them to take another call.
Bobby and Kim also cleared themselves, and as soon as they did they got another call. It looked like it was going to be one of those days where you hardly have time to breathe. Kim was happy. She wanted a busy day to prove to everyone that she really was ready to be back.
--
By the end of the day Kim was still feeling pretty good about being back, but she was beat. It had been a long day, with hardly enough time to even breathe between calls. She felt pretty good considering, but couldn't wait to fall into bed.
The only thing that had bugged her throughout the day was Bobby constantly asking her if she was doing all right. The answer was always the same. She kept telling him that she would tell him if she started to feel not right. She had had a little trouble with lifting a few people, but that was cause she hadn't done any in over six months.
She was just glad to be back, working, and helping people. She had just finished cleaning up after the run, and she was going to go get changed, but Doc stopped her.
"How are you feeling?" Doc asked her.
"I'm a little tired, but otherwise I'm good," she told him, smiling.
"No problems out there today?"
"Not really, but if my partner asks me one more time if I'm feeling all right I may slap him silly."
Doc laughed. "All right."
"So I'm just your partner now?" Bobby asked, coming up behind her, and wrapping his arms around her waist.
"When we're working, yeah, you're just my partner."
"All right, I guess I can deal with that."
Doc shook his head, and walked away from them. Kim turned around in Bobby's arms, and kissed him lightly on the lips. He almost immediately deepened the kiss, and she didn't protest, wrapping her arms around him.
"Oh get a room!" Lombardo laughed, as he walked past them.
"Come on, if you had your girlfriend around here you'd be all over her," DK reminded his co worker.
Bobby and Kim broke their kiss, but didn't let go of each other. Kim was laughing as Bobby held her close.
"He's got you there," Bobby laughed.
"How about we go get changed?" Kim suggested.
"Good idea."
The pair went upstairs to get changed, and ready to go home. Just as they got up the stairs, they saw Alex coming down.
"How did your first day as a firefighter go?" Kim asked.
"It's went really well," Alex replied. "How was your first day back?"
"Pretty good, feeling a little tired though."
Alex laughed. "That happens when you have a few months off, takes a while to get back into the routine."
"Yeah, that's for sure. And the whole missing a part of my stomach thing makes things even worse."
Alex nodded. "I'd imagine so, never been through that though."
"I wouldn't recommend it."
Alex laughed. "I'll remember that, if ever someone offers it to me."
They moved out of the way of the stairs to keep talking a little bit. They had an instant connection, probably because they both knew what it was like to one of the girls at the firehouse.
"I think the worst is that sports shakes that I'm supposed to drink."
"Oh, yeah those things are awful. What else is different about your diet?"
"I can't eat a lot at one time, I hate that. It's kind of fun to be able to snack all the time, but there are days where you just want to go out and make a pig of yourself, at a buffet or a special dinner, you know?"
Alex nodded. "Yeah, especially when you're working with a bunch of guys!"
"Exactly, but if I eat too much then I get sick."
"That's has to suck."
"Yeah, just a lot. Anyway, I really should be getting dressed, but we should go for coffee sometime."
"I thought you can't drink coffee."
"I can't but there are things at coffee shops I can drink, so I'll stick to those."
Alex smiled. "All right, that sounds like fun. How about we talk a little bit more tomorrow, and set something up. You look a little tired."
"Thanks, sounds good. See you tomorrow."
Kim continued on her, way, and quickly got changed. She went downstairs, to find Bobby already in his SUV. She smiled at him, as she got on. He leaned over and kissed her on the lips.
"I think today was a good day," he told her, as he pulled away.
"I would have to agree with that," she agreed.
They hadn't gone more then two blocks, and Kim had fallen asleep in the passenger's seat. It had been a long day, and she realized that she would have to experiment a little to keep her energy where it should be all day.
tbc...
end notes: she's back at work yay! like my little surprise as to who replaced kim while she was gone? hehe... i'm gonna work her into kim and faith's gal paling hope everyone like the idea, big thanx to kristen for telling me to go for it, and keeping relativly mum about it!