Chapter 16

Like a dancer under a spotlight, he found himself under the scrutiny of his crew the moment he opened the door. Their conversation instantly hushed and five pairs of eyes were locked onto him. They followed his every move, anticipating what was to come. It was unnerving, but also somehow comforting. He looked at each of them, wondering where to begin.

"Well, I want to thank you all for sticking around this morning. I have some news to share with you."

He internally winced. It sounded robotic, insensitive. It wasn't what he'd wanted to say, but once again, words escaped him. It didn't help that their conversation wasn't private. He could hear Hookraider's loud voice lecturing his crew about the importance of waxing the engine.

Probably not the first time they've gotten that lecture this month. It's one of his favorites.

Returning his attention to the men around him, he began to speak.

"I would say let's talk here but I don't want to worry about the other guys coming in."

"Cap? We could head over to your place. As long as you don't think the girls and Emily would mind." Roy suggested.

It was an odd suggestion for Roy to make. Never before had Hank ever heard him invite himself to another person's house.

"I think that's a good idea. Don't the girls have practice today?" Mike added.

Hank was doubly confused, having never expected to hear such a thing from Mike.

"Well… I guess we could." He furrowed his brows.

"It's settled then. We'll go outside and wait for you to change. Then we'll all head to your place." Roy led the group to the parking lot, leaving a confused Hank alone in the dorm.

What just happened?

That was his first thought.

Please don't kill me for inviting people over unannounced.

The silent plea to his wife was his second thought.

He'd left the station first, leading the parade onto the boulevard. Turning off the busy street, he noticed that the guys were trailing further behind him. Soon enough, all traces of them disappeared from his rear-view mirror.

What are they up to?

He pulled into the driveway and almost ran for the front door, deciding that he was grateful for the slight delay of his entourage, since it might provide him a moment to plead for mercy.

When he reached the door, it was already open.

"Emily! Good morning, Honey. Listen, I'm sorry but the guys are all coming over and I didn't get a chance to tell you. It was sudden. I know you don't like to be surprised like this..."

He finally looked at her. When he did, he promptly shut his mouth.

That's not Emily.

In fact, the woman at the door was the beautiful JoAnne DeSoto.

"Good morning, Hank."

"JoAnne?"

"Roy's been worried about you, so I talked to Emily and we decided that you guys needed a good home-cooked meal."

"So that's why Roy suggested we come back here?"

"Yeah, but from the look on your face, I'm assuming he wasn't the most tactful?"

"Well…"

She put her hand up.

"You know what? I don't want to know."

Just then, the parade of firemen turned down the street, pulling into the driveway.

"JoAnne!" Roy jumped out of the car.

He embraced his wife on the sidewalk.

"If you want a hug, I'm standing right here." Emily appeared in the doorway.

Hank smiled, she smiled back.

"What's this?" He whispered into her ear.

"I know you haven't had a chance to talk to them all at once. I know you had to wait until the Board met to discuss what's actually happening. We figured that it would be easier to talk here than at the station."

"Did you tell JoAnne?" He already knew the answer.

"No. But she knows."

He held her tight, she held him in return until the rest of the crew made their way to the front door.

"Okay boys, there's plenty of food in there. Take whatever you want as left-overs. And Mike? The chocolate chip cookies in the red tin are from Hannah."

A huge smile stretched across his face. Hank had to laugh.

That man is smitten.

But he knew he wasn't one to talk; he was smitten too.

"Thank you, Emily."

"And thank JoAnne." She gently chastised, giving the woman the credit she deserved for this feat.

"If anyone needs us, we'll be at the DeSoto's. Hannah's over there now with the kids." Emily nodded at Mike when she mentioned his wife's name. He nodded back.

The pair walked to JoAnne's car, parked across the street from the Stanley house. By the time they looked back, the front door was shut.

"I know you haven't been able to talk about it, Em." JoAnne empathized.

"I know. I feel so horrible for keeping you and Hannah in the dark."

"You didn't have a choice. You couldn't talk about it."

The six men sat around the dining room table. There was plenty of space, but the room felt unusually small. Hank supposed that it was just his rising anxiety that filled the air.

Even though they'd had waffles a few hours earlier, the burly men couldn't resist the temptation of pastries and fruit spread before them.

"Remind me to thank JoAnne and Emily for all their cooking." Crumbs spilled from Chet's mouth.

"And don't forget to put Hannah on that list too." Hank added, smiling at his engineer's scowl.

"Right."

Roy stifled a snicker with a muffin.

"I didn't realize how hungry I was." Marco commented.

"Same." A chorus of replies came.

Hank wasn't hungry though. The thought of eating made bile rise higher in his throat. He got up and went to the kitchen.

How am I going to tell them?

'They already know.' A voice responded to his silent question. Not just any voice, but Emily's.

He recalled their many conversations from the past few weeks.

'I know they are suspicious, but there's no way that they've put it all together.'

'I don't think you're giving them enough credit. They already know.'

He'd known she was right back then, but he'd denied it. Perhaps it brought him comfort to believe that it was still a secret for only him and McConnicke to know. Regardless, it was time to let the secret out.

Inhale. Hold. Exhale.

Inhale. Hold. Exhale.

Inhale Hold….Exhale.

He walked back into the dining room just as the others finished their meal. Sitting down, he looked around the table starting with the man on his right. Mike, Chet, Marco, Roy, and to his left, John.

He sighed loudly, gathering their attention.

"I think I've kept you men in the dark long enough."

And so it began.

"Men come and go in the fire service all the time, for different reasons. But us? It's been almost six years since I came to 51s. All of you were there for a year before that. It's so rare for this to happen, for a crew to be together for this long. Everything we went through brought us closer together. I know we had rough patches along the way, fights and that sort of thing. We've seen some of you get seriously injured, but never once did I ever think that anything could pull us apart.

"Now, something has come that will pull us apart. We can deny it, but it was inevitable. Eventually, one of us would have left for one reason or another. I figured one of you would've gotten a promotion, or maybe you got so sick of my coffee that you'd swear to never walk into Station 51 ever again. I just never thought it would be me. You see, I'd been thinking about the chief's exam for a few years, though it wasn't until last summer that I decided it was something I really wanted to pursue. You all have been nothing but supportive and loyal through this whole process. I sincerely thank you for that." He choked on those last words.

Needing a moment to recollect himself, he noted the tears forming in his friends' eyes.

"I never believed I'd make the list. I did. And I got the top spot."

He paused again, deciding that he needed to tell his friends the entire truth.

"For the first time, I was forced to confront myself, to consider what I'd do when a promotion came my way. It was hard. I was anxious. I….I was afraid. I thought long and hard about how it'd feel to leave 51s, to leave you…I hated that. I hated that things would have to change. And no matter what I would choose, I would have to live with the consequences, good and bad. I only found out yesterday about two of the openings—one in Battalion 16 and one in Battalion 9. But there is a third opening—this third opening is the reason why I deliberately hid the report from you all.

"A few weeks ago, Chief McConnicke reached out to me and told me that he was stepping down from Battalion Chief in pursuit of a Board position. I wasn't supposed to know this information. It was supposed to be kept secret until the Board meeting, after which time, the position would've been offered to me, according to protocol. The fact that I knew this information beforehand is strictly confidential."

Five nods assured him that the secret was safe.

"Because I had this information, I had quite a bit of time to consider my options and agonize over what I would do. I wanted to ask you for your insight, God knows I needed it. I suppose I still could have asked. You didn't need to know the entire story. I could've simply asked you what you would do in my shoes. You would have answered me honestly. Instead, I've been quite aloof, distracted. Deceitful even. I just couldn't find the words to say. The more I thought about it, the harder it became for me to talk to you guys.

"What makes it worse is that, I know now that you all had it figured out. You've been waiting for me to come clean. Instead of doing that, I pushed you all away."

The room was motionless, as if all the guys were afraid to breathe. As if taking a breath would be enough to shatter the skin-tight masks they hid behind. Hank took the moment to look down at the table. He knew what he had to say next. It had been the part he'd dreaded most, the reason why he'd kept his anxiety and doubt to himself. With a shaky breath, he gripped the chair arms and again looked around the table. He owed it to his men to look them in the eye when he told them.

"The truth is, it's hard to make a decision that has such life-altering effects when you're excited about one part of it and devasted about the other part. I'm so excited to get this promotion and to serve LA in this way. It feels like everything I've been working towards for my entire career is finally coming together. But at the same time, I'm devastated. I'm leaving my second home, my second family. Even though I'll still be working with you, I won't always be there with you. It's…I…I can't put it into words, this thing I'm feeling."

With each word, the weight on his chest seemed to lighten.

I guess this is what I needed all along—to talk to my family.

"I have made a decision. I made it a week ago, actually. And every day, it feels more and more like the right choice. I have decided to take Chief McConnicke's place."

As his gaze rounded the table, his eyes met Mike's last. His right-hand man, his best friend. Despite the tears trickling down both their faces, there was an inexplicably large smile on their mouths.

"I'm so proud of you, Hank."

They stood, embracing in a brotherly hug. Soon, the others joined in. They all had a lot to say, a lot of questions to ask. There were still a lot of loose ends to be tied. But for the moment, they reveled in whatever they were feeling, even though none of them could find a word to describe it.

"I have a question, Cap." Chet asked a while later.

There had been tears and laughter, congratulations and sorrows. But now the gang sat comfortably on the deck, shaded by puffy summer clouds.

"Careful, Chet! It's Chief. He'll write you up for disrespecting a superior officer." Johnny joked.

"You be careful or I'll write you up for insubordination." Hank joked back.

It felt good to joke around without the guilt of hiding such an enormous choice. Afterall, Hank knew that his choice impacted his friends just as much as himself.

"What's up, Chet?"

"When McConnicke stopped by the station this morning, he told Marco and Mike that he had a story to tell, but he'd have to wait for John and Roy to get back. Do you know what that was about?"

Hank laughed.

"Oh yes, I do. He told me."

"What was it?"

"Gene Hookraider is retiring."

"No he's not. Remember how he tried that a few months ago and then came back?" Chet moaned.

"If I recall, it was youridea that made him come back into the service." Hank reminded the bunch.

"Everyone else thought it was a good idea and played along!"

"Not everyone." John corrected.

"Oh come on Johnny, we all know you were into it too."

"Now come on, boys! I think we can all agree that it maybe wasn't the best decision made in Station 51's history, but I do believe that it taught as all a very valuable lesson. In all seriousness, he's retiring. Hookraider himself confirmed it. After he got to the station, he told me that it was true."

Stunned amazement hushed the normally chattery bunch.

"Wow," was all Mike could say.

"Yeah." Hank noted a shift in Mike's demeanor. Suddenly anxious and perhaps a bit frightful, he shifted his weight in the wicker chair.

"Good for him." Roy finally spoke up. "He's a bit of a hard man but gotta give 'im credit where it's due."

"That's the spirit, Roy."

"Hang on Chet, I have a question." All eyes were on Marco.

"You said that the Chief said that to me and Mike. But where were you? Cuz we never told you that he said that," he quickly looked at Mike for affirmation, "and we didn't even know where you were, for that matter."

"That's right!" John pointed at Chet. "You were gone. We went to look for you but then the squad got called out."

Now, all eyes were on Chet. He looked down.

"I just needed a minute alone."

"Then why'd you disappear for nearly an hour?"

"Because it's so hard to get privacy in a station. I needed a minute to get my thoughts together and I knew that if I said that out loud, the you'd all just start pestering me and asking, 'What's wrong?'"

Woven into the melodic frustration, Hank heard the harmony of fear. Sensing that the younger man was embarrassed to have been put on the spot like this, Hank skillfully turned the conversation away from its current target.

"You aren't wrong. It's really hard to have privacy for anything." He picked up a chocolate chip cookie. "Mike, tell Hannah that these are wonderful." He chewed contemplatively. Chet watched him.

As he watched, Hank raised an eyebrow at him.

Come on Chet. You know what I'm getting at. You can talk to me. You can talk to all of us now, or we can talk privately later. It's your choice, pal.

"It hit me all at once."

Good, Chet! Thank you for speaking up.

"Cap, you're gonna be leaving us soon. We all knew that it was coming, but this morning, it hit me that soon, we'll have a new captain. And I don't know if I like that idea. What if he's like Hook?"

Fear stamped itself in his eyes.

"But what if he's not?" Was Hank's confident reply.

His sixth sense, his 'Captain's Intuition', took over.

"Guys, you joined the department because you had a drive to help others, to serve your community. You hate seeing pain and suffering, so you wanted to do something about it. That's the kind of heart you all have. No captain should change that, no matter how he acts. Your passion is yours, no one else's. If you do get a Hook, you've got a few things going for you. First, he's new to the station whereas you already know the dynamic. Two, you've got each other to lean on and stand with. Third, you have a Battalion Chief who cares and will listen."

As if a vacuum opened up, the air seemed to be sucked away; even the birds stopped chirping.

Wait a minute…I'm not going to be their Captain anymore. I'm going to be their Chief!

"You're going to our Chief?" Chet asked.

Well at least I'm not the only one who didn't quite put that together yet.

"Yes. I'm going to be your Chief."

Author's Note:

A huge thank you for your continued support. I promise that this story is almost over (for real this time!) There are a several inconsistencies in this story…it got WAY longer than anticipated and I could not tie up all my loose ends. I hope you've still been able to enjoy it.