Taylor took her keys out as they reached the door of her apartment. It had been months since she had last walked into her home.
She opened the door and stepped into the small apartment. She looked around for a moment at the counters in the kitchen. The small table that she had in one corner of the kitchen area looked like it had about an inch of dust on top of it.
"I guess I need to clean around here." Taylor cracked
Walsh wiped some dust off of a shelf. "Yeah it might now hurt."
"There's a lot that needs done." She added looking around the living area of the apartment. She picked up a blanket that was thrown across the couch haphazardly and she started to fold it.
Walsh quietly put his hand on her wrist.
"You'll have plenty of time to do that later." He said as he pulled her close to him.
She relaxed a bit in his arms as he kissed her. It was a short lived moment when the phone began ringing.
"Just ignore it." Walsh said
"I can't." Taylor pulled away to answer the phone.
Walsh watched with a frown as Taylor made her way to the phone.
"Hello?" Taylor said into the phone. "Yes it is. Okay. 10:30 tomorrow, I will be there. Thank you."
Taylor hung up the phone.
"Who was that?" Walsh asked
"The Office of the department." Taylor said
"What they want to retire you?" Walsh asked
"No, I had called them." Taylor said
"YOU called them?" Walsh was surprised
"Yeah, I want to know what it's going to take to get back on the job." Taylor said
"Whoa!" Walsh said. "You just started walking again; you've gone through severe burns. And you want to go back to the reason you were in that position in the first place?"
"I said in the beginning that I was going to walk again and I was going to be a firefighter again. You supported me then, now you have a problem with that?" Taylor asked
"No, I'm just saying that it seems a little too soon for you to start thinking about that." Walsh said
Taylor was clearly angered by the comment.
"If it weren't for thinking that I would have never worked so hard to get the strength back in my body. I've never given up on the thought of being back on the squad. You forget that I don't know how to quit." Taylor replied
"I want you to!" Walsh yelled. "You don't need the department to survive. You're getting benefits from them, with me working for them- I passed the Lieutenant's exam- we can live without you having to go through that again. Without you having to risk your life for the damn job!"
Taylor stood in shock for a moment.
"The damn job?" She asked. "You think it's fair for you to still get to do the only job you know how to do, but because I'm a female and I got hurt on it once- that means that I should just give it up? Do you have any idea how much I've fought to get where I am or was before my accident? Congratulations on passing your stupid Lieutenant's exam, you can get a promotion and here…" She ripped the engagement ring off of her finger. "You can have this back. It's obvious that you were only worried about marrying me when you thought I was dying. I have news for you, I don't need your pity, I don't need you to be my protector."
Walsh stood in shock as Taylor threw the ring at him. He didn't have words to respond to that.
"Alex…" He started but she broke him off.
"You need to leave." She said
"Alex, we can talk about this." He said calmly
"I don't want to talk about this. I want you to leave now." She replied as she stared at him.
He put the ring in his pocket and looked at her but her gaze turned to a cold stare. He bit his bottom lip in frustration as he walked to the door. He looked back as he opened it and realized that Taylor wasn't changing her mind. With a frown he walked out the door and closed it behind him.
Taylor waited a few moments and then she sat down on the couch and started to cry. She covered her face with her hands.
Walsh stood out in the hallway hoping that Taylor would change her mind. He could hear her crying. He felt terrible and wanted nothing more than to go back into the apartment and take back all of the words he had just said.
Reluctantly, he turned and walked down the hallway.
It was almost 5 o'clock when Taylor woke up on her couch. She had cried herself to sleep. Sitting up, she looked at the mess of tissues that were lying on the floor. It didn't feel right to her, but at least she knew what Walsh thought of her 'comeback.'
"I don't care what he says or thinks. I'm going to be a firefighter again." She said to herself.
Walsh milled about the firehouse aimlessly.
"You okay Billy?" DK asked after he watched Walsh clean the kitchen.
"I'm fine." Walsh tried to deny that anything was wrong.
"You just cleaned the kitchen, took out the trash, and reorganized the pantry… there's something wrong." DK argued
"I'm fine." Walsh again argued.
"Whatever is bothering you, you can talk to me." DK said
Before Walsh got a chance to reply the Claxton sounded.
"Squad 5-5, Ladder 100, Adam 5-5-3, Boy 5-5-3 respond for a residential fire 108 and Riverside."
Without as much as a smile the pair of firefighters headed down the stairs to the truck.
Taylor made a little dinner for herself and sat down at the table in the kitchen. She turned on the 6 o'clock news. The headline at the bottom of the screen caught her off guard.
"FIREFIGHTER KILLED"
She knew that Walsh was at work and in one of the pictures that was shown; she could clearly see the Squad was on scene. Her heart was in her throat as she dropped her fork onto her plate. She listened carefully to the report.
"Firefighters have been fighting an apartment building fire at the corner of 108 and Riverside for over an hour now. As you can see there are literally hundreds of firefighters trying to bring the blaze under control." The reporter said
The scene shifted to a picture of an ambulance pulling away from the scene as well as another ambulance being loaded with the patient obviously being a firefighter. Taylor felt sick.
"We're being told that at least 1 firefighter has been killed and as many as 6 others are injured with what are being called serious injuries. They haven't released any names of those firefighters but we have been told that the injuries occurred when there was some sort of an explosion on an upper floor of the building."
The cameras panned the scene again and Taylor tried desperately to spy her friends and coworkers. That's when the phone rang.
"Hello?" Taylor said anxiously
"Alex." The voice on the other line was Kim's and she didn't sound good.
"What's wrong?" Taylor asked
"There was an explosion." Kim cried, "Billy's been hurt. You need to get to Mercy now."
The words didn't quite sink in as Taylor stood there for a moment. She hung up the phone and grabbed her keys.
"This isn't happening." She said to herself. "This can't be happening."
TO BE CONTINUED