MOMMA MIA
by ardavenport
- - - Part 5
The light up ahead turned yellow. Roy slowed, coming to a stop as it turned red.
". . . . The history book on the shelf,
Is always repeating itself."
"Waterloo,
I was defeated, you won the war.
Waterloo,
Promise to love you forever more."
"Waterloo . . . "
That sounded like. . . . stunned, Roy saw Johnny leaning on the passenger door, the back of his head framed in the window.
"Hi there!"
"Hi!"
This time, Roy heard the blond woman's response. This was impossible. It was a different song, but the same type of music. The same woman, flirting with Johnny at a stoplight.
". . . . Waterloo,
Couldn't escape if I wanted to,
Waterloo,
Knowing my fate is to be with you,
Waterloo . . . ."
As soon as the light went green, the red convertible shot forward. It was an older, small and sporty foreign model with rounded fenders and two seats, not too dissimilar from Roy's own car. The woman was tanned and wore a white sleeveless shirt with a pink scarf over her sun-bleached hair. Roy turned the squad to the left.
"Roy!" Johnny looked offended.
"We're in the left turn lane!" He waved a hand forward, toward Station Fifty-One. "We have to turn. Besides, I still want lunch."
"Oh, yeah." His partner seemed to accept this. Then he brightened again. "Oh, well. We'll see each other again."
"I don't know how that happened the second time." They drove the last few blocks back to the station. Roy couldn't figure it out. They were on a different street. Going in a different direction. Later in the day. She couldn't have been following the squad. Roy, and especially Johnny, would have seen her. Was she just driving around in the area all day?
When they got back, the rest of the crew was busy with station housekeeping. In the dayroom, Chet Kelly mopped the floor in front of the couch while Mike Stoker finished drying the lunch dishes and putting them away. The pot of soup in the fridge was still a little warm and Roy put it on the stove. Johnny took out the sandwiches. Plates, napkins, glasses of milk. Roy told Mike about the girl in the convertible.
"Nice going, Gage." Stoker gave him a thumbs up before putting another dish in a cabinet above the counter.
"Hey, when you got it, you got it." Johnny peeked under a bread slice. Bologna, mustard, pickle slices, tomato.
"Well, the sun must have been in her eyes, 'cause you sure don't got it." Chet wrung the mop out in the metal bucket.
"Eat your heart out, Chet." Grinning, Johnny took a bite.
"What I can't figure out is how it happened twice. Once sure. But twice? In the same day? What are the odds of that happening?" Roy grabbed a half a sandwich for himself and got a spoon to stir the soup. It was tomato.
Johnny shrugged confidently. "Must be fate. We were just destined to meet."
Roy finished reheating the soup and brought it with bowls to the table and talked about the last run as they finished lunch. After that, they got to wash and dry their own dishes. By then, Captain Stanley and Marco Lopez came in from making up the beds in the dormitory.
Afternoons was the least busy time of day at Station Fifty-One for runs and this one was slower than usual. The Engine crew got called out for an 'outhouse fire' but Squad Forty-Five was already on the scene. Roy and Johnny were just as glad that they didn't get called for that one. The day's mail arrived and they sorted it, took out the trash and then looked at a list of four fire inspections that Captain Stanley had left for them. Two restaurants, a theater and a beauty parlor. They left the station before the engine crew got back to start with the restaurants.
Neither one was bad. They gave a warning to the owner of a fancy steakhouse for a flue over his deep fat fryer overloaded with grease. Everything else was fine and the owner unhappily grumbled that he would fix it without any arguments.
The second place, a family Mexican restaurant had no issues. On their way out, the manager told them that he would never be able to face his brother, a fireman in Sacramento, if he ever skimped on fire codes.
The theater was a problem, the electrical boxes were unmarked, they had too much current plugged into one outlet at the refreshment stand and unmarked exits. The manager complained loudly about the injustice of them harassing him over every citation. Since it was a theater, where a lot of people would gather, he only got seven days to fix the problems. They left the dark lobby, walking out on the sidewalk into the sunshine, with the manager yelling about lawyers and hard-working businessmen.
They had plenty of time to do the last inspection and get back to the station for dinner when they got a run. A woman injured in a fall.
- - - End Part 5