Page 82 of Sleeping with the Frenemy

Leo took a deep breath and let it out. He centered himself and then opened his eyes. He was ready. Surrounding him were eight stations all featuring tasks he’d have to complete in less than ten minutes. It was like an obstacle course he’d have to maneuver around and through in order to prove his skills. He remembered the first time he saw everything laid out and thinking that it didn’t look like much. He’d assumed it would be a piece of cake, but he’d quickly learned the entire endeavor was more about stamina than anything else. Now he’d conditioned himself to handle the rigors of the job. His main worry was making sure that his body didn’t rebel against him and cause him to make a careless mistake that would mean no doctor’s approval.

“Oh shit, Vega looks like he’s about to puke,” a voice said from his left.

Leo spun and found Ahmad and his other buddies from truck standing there.

“What are you doing here?” Leo asked.

Ahmad gave him the same smile that got him hit on by women at bars. “You think I put in all that work getting your ass in shape just to miss this now?”

Obi reached him first and thumped him on the back. At six-six and about 230 pounds, his thump packed a punch and nearly sent Leo sprawling. “You got this, bro,” he said in his deep voice with a hint of a Nigerian accent. The man should’ve and could’ve been a professional basketball player, but he’d forgone the draft in favor of the academy.

Leo never asked him why he’d do such a thing, because the truth was that Leo had given up the opportunity to sign with Gio’s manager for the same thing. Being a firefighter was just more rewarding to him than being a salsa star.

“If you do throw up, warn us first so I can take a video,” Stefani said. The dick. Enzo Stefani was a Chicago native like Leo, but his family could trace their Chicagoan legacy back generations. Their firefighting legacy too. Everyone in his large Italian American family worked for the CFD in some capacity or another. Since his uncle was the commissioner, they basically ran it. Stefani acted like it too, swaggering around like he walked on water. But Leo still liked the guy. He was a good firefighter and a loyal truck-mate.

“Lieutenant Collins couldn’t make it, two of his kids are sick.” Ahmad held up his phone to show Leo a text, but gave him the message verbally anyway. “But he says to kill it because he’s sick of having to train these would-be replacements who can’t hack it.”

“Chief pretty much said the same thing,” Obi added. “He also said to make sure you’re one hundred percent ready to be back.”

Leo was ready. He was more than ready.

“Alright, Vega,” the test administrator said, calling an end to their chat. “Let’s get you back to work.”

Leo slipped on the fifty-pound weight vest and the added twelve-pound weighted beanbags that would go on each shoulder. First up was stair-climbing. He had to walk fifty then sixty stairs per minute for three minutes all together. He couldn’t touch the rails and he couldn’t fall off or stop. This was the part that tripped a lot of people up. They didn’t realize how quickly they’d tire out. Leo was familiar with it though, so he just put on his helmet and his gloves before hopping on. He wasn’t going to deny he was breathing a little heavy by the time he was done, but he still had more than enough gas to keep his engine revved. Even if he didn’t, the cheers and chants from his crew would’ve pumped him up.

After the stairs came dragging the hose. He had to keep the marked spot behind him as he dragged it seventy-five feet at a run. Once he reached the designated spot he dropped to one knee and proceeded to pull the hose hand over hand until the marked spot on the back end of the hose passed the line in front of him. He hopped up and followed the line he was directed to toward the equipment shelf.

Sure, carrying two bulky saws totaling thirty pounds a distance of forty feet there and back didn’t seem like much, but his arm was tired after dragging the hose. He’d dropped one of the saws multiple times during practice which would mean an immediate fail in the test. Now his arm began to tingle in a way that scared him, but he was able to maintain his grip.

Next up was the ladder raise and extension. Lifting the heavy ladder into place wasn’t difficult for him as he was used to it, but he did slow down when it was time to lower the extended ladder back down as the rope had the tendency to slip when using gloves. Especially for Leo, who mostly struggled with the resistance part of lifting/lowering heavy items. Again, his arm was tingling in an unpleasant way. His fingers began to be uncooperative, but he pushed through.

The next part had him worried—the ceiling breach and pull. He had to use a long hooked pole to both thrust against the weighted “ceiling” three times and then hook it into the device to pull the ceiling down five times. This exercise had also given Leo trouble during practice on account of the reverberations, and he had to complete a series of repetitions in the correct way in order to not get an automatic fail.

Leo flew through the search portion of the exam which basically entailed crawling seventy feet through a dark space that turned and lowered unexpectedly like the play tubes at Chuck E. Cheese. While he crawled he tried to flex his hand, but it wasn’t like a cramp he could work out. It was fucking nerve damage. There was nothing he could do but ignore it.

He stood and went immediately to the 165-pound mannequin lying on the ground. He had to grab onto the handles and lift it into a sitting position before dragging it fifty feet in one direction, around a barrel and all the way back across the finish line. This was about the time things started to go really wrong. Suddenly. The mannequin felt like it weighed a ton. His shoulder and arm had gotten sick of being coy. They began screaming their anger at him, but Leo clenched his teeth and kept pulling even if he’d slowed down considerably. The relief he felt when he was able to release the mannequin was short-lived.

Finally Leo arrived to the final station—he knew this was going to suck, but he was determined to see it through. Forcible entry consisted of lifting a ten-pound sledgehammer and slamming it into small square box a bunch of times in order to simulate breaking down a door. As soon as he lifted the sledgehammer he knew this wasn’t going to end well.You’re too weak. Your arm is done.Leo told his inner voice to shut the fuck up. He wasn’t too weak. His arm could hold on for a few more seconds. He could do it. He was almost done and then he’d have reached his goal. He’d be a firefighter again.

He pulled the sledgehammer back and swung it forward. The minute the hammer hit the box: instant pain. The type of pain there were no words for. It was more violent than tearing, more intense than lightning, and made getting shot feel like a kiss from an angel. Leo immediately dropped the tool, not even caring that it landed on his toes. He dropped to his knees, yelling in agony and clutching his shoulder. Something was wrong. It should not be this painful. It hadn’t even felt like this when he’d first began working out again.

His crew scooped him off the floor and rushed him to the ER where he was given pain meds and eventually a CT scan, but he was barely aware of any of that. Everything around him felt like it was covered in a blurry filter. It was far away from him. It was just him and his pain. There was one thing his brain focused on. He’d failed the exam. He wasn’t going to be a firefighter again. He was a failure.

The door to his room opened and the doctor, an older Asian woman, slipped in with her laptop-wielding flunky behind her. “How are you feeling?” she asked him with a caring smile. “Is the pain medicine working?”

Leo grunted. The pain was still there but the medicine helped him not care about it, which he learned long ago is the most he could ask for. “It’s fine,” he added when it became clear she was waiting for an actual answer.

“Well, your CT scan came back. I’m afraid that I was right. Your rotator cuff is torn. You’ll obviously have to get an MRI to see the full extent of the damage, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this ultimately requires another surgery.”

Fuck. He’d known that something was wrong, but he hadn’t thought it would be so serious. He was such an idiot. He could practically hear his abuela’s voice in his head saying,Eso es lo que te pasa por pendejo. And she’d be right. This is exactly what he deserved for being a dumbass. A colossal dumbass. Not only had he just undone everything he’d been working for in the last year, but he set himself back farther than where he’d started. He was fucking tired. He didn’t think he had it in him to go through all of this again. That left him where? Off the force completely and without the ability to even comfort himself with music. So, miserable in other words. He had few options and even less hope.

“I want you to see your specialist ASAP, but until then you must baby that arm. I mean it. No lifting, no exercise, nothing. Just ice and rest. I’m giving you an immobilizer that I want you to wear all the time, even during sleep, until you get in to see your specialist.”

Shit. He’d fucked up badly if she was being adamant about him doing nothing. “Yeah. I’ll call my doctor tomorrow morning and I won’t do anything with my arm until he tells me I can.” Not that he could if he wanted to. He couldn’t even flex his fingers without pain and his last two fingers were pretty much numb.

“The nurse will be in with the sling and discharge papers, including some information about icing your shoulder. I’ve sent your pain med prescription to your preferred pharmacy. You should pick those up before you go home, because you’ll need another dose in the next two hours.”

“Okay,” he replied tonelessly.

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