Page 68 of Keeping It Professional

“There’s a bus,” said the firefighter running the scene. “The mud rolled it down there, flipped it onto its back. Shook up the passengers like peas in a can. It’s almost dug out, but when you get inside?—”

“Got it,” said Miles. His lips had gone tight.

“Get them tagged right away, so we know how to triage!”

I knew Miles was expecting a lot of red tags — black tags as well, meaning no hope — but by the time we arrived, the bus was unearthed, passengers being extracted through its back doors. A couple were red tags, a head wound, a crushed pelvis, but by some miracle, most were all right. We checked them all for concussions and found only three, then the rest we sent on with just scrapes and bruises. Then we treated a grandmother who’d collapsed from exhaustion, and two kids sick after drinking brown water.

Our last case of the day was our toughest by far, a large man pinned under a rolled-over car. He’d been trapped for hours, neck-deep in mud, waiting first to be found, then for FD to free him. The extraction was complicated due to the angle, the risk of the car sliding down when they moved it. Now, they were ready, and Miles stood poised and tense.

“When they free him, we need to be ready to move.”

I nodded, but Miles didn’t see. His eyes were fixed on the car, and the crane poised to lift it. The second it did, circulation would restart, blood rushing through tissue crushed tight for hours. Blood full of toxins from necrotized flesh, racing straightfor his heart. Stopping it, most like. We’d need to restart it, and we’d need to move fast.

The chains pulled taut with a creaking of metal.

The patient stiffened, then screamed as the car jerked away. His whole body arched, then it went slack. The car swung aside and we rushed in, Miles on one side, me on the other.

“No pulse,” he yelled. “Bag him!”

I got a bag mask on him. Miles started compressions. The rain was still coming in warm gray sheets. It made the scene slippery and CPR difficult, Miles struggling for balance, his knees in the mud.

“Come on. Come on!” Miles thumped his chest. I worked the bag. We each had a knee on him to keep him from sliding, mine at his shoulder, Miles’s at his hip. I knew when Miles felt a pulse before he yelled “V-fib,” and had the AED ready to go. We shocked him three times and hit him with epi, and his pulse evened out, steady for transport.

We stood in the aftermath soaked to our skins, shivering through the onset of adrenaline withdrawal. Miles flicked a wet leaf off of his sleeve.

“We’ve still got it,” he said.

I blinked, half-stunned. “Huh?”

“Our rhythm, you know. We still, uh…” He looked away, frowning. “Want to get something to eat?”

I stared at him, torn between the impulse to slap him and the equally strong urge to laugh in his face. Get something to eat?Was he out of his mind? Like, sit and eat with him like nothing had happened? Like he hadn’t dumped me like a hot rock?

“I don’t think so,” I said. “I need to dry off.” I started to go, but Miles moved to block me.

“You could do that first, and then we could eat. I wanted to talk to you. I was going to call.”

I laughed. “You were going to? When?”

“Soon. Today.”

“Really? Today?” I rolled my eyes. “Because you’ve had six weeks to pick up that phone. Six weeks to try, at least. And find out you’re blocked.” I dodged him, strode off, but he jogged to catch up.

“That’s fair. You blocked me. I deserved that. But if we could just talk?—”

“Talk about what?” I picked up my pace. “You know what? Don’t answer that. There’s nothing you could say now, after so long?—”

“I was wrong and I love you. I pushed you away.”

I stopped walking so suddenly Miles trod on my heel. I pitched forward, off-balance, and he caught me in his arms. He swung me upright and set me on my feet.

“Sorry,” he said.

“Yeah. You should be.”

“So, uh, could we talk? I’ll be quick, I swear.”

My head spun. He loved me? But what did that mean? What could love mean to him, to hurt me like he did? I didn’t want tohear it, but at the same time, I did. More than anything, I wanted that, to hear the truth — but only agoodtruth. One I could forgive. A truth that would let me fly into his arms, and hold him, and tell him we’d be okay.

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