The familiar announcement stirs the fire station.

"Engine Company 23, Truck Company 12, Rescue Squad Company 2—"

Harris doesn't need to rub sleep out of his eyes or stifle yawns like Colin. He's been living for his job for three weeks now, ever since returning from Singapore. Seemed like the thing to do, since nothing else, nothing else presented itself. He was even more broke than before his trip, his dad backslided into depression, his mom didn't call back, not on Monday, not on Tuesday... never. And that other guy got his girl.

"Residential fire at—"

At... where?! It can't be... Harris stumbles on the skid-free cement floor of the shop. It's also meticulously kept free of tripping hazards. Something grasp his innards and twists them, nearly yanking it out of his throat. He can't hear anything, except a phantom laughter in his ears. Apart from his job, he still had this one thing left. He'd just forgotten he had it, and... this address means he must pick one. He can't have both. If he's serious about doing his job, he should tap out of this one. But he also has to be there, at this one alarm fire.

He freezes in indecision as the crucial nanoseconds tick away. He must go somewhere, right fucking now. The truck or the office. Neither doesn't work.

With a numb finger he pounds his speed-dial, until it connects and... Fuck. Fuck. Fuck! Of course, dad's not picking up at 2 a.m. His phone's on silent mode for the night.

Then... then it's not a choice at all. Once Harris' legs start moving, they carry him to the truck. Thankfully, Jung doesn't intercept his glance as he pulls up on the handlebars and swings in. He lowers his head to hide his grimace.

"Sarkisian!"

Oh, shit. Jung has his number.

"It isn't your first time, is it, darling?" Jung's voice drips syrop.

Fuck him and his fake concern. Harris's fingers grip metal until they are bloodless. "No, Sir." Good thing he's given up on talking back, because talking feels like chewing on sandpaper.

"Then sit the hell down and strap in!"

The command drops Harris into his seat. He yanks the belt with all his might to mask the tremors in his hands. If he lifts his eyes from the buckle just a little, he could confirm that Jung doesn't know. His forehead breaks into sweat with an effort to do so, and...

He can't. This pressure in his temples is Jung's gaze on him. Even if Jung doesn't remember a thing, that cursed gut of his tells him that something is off. Something that can compromise his whole team's safety. How do you fool sixth sense?

Harris clicks in his belt on the first try and stifles a sigh of relief brewing in the bottom of his lungs.

Jung's gaze swivels away.

He's off the hook—for now. "Colin, it's the one on the right, buddy. We call it a 'gas pedal'," Harris mutters. "Haven't you gotten a memo? There is a fire."

Finally, the siren screams in the night. Something—not everything, not nearly everything—releases in Harris' chest as he watches patches of lit windows, street lights and cars zip out of the truck's way. There's a fire. Fire!

Rationally, it's the fastest he's even driven this route. Rationally, he's doing all he can, plus some things he shouldn't be doing. But, it's hard to be rational. He squeezes the key in his pocket and watches Jung from under a furrowed brow. Not a flicker of recognition passes over his boss' face.

Jung truly doesn't know whose address the dispatch has called up. Hadn't known where she had lived. Never been to their place, didn't do it in his parents' bed—something Harris tried not to imagine for months and months.

Fuck... what did he know save for her name? Because Harris can vouch that Jung had known her name.

Sweat coats his forehead. The key is also slick with sweat in his clenched hand. His house is on fire with his paraplegic dad sleeping inside. This is not the time to relive the crappiest memory of his life... the day when he, then a fresh candidate at the Fire House, walked into the closet. His arms were loaded with clean overalls... Dammit!

***

When Harris' mother had mentioned she was going to stop by, he was stupid enough to tell it to 'the boys'. Naturally, not a minute of her visit had passed without someone dumping the dirtiest chores onto him. He ended up walking his mom to the car in overalls stained with pigeon shit—don't ask!—red face and a life lesson stamped into his brain: boys will be boys.

The second time he kept his mom's intention to 'drop by' a secret. Too bad Colin and Co had a radar of sorts. The moment her Audi pulled into the lot, Ambu-Lance whisked Harris away, claiming his EMT credit was due tomorrow or he'd wash out of the Fire House.

Harris didn't dare argue.

Once he returned back to the shop, stinking of bleach, Colin presented him with a pallet full of the clean overalls to hang. Harris knew better than to ask where his mom was. Or why he was assigned to do what the laundry company's employee usually did.

He was a candidate, the only one in the station at the time, so he kept his head down and went to the closet, pushing the cart with the stacked overalls. Frustrated, he yanked the door of the closet open. Racks of clean overalls and the bins with soiled ones faced him. But it wasn't this sight or the stench that stopped him in his tracks. He'd seen worse, smelled worse. It was the unmistakable sounds of people being 'busy' in the depths of the closet.

"Have you been setting fires in my pants, naughty lady?" the hoarse voice asked.

Harris wished he could plug his ears with his fingers and chant 'la-la-lah' really loudly, like in childhood. It was his boss' voice. Since he started at the Station, Lt. Jung acted like a firefighter of his dreams. Heroic. Straight shooter. Man of few words. But, apparently he could say those scarce manly words in a purring tone too.

Harris backpedaled, his hands still full.

The woman with Jung laughed.

His feet rooted to the floor. It couldn't be—

"I guess you'd just have to bring out the biggest hose to put those pesky fires—"

The rest of the terribad line was lost in the sound of making out.

Harris commanded himself to stop hallucinating. He was tired, on the edge, under pressure... His mother would never talk dirty, let alone make out in the station's closet with Lt. Jung. She wasn't some uniform bunny. She was his mother!

Sure, whenever he came up for air after the rigors of the Academy's training, he caught on to tension brewing between his parents, but it was temporary. They'd been married for so long, they'd work it out. Everything would be back to normal when his candidacy was confirmed and he would move out. So he should pull his head out of the gutter, go check if the Audi was gone and leave Jung to his fun. Jung, the old rascal, who would have thought?

'Shushana..." Jung moaned. "What are you doing to me?"

The overalls spilled from Harris' hands.

Even if he could convince himself that there could credibly be two Shushanas visiting this Firehouse simultaneously, the lovers barreled through the racks. Harris glimpsed Jung slamming into the wall, wearing the hardhat and vest over his naked tanned torso—ye God!—and a woman. She arched back from Jung's hips. Her eyes were closed, mouth contorted in chasing her pleasure.

Before Harris could swallow the positive ID, Jung looked above her breasts at Harris. Their glances locked. Harris suppressed a squawk, left the overalls on the floor and fled with the image burned onto the corneas of his eyes forever.

***

Despite being plagued by the memory, Harris snaps into the present the moment his house comes into view.

The street is illuminated by red reflecting in the windows of the top floor. The next-door neighbors only now crawl out, holding a sleepy kid by hand. Someone's rat-sized fluffy dog hops around, drawing its leash behind it. It yapped itself hoarse, but it still challenges the fire truck's siren for supremacy.

Harris vaults onto the street, wheels around and yells at Jung, Colin and the rest.

"There's a quadriplegic man on the first floor! Get him out if—" his voice breaks. He chops the air with his hand, gives up and races across the lawn.

"Sarkisian!" Jung bellows behind him. "Stand down! Staaand—"

Fuck off. Harris unlocks the front door of the burning house with his key, yelling, "Dad! Dad! Wake up! Fire!"

Smoke scratches his throat, plunging him into a fit of cough. He snaps the mask on, wipes the sweat rolling down his forehead, lowers his face shield and walks on.

A street you only drive in daytime looks completely different at night, and so does a familiar house when it's burning. Paint peels and boils off the wall. He stumbles into his smoldering couch. Through the cloud of smoke, Dad's prized pots gleam from the counter, ridiculously clean when soot settles on everything else. Heat intensifies as the fire roars upstairs, probably gutting his bedroom.

"Dad!" With a desolate cry he pushes past the coffee table, spilling the chess pieces on the steaming floor. One of them crunches under his boot. Tears sting his eyes. This match may never be finished. "Dad!"

The front door slams into the wall, gunshot-loud.

"Milwaukee Fire Department! Call out!" Jung sounds like a firefighter should, reducing Harris to a boy in over his head. No matter. He's finally felt his way to the door of his Dad's bedroom.

"Dad!"

"Sarkisian, back. Back! Now!"

Harris turns for a split second to stare at the apparition. Jung in full kit, outlined in the smoke. No way his boss can read the apology in his eyes through the shifting veil of it.

Harris grabs the door handle, swings the door into the billowing darkness punctuated by orange tongues.

"Dad, it's me. Everything is going to be—"

Like a house of cards, the burning ceiling falls. And it falls. It keeps falling...