Free 3000 Degrees by Sean Flynn

spent enough time in jail to disqualify himself. Mike, meanwhile, went to see the chief, Dennis Budd, to put in a good word for Jay. It wasn't hard. Budd had always liked Jay, thought he'd been a good fireman the first time around. In July, Budd agreed to give Jay a job. Jay told him, “You won't be disappointed, Chief. I won't let you down, I promise.”
    T he diabetic survived. The ambulance arrived just after Engine 3, packed him up, took him to the hospital. Jay trudged back to the truck, Lieutenant Sullivan a few steps behind him. The other three men—Joe McGuirk, Mark Fleming, Doug Armey—climbed into the back. Jay kicked the engine over and started the slow drive back to Grove Street. They'd be back to the station by quarter to six, plenty of time before dinner.
    A few blocks away from the gym, Sully shifted in his seat, pushed his shoulders back, gave the air an exaggerated sniff. “Gonna be a big one tonight,” he said. He was smiling. “I can smell it.”
    Jay gave him a sideways glance. Sully said that almost every night, and he was wrong every time. Jay had been back on the job for more than two years, but Engine 3 still hadn't seen a fire that a good squirt from a two-and-a-half couldn't handle. The other three guys on the truck, Mark, Doug, and Joe, had never been in a real burner. They were all fairly new, only a couple of years out of drill school even though Joe, at thirty-eight, was the oldest man on the truck. The three rookies were part of the reason Jay had been assigned to Engine 3. He was only thirty-four, but a grizzled veteran compared to everyone but Sully. If Jay hadn't left for five years, he was sure he'd be running his own truck by now. As it was, he was on the promotions list for lieutenant, having taken the test after rejoining the fire department. He was just waiting for a slot to open up. Early next year, he figured, maybe February. In the meantime, putting Sully and Jay on the same engine made sense, two qualified men to supervise three rookies. If things got hairy, Sully knew he could count on Jay to help look after everyone.
    They'd come on the job together, Sully and Jay, in 1987. In some ways, they were strikingly similar: both were aggressively intelligent, almost cocky, eager to prove how smart they were. They were the top two graduates in their drill class, Jay a fraction of a point ahead. And part of the reason he took the test for the state police, not to mention the New York City Fire Department exam, was just to see how well he'd score. Sully started studying for a promotion almost as soon as he learned to drive the trucks; he made lieutenant after only six years, when he was thirty-one. Six years later, he was next in line to make captain.
    Yet they were very different firefighters. Sully was a book man, methodical, controlled. If Engine 3 was second due—that is, if it was slotted to be the second engine on the scene, which meant it was supposed to tap a hydrant to supply the first-due guys lugging lines into the fire—he was going to be second in, even if it meant letting a slower truck overtake him. It was neither glamorous nor exciting, but it had to be done, and Sully believed in doing the job properly. Most of the department's procedures were outlined in manuals, handbooks, and memos, most of which Sully knew by heart and followed to the letter. It made him a good instructor, always lecturing at some academy or seminar.
    Jay used to tease him about that. “Those who can't do,” he'd say, “teach.” It came out as a joke, but there was an undercurrent of a sneer. Jay thrived on chaos, action. “Ballsy,” Sully called him, always wanting to jump into the hottest, smokiest patch of hell he could find. If the first-due truck couldn't keep up, fuck 'em. Let those guys grab the hydrant, let Jay rush the flames. If he was driving Engine 3, Sully would be sitting next to him flipping through a thick pamphlet that listed the location of every hydrant and specifying