Read Report from Engine Co. 82 for Free Online Page B

yelling or pushing, only the fast syllables of conversational Spanish. A man
     once told me that he was told by an immigration officer in Puerto Rico to call the Fire Department if he ever needed emergency
     help in New York City. The people in the South Bronx know that when the corner alarm box is pulled the firemen always come.
     If you pick up a telephone receiver in this town you may, or may not, get a dial tone. If you get on a subway you may, or
     may not, get stuck in a tunnel for an hour. The wall socket in your apartment may, or may not, contain electricity. The city’s
     air may, or may not, be killing you. The only real sure thing in this town is that the firemen come when you pull the handle
     on that red box.
    Billy-o is rapidly squeezing the boy’s cheeks. Bill Finch has the resuscitator turned to the inhalator position, and puts
     the face piece an inch from the boy’s mouth. The boy finally begins to moan and move slightly. The crisis is over for him,
     at least until the next time he squats in a vacant building, wraps a belt around his arm, and puts a match under a bottle
     cap filled with white powder.
    “Put in another call for an ambulance,” Chief Niebrock says to Captain Albergray. It is now near 11:30 P.M., and I make a mental note to pick up a container of milk and a piece of cake on the way back to the firehouse. I have lost
     any hope of being satisfied with dried-out Irish football.
    We have been here a half hour when the ambulance arrives. We are able now to walk the boy to the ambulance, although he still
     cannot support his own weight. The nurse in the ambulance looks at me and says, “What a night!” I know what she means.
    Some nights our job has little to do with fire. Since the O.D. case on Hoe Avenue, we have responded to eleven alarms. One
     was a water leak—a guy’s bathtub overflowed at four in the morning. Another was a fallen street wire, which required the emergency
     crew of Con Edison. And the other nine were false alarms—one each hour from midnight to eight.
    It is a little after 8:00 A.M. now, and I am sitting in the kitchen having coffee and a roll. The men working the day tour begin to arrive, but I’m too
     tired to say much more than “Good morning.” Instead of driving the sixty miles to where I live, I think that I’ll take the
     subway to my mother’s apartment in Manhattan. At least there I’ll be able to get six solid hours of sleep in. I’ll have to
     get up at four, because I’m due in again tonight at six.

3

    I can hear a vague voice calling, “Dennis, Dennis.” I don’t want to get up, but I realize I have no choice. I was dreaming,
     but I can’t remember what about. It must have been pleasant though, because I feel relaxed, relieved. “Dennis, Dennis,” my
     mother calls. Her words sound apprehensive. They lack conviction, like she doesn’t want to say them, but knows she has to.
     “Dennis, Dennis,” the words soak through my body, and I make an effort to rise. Then the words suddenly change in my mind,
     and I am hearing “Rufus, Rufus,” and I rest my head back again. I wonder what that woman is doing now. Before I left work
     this morning, I heard that Rufus was D.O.A. at the hospital, and now all I can think of is the yearning, pleading sound of
     his wife’s voice.
    “Dennis.”
    “All right, Mom. All right. I’m up.”
    “Do you want some bacon and eggs?”
    I look at the clock on the kitchen wall. “No thanks, I don’t have time.” It is four-thirty. I like to be in the firehouse
     before five, but now I won’t make it there until five-thirty.
    “How about a cup of coffee, or tea?”
    “Yes. Tea. Fine. Thanks.” I get up from the living room couch, and look for my socks on the floor. I get on my knees and look
     under the couch. There they are. Now my pants. I left them on the chair, but I don’t see them. “Hey Mom, did you see my pants?”
    “I put them on a hanger. Somebody has to take care of your clothes.