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envisioned a hatchet-faced, grizzled woman with a gray crew cut, not a pretty blonde. Jessica envied how the other woman carried herself with such grace and confidence. Jessica had always felt a little uncomfortable with her size. This woman seemed to have no such problem. She also seemed to have no problem chatting with Kevin, who grinned and shook his head at something the woman had just said.
    “Jessica, you’re here.” Kevin smiled. “This is Bobbie Kelly. I told you she might help us out.”
    “Hi, Jessica.” Bobbie shook her hand. “Why do you want to be a firefighter?”
    Jessica blinked. She’d been considering the question in quiet moments, expecting someone to ask, but hadn’t expected to be asked so soon. “I want to help people?”
    Bobbie raised one eyebrow. “What, don’t you like sirens?”
    “That’s a perk.”
    Bobbie laughed.
    “Ladies, can we go inside?” Kevin asked.
    “Ladies? Marshall, do you have a fever? I don’t get that out of you unless I’m wearing a dress.”
    Kevin rubbed his forehead and reached for the door handle. “Come on. All the good tables are going to be gone.”
    Meechan’s was a neighborhood fixture. Most of the residents ate at least one meal a month there, if not more, despite the cramped dining room and lack of air-conditioning. The three of them jostled around a too-small table. Jessica hung her purse from the back of her chair and noticed Bobbie hadn’t carried one. She wasn’t sure if it mattered or not, but it made her uneasy.
    Bobbie picked up a menu from the rack on the center of the table and studied it. “Nice place here, Marshall. You always take me to the best greasy spoons.”
    “Kelly, quit complaining.” Kevin put his elbows on the table, looked at their position relative to her, and dropped his hands into his lap.
    Jessica noticed Kevin didn’t look at a menu. Regulars knew it by heart. She wondered why she hadn’t noticed him in here before. Glancing around the packed dining room, she saw all the usuals. The woman who tried to bum a cigarette off every person she saw every time she saw them, even when they’d repeatedly told her they didn’t smoke. The old man with the fedora he wore rain or shine all year long and doffed to every woman he met. The weird artist girl with the piercing blue eyes.
    “So.” Bobbie snapped her menu closed. “You want to be a firefighter. Let me tell you the single most important thing about being a woman firefighter. Never wait to take a leak.”
    “What!” Kevin protested.
    “It never fails, you gotta wiz and you get a call. There is no place at a fire for a chick to take a p—”
    “Bobbie!” Kevin slapped his hand on the table, rattling the condiments in the center. “Oh my God. You are so crude.” His face was bright red.
    “It’s a hazard of the job. Crudeness.” Bobbie shrugged. “You’ll get used to it.” She patted Jessica’s hand.
    A waitress sidled up to their table and took their orders.
    “Have you ever started a chain saw?” Bobbie blurted out as soon as the waitress turned to leave. The waitress hesitated, decided the question wasn’t directed at her, and left.
    Jessica blinked at Bobbie. “A c-chainsaw?” She shook her head. “With a rip cord? No.”
    Kevin dropped his head into his hands, groaning. Jessica eased back in her chair so he wouldn’t elbow her in the chest.
    “You better learn. The guys can just rip that sucker.” Bobbie jerked her hands apart above the table demonstrating and nearly smacking Kevin’s head. “But most women can’t. I was in training with a woman who couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t get it. She quit. I have to put it on the ground and brace it with my foot. For some reason women can’t jerk it like the guys do.”
    Kevin groaned again.
    “It’s a lack of upper body strength,” Jessica said. She thought she’d been dizzy before, but Bobbie was the human equivalent of the Tilt-A-Whirl. “Most of a female’s strength is centered