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“—still don’t see why this is necessary.”
Black screen, and the camera abruptly switches on; a lens flare, as it adjusts to the light. Two figures are stood in what looks like an office: a young woman in a pantsuit, with flame-red hair and a pursed lipsticked mouth, raising one perfectly manicured eyebrow down at an older man in LAFD uniform, sat in a chair behind a desk. The nameplate in front of him reads CAPT BOBBY NASH.
“As I told you, sir,” the woman says. “We’ve received clearance from your superiors.”
The man, Nash, does not look so pleased with this. “For a month?”
“Yes.”
His mouth twists unhappily, but he seems to realise that he has no way out of this. For a moment there is silence, the camera flitting between him and the woman, whose arms are folded, one polished finger tapping impatiently against her bicep. Finally, Nash sighs. “Well, if the commissioner signed off on it,” he says, though he says it with a level of enthusiasm that wouldn’t be out of place if what the commissioner had signed off on was his execution warrant. “But I want you to remember that this is a firehouse, and not a reality television set. I don’t want you or any of your crew getting in the way of any of my team.”
The woman’s lip curls. “It’s not reality TV. It’s a documentary.”
Nash raises an eyebrow.
She sighs. “We promise to stay out of your way. But we want your full cooperation.”
“I’m afraid I can’t promise that,” Nash says, as he pushes himself out of his chair. “Though I don’t suppose my luck is good enough that I can say the same for my team.” He winces, as if a thought has just occurred him. “Just… go easy on them, okay?”
The camera swivels to the woman just in time to catch the almost dangerous smile that slips on her lips. “Don’t worry, Captain Nash,” she says. “I assure you, your story is in the best hands.”
*
“Let me give you the run-down,” says one of the paramedics, whose name badge reads Han but who introduces himself as Chimney. He pops a grape into his mouth, bracing himself on his forearms as he leans forward across the kitchen counter. “You’ve come to the right place for all the hot gossip.”
“Uh,” says a voice, awkwardly, from behind the camera. “That won’t be—”
“Yes it will,” another voice says sharply, and the camera turns to see the red-haired woman watching the paramedic, Chimney, intently. “Please, tell us everything you want to.”
Chimney glances between her and whoever is behind the camera. “Uh—are you sure?”
“Yes,” the woman says emphatically. “This documentary isn’t just meant to highlight the amazing community service you do – but also who you are as people. This documentary is meant to humanise.”
Chimney looks decently chuffed by this. “Well, in that case,” he says. It is not missed how he discreetly angles himself a little differently, flexing his biceps. Politely, the camera focuses in on them for a second. “I’ll give you the run-down on everyone here. First, Cap.”
There is a camera cut to a shot of Captain Nash stood in the communal kitchen, gently jostling a pan over the heat, surrounded by cut-up vegetables. The hand that isn’t holding the pan is carefully poring over a page in a cookbook propped up next to him, brows furrowed.
“Cap is a softie at heart,” Chimney’s voice says, and the camera cuts back to him at the counter, throwing another grape in his mouth. “But he’s also tough as nails. Doesn’t take shit from anyone – oh wait, can I swear?”
“We’ll bleep it.”
Chimney looks thrilled by this. It is clear that of everyone, he is probably the most excited about appearing on television. “Yeah, he takes no shit, but he… he cares about us, you know? Looks after us. He made it a rule, almost as soon as he became captain, that we do every meal together, and we’ve stuck by it since. He’s a family man, through and through, and I think that’s why we work so well as a team. It all trickles down from the top.” He pops another grape in his mouth. “And man, is he a good cook. His macaroni cheese bake. Oh man. He only does it sometimes, but I reckon we could twist his arm to make it for you guys at some point.”
The woman’s face is sharp, thoughtful. “What was your last captain like, then?”
“Ah.” Chimney pulls an awkward face. “Well. I think he’s still employed by the LAFD, so I probably shouldn’t name names.”
The camera cuts immediately to another paramedic, sitting in the back of an ambulance, stocking one of the med kits. “Captain Vincent Gerrard,” she says, without even a hint of deliberation. “Piece of shit. I was glad to see him go.”
“Who else is there?” Cut, again, back to Chimney. “Well, my partner in crime, Hen, of course.”
Another cut, back to the paramedic in the ambulance. She has a shaved head, thick-rimmed glasses and big gold hoop earrings. For the first time, the red-haired woman looks a little awed, though she’s still sporting that dangerous smile again. It is not hard to notice that she feeds off spectacle like vultures to a carcass. “What was he like? Your old captain?”
“Sexist, racist pig.” Hen, the paramedic, packs one of the med kits away, and then turns properly to face the camera, raising an eyebrow. It is clear she doesn’t want to spend any more time talking about Captain Gerrard than she has to. “Are you on TV at all?”
The red-haired woman blinks. “Sorry?”
“Your voice is familiar. I’m trying to place it.”
“Oh.” The woman straightens, a little, tossing a lock of red hair over her shoulder. “Taylor Kelly. I did traffic for Radio 4 for a year.”
Hen’s face eases. “That’s it,” she says. “Hen Wilson. Good to meet you.” It is a little difficult to gauge whether this is genuine or just polite. Taylor’s eyes narrow like she’s not sure either, but when Hen holds out her hand she shakes it.
“You, too,” she says.
“Hen is my number one,” Chimney’s voice says, and the clip cuts back to him. “We’ve been with each other pretty much since day one. We’re both paramedics so we’re partners, too. Honestly, there’s not much I wouldn’t do for her. She’s my best friend.”
The camera swivels to Taylor, as if anticipating her to look fond at this. Instead, she looks a little bored. “How long have the two of you been working here?”
Laughing, Chimney stretches his arms above his head. “God, I can’t tell you. Donkey’s years. We’ve seen each other through thick and thin. I introduced her to her wife Karen, you know? Don’t ask her to corroborate that, she’ll tell you it was coincidence that I was in the room they first met, but I definitely introduced them. Hold on, let me see if I can find a photo of us.”
There is a long pause, as Chimney pulls his phone out of his pocket and scrolls. He immediately gets distracted by something, face softening into a dopey grin, seemingly forgetting he’s on camera or that he’s promised to find a picture. After maybe thirty seconds, Taylor delicately clears her throat, and he jerks back.
“Oh, sorry,” he says, and holds up his phone. It’s a photo of Chimney and Hen, but clearly taken many years ago. Hen’s glasses are different, thinner and frameless, and Chimney has less smile lines, his hair jet black instead of shot through slightly with grey. They’re both standing back to back, holding medical flashlights like guns. “That was us in the hey-day. Man, what a time. Back when I could eat an entire pizza and not have to go on a jog the next morning.” He pulls the phone back towards him. “Hey, you wanna see a picture of my daughter? She just turned one!”
The camera cuts before he can, showing general panning shots of the station. Some firefighters scrub the doors of the trucks; others do pull-ups in the gym; others lounge around aimlessly reading or shooting the shit in the upstairs lounge. There is a particularly raucous burst of laughter, and the camera belatedly follows it to two firefighters playing pool, one of them accusingly pointing his cue stick at the other. “I had it!” he protests. “You nudged the table!”
The other, the darker-haired one, raises his hands a little smugly. “Maybe you’re just a bad shot.”
“Bad shot!” the other parrots indignantly. He teasingly jabs at him across the table with his stick. “I’ll show you a bad shot—”
“Children,” a voice calls exasperatedly, and both the firefighters glance over at the kitchen counter, where Captain Nash is dicing an onion, raising an eyebrow at them both. Sufficiently chastised, they both mutter, “Sorry,” and turn back to the table, but when the blond one leans down to take his shot, he points at his own eyes and then jabs his fingers at the dark-haired one, the universal sign for I’ve got my eye on you. The camera swivels to the dark-haired one for his reaction, missing whatever the blond says that makes him laugh, but it does catch the way the laughter remains in his face, even after the blond has successfully sinks a shot and smugly dances around the table to take another, his eyes soft and fond.
“And the others?” Taylor’s voice says, and the camera cuts back to Chimney, still at the counter scrolling through his phone. The clock on the wall behind him shows it’s been half an hour since he showed the first baby picture. “What are they like?”
“Hm?”
Taylor looks like she’s about to snatch the phone from his hands. “The other firefighters? Buckley and Diaz?”
Chimney doesn’t appear to have listened to a word she said; is still scrolling through his phone. After a moment, he finds whatever he was searching for her, and turns the screen towards the camera triumphantly. “Here. Uncle Buck with Jee-Yun.”
It’s a photo of Firefighter Buckley holding a small child, their cheeks pressed together as they both grin at whoever is taking the picture. While adorable, it also does not answer any questions.
Taylor seems resigned to her fate. “Cute.”
“Isn’t it?” Chimney misses the pointedness of her tone. He turns the phone back to him, and smiles dopily at the photo a little while longer, before swiping to the next one. “Oh, and look at this one!”
Obediently, the camera zooms in, just catching Taylor’s unimpressed look in the corner of the frame as it does. This one was clearly taken moments after the first, still with Buckley and Jee-Yun, but there’s another man in on Jee-Yun’s other side, an arm around Buckley’s shoulders.
“Wait,” Taylor says, off-camera, “is that Firefighter Diaz?”
“Eddie? Oh, yeah.” Chimney soppily looks down at the picture. “She’s so cute.”
Whoever is behind the camera must catch something in Taylor’s tone, because it swivels back in her direction, her expression sharp and thoughtful. She makes eye contact with it, and then subtly gestures with her head somewhere to her right. Obligingly, the camera follows her eyeline, over the mezzanine railing, and zooms in to the locker room, visible through the glass dividers. Diaz is sat down on the bench, frowning at his phone, whilst Buckley is stood by his locker, getting changed. Diaz says something, inaudible despite the microphones planted everywhere across the station, and Buckley comes up behind him, still buttoning his shirt; swings a boot up onto the bench next to him, leans in close over his shoulder. Their cheeks almost brush as he squints at whatever Diaz has on his phone, and then he points at something on the screen that has Diaz’s face clearing, mouth forming an oh in realisation. He half-turns on the bench, says something that makes Buckley’s ears go pink, though he dodges it by slapping Diaz on the shoulder – but neither of them make a move to step away, Buckley finishing buttoning up his shirt with one foot still on the bench, Diaz’s hand loosely around the ankle of his boot, fingers absently tapping out a senseless rhythm.
The camera flicks back up to Taylor, but not before it catches Diaz absently smoothing a hand down Buckley’s side to catch out a wrinkle. Chimney is still obliviously flicking through his phone, chattering away about his daughter, but Taylor’s eyebrows are sky-high.
“And this was her first bubble-bath,” Chimney is saying, showing the phone to the camera. Dutifully, it zooms in on the phone, though Taylor still remains in the background of the frame, and that dangerous smile is back on her face.
*
There’s a call, that first day: nothing out of the ordinary, a woman locked out on her balcony who tried to jump down and then last-minute changed her mind, clinging onto the railing to stop herself plummeting three storeys. The camera politely averts its lens as the truck rolls into the scene to avoid any upskirt shots, and instead fixes on Buckley and Diaz playing a hand slapping game, which mostly involves prolonged time of them palm-to-palm.
The cameraman isn’t the only one to have noticed this: next to Buckley is Hen, who watches them with thinly-veiled amusement. After maybe a minute of the two of them waiting, palms over palms, she says dryly, “You know, I remembered this game involving a lot more slapping and less sensual hand-holding.”
Diaz’s ears go pink, but Buckley just wags a finger at her and says, “It’s all about the element of surprise, Hen.”
“You’ve been sat there for about two minutes.”
“It’s called raising tension. Do you watch horror movies?”
Hen makes deliberate eye contact with the camera.
“We haven’t properly met yet,” says Taylor, off-camera, and the camera does an awkward pivot to get the side of her face. It’s uncomfortably cramped, in the truck: it’s not a space built for a camera crew as well as half a dozen firefighters and all their gear. Captain Nash has grown no less fond of the crew in the hours they’ve been there, and his frowning face is captured in pretty much every single angle in the rearview mirror. “Do you want to introduce yourselves to the camera?”
“Not now, Miss Kelly, please,” Captain Nash says, passive-aggressively, as he opens the truck door. “Please stand back while we do our jobs.”
The camera catches Taylor’s epic eye-roll.
Stand back it does, though, watching from the side as Buckley rides a ladder up to the balcony, hands held out in front of him in reassurance, Diaz close behind him, a hand of his own hovering over Buckley’s back, as if to stabilise him. It’s a quick job, the two retrieving the woman who clings to them with a grateful sob, and bringing her back down, where Hen and Chimney give her a brief once-over to check for any injuries. Uncharacteristically, Taylor is somewhere else, not attached to the camera like she normally is, on the prowl around the other firefighters, so it is just Nash and the cameraman standing in silence as they observe.
“Do you get these kinds of calls a lot?” the cameraman says, finally, awkwardly.
Nash glances at the camera, a little warily. After a moment, he nods. “Generally,” he says. “Despite the name, our most common calls are medical ones. All of us have our EMS certification, even if we aren’t licenced paramedics.”
“Why’s that?”
“We have the most equipment. And a lot of medical calls require extraction that only paramedics can’t perform.”
“Oh, cool,” says the cameraman. Then, like he can’t help himself, “What’s the weirdest call you’ve seen?”
Nash glances at the camera again, but this time there’s something almost like amusement in his eyes. He opens his mouth as if to respond, but before he can he’s cut off by Taylor off-frame saying contemptuously, “Some people!”
Almost guiltily, the camera swerves to face her as she approaches, busy with brushing her arms down as though she’s come into contact with something dirty.
“Those bystanders didn’t want to tell me anything,” she continues irritably, unaware she’s just interrupted a conversation. “But then I mentioned that we were filming a documentary about the LAPD and suddenly it was all, oh let me tell you about the one time my brother-in-law’s colleague set his kitchen on fire. It’s like they have no respect for credible journalism unless there’s a camera involved.” For the first time, she looks up, and notices Nash still stood there. “Captain Nash.”
“Miss Kelly,” Nash says coolly. The amusement is gone from his face. The camera just catches the hand he reaches out to pat the shoulder of whoever is behind it, before he’s striding off. “I’ll tell you later, young man.”
“Tell what?” Taylor says, when he’s out of earshot.
“Nothing,” says the cameraman.
Her eyes narrow, but she leaves it. “Whatever,” she says. “Come on, we still need to get Buckley and Diaz’s introductions.”
*
Evan Buckley has enough charm to light up probably a whole house. “Everyone calls me Buck,” he adds, after his name, as he shakes Taylor’s hand. For the first time Taylor looks something other than devious or bored – she almost looks a little… struck. It’s easy to forgive: Evan Buckley looks more like something out of a movie about firefighters than a real one, with blond close-cropped hair, wide blue eyes and a pink smiling mouth that is the same colour as the birth mark splashed over his left eyebrow. He’s in the small gym on the heels of a workout, face and shoulders dotted in sweat. “And you’re Taylor Kelly, right?”
Taylor blinks a little. “Uh… yes. Yes, I am.”
He grins at her, revealing dimples. “I knew I recognised your voice.”
“Buck, stop hitting on the camera crew,” says a voice, and the camera swivels to see Chimney doing pull-ups on the bar. When he notices the camera in his direction, he schools his face in mock-seriousness and completes a few more reps, biceps bulging. In the background, Diaz hits the punchbag so hard the frame rattles.
Buck rolls his eyes. “I’m just being friendly.”
“Oo-kay,” Chimney sings, and drops down nimbly. As he stoops to pick up a towel, he adds, “You should tell them about Buck one-point-oh. So the taxpayers know what the men of the LAFD do with the trucks they spend their hard-earned money on.”
“A-as I was saying,” Buck continues, though his ears are bright pink. “My favourite thing about working here is probably the comradery.”
Chimney’s laugh echoes around the gym.
“The comradery?” Taylor raises an eyebrow. “Like with whom?”
“Not Chim, that’s for sure,” Buck says, and Chimney laughs again. “But—Eddie! Eddie, come say hi. Has Eddie done this part yet?”
The camera seems torn between filming Taylor’s sly expression as he’s presumably played right into her hands, and Diaz coming over, grey tank top blackened with sweat. When he draws near enough he claps Buckley on the shoulder, says, “What part haven’t I done?” as though he only tuned in for the latter half of the conversation, though his back is ramrod straight, his eyes inscrutable.
“Introductions,” Buck says. “For the documentary.”
“Oh.” Diaz casts a distasteful, wary look towards the cameras; clearly a mistrust of the camera crew runs in the water in the 118.
Or, at least, mostly. “Come on, broody,” Buck says, slinging an arm around his shoulders. To the camera, he says, “This is Eddie Diaz. LA’s finest.”
“That’s police, Buckaroo,” Chimney says.
“What?”
There’s a beat, in which Chimney seemingly decides it’s not worth it. “Don’t worry about it.”
“How long have you both been working here?” Taylor says.
“Coming up on four years now,” Buck says. “Chim? Right?”
“Yeah, 2018, kiddo.” Chimney comes over at this now, slings his arm around Buck’s shoulders. It causes Buck’s own arm around Eddie to slip a little to his back, where it lingers for a long moment. To the cameras, oblivious, Chimney says, “I’ve known this one since the beginning. Back when he was young and cute and reckless – remember that time you defied direct orders and ran headfirst into a burning building to save a cat? Oh, wait.”
Eddie smirks as Buck rolls his eyes. The camera cuts, briefly, to a newscast of the incident, an apartment block completely up in flames, and a small figure clad in black running straight into it. The timestamp at the bottom of the newscast is dated a week ago.
“Funny,” Buck mutters, and Chimney squeezes his shoulder.
“And you, Eddie?” Taylor says. Her voice is a little pointed, like she’s angling for something. “How long have you worked here?”
Eddie shifts, uncomfortable with the attention as the camera turns to face him. Buck’s hand is still on his back; he seemingly realises it at the same time the camera does, because just as it is zooming in on it he drops it like it’s red-hot. “This will be my third year,” Eddie says, a little warily, like this information is going to be held against him in some way. “We moved in 2019.”
“We?”
Eddie looks even more uncomfortable. “My son and I.”
“Eddie’s a Texas man,” Buck says. “Doesn’t have the accent, though, which is a shame.”
“You sure about that?” Eddie drawls, a little, putting it on. This is softer, a tease just for Buck, and Buck’s face brightens delightedly.
“You did it.”
“Buck and a buckeroo,” Chimney says. “A match made in heaven.”
Eddie rolls his eyes. To the camera, Buck says, “He’s made that joke at least twice a week since he thought of it.”
“It’s a good joke!” Chimney defends, and swats Buck’s hand away when he reaches to poke at his cheek.
“Get outta here, man, you’re meant to be helping Cap upstairs.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Chimney says, and then scrubs a hand through Buck’s hair as he disappears behind him, messing up the careful wave it’s been gelled into it. Buck groans immediately, flipping him off with one hand and ducking his head out of frame to try and pat it back into place with the other, Chimney’s laughter echoing as he leaves. When he straightens, it’s still a little rumpled, and Eddie, completely assuredly, reaches for an errant curl that’s not laying flat, smoothing it down.
“Just a hair,” he says, in lieu of an explanation, and Buck grins at him a little sheepishly.
“Thanks, man. I’m good?”
“You’re good.”
Buck runs a self-conscious hand through his hair one more time anyway, like a nervous habit. Eddie watches him, not without fondness.
“You’re close, then,” Taylor remarks, because she has the subtlety of a knife through the heart. “Does your relationship help with your teamwork on calls, too?”
Eddie’s eyes narrow at her, like he can tell what she’s angling for, but Buck smiles, oblivious. “Oh, definitely. These guys are my family, here.”
Taylor’s slightly irritated face suggests that wasn’t exactly the answer she was wanting. “And you two? You’re partners?”
“On and off the field,” Buck says.
It’s something to be marvelled at, the ease and confidence with which he says it, like there’s not a shadow of a doubt for anything else. It’s the same confidence with which Eddie smoothed his hair down, with which he hovered his hand over Buck’s back on the call. What it must be like, to have this unerring, unequivocal trust in a person.
Still, Taylor doesn’t look quite satisfied with his answer. “What does that mean?”
Buck shrugs. “We have each other’s backs,” he says, simply. “We all do.”
Taylor looks like she’s suppressing a sigh. It would probably be irritating, if Buck completely missing the point was anything other than good-naturedly oblivious. “Well, thank you,” she says. “It’s been good to meet you both.”
“Yeah, you too,” Eddie says, still suspiciously. He eyes the camera for as long as the camera eyes him – which is to say, until it’s halfway up the stairs to the mezzanine – and when the camera discreetly swivels back in his direction a moment later it catches him saying something to Buck that has him bursting out laughing, bending at the waist.
*
“Chimney promised you hot gossip?” Hen says. “Chimney?”
It is sometime deep into the night – maybe two or three. Hen calls it the graveyard shift. The firehouse is dark and quiet, most of the team squirreled away in bunks to catch any snatches of sleep they can. “He said that as well as 9-1-1 he dealt in 4-1-1,” Taylor says, dryly.
This looks like it causes Hen physical pain. “I think being a dad has made the jokes even worse,” she says. “That one actually hurt me a little bit.”
Someone behind the camera yawns. Taylor impatiently slides a cup of coffee towards it; Hen slips off-centre, the camera unfocus-ing briefly as whoever is behind it greedily slurps it down.
“I don’t suppose you’d be more informed?” Taylor says.
Hen raises an eyebrow over the rim of her own coffee cup. “You’re a clever girl, Taylor Kelly. I bet you don’t get a lot of people saying no to you.”
Taylor shrugs modestly. “I’m good at my job.”
“You’re a nosey little thing, is what it is,” Hen says, but puts her mug down anyway. “You’re itching to ask something. What is it?”
“Buck and Eddie.”
A smile slips on Hen’s face. “Oh, I was waiting for how long it would take before you got curious about that.”
“Are they together?”
“Short answer? As far as we’re aware, no.”
“And the long answer?”
Hen takes another long, measured sip of her coffee. “I thought this documentary was about firefighters.”
“Buck and Eddie are firefighters, no?”
“I’m not in the habit of divulging private details for television. If you want that, ask Chim or Buck.” With that, Hen rises from her seat, taking her coffee with her. The camera turns to Taylor, whose eyebrows are furrowed in something like surprise and indignation, her lips parted on the beginning of a protest, but before she can say anything, Hen adds over her shoulder, “But – long answer? There’s a station-wide bet on when they’re going to get together.”
And then she’s gone.
The camera zooms in on Taylor’s surprised expression, blinking after Hen’s retreating back. Then it catches on something just over Taylor’s shoulder, and zooms in further, to the reflection of the blank television sitting neatly on a cabinet. In it is clearly the image of Buck and Eddie fast asleep, heads tucked against each other, arms overlapping, blocked from view by the back of the couch they’re napping on.
When the camera zooms out, it’s to the back of Taylor’s head, who has also noticed this and is watching the reflection intently. She turns, makes eye contact with the camera, and raises one, knowing eyebrow.
*
The hissing of a frying pan; the flash of red, green, yellow bell peppers on the cutting board. “It’s all about care,” Nash says, as he deftly sweeps a crushed garlic clove into the pan. “Anyone can follow a recipe, but the real secret is putting the work in, looking after it – that’s when the ingredients really start to sing.”
“Sort of like a team, then,” says the cameraman.
Nash’s lips twitch upwards at that. “Yeah. Exactly like a team.”
A few montage shots, of the 118 gathered around a table, passing bowls and plates around. In one shot, a police officer has joined them, with short dark hair and a sleek maroon manicure: Nash serves her first from the salad bowl, and she kisses his cheek in thanks. In another, Hen throws a cherry tomato across the table, and Buck nearly careers sideways into Chimney trying to catch it in his mouth – which he does, successfully, throwing up his arms like he’s just won a medal. Next to him, Eddie laughs, eyes warm.
“You asked about calls?” Nash says, and the shot cuts back to him, though this time a little while later; the frying pan has been lidded, kept on a low flame, and Nash is carefully stirring a wooden spoon through a new pot that wasn’t present in the last shot.
“Oh, man,” the cameraman says. “Do you get a lot of weird ones?”
“Occasionally there are some stranger calls,” Nash says. “The sex-related ones are always interesting.”
The shot cuts to a call, taken at another date. A blue sky, a kid’s playground, and two clearly naked adults stuck in the little house beneath the slide. Nash is crouched by one of the windows, talking to them through it, whilst Buck stands a few feet away, an axe slung over one shoulder. The camera tries to zoom in, catch a glimpse of the callers, but then Eddie is stepping up, face mostly shielded in a pair of dark sunglasses. “Stand back, please,” he says. “We’re trying to work.”
“So are we,” says Taylor, a little irritably. It is obvious that Taylor is not the friendliest presence, or one that many of the firefighters particularly enjoy, but Eddie visibly, uniquely seems to have an issue with her, though you could only tell by comparing the cool, polite way he speaks to Taylor and the crew and the open, smiling way he greets his co-workers.
“Well, it’s a sensitive call,” Eddie says, “and while I’m aware we all signed waivers consenting to having our faces on television, these people did not. So until they do, please keep out of our way and switch the cameras off.”
Taylor is not backing down. “What if we film and after they’ve been extracted we get their permission to use their image?”
Eddie simply raises an eyebrow. The last shot of the clip is a blur as the camera turns down to face the ground, the cameraman awkwardly saying, “I think I’m gonna—” while Taylor says, “No, keep—”
It abruptly switches back to Nash back in the kitchen. “It is important that we stay professional,” he says. “Oftentimes, the time a person calls 9-1-1 is the scariest moment of their life. It is our job that we keep them as safe and comfortable as possible, which is why we didn’t let you film last week.”
“Oh, I get it.”
Nash raises an eyebrow. “Well, that’s considerate of you,” he says. “I don’t think your colleague feels similarly.”
“Taylor likes a story.”
“Mm,” Nash says, not impressed. He holds out a spoon. “Do you want to taste that and tell me if it needs more salt?”
Another sweeping shot of the whole station: the locker room, the gym, the trucks. A shot of the team quietly relaxing in between calls upstairs, curled up in various chairs reading books or scrolling through their phones. Hen is studying – “I’m in my third year of medical school,” she says, in a talking head segment later. “Because apparently being a full-time mom, wife and firefighter wasn’t enough to do” – Chimney is squinting down at a sudoku book, Eddie is reading and Buck is fast asleep, head in Eddie’s lap, legs crossed at the ankle and propped on the armrest of the couch.
There’s another young man present, absently spinning a Rubix cube in his hands. “Ravi,” he introduces himself, when Taylor parks herself in front of him and offers her hand in the way one might point a gun. His eyes nervously flick between her, the camera and the rest of the team present. “Uh… I don’t have to act or anything, do I?”
“No, this is just a documentary,” Taylor says. “We want you, Robbie.”
“Ravi.”
In the background, Eddie poorly hides a smirk behind his book.
“Ravi, sorry,” Taylor says. “Tell me about yourself. How long have you been working here?”
“Oh, uh, not long. I’m still a probationary firefighter.”
“His shield ceremony is coming up soon,” Nash says, coming over, two mugs of coffee in his hands. He passes one over to Chimney, who takes it without lifting his eyes from his puzzle, pen still between his teeth. “Just under a month now.”
Ravi smiles at that; something shy, but excited, too. “Yeah.”
“Your family coming to visit, Ravi?” Hen says.
“Yeah, the whole extended family.” Ravi rolls his eyes, a little embarrassedly, but it’s clear he’s glad this is the case. “I’m pretty sure I’m meeting some estranged cousins for the first time because of it.”
Nash smiles at this. “They’re excited?”
“Mostly confused, to be honest. Dad doesn’t really understand the whole probationary thing – he thinks I’m a real firefighter already. Mom is just happy I have a job, unlike Priya.”
Hen clicks her fingers. “Priya is… History of Art?”
“Yeah! She’s in her senior year, now.” Ravi smiles, cheeks a little pink. “But, yeah. I think they’re all really excited.”
“We haven’t had a shield ceremony in a while,” Chimney notes, over his book. “Who was the last one? Eddie, right?”
Eddie laughs. “That feels like so long ago.”
The sound, or perhaps the rumble of his chest, is enough to have Buck on his lap stirring a little, bringing a hand up to his face to knuckle at an eye. “What time is it?” he mumbles.
Eddie glances down at him, something warm and gentle in his eyes. He brings the hand that isn’t holding his book gently to the top of Buck’s head, brushing his hair off his forehead. “Half past four. You were only out for twenty minutes.”
Buck hums, stretching his legs. “Still tired.”
“Go back to sleep. We’re just chatting.”
“I like chatting.”
“You have the worst FOMO of anyone I know.”
“I taught you what Snapchat was last week,” Buck mumbles sleepily. Despite his best efforts, he seems to be drifting off again, Eddie’s hand still carefully carding through his hair. “How do you know what FOMO is?”
“I’m not an alien.”
“Agree to disagree, Grandpa,” Buck says, eyes closing. “What… what are we chatting about?”
Eddie rolls his eyes. “How you’re a stubborn ass.”
Buck yawns. “You… like my… ass,” he murmurs, and then immediately falls back asleep.
The camera focuses a second too long on the soft look in Eddie’s eyes, before seemingly belatedly realising that there are other people in the zoom and hurriedly zooming back out. Surprisingly, no one has even batted an eyelid at what just took place, the conversation still continuing on over their heads. Taylor’s eyebrows are somewhere in her hairline when the camera pans back to her, even as Chimney says something that has them all laughing, including Eddie, who has tuned right back in as seamlessly as if he never clocked out – though the camera does not miss how his fingers keep carefully combing through Buck’s hair.
*
“What does being a firefighter mean to me?” Chimney’s hand slows on the side of the truck he was wiping down, brow creasing in thought. After a short pause, he huffs out a laugh, putting his hands on his hips. “Well, gee. That’s a big question.”
“For me, it means family,” Hen says, in the bunk room, over a cup of coffee. “It means protection, and maintaining the welfare of a community.”
“Being a firefighter isn’t just about fighting fires,” says Nash, in his office. “We swore an oath to serve and protect; to uphold the Constitution.” For the first time, his face loses that suspicious, frowny look it tends to take on in Taylor’s presence; softens, a little. “For me, being a firefighter means working in a team. Trusting and defending everyone in that team with their lives. This fire station, these firefighters you have spent weeks filming – they are family. We take care of each other.”
“Being a firefighter means looking sexy in the uniform,” Chimney decides, finally. From nowhere, he produces a calendar, slides it Taylor’s way. “You can keep this. Mr April, by the way.”
“…How generous,” Taylor says.
The shot cuts to the small ground-floor kitchenette, on another day. Ravi is perched atop of a pile of rolled hoses, scrolling through his phone; Eddie and Hen are stood next to him, Eddie pouring coffee into three different mugs, two plain white and one patterned with little cartoon dinosaurs. “Tell me about your families,” Taylor says, from behind the camera. “Do you have partners? Kids?”
Hen’s face softens as she stirs in a teaspoon of sugar. “My wife, Karen,” she says. “And my son Denny.”
The clip cuts, to a photo of the three of them in what looks like a photobooth, Hen and a young boy, presumably Denny, in funny stripey hats, and another woman with long rope twists in big green glasses and waving a pink sparkly pom-pom. They’re all smiling widely at the camera.
“Oh, how old?” Taylor says.
“Just turned eleven.” Hen looks a little grieved by this. “I don’t know what happened, he was six only a few months ago.”
Eddie makes a wounded noise of agreement. “Same with Chris. I’m not ready for him to grow up.”
“At least we can get through the terrible teens together,” Hen says, and they bump shoulders in solidarity.
“What about you, Eddie?” Taylor inquires, and Eddie gets that cagey deer-in-headlights look he does whenever the camera is pointed directly at him. “Wife? Kids?”
“No wife,” Eddie says, and the look in his eyes is seemingly enough to have even Taylor not push that subject. “But… yeah. One kid. Christopher. Twelve next year.” Almost reluctantly, he pulls his phone out of his pocket, scrolling through to find a photo.
“Oh, that’s not necessary,” Taylor says, “you can just send one and we can edit it in—”
“I’m not giving pictures of my son to a corporation, thank you,” Eddie says stiffly, and Hen rolls her eyes fondly as she lifts a coffee mug to her lips. “But… here.” He holds up his phone to show a photo of a young boy with crutches cheesing at the camera, Eddie crouched down next to him, an arm around his shoulders. Surprisingly – or perhaps not surprisingly at all – Buck is on the boy’s other side, face screwed up in laughter.
Taylor looks like she’s trying terribly hard to look inconspicuous. “Buck, as well?”
“He and Chris are best friends,” Eddie says. “He helps me look after him.”
Next to him, over the rim of her coffee cup, Hen makes direct eye contact with the camera.
“What about you, Ravi?” Taylor says. She pronounces Ravi intentionally, as if emphasising that she’s remembered it this time. Ravi blinks a little at her. “Any family?”
“Uh,” he says. “My mom and dad?”
“No partner?”
“I… have a boyfriend?”
Clearly sensing his discomfort, Hen cuts in. “How is he?” she asks Ravi. “I haven’t seen him since the barbecue at Athena’s.”
Ravi perks up, a little. “He’s good! He decided to go for the masters after all – his supervisor kept bugging him for ages about it, and he eventually caved. He’s really excited, though.”
Hen smiles at him. “I’m glad to hear that.”
Taylor is watching them both with that scrutinising, assessing gaze she has, eyes ice-blue and cool. “What do your families think about your jobs, then?” she says, and Eddie, Hen and Ravi glance at her. “As firefighters? It can’t be the most stress-free life.”
“It isn’t,” Hen says, and puts her mug down. “But… for me, anyway, knowing that I have people I love back home waiting for me, someone to return to… it’s what keeps me going, whenever a call gets rough. It keeps me going. Every life I save, I dedicate to them.” She sighs, adjusting her fingers around her mug. “It’s not easy, is what I mean to say. And I can’t—I can’t imagine, sometimes, what it must be like, to know that someone you love may not return home every time they leave the house. But it’s what it makes it worth it, right? Loving in spite of an end? Isn’t that what makes it meaningful?”
She glances at Eddie at this, as if silently asking if he wants to add something, but Eddie is already watching her with an inscrutable, almost revelatory look in his eyes. There’s a beat, and then he looks back down at his phone, still presumably showing the picture of he, Christopher and Buck.
“Eddie?” Taylor prompts.
“What Hen said,” Eddie says, and picks up the two remaining mugs. “These are getting cold.” And then, before anyone can say anything else, he disappears up the stairs. The camera belatedly follows him, zooming in on the couch area as he approaches Buck, who is sat down on FaceTime to someone. Buck visibly perks up when he spots Eddie coming, then even further when he notices the coffee. “Your dad has returned bearing goods,” he declares to whoever is on the other end, his voice caught by one of the microphones. “And in my favourite mug too!”
Eddie sits down next to him, close enough that their thighs touch. Buck gratefully takes the dinosaur mug from him, passing the phone over to Eddie as he curls both hands around it, and holds it up so it’s in camera. “Look! Your mug!”
“My mug!” This voice is harder to catch, tinny from the phone speaker and the microphone tucked far away in the ceiling, but it’s decidedly from a little boy. “I got you that for your birthday!”
“Sure did, bud,” Buck says. “My favourite.” He takes a sip, and hums. “Mm, and done in my favourite way too. You Diazes know how to spoil a guy. Is this oat milk?”
“No,” Eddie lies, poorly.
“It so is! Did you go out and buy oat milk for me?”
“I put it on Cap’s grocery list, there’s a difference—”
“Aw, Eddie—”
“It’s good to see that they can still be civil with each other,” Ravi muses, off-frame, and the camera whirls around to face him, eyes similarly fixed watching Buck and Eddie.
Hen frowns, amusedly. “What do you mean?”
“You know, for Chris. Shared custody.”
Hen snorts coffee out of her nose.
*
Several evenings later, there’s a big call: a five-alarm fire, at a college accommodation building across town. There are dizzying, close-up shots of the sirens in the station flashing red; the pound of boots against the floor as the firefighters pull on their turnout coats and run for the trucks. It’s late enough that when the trucks squeal out of the station two minutes later, everything is shrouded in dark, lit only by the slashes of streetlight glow that whizz past. Even the camera work is shakier, as if to emphasise the spontaneity and danger of the situation: it pans across the truck, catching serious, focused faces of the firefighters, severely and angularly lit by the flashes of storefront glows through the windows. Even Taylor is uncharacteristically quiet, bundled in a black windbreaker. For the first time, she seems very okay with not getting in the way.
“There are six floors,” Nash is explaining, in the truck, turned around from the front seat to debrief his team. “The fire appears to have started from someone leaving a fork in the microwave on the third floor.”
“A fork in the microwave?” Chimney says. “And it got this bad?”
In the slash of the rearview mirror, Nash’s face is set in an unhappy, firm line. “Apparently to cut costs the building managers have been skipping code checks,” he says. “Nothing is properly insulated or protected – the whole place went up in flames almost instantly.”
“They’re just kids,” Buck says, quietly.
Nash turns around properly at this, making deliberate eye contact with every member of his team. “This is not a time for heroics, any of you,” he says. “I don’t want a single one of you disobeying orders in the name of martyrdom – this a huge, dangerous fire, and we’re back-up. There have already been casualties, and there are going to be more. This isn’t a situation where we can save everyone. Our main priorities are putting out the fire. Do you all understand me?”
“Yes, Cap,” everyone says, except Buck.
Nash notices. “Buckley.”
They hold gazes for a very long time, before Buck finally acquiesces, ducking his head. “Yes, Cap,” he mutters, reluctantly.
Nash nods. “Good,” he says. He makes eye contact with the camera. For the first time, he doesn’t blanch at the very sight of it. “You two,” he says, quieter but no less firm. “You stand right back. Let us do our jobs.”
Taylor nods, wordlessly.
The camera jerks with bumps in the road as the truck finally pulls in. Through the window, it catches a glimpse of a huge pillar of flames, so red it almost looks unreal, roaring like an injured animal. Outside, there is the sound of shouting and screaming, the hiss of hoses and the godawful splinter of floors giving way and collapsing. The camera turns, briefly, back onto the firefighters, as they climb out of the truck, jaws set in determination; in the rearview mirror, Nash briefly crosses himself, lips shaping the words of a prayer, before he follows his team.
The shot cuts, there: switches to news reports of the same incident, a dark-haired reporter in a parka grimly recounting the situation. Dozens more clips flick by in a gruesome montage: camera phone footage of the building up in flames, of people screaming and frantically trying to climb out of their windows to escape the furnace. A gurney rolls by with a girl blistered in burns; two of her friends, faces blackened in soot, cling to her hands, sobbing after her. Another clip, of a line of firemen armed with hoses, spraying water.
It cuts, all at once, to Nash, back in the kitchen, back to stirring a pot with a wooden spoon. From behind the camera, the cameraman ventures, carefully, “I don’t suppose all your calls are funny, though.”
Nash’s face sobers, eyes falling down to the pot. There is silence for a few moments, Nash throat working as he presumably finds the best way to vocalise what he wants to say, still stirring, before he finally says, voice a little rough, “No. They’re not.”
“What… what are the worst ones? If you don’t mind me asking?”
“I don’t mind,” Nash says. Of all the firefighters, he has received the fewest minutes of screentime so far, probably due to his aversion to the whole operation in the first place, but the few times he has been onscreen, it is easy to see why the rest of the team feel comfortable, here; feel safe enough to call it family. There is a sadness, in Nash, something bone-deep like the grief of having lost a family once that means he’s unwilling to let it happen again. Before he was ever a captain, he was a father – that much is clear. “The worst ones are the calls where we lose people.”
“That must be hard.”
“It’s something you don’t ever get better at dealing with – you learn to compartmentalise, to manage, but death is not something that will ever be comfortable. It’s not something I ever want to be comfortable. As soon as death is easy, you’ve lost what makes you a good firefighter – a heart.”
“Is there… is there one that has stayed with you?”
Nash exhales a wry laugh. “They’ve all stayed with me, son. There is no call we’ve lost someone that hasn’t. But I’ve been in this business a hell of a long time; I’ve learned to keep them as friends instead of ghosts.”
There is something about how he emphasises the I. “There are others that haven’t?”
For the first time, Nash’s hand slows around the spoon. There is a very long pause before he finally speaks again. “Some still take them personally,” he says, quietly. “The deaths. The truth is, sometimes we’re too late. Sometimes they don’t want to be saved, or there’s nothing we can do. But it is hard to accept that; it can feel a little like giving up. Admitting you’ve lost control, you know – that there’s nothing that could have been done to save them. And some don’t like to accept that. It's in that, that people get hurt.”
It cuts back to the fire, now, a little while later. The bottom floors have all been extinguished, but the top of the building is still ablaze, the air still rent with screaming. The camera zooms in, jaggedly, on a line of black-and-yellow-clad figures, silhouetted stark black against the sky by the waves of flame. The back of their jackets read 118.
It’s too far away to hear anything, especially over the cacophony of splitting beams and screaming, but the camera gets in close enough to see Nash’s expression, furrowed in concentration as he yells out instructions down the line. The whole team are all streaked in sweat and soot, exhaustion evident in every line of their faces, as they haul the hoses out of the trucks, but they listen to him, and when Nash waves, go back, they move.
Except one – who takes off straight for the fire.
The shout of, “BUCK!” can be heard over the roaring fire. Eddie makes a move to go after him, but Nash blocks him with a firm arm across his chest, despite the fact that he looks like he wants to go too. He shouts something at his retreating back, inaudible over the roaring fire, but Buck either doesn’t hear or doesn’t listen, tugging his oxygen mask over his face and disappearing into the building.
Eddie shouts something at Nash; Nash takes his helmet off, frustratedly. Another firefighter comes up to them, waving his arms, and they reluctantly are all shepherded backwards, even though Eddie is still yelling after Buck’s retreating back.
“What’s going on?” Taylor calls over the noise, when they’re close enough. Their faces are smeared in soot, eyes frantic. Nash has never looked closer to his sixty years than he does now, eyes grieved. “What happened?”
“Buck’s still in there!” Eddie is yelling. “Cap, we need to go after him!”
“We were given direct orders—”
“Fuck the direct orders! Buck’s still in there—”
“Diaz,” Nash snaps, and Eddie falls silent, eyes angry. “I understand that you’re worried, but you heard the chief. We were given an evacuation order, and we need to obey that.”
“But Buck—”
All at once, Nash’s radio crackles to life. “This is Captain McGintley,” a voice says over it. “Can all stations confirm evacuation? Over.”
Nash and Eddie hold each other’s gazes for a long, tense moment, Eddie’s hands curled into fighting fists, his whole body ready to run. Finally, Nash breaks eye contact with a frustrated sigh, and lifts the radio up to his mouth. “Captain McGintley, this Captain Nash of the 118. We still have a man inside. Over.”
There is a pause, but the faint crackle of radio says that it’s not because McGintley hasn’t heard. “The whole building is about to collapse,” he says, finally. “It would be a death mission to try and—”
“What?” Eddie demands. “Cap, we have to—”
“I know, Eddie,” Nash grits out.
“Do you still have contact with him?” McGintley says.
Nash glances at Chimney, who raises his own radio to his mouth. “Buck, this is Chimney,” he says. “Do you copy?”
“I copy, Chim,” comes Buck’s voice, laboured. Eddie’s shoulders deflate in relief. Nash takes the radio from Chimney’s hand, holds it up to his own mouth.
“Buck, you need to get out of there now. This is a direct order.”
“Cap, there are still people in here—”
“The building’s coming down in minutes, and I want you out before it does. Am I understood?”
There is a silence. “Understood, Cap,” Buck says, finally. “But—”
“No. This is not about what you want. Get out of there now.”
“Cap, there’s a girl here.”
Nash’s eyes close, briefly. “Buck.”
Buck’s voice is urgent. “She’s alive. I need to get her out.”
“No, what you need to do is get out—”
“She’s pinned under a refrigerator—”
“Buck,” Eddie snaps, “get the fuck out of there.”
“Eddie,” Buck breathes.
“I know you want to be a hero, Buck, but—goddamn it, Buck, you can’t die in there. Not tonight. Get out now. Christopher—”
“Eddie—”
“Christopher needs you. I—”
The building lets out another ominous creak. Chimney mutters, “Cap…”
“Buck,” Nash interrupts, “you need to get out now.”
“But the girl—”
“The building is about to come down, and you need to get out—”
There is another creak – and then in slow-motion, with the gut-wrenching screech of breaking beams, the rest of the building collapses in on itself. The camera flicks just in time to see Eddie lunge forward, Chimney and Nash grabbing him by the shoulders to drag him back. He shouts, “Buck!” and it comes out gutturally, something from the very pit of his chest. The impact of the entire thing crashing down to the ground shakes the very earth they stand on, and the camera rattles, barely catching the look on anguish on Diaz’s face or the way Nash’s eyes shutter. Plumes of smoke and flame spread out like dust clouds; it is so loud that for a few long moments the audio peaks and whites out completely.
When it comes back on, it’s to Eddie yelling.
“Buck!” he shouts, straining against the cage of arms around his torso. “Buck—!”
“Buck,” Chimney says, into the radio, and Eddie falls silent, watching the radio desperately. “Buck, this is Chimney, do you copy?”
Silence. Eddie’s breaths come more and more uneven.
“Buckley,” Chimney says again, more urgently. “Evan Buckley. Do you copy?
“Fuck,” Eddie hisses, and takes off his own helmet, running a hand through his hair. “Fuck, we should have—”
“Eddie,” Nash says, lowly.
Eddie falls silent, though his jaw ticks; his fingers tap, relentlessly against his helmet.
“Evan Buckley,” Chimney says, again. “Evan Buckley, do you copy?”
Silence. And then—
“Chim?”
The breath that leaves Eddie sounds is so deep it sounds like it hurts, like it rattles the lungs within his ribs. “Buck?” he says, and then, again, louder, “Buck? Buck, do you copy?”
“I copy,” a voice rasps, and Hen brings a hand up to her mouth, the tense line of her shoulders dropping. “I’m here.”
Nash takes the radio from Chimney’s hand again. “Where are you? Are you okay?”
A laboured breath. “I’m okay. I think I’ve fucked my ankle, but—I’m okay.”
Nash tightens his grip around the radio. His lips mouth around something that could be a prayer of gratitude. “Okay, we’re coming for you,” he promises. “Are you on the ground floor? Are you obstructed by anything?”
“No need,” and then next to him, Hen sucks in a breath of surprise. Startled, the camera swivels up to see a figure on the horizon line staggering towards them, illuminated from behind by the flames, what looks like a girl slung over his shoulders. Eddie breathes, “Buck,” and then again, louder, “Buck,” and before Nash can grab him he’s running off towards him, Chimney hot on his tail. Dizzyingly, the camera swings to Taylor, her face white, eyes wide, before swerving back to Buck, just in time to see him collapse into Eddie’s arms.
“We need a gurney here!” Chimney shouts, waving his arm, and within seconds three paramedics from a different station have swarmed, dragging a gurney and a backboard behind them. Taylor attempts to take a step forward to get a better look, but Nash holds out his hand, effectively blocking her way; and for the first time, Taylor doesn’t argue against it, just lets herself be stopped, chewing on her lower lip. The camera zooms in jerkily, trying its best to capture what’s going on, the quality fuzzing the further it zooms. Between the paramedics’ legs, it just about catches the way Eddie has pulled Buck into a bone-crushing hug, arms tight around one another, faces tucked into each other’s necks; Eddie palms the back of Buck’s head, mouth against his ear. The paramedics lift the woman Buck was dragging with him onto the gurney, carefully pull her away, and Chimney waves for another gurney for Buck, meanwhile—
Meanwhile, Buck and Eddie stay clutching each other on the ground. It appears as though the world could end around them and neither would notice.
*
The documentary, fittingly, ends with Ravi’s shield ceremony.
It’s a bright sunny day, the sky blue and cloudless, and enough people have gathered that they’ve run out of chairs. The camera is somewhere near the back of the room, Taylor on one side, she and the cameraman sharing a paper plate of cake (Taylor picks the strawberries off the top, the cameraman eats everything else). At the front stands Nash and Ravi, both in uniform, Nash holding a helmet in one hand.
“It is my greatest honour to announce that your probationary period is officially over,” Nash says, and Ravi bites down on a wide, excited grin, eyes sparkling. “And to officially welcome you to the Los Angeles Fire Department, Firefighter Panikkar.”
The room erupts in cheers as Ravi holds out his hand to shake, and they get even louder when Nash bypasses a handshake for a warm hug. The camera catches a glimpse of Ravi’s surprised, pleased face over Nash’s shoulder, before his eyes crease in a smile and he hugs him back.
“Go probie!” someone shouts, off-frame. (It is probably Buck.)
There are a series of various panning shots of the station floor after this, people laughing and talking to each other over paper plates of cake and flutes of champagne, Ravi red-cheeked and unable to stop smiling as he gets passed around from person to person. Many people are unfamiliar, relatives of Ravi whose names and faces haven’t come up, yet, but there are lots that are: a smiling, warm-eyed woman with Buck’s smile and a child recognisable from Chimney’s three dozen baby photos propped on her hip; Hen’s wife, Karen, and their son Denny; the police officer with the short hair, who keeps her around Nash’s waist; a tall smiling boy from Ravi’s homescreen; a little boy with crutches and Eddie’s bright eyes.
Most of the guests don’t even spare the camera crew a second glance, just let it fade into background decoration (as it turns out, even someone as camera-averse as Bobby Nash can be worn down by a month of constant exposure), but the little boy approaches it directly, looks right into the lens. “Are you making a movie?” he says to the cameraman.
The camera swings to Taylor, whose face is a little pinched in the way it does whenever someone calls the documentary anything other than a documentary. She’s at least attempting a smile, though. “Not a movie, no. Do you know what a documentary is?”
The boy’s face brightens. “I love documentaries! I watched one about sea turtles last night with Dad and Buck!”
Taylor’s eyebrow raises. “Oh?”
Before the boy can say anything more, Eddie comes over with a paper plate and an awkward, apologetic look on his face. “Christopher,” he says, “let’s not bother the camera-people, please.” It would maybe be sweet, if it wasn’t completely obvious that this was mostly borne of Eddie’s weird phobia of the crew and not a selfless desire to let them work in peace.
“But Dad,” Christopher says, “they’re making a documentary! Like the sea turtles!”
“They sure are, bud. Remember what I told you about that, why there were cameras at work?”
Christopher’s eyes go wide. “Wait, Dad, you’re gonna be in a documentary like the sea turtles?”
Eddie’s face does something complicated at that. “Uh…”
Taylor’s smirk is caught in the corner of the frame, but before she can make a comment someone cheers, “Diazes!” from off the side, and the camera swivels to see Buck hobbling over, a crutch tucked under one arm. His right foot is wrapped in a moonboot, and has already been decorated with lots of red-marker stickmen climbing up and down it. “I was wondering where you guys got off too.”
“Chris was just getting acquainted,” Eddie says, in the way might say injecting drugs.
Buck brightens. “Oh, Chris, have you not met these guys yet?” Christopher shakes his head no, face bright. Buck carefully lowers himself into one of the deserted chairs across the table from the camera, and beckons Christopher over, tucking him against his side. “Chris, this is Taylor and her cameraman John. Guys, this is Christopher, the coolest kid in the whole world.”
Chris giggles. “Not the whole world.”
“Mm, pretty sure the whole word.”
“You haven’t met all the kids in the whole world.”
“I don’t need to. I just know you’re the coolest one. After me, of course,” he adds, and Christopher bursts out laughing. “Your dad is somewhere near the bottom.”
“The very bottom!”
“Ouch,” Eddie says.
Buck shrugs. “Sorry, man. I don’t make the rules.”
Eddie pretends to look upset at this news. “Well, in that case,” he says, making a move as if to leave, “I can find someone else to give this slice of cake to…”
“No, Dad!” Christopher protests. “I want the cake.”
“Mm, but am I even allowed to hang out with you guys? Seeing as I’m the least cool person in the world.”
“You’re not the least cool,” Christopher says, generously. “There are probably less cool people than you. Like the inventor of broccoli. Or Mr Hylam from Math class.”
Eddie looks amused. “Well, it’s good to know I at least beat out Mr Hylam from Math class.”
Christopher seems to be satisfied with this conclusion and makes hands for the cake, and Eddie hands it over with a laugh, settling into the empty chair next to Buck. The camera makes sure to focus in on the casual arm he slings around the back of Buck’s chair, hand curling around the ball of his shoulder, as Christopher wiggles in between them, happily humming around his plastic fork.
“I’m glad to see you’re doing better,” Taylor says to Buck, of the moonboot. Buck grins a little sheepishly, flexing his fingers around his crutch.
“Yeah, well. The doctors should I be back in one piece in a month, so…”
“You gave us quite the fright.”
Buck shrugs modestly. “All in the job description.”
Eddie rolls his eyes. “It’s most definitely not, but whatever.” Buck pouts at him. “Eat your cake, Evan.”
Buck pulls a face at him, but steals a bite of cake off Christopher’s next spoonful anyway, making him indignantly cry, “Hey!” It is evident by the way Eddie watches them fondly, arm still around Buck’s shoulders, that the conversation is done, that they’re not willing to answer any more questions, and in the corner of the frame Taylor rises from her seat.
“We should do the rounds,” she says. “Nice to meet you, Christopher.”
“Oo koo,” Christopher says distractedly, through a mouthful of cake. Eddie wipes at his face with a napkin and Buck swipes off a lick of frosting from the side of the plate with his finger.
It is somewhat of a bittersweet end, the final act of the documentary: ending on an occasion so full of joy and laughter that it hurts to conclude the story there, to know that there is no more afterwards. But as the camera focuses on Chimney’s bright ceaseless smile as he introduces his daughter to all of Ravi’s relatives, the way Hen and Nash’s wife laugh together by the cake table, Buck’s warm eyes as he hugs his sister, it is hard to feel sad. These people are happy, and they are together, and they are family, and they will be long after the documentary crew step out of the firehouse for the last time.
The final scene is one later in the day, when the celebration is winding down, only a few people left carefully folding away the trestle tables and chairs. Nash is stood somewhere in the corner of the firehouse, consulting a clipboard, and Taylor strides right up to him, the cameraman following a little meekly behind her.
“Captain Nash,” she says, when she gets near enough.
Nash glances up from his clipboard, and something inscrutable crosses his face when he sees who it is. “Miss Kelly. I’d thought I’d missed you.”
“We’re just about to leave,” Taylor says. “But I wanted to personally come and say goodbye.”
That seems to surprise Nash, a little. He raises an eyebrow. “Me?”
“Yes,” Taylor says. “I know that I’m not your favourite person, and frankly, you’re not mine either – you don’t make for terribly interesting television. However, I respect what you have built, here; this community you have made. And I wanted to say thank you, for letting us stop by to experience it, if only for a short while.”
Nash smiles, a little at this. “Well, that’s very kind of you,” he says. “I fear it may be too soon to thank you back, because I haven’t seen what you’re going to do with all this footage, but… I think it will be strange, not having you around.”
Taylor smiles back. It’s maybe her first genuine one of the entire series. “Well, that’s really the best we could have hoped for. It was nice meeting you, Captain Nash.”
“Please,” Nash says. “Call me Bobby.”
*
(Or, well. That’s not entirely, the last scene.
The real last scene, the one that airs after the credits and the endless list of thank-yous, is in the carpark, in Taylor’s car. The camera is still rolling, though much more informally – it is propped on her dashboard, and for the first time the cameraman is visible, a tall awkward-looking man in wire glasses and a dark sweater. He’s picking at a Tupperware of leftovers, while Taylor searches through her bag for something.
“Nine, ten,” she counts. There’s a pause. “Did we have eleven microphones?”
“I thought we had ten.”
“I could have sworn we had an eleventh.” She purses her lips again, and reaches in the seat behind her for something – before her eyes snag on something out the window, and grow wide. “John. John.”
John, the cameraman, glances at her sharply. “What?”
She points at something through the window. “Camera, camera, quick!”
The camera is seized; is turned around hurriedly, so it’s spying through the window of her car. It zooms in on two figures, helping a young boy into a car: Buck and Eddie with Christopher. Buck opens the door of the passenger seat but doesn’t climb in, just hooks his elbow over the top of it and watches as Eddie buckles Christopher into the backseat. It’s too far away to hear what they’re saying through the glass, and all their previous spyware is now tucked away in Taylor’s bag, so the only sound is the gentle thrum of the engine, the sound of Taylor and John’s breaths.
Only, no sound is really needed to interpret the way Eddie closes Christopher’s door, and then turns to face Buck, eyes warm. His hand reaches out for his waist; the arm Buck doesn’t have hooked over the door goes for the side of his face.
Their mouths meet in the middle in a gentle, familiar kiss.
“Holy fuck,” Taylor whispers.
The camera hovers on them for a long moment: until they pull away, a minute later, but keep their foreheads together. Buck nudges his nose against Eddie’s, who laughs and cups his face in both hands, kissing the very tip of his nose, before he pulls away and then steps around the side of the car to climb into the driver’s seat. In fact, the camera stays there long enough that it follows their car as it pulls out – revealing, behind it, Hen and her family, who were watching the entire affair themselves.
Hen says something to her wife Karen, who laughs, and heads around to the driver’s seat of their own car. Then, as though she can sense the camera on her, she turns her head, makes direct eye contact with it:
And winks.)