Wax

Twenty Three

A/N: This chapter is extremely long at 8.3k words because while everyone is out having a fun halloween night, I'm here writing STEAMY ASS SCENES for your halloween enjoyment. I know, I know, usually I have a halloween special written for you guys but I have no idea why or how it turned out to be white stuff for some reason. What a treat. 

Enjoy!

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[Leroy]

I was reaching behind me as soon as I got off the call with my personal snowstorm, grabbing a clean station shirt and putting that on before gathering everything else. Chicken woke up as I did. A couple of backup crew members were standing around to prevent residents from going anywhere near the building but I was thinking about dashing upstairs for a couple of seconds to retrieve something.

The idea directed my gaze to the line of officers sealing off the area and I was counting the number of residents waiting for the green when someone else obscured my view.

"Who was that?" Erlynn did not look or sound very happy; which wasn't really news these days. Her mood had dropped to a general low ever since she met Vanilla back in my apartment a week or two ago and hadn't exactly improved. "Please don't tell me you're crashing at his place. What, did he make you agree to that or something?"

"No one's making me do anything, Erlynn." I stuffed my ash-crusted gear into a duffel bag and zipped it up. "I'm running up to grab a couple of things once the officer gives the green. You should too. Don't think there's..." I stopped short because her eyes had reduced to slits, fixed on me without bothering to hide all the aggression. "Okay. What did I miss?"

"Miss?" She repeated like I'd stepped on a mine. Wasn't a far fetch at the rate we were going. "Leroy, you weren't even listening to me the whole entire time I was concerned and worried for you. Do you have any idea how—forget it. So much for being a good friend." She scoffed.

I had to apologize for being distracted just because since apparently that's how things work now and try to account for the fact that I had stuff to settle since, practically speaking, my apartment has a hole in it.

"And that's exactly what I was trying to help you with, Roy." There was no reasoning with her at this point 'cuz I could tell she wasn't in the mood to talk and my social battery was near zero after fighting that fire and getting this close to losing my boy.

Over her shoulder, the officer in charge of the scene was giving permission to residents on the lower floors to re-enter their apartments, which meant that chief had cleared building after multiple checks. I saw one of the backup engineers wave me over and I nodded back, telling Erlynn I'd drop her a text before getting back to work.

"You the owner of that other unit on the fifth floor, mate?" He handed me a pass. "Station nine's cleared out. Three's making a move to the next EMS too, so. You alright with getting someone from your station to look out for you up there?"

I nodded, making out crazy-ass eye bags under his eyes even in the dark. "Thanks for your help. Forty-eight?"

"Seventy-two," he corrected with a laugh, raising a hand and starting backwards from where he came. "Covering for someone. Have a good one mate."