The Fire Within

2 | The One With a Shower

— R A E —

As I follow Ajax down a hallway I try to take in as much as I could. It was my first time at a fire station but so far most of what I'd seen was pretty plain jane. We passed a simple but spotless kitchen, a few offices, and some other closed doors as we made our way down the main hallway. Finally, towards the end near a set of stairs, Ajax stops and half turns to me.

"Alright Cupcake, first stop. In addition to cleaning this cut, I need to take a shower anyway. Two birds with one stone. I'm covered in smoke and sweat, and I probably smell like it too."

In fact, he does smell... smoky and musky, like a campfire in autumn. Is it weird I kind of like it? Of course, I wasn't about to tell him that.

"Makes sense to me, I'll just wait out here for you."

"Not so fast. You said yourself I'm no good with
one arm. You're the one who volunteered to help, so guess who gets to come in with me in case I need something? Yep, you. Ah, but don't worry too much about it, it's not like I'm asking you to scrub my back in the shower—And yes, the showers have curtains, so you might as well just come wait inside. Ok?"

He was rambling, which crossed my mind as being kind of cute, but then I realize what he asked, and oh crap. It's true I volunteered to help, but I was just planning to help bandage, not join him in the men's restroom.

The men's showers... Naked firefighters... In the shower! Naked him in the shower!

No, stop thinking about that! Stop thinking about him. It's not like you've never seen naked men before, you're not that innocent. Don't let your hormones get the best of you.

Even if the mental images are extremely hot.

Like damn.

But also...he's got a point. There's no way he'll be ok on his own with one bloody arm.

I shake my head, clearing it. "Fine," I sigh and follow him inside.

As we walk in he continues to ramble. It must be a nervous thing, which is relieving—at least I'm not the only one.

"There's two sets of restrooms in The House, one upstairs near our dorm rooms, and this one down here. I brought us to this one because nobody else ever uses it since it's kind of out of the way. The chief uses it since his quarters are close by, but other than him I've only ever seen one or two others. So, we should have the place to ourselves," he adds with a quick wink.

So maybe he's not as nervous as I thought?

I watch as Ajax walks over to the paper towel dispenser, grabs a piece, and places it over the cut to staunch the bleeding.

It looks fairly fresh since the blood is still a bright red. A small trickle had started to run down his arm while we had walked here, but it didn't seem to bother him. If my preliminary look was right, it was nothing too serious. A good cleanse and bandage will do the trick. Until then, the paper towel will at least help prevent any mess.

I guess I can admit Ajax has some common sense as well as his looks. In hindsight, it was probably rude of me to think, but Ajax kind of struck me as the all-brawn-but-no-brains type of guy. The stereotypical guy that you see in the movies who's roguishly handsome with big muscles, but is as dim-witted as they come. You know the type. It's probably because Ajax definitely has the roguishly handsome part down, and it seemed too good to be true that he would actually have something worthwhile in that brain of his as well.

But from what I can gather from the tiny amount of time we've spent together, I will happily admit I was wrong in this case. And I actually feel terrible about misjudging him yet again.