Fire Meet Gasoline

Chapter Fourteen

"It's date night." Sylvie said to me as we walked through med.

"That is correct." I tell her with a smile.

"You talked to Rhodes yet?" She asked and I shook my head.
"No, but I'm about to." I say as I spot him and wander over towards him.

"Hi." I say to him.
He looks up from his paper. "Can I help you?" He asks, and I smile.
"I'm Len, we're going on a date tonight with Sylvie and Will."
"Oh, that's you. Len? Isn't that a man's name?" He asks hardly looking up from his paperwork.
"Strictly speaking yes, but it's short for Eleanor, so no, it's not." I tell him.

"Interesting..." he says and finally looks up from his paperwork, looking me up and down, his tone changing.

"Look, I don't mean to be rude, but I've had a hectic day." He tells me.

I nod and smile.
"I get it, since the hospital bombing, trying to operate at full capacity with one CAT scanner? Far from ideal. As long as you're in a better mood by tonight, I'm sure I'll get by just fine. Oh, and wear something nice." I tell him before wandering back to Sylvie.

"He's an arsehole, but a damn good looking one so I'll suck it up." I say to her.

Right as we pull into the garage of fifty one, we get another call out.

After being rushed off our feet all morning, I'm relieved to see it's just one of our frequent flyers, Morgan.

"Hello Ladies, looking fabulous as ever." He greets us.

"Morgan, we've talked about this. You're wasting CFD resources. What's wrong this time?" I ask, the disapproval obvious in my voice.

"How else would I get to see my two favourite ladies? I have a burn, see." He lifts his shorts and there's a nasty looking burn on his upper thigh.

I glance at Sylvie before, I crouch down looking at it.

"How did you do it Morgan?" I ask, intrigued as to how he got it in such an awkward place.

"Dropped my coffee on it." He replied, and I could immediately tell that he was lying. It didn't look like a coffee burn.

"You need to be more careful Morgan. If you're struggling, you can get help." I tell him and start to dress the wound.
I felt uncomfortable as to how close the wound was to his genitals, it wasn't adding up.

I quickly dressed his burn, I was hardly going to subject Sylvie to being that close to him.

"Right Morgan, you need to get that wound dressed every other day. Perhaps you should contact your doctor."

"Perhaps.." he replies, and places his hand on my shoulder. I frown, and step back from him.

"That's not appropriate Morgan. Okay?" He laughs and shakes his head.

"Playing hard to get? I like it."

I ignore his comment and pack my bag to leave.

"Remember to check your wound Morgan." I say and let myself out and Sylvie is packing away her bag.

"Do you ever sense he's a bit weird?" I ask Sylvie as we drive back to fifty one.

"A bit, but then I remember he's in his forties, and that they're raised different. Back home they're just bred a little different. They don't take offence easily and they compliment people all the time." Sylvie says.

I smiled. I understood what she meant. Older men didn't always understand their predatory behaviour. British culture dismissed it. I know many men didn't act upon it but this guy gave me serious bad vibes.

The last few calls have been fake illnesses or where he has deliberately injured himself, and then this time he touched me, which made me feel disgusted.

I decided not to overthink it, and focused on my date tonight instead.
What would I wear? Was Connor gonna be even more of an arsehole? Where were we going? Am I ready to go on a date?

The date only distracted me briefly before my mind swirled back to the thought of Morgan and how creepy he was being.

Back at the firehouse, I wandered straight to Kelly's office.
We'd only recently made up, but I wanted to discus it with him.

I saw he was sat at his desk and knocked the door gently, and he didn't look up.

"What is it?" He called out.

"It's just me, I wanted to talk to you, but I can see your busy. I'll come back after." I tell him and he shakes his head and drops his pen.

"What's up?" He asks and I take a seat on the edge of his bed.

"I don't know, I..." I paused for a minute.

"We just had a call to this guy, Morgan, he's a frequent flyer, started off with him telling us how his old paramedics got rerouted, and we see him most weeks. I'd say at first it was an average of once a week, and now it's probably once every shift. He just seemed lonely to start with, but now he's.. he's just creepy. His injuries seem deliberate or he's faking an illness just so he can see us. Like today...." I trailed off, the thought of it made me uncomfortable.

"What happened Len?" Kelly asked.

"He had this burn, on his leg, like right here." I said and pointed to my groin.
"I asked him about it, and he said he spilt his coffee, but it was absolutely not a coffee burn. The shape of his burn and the condition of it looked like he's held something hot against his leg, like the side of a frying pan or something. It was just really disturbing especially as I had to crouch down and be Level with his crotch. He even touched my shoulder and told me I was playing hard to get." I glanced at Kelly.

"Do you think I'm overthinking it? Sylvie is never present for the worst of it, which is why I'm doubting myself."

"Sounds like a pervert. I think you should talk to the chief about it. It's harassment, and you don't deserve to deal with that. Is this the worst of it so far?" He asked and I shrugged.

"He's made weird suggestive comments before, but I just ignored them, just figured that I wasn't going to see him that often."

"He touched you Len, and that's crossing the line. Do you think he has a crush on you?"

I shrugged. "I don't know, even thinking about it makes me feel weird. His comments were initially innocent, telling us we're his favourite ladies and so on, but recently, they're personal. Makes my skin crawl.." I say and shiver a little bit.

"I told him he's wasting resources but it's like he got off on it." I whispered.

"Speak to the Chief, he'll know how to handle this situation, and he'll probably get your rig rerouted. Better safe than sorry Len." Kelly says and I nod standing up, deciding to go and find Boden.

"Thanks, I know we just became friends again and you didn't have to..."
Kelly cuts me off.

"Len, that's what friends are for." He tells me and I smile.

I explained the situation to the Chief and he agreed that this man was demonstrating inappropriate behaviour and he would get in touch with headquarters and ensure our rigged was assigned a different route, and that PD did a welfare check.

It felt like a weight lifted off my shoulders, and I could finally look forward to my date with Connor, but given his mood this morning, there didn't seem much to look forward to.