From Fire to Fire

Chapter 1

"Hey, brother, you okay?" Judd asks Paul worriedly, as they do chores around the firehouse.
"Huh? Oh yeah, man, I'm good," He replies, putting on a fake smile, folding clothes with Marjan.
"You sure? We've all kinda noticed that you've been acting weird," Marjan replies, looking up from the pile of clothes.
"Yeah, yeah- I'm fine really. Just missing some people," He says, trying to wave off their concern.
"Yeah, I get it. There are some people from New York I've been missing. I'm sure my dad will give you some time off if you want to go visit for the holidays," TK says as he wipes down the truck.
"Nah, it's fine. It's almost New Years and you know we get some crazy calls on New Years," He says, getting annoyed.
"True, but you ain't gonna be much help if you head is in the clouds. Why don't you take some time off? Go visit who ever it is you're missing, I'm sure they are missing you too," Judd says not wavering.
"Hey, I said I'm fine! Will you just drop it already?" Paul responds fed up.
"Hey! He wasn't doing anything but try to help you! There's no need to get all hostile like that!" Marjan replies mad and worried at the same time.
"I know that y'all are just trying to help, but I don't need it so just drop it. Okay?" Paul says in an annoyed tone.
"Alright, sorry. I didn't mean to overstep. We'll leave it alone," Judd says giving a knowing look to Paul and then to the rest of the people in the room.
"Thank you," Paul said as he walked away with a stack of folded clothes.
As soon as Paul walked out of hearing distance, they were talking about it again.
"What do you think that was about?" Mateo said.
"I don't know, I've never seen him get like that," Marjan answered.
"Maybe he just had a bad case of the holiday blues," Judd suggests.
"Or, what if he is missing a person he can't visit?" TK offers.
"You mean like, what if he's missing someone who died?" Mateo asks.
"That, or they moved away," TK said in a casting tone.
"Damn, you think we can do anything?" Marjan asks.
"I don't know. Maybe he just needs us to be here for him. I mean that's clearly all he's going to let us do, you saw how he reacted earlier. Ain't nothing we can really do if he don't want us to help," Judd says.
"Hey, what are we taking about?" Nancy asks as she walks in with Tommy.
"Well we aren't talking about how Paul has been acting," TK says hoping they get the point.
"Oh, okay. Yeah I have noticed he's been a little off lately. You think it's something we need to take to Captain Strand?" Nancy asks, worriedly
"No, he said he was missing someone, so we think he's just got a case of the holiday blues," Judd says with a shrug.
"Why doesn't he just ask for time off? I'm sure Stand will allow it, especially with how he's been acting," Tommy said in a motherly tone.
"Well he said that he didn't want to do that because it's almost New Years and we get crazy calls near New Years," Mateo says moving on to his next chore.
"But we think it's because he can't visit whoever it is that he misses," Marjan finishes his thought.
"Oh, yeah I know the feeling. So do we think whomever it is he misses died or moved to far away?" Nancy asks bluntly as she cleans out the ambulance.
"We haven't gotten that far yet. And last time we got to asking about it, he got real mad and blew up at us. So I think we have all agreed to just leave him be, and be here for him until he asks us to do something else. Right?" Judd asks giving a look to everyone else in the room.
"Right," They all reply in a tired annoyed tone.
With that being said, they all knew that "leaving Paul be" wasn't going to just long, especially not with how miserable he looked.

The next week the crew did all but ask Paul what they could do. Because if they didn't ask, they weren't overstepping, right?