Eddie Begins.

CHAPTER FIFTY EIGHT , LIFE COULDN'T BE ANY DIFFERENT

━━━━━━━━━━

5 Months Later.

Emerson Sharpe never got tired of adding accomplishments to her wall.

Especially when it came to graduations. When she finished her psych courses, she didn't have a graduation but she did receive a certificate (that she framed and hung on her bedroom wall). During her high school graduation, she was valedictorian. She was instructed to have her speech be 10 minutes. That was the max. Emery's ended up being 18. It would've been longer, but the administration forced her off the stage.

Even in Emery's 6th grade send off, she had to walk down the hallway and wave goodbye to all her teachers and first graders. Emery ended up shoving her certificate in each child's face while screaming "YOU WISH THIS WAS YOU!!!"

So, being able to stand on this stage and shake her instructor's hand made her feel so fucking good. Just act normal.

It took everything out of Emerson, not to throw her hands up and scream "IM GONNA MAKE THIS JOB MY BITCH"

Emery bit her tongue and gave her instructor a small smile. "Thank you, sir." She lets go of his hand and walks down the ramp with her body relaxing. Before she could even walk away from her instructor, she heard applause and cheers from the audience. Emery quickly looks out into the audience at the group and her face lights up.

Being a first responder took up a lot of time, Emery knew that. Which is why when she had extended an invitation to everyone for her ceremony, but she didn't expect anyone to make it.

So, seeing her entire team standing along side Wren and Athena made her smile widen. Emery looks at her instructor, who instantly recognized the mischief flicker across her eyes. "Oh, no..." he sighs. "Emerson, please don—"

"Fuck it." Emery holds up her certificate with her good hand. Then she jumps up and down. "IM GONNA MAKE THIS JOB MY BITCH"

Her entire group roars with more cheers and applause while the rest of the audience looks at them oddly. Emery looks back at her instructor, "Sorry, sir. But it had to be done."

"Yeah...get out of here, Sharpe."

Emery nods her head, "Yes, sir."

She runs down the ramp.

☆

"I can't believe you didn't toss your cap."

Emery licks her ice cream and pulls her brows together. "And lose it? I'm not a maniac, Evan." She shakes her head.

"But, that's the school experience." Buck presses. "Have you watched any cliche high school movies?"

"I have." Emery nods. "And I am also a 27 year old graduating from EMT school. Not high school."

Buck slightly opens his mouth. "You're such a fun sponge..."

Emery giggles, "You say fun sponge. I say practical mop."

The entire group groans. Maddie winces, "Em, we love you but that was just...so bad."

Emery rolls her eyes and eats her ice cream while mumbling a small "whatever".

"Wait, so...did you ever throw your cap during your high school graduation?" Eddie looks at the girl.

Emery bunches her shoulders and sputters. "Of course, I did." she looks at Eddie. "I've had my high school experiences and that was one of them."

The group of first responders all exchange looks.

"You're totally lying."

"You're full of it!" Chimney points in her face.

Emery groans and lightly smacks Chimney's hand. "All right, whatever! While you guys are making fun of me for not throwing my hats in the air, this bad boy will be going in my keepsake box right next to my high school cap." She points at each and every one of them. "I can look at my caps all the time. Can you say the same about yours?"

"Oh, god, Em." Wren laughs and covers her eyes from Emery's dramatic flare. "I didn't throw my cap too, remember?"

Emery frowns, "No, I don't remember because our last names are on different sides of the alphabet spectrum."

Wren blinks. "Shit, you had your ceremony later that night with the last half of the alphabet."

"Exactly." Emery nods her head.

"Well, anyway." Athena speaks up. "We are so proud of you, Emerson. You are going to make an excellent Paramedic." She holds up her ice cream cone.

"Yeah! Welcome to the team!" Hen shakes Emery's arms.

"You will be missed on the firefighter side of things." Eddie sighs. "I am proud of you, though."

"Kicking ass and taking mother fucking names!" Wren was the next to shake Emery's shoulders and the girl groans. The brunette released her and giggles, "Sorry. Too much sugar."

Emery laughs softly and her dark eyes meet Buck's bright ones. Buck tenses and his face grows hot. How long had he been staring at her? He quickly looks down and eats his ice cream. Emerson cracks a small smile from Buck's nervous expression. "Thank you for being there for me." She says to her family. "For being there today and every other day. You have no idea how much I appreciate it."

"You should know that we'd be there for you every step of the way." Maddie reaches over and gently grabs Emery's hand.

Suddenly, Bobby's phone begins to ring. Then everyone else's phones ring. Emery swipes her tongue across her lower lip and pulls her phone out.

"Shit, you got the call too?"

Emery looks at Eddie and she frowns. "Yeah, I guess I'm officially back." She slips her phone back into her pocket. "I thought they weren't gonna have me back until my wrist healed."

"I mean, you can move it, right?" Buck asks.

Emery shifts her eyes to her wrist. Her physical therapy had been getting better. Her arm was now out of the sling, but there was a black compression brace tightly wrapped around it. She could feel her wrist. Sometimes. Every now and then there, her wrist would feel fuzzy then go numb. Dr. Martin said that could go hand in hand with her PTSD. Emery was reluctant to admit it, but he was definitely right.

"All right—118. Let's move out!"

Emery watches as everyone stands up. She slightly opens her mouth, "Uh, wait. I don't have my—"

"Your uniforms in my bag." Maddie says. "Buck picked it up."

Emery raises her brows. Everyone looks at the male Buckley. Buck's jaw goes slack and a light pink dust forms across his face. "Uh, no. I didn't. Eddie did—"

"Nope. I will not be covering for you this time." Eddie clasps Buck's shoulder. "Just let it happen."

Buck exhales a sharp breath. "Okay, yeah. I brought your uniform." He looks at Emery.

Emery smiles, "Thank you! I'll get ready in 5 minutes. Tucked and all!" She grabs the uniform from Maddie's hands and sprints towards the bathroom.

☆

"What do we got?"

"Missing boy." Athena pronounces. "Two kids playing in an open field. Mom calls them home, only one shows up. Sounded like maybe an abduction. Road's not far away. Made sense." She and Wren lead Bobby into the house. "But then we're interviewing the mother, asking the usual questions, and we saw this."

Wren picks up the photo and holds it up to Bobby. "This photo came with the house."

Bobby pulls his brows together. "I didn't see a windmill when we pulled up."

"Yeah, torn down years ago." Athena states. "It used to power a water pump."

"There's an abandoned well on the property."

Wren nods her head. Bobby sucks in a sharp breath, "All right, I'll inform the team and we'll spread out and look for the kid."

As soon as Bobby told the team about the missing kid, they all spread across the acres of land while shouting his name.

Eddie was the first to find a clue where Hayden got lost. He called the rest of the team over.

"Give me a hand with this!"

Emery runs over to Eddie and helps him push the lawn tops away off the old well. Eddie leans down and screams, "Hayden!" He waits for a response but there was no response.

"All right, we're gonna need a visual." Bobby says. He looks at the curly-haired woman. "Em?"

Emery nods her head, "Got it, Cap." She stands up and quickly makes her way over to the fire engine. Emery grabs the cam cable. They roll the cable into the well.

"30 feet." Chimney says.

Emery rolls the cable farther down the well.

"35 feet."

"How far down does this thing go?" Buck questions.

Emery looks at Bobby. "We're at 40 feet, Captain, and we got 50 feet of cable."

"Can a boy even survive a fall that far?" Athena asks.

"The walls are narrows, so there's lots of friction to slow a fall." Hen states. "But if he's really down there..." she looks at the screen.

"There. Right there!"

"Yeah, he's alive."

Emery lets out small breath. She looks at the computer screen and squints her eyes. "Look at the way he's pinned."

"Arms forward, chest constricted, shallow breath."

"45 feet." Chimney adds onto Hen's points. "At that depth, oxygen's an issue."

"We need to get a line of compressed air down there." Emery states.

"You found him?" The mother runs towards the first responders. Wren gently grabs the crying woman. The woman sees her son on the screen and her cries grow louder than before.

...

"I hate the media..."

Wren follows Emery's eyes to the channel news that just pulled up to the house. Emery scoffs, "I mean, I get that they're doing their job. But, there's a kid down there, whose life is in danger. It just feels like they're profiting off of it."

Thunder erupts across sky and Wren tenses. "It's gonna start pouring soon."

Emery looks at Wren, "As if we don't have enough to worry about." Her jaw clenches. "If I see Taylor fucking Kelly—"

"You won't do anything, because you are a Firefighter/EMT." Wren grabs Emery's arms.

Emery sighs and rolls her neck, "Athena's heading out. Are you going too?"

Wren shakes her head. "No, I'm crowd control with the news." She clicks her tongue and motions to the vans.

Emery nods her head. "Good luck." She presses her lips together and walks back over to the drill.

"Okay, the rig is ready to drill!" Bobby says. "How's he doing?"

"He hasn't moved in a while." Chimney informs the man. "Could've fallen asleep down there."

"We're ready to put the radio down." Eddie announces.

"How dare you down until we lose the signal?" Buck asks.

Bobby shakes his head, "No way to know. Go down 40 feet and we'll see what happens."

"Copy that."

"So, I'll be able to talk to him?" Hayden's mom walks over to the group with Hen standing beside her.

"Well, you might not be able to hear him but hopefully he'll hear you." Hen says. "Just let him know you're here and help is on the way."

The mom grabs the radio.

"Radio's at 40 feet, Cap." Buck states.

Bobby nods his head. "Okay, let's do this. Everybody off, all channels."

The firefighter's all turn their radios off.

"Hayden? It's mommy."

The boy didn't have any reaction, so Bobby turned to Buck. "Buck, raise the radio. There's no signal."

"Hayden, can you hear me?" The mom's voice begins to tremble. "Hayden. Hayden—please! Please look up."

A couple seconds later, Hayden looks up at the camera and his mom lets out a breath of relief.

"Okay, he can hear us now."

The mom clicks the radio again. "I know it's scary right now down there by yourself, but it's gonna be okay. They're coming to get you."

Emery bites the inside of her cheek from the petrified look across Hayden's face.

"Baby, I'm so sorry—I can't do this."

Eddie stands beside the woman. "I got this." He gently grabs the radio from her. "Hey, Hayden. My name is Eddie. I'm a firefighter. I'm here with your mother and a whole lot of other people. We're all working to get you out of there. Just stay calm, Hayden, okay? It might get a little noisy. Don't be scared. We'll be there soon."

The mom lets out a small breath. "Thank you."

"Thank us later. When we give you back your son." Eddie gives her a small smile.

☆

Wren was right. The rain started coming down hard. It was gonna make getting Hayden out a lot harder.

"We need to cover the mouth of the well STAT." Bobby walks over to the group. "I need trenching to divert the rainwater away from the opening."

"Buck, where we at?"

"We're almost at 40 feet." Buck announces. "At the rate we're going, I'd say another hour, but this rain is really gonna slow us down. Could be two, maybe even another three."

"Shoring up as we go is killing us." Eddie states. "The ground's just too unstable. It's eating up time."

"Time we don't have." Emery looks back at the camera screen. "Hayden's been down there ten hours already. He's wet now and most definitely hypothermic."

Lightning strikes closer than before.

"It's barely a mile away!" The commissioner screams over the rain. "We gotta pull the plug."

Emery pulls her brows together. "What?"

"Hey, no, no—come on. No way!" Buck exclaims.

"We got a five-story lightning rod sitting in an empty field out here." The commissioner says.

"It's still a mile away." Bobby points out.

"If it gets any closer—"

"I know." Bobby snaps. "Okay, get the wind and the harnesses and once we hit depth—"

"I'll go in." Eddie says.

Emery snaps her head over to Eddie.

"I'm the one that was talking to him on the radio." Eddie states. "He knows my voice. Make sense it's me. Suit me up. I'm going down."

It seemed as if Eddie had already made his mind up. And all his points made sense, but Emery still had a pit form in her stomach.

...

The lightning had hit down far too close to the sight. The commissioner looked up at the sky. "That's it. You're done."

"That kid is still down there, waiting for us!" Emery snaps. "Captain Nash said we give Eddie 30 minutes. So, let's give him that. Please."

The commissioner hesitated. He then looks at Eddie. "30 minutes."

Eddie nods his head, "Lets bring him home." He then shifts his eyes to Emery.

The woman gives Eddie a small smile and nods her head. Come back.

Eddie is lowered down into the hole until he's no longer able to be seen.

No matter how many times Eddie tried to speak to them over the radio, it sounded like static to them up top. At some point, the footage from inside the well was lost and they couldn't get it back. Which meant, they had no visual down there.

With almost a minute and 30 seconds left, Bobby spoke. "I can't raise him on the radio. Prep the rig. We're bringing him up."

Emery pulls her brows together.

"No, cap. Can't we give him more time?" Buck asks. "He could have the kid or almost have him."

"Or he could be suffocating in mud five stories below ground." Hen replies.

"We're almost down to one minute." Bobby tells the team.

Emery tenses. "Eddie didn't tug yet. So he doesn't have the kid and we don't even know if he's in trouble."

The watch beeps and Emery looks at Bobby. He looks at the girl with a sympathetic expression. "Time's up. Pull him out, now."

Buck begins to pull Eddie back up. But then his face drops, "I lost the weight!"

Emery's eyes widen, "What are you talking about?"

"What does that mean?" Chimney screams over the rain.

"I don't know! Something's wrong!" Bobby shouts.

"15 feet!" Buck announces. He continues to countdown 5 increments while pulling the cable back up. Once they got the rest of the cable up they saw it was cut off.

Emery's heart drops, "No, no..."

"Oh my god—he cut the damn line!"

"All right, Chim. Gear up, I'm sending you down." Bobby immediately says.

"Copy that."

"Cap, I should be the one to go down." Buck urges.

Hen deadpans, "So, we can end up with two cut lines?"

Emery's back straightens when she sees an image appear on the screen once again. "The camera's back up." Her heart sinks.

The group all looks on with confusion from the image. "I still can't see."

"That's because the camera's underwater." Emery swallows. She rubs her arms, hoping her goosebumps would disappear.

"Hopefully it's just the camera."

☆

Chimney begins to slowly go down the hole. Buck couldn't see Emery's worry, she tried to hide it. But he could feel it. There was a tightness in his chest when he saw the way Emery's eyes never left the hole.

"Em..."

The curly-haired woman pulls her eyes from the hole and meets Buck's soft blue eyes. "Yeah?" She pulls her brows together when she sees the worry in his eyes. "What's wrong?"

"I was just checking on you." Buck says.

Emery presses her lips into a smile. "I'm good. Just worried." She looks at the hole.

"Chim's down there right now getting Hayden and Eddie out." Buck says.

Emery nods her head. "Yeah, you're right. Everything will be okay, soon." Despite her saying that, Buck could see feel the worry coming off of her.

He really wish he could do something to help her feel better.

Emery inhales a shaky breath. She softly winces from the pain in her wrist. Buck glances at her as she grips her wrist. He raises his brows, "Hurts?"

"Just a little."

Buck clicks his tongue, "Yeah, the weather will do that."

Emery looks at Buck. "It happens to you too?"

Buck nods his head and points at his leg. "I forget about my past injury until the bad weather comes along."

Emery presses her lips together. "My dad had that same issue with his shoulder. High-school football injury." She shifts her eyes to the mud. "Thank you, by the way." She looks at him. "For helping with my dad while I was at school."

Buck keeps his eyes on Emery. "You don't have to thank me. I was just doing what I had to."

Emery's eyes soften. "These last 5 months have been a lot for us and you guys have been doing everything you can to help." She bunches her shoulders. "I can't think of any other way to repay you guys."

"Emi..." Buck lets out a soft breath. "We're your friends—your family." A soft smile forms on his lips that causes Emery's heart to jump. "Us being there for you and your dad. That comes for free."

Emery inhales a shaky breath. She didn't know if it was from her shivering or just the overwhelming gratitude she felt. Emery was still in awe with how much they were willing to give to her after everything she's put them through. She steps closer to Buck and wraps her arms around his neck.

Emery still had moments when someone would lightly touch her back and her skin would crawl. Or even when someone would slam a car door shut and she felt like she was being shut in that barrel again. But being close to Buck. Having his skin against hers was so warming to her. She felt safe.

Buck wraps his arms around her waist.

"Are we interrupting something?"

Emery and Buck pull away from each other and look at Hen and Bobby. The girl wipes her eyes, "No, we were just—"

"Mhmm..." Hen smirks.

Emery deadpans, "Whatever—"

The line that was down the hole yanks twice which catches everyone's attention. "Chim's ready."

Buck begins pulling Chimney back up and the group all gathers around the hole. Emery let out a quick breath of relief when she sees Chimney being pulled out of the ground with Hayden in his arms.

Emery crouches down and grabs Hayden's from Chimney's arms. She keeps the shock blanket wrapped tightly around him. "You're okay, buddy."

Emery guides Hayden to his mom. "Hayden! Hayden!" The mother runs over to her son and wraps him in a tight embrace.

"Let me get you two somewhere quiet. I need to check him out." Hen guides them to the house.

Chimney looks at the rest of the group. "Eddie's fine. He just needs a ride."

A small smile forms on Emery's lips.

"All right, I need to drop another 50 foot line to get my guy!" Bobby orders. "Buck, let's pull Eddie up and let's all go home."

Thunder echoes across the sky and lightning quickly follows. It strikes down on the tower attached to the truck. Sparks fly near the truck. Emery's eyes widen and she sprints toward her captain. "Bobby!" She jumps forward and tackles him out of the way. The truck explodes and tips over; destroying the hole.

Emery looks at Bobby, "Are you okay?"

Bobby nods his head and mumbles a soft 'thank you'. Emery pulls her brows together when she hears Buck yelling Eddie's name. She stumbles onto her feet and turns to Buck, who was clawing at the covered well.

Emery's eyes widen and she stands there, frozen.
All the air had left Emery's lungs. Everyone around her had gone out of focused except for Buck digging at the mud—trying his damndest to get to Eddie. The logical part of Emery knew that Buck wasn't going to make it. But the part of her that was tired of losing the people she loves. The part of her that was hopeful.

She was waiting for Buck to dig Eddie out of that hole.

Then Bobby grabbed at Buck's arms and pulled him away. It felt as if he pulled Emery away too.

Her legs began to tremble and her eyes filled with tears. Everything felt so heavy once again. She could hardly keep herself up. Emery felt her knees buckle underneath her and her knees came into contact with the mud, slowly sinking into it. A desperate breath had escaped her lips and she quickly grasped at her stomach as she tried to catch her breath as best as she could.

"E-Em?" Chimney hesitantly makes his way over to the girl.

Emery keeps her unshed tears on the covered hole and she shakes her head. She opens her mouth to say something, but all she could let out were quick pants.

Not again. Not again.

Emery presses both her palms against the mud and she curls the mud into her hands. Chimney crouches beside the woman. He doesn't touch Emerson. That's not what she needed right now.

"Hey, I'm right here with you, okay?"

☆

"You sure you don't need to sit this one out?"

Emery inhales, she runs her hands under the cold tap water. She presses her wet hands against her face, then her neck. Her eyes stay shut for a moment and her head tilts to the ceiling. Emery was able to gain her bearings after seeing the well covered up. Emery wasn't going to lie. She contemplated on if she could handle this. Being back in a situation where her teammate's life was in danger. Thinking about being back in a moment like this made her chest begin to tighten once again.

She didn't want to get in the way of rescuing Eddie. What if she couldn't handle it?

Emery opens her eyes and meets Chimney's soft expression. Even though, Emery had doubts about herself. She knew that she wasn't going to sit around while Eddie was alive down there. He's alive.

"I'm okay, Chim." She gives him a small nod. "I lost my cool for a second. But, I'm okay."

"If you need anything—"

"I'll let you know."

Chimney gives her a soft smile before walking away from the bathroom. Emery's soft expression lessens and she wipes her face with her arm. She quickly inhales a breath and walks out of the bathroom. Emery makes her way through the hallway, following Buck's voice of urgency as he tries to plead with Bobby.

"Cap, we gotta dig."

"We don't have a drill, Buck, and even if we could get another one up here their access road is flooded."Bobby says.

Emery follows the team outside onto the porch. Bobby turns to everyone.

"Okay. Well, then, we did by hand." Buck suggests.

"Not with all this rain." Chimney replies. "We could trigger another collapse."

"How long can he last down there?" Emery looks at the captain of the Urban Search and Rescue.

"We're talking 30 feet of wet earth coming right down on top of him."

Emery pulls her brows together and reads everyone's face. She was never good at reading emotions, but this was practically tattooed across their foreheads. Even Buck noticed it too.

"Wait, you all think he's dead."

"Nobody thinks that." Bobby immediately assures the two.

Emery softly huffs, "Your expressions say something completely different."

"We just don't know how to get him out." Chimney says.

"Nobody's giving up on him. Nobody." Hen adds. "We're gonna find him."

...

"There could be some intersection feeder pipes down there. Maybe some drainage tunnels." The officer clicks his tongue from the layout of his map. "Frankly, this system predates our maps."

Buck inhales, "Feels like a lot of distance to cover when you're 40-something feet down."

"Okay, listen up!" Bobby speaks, catching everyone's attention. "Buck, here, is gonna get some thermal cams. We are going to fan out and do a grid search."

"Chimney is gonna have oxygen tanks and warming blankets standing by. I wanna start at the well and go outward in concentric circles."

"LAPD copters are on the way." USAR captain pronounces. "We'll use their thermal imagining to scan this wider area. Try and pick up Diaz's heat signature."

"Won't be easy,"

Emery pulls her brows together and turns her head to the voice. The crowd of firefighter's step aside, revealing Eddie stumbling toward them. Emery blinks—trying to register what was happening. Her eyes then widen. "Eddie!" She runs over to him.

"I'm cold." Eddie grunts out. Before he could take another step, his legs give out and he collapses to the ground.

Emery grabs one of his arms and throws it over her shoulders. "C'mon." She softly grunts. Buck and Hen help Emery get Eddie onto his feet and lead him to the house up the hill.

☆

"Inhale for me."

"Em, I'm okay—"

"Inhale, Edmundo."

Eddie softly chuckles. Giving in, he inhales.

"Exhale."

Eddie exhales.

As Emery listens to Eddie's heartbeat her stomach painfully turns. "You cut your line."

Eddie tenses, "Yeah. I know."

"I'm glad you saved Hayden, but..." she shifts. "I thought..."

Eddie's slightly turns his head to Emery. His eyes then soften when he noticed her not making eye contact. "I'm sorry, I scared you."

Emery bites the inside of her cheek. She lifts her head and looks at Eddie. Her eyes begin to water. "Dammit." She inhales a shaky breath and wipes her eyes. She presses her stethoscope against his chest once again. "Inhale."

This time, Eddie complies with ease.

He inhales.

...

It was quiet when Emery walked down the hallway of her apartment complex. Even though she took a shower at the station before coming home, Emery still felt like she couldn't get that mud off her body. She definitely was going to take another shower. God, she just wanted to go to sleep.

Emery unlocks her front door and slowly pushes it open. As soon as she stepped into the apartment, her eyes met the nurse.

"Emerson, you're back."

Emery smiles, "Hey, Moira." She closes the door and hangs her bag on the rack. "How are you doing?"

"Good. I had some of the meatloaf you made."

Emery's face lights up. "Yeah? How was it?"

"It was better." Moira gives her a pained smile.

Emery bites the inside of her cheek and chuckles. "So, in other words, it wasn't good."

Moira's face drops, "No, not at all." She holds up her hands.

"It's okay." Emery softly laughs. "I will be the first to admit that I'm a terrible cook. I just know you forget to eat."

The nurse stops panicking and her face softens. "That's so sweet of you, Emerson."

Emery shrugs a shoulder. "If you want to take the meatloaf home for your kids, you're more than welcome to."

"Oh..." Moira winces. "I would, but..." she swallows. "It gave me a bit of a...stomachache."

Emery's eyes widen, "Are you serious? I have you food poisoning?" She quickly walks over to Moira. "Oh, god—this settles it. I'm putting the spatula down and I'm never cooking again."

"Emery, I will be fine. I just need some pesto bismal and a good nights sleep." Moira grabs Emery's hands and lightly pats them.

Emery swallows and she nods her head. Her eyes shift to the room down the hall and she bites the inside of her cheek. "Was everything okay?"

"Yeah, he's been resting today." The woman says. "We went for a walk and it took a lot out of him."

"Well, him going for walks is good." Emery lets out a breath of relief with a soft smile. "Thank you so much, Moira."

Moira waves a dismissive hand. "No, need to thank me. I'm just doing my job."

Elijah's cancer had progressed faster than the doctor's had realized. Emery and Elijah's decisions had to start coming more quickly. One of those was if Elijah should be admitted into the hospital or have hospice care. Elijah immediately chose hospice and Emery saw no need to argue. She 100% agreed with him.

When she told Dr. Martin, he was kind enough to call a close friend of his who was looking for work. And now here Emery was, showering Dr. Martin's close friend with every compliment in the book.

"Well, you're doing a great job." Emery continues to show her gratitude.

Moira clicks her tongue and shakes her head in disbelief. "You might just be the kindest person I've worked for."

"I really hope that's not true." Emery chuckles. "I'm nothing special."

"So, you say..." Moira hums. "I'll see you tomorrow before your shift?"

"Of course." Emery presses her lips into a small line. Moira left the apartment and Emery exhales a soft breath. She walks down the hall as quietly as she could. She stops at the door and notices light bleeding out from under the door. Emery softly knocks on the door. "Dad?" She gently opens the door and peaks inside.

"You alive in here?" Emery gives him a playful smile.

Elijah softly laughs but it ends up sounding like a wheeze. He slowly pushes himself up and Emery tenses. "You don't have to sit up." She quickly walks into the room and gently grabs his arms.

"Now, I can't sit up to hug my daughter?" Elijah chuckles then it quickly morphs into a cough.

Emery deadpans, "You can. But I would like for you to get some sleep." She fluffs his pillow. Emery's eyes shift to the EKG monitor and she softly huffs. "I wish you already were asleep."

"It was your first day back. And as a paramedic. I couldn't just go to sleep without knowing how it went." Elijah grabs her hand. "I couldn't make it to your graduation, so I sure as hell was going to hear about your first day."

Emery presses her lips into a grateful smile.

"So, tell me about it." Elijah pats her hand. "How was the call?"

Emery smiles and she sits in the chair beside her father's bedside.

"Okay, so the call started off as a rescue mission for a boy trapped in an old way. But that rescue changed into us trying to find Eddie."

━━━━━━━━━━

author's note.

Everyday I think about making this fic into a poly one...Emery and Eddie's chemistry is unmatched even when I don't try

words : 5338