thursday started out with a bang: a gunshot to the chest on a drug deal gone bad. heat, humidity, moonlight-- all the elements in place for a long weekend. i was good at my job: there were periods when my hands moved with a speed and skill beyond me and my mind worked with a cool authority i had never known. but in the last year i had started to lose that control. things had turned bad. i hadn't saved anyone for months. i just needed a few slow nights, a week without tragedy followed by a couple of days off.
move back. where's the stairs? 5a.
how long ago did he stop breathing?
we'll do all we can.
clear! clear!
in the last year i had come to believe in such things as spirits leaving the body and not wanting to be put back, spirits angry at the awkward places death had left them. i understood how crazy it was to think this way, but i was convinced if i turned around, i'd see old man burke standing at the window, watching, waiting for us to finish.
i'll take over. call er and ask for an eighty-three. sorry.
do you have any music?
music. i think it helps if you play something he liked.
no we can't. he's got a pulse.
his heart's beating.
have 'em bring up a stretcher.
help your family. ride with your mother and brother. help your family. they need you more. help yourself.
i needed to concentrate because my mind tended to wander on these short trips. it was the neighborhood i grew up in and where i had worked most as a paramedic, and it held more ghosts per square foot than any other.
griss, let us in.
we got him at eighteen and second. you're closest.
he wanted to come here. said the nurses at misery were the best.
i can't. i have to stay with my patient.
he got better.
he one of them?
he's very very sick.
we'd better go outside. quickly.
i guess there's always a chance.
i wouldn't do that. the doctor seems to think he's suffering from some rare disorder.
i think the moment that food hits your mouth we'll get a job.
what?
i'm not hungry.
i eat. i just haven't had coffee yet.
rose was getting closer. ever since the call a month before, when i'd lost her, she seemed like all the girls in the neighborhood. one of the first things you learn is to avoid bad memories. i used to be an expert, but lately i'd found some holes. anything could trigger it. the last month belonged to rose, but there were a hundred more ready to come out.
these spirits were part of the job. it was impossible to pass a building that didn't bold the spirit of something: the eyes of a corpse, the screams of a loved one. all bodies leave their mark. you cannot be near the new dead without feeling it.
i could handle that. what haunted me now was more savage: spirits born half-finished, homicides, suicides, overdoses, innocent or not, accusing me of being there, witnessing a humiliation which they could never forgive.
what?
you wanted it turned off. there's no such thing as a good fire. people get burned up. they can't breathe.
don't push it, larry.
mr. oh.
relax, it's a street job, easy except for the smell. we'll just throw him in back and zip over to mercy--no blood, no dying, that's how i look at it. he's just a drunk.
they'll just keep calling.
well why didn't you say so?
faster!
the first is always the best.
you never know.
at least he's got people around him.
even when you say the things, there's always more things.
go home. take her home. get some rest. not going to find anything out now.
larry, swing over on eighth. we're gonna hafta run one of these calls.
the biggest problem with not driving is that whenever there's a patient in back you're also in the back. the doors close, you're trapped. four in the morning is always the worst time for me, just before dawn, just when you've been lulled into thinking it might be safe to close your eyes for one minute. that's when i first found rose .
she was on the sidewalk, not breathing.
i'm not feeling very well, larry. i say we go back to the hospital and call it a night.
take me back, put me to bed; i surrender. we've done enough damage tonight.
yeah, you're right.
tell me, you ever think of doing anything else?
i'd always had nightmares, but now the ghosts didn't wait for me to sleep. i drank every day. help others and you help yourself, that was my motto, but i hadn't saved anyone in months. it seemed all my patients were dying. i'd waited, sure the sickness would break, tomorrow night, the next call, the feeling would drop away. more than anything else i wanted to sleep like that, close my eyes and drift away .
zebra.
ten-four.
we have a call chief. somebody's bleeding, houston and first.
noel, don't!
you really think so?
you came out of the hospital. you were tied down and hallucinating. you got some bad chemicals in your head, noel. there's some medicine at the hospital that will fix that.
noel, you didn't let me finish. we have rules against killing people on the street. looks bad, but there's a special room at the hospital for terminating. a nice quiet room with a big bed.
well, you have your choice: pills, injection, gas.
used to be my partner.
it's not worth it, tom. he's surrendering.
don't do it, tom!
where you hit?
major tom, i'm going to misery. you take yours to bellvue.
you're gonna feel a stick in your arm. don't move.
you're not going to die.
shut up. you're going to die and he's not. got it.
i can't. i got to do the other arm.
hold this--right there. if you let go, i swear, i won't kill you.
it's all right. we're here.
he's not breathing. call a code.
it's okay. they're prescription. works better with a little whiskey.
yes.
yes.
our lady of misery.
no.
he's working a double shift.
she should go home.
here she is.
mrs. burke, please, they'll take care of him. you should go home now.
larry and i'll drop her back home. help me get her to the ambulance.
saving someone's life is like falling in love, the best drug in the world. for days, sometimes weeks afterwards, you walk the street making infinite whatever you see. once, for weeks i couldn't feel the earth. everything i touched became light. horns played in my shoes; flowers fell from my pockets .
you wonder if you've become immortal, as if you saved your own life as well. what was once criminal and happenstance suddenly makes sense. god has passed through you, why deny it, that for a moment there, god was you.
good morning, captain.
i'm sick. that's what i've been telling you.
it's okay. i'll just get my things out of the locker.
i'm sorry captain. don't take it too hard.
you know they won't do it. it's up to you. you gotta be strong.
you swore you'd fire me if i came in late again.
i don't think a week's gonna do it.
the captain almost fired me tonight. i'm on my way out. anytime now.
the ghosts--
i think the worst is over.
hey, marcus, it's love. i haven't heard her in months.
is it true that you and love went on a blind date? she hit you with a bottle?
he's not dead. it's a heroin overdose. break out the narcon.
c'mon.
that guy i brought in yesterday, post-cardiac arrest. he's gone.
what do you think?
the family know?
where the guy jumped and you almost fell. no, you never told me that story.
make a left here. i want to stop.
i'll be right back.
hello, i'm frank pierce, from the ambulance last night. i brought your father into the hospital and i just learned some news.
well, the doctor says he's showing some movement. it's still early, it might mean nothing, but i thought you'd want to know.
you look so different.
i think it looks good.
how is she?
i was just going to get some food. pizza. maybe we could.
be tough to get a taxi here. we can give you a ride if you like.
she's the daughter of a cardiac arrest i brought in last night. i told her we'd give her a ride back to misery. her father's showing signs of improving.
i'm hungry too. we gotta get some food after this.
why don't we go outside for a little while, wait until this passes.
he wants to pull that tube out. it's pretty painful--that's why they keep him sedated--but it's a good sign.
that's how it's done. you have to keep the body going until the brain and heart recover enough to go on their own.
he's better.
thanks.
it's best not to .  it's good pizza, huh?
you remember that pizza place, joe's on tenth street maybe fifteen years ago? when you ordered a pie it came with a little plastic madonna in the middle?
i grew up on elizabeth. i went to blessed sacrament.
we moved out after that. upstate.
they're fine. my old man was a bus driver, mom a nurse--i was sort of born to it, i guess.
ah, no. i was. it's hard to explain. she had a hard time adjusting to, well, maybe it was my fault too.
it's been bad lately, but it's always bad.
five years.
you learn to sort of block it out, you know, like cops fence off a crime scene. but then something good will happen and everything will just glow.
i think i'd remember that.
mostly. it must be my face. my mother always said i looked like a priest.
sure.
look after her, griss, okay?
what about rule number three: don't get involved with dispatchers named love.
the street is so much more unpredictable than the er and to prepare for the unexpected i was taught to act without thinking, like an army private who can take apart and reassemble a gun blindfolded .
i realized that my training was useful in less than ten percent of the calls and saving someone's life was rarer than that. as the years went by i grew to understand that my role was less about saving lives than about bearing witness. i was a grief mop and much of my job was to remove, if even for a short time, the grief starter or the grief product. it was enough i simply showed up.
she's no whore, marcus.
she wasn't looking at you, man, she was looking at me.
i didn't kill you.
i need a drink, that's all.
what's wrong.
pregnant.
are you pregnant? estas embarazada?
can you walk? puedes caminar?
thanks for the translation. what's your name? nombre?
let's have a look.
oh jesus, we'd better go. call for backup.
it's coming. hold her down.
three legs.
backup?
she's having a baby. twins.
you can trust me on this one.
you take the first one.
she had a pulse.
can't tell. it was a breech, twins. the other one seems okay, though. marcus is taking him and the mother to maternity.
don't give me that look.
you know what i'm talking about. it's all over your face. that i-just- saved-a-little-baby-boy look.
i don't want to hear about it, okay? that's three jobs for the night. it's over. three jobs and time for a drink. six am, the cocktail hour. pass the bottle; i know you're holding.
i hate vodka.
i'll drink to that.
greatest job in the world.
don't do it, marcus. tell her the bus died, our radio's not working, our backs are out. tell her we're too drunk to take any more calls.
i quit! i'm through!
so long, noel.
what's going on, griss?
excuse me. you seemed like you were in trouble.
don't seem so bad to me.
okay.
maybe i should come up with you.
nothing's going to happen. i'll come with you.
you asked me not to come.
fifteen minutes.
we can still go back. i'll walk you home. you sleep a couple of hours, watch some tv, take a bath.
mary burke. she's a friend.
frank pierce.
where is she?
she asked me to pick her up.
i better just go in and see her.
mary. mary, we've got to get going.
mary, we really have to go.
got a beer?
did you give mary something called red death?
i should be going. i just quit.
is this what you gave mary?
i guess i'll be going.
perfect.
you sure?
huh?
one more time!
no way!
because you can barely walk.
i need to sit down a minute.
hello, i'm frank. mary's friend. a very close friend who loves animals.
hello?
i washed my face with three kinds of soap, each smelling like a different season. it felt good to be in a woman's room again, especially a woman who wasn't comatose or severely disabled. i felt that perhaps i had turned a corner, like i saved someone, though i didn't know who.
no .
what if there is no tomorrow?
morning, griss.
mr. burke?
you do it.
i thought he was getting better.
why not?
clear!
i'm sick, tom. i need a cure. vitamin b cocktail, followed by an amp of glucose and a drop of adrenaline. not as good as beer, but all i got.
these are hard times, tom.
great to be drunk. sobriety's killing me.
our mission is coffee, tom. a shot of the bull, puerto rican espresso.
the cure's not working, tom. maybe we should go back to the hospital.
tom, where are the band-aids? this is an ambulance, isn't it?
this is the worst suicide attempt i've ever seen. you feel the pulse? here. that's where you cut, and it's not across, it's down like so. here take it.
with all the poor people of this city who wanted only to live and were viciously murdered, you have the nerve to sit here waiting to die and not go through with it. you make me sick. take it.
c'mon, tom. the city's burning.
i feel the need, the need for speed. i'm driving out of myself.
i've taken that into consideration.
i never felt better in my life.
you've said too much already.
it's early for him.
better bring it all.
the elevator's fucked. we'd never all fit anyway. let's go.
i'm going to sixteen.
i'm going to thirteen.
well, he's the steakhead of the night, then.
how's he doing?
does that hurt?
i don't think you've hurt any major organs. we got to get you off this thing without setting off bleeding.
they're gonna torch the fence. you're gonna feel the metal getting warm, maybe very warm.
you're going to live.
i was tired. i needed a coffee.
dead.
no.
how many times have you shocked him tonight?
what do you do, just have someone follow him around with a defribilator?
a medical miracle.
i'm going out for a smoke.
he'll be all right.
it'll be a while before he's up and running again.
no problem. thanks for letting me crash. it was the best sleep i've had in months. i used some of your soap.
can i bring you something back to eat--a falafal, some pizza?
no, the city doesn't discriminate. it gets everybody.
i gotta go. another call.
we're all dying, mary burke.
there's no time.
as long as we keep moving. no standing still.
c'mon, tom, pick up a job.
let's get in a fight, then.
that's your job. just keep driving, keep moving. no stopping. we're sharks. we stop too long, we die.
let's break something, tom. let's bust something, bomb something.
i don't know--let's break some windows.
destruction, distraction. i feel the need.
what's the reason? give me a reason, tom.
he's crazy. he can't help it.
okay, whatta i do?
that's ridiculous.
you learn that in the army?
flatbush.
that's a hell of a swing you got there, noel. i'm thinking strawberry in his prime.
no, i'd better not.
yeah?
what the hell. the next year, tiebreaker for the division, in boston, yanks down two to nothing, bucky dent steps to the plate.
the pitch, high heater. bucky knows what's coming. he steps in, smash, over the green monster.
i didn't mean to.
i tried to help. i wanted to.
get the kit! we're gonna tube him!
do it!
we're gonna save you, noel. you're gonna be all right. do it, tom! i'll call for fucking backup, i swear!
you're going to make it! you're going to make it!
last show of the night.
no.
where's burke?
frank.
he's dead, rose. your father passed.
he coded. they shocked him one too many times. i'm sorry.
i'm sorry.
yes.