Tribute by Diane K The reporter sighed in frustration and leaned back in the chair. Now what was he going to do? This was just too good, but it had no place in his story. Did it? A knock at the door of the editing room gave him the opportunity to clear his head for a moment. "Come in!" It was his friend, Paul. "Hey Bob. How's the story going?" An idea suddenly crossed Bob's mind. "Do you have a minute? I've got something I want to show you." Paul glanced at his watch then nodded. "As a matter of fact, I have 45 minutes I can give you." He sat down in the chair next to his friend and motioned towards the screen. "What's wrong? Don't have enough for the story? I thought it'd be easy…" "No, that's not it. It was easy. We knew it would be. No, I've got something else here that I want you to listen to. It's part of the story, but-not. I think it could be-more." Paul glanced at Bob, then back to the screen. "Lead on, MacDuff," he said as he leaned closer to the monitor. "Why don't you start by telling me what I'm going to be seeing?" "OK. Well, I went through all kinds of people at City Hall, CHP HQ, and the LAPD HQ, and then I got to the Fire Department…" "Yeah, yeah…" "And after I talked with a couple of Commissioners, I ended up talking to the Chief." "Go on," Paul prodded. "The Chief I talked to, a Roy DeSoto, asked me if I had talked to any of the actual fire department captains. I told him I hadn't. He seemed a little, well, hesitant, I guess you'd say. But he recommended I talk to this guy here. Captain of Station 36, John Gage." "That's him, here?" "Yeah." "Alright, so obviously you did. But?" Bob made his decision. "Just listen, and tell me what you think." He pressed the PLAY button. E?E?E?E The video camera is trained on a desk that is covered with piles of papers. In the short time that Bob has been there, however, Capt. Gage had accessed those piles and easily found things he needed. He noticed Bob's face the second time and gave the reporter a crooked grin. "I know where things are, and that's all that matters, right?" Bob smiled. "To each his own, Captain. I just know I'm not happy unless everything is tucked in a file and in a drawer." Gage had picked up a paper clip and tossed it into a cup designated for that purpose. "I know I'll never get transferred outta here with things like this-no one'll want to come in and organize this mess!" Captain Gage sits behind the desk, forearms resting easily on the top. "And you just want me to talk to you, and not the camera," he is saying, with a glance to the instrument in question. "Exactly," comes Bob's voice from the right of the camera. "Alrighty, then." "Just a couple other things to remember, Captain. If there's any question you don't want to answer, all you have to do is…." E?E?E? Bob pressed the Fast Forward Button. "Hey!" Paul exclaimed. "What are you doing?" "Getting to the good part," Bob replied. "The first part is the typical 'Yeah, L.A. has done a great job of reviewing and revising emergency procedures in the case of a terrorist attack'. No, it's the next part that I want you to listen to. Hold on…Got it." E?E?E?E Gage fidgets with a paper clip, eyes focused on it, as if it is the most interesting thing he's seen in ages. "No, I didn't see the Towers fall. Not at that moment. We were on a call to a car accident at the time. We had been glued to the TV before we left though, and I know what was happening in New York was on our minds as we worked the accident." He shifts uneasily in his chair. "We heard they fell while we were at the site, and when we got back here, of course, we turned the coverage back on." He shakes his head. "I can't think of one fireman who wasn't watching that day. I guess it's the nature of the job. We see people who need help, and we want to help-even if they're thousands of miles away." "What were your thoughts at that time? " "My thoughts? I don't know really. I was just feelin' it-frankly, I was sick to my belly. I guess my first real thought was to wonder how many people died-and how many of them were firefighters." "Did you expect the number of casualties to be larger or smaller?" Bob asks gently. "I don't know what I expected, really," Gage says. "Considering the thousands of people who worked there, I suppose I could say it could've been worse. But, to a firefighter, to a policeman, to the families of those killed, well, there were 3,000 too many casualties, don't you think?" He looks at Bob, but then quickly looks away. "You gotta understand, Mr. Thomas, a firefighter thinks one death is too many. And this…" Gage shakes his head. "I still can't comprehend it. Who DOES things like this?" He makes a motion with his hand, stopping Bob from saying anything. "Yeah, yeah, I know the reasoning, I know the drill. I just don't understand it." He tosses the paper clip down with disgust. He suddenly leans back and motions to his right. Another man's voice is heard, telling Gage that a victim from an earlier fire call is going to recover and that the squad truck will be returning soon. Gage nods and looks at Bob. "Think you'll be here for dinner? Cipriani makes the best pizza this side of the Rockies." Bob laughs and says he could eat a slice or two. Gage smiles at the firefighter and tells him to close the door. It shuts quietly, and Gage turns his attention back to the reporter. "So, where were we?" "Did you know any of New York City firefighters, Captain Gage?" Bob's voice is quiet and respectful. "Before 9/11? No. I have met a few since. I tried to get to New York right afterwards to try to lend a hand, but it just didn't work out." Gage sits up straight, and his pride is evident. "There were a bunch of L.A. firefighters who volunteered to go, and the Department tried to tell 'em they couldn't. Man, the union was in an uproar, the Commissioners were in an uproar…I was still plannin' to go anyhow, but then I ended up havin' surgery on my knee and couldn't move for weeks." "Was your knee injured on the job?" Gage smiles. "Hell, I've had every injury in the book, plus some, because of this job. The doctors used to say I shoulda had my own room at Rampart. I'm sure I financed the addition of that new wing of theirs all by myself." Bob's tone is serious again, bringing them back to the topic. "What one thing do you remember most about that day, Captain?" Gage sighs and runs his hand through his short steel-gray hair. He looks at Bob, and Bob finds himself surprised to see Gage seems puzzled (as is Paul, watching the tape-how hard could the question be?) "One thing? Just ONE thing?" "Yes." "'Oh God'." Bob waits. John Gage sits back and just looks at him. After a moment, Bob asks, "Well?" Gage smiles, but the charm of before has been replaced with sadness. "That was it. The one thing. I just kept thinkin': 'Oh God'." Bob can't be seen, but his voice betrays the fact that he's smiling back. "Are you serious?" "As a heart attack," Gage nods once. "I think I was just so stunned by the whole thing…" "Who wasn't?" "Exactly. So there didn't seem to be anything that I could say or think or do that could possibly help me or my men deal with what we were seeing." Gage goes still, and there's a sudden haunted look that appears in his eye. E?E?E?E "He's thought of something," Paul muttered. "Oh yeah," Bob responded. "Just wait." E?E?E?E The firefighter picks the mangled paper clip back up and begins to twist it back in its original shape. "Or hearing." He says it so quietly the mic on the camera almost doesn't pick it up. "Captain Gage?" "Late that afternoon, we got called to a huge fire in an apartment complex. Hours later, we came back, and I walked in the dayroom there-I was going to make coffee for us all. We hadn't turned off the TV when we got the call. So, when I came in, the first thing I saw were the shots of Ground Zero. But the first thing I HEARD was the sound of hundreds of locator alarms that we firefighters wear." Bob is silent. Gage bites his lower lip for a moment, then continues. "Those alarms go off if a firefighter doesn't move for a couple minutes. If you're unconscious, or under debris, you're more easily found. Man, you'll never know how hard it is to find someone in a smoke-filled room, especially if they're in a gray turnout coat, and aren't moving…" His eyes are unfocused, his hands suddenly very still. "So, I walk in and all I can hear are those locator alarms. Hundreds of 'em. And I could just stand there and stare at the TV for a minute or two. It suddenly hit me, there were firemen under those blocks of concrete. There were hundreds of our Brothers there, and no one was tryin' to get them out. I wanted to scream at someone to get them OUT of there, and get them help. And then, just as quick, I remembered…" Gage stops and runs his hand through his hair again. "What did you remember?" Bob whispers. "I remembered how terrible it can be when concrete falls. I remembered concrete walls fallin' on us, and the injuries, and I realized that, oh, hell, that no one could be layin' under there alive." He looks at Bob and says, "Remember the 1989 earthquake in Oakland? When the freeway collapsed onto those cars? Concrete." E?E?E?E "Good Lord," whispered Paul. Bob nodded. "Yup. Pretty much what I was thinking." E?E?E?E Gage leans over to pitch the paper clip into the garbage can. When he sits up, he takes a deep breath, and sighs. "You never leave your Brothers behind, Mr. Thomas. Not if you can ever help it. No one would've left them there if there were a chance in hell that they'd get out of it. So, I knew it was going to be a recovery mission-not a search and rescue." "There were a few people that were discovered alive," Bob reminds Gage. "Yeah, I know." Gage whispers, "But not enough." "I almost hate to ask you any more questions," Bob says. He sounds a little shaken. Gage flashes that lopsided grin of his. "I almost hate for you to do it." "Would you rather I stop?" Bob drifts into view from the side for just a second as he leans forward. The captain actually seems to consider it for a second. "Nah. I'm good." "Did you tell your men that night that you thought it would be recovery and not rescue?" Gage shakes his head. "I thought maybe, just maybe, I might be wrong." He picks up another paper clip and begins to fidget with it. "Actually, I was praying I was wrong. When a tragedy strikes, and you know firefighters are dead you can't help but think, 'if that had happened here, it woulda been me.' You can't help it. It's the nature of the job. So you want to believe there will be a miracle. You want to believe that if it happens to you, there's a chance you'll come out of it." "So firefighters have to be an optimistic group," Bob muses. "Optimistic?" Gage thinks about it. "Maybe. Maybe we're just-more-hopeful than other people. We know the dangers we face every time we enter a burnin' building. We're just hoping that the training we're given is enough to get us OUT of it alive. We go into places other people are runnin' out of because we're hoping to get EVERYONE out." "I'm betting you didn't sleep well that night." "Man, you have no idea." "Have you ever faced a difficult recovery?" "Not like at the Towers, no. Still, anytime you have to go in and pull kids' bodies out of a burned-out building-that's somethin' that gives me nightmares for a night or two." "The Towers probably gave you nightmares for weeks." Gage takes a drink of coffee that has to be cold by now. "It did, but not every night. It was usually something I saw on the TV that would bring 'em on. Like, the one night, I saw them pull a rig out from under the rubble with a crane. Damn-it looked like a toy that some kid had left in a gravel pile. It just-dangled there. I found myself thinking about an engineer I once worked with, Mike Stoker. He was always polishing 51s engine. He took a lot of pride in making sure she looked her best all the time. And as I watched that rig being pulled out by that crane, I wondered where the engineer was that was had driven her. Had he made it out? Was he watching the truck being hauled out of there? Or was he buried right next to her?" Gage rubs his coffee cup with his thumb and gazes into its depths. "I called Mike that night. Hadn't talked to him in two years." "Have you kept in touch with him since?" Gage looks surprised that Bob has asked that question. "Yeah. We've been getting together every couple of months now." He sits back. "In fact, I've been in touch with everyone I worked with as a paramedic twenty-five years ago. I don't think you can watch what happened in New York and not feel like you've been given a second chance." "Do the others feel that way?" Gage sighs. "Well..." He looks out of the window of his office door, watching one of his men cross the room. What he says next almost seems completely unrelated to what they've been talking about. "The men I have workin' for me now are still practically boys. Only one of 'em's married, and one's engaged. The oldest one is 28. I think what happened on 9/11 made them grow up too fast, almost." "Why do you say that?" "I think back to when I was that young-I was stupid, always doing dumb things. But my boys are growin' up quicker. Stern has finally started writing the book he was always sayin' he was gonna write." He smiles and shakes his head. "Cipriani flew to Italy to meet the family he always said he was going to meet." He pushes the coffee cup back. "In one way or another, they've all done something that maybe they might not have otherwise done. If there's one thing that can be considered good that came out of this whole tragedy, maybe that's it. Second chances for us older guys, first chances for the younger ones." "I've heard that several firefighters and police officers, and even people who worked in the Towers now are feeling 'survivor's guilt', that they lived, while so many others died." Bob pauses as Gage nods in acknowledgement. "You said earlier that if you had lived there, it would have been you in there. It might have been you that died. Do you, even living almost three thousand miles away from New York, have survivor's guilt?" Gage actually chuckles. "Shit, that's a hard one. Do I feel guilty that I'm still alive, and there are 343 firefighters that aren't, just because they lived there and I live here?" He again looks out of the window, then leans forward and picks up the second paper clip that he has been playing with. "I've dreamed about it." He says softly. "I know how it woulda gone. I'd be going up the stairs, leading, because I'm not gonna to let my boys go up there without me seeing where they're goin'. My wise-ass paramedic, Dougherty, would be right behind me, makin' comments behind my back about how the old man's knee is gonna give out at any time. My other paramedic, Stern-he'd be thinkin' about how he can turn the whole thing into a novel. Then behind them, there'd be Cipriani, who complains all the time. He'd be bitchin' about the stairs, and the terrorists, and how I'm walkin' too slow because of my knee. Then, there'd be Martinez, who rides in the rodeos and loves NASCAR. He'd be pushing Cipriani up the stairs, because Cip would be stoppin' to talk to him on every landing. Then bringin' up the rear would be my engineer, Frantz, who'd be humming opera under his breath. The guy sings like an angel, and he always sings opera when we're fighting fires." Gage rolls his eyes. "Go figure." "If you had been there, Captain, and you knew then what you know now…" "That the Towers were going to collapse?" "Yes. Would you still go up the stairs?" Gage is nodding before the question is finished. "Absolutely." "Why?" Bob asks. "If you know that you and your five men are going to die, why would you do it?" "Because that's our job." The intensity in the man's eyes can almost be felt, even through the camera lens. "To die for others?" "If we have to, yes." Gage states firmly. "Look, I read somewhere that when the firefighters were climbin' those stairs toward the fires-up those 70, 80 flights of steps, they were talkin' to and offerin' encouragement to the people who worked there, who were being evacuated. I read that the people were watchin' those just incredibly brave guys goin' up the stairs, and they began to applaud them. In the middle of this horrible nightmare, they're applauding those men who were just there to do their jobs. To fight fires, and get the victims out." He stabs his finger at Bob to make his point. "THAT'S why we do this." "For public appreciation?" "No. So that people know they've got someone on THEIR side." "Is it enough?" Bob asks quietly. Gage sucks in his breath. "It has to be. I have to believe it is. There might have been a firefighter on Ladder 15 who made pizza better than Cipriani. There might have been a guy in Squad 18 who wanted to write novels like Stern. There might have been a guy on Engine 10 who loves NASCAR more than Martinez. There might have been a guy at Battalion 13 who sang opera like Frantz. Maybe there was a guy who was as much a wise-ass as Dougherty on Ladder 118. I don't want them to be forgotten." Suddenly, an alarm goes off, and a loudspeaker starts to spit out station names. Gage is out the door before the first station name is finished. Bob moves in front of the camera and says "I guess the interview is over." E?E?E?E "My God," Paul said. "What an interview." "Ain't that the truth." Bob started to rewind the tape. "So, my question to you is, what do I do with it? I can't put this in with the 'How would L.A. do in a Terrorist Attack?' story." "No," Paul agreed. "You know what? I think you do this one as is. Leave it. Run it just like it is. As a story about how the firefighter thinks. As a story about why they'd go up those stairs to certain death." Bob considered Paul's words as the tape finished rewinding and he pressed the Eject button. "Should I go back and finish the interview?" Paul debated it. "What more could the man say that he didn't already? You got a great piece there as it is." Bob chuckles. "I know. I think I just want to go back and try that pizza of Cipriani's." Author's comments: When the first Tower fell, my cousin was on the with her dad, who is a volunteer firefighter. She told me my uncle said, "A thousand voices just cried out." Thank you, Janet, for this chance to exorcise some demons still resting in my heart over 9/11. And, to everybody: If you haven't heard the lyrics to Bruce Springsteen's "Into the Fire" and "The Rising" (from his CD "The Rising"), check 'em out. Thanks again! Feedback for Diane |