By his third drink on me, Flannery had told me a few hundred war stories-at least it seemed that way-and had begun grousing about how the world and the job had changed and, in his opinion, not for the better. I subtly egged him on, though he didn’t really need any encouragement. Just when I was about to introduce the subject of Alta and Maya’s alleged dereliction of duty, Flannery made a trip to the bathroom. The business at the bar slowed down momentarily and I waved the barman over. I had him bring another round.
“So what’s my drinking mate’s story?” I asked the bartender-a guy about my age-when he brought the drinks.
“Flannery? He’s a pain in the balls, but make no mistake, the man’s a hero.”
“Him? Get the fuck outta here.”
“I shit you not. Remember how bad things were in the ghettos in the early ’70s?” he asked. “I was on the job then too, a ladder company in Brownsville. We used to get pelted with bricks and bottles on nearly every night run we made in them days. Trust me, it didn’t fill me heart with love for those people. We were targets for their anger. Flannery, after getting hit in the head by a brick, made the best rescue anyone ever saw. It’s fucking legendary. Singlehandedly saved five kids, their parents, and a cat from a kerosene heater blaze that lit up the building like tissue paper. Kept running in and out of a building he had no business going into in the first place. I know he can be a ornery bastard, but that bastard won the James Gordon Bennett Medal. That’s the highest honor the department bestows and it ain’t given out like Halloween candy. Just don’t mention it or tell him I told you. He hates talking about it. Okay, here he comes.”
Flannery sat back down beside me and made quick work of the Jameson. He nodded at the barman. “Big-mouthed son of a bitch bartender told you, didn’t he? About the medal, I mean. Don’t deny it. I seen that look on your face. I seen it plenty. How can a broken-down drunk slob like Flannery be a hero?”
“Don’t get mad at him. I asked about you.”
“Yeah, well, we’ll get on fine, you and me, as long as we don’t talk about that.”
That was my opening.
“Fine. Then let’s talk about something else.”
“Like what?”
Finally, a song I knew came on. “Paradise By The Dashboard Light” played and most of the crowd in Finbarr’s was singing along. I had to shout at Flannery to be heard.
“Like about the two EMTs that let that guy die in the city.”
I guess I was a little too successful at being heard. Before Flannery could say a word, a heavy hand slammed down on my shoulder and it stayed there. The guy attached to the other end of it walked around in front of me. He was twenty-five with dark red hair, a healthy mustache, and light blue eyes shot with blood. He had the look of a man who’d been drinking for a few hours and was spoiling to flex his beer muscles.
“What are you, another fucking reporter here to stir up the shit?”
“No, I’m a man having a private conversation,” I said, calm but serious. “Now if you don’t mind, please get your hand off my shoulder.”
“But I do mind, motherfucker!” He turned his attention on Flannery. “Don’t talk to this asshole. He’s looking to bury us.”
Flannery didn’t answer right away, but I was losing patience.
“Listen, I asked you politely to move your hand off my shoulder and got called a motherfucker for my trouble. Now I’m not asking, I’m telling you. Get your fucking hand off my shoulder.”
“And if I don’t?”
By now, the rest of the bar had stopped singing and focused their eyes on us. Not good. With an audience, there was no way for this guy to back down and save face. His friends started egging him on. Kick the old guy’s ass, Hickey. Come on, Hickey, fuck him up. And so it went.
I may have been an old man in his eyes, but I stopped taking shit from morons like Hickey when I was eight years old. And there was this other thing: I was carrying. My old. 38 was holstered in the small of my back and I could have it sticking under Hickey’s chin in a second or two. I waited a beat to give him a chance to back off. He didn’t avail himself of the opportunity. No surprise there. So I reached around under my jacket, but my hand never made halfway to my holster. Flannery had a hold of my wrist and when he had hold of something, it stayed held. I looked his way and he shook his head no. I nodded that I understood and he let go. Before I could exhale, Flannery was out of his seat and had his left hand around Hickey’s throat.
“Listen, pup, what me and my friend choose to discuss is none of your fucking business. You ever interrupt me or lay a hand on a friend again and I’ll make sure you get your medical pension in a hurry. Do you take my meaning, son?” He squeezed a little tighter as he asked. Hickey nodded that he understood. “Smart lad. Now my friend and I are leaving. I turn around and even sniff you behind us, I’ll snap your arm off.” He let go of Hickey.
I thanked the barman and left the change as a tip. Outside, I asked Flannery why he stopped me from teaching Hickey a lesson.
“Because we police our own,” he said. “Now let’s find a place to do some proper drinking.”
And so we did.
TEN
Flannery knew a real neighborhood bar not two blocks from Finbarr McPhee’s. The kind of place where they played Sinatra on the jukebox and the jukebox still played vinyl records. It was the kind of place that had a name, but you didn’t need to know it because you knew where it was and what it was about. And what it was about was beers and shots of whiskey, a pool table, a dart board, and one old TV that hadn’t worked in years. Nobody came here to hit on babes or to impress anyone at all. It was a bar for men to drink in and to be comfortable doing so.
The bartender knew Flannery, which didn’t exactly shock me. I supposed most of the bartenders in Bay Ridge knew him. I gestured to a booth. Flannery wasn’t having any. He preferred sitting at the bar and that was fine with me. I took out another fifty and ordered a Jameson and a Guinness. I think I’d managed two sips of my first Guinness at McPhee’s and never got to the second. I meant to actually drink this pint. My drinking buddy had no trouble finishing his and made quick work of his whiskey. I figured that since he’d just saved my ass or saved me from making an ass of myself, I’d let him bring up the subject that had started all the trouble in the first place.
“You know why that pup got so agitated when you brought up the EMTs?” Flannery asked, his unfocused eyes aimed vaguely at the mirror behind the bar.
“I have some idea. They reflected badly on the department and all of that.”
“That’s part of it, but not nearly all. It’s politics.”
“What isn’t?” I said, nodding for the barman to bring Flannery another.
“True enough, but this is ugly politics, internal politics. See, EMTs wear uniforms, but are civilian employees of the department. They’re not firefighters like in other cities and they don’t usually work out of the same houses that the men on the real job do. If an EMT wants to become a fireman, they gotta take a special test.”
“I see. So even though these two women weren’t on the job, the real firefighters get tainted by what they did. The public isn’t big on making subtle distinctions.”
“The media neither, but it’s even more complicated than that, Moe.” He looked around to make sure no one was in earshot. “Here’s the deal. The department has never been the most welcoming place for certain kinds of people, if you catch my drift.”
“I do.”
“Going back to my days in the department, the blacks always sued over the test to get on the job, saying it discriminates against them. Even though I think that’s all a crock of shit myself, when you look at the numbers… And these days, the FDNY gets federal money too. So someone inside the union got the bright idea to get EMTs counted with the FDNY’s numbers because a lot of the EMTs are women and minorities.”
“Holy shit!”