Page 9 of In Sheets of Rain

3

Life In The Big City

The party was in full swing. I gathered it was always like this at Cathy’s.

Tayla sat down beside me on the settee and took in the raucous crowd.

“You’re hiding,” she said, offering me a chip from a bowl she was holding.

Tayla worked the opposite AO roster to me. When I was on the e-car, she’d be on the life support unit. Then we’d swap over for the next four-on week. She was also best friends with Cathy.

“No, I’m not,” I argued, accepting the chip peace-offering begrudgingly. I’d put on weight since I’d moved down to the big city. Shift work and snacks for meals, plus the odd meat pie from the service station on Pitt Street while refuelling the ambulance in the middle of the night had finally caught up with me.

I was going to have to start exercising. But who had time for that?

“We won’t bite, you know,” Tayla said, shoving a chip into her mouth and grinning toothily.

“I’m not hiding,” I repeated. “I just don’t know everyone yet. There’s a lot of people here.”

“The Service is big,” she agreed.

We watched the partygoers; boozing, and laughing, and smoking.

“Come on,” she said a moment later. “I’ll introduce you to a couple.”

I got up off the couch, bemusedly noting I’d placed myself in the corner behind a potted palm tree. Ihadbeen hiding. Shaking my head, I followed Tayla into the throng of people.

A few words here and there caught my attention. Scaring a cyclist on K’ Road with the bullhorn. Fishtailing along Tamaki Drive in a storm. Diesel instead of petrol at one in the morning, and the copious amounts of incident forms that followed. Laughter and black humour and camaraderie.

It was starting to feel like home to me.

We approached a group of people leaning against the railing on the balcony. Voices were raised and spilling over each other. Laughter frequently punctuated the air. One guy stood out, everyone laughing at his jokes, sharing his stories as if they were their own, back slapping and clinking glasses.

He wasn’t the tallest or the loudest, although he did hold his own in the crowd. He wasn’t the best dressed or even the best looking, but he carried himself in a way that called. His eyes came up from where he’d been staring at his shoes, laughing, and connected with mine.

I couldn’t look away.

He smiled at me.

“Everyone,” Tayla said loudly. “This is Kylee. Kylee, this is everyone.”

“That’s your idea of introductions?” I asked, smirking despite everyone’s attention being on me.

“Hey,” Tayla said, “I got you up off the couch, didn’t I?”

“You got a seat on the couch?” the guy I’d shared a look with said. “Lucky. We got shoved outside because we were too loud.”

“It’s loud by the couch,” I told him.

“Yeah, but I bet the conversation is better.”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “What were you talking about?”

“Music,” someone said. I didn’t look at them. The guy hadn’t stopped staring at me and I found myself unable to look away from him, too.

“Someone wanted to play some Black Sabbath,” he said and I wrinkled my nose. “Exactly!” he agreed, laughing. He had a good laugh. “Then we started arguing over rock music versus country.”

I arched my brow. The rest of the group forgotten.