I felt nothing at all like her, either.
My next thought, looking at all those stricken faces, was that Owen must have died.
I held my breath.
But then the captain pushed through the crowd, came up to me, clamped his arm around my shoulders, and steered me off in the other direction down the hall.
“Let’s talk,” he said.
“Is he okay?”
The captain sensed my anxiety. “He’s fine,” he said, and I closed my eyes, and my whole body felt like it was full of water. “Well,” the captain corrected, “notfine.They’ve had him down in the hyperbaric chamber since he got here, but they just brought him up for the night. We’ll see how he does for a while. He’s got edema of the upper trachea and second-degree burns on the face, a couple of broken ribs, and a collapsed lung.”
“So,” I said, “the opposite of fine.” More like fighting for his life in the ICU.
“He’s a strong kid,” the captain said. “He’s got everything to live for.”
I had a sinking feeling. “What’s the prognosis?”
The captain let out a long sigh. “Maybe fifty-fifty. He needs to make it through the night.”
I took a minute to concentrate on breathing. How did it work again? In, then out—or the other way around?
The captain gave my shoulders a final, awkward squeeze and then released me. “Good thing DeStasio caught that cyanide situation, huh?”
I looked up. “DeStasio?”
“If he hadn’t caught it,” the captain went on, clearly trying to stay positive, “we’d be facing a whole different deal right now.”
“DeStasio didn’t catch it,” I said. “I caught it.”
The captain frowned at me, like I’d taken leave of my senses. “Hanwell,” the captain said, like I needed to stop playing around, “DeStasio already filed his report.”
Was that supposed to explain anything? “Okay,” I said.
“He emailed it to me from his hospital room. I read it on my phone.”
“Why did DeStasio even fill out the report?” I asked. “He wasn’t the ranking medic on scene.”
“He was the senior firefighter,” the captain said, as if that mattered.
“What did his report say?”
The captain studied my face. “It says that he identified symptoms of cyanide poisoning while still inside the structure, and he instructed you to administer the antidote as soon as possible.”
I actually shook my head to try to clear it. “That’s not true. I’m the one who recognized the cyanide poisoning.”
“That’s not what the report says.”
“Then it’s incorrect.”
“Are you saying DeStasio filed a false report?”
That would’ve been a hell of an accusation. “I’d have to see it,” I said. “Maybe he was disoriented from his injury.”
“He seemed pretty coherent to me,” the captain said.
“Can I see the report?”
