John Gage awoke in the dark, to a ‘ringing’ in his ears. ‘Where the hell am I?’ his half-awake brain silently wondered. ‘Oh. Right. Rampart’s basement…’
Somewhere to his right, a phone was ringing.
His right hand reached out and began groping around for the annoying instrument. His fumbling fingers finally found it and managed to dislodge the handset from its cradle.
The incessant ‘r-r-riiiiinging’ stopped.
His fingers continued fumbling until they’d found and flipped the switch for his nightstand’s lamp on.
His new underground apartment’s itty-bitty bedroom appeared.
His left hand latched onto his covers and tossed them off. Gage gritted his teeth and slowly slid his legs over until both of his bare feet were on the carpeted floor. He sat his stiff, sore self up on the edge of his bed and then finally reached for the phone’s receiver. He raised the device to his right ear and didn’t even attempt to hide the annoyance in his husky voice. “Hello?”
Gage glanced at his radio alarm clock. “Doc, it’s after eleven. Don’t you ever sleep?”
“The-ey?” John’s heart about stopped, as the door to his apartment’s little living room suddenly flew open.
A doctor, an RN and two orderlies came bursting into his bedroom—with a resuscitator.
‘They’ seemed to be every bit as surprised to see him calmly sitting there, as he was to see the bunch of them breathlessly standing there.
“They just…arrived,” John dazedly informed the disturbing doctor.
“Hmm…a minute and a half. Do me a favor, will you. Tell Dr. Morston I said that wasn’t bad, but that I expect them to do even better, next time.”
“Goodnight, Johnny. Sleep tight.”
‘Cli-ick.’
Johnny replaced the phone’s receiver and then obligingly passed the message along to Morston. “Brackett says to tell you that ‘that wasn’t bad, but he expects you guys to do even better…next time’.”
The rescue party managed a group eye roll and immediately began making their way back to their rapidly vacated posts, up on the hospital’s first floor.
The disturbed sleeper waited until he heard the hall door close. Then he clicked the light off and climbed slowly and painfully back under his covers. ‘Shee-eesh!’
Less than fifteen minutes later…
John was just about to fall back to sleep…when the damn phone started its incessant ‘r-r-riiiiiiinging!’ again.
‘Ma-an! I definitely need to get an unlisted number!’ he silently mused—er, fumed.
Gage managed an exasperated ‘gasp’ and grabbed the infernal phone from its cradle. “Hello!” he snapped into the invisible instrument’s invisible mouthpiece.
“Johnny, do you have a television set?” his partner excitedly pondered.
Johnny lowered the phone in his hand and then stared unseeingly—and disbelievingly—down at it.
No doubt about it. His good buddy had definitely ‘lost it’.
John reluctantly raised the invisible instrument back up to his right ear. “Yes, Roy. I have a TV set. And, now that you know that, I trust you’ll be able to sleep a lot better,” the interrupted sleeper snidely tacked on.
‘Cli-ick.’
Gage returned the phone to its cradle…and then unquestioningly obeyed.
It wasn’t like he could’ve asked any questions, anyway. Since his partner had already hung up on him.
The still half-asleep on his bare feet fireman stumbled into his new apartment’s little living room.
He turned his television on and then obediently flipped its dial to Channel Three.
It took a few moments for the set to warm up.
John’s bottom jaw dropped open, as Johnny Carson appeared up on its screen—right along with his latest ‘special guest’…one 15-year-old Anthony Larkin!
Gage listened as Tony told Johnny C. all about the events that had led up to the runaway semi rescue Squad 51 had responded to last Thursday afternoon. Tony told The Tonight Show’s inquisitive host everything. The boy even mentioned that his father had given him permission to accompany his rescuer to the Monster Truck Show that coming weekend. Only now, it didn’t look like they were going to get to go.
Johnny C. seemed more than a little concerned to hear that. “Oh? Why not?”
“Johnny’s doctors won’t allow him to drive.”
“No problem,” Johnny C. assured the sad-faced kid. “I shall personally see to it, that you guys make it to—and from—the Monster Truck Show.”
“Thanks, Mr. Carson. But I still don’t think we’ll be able to go.”
Carson’s face filled with confusion. “Why not?”
Johnny C. looked lost in thought for a few moments. “Tony…what if we were to send a medical team, along with the limousine. Do you think his doctors might let you guys go to the Monster Truck Show—then?”
The kid’s gloomy countenance instantly brightened. “I don’t know, Mr. Carson. But, I sure hope so!”
“I sure hope so, too, Tony!” Carson assured the boy. He took and shook Tony’s hand and thanked him for coming on ‘tonight’s’ show. Johnny C. then turned to face camera two again. “When we come back, Carrie Fisher and Harrison Ford will be here, to tell us all about the new ‘Star Wars’ sequel they’ve been working on. So don’t go away…”
“Well, I’ll be damned!” Johnny G. exclaimed, solely to himself. “I hope so, too, Tony…” he mumbled beneath his breath. The sleepy fireman then flicked his TV set off and went stumbling back into his itty-bitty bedroom. ‘I hope so, too…’
The following morning, just as ‘The Phantom of the Hospital’ finished getting ready for class…
John heard a knock on his basement apartment’s hall door and strolled over to answer it.
“Mister Gage?” a tall, official-looking fellow in a dark-blue business suit cooly and calmly inquired.
“Ye-es…” the paramedic course instructor tentatively replied.
“Detective Mark Curhan,” the man in the business suit introduced and flashed the fireman his badge. “My Captain sent me here, to find out if you intend to press assault charges against the guy who slammed that door into you. May I come in?”
“Of course,” Gage assured him and motioned for the polite policeman to step inside. “I mean, of course you can come in. Not of course I intend to press assault charges.”
“But, you were assaulted. The guy damned near killed you!”
“I believe it was more of an ‘accident’ than an ‘assault’. I’m sure his intention was for the door to hit his foot…not for his foot to hit the door. The guy may be a colossal jerk. But he’s not a ‘criminal’. Besides, the doc said that, as soon as that reporter realized what he’d done, he came back to make sure that I was gonna be all right.”
“Okay. It’s your call.”
“Yes. It is. And, if the guy hadn’t come back to check up on me, I’m sure I would be feeling a lot less forgiving right now.”
The detective was forced to smile.
The cop and the assault victim shook hands…and then they both went about their respective jobs.
The detective went back to collaring criminals.
And the forgiving fireman went back to training future paramedics.
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Guest Dispatchers Stories by Ross
