December 12th, 2009
“Wow! What a place you got here, Emma!” Patterson gawked as Wagner pushed him through the door, into the foyer. I just rolled my eyes and shut the door behind them.
“Sorry, the probie needed something to do since his girlfriend dumped him,” Wagner said apologetically as he shrugged off his coat and handed it to me.
I snorted, “You’re not gay, Patterson?”
“What?! Fuck, no. I’m just metro!” he exclaimed. He held up his hands and said, “Believe me babe, I love chicks. No doubt about it.”
Wagner and I were both laughing at the poor kid who had just joined our station over the summer. He was a really nice, very energetic and a good dresser. Because of the good dresser part, we picked on him pretty hard. Thank heaven the kid was a good sport and was turning into being a damn good firefighter and friend.
Once I stopped laughing I throw my arm around Wagner’s shoulders and said, “Well if that’s the case, then maybe you can get Wagner here in some decent looking clothing so he can pick up a nice chick.”
Wagner stopped laughing and glared at me. “Don’t even start with me, Emma. I am not the marrying type, and you know that.”
I walked over and put my arm around him, pushing him and Patterson near the kitchen so they’d eat the pizza that was just delivered as I said, “I know, Wagner. However, I think if the right girl walked up to you and told you to roll over, you’d do it.”
We ate our pizza and then went to work on painting the rest of the nursery. We were painting a scene from the Peanuts cartoons that I had drawn life-size onto the wall. I was working on Snoopy’s doghouse, Patterson was painting the sky blue background and grass on the far wall and a surprisingly artistic Wagner was working on the ice pond hockey scene I had drawn. It was an in-depth scene that had a lot of the characters to be painted, but he was doing an awesome job.
I had the radio tuned into the game on 550am since the boys were in NYC, playing the Rangers.
“So I guess they are in the middle of a road trip?” Patterson asked as he carried a bucket of sky blue paint over to the wall he was working on.
“Yup, they head to Montreal for the 14th and then to Ottawa
“Good! By then we should have the whole nursery finished!” Patterson said cheerfully.
“Myers and Vanek head for the net, wait, Vanek passes to Roy
I proceeded to bounce up and down happily with my paint brush as I splattered the red doghouse paint across the front of my shirt. “Yay!!”
“You are going to have more paint on you and the baby than you will the wall if they keep scoring tonight,” Wagner joked as he turned to watch my little celebration. “Thank goodness you aren’t wearing your jersey, or you’d have paint all over that old ratty thing. However, it might be better for it because it’s pretty rough looking…”
I walked over to him, holding the red paint brush out at him, threatening to swipe it across his neck. “Don’t ever make a bad remark about that jersey,” I growled, trying to keep a straight face. “I’ve worn that since Patty suited up for his 2nd game as a Sabre. It was his very first jersey he wore in his very first NHL game.”
“No way!” Patterson said, surprised.
Wagner ignored the paint brush and looked over at the probie. “Yes way. She ain’t yanking your chain kid. She’s very protective over the jersey, that’s why I like to pick on her about it.” As he said the last part he turned back towards me, grabbed my wrist and lowered my weapon. He then turned me back to facing the wall I had been painting and patted me on the ass so that I would go back to it without argument.
During our little spat the Ranger’s had scored twice on Ryan, two minutes later my hubby scored to tie the game back up. This time I put my paint brush down onto the tray and ran into the bedroom to watch the replay. The guys followed me and we jumped and clapped together as we watched the highlight. I could even feel the baby jumping around with me, like she (yes, Patty got me calling it a she) knew it was her daddy scoring.
We went back to painting until I heard Rick Jeanneret (the play-by-play announcer of the Sabres) start going crazy on a possible short-handed break away. I ran back into the bedroom as Patty scored a shortie to put the team ahead in the game. I squeaked and squawked as I watched Patty do his pathetic “starting the lawn mower,” celebration as he skated around the ice to be congratulated by his team.
“You are going to put yourself in pre-mature labor if you keep acting like that, Emma Kaleta!” Sandy
“Holy shit, Sandy
“Just in time to hear you bouncing around up here like a bunch of kids,” she said with a smile as she came over to do the customary patting of my belly and giving me a hug and kiss. “I see my boy just got himself a short-handed goal?”
“Yup, yup!” I said with a proud smile. “So whatchya doing here?”
“Figured I’d come over and check on you and see what kind of painting needed to be done…”
I threw my arms back around her and said, “Thank you so much. I want to get it done before Patty gets home at the end of the week…”
“Just so you know, it was like pulling teeth to get her to let us come over here!” Wagner called out from the nursery.
“I believe it!” Sandy
We were all still painting when the house phone rang. I placed the portable between my ear and shoulder so that I could still paint and answered, “Congratulation’s Patty on your game winner, baby!!! Second Star tonight!! You are awesome!”
“Whooot!” he yelled back into the phone at me, obviously still excited about the great game he played tonight. “Why can’t I do that shit when I’m home and you are in the stands?”
“I’m obviously bad luck…”
“That is not true.”
I just giggled as I pictured him furrowing his brow and tightening his already chiseled jaw as he scolded me. Patrick absolutely hated when I missed his home games and hated it even more when I would make remarks about being a bad luck charm if he played poorly or the team lost.
“Good job on keeping yourself outta the penalty box!” I exclaimed, changing the subject.
“I thought I might have to go after Avery at one point, but I didn’t let him goad me on too much…So what are you up to?”
“Painting the baby’s room.”
“By yourself?!” he grunted into the phone.
“Nope. Wagner, Patterson and mom are over helping me.”
“Seriously? You honestly have help?”
I put down my paint brush and hit the speaker phone button as I said, “Everyone say hello to Patty because he doesn’t believe that I’m letting people help me.”
“Hey Patrick!” Everyone said in unison.
“Holy shit. Hey guys. Thank you for putting up with my stubborn wife and helping with the nursery.”
Everyone just laughed as I took him off speaker phone. “I’m going to make you pay for the stubborn wife comment, Kaleta.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he said as I could hear him smiling through the phone. “Well, we are getting on the bus to head to Montreal Canada
“Alrighty. Patrick?”
“Yeah, Emmy?”
“I love you and I miss you already.”
“Mmm…I love and miss you too Baby Mama. Behave yourself and let people help you. I mean it, Emma.”
“Yes, Patty.”
“Love you bye.”
“Love you bye.”
April 26th, 2010
“Well that sucks ass,” I said as I climbed into the taxi with Emma as we left the TD Garden to head to the airport. We were officially out of the playoffs after taking it to 7 games. We finished first in our division and now we were the first out of the playoffs. Summer had officially arrived earlier than expected for a team that worked so hard this year. I felt even worse knowing that all of Buffalo
“I was so proud of you when you scored that goal tonight, babe. You guys tried your best against the pieces of shit,” she said as she placed a kiss on my cheek and squeezed me tightly. This wasn’t the first time Emma had been through the let down of the playoffs and most definitely wouldn’t be the last time. I knew secretly she was happy that the season was over so that we could finally be a family without the crazy hockey schedule. This year’s compressed schedule was complete hell and truthfully, I was ready to start my summer with my new family.
February 10th, 2010
“You know, Drew is right, it is pretty damn handy that you happened to get hurt right around the due date of our baby,” she said as I attempted to help her climb out of the bathtub, but not having a ton of luck because I couldn’t put any weight on my left foot without shooting pain.
Her belly was huge! Even though I’d never actually say that out loud. If I hadn’t seen the ultra sound, I wouldn’t believe that there was only one baby inside the belly of Emma’s.
Throughout the pregnancy, Emma was very much into exercising and keeping herself as trim as possible. From the back you couldn’t even tell she was pregnant, but when she turned you would be shocked to find the large stomach she was carrying around.
She refused to buy much maternity clothing unless it was for nice occasions, so around the house she took to wearing my hockey sweaters with gym shorts because she was constantly hot. I loved watching her walk around in my old jerseys and enjoyed figuring out if she actually had shorts underneath them on the days she wore the real short shorts.
She had stopped working a week before Christmas mainly because it was getting hard for her to climb up into the driver seat of the truck and she was very uncomfortable being on her feet for long periods of time. She was supposed to stop working by the New Year, so it wasn’t a huge deal, but I knew she was still somewhat disappointed about it.
It was nice having her home all the time and we enjoyed our time together by finishing up decorating odds and ends around the house and just spending more time together.
She was able to come to all the home games and even traveled to a couple of the away games that were in the northeast, including Pittsburgh , Long Island, Toronto
In the beginning of February, during a game with the Penguins, I suffered a bruised foot and now I’ve been hobbling around the house on crutches, which didn’t make it easy for me to help my very pregnant wife, plus I was chomping on the bit to get back on the ice, even though we were going into the Olympic break shortly.
I grabbed her fluffy robe off the door and wrapped it around her, gently squeezing her and pressing my lips to the soft skin of her neck.
I breathed her fresh soap scent in and exhaled, “Mmmm…baby you smell so good.”
“I don’t feel so good right now,” she chewed through her teeth.
“Something wrong?”
“I dunno, I just haven’t been able to get comfortable all day,” she said as she threw her wet hair up into a towel.
“Do you think we are getting close to meeting our little one?” I asked as I rubbed her belly that felt hard as a rock right now.
She took in a deep breath and pinched her eyes shut like she was willing pain to pass.
“Emma, are you having contractions?”
“Maybe…”
I looked over at the clock and noted the time 3:45pm and then helped her over to our bed, willing her to sit for a bit. She didn’t put up a fight and I climbed up next to her so that she could lean into me as I wrapped my arm around her.
“Just try closing your eyes and get some rest, babe,” I said quietly as I turned the NHL Network to see what was going on around the league. About 15 minutes later I felt her tense up again and once more 12 minutes later. “Emma, I’m calling the doctor.”
“No, I’m fine. My water didn’t break…”
“They said in that book you gave me to read that it won’t always break on its own.”
She took a deep breath and blew it out, “Fine,” she grumbled, handing me the cell phone with the doctor’s number already keyed up.
4th of July, 2010, 2018hrs.
“The city is rockin’ tonight!” Wagner commented as we sat on the flat roof of the firehouse, over looking the city and the fireworks they were setting off on the barges in the lake.
“And of course we have to be working…” I mumbled as I rocked back on my chair, taking another sip of my coke.
“See, that’s what I don’t understand. You don’t have to be working Emma. You could quit this job and be a stay at home mom. I know I would do that if my husband was a professional hockey player.”
A smile came across my face before answering because he was not the first one to make the same remarks. “I’ve loved this for so long that I can’t even think about giving it up. Sure, I’d love to be a stay at home mom for Maddie, but I can’t imagine not doing this. Especially since you guys are just as much family as Patrick’s family is to me. Besides, it’s not about the money. Hell over half my paycheck goes to the Fallen Firefighter’s Fund the rest is paying off the house so that we don’t have that debt hanging over our head if Patty would get traded or something. Further, you never know if, God forbid, he would become injured and never able to play again.”
Wagner left out a small chuckle of agreement. “You know Kaleta? You are one amazing woman.”
“Nah, just one stubborn woman,” I said with a smile and glance towards him.
Our thoughts were shattered when the pagers on our belts began vibrating and tone poured out of them.
“Ladder 21, Rescue 2, Engine 20, Heavy Collapse Unit, due to respond to 5621 Ohio St. for structure fire with possible building collapse.”
“Guess it’s our turn to join into the party,” I said with a snort as we ran down the stairwell to the first floor.
“Kaleta! You’re officer on the collapse truck!” Charlie called over to me. “Wagner, Patterson, you’re on the truck with her!”
I was jogging over to the truck as Wagner came up along beside me, grabbed my hand and kissed it like he often did when we knew we were going to be partners for a job. “It will be my pleasure, my lady.”
I rolled my eyes as he pulled the door open for me to climb in the front officer’s seat. I climbed up and buckled in as we pulled out onto the street with our lights reflecting off the neighboring buildings and the cue blaring to announce our presence. I picked up the radio to go responding with dispatch, not knowing quite yet that what we would encounter would change lives forever.
1 comment:
Oh Lord.. OK so I'm getting a little confused... Did she already give birth to her baby Maddie or does she just know the baby's sex? Either way I can't wait to see what happens to her! Great update!
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