The Prettiest Girl in School

Flipping on the emergency lights and siren, Ben drove out of the station, stopping both lanes of traffic as he turned onto the road and accelerated towards the location they had been given.

As they drove further details of the incident came through and it was quickly apparent to them both that it was a bad one.

Two articulated lorries, a van and several cars had been involved in a multi-vehicle pile-up on the edge of town with numerous casualties being reported.

It was carnage when they arrived. Several police cars had closed the road while three fire engine crews were working on the crumpled, entangled mass of metal that had been motor vehicles a short time before.

Grabbing their bags Ben and Susie went to join the other paramedics treating the injured.

He flinched as they got closer, the cries of those trapped in cars, the blood on the ground and acrid smell of burning reminding him of the aftermath of the battles when he had been in the army, deployed in Afghanistan.

Stopping he struggled to catch his breath, his stomach tightening as his PTSD started to take over his body.

"Are you ok?" Susie looked at him with a concerned expression.

"What.... Oh err.... yeah, yeah I'm.... I'm ok."

"Over here."

A fireman called out interrupting them and summoning them over to a Ford SUV with the front partially crushed under a trailer.

Swallowing hard Ben forced his stress aside and started towards the wrecked car.

There was a family of 4 inside; the father trapped behind the steering wheel, one leg badly mangled while next to him his wife was unconscious and had what seemed to be a fairly serious head injury. In the back were two small children, strapped in their car seats, both crying but seeming to have escaped uninjured.

Quickly checking over the children they released them into the care of the police and then took their time extracting the mother from the wreck.

Fitting her with a neck brace they, with the help of a couple of firemen, carefully maneuvered her onto a spinal board so they could get her into an ambulance and on her way to hospital.

"What about the driver?" Ben asked watching the woman being carried away.

"It's a tricky one. We need to cut him out but the petrol tanks fractured and leaking so we'll have to deal with that first. The problem is he's losing a lot of blood...."

The senior fireman left his sentence unfinished and frowned at the two paramedics. It was obvious he didn't think the man was going to survive.

Ben didn't hesitate, "Ok, I'll get in the car and apply a tourniquet while you start cutting."

"You realise if we do that it could all go up in a second?"

He nodded grimly, "The sooner we get started the more chance he'll have then."

"Ben, what do you think you're doing?" Susie, his partner, looked at him in alarm.

"He'll die if we don't get him out of there very soon."

"But....."

"It'll be ok." He smiled at her trying to appear a lot more confident than he actually felt, "Just contact control and advise them we may need a helicopter."

Clicking on her radio Susie relayed the request adding, after a moment's thought, that the burns team should also be on standby.

Five minutes later Ben was laying across what was left of the passenger seat, the smell of petrol permeating through the wreck, as he did what he could to stem the drivers blood loss. Outside the cutting gear rained sparks, while the noise prevented anyone talking, and he tried not to think of what could happen if one set the gasoline off.

He had seen the results of numerous IED's and firebomb's while he was serving overseas and the thought of being burned alive filled him with an unimaginable dread. With that at the front of his mind his heart thudded frantically against his ribs and his stomach churned as he fought his fear and resisted the urge to get up and run.

Time seemed to stand still, the minutes ticking by interminably slowly as he lay there, the smell of the leaking fuel in his nostrils growing steadily stronger.

"Ben. You need to get out of there." Susie screamed over the sound of the grinder.

"He's nearly free, just a minute or two more."

"Please Ben.... get out. For God's sake."

He could hear the panic in his partners voice as she yelled at him.

A minute later the cutter went silent and the door was pulled away allowing eager hands to reach in for the driver.

"We've got him, get yourself out." A fireman told him.

Sliding backwards, wanting to get away as quick as he could, Ben suddenly found himself stuck inside the wreckage when his clothing caught on a jagged edge of metal. That was when he noticed the smell of burning.

"Fuck!"

He cursed under his breath, pulling harder against whatever had trapped him, the flames starting to grow rapidly as they worked their way back towards the petrol tank.

"Get out Ben.... for fucks sake..... the bloody things on fire."

Susie's voice reached his ears but he remained firmly stuck for another few seconds, wriggling desperately and starting to panic as the heat inside the vehicle increased.

Fortuitously he felt his clothing rip as he wrenched himself free and whatever was holding him released its grip.

Squirming urgently backwards his feet slid out through the door, the flames starting to lick around the rear of the car as he stood up.

"Ben!"

Susie's shriek filled his ears and, almost pitching himself bodily away from the wreckage, he started to run. He had barely managed to take a dozen steps when the flames behind him finally reached the petrol tank.

The explosion sent a ball of flame outwards, throwing him a good twenty feet forwards through the air, a searing wave of heat engulfing him as he cartwheeled over before slamming into the road.

Pushing himself up from the tarmac where he had landed Ben stood unsteadily looking blankly at Susie and the two firemen running towards him.

His left arm was hanging limply by his side as the blood from the gash on his forehead ran down into his eyes obscuring his vision but, utterly dazed, he barely registered the fact his back was on fire. Reaching him one of the firemen threw a safety blanket over him, putting out the flames from his burning jacket, as his partner grabbed him.

"Jesus Christ Ben, what the fuck do you think you were doing?"

"How.... How's the driver?" Swaying unsteadily on his feet Ben asked as what little vision he had started to blur even more.

"He's going to live thanks to you." Susie couldn't help but grin as she guided him towards a waiting ambulance, "Now we have to get you to hospital."

They had taken less than ten steps when he lost consciousness and collapsed.

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Wheeling herself into the call centre Ashley was immediately aware of the tense atmosphere that hung over the room. The subdued buzz of voices doing their job, the intensity with which people concentrated and the lack of friendly banter all led her to believe something wasn't quite right.

"What's up Trish?" She whispered to her friend as she pulled herself up to her desk.

Trisha Preston looked at her grim faced, "Multi-vehicle pile-up on the outskirts of town. It sounds pretty bad."

"Shit! Have we got anyone out there?"

"Three ambulances, several fire engines and plenty of police."

Picking up her headset Ashley quickly logged on and started to take the first call that came in.

"Control this is Blue one three."

Ashley instantly recognised the call sign from Ben's ambulance, "Go ahead Blue one three."

"Request additional vehicle. We have an unconscious female with a head injury requiring immediate transport."

"On its way." She confirmed and felt a shiver of apprehension knowing that Ben was there and wondering if he was in any danger.

While the accident took priority there were also the normal calls to deal with and she soon found herself immersed in work, although her worry about Ben remained lodged at the back of her mind.

She had just finished a call when Gwen Oakley appeared alongside her.

"How's it going out there?"

Glancing up Ashley could see the concern on her supervisor's face, "It sounds pretty bad. We have five units up there now."

"Our new boy Ben, is he with them?"

"Err yes... Blue one three is there."

"Good." Gwen muttered under her breath, "They can probably use his experience with something like this."

"What experience?" Ashley asked without thinking.

"I thought you two knew each other." Her boss looked at her with surprise, "His experiences in Afghanistan of course. When he was in the army."

"The army!" A look of stunned disbelief crossed Ashley's face and she felt her heart start to race at the thought of him being a soldier and the dangers he must have faced.

"Yes. Didn't you know he was an army medic." Gwen continued on blithely, "He told me he resigned because he lost to many friends over there."

She didn't answer as cold fingers of fear gripped her heart when she thought about what her boss had just told her.

He could have been badly hurt or even killed and she would never have known. The thought that she might never have set eyes on him again terrified her and made he even more determined to confess everything to him and hope he would forgive her.

"Blue one three to control."

The head set came to life and brought Ashley back to the present moment.

"Blue one three this is control, go ahead."

"Be advised we may require helicopter transfer. We have a badly injured male currently being extricated from a vehicle. Also have the burns team on standby."

"Understood Blue one three, control awaiting update on requirements."

Going to sign off Ashley realised that Susie hadn't closed her end and through her head set she could hear what was happening at the crash site.

She looked at Gwen who just shrugged, "Stay with it for the moment Ashley, and keep me updated on what happens."

"Ben. You need to get out of there."

A minute or so later she heard Susie's voice shouting out of the comms and her stomach clenched.

Listening carefully, she could feel the fear growing inside her, the sound of clattering and banging mixed in with shouts and curses echoed through her earpiece and had her trying to envisage the scene in her head.

"Get out Ben.... for fucks sake..... the bloody things on fire."

The piercing shriek that came next was followed within seconds by the sound of an explosion and together they made her blood run cold.

'Ben!'

Hearing his name being screamed filled her head and she felt the tears on her cheeks as she began to panic.

"Blue one three to control. Paramedic down and requiring immediate evac to hospital."

Unable to answer Ashley just looked around at the faces gazing at her, not resisting when Gwen Oakley took her headset off her and started to respond.

"Blue on three this is control. Helicopter dispatched eta ten oh two."

"Blue one three to control, Have burns team ready."

"Blue one three this is control, roger that."

Taking off the head set the control room supervisor looked at Ashley sympathetically.

"You best get yourself over to the hospital."

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Opening his eyes, Ben found himself lying face down in a bed, a tube down his throat and another in his arm while a machine next to him beeped at regular intervals.

"err.... er um I?"

He tried to swallow, wincing at the pain, and attempted to speak but all that came out from his mouth was a dry croaking sound that vaguely resembled words.

"Ben... oh God Ben.... you're awake. I was so worried."

Focusing he found himself looking into a pair of brown eyes that seemed very familiar to him.

"An...."

Jan Mitchell cried, tears running down her face as she took hold of his hand and held on to it.

"Don't speak.... Everything's going to be ok. I'll get the doctor."

"Jan.... What..." He went to say more but she was already half way out of the door.

Now he was alone he tried to piece together whatever he could remember; the driver being cut free, snagging his clothes and trying to get out and...."

There was nothing else, everything after that was a blank.

"Ben, I'm Doctor Ainsworth. How are you feeling?"

It was a good fifteen minutes later, after the doctor had checked him over, that he filled in the details of what had happened to him.

The accident had been two days previously and he had been kept sedated for the last 48 hours so they could more easily treat him.

His wrist had apparently been broken, along with two of his ribs when he hit the road which was why his left forearm had been put in a cast. The gash on his forehead had occurred at the same time and now had half-a-dozen stitches in it.

However, the worst of his injuries were on his back and neck. Although the fireman had smothered the flames quickly he had still been quite badly burnt and the doctor had advised that while he would recover he would eventually require skin grafts.

Finally, he informed him that he would be confined to bed for some time.

After answering a couple of questions, the doctor left and Ben closed his eyes, slowly starting to digest what he had been told.

'How bad were his burns?'

'Would he really be able to go back to work eventually, like the doctor had said?'

'No girl would even look at him now, especially Ashley.'

"Ben."

Turning his head, he found Jan had come back in.

"Jan." He croaked hoarsely, "Thanks for being here."

She gave him a rather weak smile, "I only got here yesterday evening. I wouldn't have even known if.... if Ashley hadn't called me."

"Ashley?"

"She was in the control room when... when it happened and came straight here." Jan informed him quietly, "She's been here ever since."

"Where is she now."

"Sitting outside. She knows you're awake but won't come in unless you want her to."

He thought about his former girlfriend for a moment.

'She should move on and find someone who wouldn't be scarred for the rest of their lives.'

"Please tell her to go, I don't want to see her."

"Why Ben? She's been here for two days just waiting to find out if you'll be ok."

Turning his face away from his friend he felt his heart break for the second time.

"Look at me Jan. I'm gonna be scarred for the rest of my life. Who's going to want me now?"

"You can be a real dick sometimes Ben McKendrick. Do you know that?"

"What do you mean?"

She shook her head, "Why do you think she broke up with you all those years ago."

He thought for a moment before realisation suddenly set in.

"You mean....?"

"Exactly. She thought you would come to your senses eventually and dump her for someone.... normal."

"Never. I love her.... I would never have done that.... I...."

The brunette waited patiently as her words sank in.

"Tell her.... tell her I'd like to see her."

Jan's smile broadened, "Sure."

A couple of minutes later his former girlfriend wheeled her chair into the room and, biting her lower lip nervously, stopped where he could see her.

"Ash... I...."

"Please Ben. Let me speak."

He took a breath, "Ok."

"I can't believe I nearly lost you and I hadn't had the chance to tell you that.... that I love you."

"But you said...."

"Let me finish, please." She took hold of his hand and smiled, "Back then I thought you would eventually come to your senses and leave me for a.... a normal girl, with legs."

"I know. Jan told me but I never would have, it was always you. I could never love anyone but the prettiest girl in school."

She kissed his hand, "I was thirteen then."

"You're still the prettiest girl in school." He grinned, wincing at the pain from his back.

Ashley couldn't keep her emotions in check any longer and broke down, the tears streaming down her cheeks.

"I'm so sorry Ben.... I should have talked to you. I thought....."

"Hey, it doesn't matter now, we're here and I love you."

"You do?" Her eyes were shining as she looked at him.

"Yeah I do."

"Do you know what you'd be letting yourself in for?"

"Do you? I'm going to be scarred for life even after skin grafts. Why would you want me when you could..."

"Now you know what made me break up with you Ben. I never wanted to but I couldn't stand the thought of losing you to someone else."

Ben grinned, "That was never going to happen."

"Well, it's not going to happen to you either. You're stuck with me." She squeezed his fingers gently.

"I guess life might not be quite as exciting after this."

She laughed and leant in to kiss him on the cheek, "Oh I don't know but if it isn't then that will suit me just fine as well."