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“Chicago Fire” recap (2.19): “Ringer”

Previously on Chicago Fire, Severide decided that he was going to save Bloom whether Bloom wanted to be saved or not. Dawson and Shay went away for the weekend and Dawson spent the whole time thinking about the fight she had with Casey. Boden broke up with Hot Donna because he had some bad relationships in the past and didn’t want to hurt her with his baggage. Jones’s father thought women should be barefoot, pregnant, or behind a desk and wouldn’t let up until she quit being a firefighter. Instead, she killed herself.

Boden is giving a speech to the firehouse before they start their shift. He says that they prepare for people to get hurt or die in the line of duty. It’s not easy when it happens but they know it’s a possibility when they sign up. He wants them all to check in, take care of each other, and be on the lookout for others struggling so no one slips through the cracks again.

Severide takes the message to heart and decides to go for a ride with Capp, Mills, and Tony to visit Bloom. While Mills remarks on how it’s the nicest rehab facility he’s ever visited, Capp tries to make Bloom feel loved by mooning him when he opens the door. Stay classy, Capp. But instead of Bloom opening the door, it’s a young woman who screams at the sight of Capp’s bare ass. When Severide asks at the desk, Bloom only lasted twelve hours into his month-long program. So, not exactly the college try.

Casey has found his way to a jewelry store and is staring at several rings. Shay walks in and he thanks her for coming. He knows he’s moving really fast but he figures what says “I love you and support your decision to be a firefighter” like getting engaged. I’m no expert but how about saying “I love you and I support your decision to be a firefighter” and acting like you actually do? Shay nods at him like he’s a crazy person whose first fiancee died less than a year ago but agrees to look at rings anyway. She picks one right away and it’s the same one Casey chose. Before he can buy it the lady needs Dawson’s ring size. Casey doesn’t know. Shay blurts out, “Six and a half!” and then says, “I mean, I can find out because I am certainly not intimately familiar with Dawson’s fingers. Nope, not at all.”

Back at 51, Cruz wants Otis to pay his half of the cable bill. Otis balks at paying for Cruz’s football package (not a euphemism). Mouch wants to know where Clarke is and Casey says that Shay’s other lesbro has transferred. What? No good-bye, no going away party? Clarke, we’re going to miss you snarling around, getting accused of murder/arson/mayhem. Herrmann is pissed. A cop walks in and tells Dawson he has a note for her from Jones. Casey stands over her when she opens it like a regular Rufus Scrimgeour. The snitch doesn’t open when Dawson touches it. She reads the note and hurries out of the room.

The gang gets called out to a fire. On the drive Shay asks Dawson if she’s all right and she says, “No, of course not.” She can’t understand how Jones could get to the point of just giving up. Shay asks if there are any answers in the note she left and Dawson shakes her head. They stop talking when they see the fire engulfing a gas station. They can’t pull a woman out of a burning car. While they work to put the fire out her husband runs back in and drives the car away from the pump. Casey pulls the wife out while Herrmann nearly rips the husband’s head off for being an idiot. Back on the truck Herrmann tells everyone that Jones came by Molly’s looking for Dawson before she went home and killed herself.

In the garage, Severide tells the squad guys that he knows how to help Bloom but they need to fill a boot with money. Capp offers six nickels and a couple of quarters. Severide tells them what happened with Bloom back in Denver. He had to tell his firefighters not to go into the burning warehouse to rescue the firefighters that died. He hurt himself wrestling a few of the guys to the ground to keep them from going in and dying too. The men spit on him afterward. That’s a lot to carry around, Severide says.

Shay pulls Severide aside and says Bloom is going to keep letting him down. Severide made it clear that he wasn’t someone Jones could talk to, he thought she needed a boot in the ass, not a shoulder to cry on. He was wrong and he doesn’t want to be wrong about Bloom too. Shay hands him a wad of cash. Real friends help you buy lances when you get the urge to tilt at windmills.

Inside, Mills is trying to convince Cruz, Otis, and Herrmann to contribute but they are balking. Otis makes a crack about having to subsidize Cruz’s television habit. These two are a lesson ins why U-Hauling is a bad idea. Casey drafts Otis to clean out Jones’ locker. Otis, who still thinks girls have cooties, asks Shay to do it. She stomps out of the room and Mills lets the guys have it for being disrespectful to Jones.

In the locker room Dawson is reading a notebook Jones left behind looking for answers for why someone like Jones would kill herself. Shay finds a ring in the locker and tries to slip it on Dawson’s finger but Dawson freaks out. It’s not a horcrux, Dawson. Shay tells Dawson that no good will come of her trying to figure out what was going through Jones’ mind. Shay tried that when Darryl killed himself and nearly got lost in the process.

Casey and Boden are having a heart to heart. Casey is doing okay with Jones’ death, mostly because he has Dawson to lean on. He asks if the Chief has talked to Donna. Boden doesn’t want to talk about himself and he’s rescued by the appearance of the chaplain. Casey leaves Boden to spit anger at the chaplain for “botching” things with Mills’ father. We need Alice Pieszecki to make a chart to keep track of all the history between characters on this show.

In the common room, Casey tells the guys that someone has to take Jones’ stuff over to her father. They act like it’s radioactive waste, not a box full of shampoo and spiral bound notebooks. Mills pulls out the cookbook he gave her and explains to the chaplain that he tried to help her out. The ring falls out of the book and the chaplain says it’s a bowling ring. Jones bowled a perfect game. Mills suggests that they go to the bowl-o-rama after shift to honor Jones and the guys act as though he suggested they all get prostate exams. Mills takes the guys to task for not letting Jones in. Herrmann is pissed but before the two of them can really get going, it’s time for another field trip with Severide.

This time the Magic School Bus is taking them to Bloom’s airstream. Severide pops out and heads inside where he finds a tea kettle on the stove but no sign of Bloom. They honk the horn when Bloom makes a break for it. Severide can’t be bothered to run after an semi-broken down, older guy with a bad back so he just steals Bloom’s wallet and leaves a note.

Dawson walks into Boden’s office. He wants to know if she ready to take the firefighter’s test in a week but mostly he wants to know if she’s okay. She’s says she’s mad but fine. He offers an ear anytime she wants to talk and then asks where she wants to go once she passes the firefighter’s test. In a totally respectful to the recently deceased kind of way, she assumed she could have Jones’ spot. Boden tells her that she can’t serve under Casey and will have to find a new house. Maybe they could just break up? I’m sure Shay would happily serve under you, Dawson at work and at home.

After she leaves Boden’s office she looks out into the garage at Truck 81. She pulls out Jones’ note and then Casey appears. He asks how she’s doing and she bites his head off before apologizing. He got them a reservation as RPM, which I am assuming is a nice restaurant and not some kind of NASCAR related event. She says “we’ll raise a glass to Jones.” That’s not exactly what he had in mind but you can combine a proposal with a tribute to a dead friend, right?

Shay and Dawson get called out to s sick girl who looks like an extra from a zombie movie. The father is freaking out and blaming the girl for having a sleepover. Dawson snaps that maybe being supportive instead of a douche would be a good choice. Dawson figures out what’s wrong with the girl (allergic reaction antibiotics) because she’s wicked smart and wanted to be a doctor for a hot second.

The chaplain asks the guys to describe Jones. Cruz comes up with “tall.” He’s a walking Roget’s Thesaurus. Mills says they were friends and Herrmann stews about how Mills better apologize before he storms out of the room. He runs into Clarke. Clarke! You’re a sight for sore eyes, we missed you buddy. Herrmann is not as pleased. Clarke had to transfer because he made lieutenant. He never told Herrmann because he didn’t want to ruin their bromance. Herrmann tries to hug Clarke but he doesn’t like people touching him (people other than Mills, obviously).

Shay is excited to see Clarke when she and Dawson walk into the common room. He says he’s working with Jones’ older brother. Dawson cracks that she hopes he doesn’t let his dad off the hook too easily. Casey tries to stop Dawson but she’s just getting started. Clarke says that he learned that Jones had depression her whole life and attempted suicide when she was 16. Dawson seems to crack a bit but still simmers with anger at the thought that Jones’ family knew she was depressed and still pushed her to the brink. She leaves with a warning that she will go off if she sees Jones’ father.

Boden walks into Donna’s classroom and tries to apologize to her. He says he was scared of her pretty face and her warm, um, smile. He is fearless on the job but girls still scare him. She has a meeting and can’t talk now, but maybe when his shift is over. Boden leaves with the hint of a smile on his face.

Back at 51, Shay sees a sleeping Dawson and is ready to pounce. She tears a bit of paper off of Mouch’s crossword and measures Dawson’s finger as she sleeps. This was a super heavy episode but our girl Shay is always around to lighten things up. She hands the paper to Casey and sings a few bars of “Single Ladies.” Best wingwoman, ever.

The chaplain is doing some intense couples counseling with Otis and Cruz when Boden walks in. He sends the odd couple packing so he can talk to the chaplain about how he dropped the ball with Mills’ dad. If the chaplain had done his job maybe Mills’ dad wouldn’t have died in the fire. The chaplain fires back that Jones’ death seems to be stirring up Boden’s guilt over Henry Mills’ death.

Boden stomps down the hallway past Dawson. She spies the box of Jones’ stuff and decides to take it over the Papa Jones. When she gets there, the Great and Powerful Oz just looks like a tiny, old man sitting behind a desk. She offers condolences and says Jones would have been a hell of a firefighter. He wells up and says he didn’t think she could handle the stress of the job and he just wanted to protect her. Dawson gets called out to an accident and leaves Jones’ father alone.

The accident is a car and a bus full of prom-going teens. The driver seems okay but Paige has gone missing (maybe just Out of Town?). Turns out Paige got ejected from the bus. Early ejection is a typical prom night problem (or so I’ve heard). Boden tells the cop to block the road but he won’t so Boden orders the truck to block it and the cop arrests Boden. Dude, that was a terrible idea. While Boden gets shoved in the back of a squad car, Herrmann finds Paige on the roadside. The cop, who appears to have borrowed a mountie hat for the evening, lets Boden out. You just don’t mess with Boden.

Back at 51 Mills and Herrmann finally go at each other over Jones’ death. Herrmann wants an apology and Mills wants Herrmann to admit that maybe he was a jerk to Jones. Herrmann loses it and says he was the last one to talk to Jones and he’s been going over everything he said, wondering if he could have said something else to make her change her mind. Boden says “I gave you the win one for the Gipper speech and this is what you do?”

Capp comes out to say that Bloom is hanging out in the common room. Bloom is combative and when the chaplain walks in with two guys Bloom gets up and screams at Severide. But it turns out these are two of the guys who were at the warehouse fire. They apologize to Bloom and say they didn’t understand that he was trying to save their lives. If Severide could have raised more money everyone would have come to say they were sorry to Bloom (next time try selling Girl Scout Cookies, Kelly).

Boden heads to his office and apologizes to the chaplain. He was trying to protect his house because they are all he has. Dawson is sitting on a couch when Casey shows up. She tells him she’s scared of the future and he assures her that they are going to face whatever comes at them together (or at least until he gets knocked on the his eggshell skull).

Donna shows up and tells Boden she’s pregnant with his baby. That is going to be one gorgeous baby with a very low voice. Mills is bowling when Herrmann shows up with his own ball and a couple of beers so they can celebrate Jones. Dawson opens her locker at 51 and pulls out Jones’ letter. She sticks it on the door and we can read that it says: “Don’t let anything stand in your way.”

All right. we have two weeks before the two part Chicago Fire/Chicago P.D. two night crossover extravaganza. I’ll see you then.

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