Fire Country Season 1 Episode 12: Two Pink Lines

The fire camp goes into the woods to learn how to cut down a tree, and they are not there long when they notice a skywriter spelling out a marriage proposal. Just after the plane writes the lucky person's name, something goes wrong: the engine kicks out, the plane crashes, and the pilot ditches it before impact, landing in a tree. A doctor is sent up the tree to assess the pilot while Bode and Freddy are tasked with going to look for the plane. They find it on fire, and the fire is spreading in several directions, so Manny calls in the rest of the fire department.

Vince and his crew are called, and Sharon shows up as well. She stops by the inmates because she has a message for Freddy: Freddy is a new dad. His girlfriend had been visiting Edgewater to see him on Visit Day, but she went into labor early and delivered a healthy baby girl. Sharon cannot wait to break the news, so she drives out to his location and hands him her phone so he can talk directly to his girlfriend. It is a sweet moment that reminds Sharon of when she had Bode — and Bode ruins the trip down memory lane by telling his mom that he matched.

Sharon needs a kidney transplant. Bode got tested and he is a match; he is her only living child and he wants to help her more than anything. But Sharon turns him down. She does not want her son to have risky surgery — she is the parent, she has to protect him, and she feels she is doing so by telling Bode he cannot go through with the surgery. Sharon later tells her husband of her decision, and Vince does not take it well: he does not want to lose his wife, he wants her to have the surgery, and Bode is the best chance at that. As for Bode himself, he wants to donate a kidney to save his mom.

Sharon may try to talk him out of it, but Bode will not change his mind. Bode also will not pursue Gabriela.

They are side by side to cut off a fire, with Freddy there too, and Freddy uses his good mood to scheme a way to get Bode and Gabriella talking again — and it works. It is working when they run into the troublesome Harlan Denbo, who is in the evacuation area and refusing to leave. He says he can protect his house and gets snappy with the firefighters.

Freddy takes one look at the man and it makes him realize he should be spending time with his daughter, not with Harlan; Freddy tries to run away and Bode stops him, telling him that going back to jail would not help their families and that they have to stick to the program so they can be released soon. Only Bode breaks the rules later: he and Freddy return to fight the fire, and they try to deal with Harlan.

Harlan is not an easy man and cannot let go of his house; his wife is sick and dying, and the smoke is probably doing more damage to her lungs. So Harlan eventually agrees to relocate, but he tells Vince that his whole life is tied to that house and that he has no insurance — he had to let it lapse to afford his wife's medications. He asks Vince to look after his house, and not long after he left the area he watches the fire come closer and his own house catch fire. Harlan wants to run back inside to get his credit cards and Vince tells him to let them go.

When everyone is leaving the fire, they notice both Harlan and Bode are missing.

Bode saw Harlan sneak away and followed him into the house, where the stairs to the second floor collapsed after Harlan walked on them, trapping him. Bode tries to get him to jump to the first level, but Harlan refuses: he does not want to move in with his daughter and be a burden to her, and he says he is going to die in the house. Bode has no choice but to leave him, and he starts feeling guilty right away. He is still feeling that way when Harlan surprises everyone by making it out of the house.

Later, it is arranged for Freddy to go to the hospital, where he gets to meet his daughter, and Freddy also arranges some private time between Bode and Gabriela. Gabriela reminds Bode that he will be free in a year, and she kisses him before pulling away with words like “we can't” — and then they end up kissing again. They know they should not do this to Jake. And someone starts to intentionally set things aflame.

The plane-crash fire is fought by the combined inmate and civilian crews, and the episode's immediate crises resolve: Harlan Denbo survives the collapse of his stairs and makes it out of his house, and Freddy is taken to the hospital to meet his newborn daughter.

Several threads are left open. Sharon has refused Bode's kidney donation and Vince disagrees with her decision, so the transplant question is unresolved. Bode and Gabriela kiss, knowing they should not do this to Jake, leaving that triangle open. Most significantly, the episode ends with the suggestion that someone is intentionally setting fires — an arson thread that is not resolved within this episode.