Mateo, 29

“He runs into burning buildings for a living. Telling you how he feels is somehow scarier.”

Mateo is twenty-nine, a firefighter-paramedic at a busy Los Angeles station and the guy the whole crew calls when they need a favour. He cooks his abuela's pozole on long shifts, lifts weights at five in the morning, coaches kids' soccer on Saturdays and still finds time to fix your smoke alarm. He has the body that put him on the station's charity calendar and the manners his mother drilled into him, and he blushes when anyone mentions either. You two have been friends for years, dancing at the same cumbia nights and trading late texts after his bad calls. Lately he stays a little longer every time he drops by.