16. Billie
Billie
T he moment I saw Gage struggling to move from the kitchen table to the living room, I knew exactly how badly he'd set himself back.
The careful way he was holding his left shoulder, the obvious swelling in his casted leg, the tightness around his eyes that spoke of pain levels he was trying to hide.
It was like watching him regress three weeks in the span of two days.
Booker's hand clasped my shoulder as he moved around me wordlessly to leave. Reece paused to give me a brief hug.
"Call me later," she said as she stepped back. "Delaney wants to escape the house for a girl's night that I think we might all desperately need."
I nodded wordlessly, my brain too busy cataloguing the man in front of me.
My professional assessment was immediate and clinical. Significant inflammation, reduced range of motion, probable tissue stress from overexertion. My personal reaction was a fierce surge of protectiveness that I had to swallow down before it showed on my face.
This was exactly why I couldn't be his therapist anymore.
"How bad is it?" I asked, setting my therapy bag down by the couch and pulling out my assessment tools. The routine of preparation helped ground me in professional mode, even as part of my mind was cataloguing every careful movement he made.
"Bad enough that Booker gave me the look."
"What look?"
"The one that says 'I told you so' without actually saying it.
It's always followed up by this eye squint that means he's considering kicking my ass.
" He settled onto the couch with obvious discomfort, extending his casted leg with care that suggested even small movements were painful.
"Scale of one to ten? Probably a seven."
I made notes on my tablet, fingers moving automatically through familiar documentation while my brain processed the implications. "And two days ago?"
"Two."
The jump from a two to a seven in forty-eight hours was significant.
This was the kind of setback that could add weeks to a recovery timeline.
I should have felt clinical concern for a patient who'd sabotaged his own progress.
Instead, I felt the overwhelming urge to ask if he'd taken anything for the pain, if he'd been icing the swelling, if he needed me to call Xander for stronger medication.
They were professional questions, but they very much had a personal motivation behind them.
Professional boundaries, I reminded myself. For what might be the last time.
"I'm going to do a full assessment," I said, pulling on gloves with hands that were steadier than I felt. "Range of motion, swelling evaluation, pain levels at different pressure points. It's going to be uncomfortable."
"I figured."
I started with his shoulder, fingers finding the familiar landmarks of muscle and bone, feeling for heat, swelling, resistance. His skin was warm under my touch. Warmer than it should be, indicating inflammation. I could feel the tension in muscles that had been relaxed and healing just days ago.
"Tell me when the pain increases," I murmured, guiding his arm through a series of movements that would have been routine a week ago and were now clearly difficult.
My hands moved with practiced efficiency, but I was hyperaware of every point of contact, every sharp intake of breath that indicated discomfort.
"There," he said when I reached about sixty percent of his previous range of motion. His voice was controlled, but I could see the strain around his eyes. "And there."
I made notes, moved to the next assessment, tried not to notice the way he was watching my face as I worked. Professional touch, I reminded myself. Clinical evaluation. Nothing more.
But when my fingers found a particularly tender spot and he sucked in a sharp breath, I had to fight the impulse to soothe the hurt with gentleness that had nothing to do with physical therapy.
The urge to apologize for causing pain, to comfort him, to let my touch linger in ways that were purely personal rather than clinical.
"The leg is going to be more complicated," I said, moving to examine the swelling around his cast. The inflammation was visible even through the plaster, the skin above and below tight and discolored. "I can see the inflammation from here. When did you first notice it?"
"Yesterday morning. It was manageable then."
"And now?"
"Now I feel like an idiot who's undone weeks of work because he couldn't handle his feelings like an adult."
The self-recrimination in his voice made something clench in my chest. This was the part I couldn't handle anymore.
The way his pain, both physical and emotional, felt like my pain.
The way I wanted to tell him that healing wasn't linear, that setbacks were normal, that caring enough to fall apart sometimes was better than feeling nothing at all.
Because he'd needed it. He so desperately needed to process some of that guilt and grief he'd been bottling up all these years.
What he'd done at the house, finally letting himself feel everything he'd been holding back for eleven years, was probably more important for his overall healing than maintaining perfect physical therapy progress.
I forced myself to focus on the clinical assessment, documenting the extent of swelling, testing sensation and circulation, checking for any signs of complications beyond simple inflammation.
But every measurement, every gentle probe, every careful evaluation was complicated by the way I wanted to take care of him rather than just treat him.
"Circulation is good," I said, more to fill the silence than because he'd asked. "No signs of compartment syndrome or nerve impingement. Just significant fluid retention and tissue irritation from overuse."
"How long will it take to get back to where I was?"
The question was asked quietly, and when I looked up at his face, I could see the fear underneath the resignation. Fear that he'd permanently damaged his progress, that he'd proven himself unreliable, that he'd disappointed me in ways that couldn't be repaired.
"With proper rest, ice, elevation, and anti-inflammatories? Probably a week to ten days to get the swelling down to where it was. Maybe another week to regain the range of motion you'd achieved."
Relief flickered across his face, followed immediately by something that looked like guilt. "I'm sorry. I know you've put a lot of work into helping me get this far, and I..."
"Gage." I set down my assessment tools and looked at him directly, abandoning any pretense of clinical distance. "I need to tell you something about your treatment plan."
He went still in a way that suggested he was bracing for bad news, his entire body tensing despite the pain it probably caused. "How much is this going to set me back?"
"That's not what I need to tell you." I took a breath, steadying myself for the conversation that would change everything between us. "I'm going to be transitioning your care to another therapist."
The words hit him like a physical blow. I watched the color drain from his face, watched his jaw tighten as he processed what I'd said. For a moment, he looked exactly like the seventeen-year-old boy who'd been convinced he was toxic to everyone he cared about.
"Because of this?" He gestured toward his leg, his shoulder, the obvious evidence of his regression. "Because I fucked up my recovery?"
"No. Because I can't be objective about your treatment anymore."
He stared at me for a long moment, and I could see him working through the implications of what I'd said. His eyes moved back and forth as he searched my face, hoping to find a meaning that even I was still trying to figure out myself. "What does that mean?"
I took a breath, choosing my words carefully.
"It means that when I evaluate your progress, I'm not thinking like a clinician should.
It means when you have setbacks like yesterday, my first response isn't professional assessment, it's personal concern that goes beyond appropriate therapeutic boundaries. "
"Billie..."
"It means I care about your recovery as more than just your physical therapist." I kept my voice steady, professional, even as my heart hammered against my ribs. "And that compromises my ability to provide you with objective care."
The silence stretched between us, loaded with things I couldn't let myself say. He was looking at me with confusion and something that might have been disappointment, like maybe he'd been hoping I meant something different entirely.
"This isn't about what happened at the house," I said quickly, needing him to understand this wasn't rejection.
"This isn't about your apology or the emotional conversation we had.
This is about me maintaining professional ethics and admitting that I crossed lines the moment I agreed to treat someone I have personal history with. "
"So you're passing me off to someone else."
The hurt in his voice made my chest ache, and I had to clench my hands to keep from reaching for him. Professional distance. That's what this was about. Creating the space we both needed.
"I'm transitioning your care to Laura Straits. She's got excellent credentials, specializes in trauma recovery, and she's available to start July fifteenth. That gives us two weeks for continuity meetings, treatment plan transfer, making sure there's no interruption in your progress."
He was quiet for so long I started to worry I'd miscalculated everything. That maybe he'd been counting on our therapy sessions for more than just physical recovery, and losing that connection felt like another abandonment.
"And after that?" he asked finally.
I took another careful breath. "After that, if you still want to try, we figure out how to be friends without the complication of a professional relationship."
His eyebrows drew together. "Friends."