Chapter 27 #3
Outside the office window, Maeve’s small red car turned into the yard.
My thoughts scattered.
Appointment.
Cane.
Pain level.
Four hundred twelve thousand five hundred.
Reid’s hand touched my shoulder.
“Are you there?” Felicity asked.
“Yes.”
“Do you understand?”
“Not really.”
“That’s all right. We’ll review it in person.”
“My nurse just arrived.”
“We can finish tomorrow. I need Mr. Callahan briefly to confirm the appointment.”
I handed him the phone.
He covered the receiver.
“You all right?”
“Tired.”
“What did she say?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Noah.”
“Maeve’s here.”
His eyes narrowed, but he took the call.
Maeve came through the open office door carrying a canvas bag and a collapsible walking pole.
“I brought you something less elderly than the cane.”
I looked at the pole.
“It has cork on the handle.”
“That makes it athletic.”
“It makes it a cane with branding.”
She smiled.
Reid remained on the phone.
I stood slowly.
The morning’s effort had caught up with me all at once. My hip felt heavy. The headache had returned to a three. Words seemed wrapped in cotton.
Maeve noticed.
“You overdid it.”
“I diagnosed a charging fault.”
“Congratulations. You still overdid it.”
I pointed to Reid.
“His fault.”
“Of course.”
He looked at me over the phone, unimpressed.
Maeve followed me upstairs.
She checked my blood pressure, reflexes, shoulder mobility, balance, and the recovering strength in my right leg. She made me walk the length of the apartment using the pole.
I hated that it helped.
Afterward, I sat at the dining table drinking water while she entered notes into her tablet.
“Your mood was low this morning,” she said.
I looked at her.
“Reid told you?”
“He said you had a difficult start but improved.”
“He tells professionals everything.”
“He tells us what keeps you safe.”
I rubbed my thumb across the pole’s cork handle.
“I felt useless.”
Maeve did not rush to contradict me.
“What changed?”
“Work.”
“Only work?”
“Reid.”
I told her about opening the yard and finding the fault.
She listened.
“You recognized the mood and told him,” she said. “That matters.”
“I recognized it after sitting alone for half an hour.”
“Still counts.”
“Everyone says that.”
“Because you keep discounting progress unless it arrives perfectly.”
I looked toward the windows.
“Will this stop?”
“What?”
“Days when I wake and feel like the accident took the wrong parts.”
Maeve’s expression softened.
“I can’t promise they disappear. They should become less frequent and less powerful. You will also build better ways through them.”
“That sounds exhausting.”
“Recovery often is.”
I had saved another question for her.
It had occupied an embarrassing amount of space in my journal.
I looked toward the stairs.
Reid remained downstairs.
Maeve noticed the shift.
“What is it?”
“Medical question.”
“Most questions asked during my visits are.”
“It’s about sex.”
She kept her face neutral with professional skill.
“All right.”
“Dr. Whitcomb said intercourse is medically possible when I’m ready.”
“Yes.”
“But possible isn’t specific.”
“What would be useful?”
I felt heat rise into my face.
“My hip doesn’t open fully. My left shoulder can’t support much weight. My balance is bad when I’m tired.”
Maeve set down the tablet.
“You want positioning advice.”
“Yes.”
“Is penetration something you and Reid are considering now?”
“Not today.”
The answer came quickly.
“Soon.”
“All right.”
She asked questions about pain, mobility, comfort, previous experience, and whether I expected to be the receiving partner.
I stared at the tabletop.
“Yes.”
“Nothing embarrassing about that.”
“I know.”
Knowing did not cool my face.
Maeve explained that positions keeping my injured hip close to neutral would be safest. Side-lying. Supported on my back with pillows beneath the knees. Avoiding kneeling, deep flexion, or prolonged weight on the left arm. Stopping at any sharp pain or dizziness.
“Reid should not place his full weight on you,” she said.
“He never does.”
“Good.”
“And if I panic?”
“Then you stop. That is not a medical failure.”
“What if my body wants it and the rest of me doesn’t know?”
“You wait for the rest.”
I nodded.
She studied me.
“Have you discussed barriers and sexual-health screening?”
My thoughts stopped.
“Barriers.”
“Condoms.”
“Right.”
I had not thought about them.
Not once.
Every conversation about intimacy had focused on consent, fear, pain, and memory. I had never asked what Reid and I had used before the accident or what we should use now.
“You can ask him,” Maeve said.
“I know.”
“He will not think it is strange.”
“I know.”
“Then why do you look frightened?”
“Because every ordinary thing becomes evidence of how much I don’t remember.”
Her gaze softened.
“Then make it a present-day decision. Not a test about the past.”
That helped.
Not enough.
But enough to hold.
By the end of the appointment, I could barely keep my eye open.
Maeve settled me on the couch and placed the new walking pole against the wall.
“Use it.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Use it while thinking.”
She left.
I intended to wait for Reid.
Instead, sleep took me before I found the blanket.