Chapter 28 Tanner
Tanner
With agony radiating from his shoulder in fiery pulses and a swell of despair threatening to cut him off at the knees, Tanner couldn’t immediately answer.
“Give me a minute,” he rasped eventually as the nerves screamed down his arm.
He was vaguely aware of Paige running from the bar, her friend hurrying behind. There was a babble of voices as everyone started to formulate a plan of action, but Drew pushed them all aside and took control.
“You probably know as much about dislocations as I do, so I don’t need to tell you the drill,” he said easily, grabbing Bel’s cardigan from her lap and using it to immobilize Tanner’s arm against his body in a few swift movements.
“And I’m not touching this here—I can’t afford a lawsuit from an NHL team. ”
“I’ll take him to the ER.” Avery’s voice was shaky but decisive.
“Your car, babe . . .” Bel butted in. “I gave you a ride to work.”
That registered through the tunnel of pain and muscle spasms, dragging Tanner out of his ruinous mental spiral. “What’s wrong with your car?” he ground out between gritted teeth.
Avery’s eyes swung back to him, rounded in disbelief and luminous in a face so pale that her freckles stood out in stark relief. “That gets your attention, when your damn shoulder is hanging loose?”
Tanner dug for a smile to reassure her but couldn’t find one. Fuck. Every time, he forgot how much this hurt for the first few minutes. He just needed the adrenaline to kick in and it would subside to something more manageable.
“It’s still attached, Stretch. Won’t fall off yet,” he muttered.
“Grab some ice, Ave,” Drew instructed. “It’ll help keep the swelling down.”
“If you’re OK with us taking your car, Sam and I will drive you,” Kash offered. “I’ve only had one beer.”
“Thanks, buddy—I appreciate it,” Tanner grunted, flexing his fist to dispel the buzzing numbness creeping down to his fingers.
Within minutes, Avery was back with a half-dozen handfuls of ice encased in a Rusty Barrel staff t-shirt, and Drew positioned the bundle gently against Tanner’s shoulder as she hovered anxiously beside them. “Keep that on there for as long as you can stand it.”
“It’ll be fine.” He tried to set Avery’s mind at ease, though the words sounded hollow to his own ears. She’d already taken a pummeling from Paige; Tanner didn’t want to add to her worries. “Shouldn’t take long to get it put back in place. This ain’t my first rodeo.”
The cocky humor he tried to inject into his voice fell flat and Avery didn’t crack so much as a smile as Tanner turned for the door, flanked by Sam and Kash.
Bracing his arm carefully against his chest, he supported the ice pack as best he could, while each footfall sparked a flare of pain through the abused joint.
No, it wasn’t his first rodeo. Nor second, nor third.
But would it be his last?
The next week was a whirl of x-rays, check-ups, and discussions. With the dislocation realigned by a simple reduction maneuver, Tanner had been in and out of the ER in a couple hours with some muscle relaxants to numb the pain and a sling to support his arm.
Coach Fisher didn’t bother to mince his words.
“If your shoulder pops in a bar fight with a girl, I think it’s time to schedule the surgery,” he said bluntly when Tanner rang to get him up to speed. “I don’t think there’s any choice since your hand’s been forced, if you’ll forgive the godawful pun.”
Tanner felt his heart plunge down to his sneakers and stay there. He’d suspected Fisher would say that, but it made it no easier to hear.
“Leave it with us. The team doc’ll get it sorted and come back to you with the details. Just rest up for now. Likely it’ll be a couple weeks before we can get you booked in,” Fisher said as he hung up.
Fuck, fuck, and double fuck.
What if he didn’t come back from the surgery stronger? What if he just wasn’t as good? What if this was the beginning of the end?
The possibilities rolled around and around Tanner’s head until he didn’t know which way was up.
He withdrew from everyone. Didn’t answer his mom’s calls, turned down Sam’s offer of company and Reid’s invitation to use his home as a bolthole while Tanner recuperated. And as for Avery—well, his feelings there were even more complicated.
Though everything in him rebelled at the idea of agreeing with Joseph Delgado, Tanner knew she deserved someone who could offer stability and prospects. Not a washed-up has-been who didn’t know how to do anything but skate.
“I’m so sorry that happened,” she’d said, the day after he had his shoulder reset, her eyes dark-rimmed with guilt, her hands gripping each other so tight that her knuckles were white. “I don’t know what the hell got into Paige.”
And then Avery had flushed and looked away because they both knew what had gotten into Paige. It was the result of her father leaving his characteristic brand of disruption in his wake, creating residual waves of devastation as he strode his own path.
“Not your fault,” Tanner had answered gruffly, shifting the strap on his sling to take the pressure off his neck. “It was an unfortunate accident, that’s all.”
And he’d turned away from her when she’d gone to say more.
Since then, Tanner had made a point of staying out of the kitchen as much as he could.
Especially during the times Avery often came in to grab a drink.
She took to bringing him groceries so there was always something easy for him to eat in the fridge, and left notes offering to run errands if he needed anything.
But he didn’t want to be just another responsibility on her list of people to look after.
He wanted to make her life easier, not harder.
And so Tanner took the mature approach of avoiding her. Just for now. To give himself a little breathing room.
He knew he was being a jerk, but it pressed every button he had to find himself poised on the edge of losing what he’d worked so hard for. Alone out of choice, and in pain through no fault of his own, he fought a constant battle with feeling sickeningly and scarily unworthy.