101. Past Tense
PAST TENSE
LAYTON
“You were incredibly lucky, Mr. Ranger.”
“Lucky? You call this lucky?” What a twat. He may be a world-renowned surgeon, but he’s a twat nonetheless. “We have very different definitions of lucky.”
“Layton,” Pop growls from my left.
The doctor begins again, “You’re alive. That’s lucky. You aren’t paralyzed. Also lucky. For what could have happened, you’re in miraculous shape.”
Alive. Not paralyzed.
When did anyone come to think of those two base-level things as a win?
When will I? Never. That’s when.
“What’s next?” I try to keep the disgust out of my voice.
He drones on and on.
Pop nods at the right times and talks with the man. I’m not listening worth a fuck, even if my life depends on it.
And fuck if it doesn’t, I can’t make myself reengage with the conversation in the room. This is a one-sided conversation between my surgeon and the shell of my former self.
Washed up.
A fucking has-been.
First round draft pick.
Medically retired at twenty-nine with a career-ending injury.
Career-ending,
Pee wee football.
Prep league.
JV.
Varsity.
College.
NFL.
I’ve played football—or been training for it—for as long as I can remember. My brothers did 4-H and FFA. I ran drills and lifted. They roped and rodeoed. I hired a sprinting coach and a nutritionist. They cowboyed up. I did two-a-days and football camps.
I played during the season and trained in the off-season.
We all have our things, but mine has always been football.
Always.
What the fuck do I do now? Because I can’t become the high school star who bitches at his TV as if he could do it better. Armchair quarterbacks are good at running their mouths. Not at running plays.
I run plays.
Or rather…
…I ran them. Past tense.
I come back into the room just as the doctor extends a hand. I don’t know what he’s said, but the look of pity and the resigned expression on his face piss me the fuck off.
I take his hand and squeeze before letting him exit. I say let, but that’s woefully inaccurate. I have zero power in this situation. I’m helpless.
Absolutely.
Fucking.
Helpless.
Pins and needles shoot through parts of my legs. If the feeling of dead limbs waking up weren’t enough, the ice pick slicing through my lower back would take me to my knees.
I know pain. I know the burn of the bench press, the pinch of lungs trying to keep up with sprints on top of sprints.
I know bruises, lacerations, surgically reconnected tendons.
I know shoulders that weren’t supposed to bend that way.
I know tackles that caused stingers and blindsides that knocked me unconscious.
I’m intimately acquainted with concussion protocols.
I know ice baths that steal the air from my lungs and made me wish I’d picked a day job.
Except I never wished for a day job.
I’ve only ever had one love.
One dream.
Football.
I don’t once think of how lucky I am.
I don’t once think at least I can walk.
I click the button on my IV and let the morphine pump through my veins. I feel its tendrils snake through me, warm and clawing, sucking me back into sweet oblivion.
I may be a selfish prick. I’m good with that. But I’m a selfish prick who was rookie of the year my first year in the League, and now I need assistance to get to the fucking bathroom, all the while fighting the blinding pain of a career-ending injury.
Career-ending.
Career…
…fucking…
…ending.