Chapter Text
She switches off her alarm and gets out of bed, only to fall onto the ground. Once she recovers from the fall, she turns onto her back and slams the back of her head against the floor and stays like this for a while. It has been almost three months and she still forgets. Is she ever going to get used to it? She hopes not.
Once she has taken her moment she pulls herself up and sits against her bed. Then she pulls herself in the wheelchair. She turns the wheels and goes to her closet, she takes some clothes and afterwards she goes to the bathroom. After a ‘quick’ bath she has breakfast
She makes her way to the Starbucks. She is still not used to the looks she gets. She curses on the trench she has to go over. She has to hold the doorpost with both hands to pull herself (and the wheelchair) inside. While she waits in line she notices it is a different barista than normal. “Great, this day could have started better” she mutters while trying to get a good position to be able to make her order. The counter is coming way too high for her to be able to face the barista. Her usual barista Kate isn’t in today. Kate knows about her, she knows how she wants her coffee and most important she doesn’t look at her with pity in her eye.
It is almost her turn and she is anxious about having the barista leaning over the counter to look at her, and looking at the wheelchair before asking if she can repeat her order. She is thinking about turning around and skip her coffee when the person in front of her turns around and asks what she’s going to drink.
I think I looked surprised before “…. an Americano, please” I say with gratitude. The girl makes her order and finishes with “and an Americano, please” While we are waiting for our order, I thank the girl. She doesn’t seem to do it out of pity. But for me it looks she just wanted to be friendly and for that I’m happy and thankful. We talk for a bit but once we got our coffees, I say thanks once again and we part ways. She goes right and I go left. I roll myself a couple streets further into my physiotherapist office.
I lie on my back on the treatment table. Mac, my physiotherapist, is moving my legs so the muscles won’t disappear. “So any news?” “No still no feeling or anything like that” I say and let my mind wonder a bit “Have you used that hand cycle yet?” “No, maybe tomorrow” After this Mac switches to another topic knowing he won’t get much more out of her.
…
After physiotherapy I go back home and install myself in the couch, I stay there for the rest of the day and watch a couple of movies.
The ball flies towards the goal and I’m ready to take it, the moment I have the ball in her hands a smile appears on my face. But it is not for long, a forward comes sliding in and slams me against the post. The moment I hit the ground after slamming into the post I know something is wrong. I stay down, still holding the ball.
I wake up, my clock shows 0248. “great” I say and push my head a bit further into my pillow. It is already bad enough I had to deal with this once, having to deal with this almost every night is just not fair. I fall back asleep a while later.
I want to get back up but I can’t feel my legs anymore and I certainly can’t move them. Christie comes sprinting towards me, knowing that I normally don’t stay down. When she comes closer I can see she sees the panic in my eyes. She slows down a bit and once she is close enough I manage to say, I can’t feel my legs.
0634, The alarm goes off. Still sleeping I step out of bed. Slamming to the ground I’m remembered to it once again. This time I slam my fist a couple times onto the ground, for once again forgetting. Once I sit back in my wheelchair I get myself to the closet and put some clots in my lap before rolling the wheelchair (and myself) into the bathroom, luckily I bought a house with shower and bath. Taking a shower would have been difficult now. I put my clots on a small table and I pull myself in bath once it is half filled. I look at my hand that already begins to swell. Great, no I will have even more trouble getting around.
I roll into the Starbucks shop at my usual time and am glad to see Kate again. “What happened to you?” Kate asks when she notices my swollen hand “I hit my hand when I fell” Kate looked up, she knew I wasn’t telling the whole truth but let it slip “So what is it for today an Americano?” At that moment someone entered the store, after I saw who it was I said “Yes and also a cappuccino” Kate looked curious but turned around to make the two coffees. I turned around and smiled at the girl. “Hi” “Hi, do you come here every day?” I smile but before I can answer Kate yells “She comes her at least ones a day, I’m sure if she could she would come more often.” “Speaking about that, where were you yesterday?” Hope asks Kate “Jake is back in town” Hope just laughs, and the girl looks confused. …
The girl stands there a bit awkwardly and smiles. Before they can say anything else Kate hands them their coffee. Kelley is surprised that she also received a cup. She looks curious at her own cup, she only had been here a couple times and she would be surprised if the barista had remembered her name. But all she could do after she read it was smile.
We walked, she walked and I rolled, outside “So Hope, busy day today?” I look surprised at her. She shows me her cup, The girl who can make Hope laugh. I smile and make a mental note to talk to Kate about it. “Yeah, a 10k run. I’m trying to break my record” that got a laugh out of her “And what about you …” “ow, Sorry. I’m Kelley” she said while sticking out her hand. But noticed I was holding my cup with one hand and was rolling the wheel forward with my other hand, so I didn’t really have a free hand to shake hers. “Do you want me to carry your cup?” I smiled “that would be nice, I haven’t quite figured it all out”
“So Kelley, what about your day?” “Euhm” I saw and recognized her look before she said “I play soccer, I have training later today” It looked like she was almost apologizing because she was playing soccer while I couldn’t play anymore.
“It’s alright. I won’t resent you for doing what you always have wanted to do. It is not because I can’t play anymore that no one else is allowed to play” I say but something inside me changes. God I would give everything to be able to play again. The feeling of flying to the air to make a safe or to feel her foot hit the ball …
Kelley sits down on a bench next to me. “Which team do you play for?” “The Seattle Reign, in the new NWSL league” Hope nods, she had heard about that league. They had asked her if she wanted to be part of it but that was obviously before all this happened. “I’m actually on the reserve team, I’m training on myself hoping one day I will be good enough to make the pro team.”
Kelley talks for a while before Hope has to get to physiotherapy and Kelley has to go to the gym.
Hope gets back home and comes across some articles written about her, that is really the last thing she could handle today. The thing, closest to Hope and small enough is flying to the room a couple seconds later. It hits the wall and the glass shatters before it falls onto the ground. It didn’t relieve all of the anger that was inside her but it did relieve a part of it. All she wants do is to stand up and go for a run to clear her mind but for now that was not possible, maybe she would never be able to do that again. Hope felt the anger boiling up again but this time nothing was thrown.
When Kelley gets at her small studio, she is overwhelmed, she still can’t believe she had come across Hope and talked to her, like really talked to her. Kelley watches a champion’s league game before she goes to bed.
Although she is free tomorrow, she has set her alarm on 0630. She falls asleep a couple minutes after. The next day Hope woke up and once again she fell out of her bed, but this time she remembered that she couldn’t walk before she hit the ground so maybe she was going into the right direction, at least that is what her doctor would say (if he knew about all this). She came into the shop a bit earlier and talked with Kate while she made Hope’s Americano this time a vanilla flavored one. Kate was almost finished making Hope’s coffee when Kelley stepped into the shop. Hope quickly ordered a coffee for Kelley.
“So how was your run yesterday? Your legs aren’t too tired today” Kelley asks when she sees me. Kate’s reaction is golden. All I could do is smile before answering “No, I’m used to it by now and I beat my record by 30 seconds. How was your day? You made the pro team yet?” I countered “I did” Kelley smiles before answering “But then I woke up”. This also gets a laugh out of Hope. Kate looks at the banter between the two in front of her and although she is confused she smiles.
They ‘walk’ back outside and this time Hope follows Kelley. “Where do you train?” “Depends on what I train. I have found a small park where I can practice on my shots, I run in a gym close to my studio, …” Hope interrupts her before she can continue “You run inside?” Hope asks with something like a disgust face. “Yeah, I haven’t really found a place outside where I can run yet. I used to run on the beach but obviously I can’t do that here.” Hope wanted to ask where Kelley lived before but she didn’t found that appropriate, she didn’t know Kelley that well after all. Hope thought about the trails she used to walk and remembered something. “Do you have time tomorrow to go run?” Kelley looked confused “You and me, on a run?” she asked surprised “Yeah” Hope says enthusiastically Kelley tempts to remind Hope she is paralyzed below the waist and therefor there is no way she is able to run but she chooses not to. Instead she says “Cool, when?” Hope doesn’t want to come across to many people so she says “0550?” Kelley looks at her “well I guess I will have to go to bed early today” “great, see you at the Starbucks at 0550?” “yes”
They say goodbye and part ways.