Some Lucky Woman

by Carmen DeSousa

  But here I was, crying over my lack of freedom. Because of shoulder pain. Who knew a stupid rotator cuff injury could bring my world to a screeching halt? I’d certainly never imagined that possibility.

  I’d gotten used to playing racquetball every Wednesday. Dance class on Thursday nights. Martial arts three days a week, where I’d recently received my first-degree black belt, and had planned to go higher. And my favorite hobby, the kayak trips I’d taken at various locations around the globe. The last one in Lake Powell, Arizona had done me in, though. I’d been showing off by taking the lead position, and now I was paying for it.

  The deep rumbling sound of the decrepit muffler on my cousin’s car alerted me that she was pulling into my driveway. Since I couldn’t pick up J’Austen, I nudged her off my lap, then slowly inched my way off the recliner that had become my sleeping quarters, dining room, and home office.

  J’Austen hopped down easily and followed me to the door. I would swear she’d turned into a worried mother, as if she knew the pain I was in, wondering where I was going.

  “I can’t reach you, baby kitty. It’s too difficult to lean over.”

  She twined herself around my legs, purring loudly enough that I felt the vibrations through my legs. Maybe the soft tremors would travel through my body and work out the thickening of tissue in my shoulder, saving me the torture of physical therapy. I could only wish.

  “I have to go to physical therapy, but don’t worry, it’s not the mean lady I told you about. Dr. Bellows is sending me to a new therapist.”

  My kitty meowed, which I took as an okay to leave the house.

  My cousin ran up to the door as soon as I opened it, taking the keys from my hand. “Here. Let me lock that,” Angela said.

  “Thanks. I was wondering how I was going to lock the door one-handed.” I gingerly walked over to her car, thankful that she had even opened the passenger door for me. My entire body hurt and the familiar pain surged up my shoulder as I lowered myself into Angela’s old Ford Focus, which sat way too low to the ground. I missed my Toyota Tacoma, but I couldn’t very well drive one-handed, popping Percocets to dull the pain.

  Angela pulled the seatbelt over my lap and strapped me in. “One day after surgery and you have to go back to physical therapy? Aren’t you in pain, Jana?”

  I gazed up at her. “Yes. Unbelievable pain. I took two Percocets an hour ago, and they haven’t even taken the edge off. Dr. Bellows says the rotator cuff repair from the first surgery has healed beautifully, though. I’m sure he was proud to see his work after the fact. But now I have to start PT immediately to make sure it doesn’t freeze up again.”

  A hint of envy ran through me as I watched my cousin dart around the front of the car. I used to be able to move without wincing in pain.

  Angela hopped into the driver’s seat, pulled the shifter into reverse, and backed out of the driveway. “I still don’t understand. What did your doctor call it again? Why did you have to have a second surgery?”

  “Adhesive capsulitis. No one knows why some shoulder injuries respond that way, but mine apparently decided to work overtime. He had to shave off all the scar tissue, then physically manipulate my elbow and shoulder out of their frozen positions.”

  “And this new physical therapist is supposed to be an expert?”

  I shrugged my one good shoulder. “Supposedly. I can’t imagine what one physical therapist can do differently than another, but Dr. Bellows took it upon himself to call this new office directly, requesting that Dr. Adrian Kijek take over my physical therapy. Said it wasn’t the first PT’s fault or my own; it just happens sometimes. At least if this new therapist tortures me like that last woman, I can cry out, Yo, Adrian!”

  My cousin spurt out a breath, then covered her mouth, doing her best not to spew the sip of coffee she’d just taken. “You’re a nut. How can you joke like that? I hurt just looking at you. Those bruises look like someone beat you up.”

  I stared down at my tank top and yoga pants, the only thing I could manage to dress myself in. Shades of puke yellow, cell-block blue, and a color of purple resembling rotting prunes covered my arm from elbow to neck from where the surgeon had to physically move my arm from its frozen condition. If someone didn’t know me, they’d probably try to escort me to a women’s shelter.

  “It feels like someone beat me up,” I said. “And now I get a new physical terrorist to provide me with hours of physical torture. Pretty sure it’s not a coincidence that the initials are the same.”

  “Jana!” Angela shrieked. “Don’t you dare say that to the PT. I know how you like to make up little nicknames for people.”

  I waved her off. She was so sensitive, whereas I would say whatever was on my mind. If the therapist couldn’t take a joke … “I won’t,” I said to set my cousin’s mind at ease. “As I said, the PT has my body in her hands to torture me as she sees fit. I swear that last woman just stared at me when I cried out in pain. Then she mockingly held out a tissue, as though it were my fault my shoulder had seized up, as if I hadn’t been doing my homework.”

  “Have you?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Of course I have. What else can I do? Writing is my life. If I can’t use my right arm, what will I do?”

  The last hourly job I’d held was twenty years ago. As a cocktail waitress. My father had gotten me the job. He’d been a bouncer at night in the bar, which kept him in constant supply of women and booze, his two favorite things. In the daylight hours he’d made a backbreaking living as a construction worker. Even at nineteen I’d known that I hadn’t wanted to follow in my father’s footsteps, working grunt jobs my entire life. So I’d worked my butt off to get a business degree. Of course, my BA in business was now worthless to me, a woman nearing forty without on-the-job training.

  “Jana,” my cousin cut through my thoughts, “you zoned out again.”

  “Sorry, I was just reminiscing about my life. I’ve been doing that a lot lately, since I can’t do much else. What did you say?”

  “I asked if you tried that voice-to-text app I emailed you information about?”

  “OMG!” I ran my hand over my eyes, massaging my temples with my thumb and middle finger. “If one more person asks me that!”

  Angela snorted. “OMG? You sound like the teenaged girl who watches my kids.”

  “Yeah, well, my protagonists are usually between the ages of seventeen and twenty-seven, not much different from teenagers most of the time — except for the fact that they have sex — so maybe they’re rubbing off on me. The attitude part, obviously, not the sex.”

  Unlike my ex, I hadn’t had sex in five years. Him cheating on me was the last thing I’d ever expected. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t gotten sex at home. We’d made love as often as he’d wanted, as often as he was home. And he’d been good too. I missed sex. A lot. I’d kept myself so busy in the last five years I hadn’t had a chance to miss it, but now that I couldn’t do anything else, my non-existent sex life was starting to bug me.

  “Hmm …” Angela said through a giggle, “maybe your protagonists should start teaching you a few things.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  She shrugged. “It means that maybe you should act like a college student sometimes. You know, start dating again. Ever since you published your big hit, you’ve all but stopped trying to find someone to love again.”

  Dating and finding someone to love were two different things. I did want to find someone to love again, but all the men I’d dated in the last five years had seemed okay at first, but by the end of the evening, all they’d done was ramble on and on about how great they were. Probably trying to impress me, hoping I’d want to hop into bed with their greatness. I didn’t want to date anymore. If I met Mr. Right while I was having fun doing what I enjoyed, at least I had a good chance that we might like the same things.

  I’d spelled out my philosophy of dating in my book, by showing everything my character had gone through, how she finally realiz
ed how much more fun she had when she stopped worrying about the men around her. “Did you forget, Angela? You Don’t Need a Man.”

  Angela pursed her lips and shook her head. “Keep telling yourself that, cuz.”

  “Hey, I thought you liked the book?”

  “I did. I do like it. Everyone does, but I know the truth.”

  “Which is?” I nearly growled. I didn’t care for it much when my cousin, who was nearly ten years my junior, but the closest thing to a sister I had, started reading me the riot act. Just because she was married to Mr. Perfect and had two point three kids. Really. She was three months pregnant.

  The truth, she’d said. The truth was, even though I wanted to find a man to love someday, I was also scared of starting a relationship with a man. I couldn’t afford to waste another fifteen years of my life. I didn’t want to take the chance of ending up with another liar.

  If my ex had cheated on me with one of the secretaries at the dealership he managed, at least I could have believed that he’d fallen in love because of the hours they spent in close quarters.

  But no, he worked seventy to eighty hours a week, but had gone to a bar after work, drank too much, and then hooked up with some bimbo who’d gotten pregnant.

  “The truth is,” Angela continued, “you’ve done a lot with your life in the last five years. I’m so proud of you, but you’re turning forty, and I see the way you look when you’re over for dinner. How just like now, I have to wait while you work out in your head whatever you’re thinking. I know what you wrote in your book, but I know the real you. You’re lonely. And I just don’t want to see you end up alone …” she trailed off, and I knew what she was thinking.

  “Like Aunt Heidi …” I cocked my head as I finished her unspoken words. Aunt Heidi — the deceased sister of my father and Angela’s father — had shut herself out from the world, refusing to take any of our phone calls or answer the door when we tried to visit her. She’d been found by the police when a neighbor called because her two dogs wouldn’t stop barking for several days. Angela and I had been devastated, wondering if we’d done enough to reach her.

  Angela sniffed. She’d been even closer than I was to our aunt. “I know you’d never end up like Aunt Heidi. You’re not an alcoholic. But yeah, I don’t want J’Austen to be your only bed companion in life.”

  “Well, I don’t either, even though she’s a great companion. She doesn’t even hog the covers. But as I wrote in my book, I don’t need a man to complete me, so please stop worrying about my love life. I won’t stop it if it happens, but I’m not going to go looking for Mr. Right either. If it happens, it happens.”

  I’d already given up too many years to a man who couldn’t be faithful. My ex still loved me. He’d begged to come back, but I knew I’d never be able to look at him the same way again, never be able to trust him. I had loved being a wife and mother. I poured my life into my husband and son. But if I allowed Dick to stay after he’d disrespected me in the worst way …

  My father hadn’t taught me much in life, but the one thing he’d drilled home was that I was supposed to respect others, and that I should expect the same in return. And Dick hadn’t just cheated on me, he hadn’t used protection, making me susceptible to God-only-knows-what type of disease.

  Frustrated with this stupid conversation that only had me feeling more pitiful than I already felt today, I looked down at the map on my iPhone. “Turn left here, then take the first left into the business center complex.”

  Angela peered up and down the sidewalk in front of the therapy office as though she were looking for hazards. Typical mom reactions. Great. I’d never really had a mother, but now I had two. “You sure you want me just to drop you off?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “It’ll only take about a half an hour today, and I don’t want you to hear me cry. There’s a Target next door, so maybe you could do a little shopping.”

  “O … kay, I suppose. Need anything?”

  “Yes, please. A large bottle of Merlot,” I requested, then quickly added, “I promise I won’t drink it while I’m taking Percocets. A box of Keurig coffee packs — whatever’s on sale — vanilla creamer, whole-grain English muffins, a couple of frozen pizzas, and a bag of dark chocolates.”

  A tiny crease between Angela’s perfectly sculpted eyebrows screamed her disapproval. Already, her kids were on a strict meal plan, which didn’t include any of my staples. “Other than the wine, that’s what I got you last week. Is that all you eat?”

  “Of course! I’m an author, or haven’t you heard?”

  Chapter 15 – Physical Torture

  Using my left hand, I clumsily signed in for my appointment. Nine-thirty on the dot. I’d never been good about making it to appointments early, but at least I wasn’t usually late.

  As I sat in the tiny area, I stared through the glass partition as a man paced behind the receptionist. I watched as he flipped through papers in a manila file folder, obviously perturbed about something. He muttered something to the receptionist, which I couldn’t hear from my side of the barrier, and she shrugged in response. He tossed the folder in front of the woman, who seemed shocked by his actions, then disappeared back into the other part of the building.

  A few seconds later, the same man stuck just his dark blond head through the doorway and muttered, “Mrs. Embers?”

  Confused by his previous actions while in view of a patient and now his tone, I cocked my head, but answered politely anyway, “Yes. I’m Ms. Embers.” I couldn’t help but emphasize the Ms. It just seemed to pop out when I was speaking to the opposite sex. Whether it was an opening that I was single, or a full frontal assault against the male species, I wasn’t quite sure, since I seemed to do it no matter how young or old, or how average or good-looking the man was.

  “Follow me,” he grunted, the words barely audible, as if he had no desire to have me in his sights.

  Wow! Really? Wasn’t it normal to introduce yourself? Use the word please when you demanded something from someone you’d just met? Apparently a new patient didn’t warrant a, Hi! I’m so-and-so. How are you feeling today?

  Not only did the man fail to greet me in a professional manner, he scowled at me as I struggled to stand without jostling my arm. Clearly this guy hadn’t eaten his Wheaties for breakfast. Hadn’t Dr. Bellows personally called the office so that I would get the best possible care? Well, I’d be sure to let the new doctor know about her employee.

  After walking through the doorway, I let my eyes wander to the man’s name tag so I’d be able to give my new therapist a name to go along with my complaint.

  I grumbled inwardly. Just my luck. Adrian. Why had I thought Adrian would be a woman? Maybe because my last therapist had been a woman. Maybe because the only other person named Adrian I’d ever heard of had been the wife in the movie Rocky.

  And tough luck for all the doctor-seeking women in the world. Adrian may be a grouch, but now that I had a full view of him … I heaved a silent groan at how utterly cute he was. Actually, he wasn’t just cute, he was extremely good-looking. But since he was so much younger than I was — in his late twenties, I guessed — cute seemed like a safer appraisal.

  His blond hair was cropped and mussed, giving him a boyish, surfer look. And his build … Sigh! His physique was what I would expect of a man who’d dedicated his life to physical therapy. His shoulders were broad, but then tapered down to a slim waist. And apparently he was the prince of the new squat rave because his … My mind flitted to unsafe areas, so I quickly reeled it back in.

  As attractive as he was, his personality wasn’t the least bit cute. No doubt, Dr. Adrian Kijek would make some unlucky woman a terrible husband someday.

  I laughed internally at my thoughts as I followed him through the antiseptic-scented room stocked wall-to-wall with different types of torture devices. The large room looked identical to the therapy office where I’d been going for the last six weeks. Several patient/therapist combos occupied different machines: a four-step
stairway to nowhere, a weight machine with multi-colored bands tied to it, and several other pieces of exercise equipment I couldn’t identify.

  The irritable doctor led me into a small room at the rear of the medical building which held nothing but a narrow platform covered with paper that looked like an examination table in a doctor’s office, a desk with a computer on it, and an electronic muscle stimulator device that had been my only friend at the other therapy office. It was the one torture device I’d actually enjoyed.

  My new physical terrorist pointed to the padded table, then sat down behind the desk. He moved a clunky black mouse back and forth to rouse the old-fashioned computer with a large square box for a screen. “You have your script?” he asked without looking up.

  Instead of throwing the computer-printed page at him, I handed the rude man the piece of paper. Doctor or not, no one should treat people like that. If it weren’t for the fact that Dr. Bellows had said that Dr. Kijek was the best, I would have already left. Maybe the great Dr. Kijek got his reputation by being the meanest therapist. His patients were probably frightened into getting better.

  As he started to type, I considered storming out of the office. But I didn’t storm out of places impressively lately, so it probably wouldn’t affect him in the least if I inched my way out of the office and then sat down in the waiting room until Angela returned.

  Still not making eye contact, Dr. Kijek asked, “What is your current pain level?”

  As in pain in the ass? I wanted to spout off. Pretty High. I’d say it’s a ten. Again, I held my razor-sharp tongue as Angela had instructed. Maybe it was just my imagination. Maybe he wasn’t purposely being rude.

  I cleared my throat, then checked my attitude, making sure I kept my tone friendly. “The nerve block just started to wear off, and I’ve been on two Percocets every four hours, around the clock, so I’m about a five. But when I get close to the four-hour mark, it surges to about an eight.”