Amen to that. She looked down at me, her expression curious. I nodded hello.
“Hey, Rita,” Cassie said, putting on a big smile. “This is Luke, my new husband I was telling you about.”
The stairs swallowed all of my concentration. At least ten minutes later, we were still only halfway up, and I was soaked with sweat from the effort. My wheelchair was folded at the bottom of the steps, my bag on top of it, guarded by a yipping mutant of a dog.
“One, two, three,” they counted, panting, and I pushed as hard as I could with my good leg, their bodies propelling me upward and forward, landing on the next step with less than a millimeter to spare. My bum leg trailed uselessly behind me, pins flaring with every movement.
Six more steps to go.
“This is a bad idea,” I said for the fifth time. “We should just call the hospital. I should go back.”
In the physiotherapy room mirror I’d watch myself hauling the limb in its droidlike, knee-immobilizing brace with the swing of my hips, or even my hands, like a cord of wood, an object that didn’t even belong to me. Sometimes I could put weight on it, but tonight I could give it about twenty pounds of pressure before the pain would stab me enough to almost knock me out. Less than 25 percent of body weight, that’s for sure.
Cassie and the nurse were right, and I hated them for it. I couldn’t do this alone.
“We can do it,” Cassie said, beads of sweat dripping down her red face.
“I’m game,” Rita said, her breath thin. “This is the closest I’ve been in twenty years to a sweaty man under fifty years old.”
Every step was harder than the last. By the end, I could see tears mixing with Cassie’s sweat. I’d landed my full weight on her toes more than once.
I sat at the top of the stairs as Cassie and Rita went to fetch the wheelchair.
My leg was trembling, my stomach heavy, my face burning with shame. They shouldn’t have to do this. I shouldn’t have to do this. And if this was a sign of what was to come, then I would either be stuck at Cassie’s place, completely frozen, or the equivalent of a two-hundred-pound toddler who’d throw a tantrum every time he had to get out of his stroller.
They held the chair steady as I dragged my lower half up to the seat, grabbing on to any available hold like some desperate, feral creature, slithering into a sitting position.
“Bye now,” Rita said, holding an ice cube to her forehead. “Thank you for your service.”
I could barely respond. The appearance of my creamy, sticklike shin peeking out of the bottom of the brace made me want to vomit.
“We did it!” Cassie said. “You want a glass of water or anything?”
My mouth was dry, but hell if I wanted her to serve me. “No, thank you.”
“Chin up, dude,” she said. “I wrote out my schedule for you so we can come up with a system.”
While Cassie was in the kitchen, I wheeled to where she had put my bag on the floor, reaching with hungry fingers for the straps, hoisting it onto my lap.
On the sky-blue futon, which I assumed would be my bed for the foreseeable future, she had set a folded blanket and a pillow, and on top of that, a handwritten piece of paper reading Cassie’s Schedule.
I could make out the phrases in her slanted hand: Nine AM wake up and play for two hours, sorry, I’ll be playing the same songs over and over. Doctor’s appt on the 9th. Band practice every Tuesday and Thursday.
I took a pill and closed my eyes. I hoped by the time she left the apartment, I’d be knocked out.
Cassie
“So it’s basically like having a roommate,” I was telling Toby.
Cross-legged on the floor, I aimed the lance at the pad of my thumb and waited for the stick. I’d told Luke to text me if he woke up and needed something, and came here to take a shower, and to remind myself of why I spent the entire day carrying Luke’s sweaty body around my apartment. When Toby asked me what I had been doing all day, I couldn’t bear lying to him. The Loyal. I did this for The Loyal, and now not only was he my actual partner, he was the only member of the band who didn’t know.
By now I had become good at telling the story. I would almost forget why I was telling it. It had become banal. Casual. A story about health-care premiums and city hall. But of course that wasn’t true. I would have to leave his apartment and at some point I would put my arms around another man, if only for show.
He was walking in a circle around his living room, running his fingers through his long brown hair, Lorraine following him like a shadow. He threw up his hands. “Yeah, like a sexy soldier roommate who’s also your, like, legal partner!”