Return to You (Letters to Nowhere #3)(9)

He grins at her, not responding, then turns his attention to me. “So, yeah… are you like, okay?”

I laugh, but there’s not much humor in it. “Sure, TJ, I’m fine.”

“Hold up,” he says, holding on to my upper arm. “I didn’t know.”

About my parents. That’s what he can’t say. My gaze drops to my feet. “Not many people here know.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Seriously, drop it,” I say, lowering my voice. “I was tired and I shouldn’t have done that last routine.”

TJ folds his arms across his chest and leans back against the wall, studying me. “Maybe you were tired, but it didn’t show. You kicked ass on that routine.”

“A compliment from TJ,” Stevie says, rolling her eyes. “That’ll get you far.”

He shoots a glare at Stevie. “Tell her then. Tell her that her routine wasn’t f*cking awesome, if I’m wrong?”

Stevie shrugs. “You’re playing the ‘what if’ game. Karen and I know better than to fall back on that. Everybody we compete against is good. Maybe even phenomenal. We’re always one good bar dismount away from gold and so are they. Karen doesn’t need me to give her the ‘you could have been great’ speech.”

TJ’s mouth falls open, but Stevie walks off before he can reply.

“I’d better go,” I mutter. “I’m already in trouble.”

“You’re scared,” he says before I can escape.

Anger flares up in me. I don’t need someone like him to state the obvious. “Really? Thanks for pointing that out. Don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“Grow a pair and march over there and do it before it gets any worse,” he says, ignoring my obvious desire for him to butt out.

I look away from him, focusing on the balance beams. “I will.”

“When?”

“Soon, if it will get you to shut up.”

He gives me a nod of approval and heads back to the bleachers. I close my eyes again, fighting off flashes of my head hitting the high bar.

Just do it, Karen. Grow a pair, like TJ said.





chapter five

~jordan~





“Have you looked at your throat?”

I shake my head, unable to provide a verbal response while the camp’s doctor has a stick pressed against my tongue.

He removes the wooden stick and steps back, clicking off his flashlight. “Not only is your rapid stress test positive, but you’ve got a ton of swelling and pus going on back there. You’re tonsils are huge.”

I swallow, biting back the pain and nausea that just hit me after creating a mental image of pus in my throat. “So it’s bacterial?”

“The strep and the tonsillitis both.” His eyebrows shoot up. “I’ll have to start you on some antibiotics, but with three recent rounds cleaning out your system, you’re at risk for all kinds of other infections, like C-diff.”

I’m dizzy now and sweating from the nausea, but I’d rather not look like a wimp by lying back on the exam table.

“I hate to break this to you, but you need to get those tonsils out and soon. Very soon.”

Cold sweat trickles down the back of my neck as I absorb those words. No freakin’ way. Not a chance in hell I’m going under the knife for a sore throat. Maybe not for anything.

He’s got his back to me now, looking up something on his laptop. I can’t stay upright any longer, so I take advantage of the opportunity to lie back without him watching me carefully. I feel a little better the second my cheek hits the cold polyester exam table.

“Aren’t tonsillectomies like a thing for little kids?”

“They’re a thing for people with huge tonsils like yours and chronic infections,” he says sternly. “There’s an ear, nose, and throat specialist in town. Looks like I can get you in next Wednesday.”

I shake my head, causing the white paper of the exam table to crinkle. “I can take care of that when I get back home.”

He turns to face me before I can sit up again. “When you get home? As in at the end of the summer?”

“Uh-huh.”

“If you want me to give you antibiotics and clear you to coach again in twenty-four hours, then you need to agree to see a specialist next Wednesday. If she clears you to wait until the end of summer, then that’s fine, but I wouldn’t count on that happening. The complications you’re potentially facing are very serious, so don’t be an idiot.”

I scrub my hands over my face and groan. I don’t want to deal more doctors, with worrying, with going home and leaving Karen.

Karen.

I shoot upright again. “Oh shit…”

His eyebrows go up waiting for me to expand on the swearing.

“Hypothetically speaking,” I ask, “How contagious is this strep/tonsillitis combo?”

“I’m afraid to ask why?”

I let out a breath. I should have been more careful. The last thing Karen needs is swollen tonsils. “My girlfriend is here at camp…” I figure that should be enough details for him.

He nods and turns back to his laptop. “What’s the staff member’s name?”