Baking Me Crazy (Donner Bakery, #1)(15)

When Denise moved, and the office manager told me they'd hired someone who specialized in the exact thing I was working on, I looked forward to it with a strange sense of trepidation.

After I got sick, hope became about as dangerous as carting around a loaded gun.

I had to mourn the loss of a future I'd always taken for granted even though I still had so much to be grateful for.

Someday, they had told the fifteen-year-old Jocelyn still getting steroids pumped into her veins, if we reduce the inflammation on your spine, you might be able to use a walker on occasion.

Someday, you should be able to get pregnant, carry a child, and give birth.

Someday, you might …

Someday, if conditions were right …

Someday, maybe …

There was a part of me, one I'd only confessed to Levi, that started hating that phrase. My mom never said the words out loud, but she hated watching me try to get around with my walker. The stumbling, graceless movement of my legs somehow made it worse. In her eyes, the smooth motion of my chair was preferable because hoping for more seemed like a useless exercise in frustration.

It took root like a weed and became a battle I didn't want to fight with her. Occasionally, I would work on my legs with Levi, but that wasn't part of our usual routine either. Sometimes, if my mom wasn't home, I'd put Nero in a vest with a sturdy handle along the top of his back to do some of my exercises at home. That way, if I fell, I could use him to get back onto my feet.

Wasn't that sad? I'd risk falling as long as no one was there to watch.

But the second any eyes were on me, going through the motions was my default. That was as easy as breathing.

Now that I sat parked in front of the office with a new person waiting inside for me, I took one last look at myself in the rearview mirror. Exhausted from trying to tame my batshit crazy hair, I finally tied it to the top of my head in a riotous bun.

There was one time in my life when I truly didn't care if I looked like a bag lady, and that was during PT. I wore my favorite black leggings and a baggy Green Valley High T-shirt—the one I'd stolen from Levi—that had a hole in the hem and constantly fell off my shoulder.

One did not need to put on mascara for your PT to make you sweat and cry and push yourself past every comfortable physical and mental boundary you possessed.

I yanked the keys out of the ignition and exhaled heavily. The glass front of the office was reflective, so I had no idea if someone was in there watching me.

With a deep sigh, I opened the driver's side door. There were four to five steps from where I was sitting to the back of my car. With my right hand, I held tightly to the side of the car but left the driver's door open so it shielded me from view.

One.

Two.

My right leg swung out farther than my left, and I took a deep, steadying breath while my fingers gripped the locked door handle on the door behind mine.

Three.

Four.

I reached the back of the car and yanked open the hatch. When it was up, and I could see my chair, I took a second to close my eyes and enjoy the feeling of standing on both feet. The air felt different on my face when I was standing. But it required so much mental energy to get that feeling. Nothing about it was unconscious or second nature. Not anymore. What direction were my feet pointing? Did I have something to hold?

That stretched a mental muscle as much as it made my physical ones shake and groan in protest.

Turning slowly, I sat down in the back of the car and used both hands to pull my chair out until it bounced on the pavement.

This was one of the things I never even thought about.

Flinging my chair out, flipping the lever of the brake until I heard the click, then sliding my body from the car into the chair, I leaned back up to pull the hatch down on the car, then flipped the lever again so I could move forward once my feet were on the footplate between the two small stability wheels.

I didn't second-guess any of those motions.

Locking the car as I passed it, I got to the front door and punched the blue button that would swing the door open.

What? Yeah, I could've done it, but if I was about to have my ass kicked by the new dude, then not opening the door felt like an important conservation of my energy.

In the back corner of the office, one of the therapists was working with an elderly gentleman on some gait training. She smiled at me when I came in.

"Andrew will be right out for you, Joss!"

I waved at her and pushed myself in a quick circle while I waited. On my second rotation, my head almost snapped clean off my neck when I saw my new PT, Andrew.

Andrew. Andy. Also known as Brad/Chris. Also, also known as Cupcake Guy.

His face mirrored my shock.

"It's you," I said like a big ole dummy.

"Hey." He glanced down at the file in his hands. "Jocelyn Abernathy, huh?"

"That's … that's me."

His broad chest was covered in a Maryville PT T-shirt, and my first terrible thought was, oh gawd, my hair looks like I stuck a key into a light socket and held on for about five seconds.

Andrew set the file down and crossed his arms over that chest. "What a small world."

My cheeks felt hot as I attempted a smile. "Sure is. Do you live in Maryville?"

He shook his head, looking far less uncomfortable than I was feeling. "I live closer to Green Valley, but I'm from here originally. Just moved back."