Page 5 of Necessary Roughness

Harrison let out a loud burst of laughter as he pulled the car keys out of his pocket. “She’s got you.”

***

JORDAN SPENT HER workdays cajoling her clients into another rep or stretching just a bit more, but she hadn’t met one yet who seemed to detest her on sight. She wasn’t sure what she’d done or said to Tanner Cole that made him react the way he had, but she was going to have to see him tomorrow. If he showed up. The PNB ballerina finished her appointment and patted Jordan’s upper arm as she passed.

After checking his file, she had a bit more insight into what his problem might be. She’d worked with plenty of athletes before. She understood the pain of serious injury, the difficulty involved with making progress during recovery from that injury, and the almost-inevitable depression that resulted from the realization that sometimes one’s life would never be the same again. He seemed to have an extra helping of irritation.

He didn’t like her? She wasn’t overly enamored of him, either. She could be professional and do her job, but in the meantime, she’d never had a client who had gotten under her skin within thirty seconds before.

***

THE NEXT MORNING, Tanner checked his Apple Watch again as he waited for Jordan. He wasn’t surprised she was late; she probably had some type of clandestine meeting with elves or whatever. At least she couldn’t accuse him of being late. He’d taken a seat on the folding chair in the corner of her workspace and scrolled through his e-mail while he waited.

This wasn’t his first time at the physical therapy rodeo, but he was tired of it. He knew he’d have to keep working in order to get as much range of movement as possible in his knee. Nobody had to remind Tanner that he’d have to push through the things every other person in physical therapy had to deal with: pain, more pain, and depression. He’d enjoy sitting on his deck with a cold drink and watching the world go by a lot more.

Tanner had been referred to Marco due to the therapist’s track record with pro-athlete clients, but he wasn’t so nuts about the man’s attitude. Marco had acted like he was sleepwalking through Tanner’s last several appointments. Truth be told, Tanner had wanted to fire him. Marco had made it clear by his actions (or lack of them) he wasn’t interested in Tanner’s recovery and was going through the motions as a result. Tanner had been talked out of firing Marco by his orthopedic surgeon.

“Marco’s a great guy,” the surgeon told him at his latest post-op checkup.

“He’s lazy, and he’s not pushing me.”

“Maybe you should be pushing yourself instead,” the surgeon said as he wagged a finger in Tanner’s face. It would be interesting to see how the surgeon would deal with a similar injury personally, but there were laws against stuff like that.

It turned out that the orthopedic surgeon was one of Marco’s golf buddies. Now Tanner was between a rock and a hard place. Miss even more PT while he tried to find someone else to work with, or suck it up and deal with Disney Princess.

“FML,” he muttered for the tenth time this morning.

“What did you say?” Jordan said. She had rounded the corner seconds before. Her voice sounded like music, and she gave him another oh-so-cheery little grin as her ponytail slipped over one shoulder.

“Nothing,” he ground out through clenched teeth.

“We’ll get some work in, and you can go spend some time doing something a lot more fun for the rest of the day. How about it?” she said. She reached out to help him out of the chair, bracing herself so she could move him without injuring herself. “It’s a beautiful day out there, isn’t it? I love summertime.”

“It’s peachy keen,” he said.

She ignored the dripping sarcasm in his voice. He wasn’t surprised. “There must be something about sunny summer days you enjoy.”

“I’m usually getting ready for training camp now.”

He knew she heard him, but she indicated the padded table. “Why don’t you lie down and stretch your knee a bit before we continue?”

An hour later, he was dripping sweat, his knee felt like it would hurt less to cut it off with a rusty butter knife, and he shoved himself off the machine he’d been working his legs at. She handed him a couple of dry towels and a plastic cup full of water.

“Good job,” she said. “Your range of motion is improving. Are you still dealing with a lot of pain?”

He sucked a breath in through his nose and counted to ten. “Why yes, I am,” he said in a deceptively quiet voice. Maybe she was so used to seeing people who were in pain that she ignored his trembling muscles and flinching, but maybe she enjoyed torturing him. Whatever. She’d better not trot out one of those “no pain, no gain” clichés he’d heard a million times or he was going to fling his walker through the plate-glass front window of the clinic. He used a clean towel to mop up the sweat. He draped the other around his neck.

She refilled his cup of water before sitting down on the bench next to him.

“Has your doctor made any effort to address the pain? You’ll heal faster if every appointment isn’t agony for you,” she said.

Tanner took a long swallow of water. “He’s concerned about addiction.” His doctor was also mad that Tanner refused to live in an injury rehab center. He was winning all kinds of congeniality awards these days.

“How nice of him to decide what you should or should not have to live with.” He glanced up at Jordan in shock. His frozen heart melted just a little at her comment. “You won’t heal until you can get control of the pain.” She got up from the weight bench, sat down at a small desk, and typed onto a keyboard for a few minutes. The printer stored below her laptop spit out a piece of paper seconds later. She brought it back to him as she grabbed his walker.

“I realize you may not want to switch doctors right now, but I’d like to recommend one who might really help,” she said. She handed him the piece of paper. “That’s her contact information. If you’d like, I’ll call her and let her know I’ve referred you.”

“Why her?” he asked.

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