Page 60 of Love of the Game
Drake had a pile of papers in his hands. “There’re some exercises you could do.”
“My first exercise will be lifting a coffee cup to my mouth.”
At that, Drake laughed. “Okay, okay, I’ll make you coffee.”
He did and I managed to get cleaned up and dressed mostly on my own. It took some doing, since it had been my dominant shoulder that I’d bungled. Using my left hand for a bunch of things was awkward, but doable.
By the time Papa arrived, I was dressed and caffeinated and working my way through some scrambled eggs and an English muffin with jam.
Drake gave me a quick kiss. “I’ll be back after practice.” Then he was gone, and it was Papa and me in Drake’s apartment. I felt like a kid again, and my brain immediately clicked over to Swedish. “He wants to marry me,” I blurted out.
Papa’s eyebrows rose. “Did he propose?”
“No, I kind of did. But he wants that, too.”
Papa burst out laughing. “Kind of?”
I shrugged and told my father what I’d said.
He nodded. “So it goes. Your mother will be happy. Or rather she’s happy you’ve finally found someone. She told me after the first phone call that he’d be our son-in-law.”
“How did Mom know?”
Another shrug. “She’s smarter than I am, that’s for sure.” He eyed my English muffin. “Are there more of those?”
There were, and after consuming one, and talking me through my first set of PT exercises, Papa rubbed his hands together. “Sun’s shining. I think we have time for a walk before Drake returns, yes?”
Why not? I needed some fresh air, so we went, heading down to Point State Park. We took a stroll around the giant fountain. A cleaning crew was pressure-washing the basin free of the winter muck, but it was still a pleasant walk, with the rivers and the trees budding up.
That’s when it hit me. The year was moving on. We were already into spring. I had six to eight months of recovery ahead of me, which meant maybe playing again in October at the earliest, but more than likely, I was missing part of next season, too. Who knew if my shoulder would be the same when I got to the other side of rehab?
I halted and stared out at the confluence of the rivers and the West End bridge beyond. “I’m going tomiss the playoffs.” I paused. “I might not play again.” I didn’t know how to feel aboutthatthought.
I looked at Papa and found him gazing where I had been. “You’ll miss playoffs,” he agreed, solemnly. Then he turned to me, his smile mild. “But let’s not get ahead of ourselves about your career, yes?”
I didn’t know what to say to that. I was nowhere near well enough to even think about stepping on the ice. This slow walk would probably tire me out for the rest of the day.
Papa clapped me on my good shoulder. “Come on.” We continued our walk and found our way to a bench on the Allegheny side of the river. My father sat, and I joined him.
“Jon,” he said. “You’ll be fine, no matter what happens.”
“I know, I know. I just—I’d hate that to be my last pro game.”
“A game-winning goal in overtime?” He arched an eyebrow.
Okay, when he said it like that, it sounded a lot better than ‘tripped over an opponent and broke my shoulder.’ I waved a hand in surrender. “That’s not so bad.” I was tired of being morose about myself, so I switched subjects. “Tell me about your latest charity thing.”
Oh, Papa knew what I was doing, but he regaled me with stories from all the charity event he’d been to as we walked back to Drake’s apartment. “You and Drake should come up sometime over the summer. Maybe when Sofia is visiting?”
That might be a lot of fun. “I’ll have to see what the rehab schedule is like.”
Papa waved my concerns away. “We have PT people and trainers in Vancouver. I’m sure your team will be okay with you actually having a summer vacation.”
I laughed at that.
When we got back to Drake’s, I was grateful to be sitting down again. The fresh air and the movement had been good, but as predicted, fatigue set in quickly. “Ugh, I hate surgery,” I muttered.
“Most people do,” Papa said cheerfully.
