I turned and looked at him with wide eyes and mimed flipping a lock of hair over my shoulder. “Honey, this is all vitamin E, sunshine, and salt water.”
Creek’s cheeks went ruddy, and he muttered something before looking away. He was halfway back down the bars, and I could see he was putting more weight on his leg than he probably should have been.
“You,” I started, then stopped. It wasn’t my business. Guys like him always had to learn the hard way. I took a breath as I stood, leaned on my cane, and tested my balance.
During my freshman year of college, there was an acrobat club on campus that used to practice on the quad. One of the guys was a stilt walker, and it used to fascinate the hell out of me how he managed to stay upright the way he did.
Now I knew. Sort of.
There was no way to describe the sensation of balancing on the prosthesis, but every step made my heart jump like I was going to fall over. But I was also doing it. My heart hammered against my ribs like I was running a sprint.
“Nice job,” Kent said. “Seriously, bro. Fucking amazing.” He was keeping pace with me, his hand out to grab the oh-shit-grip tied around my waist if I started to wobble, but I was still doing it on my own.
And okay, this wasn’t the first time I’d walked around by myself on the leg without using crutches or my cane. I’d been cheating here and there at home, but nothing like this. Not taking long, steady strides from one end of the room to the other.
I could feel the tension radiating from where Creek was still at the bars, and part of me wanted to tell him he’d get to whereI was sooner than he thought. And another part of me wanted to just let him stew in it.
“Alright,” Kent said, clapping his hands when I finished the third round. “Leg off.” I started to groan, but he shook his head. “Time for balance and core work, and I have a new guy coming in, so I’m hoping you two can play nice for the exercises.”
Creek’s mouth fell open to protest, but I jumped ahead of him. “We’re both grown adults.”
Creek’s jaw slammed shut, his eyes blazing, but he nodded. “Yeah. Fine.”
“Excellent,” Kent said, just a note of warning in his voice that sounded a lot like me when I was trying to give my kids a little bit of responsibility. “I want you two to stand about six feet apart and pass the ball back and forth for sixty tosses. When you’re done…”
“Don’t say sit-ups,” I begged.
He grinned. “A hundred each.”
“We can make it two,” Creek volunteered. “A hundred is nothing for me.”
Kent snorted a laugh. “A hundred is fine for today. Feel free to throw in some extra at home.”
I met Creek’s gaze and glared, and his lip twitched into a half smile with absolutely no kindness behind it. “Make it one fifty.”
Kent rolled his eyes. “Get to work, boys. Legs off.”
I strolled over to the chair and sat while Creek lowered himself into his, and I purposefully didn’t look over as he slipped his stump out of his socket. I peeled my sock away, and I hopped over to the wall, where there was a large rack filled with medicine balls.
Kent always had us work with the lightest, so my fingers lingered over the fives, and I heard Creek scoff behind me.
“Feeling tired?”
I bristled and grabbed the twenty-pounder. It was as heavy as we could go without Kent yelling at us. I glanced over my shoulder to see Kent behind the wheelchair of a man who was missing both of his legs above the knee, and I turned away quickly so neither of them would see my wince.
I did my best not to think about the accident—and how it could have been so much worse. How I could have lost more than just a leg. I’d been pinned under a tire, dragged across the asphalt, and…
“You trying to propose marriage to that thing or what?” Creek asked.
I took a breath and spun with the ball in my hand. “Let’s do this. I should warn you, though, I’ve been doing this for weeks longer than you, Sergeant Grumpy.”
Creek’s eyes narrowed. “And I’ve been training for years longer than you, Point Break.”
I grinned in spite of myself because this big, buff Army guy knew a surfer movie. I adjusted my stance and bent slightly at the knee, holding my stump just a fraction to the side to maintain my balance, and then I threw the ball.
It hit his hands, and he wobbled, but he didn’t fall.
He threw it back harder than was necessary. I let out a grunt and felt my balance shift, but I kept my knee steady and stared up at him.
