Her phone binged on her nightstand. She glared at the offending device. Chad had texted every morning since she’d kicked him out.I’m sorry. Please forgive me. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I miss you.She deleted the text without reading it. Day late and a dollar short, asshat.
With a groan she got out of bed and got ready for work. An hour later she strolled into the physical therapy clinic.
Her first patient of the day was already in the waiting room.
“Morning, Ryan. I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”
“No worries, Doc. Feel free to delay the abuse as long as you need,” he replied with a grin.
Bree rolled her eyes at his exaggeration. “Don’t be such a baby.”
She stored her bag in the locker and logged on to her computer to see if there were any changes to her schedule. One of her afternoon appointments had cancelled, but a call-in had quickly taken the spot. She sighed and adjusted her neck. There were just too many patients and not enough providers.
She pulled up Ryan’s record to review. Extensive injuries to his left side during an Improvised Explosive Device attack in Iraq had left his arm nearly mutilated. The surgeons had managed to save it, but the damage to the underlying muscle and tissue limited his range of motion. Bree read her notes from his session two weeks ago - his treatment plan was right on track.
She picked up her phone and dialed her assistant’s extension. “Cindy, can you bring Ryan back?”
“Sure, Dr. Marks.”
“Thanks.” She hung up the receiver and covered the table with a new sheet.
“Hey, Ryan. You know the drill.”
“You know, Doc, just once it’d be nice if you had me lie down for a reason other than to torture me.”
Bree patted Ryan on the head. “Oh. That’s sweet you think you could handle me.”
Ryan laughed.
“Let’s see if we can break up some of this scar tissue and increase your range of motion.” She turned his arm over, palm up.
“What the hell is this?” She brushed her thumb over the black and purple bruise covering most of the inside of his forearm.
“Oh, that. Archery.”
“Oh, that,” she repeated. “I need more detail. I can’t work on you with this kind of bruising.”
“Why? It’s not like I can feel it.”
Bree sighed in exasperation. “You might not be able to feel it because of the nerve damage, but what I do still affects the underlying muscle and fascia. This is a lot of bruising, which means a lot of trauma happened to the area. What were you doing?”
Ryan sat up. “A buddy of mine invited me to go to an archery class for wounded veterans. It’s part of a prep course to go on a bow-hunting trip. I was a last-minute addition, so they didn’t have enough arm guards for everyone. The guy who was running the training reamed me a new one, if it makes you feel better.”
Bree looked at him for a moment. She could yell at him for being careless, but that would only shut him down. She depended on communication with her patients to determine their pain level and appropriate treatment. And she didn’t want to discourage him from doing something he enjoyed. “Did you like it?”
“Shooting with a bow? Yeah, it was cool. Different than shooting a rifle, you know? Took a lot more concentration.”
“Were you able to straighten your arm all the way or did you have to compensate somehow?”
“I couldn’t straighten it all the way. I kind of had to cock my elbow and lock the muscles around it to hold the bow steady. It was awkward.”
Bree gave Ryan a small nod. “Lay back down; I’ll go easy on you today.”
“Thanks. Sorry, Doc. I even told the guy you were going to yell at me when you saw it.”
“Are you going on a trip soon?”
“I’m not sure. My buddy’s going in two weeks or so. The trips are Thursday through Sunday, so I have to see if I can get off work.”
