I shift, trying to sit up without putting weight on the knee. It protests immediately, a hot throb that shoots up my thigh and makes me freeze halfway.
"Fuck," I mutter.
From the kitchenette, I hear movement. Élise appears in the doorway, hair pulled back, wearing one of my T-shirts and leggings. She's holding a mug of coffee.
"You're awake," she says.
"Yeah."
"Hurting?"
"Fine."
She gives me a look. The one that says she knows I'm lying but isn't going to push.
"I made coffee," she says. "And there's bread if you want breakfast. I went shopping,"
"I'm good."
She nods, doesn't argue, and disappears back into the kitchen.
I finally manage to sit up, swinging my good leg over the edge of the couch. The bad one follows slowly, carefully, like I'm defusing a bomb.
The rehab schedule is taped to the fridge. I can see it from here, even with the morning light making the paper glare. Team doctor's handwriting, neat and clinical.
Week 1: Rest, ice, elevation. No weight-bearing. Resistance band work.
Week 2-3: Begin ROM exercises.
Week 3-4: Re-evaluation. Consider return to training.
Finals: March 22-26. Lenzerheide.
I've circled the Finals date in red marker. Four weeks from Kvitfjell. It's tight. Maybe too tight. But it's possible.
Even the physio called it “a miracle timeline,” the kind of thing guys try once in a generation and usually regret.
But they used to callmea miracle, when I started racing.
So, it has to be possible.
By the time I finish breakfast, half a protein shake and some bread I don't really want, Élise is at the table with her laptop open. She's been there every morning since I got back. Typing. Scrolling. Her face lit by the blue glow of the screen.
I don't ask what she's working on. She doesn't tell me.
I grab the resistance band from the corner, the one the physio gave me before I left Norway. It's green, which supposedly means "medium resistance," but it feels like trying to stretch steel cable.
I loop it around my good foot, hook the other end around the brace on my bad leg, and start the first exercise. Slow, controlled knee extensions. Ten reps. Three sets.
The first rep is fine. The second hurts. By the fifth, I'm gritting my teeth.
"You're supposed to breathe," Élise says without looking up from her laptop.
"I am breathing."
"You're holding your breath."
I exhale hard, louder than necessary, and keep going.
