Hillary wouldn’t let Harrison take a swing without first checking hisform, reminding him to stand with feet hip distance apart, core tight. Harrison resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He’d been playing for years, and he knew proper form. “Good,” she said, when she was satisfied he was centered over his hips. She stood back, nodding. “Okay. Swing.”
Harrison swung, and immediately grimaced at the pain in his knee. It was possibly worse than when he left Florida, which wouldn’t surprise him, seeing as how he hadn’t kept up with his physical therapy. Man, he hated when Clay was right.
“That does not look good. First of all, you have aridiculouspelvic tilt,” Hillary announced, then stepped behind him, put her hands on his hips, and shoved his hips forward. “See that?”
“Umm…”
“You need to find a neutral spine, Harrison. How did you let yourself get so out of whack?”
It was a fair question.
“Okay, try and hold that position and swing again.”
Harrison did as instructed, because there was still that little kid inside him who was afraid of coaches. The swing felt more natural. And his knee didn’t hurt quite as much.
“Okay, let’s work those quads and hips,” Hillary said, and gestured at the table. “Hop up here, boss.”
He silently debated telling her he was not her boss, and if anything, she was his at the moment, but she was talking again, so he just did as he was told.
“I’m glad you’re wearing sweats,” she said. “Generally, I’d have you take those off and put a towel over you, but it’s too cold for that.” She dug her fingers into his right quad, and Harrison very nearly came off the table.
“Tight,” she said. “You know who else has tight quads? Tony. He wouldn’t let me really get in there.” As she continued to work on Harrison’s quad, she talked about how someone named Tony was resistant toher help. Harrison gradually figured out that she was talking about Tony Cho, a fellow PGA golfer. And that, apparently, Hillary had been dating him? Tried to date him? Wanted to date him? It was a bit unclear. When she made Harrison roll over to work on his hip, he got up the nerve to ask her. “Are you and Tony dating?”
“That is my point! Are we? Like…do you see what I mean?” she exclaimed as she massaged his hip.
He did not see what she meant and he was terrified to ask for clarification. Not that he needed to—Hillary kept up a running stream of discourse, in which he lost track of who had done what to whom.
By the time she’d finished and asked him to take another swing, Harrison had to admit that his knee felt better.
“Epsom salt,” she said as she folded her table. “At least a thirty-minute soak in it tonight. Here you go.” She handed him a packet of Epsom salt. “And the exercises I showed you. Three times a day.”
“I will. Thanks again, Hillary. I’m sorry you had to come all this way for a session.”
“No problem! Anything to get out of Detroit this time of year. See you tomorrow, about the same time?”
Harrison hesitated. “Tomorrow?”
“Oh, I forgot to mention that Clay paid me for a week. He put me up at the resort up the hill. It’s a beautiful place but they are absolutelydead.”
Harrison couldn’t quite wrap his head around this. “Clay sent you here for aweek?”
“Yep. He said you needed to be good to go by the first of the year. You’ve got a gig in Scotland, I think?”
“I don’t have…” Harrison stopped. There was no point in explaining his frustration with his manager to Hillary. He wanted to say that Clay didn’t own him and could not decide things like this on his behalfwithout talking to him first. But apparently, Clay did own him, because here was Hillary, looking very pleased with her situation.
“He said if you hadn’t made significant progress in a week, to let him know, and you two would come up with another plan. But we can do it, right?”
“Umm—”
“Don’t look so dubious,” she said, and playfully swatted him. “I’m very good at my job. Just ask Tony. He had that hip thing, remember?”
Harrison did not know anything about Tony Cho’s “hip thing.”
“I cured it. Okay, I’m going to go. Let me know if you’re looking for something to do. We could meet up at the resort.”
Harrison felt a slight surge of panic. “Thanks, but I—”
“I didn’t mean today. See you tomorrow!” With a cheery wave, she loaded up her massage table and walked back into the house, disappearing from view.
