Jaden Read online

  “Would you mind getting me one too, please?” Jaden asked, as he held out cutlery for her.

  Since they were together and ready at the same time, she asked, “Shall we find a place to sit together?”

  “That works for me,” he said.

  She found a table out in the sun. “It might be too hot,” she said, “but it doesn’t look we have a whole lot of choices right now.”

  “No, I think lunch becomes one of the big events, where everybody jumps to attention to be here,” he said.

  “With good reason,” she said. “The food is fantastic.”

  “I know, right? Best food ever.”

  Once seated, they quickly tucked into their lunches. By the time he was done, she was almost finished at the same time. She sat back and said, “I really don’t want to go back to work today.”

  “No, me neither,” he said. “I still have to meet my nurse too. Well, I met one but not the second one.”

  “You haven’t met her yet?” She frowned, pulled out her iPad from one of the pockets on her scrubs, and looked at her own schedule. “You know what? That could be because you’re my patient,” she said, frowning and flicking through the pages on her tablet. “I’m sorry. I’m a little behind, playing catch-up. Dani had to do a big shuffle on the schedules because one of the nurses is leaving a lot sooner than expected, and then I was supposed to be just part-time but was full-time …”

  She looked up at him and laughed. “Anyway, so then things got really complicated when I was supposed to take on the departing nurse’s assignments too.” She laughed again, stopped, looked at today’s schedule on her tablet, and said, “Jaden Hancock?”

  “That’s me.”

  She chuckled. “Well, maybe we can just have coffee and meet each other here right now.”

  “Or technically we could say that we’ve already met each other,” he said with a grin.

  She nodded. “I do have to go over your medications though,” she said, bringing up his file, newly added to the digital database by Brianna herself. But, by the time they were done with this overview, they were both more comfortable than she’d expected to be. “And I think you’re meeting Shane for some testing this afternoon, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah,” he said glumly. “Iain warned me about him.”

  “Warned you in what way?”

  “Shane’s really subtle. Nothing happens, nothing happens, and then bam. All of a sudden you’re in major pain.”

  “Don’t ever let him push you into that stage,” she said. “You can tell him to back off.”

  “I could,” he said with a half smile. “But also, if I plan to get out of here in the same shape that Iain is in, I don’t want to buck the system too much. If the PTs here know what they’re doing, I have to put my trust in them and do it.”

  “That’s a really good way to look at it,” she said in approval. “You haven’t given up, and that’s great. You’re here now, so be patient and see what everyone on your team can offer you.”

  “That was the thought,” he said, as he nodded. “And speaking of which …” He looked up to see Shane walking toward them.

  Shane stopped at their table and asked, “Are you guys done eating?”

  “Yeah. Why?” Brianna asked him.

  “I was hoping Jaden could shift his schedule a bit, so I could work with him earlier,” he said. “That way I can run into town to pick up some of the equipment that I missed on its regularly scheduled delivery, and I really need it.”

  “Sure enough,” Jaden said. “I’m ready when you are.”

  Shane grinned at him. “I hope so,” he said. “I’ve heard that phrase a time or two, but sometimes the men go back to their room in tears.”

  “Well, let’s hope there aren’t any tears in my world,” Jaden said. “Up until now, I feel like I’ve already poured every bucketful that was available.”

  “And you shouldn’t be sending them back in tears,” Brianna protested. “What about keeping within their limits?”

  Shane looked at her in surprise, then saw the frown exchanged between Brianna and Jaden. Shane smiled gently. “We only do as much as he can handle,” he said.

  Jaden looked at her with a smirk on his face. “Thanks for being worried,” he said, winking at her, “but we’ll be good.” Then he turned and headed after Shane.

  She knew most of these patients were military types. She could almost be embarrassed that she was sticking up for this ex-Navy SEAL, afraid the PT guy would hurt Jaden. Almost. But her innate caregiver instincts had automatically kicked in. She was all about dealing with their pain in ways to lessen their agony. Plus maybe that maternal instinct in her, awaiting her own babies to care for, was yearning for trial runs with all her patients.

  She watched them go, wondering if Jaden would be okay. But Shane had been here a long time, and she’d never heard anything but good reports about him. However, it really bothered her to think of these men at the end of a day resorting to tears. But then she realized it wasn’t a case of resorting to tears of sorrow or even of pain, but maybe tears being released due to the stress of the day, whether physical or mental.

  Often women placed unfair expectations on men—any males, whether military or not—to keep their diligence and their silence, and these women expected the men to control their attitudes, even when inside they’re breaking. In Brianna’s opinion, it was best to avoid pushing them into greater areas of pain and was much better that these patients be allowed to release their pent-up emotions instead, to let go of some of that stress and the weight of responsibility on their shoulders, so that they could turn around and face a new day again. And again and again.

  Shane led Jaden to one of the rooms he had yet to be in. He wheeled into the center of the room, spun around, and said, “Wow, this is a huge room.”

  “It is, indeed.” Shane tossed a file and a clipboard onto the small table off to the side and laid down his tablet. “So, we’ve started with some elementary testing,” he said, “but the focus appears to be that poor leg of yours and your structural alignment, which is definitely off. Then there is your shoulder.”

  At that, Jaden’s eyebrows rose. “Is it the shoulder too?”

  “Definitely, it is. You’re blessed in that you still have both legs. But obviously you’ve been compensating for the poor one,” Shane said, as he walked toward him. “The bottom line is, you’re also throwing your right shoulder and your spine into that misalignment—your head too. So headaches, difficulty sleeping, and all of those related aches and pains are the result of that.”

  “What about my gut sensitivities? I had a few issues before the accident, but it’s much worse now.”

  “It depends how many issues you got from the accident itself,” Shane said, “but any structural alignment that we can fix now will help you in that regard.”

  “I like the idea of that,” Jaden muttered. “So, where do we start?”

  “Well, you won’t want to hear this,” he said, “but we start with more testing.”

  Jaden groaned. “I was hoping that we’d start with a workout program.”

  “You’d be surprised at just how much testing there is before we can get started. I do have a plan set out,” he said. “But, first off, we’ll take a bunch of photos, so you can see what I’m talking about. I want you to stand up and to step against that wall, so you’re as flat against it as you can be.”

  Jaden nodded, rolled over slowly in his wheelchair, stood up on his good leg, and held his weight off his bad leg as he leaned against the wall.

  “Okay, here’s a set of crutches,” Shane said, holding them up to him. “Use the crutches to help align yourself as straight as you can, with your heels against the wall.” With that done, Shane took away the crutches and took several photographs of Jaden from the front, both sides, and then more along his back—just so Jaden could see what Shane saw.

  Jaden wore only a muscle shirt and shorts, and he could feel his bad leg already shrinking with the pa
in. “Can I get off the leg now?” he asked.

  Shane stopped, looked at him, stared down at the leg, and asked, “Which one?”

  “The bad one.”

  And Shane nodded. “Put your weight on the good one and tell me, on a scale of one to ten, how that good leg is holding up.”

  “It’s fine,” he said, avoiding the number issue.

  “But what’s fine?” Shane asked quietly. “You’ve become so accustomed to it taking the weight of everything. Did you ever stop to listen to what its complaints are?”

  “Of course not,” he said. “It’ll just have to suffer in silence because it needs to do its job.”

  “Agreed,” Shane said with a half smile. “But what we need to do is have it do its job without hurting itself any further.”

  “Any further?” Jaden’s voice rose at the end. The last thing he wanted to think of was an injury to that leg, his good one.

  “Well, it didn’t get off scot-free, did it? Didn’t you notice the angle that you’re holding your good leg at? The angle that you put all your weight on is not quite right,” he said. He bent down, then took a photo of just the good leg and stood to hold it up on his camera for Jaden to see. “You can see the angle that you’re standing at naturally right now isn’t good for the left leg.”

  “Well, I can shift that,” he said.

  “Good,” Shane said. He handed him the crutches back again. “Now, just like I asked you to earlier, position yourself naturally on both your legs, as straight as you can against that wall, keeping in mind to adjust the angle your left leg has been at currently.”

  Jaden did as he requested, only to stare down to realize that the left leg did not want to move into a fully straightforward alignment. He looked up at Shane, his eyebrows raised.

  Shane nodded. “See what I mean?”

  “I guess,” he said, frowning. “I didn’t realize that it was struggling so much.”

  “Well, you’ve asked it to take on a heavy load,” Shane said. “So one of the biggest issues right now is to make sure that whatever load it does carry is something that it can carry long-term. Not just a short-term fix but beyond that.” He took more photos of Jaden’s alignment and posture so he had documentation as to what Jaden was like when relaxed. Initially. Post-PT.

  Shane took several photos when Jaden thought he was straight, when he thought he was leaning from side to side, and then saw the truth in the actual photos. He shook his head in amazement. “And here I thought I was sitting straight up,” he said after one particular session. “But, according to those photos, I’m leaning forward.”

  “And you’re leaning forward because of pain in your back,” he said. “It’s a common issue, but it’s one that we need to address fast.”

  Jaden nodded slowly. “Well, I didn’t realize that was even an issue. So, yes, absolutely. It needs to be addressed.”

  “So, a few other issues need to be dealt with,” Shane said. “Let’s finish off all this testing, so you have a good idea.”

  By the time they were done, Jaden was surprisingly tired. “We didn’t do anything,” he muttered. “And yet I’m already sore.”

  “Because you’re using muscles that don’t want to be used in the way that you need them to be used from here on out,” Shane explained. “When you allow your posture to slide like that, correcting that will take time because of muscle memory. You’ve taught them to be this way for the last several months. Now here we need to retrain them. In the meantime, they’ll rebel.”

  “Great,” he said. “So now what?”

  “Now we’ll work on a bit of a massage, although it’s not the nice pleasant spa-type massage you’re probably thinking of,” he said with a chuckle.

  “Meaning, it’ll hurt, right?”

  “Maybe not,” he said. “But we’ll do some deep breathing exercises to hopefully relax you a bit, and then we’ll start working on the intercostal muscles.”

  Jaden didn’t even know which ones those were, but, if Shane said they needed work at this point in time, Jaden was willing to give his PT guy the benefit of the doubt. Jaden had to wonder why none of these issues had come up in his past physiotherapist sessions at the other center. “Is this work common among your profession?”

  “Everybody looks at posture slightly differently,” he said. “There’s a right way and a wrong way in terms of defining posture, but, after so many injuries have occurred, especially all concentrated in one spot, a lot of times the posture rehab is relaxed. The medical staff knows that, for some muscles, they can no longer possibly do the same work that they used to do. The trouble is, you still have to get the muscles there to do its maximum job as best as they can.”

  “Got it,” he said, as he wheeled his way slowly to the door. “Where’s the massage at?”

  “I figured your bed.”

  “Perfect,” he said. “I didn’t think I could do much more than get into bed anyway after this.”

  “I’ll be there in about ten minutes,” he said. “So, boxers on and the rest off. Stretched out on your stomach with just a sheet on top would be good.”

  Jaden nodded and headed toward his room. He was pretty disappointed in his own current health status after seeing the physical evidence of what Shane had been talking about. Jaden knew that he’d been told to work on some posture exercises, but he hadn’t ever really seen what the good posture was supposed to be, what his bad posture had become, and how it would affect the rest of him. Now he had a damn good idea. He looked down at his good leg.

  “You keep working, you hear me,” he said to himself. “We need you to stay strong until the other leg can pick up the slack.” Because now he started to realize that he really had slack to be picked up. That’s probably how his buddy Iain had gotten so big and so strong as he had under Shane’s care.

  And right now, Jaden was grateful to be under Shane’s care himself. He knew the massage coming up wouldn’t be the same as sitting in a hot tub and getting gentle pulsing waves of water hitting his back and shoulders, where Jaden was in charge of how close and how hard that water hit him and where it hit him. He winced just at the thought.

  But, if a little pain got a lot of gain, he was all for it.

  Chapter 4

  Several days later Brianna came upon Jaden, sitting outside on the deck with a cup of coffee and a cinnamon bun, watching the birds.

  “How are you doing?” she asked, sitting down beside him. She wanted to check him over carefully but didn’t want to push the boundaries.

  “I’m fine,” he said in an offhand way that didn’t tell her anything. He stared off into the distance. “I used to bring home every broken and wounded animal possible,” Jaden said, pointing out a sparrow that landed on the railing nearby. “From birds to rabbits to squirrels. My foster parents were beside themselves, but I did my best to keep the animals alive and to give them a decent life. I wasn’t very successful early on. My foster parents didn’t have much money to take the animals to the vet, so I was a constant frustration for them.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Well, I lost everybody in my birth family at an early age,” he said. “And foster homes weren’t exactly the same thing. I turned to all the animals as a way to deal with my own losses.”

  “What happened to your family?”

  “Well, my dad took off with my brother,” he said with a smile. “That left me with Mom. And my mom was killed in a car accident soon afterward. I don’t even know if my dad and my brother knew about her passing, but the police came and put me in foster care, while they tried to find them. The authorities suspected my dad had returned to Germany, and they never did find him in order to let him know about my situation.”

  She frowned. “Oh my, how sad. Have you tried to contact him since?”

  “I haven’t found him,” he said. “But, then again, I guess I haven’t put too much effort into it either.”

  “No, I guess not,” she said. “I’m sure, in that child’s heart, it was
an act of betrayal.”

  “It was,” he said bitterly. “Definitely abandonment. It doesn’t matter if you do split up the kids, one kid to each parent. You shouldn’t let go of all contact.”

  “It’s also possible that your dad couldn’t have done anything,” she said, “in that maybe he passed on too.”

  “I’d like to think so, and that’s terrible of me,” he said. “But that’s just a reminder how life is always something that you have to adjust to.”

  “True enough,” she said.

  “The look on your face says it bothers you more than me.”

  “Maybe it’s because I’m a licensed caregiver. Or female,” she said. “I don’t know, but it’s a betrayal, and I’m not a stranger to that too.”

  “In what way?” He watched as she hesitated. “Unless it’s too private,” he said. “I’m not trying to pry.”

  “It’s not that,” she said. “It is personal, and it is something that I still haven’t shared with very many people. But, one of the reasons why I came here and moved in with a girlfriend, even though I had a good job in Houston, was that I was left at the altar by my fiancé.” He gasped. She turned and looked at him, then nodded and said, “Right? You read about it happening online. You hear about it from other people, but you never ever expect it to be somebody who either you know or, in my case then, who would be me.”

  “I’m so sorry,” he said.

  “I’m not,” she said. “I mean, it was tough, but it would have been worse if we had married, and then he’d immediately divorced me. Apparently he was sleeping with my maid of honor, and they both forgot to tell me. I believe the two of them have broken up now.”

  “Wow.” He didn’t know what to say. When he had asked the question, he realized it was intrusive and probably a little past the point that they were in their friendship, but he had never expected a revelation like that. “I guess the right response would be Congratulations?”

  She gave a startled laugh. “In what way?”

  “That you were saved from a very distressing time of being married to someone who you were sharing with another woman and to later find out that he had betrayed you all along and then jump into a messy and probably expensive divorce. This way, at least, you cut to the chase before it could get any worse. But still, on the day that’s supposed to be one of the happiest in your life? … That’s not the place where you want to find out that.”