contagious disease that would jump through the air and infect them.
Without even knowing his name, Lauren broached the subject of his injury head-on. Jake admitted that threw him for a moment. He was in pain and when she bumped into him, it escalated.
There was no pain now. She said she wasn’t a therapist, but her hands had felt magical as she soothed his muscles better than any licensed therapist had ever made him feel.
Who was she? he asked himself again. He had his eyes on her back. She walked confidently, weaving in and out of the swaying crowd. After a few seconds, she was gone, swallowed by the sea of humanity. Jake glanced at the card in his hand. It had her name and a phone number. He remembered her words. That line would be disconnected soon.
Pushing the card in his pocket, he told himself it didn’t matter. He was no longer seeing therapists or nurses. They’d proved they could do nothing for him. It was all in his head. He’d been told that by the best psychologists in the business. Of course, they didn’t use those words. They used medical school jargon to explain neurological deficits, paralysis or somatosensory losses. It was hysterical paralysis for the layman. He was no moron. He knew the language. He’d learned it alongside them in the same chairs at the same medical schools. In essence, his mind wouldn’t let him move his arm.
Turning around, Jake dismissed Lauren. This was his life and this was how it was going to be. He headed toward the car that stopped at the curb. The driver got out and rushed around to open the door. Jake levered himself inside without any help and soon the car merged into the traffic.
Back at his apartment, the place felt cold and austere. It never had before. Had Lauren somehow changed his perspective? The apartment was a grand two-story space with twenty-foot ceilings and windows almost as tall, but today it felt empty and bleak. Lauren was different, not exactly a breath of fresh air, but someone he rarely came across. She was like spring: warm, sunny, colorful. Why was she making him feel that his apartment, the space he’d lived in for the last five years, was a grayed-out shell? It had everything he needed, furniture, lighting, paintings on the walls, books and a huge concert grand piano that had once belonged to his grandmother, yet he felt as if there was no life in the place.
Wasn’t that the way he wanted it? As cold and empty as his life had become. Did the rooms reflect the state of his life? Had it atrophied along with his arm? Jake glanced at his right arm. The pain had not returned. He wondered what she’d done that was different from the multiple therapists who’d tried and failed. Why were her hands more effective than those of the professionals?
The pain was real, but phantom nevertheless. Jake stared at the limb that hadn’t moved in two years. He willed it to move. Just a small change, even minuscule, would be welcome, his brain said. He’d ordered it to move millions of times since the doctors told him there was no physical reason why he shouldn’t be able to use his arm. Yet it refused to answer the commands of his conscious brain. It hung limply by his side or stayed in a pocket if he used his left hand to put it there.
Since he’d stopped all the therapy, the arm was noticeably smaller than his left one. He could give himself all the rationalized reasons he wanted, but he knew that without exercising that arm, it would atrophy. He dug out Lauren’s card and looked at it. As he ran his thumb over the raised lettering, he outlined her name, remembering her smile and her touch. He could almost feel the warmth of her hands sliding along the grain lines of his muscles, coaxing them into submission, giving them the blood flow they needed to allow the natural biochemistry of the human body to act as nature intended it.
His brother, Cal, came through the door while Jake was still looking at the card.
“You’re late,” Cal said.
Jake knew his brother was concerned about him. He wouldn’t have been surprised if Cal put out a missing person’s report. In this case, he probably only needed to contact the limousine driver to discover that he was alive and well and talking to a stranger on the street.
“I stopped for a late lunch with a woman named Lauren Peterson.”
“Really? Who?” Cal’s brows went up in surprise. Since the accident, Jake had spoken to few women and agreed to no invitations.
Jake walked to his brother and handed him the card. “Her. Check her out.”
“Where did you meet her?”
“On the street. Actually, we ran into each other, literally. She fell, dropped her packages, then suggested we have a cup of coffee.”
“Why am I checking her out?” Cal asked.
Cal always did the background checks. At least since the accident he had, taking on the role of protector to an infirm Jake. Jake was a wealthy man and he’d been taken advantage of once. Since then he protected himself. Jake didn’t mind Cal looking out for him. He loved his brother and knew Cal loved him.
“You’re concerned about me being alone while you go away. And since I refuse more nurses and therapists, at least for a while, maybe she will be the answer.”
“Why do you think that? You’ve met her once. For the space of a lunch.” Cal frowned.
“She massaged my arm and I’m not in any pain.”
“What? Where? Did you two go somewhere?”
“Nope. Right there in the restaurant. We were about to leave and she started stroking my arm. The pain went away and so far it hasn’t come back.”
“And you let this happen?”
Cal knew how sensitive Jake had become to people touching him. Most of them didn’t want to make contact. It was only the professionals who wanted to examine him, using the royal we to ask how he was doing.
“I didn’t have much of a choice.” Jake remembered how she’d begun. He would have stopped her, but the pain was subsiding and he couldn’t refuse the relief.
“And you think this person you met on the street can fill the job.”
“Not exactly I think she’ll fill your requirement that there is someone here in case of emergency and to make sure I get to appointments on time. And that’s why you get to do the digging.”
“All right,” Cal agreed. “I’ll check her out.”
“Cal.” Jake’s voice held a warning. “Don’t veto her just because she isn’t the nurse or therapy type you usually find.”
“I’ll be as thorough as possible. I don’t want to be leaving you with a stranger who has no credentials.”
“Don’t make that sound like she might have a criminal record.”
“I’ll check that out too,” Cal said as if the thought had just come to him.
Jake knew it hadn’t, but he decided to ignore the comment. When his brother said he’d be thorough, he meant it. Both of them would need to know if she had a criminal record.
“One more thing, Cal. She said she’s leaving the city soon, beginning a career somewhere else. That might be a problem.”
“If all goes well, I’ll contact her to see if she’ll take the job, at least until I return.” Caleb was a consulting engineer on a number of projects and traveled
