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THWOK!
The rubber ball smacked against the concrete wall and bounced back to her. Aubrey caught it in her scarred hand, her grip still awkward. Despite the uncooperative muscles—and the pain transmitted from her sensitive nerves—she felt a growing confidence.
She’d been doing these exercises, at Doc’s firm insistence, for several weeks now. She refused to give up, no matter how much it hurt.
Aubrey knew she was making progress, even without Doc’s daily examinations. Her grip was stronger, her aim better. Her wrist and elbow continued to protest, but her strength was increasing. Slow yet sure.
And it’s good for your eye-hand coordination, Aubs. She reared back for another throw. Everything’s still a little blurry, but not as bad as before.
She remembered her trepidation when the bandages were removed. She’d been secretly afraid, despite Doc’s assurances to the contrary, that her eyes were irreparably damaged and she’d be functionally blind.
Doc and Sheila had gently bathed away the sticky goo they’d put over her eyes during her convalescence. Something Doc had concocted from various natural ingredients, Sheila said.
When Aubrey forced her eyes open again, she realized her fears were unfounded. She wasn’t blind, although her blurry vision fed her anxiety until it cleared.
It took several days of slow, patient work to focus without developing a splitting headache. Or to not flinch away from bright lights. Doc promised her this was normal, and the subsequent days proved she was right.
Aubrey’s brief elation changed as she faced the long road to regaining full use of her arm. As her eyesight improved, the swath of bandages, extending from above her elbow to her fingertips, became a new source of apprehension.
She’d held her breath when the bandages finally came off, dreading the first glimpse of her wounds. Aubrey had never thought of herself as vain, but the prospect of seeing the full extent of the damage was suffocating.
Just as she’d feared, her forearm was an ugly mass of ridged scar tissue under the bandages. Her hand was a grotesque mockery of its former self, and her fingers would require a great deal of ongoing treatment to regain anything close to their former mobility.
Aubrey did her best to put on a brave face in front of Doc and Sheila. After they left, she curled into a fetal position on the gurney and wept.
Exhaustion ushered her into a fitful sleep, where she dreamed Jane-the-Snake was one of the Soul-less, chasing her through the sewers, red-encircled eye ablaze.
She awoke the next morning with one of her headaches, and stared at her arm with a seething mixture of loathing and outrage. She held her tears at bay with an effort, feeling the burning sensation on her eyelids as she forced herself to look at her arm without flinching.
And she made her decision.
Thwok! The ball stung the palm of her hand.
She’d discovered a stubborn determination as, under Doc’s careful supervision, the rehab worked its slow restoration.
She threw the ball again, this time with her left hand, and deftly snatched it out of mid-air as it returned with equal force. She’d also become quite ambidextrous as the weeks progressed.
Even the pain is less. Aubrey smiled as she mentally tallied the signs of progress. Although I’ve come to like the pain—it lets me know the nerves in my hand are alive and well.
She adapted to the daily exercise routine and the painful massages administered by Doctor Simon. She could tell when Doc was pleased with her progress, and the scars were gradually losing their power to repel. She began to view them with a twisted sort of pride.
Battle scars, that’s what they are. I’m a survivor.
Her left foot was well on its way to complete healing, although if she jammed it down too abruptly, she was rewarded with a knot of pain in her heel.
You cut into a high-voltage wire, young lady. Doc would patiently remind her whenever she complained about it. The electricity had to exit your body somewhere.
She hobbled around with a cane at first, but for the past couple of weeks, she’d stubbornly refused to use it. No matter how stiff and uncooperative her scarred fingers were, she forced them—day by day—to bend to her will.
Or, at first, to bend at all.
I’ve got to toughen up. Nobody’s telling me anything, but I can see it in their eyes, hear it in their voices. Something big is brewing.
Her face contorted into a scowl as she hammered the ball into the opposite wall. Left hand throw, right hand catch. Now reverse. And reverse again.
I will not be the weak link.