NOTE:-------> Kadence's knee brace, the protective knee cap part will soon be taken off, but she'll have to wear the brace still.
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Not being able to carry my own books, drive my car, play basketball, and more has been killing me for 2 weeks. I know I’ve gained some weight, because I can’t do anything anymore. I feel so helpless. It’s all because that stupid girl let the anger grow fond of her. Both my mom and dad didn’t like that and talked to her parents about it. They told me that the girl started to break down and cry about it. I wish I only saw it with my own eyes.
But now I’m here at the hospital getting physical therapy to know how to walk the right way, how to do a lot of things that involve my knee.
“Okay, Kadence, this is your knee brace.” The physical therapist says holding the knee brace. She puts it on me securely and I begin to feel weird having it on me. I put my foot down on the ground. “Looks complicated.” I joke around. She laughs at my joke.
“What I need you to do is I need you to gently rotate your leg in circles, but very slowly.”
I move my left leg in circles slowly and I swallow hard as my knee hurts a little.
“Now move your leg forward and backwards.”
I try moving my leg forward and backwards, but it feels weird to do so I stop. She looks at me. “What’s going on?” She asks.
“It just feels weird.” I say.
“It will for a little while.” She says and places her hands under my calf. She moves it forward and backwards slowly making sure she doesn’t hurt me. I cringe to the weird feeling of my knee. I let her do that for a little bit until I get use to it.
“Okay, now try to stand up. You might feel weird, because you haven't stood up in 2 weeks.”
I grab onto a railing that’s attached to the wall next to my chair, and I stand up slowly placing my foot firmly onto the ground. I hold onto the railing.
“Do you think you could try walking for me?” She asks.
I nod my head and let go of the railing. I take a small step forward starting to walk towards the other end of the room. I feel my knee doing weird things as I walk. “Oh, Jesus.” I say quietly letting out a small breath.
“You’re doing great, Kadence.”
I feel like a little baby learning how to walk for the first time. It doesn’t feel right to me, but it’s better than being stuck in a cast 24/7 that ends up stinking too.
“This feels really weird.” I say.
“It will. Before you turn around make sure you don’t put a lot of pressure on your knee, okay?”
I nod my head and start to turn around. I place my foot firmly on the ground again, I start to feel my knee give out so I grab onto the railing leaning against it.
“Are you okay?” She says running up to me. She places one of her hands on my back and the other on my arm.
“Yes. I just have to get use to this.”
And so an hour of spending with this physical therapist, I ended up putting a lot of strain on my knee, but I kept walking and trying to get use to it. I’m still going to have to come back here for another week to be examined by her to see if I get any better. I’m hoping I’ll be able to play basketball again sometime soon. The doctor didn’t say I COULDN’T play sports, but I should take it easy. I’m definitely going to play sports.
I wait for Aiden to pick me up outside of the hospital. She was given the Nissan Altima her grandmother had about a week ago. Her dad was let out of jail a while back and he’s been living at her grandparents’ house who’s the mother and father of her mom.
She pulls into the “outpatient” lane and parks the car. She leans over and opens the door for me from the inside. I get inside slowly making sure I don’t hurt my knee. I shut the door and when I do she kisses my cheek. “How’d it go?” She asks.
“It didn’t feel too good to walk again. I think I’ll get use to it though.” I say in a positive manner and smile at her. She drives off taking me home.
“Do you want me to stay at your house with you for a while?”
“No, you can’t take care of two people. I want you to take care of your dad.” I say honestly and stare at her.
She places her hand on my thigh and rubs it slowly. It makes me feel comfortable and forget the pain I’m feeling from my knee. I place my hand on hers and rub my thumb on it slowly. I lean my head against the headrest and stare down at our hands. It’s an unusual time to be thinking of it, but I begin to think of doing sexual things with her. We’ve been together for about 4 months, and I never thought of it really. I zone out of reality thinking and imagining naughty things with her, but soon I snap myself out of it.
“I’ll see you tomorrow at school.” She says when she opens the door to the car for me. I get out and move out of the way so she can shut the door. I kiss her lips gently longing to keep them there for longer, but I pull away.
“I love you, Aiden.”
“I love you too, Kadence. Be careful and take care of yourself.” She says staring in my eyes.
“I will.” I smile at her. She gives me one last quick kiss. She walks away and gets into her car and I walk away going inside of my house. I shut the front door behind me, and walk over to the couch where Michael is watching TV. I plop down on the couch letting out a groan. I take a deep breath finally being able to rest.
“What is that alienated thing on your knee?” He stares at it weirdly and won’t take his eyes off of it.
I stare back and forth at him and the knee brace. “My knee brace.”
“Never seen one before. But how did physical therapy go?”
I shake my head and groan again. “I hated it.”
He moves his head up which means “okay” and he won’t go any further in the conversation. I scoot down on the couch and I lay my left leg on the couch and let my other one hang off the side of the couch placing my foot on the ground. I push a pillow behind my head and watch TV. I can’t help but to feel anxious, because I’m lying here doing nothing. The day I get to be active will make me so happy.
“She’s asleep, but come on in.” I barely hear my mom talking as I begin to wake up from taking a nap on the couch. I turn my head facing the back of the couch. I don’t care if whoever is in our house sees me lying here with my hair all messed up. I try to fall back to sleep, but I feel a hand shaking my shoulder. I open my eyes and look at my mom.
“Someone’s here to see you, honey.”
I stretch my arms out mumbling as I do and I close my eyes. I yawn opening my eyes back up.
“Who?” I ask with my tired voice.
My mom walks away going somewhere in the house revealing a girl holding flowers that was standing behind her. It’s Dakota, the point-guard that knocked me over, and made me end up in this situation. She looks at me and I realize how nervous she looks. Her legs are close together and it looks like she keeps gripping onto the glass vase that holds the flowers.
“Um, I-“ Her voice has some shakiness to it. Does she really have something to say to me?
“I, here.” She holds out the vase with the flowers. I watch as her hand shakes while holding it.
“Put it on the table there before you drop it.” I say pointing at the coffee table in front of the couch I’m laying on. She puts the vase down on the table and starts fettling with her fingers. I shake my head. “Sit down.” I start to raise my body up.
“No, no, please don’t move.” She says in a nice tone. I raise my eyebrow and stop moving. I relax my body and watch as she sits down beside of my foot that’s on the couch. She stares at her fingers as she continues to fettle with them. Finally, she looks at me with tears formed in her eyes.
“I’m sorry. I’ve felt so bad about this that I haven’t been able to sleep a lot lately. I can’t stop thinking about this horrible thing I caused to happen to you. I was so stupid-“
I raise my hand up making her stop. She’s talking so fast I can’t understand much of what she’s saying.
“Could you speak slower, please?”
She repeats the same thing she said and this time slower, and she continues where I interrupted her at.
“I was so stupid. What I did will never be tolerable and I will never give an excuse-“
I interrupt her again. “Tell me your excuse.”
She opens her mouth looking for words to say. “Um,-“
“I was just having a bad day.”
“That’s it? Come on, you could give a better excuse than that.” I joke around trying to lighten up her mood.
She gives a blank expression not sure if she should laugh or be upset.
“It’s okay to laugh.” I re-assure her.
This time she lets out a small chuckle and stares at her hands. “So, um, what did the doctor say?”
I lean up and I turn my body placing my feet on the ground. I press my back against the back of the couch.
“She said that I broke my knee cap. She said that she doesn’t like the fact that I play sports, but with this knee brace I can still do active things. I have to be careful though or I won’t be able to walk again.” I look at Dakota.
“It’s all my fault…” Her voice starts to break as if she’s going to cry.
“Some of it is my fault too. I shouldn’t have played when I knew my knee was hurting already. It’s always been my bad knee, and during school the day of the game I tripped up the stairs-“ I pause laughing at myself a bit. “I fell up the stairs and landed on my bad knee.”
“Are you mad at me?” She asks shyly.
“Yes, it’s a burden knowing that even when I take this knee brace off I might not be able to walk again if I break something. Everyone makes mistakes though and I hope you’ll learn from this mistake and never do it again. Over time I’ll forgive and forget.”
“Okay, I should probably get home now.”
She stands up about to head for the door, and I stand up to walking with her to the door. I face her and lean in hugging her. “It was a good step to come and see me to apologize, so thank you for that.” I say. She hugs me back but quickly let’s go and puts her hand on the doorknob. “You’re welcome. I’ll, uh, see you around.” She says. She opens the door and walks herself out. I shut the door behind her and take a deep breath. I’m too nice to people. I should have screamed in her face or something like Aiden did, but I could tell she’ll regret this for the rest of her life.
“Where did that bitch go?!” Michael says loudly coming down the stairs quickly.
“Michael!” I yell at him. “Leave her alone, she came over here and apologized. I’m the only one that should be mad at her and don’t call her a bitch.”
I stare at my softball bat that he has been holding. I slap my hand on my forehead shaking my head.
“Should I ask why you have my softball bat?” I remove my hand from my forehead staring at him.
“No.”
I roll my eyes and walk to him. I grab the bat from him. “Never touch my bat.” I glare at him. He looks at me afraid and tries to go around me, but I step in front of him. He tries going the other way and I step in front of him again. I laugh as he becomes agitated over it. I finally move out of the way, and he goes to the couch. I walk upstairs as I hold onto the railing.
“Are you okay, Kadence?” My mom asks as she comes down the stairs.
“Yes. I’ll make it up here on my own.”
She continues to walk down the stairs on the other side as I walk up the stairs. Once at the top of the stairs I feel like I ran out of breath or something. I walk into my room and set my bat down where I had it. I plop down on my bed snuggling up to my freshly cleaned, comfy pillows. I realize I still have a knee brace on so I take it off and lay it on the floor next to my bed.
I’m just gonna fall asleep in my school clothes.
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