In Case of Heartbreak

10 | amend

C H A P T E R 1 0 | D E A N

Watching Katie break down that night was heartbreaking. From the first night that I'd met her she always appeared to be strong and independent – striving for success as though nothing could get in her way.

But that was why you could never judge a book by their cover.

Katie was strong and she was independent, but she hadn't been given the choice to be that way – it'd been forced onto her when her mom fell ill to cancer. Not on purpose, but that was just the way the cards fell, and she'd learned to live with it. There was a wall she'd built up over the years to protect others from seeing her inner agony and bouts of loneliness, and somehow, I'd stumbled across the boundaries and discovered who she truly was.

A myriad of emotions had struck as I kept her close to me the night her past had come out. With her eyes shut and the remnants of tears staining her rose coloured cheeks, I blocked out the soft lull of the television as her words looped in my mind. She was losing her mom. She was fighting and she was scared, and seeing her like that had shifted my perspective on my own injury.

I had the ability to get better, and while things may begin to shift in my life, I still had my family. I had a life that I could build up from the wreckage, but from the way that Katie spoke, it seemed like her mom didn't have much hope left.

The worry that I'd pushed her too far – that I'd made her uncomfortable – had been at the forefront of my mind, especially when I awoke the next morning to see that she'd disappeared. Panic set in immediately, and as I struggled into my chair, banging around the room, Ryan was quick to stop me. He told me that she'd slipped out in a hurry, that she had another early shift at the hospital, and though it made my fear subside slightly, the text message that came through later that afternoon was what curbed my concern fully.

Thank you.

She wasn't keeping me at a distance, and for that I was thankful.

As the days passed Katie didn't bring up her mom again, though I could tell from her eyes when she'd been to see her. Whether they were guarded with thinly-veiled sadness after talking to her mother's doctors or shining with happiness after seeing her mom awake, I was there to offer her my silent support.

With my thoughts preoccupied by a certain blonde, time seemed to speed up. With a will to focus, I managed to catch up with my classes before my midterms started at the beginning of October, and because I was getting used to having to maneuver around in my chair, I was less bothered than I should have been when my doctor kept pushing back my appointments to give me a better opportunity to heal.

By the time the autumn-coloured leaves had begun falling from the trees, six weeks had passed since my accident, and I was sitting in an observation room, hopeful but non-expectant as my doctor entered.

"Dean," he nodded his head in acknowledgement, jotting down a note before slipping his pen into the pocket of his white coat, "How are you today?"

"Pretty good," I replied indifferently, shrugging my shoulders, "All things considering."

The ghost of a smile pulled at his lips. "Well then, I guess I'll just cut to the chase." He paused, paging one of the nurses as he flipped through the pages on his clipboard. "After looking over your physiotherapy progress and mirroring it to the results from your most recent tests, I can safely say that your ACL and meniscus seem to be healing greatly. Your bones have more or less healed, but because of the severity of your injury, I can't advise that you put much weight on your leg just yet."