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Physical therapy was absolute hell.
If constantly tasting my own blood from biting my lip so hard in frustration was a form of therapy then fuck, I'd been cured about twenty times. But those months feeling like the dirt on the bottom of everyones' boots, with barely anyone coming to see me in the hospital, with the therapists as the only people asking if I was okay for weeks. That was rock bottom.
Which is what therapy started to feel like.
An endless cesspool. Pain, more pain. A bit of relief. Clapping when I could move my arm over my head. And me, feeling like a monkey that really deserved more of a treat for putting up with all those experiments.
If it wasn't the lowest point in my life, it probably wouldn't have been as bad as it seems when I look back. When I think about trying to be optimistic to just be able to move normally after a hit that could have left me paralyzed.
A little more to the left and about twenty centimeters down. Spine would have taken the hit. No movement would have come from my legs again. And fuck, I probably should have been relieved while they got my body back to health. I should have cried tears of relief instead of wanting to throw things against the wall.
Maybe I really am just selfish. Because a part of me - sitting in the therapy room - not being able to breathe properly while my fingers spasmed through an episode, wished that maybe the hit had just taken me out.
Physical therapy was the worst of hell for me.
But this, sitting in a room full of mostly elderly people with a paintbrush clasped awkwardly between all my fingers, is a little better than that.
"Jesus, Ty," Franny sighs, grabbing my hand as she stops beside where I'm sitting in the back of the numerous semi-circles of easels. She unclasps my fingers and rolls her eyes. "Do you even know how to hold a pencil? Hold the paintbrush the same."
I huff and shift the way I'm holding the intimidatingly large brush. She non-so-gently moves my thumb into a more comfortable position and grins, nose scrunching up.
"There, perfect," she says, admiring her work before glancing around the room. It's a back room in the recreation centre and the walls are covered in artwork and community postings. The fluorescent lights are absolute annihilation to my eyes but if I can put up with the bright yellow brick walls of this place then I can put up with horrendous lighting.
Most of the people in this art class are already in the room, picking a stool to sit at which has an easel perched directly in front. The majority are on the elderly side but there is a group of what appears to be middle aged women chatting and setting up in the front row. There is a bottle of wine in one of their hands and I raise an eyebrow at Franny.
