Esperansa- (the re-write)

A Step at a Time

Chapter three

The life of a hospital inpatient is tediously boring; Spending the entire day watching the TV or sleeping off the end of the coma. On several occasions other members of the family would come to visit me.  Bella brought Nessie to along with her hand-made get well soon card.  Little Renesmee first words were to as why I had been asleep for so long. Esme would often come to see me for an afternoon when Jasper couldn’t. She told me about her plans of returning to college to do childcare or teaching. Even Rosalie turned up, showing of the little bump that had begun to grow between her hips.

Even with my visitors it was boring. A month after I first woke up I was awake almost the entire day, although I did still require much more sleep than the average adult.

Routine blood tests were also beginning to prove I was staying awake an obviously my brain activity had increased to normal levels. I could talk and move most of my body; a physiotherapist was helping me communicate with my lower body again.

The therapist was called Vicki, she spoke quietly and always apologies when one of her exercises caused me pain. Vicki was in seeing me on the last day off my fifth month in hospital.  I had been able to feed myself and had long since became capable of holding and moving objects but I, till that point had never been allowed from my bed.

“I think,” she told me the afternoon of the May 26th, “you might be ready to start testing your legs again,” she said in her mouse voice.

Part of me wanted to jump up and down, screaming for my freedom, the thought that I could get up and move again, to be able to dance once more. I had felt like a fish trapped out of water, I couldn’t breathe without the use of my feet. This was what I had been waiting for.

“I’d rather we didn’t test you today since your muscles have already been used quite a lot but tomorrow morning we’ll take you to the gym and give you a first try on the bars.” She smiled before leaving me alone with Mandy once more.

Over my time in hospital I had got to know a lot about Mandy. She had told me about her husband and two grown-up children and about her pet dog Russet, who she adored. Mandy was a lovely woman to spend time with, I had missed her when she had taken a two week holiday to Florida a few weeks ago-I’d missed the buzz of her bubbly personality and the warbling of her occasional song.

The following morning couldn’t come fast enough; I was delighted when eventually it arrived. Jasper arrived just before nine, before I was to be taken to the gym for my first walking physio.

I was excited when he arrived and mentioned the day’s events, what lay ahead was the beginning of the end, the beginning of going home a getting back to normality. Jasper barely had a chance to say hello before a porter arrived with a wheelchair to take me down to the gym. The porter never said a word to either of us, just grunted when he put the brake on the chair which, with a little help from Jasper just to steady my arm, I climbed into.

Having someone push you from behind is a strange experience, you yourself moving forward without even thinking about it and not having to move your feet at all. It was a different experience from being in a car because in a car you are enclosed by sheet metal and leather upholstery, in a wheelchair you are open to everything and even closer to the ground than normal.

We were taken through so many hallways even my more than average human brain was confused, we went down in a huge lift then through  multitude of other corridors- this time they were all a healthy salad green color. Eventually I spotted the signs saying rehabilitation gymnasium- you’d think they could cut it down even a little.

Vicki met us at the doors and took charge of my wheelchair from the porter who gave another ape-like grunt before stalking off.

The doors were opened to reveal a big light blue room. The room had wooden bars running up the wall on the far side to the far left there was a ramp with wooden bars on either side, these were not secured to the ground but closer to the center there was another area with waist height bars on either side, just wide enough for someone of more than average weight to fit through. Around the outside were countless other bits of equipment walking frames, crutches, balance balls, even things that just looked like children’s toys.