Chapter Fifteen
As I look out the window, I hear the door shut. I just kicked my mom and Chatty out because I can’t let them see me break. And I do, I fuckin’ break. I cry, sob, and wail because of the news that just got delivered by my doctor. His words replay over and over in my head.
There is a possibility that you could walk again, but it is going to be a long process. I’m sorry, Mr. Williams.
I scream in rage at the top of my lungs, and a nurse comes barreling through the door. “Are you okay?”
She immediately starts trying to check me over. I don’t want her fuckin’ touching me. “Get out!” My eyes cut to hers, and she freezes.
Trying to help her get to fuckin’ moving, I hit the bedside table, knocking all of the contents onto the floor, along with knocking the table over. It makes a loud thud as it crashes to the floor. I said, “Get the fuck out!” Shock and fear play in her features as she scurries out of the room.
Goddamnit! How do I deal with this shit? I’m fuckin’ paralyzed and I may never walk again.
Flashes come and go of shit I’ll never be able to do: ride my Harley; stand at the alter waiting for Chatty as she walks towards me in her white dress; run around, playing with our kids. Fresh tears spring up, and another wave of emotion takes over. I cry until I fall asleep from the exhaustion this day has brought—and the pain medication I got earlier probably helped fuel my drowsiness, too.
*****
I’m woken up several times throughout the night because of the nurses checking my vitals, checking and changing the bandages on my wounds, and emptying my piss out of the catheter bag. I won’t even go into detail on how I have to shit, but just know it is fuckin’ humiliating and it’s fuckin’ embarrassing having to have someone clean my ass. More shit I have to deal with, and it’s not easy.
They insert my pain medication into the IV and I would fall back to sleep quickly. I’m brought food for breakfast and lunch; I tried to eat, but hospital food is tasteless shit. After my little stunt yesterday, I think the nurses are a little scared to come in here, but they do their job, ask the needed questions, and get the fuck back out.
The door opens, and I think that it might be another nurse, but it’s not. “Hey.” Chatty speaks quietly; walking to the side of my bed, she takes a seat. She smiles and tries to take my hand, but I pull it away. Lookin’ at her beautiful face, I know what I gotta do. It tears me apart, but it needs to be done.
“What are you doin’ here? I told you to leave yesterday.” I’m void of emotion; it’s the only way I can go through with this.
“I know, but I wanted to come see how you were.” Chatty’s lips tilt up a little, giving me a small smile.
“You need to leave and not come back. I don’t want you here.” Her face scrunches up like I physically punched her in the gut. I gotta keep going. “This is all your fuckin’ fault why I’m here, if I wouldn’t have had to chase your ass down, then I’d be walkin’ around the club right now.”
All color drains from her pretty face, and tears cascade down her pale cheeks. “Gunner, I’m sorry.” She sobs, covering her mouth with her hand.
“Little too late for sorry, don’t’cha think?” Fuck, this is tearing me apart. I know I’m breaking her heart, but I have no choice. I can’t expect her to hang around, takin’ care of me, when she could find someone else and have a full, happy life with them. I can’t have her be with me out of regret or because she thinks she has to. I can’t have her takin’ care of me like the invalid I am. But the thought of her being with someone else makes me want to destroy shit all over again. Somehow I manage to keep my cool, and don’t show her one ounce of emotion.
“Gunner.” Chatty’s hands cover her face now, shoulders shaking while the sobs rack through her.
“Just leave, Chatty, and don’t come back.”
Rage washes over her, her eyes connect with mine, and the anger is palpable. “Really, Gunner? Are you fucking kidding me?” She seethes. “You spew all this fucking bullshit about love and wanting me as yours. Now, the first chance you get to throw it away, you do. Since when did you become a quitter, when did you stop fighting?”
“Chatty…”
She points her finger at me. “You shut up. I’ve heard you talk—it’s my fucking turn. You pushed and pushed and fucking pushed me and I fell for it, I handed you over everything you wanted and now you wanna throw it back in my face and take the easy way out.” Her rapid breathing is making her chest heave up and down.
“Easy? You think this is easy for me?” I roar in her direction. “You’re not the one lying in this bed and can’t fuckin’ move your legs. I’m helping you!”
“Helping me?” Chatty humorlessly laughs. “Fuck you! You want me to leave, fine. I’ll fucking leave, but remember, Gunner, while you are sitting here being angry in that bed: at least you’re fucking alive and here and not dead six feet under the ground. And that’s exactly where I thought you were gonna be. So be angry and mad all you want, but I’m fucking grateful your ass lived.” She pushes through the door, leaving me speechless at her words.
*****
2 days later
It’s day four of being in the hospital. I’m already sick of fuckin’ lyin’ around, not able to do shit. Chatty hasn’t been back since I ripped out her heart and stomped on it. I realize I threw away everything I ever wanted; I made her fall in love with me and then dropped her when this happened, but I did it for her own good, and one day she’ll understand. She may hate me, but I’m okay with that if it means that she can get over me. I miss her so fuckin’ much, though, and that’s just one more fuckin’ thing I’m gonna have to deal with.
When I sleep at night, dreams come to me about Ripper and my father. They seem so real it makes me question if they are dreams at all. I wake up feeling their presence, smelling the scent of oil, leather, and their distinct colognes, which I haven’t smelled since they died. They give me a sense of peace, but when I’m thrown back into reality and the truth of my situation, I’m instantly angry again. Depression is starting to take root deep inside of me, and at times I scare myself with the darkness I feel.
My mom and Mark come every evening to see me and she ripped me a new asshole for what I did to Chatty. I didn’t tell her why and I won’t; she’ll try to change my mind and tell me I’m being ridiculous. What’s done is done, and so is the damage.
My mom finally let it go after Mark told her to drop it; he could see the expression I was sportin’ and knew we needed a change in subject. Dude gained some points with me on that one, and after it was dropped, Chatty’s name hasn’t been mentioned since. I’d like to keep it that way. It hurts just thinking about her, which I already do every waking moment.
All of my brothers and the prospects, except for Tink, come on a daily basis to visit. Any mention of that day, who did it, or what has been done and I’m shot down completely. I know they aren’t talkin’ for a reason, but I’m not sure why. It might be they don’t think I’m ready to hear, that they are waiting until I’m released, or that they don’t have answers for me. Whatever the reason, I will find out.
“Are you ready to get moved, Mr. Williams?” One of my regular nurses comes into the room with a smile on her face. Since that first day, they haven’t had any more trouble from me, and I think they were starting to warm up to me a little.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” Another nurse walks into the room behind the first, pushing a wheelchair. I am being moved to the in-hospital rehabilitation wing today, and my physical therapy will start.
She grabs the controller for the bed and pushes the button so that it lowers. “Can you sit yourself up, using the side-handle right here?” She taps on the side bar of the bed. I try, but I don’t have the strength to make it up very far and I fall back down, my head hitting the pillow. “Let’s try again.” This time, she helps me by supporting my shoulders with one arm and rotating my legs with the other. Now sitting up, I feel a little lightheaded from lying down for so long. “We are going to transfer you from the bed to the wheelchair. On the count of three.” Both nurses move close, lift my arms, and wrap one of their arms around mine. With their other arm, they each bend a little and place it under my legs. “One. Two. Three.” I am lifted off the bed, turned, and placed in the wheelchair.
Reading the nametags they are wearing, I learn their names. Brittney, the first nurse, gets behind the wheelchair, preparing to push. Chelsea, the other nurse, walks to the door and opens it for us. We go onto the elevator and down a few floors. I’m taken to my new room and a woman is waiting inside. She looks older, mid-forties maybe, with her dark hair pulled back and black scrubs on.
“This is Jane; she’s your occupational therapist,” Brittney tells me before saying her goodbyes and leaving me in the wheelchair.
“Mr. Williams, it’s nice to meet you.” Jane has a kind smile, and she holds out her hand for me to shake, so I do.
“Nice to meet you too, Jane.”
“So, let’s get to it.” She looks down at the chart in her lap and goes over whatever it says before meeting my eyes. “You will be here for a few weeks before being released to go home. My purpose here is to evaluate your range of motion, strength, coordination, dexterity, functional muscle use, balance, transfers, and level of independence. From your chart, it says you have no feeling below the hip area, so we will start off slow. Right now I will just report back to physical therapy to start with range of motion. Over the next couple of weeks, you will grow stronger and a full evaluation will take place before you go home. I am going to take you over to the physical therapy room, and tomorrow morning we will start with your ADLs.”
My brows furrow. “What is ADLs?”
“Activities of daily living: dressing, bathing, and then, before you go home, we will work on home management and functional mobility.” Jane stands from the bed and comes behind the wheelchair to push me.
“Okay.” It’s all a lot to take in, but a shower sounds real fuckin’ nice right now. I’m startin’ to smell myself, and it’s not pleasant.
When we get to the physical therapy room, Jane tells me that Sean, the therapist, will be in shortly, and she leaves me to look around the room. It’s a large room, with a set of parallel bars in one corner, a couple of exercising bikes that look like the handles move, and shelves with different sizes of medicine balls. An assortment of colored ribbons hang on the wall, different sizes of weights are lined up on other shelves, and there is a lot of other shit in here that I don’t know what it is.
“Mr. Williams, I’m Sean, your physical therapist.”
I know that voice, but what the fuck? He’s a physical therapist? His hand is stuck out for me to shake, until he sees my face. Then, it drops, as does he. Sitting down on the bench in front of me, he questions, “Gunner?”
“Spike.” I use his road name back at him. “Didn’t know you did this.” Spike is one of the patched-in members of the Cobras. He’s one we wish we could have taken from Snake, but it’s against club rules for a patched member to switch over to a different club.
He lifts his pant leg and reveals a fake leg that I didn’t even know he had. “Second tour in Iraq. Had to do time doing therapy and wanted to help other people.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal.
“How’d you cope?” I ask, feeling like I’m not alone for the first time in four days.
“It took a lot of time; went through the anger, depression, and all that, until I came to terms with it. You ready to get started? We will start slow, just starting with some range of motion exercises.”
He grips my left leg with one hand and my foot with the other. I watch his every move as Spike lifts my leg, bringing it up to my waist then back down. He repeats the process ten times before moving to the other leg.
When that’s done, he goes back to the left and begins pulling my leg out straight, doing ten reps of that exercise as well. After my right leg is done, he walks to another area of the room, where he grabs some of the weights and brings them back over. He has me do multiple exercises with the weights, using my arm muscles, and by the time I’m done I’m out of breath and exhausted.
“We are done for today, but I’ll see you the same time tomorrow, yeah?”
“Yeah.” He wheels me back to my room, where a new nurse helps him transfer me into bed and I spend the rest of the evening watching meaningless television before falling asleep.