Dance With Me (30 page)

What are your physical activity goals for one month? For one year?

His eyes darted around the room as he tried to think of something to write down that would get Tim off his back. He spied a pile of laundry on the edge of the counter, neatly pressed and folded. Laurie had done that. Twice—twice in one week—he'd taken Ed's dirty clothes and brought them back clean. It both touched Ed and made him embarrassed. His eyes passed beyond the laundry to the sink where the dishes had begun to overflow onto the counter. Laurie washed those too, when he came over. And he made dinner, or he ordered it. And Ed's mom was going to the store for him lately.

Did that mean he was depressed?

Ed pushed the paper aside and rose, moving stiffly to the kitchen. He'd do the dishes, in case Laurie still came by.

But at the thought of “in case,” Ed backtracked and cued the stereo up to Britney.

He hummed under his breath as he worked, but his heart wasn't in it. When he finished his chore, his neck hurt, and it was almost seven. Turning Britney up a little louder, Ed went back to the couch and pulled the notebook back into his lap.

What are your physical activity goals for one month? For one year?

Ed grimaced at the paper. What were his goals? To be normal. To play football. To not think about his neck all the damn time. That was what he'd told Tim the time Tim had tried to fill the worksheet out with him. Tim had given him “To not think about his neck all the time” as a fair start, but as the answer for question number four (Where do you want your pain management to be in one month? In one year?), not question one, and only for the year part of the question. And after that, Ed had refused to so much as look at the sheet.

But he was looking at it now.

To be normal enough for Laurie, he thought. But like hell he was writing that down.

Another half hour went by, form still blank, and Laurie had not arrived. Ed shoved the paper away again, got up, and paced. When his head started to pound, he fished the gel pack for his neck brace out of the freezer and strapped it on before lying back on the couch to stare up at the ceiling.

What are your physical activity goals for one month? For one year?

When the door opened, Ed bolted upright, then swore because that hurt his neck like all hell.

Laurie dropped his duffel and the bags in his hand and hurried over. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” Ed snapped, then tried to gentle himself, but it was hard. He ripped off the neck brace and rubbed at his hairline, feeling like one big jagged edge. “You scared me is all. I forgot you had a key.”

“Sorry. Your mom gave it to me, to make things easier. Do...do you want me to give it back?”

Oh fuck. “No.” Ed found Laurie's hand and squeezed it. “Sorry. I'm just—” Cranky.

Depressed.

Because of my chronic pain.

Laurie squeezed his hand back and smiled. It was a shy smile, and it made him look alluring. He also, Ed noticed, looked breathless. Happy.

“Hungry?” Laurie asked, rising. “I brought things to make a steak salad, unless that doesn't sound good to you.”

God, but Ed hated it when Laurie was careful around him. “It's fine.”

Laurie was frowning at the coffee table. “What's that?”

He was looking at Ed's pain-goal sheet. Fuck. Ed scooped it up quickly. “Nothing. Just this thing I have to fill out for PT.”

“I'll just put this together while you finish it, then,” Laurie said, and he headed to the kitchen.

But Ed knew there was no way he'd be able to focus on the sheet with Laurie in the room. He made a pretense of it for a few minutes, balancing the sheet on his knees as he tracked Laurie through the kitchen out of the corner of his eye. He could tell Laurie was forcing himself to look relaxed, just like he had every other day he'd been over the past few weeks. Sometimes he'd glance over at the couch, and Ed knew Laurie was waiting for Ed to give him a clue as to what they were supposed to do now.

That was the problem. Ed had no idea.

Eventually Ed shoved the paper away again, rose, and went to stand at the edge of the kitchen. When Laurie glanced at him, he waited until he held his gaze.

“I'm sorry,” he said gruffly.

Laurie set down the bowl he was holding. “For what?”

“For this. For me. For—” He gave up and leaned his head against the cupboard.

Some of Laurie's guard went down, and he looked relieved. “I thought maybe I'd done something. Am I...am I coming over too much? Doing too much? Too little?”

Jesus. “It's not you!” Ed's hands tightened at his sides. “Fucking hell, Laurie, it's not you. It's nothing to do with you at all.”

“What's wrong?” Laurie asked.

Ed lifted his head and looked at Laurie like he was crazy. “What's wrong?” Anger rose up without warning, and Ed gestured angrily at his neck. “This.
This
is what wrong. I don't want to be like this. At all. But I especially don't want to be like this with you.”

Laurie frowned, looking confused. “What do you mean, with me?”

Ed swore and pushed away from the counter. He paced for a few seconds, then swore again and braced himself against the back of a chair, staring into the living-room area.

“I don't know why the hell you're here,” he said at last. He realized that sounded bad. “I mean—what the hell is good about this, Laur? Even when this settles down, it'll just happen again.” He glared at the pain-goal sheet.
Chronic pain
. Rage swelled inside him, and he stormed over to the table, picked up the worksheet and wadded it up before hurling it across the room. “It's fucking worthless. There's no fucking point.” He wiped a hand over his face and turned away. “And you deserve better than this.”

Ed wanted to call the words back as soon as he said them. He meant them, but he didn't want to say them. He was so confused, so miserable. He watched, rigid, terrified, as Laurie crossed to the paper Ed had hurled across the room. Laurie picked it up and uncrumpled it.

“What does it mean, ‘physical activity goal'?” He looked at Ed, questioning. “What you'd like to be doing in a month?”

“I'm supposed to write down something I can't do now because of the pain but want to do. But it's worthless, because I don't know when it's going to hit or what it's going to do, so I don't know—” He stopped because Laurie had sat down on the couch, picked up the notebook and pen Ed had discarded, and he was writing something down. Ed tried to peer closer to see, but his neck got mad at him, and then he swore. Which made Laurie look up at the clock.

“Have you been taking your meds?”

“What did you write?” Ed tried to take the notebook from him.

Laurie pulled it out of his reach. “
Did you take your meds
?”

“No!” Ed barked. “Now give me my notebook!”

Laurie took the notebook with him as he went to the counter and poured out the pills. “Do you want a Vicodin?”

“No.” Ed sank onto the couch because he was feeling dizzy. “It's not that bad. And I didn't eat enough. I'll feel sick.”

“What about your TENS unit?”

Ed's jaw tightened, and wanted to tell Laurie to fucking leave it alone, but then he thought, Depression.

He forced himself to relax. “I'll take a Vicodin.”

Laurie rose, taking the notebook with him. “Juice or soda?”

“How about a beer?” Ed asked, his tone mocking despite his resolve to be good, but to his surprise, Laurie came back with one and a plate of wicked-good-looking salad with a piece of whole grain bread on the side. When Ed looked at him in surprise, Laurie just smiled.

“You're actually talking to me, telling me what's wrong for a change. I thought it was reason enough to celebrate.”

Ed winced, but not from pain. He took the beer, but it was heavy, weighed down by the pain-goal sheet. “You know, I'm Catholic, so I should know about guilt, but Jesus God, nobody does it quite like you, Laur.”

“Wait until you meet my mother.” Laurie sat down and picked up his notebook again. “So what does the ‘social goal’ mean?”

“What'd you put for the first one?” Ed demanded. When Laurie ignored him, he popped the pills and took a long sip of his beer. “Just what it says. I'm supposed to have a social goal. It's dumb, because I'm not one of those sad sacks who are so wrapped up in their pain that they don't get out. You can cross that one out. Even Tim said so. I swear.”

But Laurie was scribbling again. Ed tried to read it, but it was at an angle, and Laurie was a little too far away.

“What is ‘ADL'?”

“Active daily life goal. Like, be able to do my laundry or something. Something the pain keeps me from. These aren't for me, Laurie. They're stupid. They're for really fucked-up people who are so down about their pain they never leave the house, not for me.”

Laurie, of course, ignored him and wrote anyway. It was starting to piss Ed off. He ate, but he watched Laurie like a hawk while he did so. How the fuck would Laurie know what his goals should be? But he didn't want to be cranky, since that got everybody's underwear in a wad, apparently, so he didn't argue, just sat there, ate, drank his beer, and waited.

Eventually Laurie spoke again. “Pain management. Is that as self-explanatory as it seems?”

“It's supposed to be what kind of pain I want to be feeling in a month and in a year. How I want it to affect me, how I want it to have diminished. But I can't predict it, so—Damn it, Laurie, quit writing! What the fuck is this?”

Laurie didn't look up. “I'm almost done.”

“Laurie!” Ed slammed his beer bottle down. “What—”

But then Laurie set his pen aside, and his notebook too, and he leaned on his knees and looked hard at Ed.

“I know why you don't want to fill it out. I understand. But it doesn't help.”

“What do you understand?” Unable to hold himself back anymore, Ed snapped off the words, but he felt edgy and shaky, like someone was about to pull the blanket off his head and show him the monster.

“I understand,” Laurie said quietly, “that you don't want to fill this out because it means that your injury is real. That it really isn't going to get better. That you really do have to live with it.”

Ed opened his mouth to contradict him, but something caught in his throat, and he couldn't speak. Startled and a little concerned, he swallowed hard and tried to sink back into the couch.

Laurie leaned closer and caught his hand. “Ed, the way out isn't by denial. The way out is figuring out a new set of goals. Like this says.”

Laurie had pulled the blanket off, yes. So why did Ed feel like he was suffocating?

“I can't play football,” he whispered.

Laurie squeezed his hand. “I know. But there are other things you can do. Other things you can enjoy.” He faltered, just a little, as he reached for the notebook and passed it over. “I wrote a few things down. Just ideas. Obviously you don't have to keep any of them, but I thought—” He cut himself off, let go of Ed's hand, sat back, and waited.

Ed turned over the notebook and looked down at what Laurie had written.

Physical goal, one month: Dance the basic steps of the Argentine tango with evenness and precision. (Alternate goal: Learn the entirety of a rumba routine.)

Physical goal, one year: Master at least four basic ballroom dances. (Alternate: Learn the advanced steps of the Argentine tango.)

Social goal, one month: Attend game or practice or event where football is happening. (Not necessary to feel okay with it. Just need to be there.)

Social goal, one year: Attend game of former team and cheer them on, knowing you are participating still and that they still value you as a team member.

Active daily life goal, one month: Regularly take breaks at work as Tim has said you should and do the stretches for your neck like you're supposed to.

Active daily life goal, one year: Find job better suited to both your injury and your talent.

Pain goal, one month: Be good about exercise and therapy so that in one month the pain is back in remission.

Pain goal, one year: Learn to listen to your injury so that when flare-ups happen, you know how to take care of them. Learn what exercise helps and hurts, and be honest about it. Learn to find the way to do the activities you want to do but in a way that respects your injury.

Ed hadn't realized he was still staring at the paper, not even seeing it, not until Laurie put his hand on his leg again. “Ed?”

But Ed couldn't talk. He felt overwhelmed—moved, sad, angry, terrified, grateful. He felt like he was dying and being reborn all at once. Nothing about football at all on there. Nothing. Just the hanging out with the team, which was hell.

So much dancing. All of it with Laurie.

For weeks he'd been pushing Laurie away, trying to make this easier on himself. On Laurie too. As he sat there now, staring down at his pain-goal sheet, filled out at last, filled out by Laurie—Laurie, who hadn't left him, no matter what kind of asshat he'd been—for a second, Ed didn't know how to respond. At last, though, he picked up the pen and held it, hand shaking, over the paper. On the line beneath the pain goals Laurie had written, he added a goal of his own.

Goal, four hours: Make love to Laurie.

He loved the way Laurie laughed—quiet, soft but open. He also liked the way Laurie's hand slid over his thigh.

“Are you cleared?” Laurie asked, his hand brushing against Ed's groin.

Ed swallowed hard, hating how nervous he was. “He said I should play it by ear.”

“And?”

Ed hesitated. “It's coming that's the trouble. You tighten up like all fuck before you come, and you get full of adrenaline and think you're Superman. And then later you pay the piper. I'm probably okay.” He grimaced. “But I really don't want to find out I'm not.”

Laurie took his hand, lacing his fingers through it. He leaned in close, brushing a kiss against Ed's cheek. Ed closed his eyes.

“We could take it slow. Easy,” Laurie whispered.

“I don't want easy,” Ed replied, but his voice was rough. Laurie's breath on his ear was doing really interesting things to his dick.