Chapter 1

“Look, Jenny, there is no easy way to say this ... I think we should take some time...”

The girl in the wheelchair with a sad expression on her face just nodded, as if she expected the bad news. Her sister, Kara, wasn’t so understanding.

“Are you breaking up with my sister because she’s in a wheelchair, Gordon? You’re a scum of the worst kind!” she spat on the boy’s face.

Jenny fought the tears and raised her hand to stop her sister, “Kara, you’re not helping.”

“I want this piece of shit to feel a bit of the pain you are feeling,” Kara said, swinging the pink baseball bat in her hand.

“Your sister is right about me, Jenny. I wish I was a better man, but I’m not,” Gordon said, to no one in particular. “I wish I was a braver one.”

Jenny squeezed her eyes shut, hoping that would help keep the tears in, but it was a losing battle.

“You’ll get no arguments from me! You’re not worthy of Jenny’s heart!” Kara spat on Gordon’s face, getting in his face. “Go! My sister needs a real man in her life, not a shallow-has-been-wannabe!”

“You’re right, Kara. Nothing you can say could be worse than what I told myself when I made this decision,” Gordon shook his head. “I’m sorry, but I can’t deal with you being in a wheelchair and what comes with it, Jenny. I see no future for us.”

“You’re such a low life! One day, bad karma is going to hit you and you’ll regret this decision!” Kara kept screaming.

“Kara, please stop it! Could you give us some privacy?” Jenny pleaded. She just wanted everything to be over.

“Fine! I’ll be in my room smashing balls with my bat,” she pointed at Gordon’s crotch with her bat and stormed out of the living room.

“I’m sorry about my sister. She is very protective of me after what happened.”

“It’s okay, Jenny. I understand.”

Jenny was silent, collecting her thoughts for a while, and then she said, “I can’t lie and say it doesn’t hurt, but truth is, Gordon, I don’t blame you. I’m not sure if roles would be reversed if I wouldn’t make the same decision you did.”

Gordon nodded, somehow relieved.

“I should have never climbed into that car. I knew James was in no condition to drive, but I did it anyway,” Jenny went on, almost talking to herself. “We had no designated driver either.”

“It was prom night. We were celebrating. We were all as drunk as James,” Gordon said. “We made a bunch of bad decisions that night. Sadly, James paid with his life, and you...” his words trailed off.

Jenny moved her head up and down slowly.

“James hit that curve too fast, the car went one way, and the road went another. I woke up in a hospital bed unable to feel my legs,” Jenny’s voice trailed off.

Jenny couldn’t remember many specific details of the accident, but the fear she felt that day was still crystal clear in her memory. She still had nightmares that made her scream and wake up, covered in sweat.

First, came the beeping. Then, a low humming sound and some clicking noises like an old dot-matrix printer might make. Jenny opened her eyes to the fluorescent-lit hospital room and remembered. The crash, the pain, the confusion.

She closed his eyes again and breathed, slow and deep.

“Calm down. You’re alive,” a familiar voice soothed her. Her mother was sitting in the chair at his side.

Jenny moved her fingers, and flexed her arms. Everything worked, but her whole body hurt like hell. She tried to move her foot, just a little to the left to ease the pressure from what felt like a tight bandage, and she couldn’t. The foot would not respond. Neither would the other foot, or her knees.

Panic rose, and she forced herself to open her eyes again, to look down and make sure her legs were still there. She pulled off the thin white sheet covering her, and tried again, watching her big toe where it protruded from the edge of a compression boot.