Chapter 4

Dale was relegated to an office job since he couldn’t work on the remote job sites anymore.

He now did most of the design work for the Electrical Engineering projects his company undertook. The amusing thing was that the building his company occupied had piss-poor facilities for a bloke in a wheelchair, so he mostly worked from home.

He met up with his clients and co-workers in restaurants, or they came to the house. Dale was discovering that he enjoyed working more like a contractor and his bosses were more than happy with his productivity despite his disabilities.

They decided to treat his position as if he was in one of their offices in another city or as if he was out on a job site. He got his projects in on time and worked on anything they sent him. He also did a really good job because of his site-work experience.

As far as Jake was concerned, Dale was one of the best workers he had. Dale probably got more done just because he wasn’t in the office and side-tracked by stupid office politics.

Dale hadn’t purchased a car designed for a paraplegic yet as he was still waiting for the work cover claims to go through. They were still bickering about his pay-out for his pain and suffering. The fact that he wasn’t improving wasn’t looking good for the Haul Company.

Dale still relied on Terry to get him around. He had found that she was a competent driver, and he felt safe with her in charge of the vehicle. He had always hated driving in Brisbane and was more than happy to let her drive.

He was also amazed and sometimes frustrated by how many people abused handicapped parking spaces. Wheelchairs can take up a lot of space when you’re trying to transfer between it and a vehicle as you need to push the doors open as wide as possible.

After seven months, he wasn’t hopeful that he would ever get the use of his legs back. While he suffered a lot of twitches and tingles that could be quite painful, and he still experienced lower back pain, he couldn’t control his legs in any functional way.

His busted hipbones had healed better than the doctors had hoped, but they still couldn’t work out why the nerves in his spinal cord hadn’t healed. The specialist had told him that his spinal cord had been partially crushed and bruised, but it hadn’t been severed. However, he hadn’t shown any real signs of improvements.

His cock was still limp, and his legs didn’t work. He wondered how much the company was going to pay for his soft cock. Millions if he had his way. A bloke just wasn’t a bloke without his cock working, as far as he was concerned.

One thing he was grateful for was that he still had a measure of bladder control as long as he could get to the loo in time. It frustrated him how poorly designed a lot of ‘accessible’ loos were and how few and far between they were in public locations.

He refused to wear nappies when he went out. He had laughed when Terry presented him with a packet of pads used by breastfeeding mothers to put in his jocks to catch little dribbles. He actually found them a much better alternative when he had to go out. It wasn’t as if he was moving around his chair to displace them.

They were soft, absorbent and easy to dispose of and replace if required.

Early in the eighth week of living with Terry, Dale was getting visitors.

He had several engineers dropping in to go over the design of the high voltage electrical switch room that was required for the overland conveyor system they were designing. Jake had been to Dale’s home several times since Terry had moved in. Rob Smith and Marty Ball were also on his team but hadn’t been in his house before.

Terry had helped Tom set up a large whiteboard that they could also use as a projector screen on the wall in the dining room, and Dale could flick through the designs on his computer and project them up on the screen. He could also display his chats and run through his projections for costs, completion time frames and man-hours.

The men had been working for most of the day when Terry came home. She happily greeted them all and organised coffee and bickies. She had made some awesome Anzac bickies that had Macadamia nuts pieces, and she had drizzled chocolate over the top. They had disappeared pretty fast when she put them onto the table.

After placing the pot of coffee and bickies on the table, she said, “You guys have two hours, and then I have to steal Dale. We have a specific schedule to maintain for his rehabilitation.”

Jake frowned and said, “How long before we can have him back?”

Terry smiled at him and replied, “Two hours at least. Then it’s about an hour to dinner time, bath time and his last massage. He frequently conks out after that.”

The three men realised that Dale had other commitments. The fact he was in a wheelchair hadn’t really impacted on them during the day until Terry mentioned it.

Jake said, “If we order in dinner, can we have him a bit longer?”

Terry looked at Dale, “One hour after his workout. He is a grumpy bugger if he doesn’t get his beauty sleep.”

Jake had to be happy with her pronouncement and thanked her for looking after Dale. Rob watched her with interest as she walked away to change.

“Damn, that is one fuckable woman,” he said. “You’re a lucky bastard, Dale.”

Dale’s eyes followed Terry as she walked away, and he didn’t comment. Rob had a bit of a reputation with the ladies, and Dale didn’t like the idea of him going after Terry.

He frowned when Marty said, “Is she your girlfriend?”

Dale was going to lie, but couldn’t. “No, she is my live-in carer and therapist,” he said. He was not happy when both men brightened at this bit of information.

Rob asked, “So does she have a boyfriend?”

Dale had to shake his head no. Jake felt a bit sorry for him as he got the impression Dale wished that he was her boyfriend. He didn’t know what their relationship was or why Dale hadn’t pursued her, but it wasn’t his business.