Chapter 21

I’m on crutches since one of my three main calf muscles was almost cut in half. It is the one that looks like a bulb sticking out of the back of the lower leg. I’m surprised that I was able to walk to my locker and then to the bathroom after it was cut.

I tore that same muscle in my first life. Every time I tried to move forward, I fell on my face. The trick is knowing what each muscle and tendon do. Two weeks after the muscle was pulled in half, I was playing indoor soccer. I could only run backwards, or I would fall, so I played defence.

Everybody looked at me like I was crazy when I showed up using crutches, then laced up my shoes and went out on the court to warm up. I had such a shit life and experienced enough pain that I made myself a promise. If it were a choice between fun with pain or no fun, I would take the pain every time. Otherwise, I would never have any fun.

Between the crutches and not knowing where Jen’s room was, it takes me a while to find her. When I walk into her room, Jen’s mom has her nose in a book, but Jen is just staring off into space. They don’t notice me, so I clear my throat and say, “I know you probably don’t want any boys to come and visit, but I thought I would check on you anyway. They won’t let me go home yet, and you are just a short walk from my room.”

Jen doesn’t acknowledge me, and her Mom looks up at me, confused. It is only a moment before the mom figures out who I am. When she does, she jumps out of her chair to hug me, crying and saying, “Thank you.” She holds me for a while before letting me go, saying, “I’m told I have you to thank for saving my daughter.”

“The jocks attacked me before I knew she was in trouble. The last boy I dealt with in the hall told me where she was and I sent Kurt, my bodyguard, into the bathroom, where we discovered Jen. Kurt is the one that rescued your daughter. When I saw her on the floor, I had no clue what to do. I checked to see if she were alive then looked for life-threatening injuries before I called for Jane, another one of my bodyguards, to help her.”

“At least it was your bodyguards that saved her, and they wouldn’t have been there if you weren’t. As far as I am concerned, you can visit her anytime.”

“Looking at how Jen is reacting, I’m not sure that is a good idea. Is she always like this?”

“She has her moments, but is particularly bad this morning. I’m sure she will feel safe with you.”

“It is difficult to say. It may be a while before Jen trusts any male, including your husband.”

“I’m sure that she will be fine.”

“I know you probably think some little kid can’t tell you anything about your daughter that you don’t already know. If you ask around, you will find out that before I moved here, I didn’t have a good life. I have helped a few girls that went through similar things as Jen. I don’t want to alarm you, but to ease her into being comfortable with boys again, it isn’t smart to leave her alone with any males, including her father and brothers. Give her time. It is probably best if you wait until she tells you it is ok.”

I desperately wanted to talk with Jen alone, but the advice I give her mother is sound.

“She always said you thought of others. Thanks for your advice. I will talk to Bill about it.”

I assume Bill is her husband.

“It’s not my place to speak of my girlfriend’s past, but you should ask Dahlia for her psychologist’s number. I don’t know of anybody more capable of helping Jen.”

“Thanks, I’ll do that,” she says as she hugs me again. I give her a minute before I push her away, and she says, “Sorry.”

“Not at all. I am fine with it. I just want to keep things appropriate.”

She blushes and returns to her seat. I head over to Jennifer’s bed and look at her. She is lying on her side, halfway in the fetal position.

Looking up, I say, “I can see how she is doing mentally. How is she physically?”

“Her chest is healing up nicely, and the scars are mostly hidden. It is her colon that there are problems with. They are worried about infection, and there is a risk that what they did to fix her will not work.”

“Scars, I didn’t think she would need stitches after the needles were removed.”

“The bastards cut the underside of her breasts. After, what they did to her, I’m glad you killed them.”

“As I said, I only dealt with the ones in the hall. Kurt is the one you need to thank. Unfortunately, I heard the ones that are still walking posted bail.”

“How on earth did they manage that?”

“I have no idea. Their crimes are heinous enough that the judge shouldn’t have allowed bail.”

“There is something seriously wrong with our legal system.”

“I better get going. Let Jen know that when she is capable of getting out of bed, if I am still here, I would enjoy a visit. It would be a chance for her to visit a male she is not related to, but she knows she can trust. Just be sure that I have a girl visiting me or come with her.”

“I’ll do that.”

When I get to my room, Paul is waiting for me. As soon as he sees me, he exclaims, “What the hell!!!”

“What?”

“Twice this year, somebody tried to kill you. Now you are crippled up and wandering around on your own. I thought I could trust you to stay in your room.”

“How is staying in my room any safer than wandering around the hospital?”

“You have a point. I will have a guard at your door before I leave.”

“Why did you come, anyway?”

“I was just checking to make sure you want us to go ahead without you tomorrow night. We can hold off and do it next week while he is gone.”

He is talking about our plan to infest Mr. Couture’s house with rats.

“Don’t wait. If you wait, there is no guarantee that Mr. Couture will get the house taken care of before coming back in two weeks. But if I am out of here in time, I will be helping to search the house.”

“Not if you can’t run, you aren’t. I’m not taking a cripple into the field, even if he is the boss.”

We change the topic to more legal pursuits. CSIS got a hold of him, and they have started to design an underground compound. I had to clarify a few things and explain what I need. We had to give CSIS the requirements for the facility without explaining why some rooms needed to be refrigerated to near absolute zero or why we need large rooms with nothing but electricity and HVAC. The requirement that we aren’t going to let them know about is that we need it to be expandable. We will let them think they have plans for the underground compound, but we will upgrade them in ways they can’t anticipate.

I didn’t even have to ask, and my girls bring me a high protein lunch to help my leg heal. I don’t understand how anybody gets better eating hospital food. It will be even worse when BC contracts out the meals, and they end up being made in Ontario and shipped out west. How they can claim that is cheaper is beyond me.

While the girls and I eat lunch, Paul takes off to arrange a bodyguard for my hospital stay.

Just after lunch, Dr. Nowak pays us a visit. Right away, he tries to shoo the girls out of the room. I stop him by saying, “They are cleared to know as much about my problem as you are. You might as well let them stay, so I don’t have to tell them everything you say as soon as you leave.

“If that is the case, I might as well just let you all know that I personally checked the girls’ blood, and they all come back negative. You haven’t passed it on to any of them. Now, without showing anybody your blood or giving away your problem, I did as much digging around as I could. As far as I can tell, nobody has ever seen anything like this. I’m at a loss.”

“That is what I expected.”

“Until I can figure it out, you will be remaining a guest here.”

“I don’t think that is necessary. My blood has been this way for almost a year now.”

“How do you know that?”

“That is when I was exposed.”

“You were exposed to something that long ago, and you didn’t get checked out until now? So much for being responsible.”

“Since I have had this problem for almost a year and I am still fine, do I really have to stay here?”

“Just because you have had it for a year doesn’t mean it won’t kill you. How often does a cancer patient come in after something was bothering him for a year, only to find that his cancer has progressed and is now growing too fast to deal with? You are staying for at least a week, while I check your blood daily. If there is any reason for me to believe that it is getting worse, you will be staying longer.”

“I’m guessing that I am suspended from school until the police are done their investigation. I might as well work from my hospital bed. I have everything here that I need except a secretary. She will just have to work remotely from the office.”

As soon as Doc leaves, a nurse pops in and attaches a heart momnitor along with a finger oximeter. So much for my mobility. I’m now confined to bed until Doc has all his readings.

I don’t feel as safe or comfortable in the hospital as I do at home, so I have reverted to my old habits. I wake up when somebody puts their hand on my door knob. I keep my eyes so they appear closed but open enough that I can see through my eyelashes. Dahlia opens the door as slowly and quietly as she can. Seeing that it is her, I sit up and say, “Morning, Beautiful.”

The smile halfway disappears from her face as she complains, “I wanted to wake you up. Oh well. We can still have some fun.”

“I’m afraid not. Doc has me hooked up to these machines to get a 24-hour baseline to figure out if my heart rate and oxygen are normal. He also needs to have something to compare my future results to. When he comes to check on me today, I will ask if I am allowed strenuous activity. If he says yes, we can have some fun.”

“That’s no fair.”

That is when I notice the time is only 7 am. Visiting hours don’t start until 9. I chastise, “You either skipped the morning practice, or you plan on skipping it?” Since the school is closed, I don’t know what time they have scheduled it for the week.

“You are not there to make executive decisions, which puts me, the executive assistant, in charge. You have a new schedule to make up for the lack of alone time you spend with your girlfriends. You have 8 hours of girlfriend time every day. Each of us is scheduled for 2 hours. Each morning you are to be woken up by a different girlfriend. After our 8 hours are up, you can work for 8 hours. The following 8 hours are to be spent sleeping, so you can heal.”

When a wise man argues with a woman, he says nothing. In both my lives, it was rare for me to sleep a full 8 hours, but I’m not about to tell her that.

“What about a compromise? I didn’t know I would be restricted from working today. How about each of my women get 1 hour of undivided attention, followed by 1 hour cuddling into my side, while my other side works? I need to do some things before end of business today. An MSA rep will be here to get some things to look over for a meeting tomorrow. I’m confiscating the visitor’s room as my conference room, to do some business. I don’t want to postpone it because this will save lives.”

“The things you come up with. Who would have ever thought that a camera would be required safety equipment for a firefighter.”

“So, you have been reading the papers I give our patent clerk.”

“Of course, silly. How else am I to know what my man is up to? ... Since you are up, I better grab our breakfast before your guard eats it all.”

Two hours later, Moira is kicking Dahlia out of my hospital room. She is a bit disappointed to discover that we can’t fool around. Shortly after Dahlia leaves, Dr. Nowak arrives, to check the EKG and oximetry readouts. I am a little surprised at how distracted he is by simple oxygen levels and pulse readings, so I ask, “What is it, Doc?”

“I’m just surprised that your readings are halfway between a typical teenaged boy and a professional athlete.”

“That is easy to explain. Since I have been here, I have wrestled, cycled and studied martial arts, but in Fort Grand, my biggest sports were curling and biathlon. Both require extreme control of the circulatory system. Not to mention, I can swim one and a half lengths of an Olympic swimming pool without taking a breath. I bet if I concentrate, I can lower my heart rate even more.”

When I left my past life behind, curlers weren’t as extreme an athlete as they were in the 80s and earlier. There was a rule change in the early 90s that prevented a curler from lifting the rock off the ice when they threw it. We used to have an extreme backswing, lifting a 44 lb / 20kg rock with one hand then sliding it down the ice. Those of us with some skill would throw the rock so fast that professionals couldn’t keep up with it to sweep. So what? Some curlers had some strength. The only true athletes were the skip or the third. These positions would throw a rock like that, drastically raising their heart rate. Then, a short while later, they would need to lower their heart rate to that of a person at rest, so they could throw a draw, placing the rock to within a fraction of an inch of where they need it. This is also in the days where the effects of sweeping were limited. It isn’t like anybody used one of the high tech brooms that started being widely used in the 90s.

A biathlete requires similar skills with their circulatory system. They get their heart rate up running a race, cross-country skiing, then seconds later, they have to lower their heart rate to that of a sniper and shoot. I was reasonably good even though I sucked at skiing.

“What is my heart rate at now?”

“46 beats per minute (BPM).”

Normal for a typical person who has been resting for at least a half-hour is just over 60 beats per minute. A top-end professional athlete is about 40. After I left the military, mine was 90-95. That was because I had trained harder than most top-end athletes. I was supposed to start fighting no hold barred before it was called MMA. Where I was better than the other athletes was my conditioning. Even if I didn’t have a fight scheduled, I would work out for at least 8 hours 6 days a week. Heck, I would typically do heart conditioners for 10 km when most people only did them for a km or 2. This caused my heart to grow. Like any muscle, the more you use it, the bigger it gets. Unfortunately, The bigger your heart is, the bigger the valves in your heart are. The bigger a flapper valve is, the more slippage it has. There is back-flow in the heart with the larger valves, and my heart would need to work harder to do the same thing that a smaller heart would do. For much of my first life, my heart needed to pump more than 20% faster to do the same thing as an average person. That increases the slower it pumps.

Something that I hadn’t done since I started this life was to meditate in bed and try to lower my heart rate. It was something I did throughout Jr high. At 16, I could drop it to just under 20 BPM. I wanted to be able to lower my heart rate so I could appear dead. In the end, I deemed the effort not worth the reward, so I stopped training at it.

“Let’s see how much you can lower it?”

Most people can only raise or lower it at will by 10%. I used to do it more than 50% easily, and it would only take about 10 seconds.

Instantly, when I concentrated, I could feel my heart rate slow. Moira, exclaims, “WOW!”

I don’t want to lose my concentration, so I don’t look. I continue to concentrate for about 30 seconds. Then I stop and ask, “How did I do?”

“You went down to 13 BPM then stabilized at 15. You shouldn’t be able to do that.”

I just shrug and suggest, “Let’s see how high I can make it.”

I don’t wait for instruction. I just concentrate until Doc sternly says, “STOP.”

I look up at him and relax, then ask, “What is the problem?”

“You shot up to 180 BPM and was still rising fast.”

When I had a large heart, I used to cycle with it between 180 and 210 BPM. Athletes tend to have heart attacks between 200 and 210. The larger heart could support it, but it wasn’t safe.

“Not to worry, Doc. I’m a martial artist. We deal in burst strength, and when that happens, our heart rate spikes for a short time to deal with the extreme release of energy. I should be able to handle 200 without a problem.”