Page 27 of The Single Dad Grump Next Door

“And it’s both hands?”

“Yes. Though the left is worse.”

“The one that you use to press on the strings, yes? To form the chords?” He badly mimics holding an invisible violin.

I don’t bother correcting his posture or wording, choosing to simply nod.

Dr. Hansen hums thoughtfully and sets his clipboard aside. “Let’s take a closer look, then.”

As he gently manipulates my wrists, bending and rotating them, I wince more than once. He asks me to squeeze his fingers, to press my palms flat against his, and to trace small circles in the air. Each movement sends a fresh jolt of pain shooting through me. By the time he’s done, my hands are trembling, and I feel like I’ve just gone through a particularly grueling rehearsal.

He sits back, frowning slightly. “There’s definitely some inflammation here, particularly in the tendons. Based on what you’ve described, it sounds consistent with repetitive stressinjuries, possibly tendinitis or early signs of carpal tunnel syndrome.”

The words land like punches. Tendinitis. Carpal tunnel. I know those terms, obviously. I’ve heard horror stories about them from colleagues. What seems like a relatively harmless type of injury can be totally destructive to someone who relies on their hands to be graceful and painless so they can be controlled with absolute precision.

“What does that mean for my career?” I ask. I know my voice is too quiet and that I should probably speak up, but the doctor is nice enough to read my lips and not ask me to repeat myself. Maybe he can tell that one nudge in the wrong direction will cause me to start weeping in this little office.

Dr. Hansen leans forward, his expression serious but kind. “It means you need to take this very seriously. Rest is nonnegotiable. Continuing to push through the pain could lead to long-term, possibly permanent, damage.”

I swallow hard, my mouth suddenly dry. “But will it heal? Eventually?”

“With proper treatment, most cases improve significantly,” he says. “But it’s crucial that we address this now. I’d recommend a combination of rest, physical therapy, and anti-inflammatory medications. I’ll also prescribe something stronger for the pain in the short term. Also, an MRI or ultrasound will give us a clearer picture of the extent of the damage. It doesn’t seem like the sort of thing that will require surgery, but I would like to get a closer look just in case.”

Surgery. Goodness.

“And if the damage is… bad?” I can barely get the question out.

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” he says gently. “We’ll take it one step at a time, okay?”

The words are meant to be comforting, but they do little to quell the panic rising in my chest. There’s no official diagnosisfor me yet, but it doesn’t feel like a reprieve. It feels like a waiting game—one where the stakes literally couldn’t be higher for me.

Dr. Hansen scribbles out a prescription and hands it to me. “Start with this, and we’ll follow up in a couple weeks. In the meantime, no violin. I know that someone like you might find that extremely difficult, but it’s doctor’s orders.”

I nod mechanically, clutching the piece of paper as though it’s both a lifeline and a prison sentence. My hands feel useless and foreign, like they no longer belong to me. The thought of setting my violin aside for even a day, let alone weeks or months, is unbearable. Without it, who am I?

I take an Uber back to the cottage. The prescription rests in my lap, the words blurring as tears prick at my eyes.

I try to tell myself that I’ll be fine. That this is temporary. That I’ll recover and all of this will be nothing but a tiny blip in my career’s very long and successful history.

But deep down, I can’t ignore the gnawing fear that my worst nightmare might already be unfolding.

***

When I get home, the house is eerily quiet. Karina and Andy are out, probably scoping out yet another wedding venue. The absence of noise makes the place feel too big.

I collect my violin from where I left it in the living room and set the case on the kitchen table, eyeing it warily. I haven’t touched it since I made a mess of myself in front of Gabe downstairs. I haven’t dared to. Maybe I should’ve told Dr. Hansen that I tried to practice through the pain recently and I’m still paying for consequences, but I’m not sure that would’ve changed anything.

The silence doesn’t last long. A weird knocking-scraping sound at the back door startles me out of my reverie of misery.

When I open it, Gabe is standing there, partly stooped over in the bushes on my side of the patio, looking about as awkward as I feel.

“Hi,” he says, scratching the back of his neck and standing upright immediately. “Uh, sorry. Wren left her bucket here earlier. It was in your hedges.”

I glance down at the sand-encrusted plastic toy he’s holding and nod. “Right. Okay.”

He doesn’t move to leave, though. Instead, his eyes flick to my hands, which I realize too late are trembling slightly. “You okay?”

It’s such a simple question, but it makes my defenses shoot up like a fortress wall. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

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