Page 1 of A Cure for Recovery

1

Tommy’s been a Granger instead of a Katz or a Cattaneo for almost seven months, and he’s still not tired of signing his new legal name on documents, or seeing it printed in his email signature. He especially likes the sight of it in the elegant script of Leo and Dana’s wedding save-the-date cards.

But even the charm of his new name, and the new life it represents, can’t make up for the drudgery of yet another doctor’s appointment.

His pleasant mood lasted through the sign-in sheet, and then sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with Lawson in the waiting room while they flipped through a magazine meant for children and failed spectacularly to find all the ways the two pictures were different. Lawson beat him by three finds, because of course he did; it didn’t matter that Tommy used to be a cop, no one’s as observant and detail-driven as his husband.

But then the nurse called him back, and his laughter died in his throat. Lawson patted his thigh and said, “You’ll do great, babe.” So he scrounged up a smile for him and tried to look positive about the whole thing. At least until he was out of sight.

Now, he leans heavily on his cane with one hand while he unlaces his shoes with the other. He’s dressed the way the informational email told him to: something comfortable that gave him a full range of motion. Sweats, a t-shirt, a zip-up hoodie. His shoes are Nikes, new,runningshoes, with thin, flat laces he ties into double knots to keep them from unraveling as he walks. They’re good shoes…for someone who can run. For someone without a cane, and who isn’t huffing, and straining, and nearly toppling over just from trying to keep his balance while he painstakingly picks the double knots loose one-handed.

For his birthday in March, his in-laws gifted him a pair of those Sketcher’s sneakers you can step into, hands-free, no laces. “Life-saversssss,” Bill said, smiling, not even frustrated with stumbling over the S. The shoes are black, with white soles, unassuming, and, while not the sort of thing he wore while playing a mob boss, at least nothideous. Exactly. Lisa pulled them out of the tissue paper and set them on the ground in front of him. “You don’t even have to bend over!” she said brightly. “Easy peasy.” She pointed to her husband. “Bill loves them.”

A glance proved that Bill wore a pair of solid brown ones, more like boat shoes.

Hot, helpless shame prickled at the backs of Tommy’s eyes. Because he was turning thirty-eight, and he couldn’t manage a normal pair of sneakers. Because he needed step-in shoes like his stroke patient father-in-law.

The moment the thought formed, he hated himself for letting it cross his mind. His in-laws meant well, and he loved them to bits, and there wasnothingshameful or embarrassing about Bill’s situation.

“Thank you,” he said, around the lump in his throat. He toed off his own shoes with minimal trouble, and stepped into the new ones. When he looked across the room, Lawson met his gaze, and his smile was small, and sad, and knowing.It’s okay. I’m sorry.

He should have worn those shoes today, but his pride got in the way, and now his legs tremble, and he sways precariously to the side. He lets go of the knot and slaps his hand out against the wall to keep from falling. He’s breathing hard, he realizes. Panting. There’s sweat at his hairline and beading along the small of his back. He almostfell; he can’tbreathe, and all because he tried to take his fuckingshoesoff.

“Sir,” the nurse asks, her concern impersonal, professional. “Would you like me to–”

“No,” he snaps, and then grits his teeth, and takes a breath. “No, thank you. I’ve got it.”

He slides his grip farther down the shaft of the cane, ‘til he’s gripping the space just above the four-footed base of it, and tries again. This time, he gets both knots unstuck, and is able to straighten – shakily – and then toe the sneakers all the way off.

The nurse stands waiting for him, nothing amiss, ready with her clipboard. “Okay, if you’ll turn this way for me, heels together, back against the wall, eyes forward.”

He complies, shuffling and ungainly, when once he would have snapped right into position. He waits, skin prickling, floor cold through his socks, as she slides down the little plastic reader until it rests on the top of his head.

“Okay,” she says, and he doesn’t ask what it said. He knows what it said: his license says five-ten, but that’s with special insoles. He’s five-eight, when he doesn’t slouch. Shorter, he thinks, since the shooting, now that his spine doesn’t want to straighten all the way.

Damn it.

Next, he gets on the scale, and he’s put on five pounds in the past two months. His blood pressure, when she takes it, is a little high.White coat syndrome, he thinks, which he didn’t used to have, before the shooting.

Finally, he’s seated in an exam room, waiting.

And waiting.

And waiting.

He checks his phone again and again, impulsively, gnawing his lip as he thinks about Lawson being later and later to work. He tried, earlier, to suggest he take an Uber to his appointment, but Lawson made a face likecome on, man, so he slid into the passenger seat of Lawson’s new car – a pre-owned Subaru with enough room for Bill’s chair in the back – and has felt guilty ever since because Lawson was supposed to work a double today, and he had to get someone to cover his first shift.

Tommy hasn’t driven since the shooting. He’s tried to, more than once, and each time, he’s crawled down the driveway, his right foot shaking so badly that he put the car in park before he hit the street, too afraid that his body would fail him and that he would crash, or, worse, hurt someone else.

The first time was a…bleak moment. When he parked back at the garage door, and stepped out of the car, his first instinct was to stomp back into the house. Instead, he nearly fell, barely caught himself with his cane, and was red-eyed and fuming by the time he shuffled into the kitchen. Lawson whirled toward him, concern writ large on his face. “Hey, what–”

Tommy threw up a hand and made his laborious way upstairs.

After that, he didn’t expect success, and wasn’t disappointed.

Lawson still drives him where he needs to go, or Lisa, if their schedules line up.

He still feels absolutely helpless because of it.

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