Page 69 of The Goalie in Room 1

Everything inside me went still.

“After we added the extra flexion yesterday? And all the leg raises?”

“Yes.”

“And no swelling?”

“It’s swollen. It will be for a while.”

My head dropped to the back of the couch. “Jesus, Doc. I know that. What I’m asking is, it didn’t swell more, right?”

“No. It didn’t swell more.”

The grin pulled at my mouth before I could stop it. “It went down.” The words mirrored the surprise that made my insides feel like a bouquet of balloons. “It’s working.”

His expression tightened, and he shook his head. “Cash.”

“No, Doc. Don’t ‘Cash’ me. The knee handled the progression.”

“It handled one very small progression over one twenty-four-hour period.”

“Right, but last time…” I paused to swallow around the emotion that clogged my throat. “Last time my knee couldn’t even handle that.”

I remembered every failure from my last recovery. Every exercise that had left my knee swollen and throbbing. Every time the physical therapist had reduced my workload and told me we would try again after the inflammation settled. Every step forward that had turned into two steps back until the team decided I had nowhere left to go.

This time was different.

I could feel it.

“The response is encouraging,” Thad said carefully. “It tells us we can continue with the current protocol.”

“And progress it.”

“When your therapist determines you’re ready.”

“You just said it handled this.”

“It did.”

“So why do you look like you’re about to tell me my dog died?”

“You don’t have a dog.”

“Thad.”

He sighed. Beyond him and the wall of glass, the Pacific crashed against the rocks below the house. The morning was cold enough that he’d left the doors closed, but the muted roar of the ocean still reached us.

I waited.

I’d gotten better at it over the last three weeks. Not good. But better.

“You’re doing well,” he said. “Your incisions have healed. Your pain is controlled. Your range of motion is where I want it. Your quad is waking up, and so far, the knee is tolerating the exercises without the swelling pattern the knee presented after the last surgeries.”

“But?”

He took a deep breath and looked away, staring at something over my shoulder. After another deep breath, he looked back at me. He said, “But…none of those things tell us whether you’ll play hockey again. And I’m worried that you’ll pin your hopes on these early wins and be disappointed later.”

“But you agree it’s a step.”