Page 27 of Offside

"Well, I'm not. How are you?"

Behind him, the training-room door stood open. Vicki moved through the far end carrying a case of wrap. Zoe would arrive in ten minutes. The building started its day around us, but our corner station was still quiet.

"Anna ended our relationship." I'm not sure why I told him that.

Bishop's hand tightened once around the loose band. "When?"

"Two weeks ago. The weekend after your assessment hit the portal."

He didn't ask if it was because of him. He didn't look down at his shoulder or give me a symptom so I could retreat into the work.

"I'm sorry," he said simply.

"It's—" I swallowed. "It's okay. She was right."

He waited for me to continue.

"We were good at being comfortable," I said. "I wasn't good at being present."

"Was comfortable enough?" His eyes stayed on mine.

"It wasn't." I shook my head.

Vicki set the case on the counter. The sound brought me back to reality. I looked at the band in Bishop's hand.

"One more set at the lower resistance. Then mobility."

That night, I opened the scheduling history because the December travel plan needed reconciling. We had two road stretches, three back-to-backs, and a holiday week when Vicki wanted every ongoing rehabilitation case assigned to a named person before anyone boarded a plane. Bishop's Monday appointment conflicted with Zoe's coverage meeting. His Wednesday time overlapped a team lift. I needed to move both without creating another early hour nobody else could cover. The current calendar showed a seven a.m. Monday, a late Wednesday, and a Friday after most of the room had emptied.

I opened the change log. The most recent request had come from Bishop through the player portal, moving Friday from two-thirty to five-fifteen. The reason field said media, but media had ended at four. The request before that moved a Wednesday from eleven, when Zoe and Vicki were both in the room, to six-forty-five the next morning. I kept going. He'd made four changes in October and five in September. Earlier requests reached back across the established treatment history, through summer maintenance, even back into the prior season. I counted nineteen in all. None moved him away from me.

Every change moved him away from a busy room and into the narrow edges of the day. He came before the room filled or after the last player left, when he knew I would still be there because my name was on the coverage schedule. I opened the July intake note in the second window and found the word avoidant.

I'd thought he avoided being observed while being treated. That fit the man who watched the shoulder chart instead of the hands on him, the man who carried pain into practice and reported it only when the joint made concealment impossible. The nineteen requests suggested something more. He hadn't moved away from care. He'd moved toward privacy with me.

I sat back from the screen.

I thought about the corridor. His thumbs at the back of my shoulder, his hands stopping when the phone rang, and my own decision not to step away. At the restaurant, I'd found his face across the room before I admitted I was looking for it. Nineteen requests didn't tell me what Bishop intended. But they told me enough.

I was still the therapist documenting his function. My notes still moved into the group evaluating his contract. He still came to the corner station and gave me access to pain, weakness, and a body he couldn't safely withhold. Private hours had made that easier. They'd also made it possible for both of us to avoid admitting that it mattered.

I closed the intake note.

I rebuilt the remaining schedule. Monday moved to eight-fifteen, when Zoe ran the next station and Vicki was in the room. Wednesday moved to the open recovery block after morning skate. Friday stayed late only on travel weeks, with the assigned coverage person beside it. I added the December road designees Vicki had requested and sent the full grid to her and Zoe for review. The player system required a reason when I changed an established appointment. Care coverage and shared-room availability. I entered the same line for each remaining session.

When I saved the calendar, the system sent Bishop an automatic notice. I didn't add a private message. I didn't explain the change with an intimacy neither of us had acknowledged. The room would no longer clear for us by accident. At ten-twelve, my phone lit beside the laptop.

Bishop: Got the changes.

I waited. No question followed.

Me: Eight-fifteen Monday. Zoe and Vicki have the December coverage plan.

Three dots appeared, then vanished.

Bishop: I'll be there.

I set the phone down. Keeping other people around didn't change what those nineteen requests meant. It only made the next choice harder to hide inside the schedule.