SIX WEEKS WITH HIM

First session

The next morning, I was at the physio room ten minutes early.

Bad idea.

It gave me too much time to think about yesterday. About the way Lucas had said “thanks” like it cost him something. About how he looked when I touched his knee. Not angry. Not amused. Just… focused on me.

“Stop it,” I muttered, arranging ice packs I didn’t need to arrange.

“Talking to yourself already?”

The voice came from the doorway.

Lucas stood there in a black hoodie and grey sweats, crutches under his arms, hair freshly cut in a low fade. He looked less like a wounded athlete and more like trouble with a varsity scholarship.

“Morning,” I said, keeping my voice flat. “You’re five minutes early.”

“So are you.” He limped in and dropped onto the bed without waiting for me to tell him. “Eager to see me suffer?”

I pulled on gloves. “I’m eager to get you walking before midterms start. Can you manage ten minutes of stretching before you start running your mouth?”

His mouth quirked. “You’re feisty for a guy your size.”

I ignored that. I knelt, checking the swelling. It was down from yesterday, but the joint was still stiff.

“Good,” I said. “Inflammation’s reduced. That means we can start range-of-motion today.”

“Translation?”

“Translation: I’m going to move your leg, and you’re going to try not to cry.”

He snorted. “I don’t cry.”

“We’ll see.”

I placed one hand above his knee, the other on his ankle. His skin was warm, and the muscle under my fingers was hard even at rest. Rugby player, obviously.

“Relax,” I said. “If you tense up, it’ll hurt more.”

“Easy for you to say,” he muttered. “You’re not the one with a knife in your knee.”

I bent his leg slowly, watching his face.

His jaw clenched at 45 degrees. At 60, a muscle jumped in his cheek. He didn’t make a sound, but his fingers gripped the edge of the bed hard enough that his knuckles went white.

“Stop,” he said at 70 degrees.

I stopped. “Breathe.”

“I am breathing.”

“You’re holding it.” I adjusted his leg back to 60. “We’ll hold here for thirty seconds. Then we try again.”

He stared at the ceiling, breathing through his nose.

For the first time since he walked in, he wasn’t trying to be Lucas Kimani, rugby captain. He was just a guy in pain, trying not to show it.

“Why are you studying physio?” he asked suddenly.

I blinked. “What?”

“You don’t seem like the type.” He glanced at me. “No offense. You’re quiet. You look like you’d rather be reading than dealing with people like me.”

I hesitated, then kept my hands steady. “My dad was a matatu driver. Got hit by a boda boda two years ago. Broke his leg badly. The physio he had was rushed, didn’t explain anything. He still walks with a limp.”

Lucas went quiet.

“My brother too,” I added. “So I figured… if no one else is going to do it right, I will.”

He didn’t say anything for a long time. Then: “That’s stupid.”

I frowned. “Excuse me?”

“Taking on the world’s problems because your family got bad care,” he said. “You’ll burn out.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But not today.”

I moved his leg to 75 degrees. He hissed, but didn’t pull away.

“Good,” I said. “Hold it.”

Silence again. But it wasn’t awkward. It was the kind of silence you get when two people are working on something together.

When the timer beeped, I let his leg down slowly.

“Better?” I asked.

He flexed his foot experimentally. “Yeah. Hurts less.”

“Don’t push it,” I said, peeling off the gloves. “Ice for ten minutes, then we do quad sets.”

He didn’t argue. He just lay there, staring at the ceiling, sweat beading at his hairline.

“You’re not what I expected,” he said quietly.

“Neither are you,” I replied.

He turned his head to look at me. For a second, something passed between us. Not hatred. Not friendship. Something in between. Something new.

“Same time tomorrow?” he asked.

“Same time,” I said. “And wear shorts. Tracksuits make it hard to see the muscle.”

He smirked. “Trying to see my legs, Kip?”

I rolled my eyes and walked to the ice machine. “Just do your exercises, Kimani.”

As he lay there with the ice pack on his knee, I realized something.

Six weeks felt like a long time.

And for the first time, I wasn’t sure I wanted it to end fast.

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