Broken Dancer

A lot of things left Diane's life that July afternoon on that stretch of Highway 58. Gone were the days of dancing with Jack, the fancy dresses, sheer stockings and high heels she loved wearing, and the short shorts in summer. Gone were the whistles of the construction workers who danced a ballet with crane cables and naked chests on the skeleton of the new building going up next to her office. They had been there every morning when she walked past from the parking lot to the lobby. Now it wouldn't matter if they were there to jeer and invite her to join them. She wouldn't be walking down that street ever again, not after the firemen had cut her out of the crumpled pile of steel and plastic that had been her car and the paramedics had whisked her broken body off to the hospital.

The orthopedic surgeon had screwed her leg bones back together with stainless steel and titanium, and after a four weeks and lots of drugs, most of the pain went away. She was able to feel the little needle-sharp wheel that Dr. Moresby kept running up and down her thigh and calf, and with some pain and effort, Diane could wiggle her toes.

"With a lot of hard work, you'll be able to walk again", explained Dr. Moresby. He smiled. "You know, you're a very lucky girl. Not so long ago, you'd have lost both legs."

Lucky? Was it luck that blew out the tire? Was it luck that turned the car through the guardrail and down the embankment? These questions scratched at Diane's mind, ploughed through her reason and logic, and planted the seeds of despair. That despair grew into self-pity and then into hatred of everyone and everything around her. She hated the women visitors who walked around on their perfectly smooth, nylon-clad legs. She hated the nurses who walked quickly without any obvious effort down the hall. She hated Dr. Moresby for standing straight while he congratulated her on being only a cripple.

The strongest hatred, and one that scared her when it came, was for the paramedics. Why hadn't they just let her die? Dying would be better than what lay ahead of her. Diane didn't want to live out her life bound to a wheel chair, but that was her future. Even though Dr. Moresby said her bones were starting to heal, when she moved her legs she thought she felt movement that meant they weren't.

Since she wasn't really sick, they transferred her to a convalescent care facility that worked as an adjunct to the hospital. After she'd arrived and been given a room of her own, she'd met with the doctor assigned to her case. Doctor Williams had restated what Dr. Moresby had told her. Because she was only twenty-three, her bones would heal quickly, but she wouldn't be using them to carry her weight for at least another six weeks. The nurses would help her get to the bathroom and would take her to meals in a wheelchair. A physical therapist would work with her every day to strengthen her muscles and help alleviate pain.

Dr. Williams explained.

"I've recommended a therapist to work with you. Rich Harris has worked with cases like yours before and he's had great success. What he'll be doing first is keeping your legs from losing muscle tone until you start walking again. Rich also knows how to reduce the pain you're feeling.

"Once you've healed enough, he'll start you out with a walker. After that, he'll give you some crutches. Once we get you to that point, there's no reason you can't go home. It'll take more therapy to graduate you to a cane and then to moving on your own, but Rich can explain all that to you."

Diane had listened and nodded her head, but inside, she was ashamed and enraged. There she was, twenty-three years old, and living in what amounted to a nursing home. Most of the other residents were in their sixties or older, and through the open door to her room, she could see them moving slowly down the hall with their walkers or canes.

Diane knew she'd never even make it to a walker. Just moving caused her pain and the drugs weren't helping that much. Trying to walk would be more painful than she'd be able to endure. Jack would never want a partner in that shape.

Jack had tried his best. She knew that. He had been at the hospital every day and then at the convalescent center for the first month. Then his visits came every other day. After the second month, he called to say he would be very busy with a different job, but would come as often as he could. He hadn't called again for three weeks. Diane wasn't surprised, really. Who could expect any man to stay with a woman trapped in a wheel chair?

That morning in November, one of the floor nurses wheeled Diane down the hall to a door with "Physical Therapy 6" painted on the outside. Inside, it looked about like the room in her high school where the jocks worked out. There were weight machines, exercise bikes, parallel bars, and mats on the floor. The nurse locked the wheels of the wheelchair and said something about being back for her in about an hour.

The big clock on the wall slowly ticked away a little more of her life this morning, and the occasional pigeon stopped to peer in the windows. Diane pulled the hospital gown to her waist and stared at her legs. The once smooth, slender legs rounded by firm muscle had become thinner and lined with pink scars that mapped the path of Dr. Moresby's scalpel. They were horrible and those scars would be there for the rest of her life, reminding her that her legs were still fragile.

Diane traced one on the inside of her left thigh until her finger touched the cotton of her panties, and frowned. Soft downy hair that matched the mane of light caramel on her head now covered her scarred limbs. Diane had not thought of shaving until that moment, and sighed at the thought that this was another thing she probably wouldn't have to do ever again. Why should she shave when no man would want to touch her?

"You wanna put that down so we can get started?"

Diane started at the man's voice behind her. She had been so absorbed in her thoughts that she hadn't heard the door open. With one quick motion, the gown again lay draped over her legs. A warm flush covered her face and chest.

"Don't be embarassed. You can look at yourself whenever you want, I guess. I'm just not used to having my patients flash me."

"I wasn't flashing you."

He grinned at Diane.

"I know you weren't. It was just a little joke. You know about jokes, don't you?"

Diane looked at his grinning face and hated him for that grin just as she hated that grin on the other people at the convalescent center. Her voice was angry, but didn't begin to reflect the anger in her mind.

"Yeah, I remember jokes. There's the joke about me walking again, for one."

Rich looked at the young girl for a moment and though he was still smiling, his thoughts were of both pity and determination. She'd been a beautiful young woman, still was even with the scars on her legs. Those would eventually almost disappear, but the scars in her mind would be there forever unless he could convince her she was still the same woman as before the accident. He'd have to do that in order to get her walking again.

He'd read the doctor's report on her condition. Diane had suffered a broken left femur, multiple fractures of her right tibia and fibia, and two broken ribs. Her femur was now held together by a titanium rod screwed inside the bone and titanium plates now held her tibia and fibia in place. The two broken ribs had been left to heal on their own. Doing anything to support them would probably have resulted in pneumonia or other respiratory disease.

A careful look at her latest X-rays that morning had told him the bones were well on their way to knitting back together. Her chart said she was still feeling pain, but there was no reason for that. All the incisions had healed and her bones were held firmly in place by metal plates and screws. The pain must be in her mind, her mind's way of confirming the thought that she'd never walk again. Doctor Moresby had come to the same conclusion and was only prescribing aspirin for that pain instead of anything stronger.

She wasn't yet healed enough to take her full weight on those legs, but she was healed enough to start using a walker if she'd help him maintain some strength in her legs. The tone of her voice told him she wasn't ready to do that yet.

Rich had no doubts she was capable of walking again. He'd worked with patients with more serious injuries and they walked again, but those patients had the determination to keep going even when it hurt. He didn't yet know how he'd build that determination in Diane, but he knew he'd find a way. That was what he did with people -- flirt, cajole, tease, or taunt them until they were ready to try, and then praise them for each little step they took towards recovery. The rest was easy. It was just a matter of strengthening muscles and re-teaching muscle control.

He smiled at Diane.

"You know, I'm working with a woman who's seventy six. She broke her hip about the same time as your car accident and yesterday she took the first steps with a walker. You can be doing just as well or better if you'd just try. Surely there's something you'd like to do again if you could learn to walk."

Diane frowned.

"There's not much chance of me doing that ever again. Even if I could get out of this wheelchair, which you and I both know I won't, I'd never be fast enough or graceful enough."

Rich arched his eyebrows.

"Ahhh, so there was something you liked to do. What was that?"

"It doesn't make any difference now, now does it? I'm always going to be a cripple.'

Rich grinned.

"Well, you're probably never going to win a triathlon or make it to the Olympics in gymnastics, but I doubt those things are what you wanted to do. Tell me. Maybe I can help."

A tear rolled down Diane's cheek as she thought of how her lifelong dream had evaporated when her car crashed through the guardrail. First it was dance classes when she was five. When she was ten, her mother had taken her to ballroom lessons and she had fallen in love with the dances and the music. Diane felt she had found her niche in life.

Her first competition was when she was twelve. Her partner wasn't a very good dancer so they didn't win, but Diane didn't care. She felt so feminine and grown up in the long dress and high heeled dance shoes. The heels weren't very high, but they were still high heels just like a grown-up woman would wear.

By the time she was in college, she was competing with Jack at least once a month and her instructor said they had a good chance of at least placing in the US competition circuit. They did just that a week before her twenty-first birthday and had begun winning competitions shortly after that.

Diane had been on her way to a practice session with Jack when the accident happened. The next competition was only a week away and they were still working on a new routine. The choreographer said they'd knock the socks off all the judges. Now the only thing without socks were her feet.

Diane looked up at Rich. He was still smiling and had a questioning look on his face. Diane's sorrow changed to fury. Rich wouldn't, couldn't possibly understand how she felt. He'd just smile and like Doctor Moresby, he'd tell her she was a very lucky girl to still be alive. Diane wasn't really alive, or at least she didn't feel alive. She felt like she was just going through the motions of eating and sleeping because her body wanted to survive more than her mind did.

Her voice was bitter.

"You can't help. Why would you think you could?"

Rich held up his hands.

"Hey, if you want to wallow in self pity, that's your business, but if I don't know, I sure as hell can't help. You might at least give me the courtesy of telling me so I can tell you I can't do much about it. You'll have confirmed your thoughts, and I'll feel like I tried to help. We'll both win."

He was smiling again, and in a sudden burst of rage, Diane told him.

"I was a dancer, a damn good dancer and I was going to be one of the best. That's all gone now. You can't do anything about it, so stop trying."

Rich frowned.

"So that's it? You thought you'd make it to Blackpool and now you think you can't? Maybe you were that good, but I doubt it. Those dancers are the best few out of several million dancers from all over the world. What makes you think you were that good?"

Diane drew herself up in the wheel chair and pushed out her chest.

"My instructor said I was. How do you know about Blackpool and what makes you so smart you can judge me?"

Rich grinned. Maybe he'd found the reason for Diane to work at getting better. He just had to convince her she could probably dance again.

"Well, believe it or not, inside this dashing, handsome, physical therapist is a ballroom dancer too. I know about Blackpool because I went there for the last competition. No, I didn't compete. I'm nowhere that good, but watching was fantastic."

"You went to Blackpool?"

"Sure did. Got there the day before the competition started and stayed until the last dancer left the floor. As for the part about judging you, I wasn't. I was just saying the dancers at Blackpool are the very best in the world and it would be a bit unusual for you to be that good."

"How would you know if you've never seen me dance?"

"I don't. You'll have to show me sometime before I can say one way of the other."

Diane frowned again.

"There's not much chance of that happening, now is there?"

"Oh, I don't know. To be honest with you, no, you'll probably never dance as good as the professionals at Blackpool, but also to be honest, I wasn't all that impressed with them."

Rich smiled to himself. Diane was still feeling sorry for herself, but at least her eyes were shining and she was interested. Her voice was more questioning than enraged as well.

"How could you not be impressed?"

"Well, to me, dancing is something I enjoy doing because I can dance to what I feel the music doing. The professionals with their choreographed routines don't usually dance anything recognizable as the dance they're doing. It's more about dance a few steps and then pose, dance a few more steps and pose again. With some of the routines, I got the feeling it wouldn't have mattered what music was playing. They'd have just danced the same routine with the same steps and the same poses.

"I liked the young kids in the rising star competitions a lot more. At least I could see waltz patterns when they did a waltz and cha cha patterns when they did a cha cha. The older folks dancing between the competitions were pretty neat too. I hope when I'm in my seventies I can dance as well as some of them did. I'm thirty, so I guess I have a few years left to practice."

Rich caught the hint of a smile on Diane's face. It was just a twitch of her lips, but it was there.

"So, tell me Diane, did you dance a routine or did you just dance?"

"For competition, we danced a routine, but I like just dancing too. We were practicing so much, I didn't get to do much social dancing."

"Who is 'we'? You had a full time partner?"

"Yes, Jack was my partner."

"And where is Jack now?"

"I don't know. I haven't seen or heard from him since a month after I got here."

Rich frowned.

"Doesn't seem like he was much of a partner."

Rich saw tears again when Diane answered.

"Well, what would you expect him to do? He has a whole dance career ahead of him. He couldn't hang around waiting for me to heal, because I won't. He'd have to find another partner."

"Well, still, you'd think he'd stay in touch. Those tears tell me you wish he had. I would have."

Diane sniffed.

"You're not a real dancer though. You're just a guy who likes to dance."

"That's true. I'm not a professional, but even if I was, I wouldn't walk away from my partner just because she got hurt. I might find another partner, but I'd stay in touch and try to help her get well again. That's what a good partner would do, well, unless he didn't feel anything for you except that you were a good match for him. If that was the case, you're better off without such an ass."

Diane had fire in her eyes when she spoke.

"He wasn't an ass. He was just interested in his own career."

"More interested in his career than in you?"

Diane didn't answer quickly, and Rich could see she was thinking. Finally, she looked up at him.

"I...I guess so."

Rich grinned.

"Wouldn't you like to show him what he gave up?"

"How would I do that?"

Rich shrugged.

"Dancing again would be a good start."

"I can't do that and you know it."

Rich's face was firm.

"Diane, if that's what you really believe and want, that's what will happen. You'll spend the rest of your life sitting in that wheelchair and mad at the world because you can't do what you want to do. If you'll give me a little effort, I'll be able to help you dance again."

The nurse opened the door then, but Rich held up his hand and the nurse closed it again. He looked back at Diane.

"Diane, you might not win Blackpool, but if you want to, you'll be dancing again and you'll feel good doing it. We're out of time today, but you think about it before you come back, OK? I'd kind of like dancing with you, that is if you can lower your standards enough to dance with a guy who just likes to dance."

That night as she lay in bed trying to fall asleep, Rich's words came back to her.

"If that's what you really believe and want..."

Diane knew she believed she'd never heal enough to dance again, but was that what she really wanted? Did she want to just watch other dancers and remember how it had been before? Could she ever even watch another couple dancing without breaking into tears?

The tears streaming down her cheeks told Diane she couldn't ever be content to just watch. The thrill of being on the dance floor and knowing other people were watching her every move came back to her then. Most dancers, even beginning dancers, knew how difficult it was to make the dance look as fluid and easy and she could. Their applause after a dance and sometimes during had caused a thrill nothing could ever replace. If only she could have that back, if time could just reverse itself and she'd never plunged through that guardrail. But time couldn't reverse itself, and she was doomed to always be a watcher and remember what might have been.

What if Rich was right and she could dance again? Of course, he wasn't right, but what if he was? He seemed to believe she could really learn to walk again and would then be able to dance.

The more Diane thought about it, Rich was acting like the choreographer she and Jack had used. When he'd introduced a new pattern to their routine, a very difficult pattern, Diane had at first doubted her ability to do it. The choreographer had then broken down the pattern into small steps and walked them through it. The pattern was still difficult, but knowing the small steps and how to do them correctly soon made it doable. After that, it was only practice that polished the new footwork into the smooth execution of the moves.

Rich seemed to be much the same. He'd told Diane that first she needed to gain back the strength in her legs. After that, she'd progress to a walker, then to crutches, and finally, to holding her weight on both legs. He was breaking her recovery into steps, just like the choreographer. The steps weren't very small, but they didn't go immediately from a wheelchair to walking. Maybe he was like the choreographer and knew how to do what he was telling Diane to do.

At nine the next morning, a nurse wheeled Diane back to Physical Therapy 6 and left her alone in the room. Rich walked in a couple minutes later.

"Sorry I'm a little late, but I was watching a video about rumba. I always thought rumba was an easy dance to learn, but watching that couple showed me all I learned was the basic step and a couple of simple patterns. I couldn't believe how sensuous and seductive the follower was. It was like she was trying to convince her partner to...well, you know what I mean since you're a dancer."