Home Entertainment Game Technology Six months after a bullet left me paralyzed, my fiancée secretly ordered the staff to stop my afternoon therapy because she believed helping me was pointless, but the exhausted aide earning twenty-five dollars an hour refused to treat me like a lost cause. I had spent my life surrounded by men terrified of my name, yet it took one brutally honest woman washing my back to make me realize the person wearing my engagement ring had already abandoned me.352

My shoulders burned.

Tessa stood behind me with a gait belt while Patel braced my knees.

“Forward,” Patel said.

“I am forward.”

“No. Your ego is forward. Your chest is still back.”

Tessa snorted.

“Don't encourage him.”

“I'm enjoying this.”

We tried again.

My legs did not suddenly wake up.

There was no miracle.

No swelling music.

Just trembling arms and the sickening terror of trusting muscles I couldn't fully command.

Ten seconds upright.

Then twelve.

Then I collapsed into the chair, breathing hard.

Patel crouched in front of me.

“Vincent.”

I hated when doctors used my first name.

“What?”

“I felt activation in your left hip.”

I stared at him.

“What kind?”

“Trace.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning trace.”

“Will I walk?”

His face softened.

“I don't know.”

I wanted to hit him for saying it.

Then I wanted to thank him for not lying.

Behind him, Tessa held my eyes.

No smile.