Wrecked

The salesman, feeling responsible, has called me every afternoon to see how I'm doing. I have more large black bruises than I have fingers and toes. I limp. I can't stand or even cross my legs without pain. Advil and I have become close buddies. So has an additional chair in my cubicle that I prop both my legs on. While my right leg doesn't have the massive bruise that stretches down my calf like the left one, it has several brothers and sisters who are just as angry.

"I'm okay," I tell him. "I ate dinner last night and passed out before 8 p.m. I think I slept a lot of it off. Now I'm just sore."

"Are you taking anti-inflammatories for your knee?"

"By the threes."

"Good. That's prescription strength and that's what you need to be on."

"I went out to lunch yesterday and I scooted my chair up to the table as I sat down. My knee lightly bumped into the chair that was already scooted in and I just cried out and laid my head down on the table it hurt so badly."

"See, that's your problem. You're still scooting. No more scooting for you until you get healed up," he laughed.

It hit me that this Sunday is Father's Day, and I'm expected to show up at my father's house. For his pool party. I don't know how else to explain what I look like in place of the truth--because I literally look like I got run over by a scooter.

He knew that I was looking at them, and he was a proponent for me getting one; he just doesn't know that I laid it down. It's not this that bothers me so much. It's his reaction when I tell him I still want one.