Mary was perched on Matthew's hospital bed. After she'd described William's funeral to him in as much detail as she could remember and he could bear, her husband was silent. He closed his eyes. Matthew looked almost sea sick as he tried to digest the information. She squeezed his hand, but he didn't respond. Every day was a tidal wave; there was no shelter from the storm. It was rather heartbreaking, as she thought about how much Matthew enjoyed rowing, that he couldn't stomach the shifting current of their new reality. And yet as she watched Matthew escape into what she hoped would be a dreamless sleep, she allowed herself to go back to a very pleasant memory.
Mary felt like a drowned wharf rat as Matthew held out his hand to fish her out of the Thames. She was finally starting to understand chaos theory. It was five o'clock in the morning in the neighborhood of Putney, and she had absolutely no idea what she was doing. Climbing into Matthew's boat had been harder than she had anticipated. She had not followed all of his instructions, and had consequently lost her balance. After Mary toweled herself off, she felt brave enough to try again, this time paying more attention. Mary was at least relieved that none of her social acquiesces would ever find her in this borough of London.
"The basic physics of rowing..." Matthew began with excitement. Mary could only smile at his passion. He was definitely getting carried away and yet his enthusiasm was contagious. She would have liked to reward this frenzy of words with a round of kisses, but she did not want to needlessly rock the boat. Instead, she settled for blowing him a kiss. She used her finger to mimic an old rotary dial phone in the air and then made the gesture with her hand for of a phone call. Mary then fanned herself, implying how heated his scientific explanations were to her and that she was very turned on. Matthew blushed at her flirtatious antics before he continued speaking.
"A boat accelerates through the action and reaction principle," Matthew said calmly as the boat swayed. When Mary rolled her eyes at him he smiled and continued, "This is Isaac Newton's third law of motion." He demonstrated by putting his oar, or "blade," as he called it, into the water. "When you move the blade one way, the boat moves the other way. The momentum, which is the mass times velocity, you are exerting into the water will be opposite to the momentum acquired by the boat."
"My darling," Mary said with a smirk, "I do love your maths pillow talk, but it's far too early in the morning to even begin to understand what you are talking about."
Matthew took a deep breath of the fresh summer air. Rowing had always been his favorite sporting activity, but, like maths, it was a part of himself he had always kept somewhat hidden. Mary joining him on this beautiful July morning was a spectacular vision. He was enjoying all of her grumbling as she feigned resistance to the activity.
In the early light before dawn, the whisper of her outline made her seem especially angelic. Matthew locked eyes with his fiancée. He admired how her long, wet chestnut hair had been effectively pinned up and the style superbly framed her face. She was wearing a sun visor and her clothes were neat and formal for this occasion, even if they were still damp. Matthew couldn't help but stare at the wet tee-shirt displayed before him. Her breasts were perky from her dip in the warm water. All kinds of aquatic recollections spun inside his mind and he felt his body react to the memories of making love in a bathtub in New York and a shower in Vienna.
"I must tell you," Mary said seductively, "that I am very distracted, and you are to blame. I am having a lot of risqué thoughts centered around those skimpy, skin-tight rowing shorts you're wearing."
It seemed they were on the same wavelength. Matthew smiled at her self-assuredly. On the water, he felt more confident than ever. A part of him was thrilled that she could see him as athletic, and his ego did back flips. Matthew knew he would have to work extra hard to make up for Mary's inexperience. But he was not worried; in fact, he relished the opportunity to show off.
"The anatomy of a rowing stroke," Matthew began the lesson with jaunting of his chin as if to imitate an absent-minded professor. "While a rowing stroke may appear fluid, it is made up of four sequential elements: the catch, the drive, the finish, and the recovery."
"The cat that drove to Finland is in recovery," Mary repeated playfully with a serious expression of concentration on her face. He smiled at her antics and couldn't help laughing at her mischievous rewording.
"Every action has an equal and opposite reaction," Matthew continued. "End of physics lesson," he concluded with a wide grin on his animated face.
"Mary," he addressed her, pointing to the oars that she was holding as props. "Position each oar so the concave side is facing the stern of the scull," Matthew said and demonstrated with his own oars. With his free hand, he tapped his nose several times to indicate a secret trick was about to be shared. "Loosely grasp each one at the end of the grip. Your thumbs should be on the outside of the oar. The fewer ripples the more functionally effective the rowing will be."
"Now," Matthew said stilling his own movements. "Show me," he instructed.
Mary felt her movements were terribly clumsy as her oars made loud splashes. She scowled and tried again with determination. The oars were a cumbersome burden that had no finesse when she touched them.
"The energy of the force needed to propel the boat with the exertion on the oars comes from straitening your legs as your row with your arms. That way you can throw your weight around as you thrust with your upper body," Matthew further instructed.
"Darling, I'm trying to concentrate," Mary said with annoyance. "Must you really say, 'thrust with your upper body?' That is monumentally distracting, especially since you are wearing those shorts," Mary purred lustfully. She licked her lips as her eyes raked over him. "You look positively cocky," she teased.
An idea occurred to Matthew, one that he hoped would catch her by surprise. He tried to keep his expression and his voice neutral as he resumed giving her instructions.
"The oar's motion needs to be smooth and relaxed, but not necessarily quick," Matthew instructed. "Just like sex," he said with an amorous grin.
Mary threw her head back with loud, wild laugh at his unexpected comment. Matthew laughed with her and winked. He flexed his arm muscles for her to appreciate. Matthew decided it was time for their departure. He turned around, climbing back into the front seat and pushed their boat off the dock. Mary felt a whoosh of air and was amazed at how quickly they were leaving everything behind despite her minimal contributions. She was sitting in the stroke seat of the scull, which was behind Matthew. From her position, Mary was able to fully appreciate his technique. She was fascinated at how elegantly he was maneuvering their boat. And she couldn't help but be slightly hypnotized by the way the muscles in his back rippled from the exertion.
They sailed swiftly down the Thames into the spectacular sunrise. Mary had never felt so awed by her natural surroundings before. The blood red of the rising sun reflected on the blue water as they floated. It was as though they were sailing on flames but were untouched and protected. Mary could easily conjure up images from famous painters such as Turner and Monet who had painted the Thames; and yet the beauty she was witnessing could not compare to even the greatest of art. They glided forward towards the beacon of light.
"Matthew." She breathed his name because of the unexpected splendor that held her transfixed. It was no wonder that he loved rowing. The sky held orange and shades of yellow and it bounced playfully off the ripples of the water.
"Thou, sun, art half as happy as we," Matthew quoted, his emotion-rich voice only a soft grunt as he worked to keep them in position. "When my father took me rowing," Matthew said reverently. "he always said that to me."
Mary listened, enraptured by his tender, heartfelt words.
"I've never shared his words with anybody, Mary," Matthew paused, "not even my mother." She could hear the thick emotion in his voice.
"Darling," Mary said, speaking loudly so he could not miss her candid words. She wanted him to know she would never neglect the sentiments he was sharing with her. Mary knew it took courage for him to share, especially since his confession when they returned from Vienna.
"I had no idea rowing could be so spellbinding," she paused and then continued. "As Voltaire said, "Je ne sais pas où je vais, mais je suis sur mon chemin."
"I don't know where I am going, but I am on my way," Mary translated. To her, Matthew was parallel to the sunrise. For when it dawned on her how much she loved this man, it had opened her eyes to the magnificence all around her. She watched him rowing; his movements were confident and beautiful, Mary thought as he continued to guide them into the morning sunrise. And she thought proudly, he is all mine.
Mary couldn't wait to divest him of his skin-tight, skimpy rowing shorts.
Matthew listened to Mary as she described William's funeral. All that he could think about was Dauðalagið, the death song by William's favorite band Sigur Ros. He heard the melody in his head as he thought about his friend. Matthew had once before known the pain of sudden death with the loss of his father. And so he simply let the music in his head overtake him. It was the only coping mechanism that would allow him to feel he was paying his respects to his friend. Matthew gave in to the darkness and slept.
In his dream, Matthew was in a small boat sailing through the lush scenery of a tropical rainforest. He saw himself at the age he was when his father had died, a boy who had recently turned thirteen years old. Matthew felt inconsequential in his impressive surroundings. The sun was hot and demanding. He felt sunburn across his face and body. The burning sensation intensified on his back, and he flinched at the spreading pain.
"Matthew," his father said, "the rainforest is the world's best chemist. Look," he commanded him, "the blue morpho butterfly, one of the icons of the rainforest." Matthew watched the small creature's wings flap, making him think about the butterfly effect.
"Watch carefully, my boy," his father said as their boat came to a halt. "I need it for a specimen." Matthew couldn't help but cringe at the severity of his father's unexpected movements. He was scared all of a sudden. His papa seemed to have sacrificed his truly gentle temperament for this quest.
"This could change everything," his father said with a gleam in his eyes as he captured the butterfly.
Matthew knew something was wrong. It was as though his father's out-of-character actions had provoked outrage in their natural surroundings. There were repercussions. Matthew looked around at the rainforest. The lush canopy of tress was blocking the sky, and it was suddenly ominously dark. Matthew found his gaze then drawn to the butterfly in the glass jar. It fluttered helplessly against its cage. He couldn't help it; he started to cry. the fact that he couldn't control his emotions had always baffled him. Matthew shook, but not from his crying. There was a great booming noise in the distance that rocked the boat. Through his tears, he caught a glimpse of a volcano through the lush greenery. It was erupting. Matthew could see lava running down the volcano.
"Papa," he cried desperately. "I have no control," he wanted to say, and yet the words didn't come. Everything seemed to be happening at once and he had no time to react.
"Matthew," Reginald spoke calmly, "I don't know what is going to happen, but you must be brave." The boat violently rocked and swayed.
Matthew awoke with a gasp. He needed to feel the intensity of his injury so that he could trust he wasn't still trapped in his nightmare. Matthew felt sticky and clammy, still trapped in the jungle's heat. He purposefully tried to move, and instantly he felt the TLSO turtle shell back brace painfully chafe. And then Matthew remembered Mary's description of William's funeral, and his heartbeat pressed like a jackhammer throughout his chest.
When he opened his eyes, he saw he wasn't alone. In the corner of his vision, he could see there was a nurse at the foot of his bed. She smiled kindly at him. And so he started to cry with relief that it had been a dream.
"Matthew," he heard his name, so soft, crisp and clear. But who was saying it? He felt panic. His father's voice was so strongly pounding in his head from his nightmare. The tears were hot as they fell down his face. He struggled for each breath.
"My boy..." He heard the words and was claimed. He was free, somehow. His mother's voice was a lifeline, pulling him away from his nightmare once and for all. She must have been the nurse at the foot of his bed.
"Mother," he responded quietly, and she smiled at him. He felt a tickle in his throat as he took a deep breath which resulted in a cough. Suddenly, he had to pinch his eyes shut as a wave of nausea hit him. The simple motion of coughing spiraled through him like an eruption. A radiating pulse of pain was throbbing up and down the back of his legs, tingling and awakening the memory of the broken vertebra in his spine. The pinched nerves from his compression fractures had given him temporary sciatica. And yet the physical pain did not upset him in these circumstances: it had heavy competition in the form of his grief.
"Matthew," he heard his name again. "Do you want to tell me about the nightmare?"
"No," he answered briskly. He had a completely different need at the moment. "Can we talk about papa instead?" he said tentatively.
"Of course," his mother said with affection. She picked up his free hand and squeezed it.
"I've been thinking a lot about your father lately. I've even been talking to Mary about him and quoting Proust!" Isobel said with bittersweet nostalgia.
"Mary loves anything French," Matthew said quietly, his lips quivering, "What was the quote Papa used to say about time, it was Proust wasn't it? I remember Papa but not Proust."
Isobel tilted her head and squeezed his hand.
Her voice was confident as she spoke. "Yes, your Papa loved Proust," she said with an encouraging smile. "I'd heard him say that quote a thousand times. 'Time, which changes people, does not alter the image we have retained of them.'"
There was inexplicable comfort in his mother's words, in the knowledge that he did accurately remember his father. However, the respite did not last long. The arrival of a nurse with his morning breakfast tray was a new set-back to his mood. He stared at the food, a new enemy to focus his rage and anxiety on. Each completely unappetizing offering held some critical vitamin that would supposedly aid his recovery. All he wanted was the peppermint tea. As he sipped it, his mind wandered as his mother chatted about hydrotherapy and how he would be meeting his new physical therapist today. Matthew felt as weak and useless as a child on the first day of school. Except that he had never attended school, as his mother had tutored him at home until he went to Cambridge. He could not handle school as a child, and the feelings of freakish isolation threatened to return and consume him. "Papa, I have no control," rang in his head.
Yesterday he had been scheduled to begin the hydrotherapy, but unexpectedly, the normal levels of pain had spiked beyond his comprehension. An epidural of steroids had been injected into his back when the pain did not respond to the medication he was taking. The rest of the day was a lost cause. He was marooned in this dark despair all around him, buoyant only with pain.
Instead of reading him maths, though, Mary was sharing her favorite distractions. She had been reading him poetry. Matthew remembered telling her he felt like Wordsworth's poem; he did feel he was wandering as lonely as a cloud. It was at this pitiful compliant that his beautiful wife had stopped the fluid motion she was performing of gathering her long hair into a ponytail. The hair fluttered down as she dropped it from her hands, as if it no longer mattered. She flipped her hair playfully in his direction, letting it cascade over him, tickling his skin. Her hair had a rich, nutty scent mingled with honey. The name of Mary's favorite shampoo was Godiva, and it was a very fitting description of the way his wife provoked action when challenged. She leaned forward and told him that the day was not a set-back. It was like dancing: two steps forward and one step back. It was all a part of the bigger picture of his recovery, and he was going to make a full recovery.
"Excuse me," a deep and distinguished voice said. It drew Matthew's attention, as if the words were a knock on the door. The tall man who stood there was dressed in green scrubs. Although he had a youthful appearance, his hair was tinged with gray.
"Nurse Crawley," he said with esteem, "it is very pleasant to see you again."
Isobel smiled and nodded. It had been a long interview process, but she believed she had found someone who could work successfully with her son.
"Matthew, let me introduce you to Asadullah Waubay."
"Asad, please," he said graciously with a warm smile on his face. He stepped forward and extended his hand.
As Matthew shook it, he saw numerous scars on the dark skin. Their eyes met and Matthew felt embarrassed for having stared. And so he was quiet as the stranger pushed him through the hospital hall towards their destination. Finally, they went through a set of doors and Matthew saw a pool twice the size of a large bathtub. It was equipped with a chair lift as well as wide handicap access stairs. The water had an iridescent glow about it and appeared to be heated.
"We're about to start over, Matthew," Asad said, holding out his scarred hands, ready to help his patient.
"The water is a therapeutic 34 degrees Celsius," Asad said, chatting amiably, "which means the water is about as hot as the temperature in my birth country of Sierra Leone. My home town of Freetown has sandy beaches and lush forested hills speckled about the coast."
Matthew couldn't help thinking about his dream again. The description he had just mentioned fit the location of his tropical nightmare. He was barely aware of how his robe was removed as he sat in his stupor. And then, to his surprise, he felt himself maneuvered with stealth from the wheelchair into the lift chair. A tiny inkling of relief pressed through him as he was submerged. The water was warm and soothing. He knew the warm water was supposed to combat and alter his perception of pain, being especially beneficial for lower back injuries. He understood the physics.
"After five minutes your blood pressure and pulse rates will start to drop. On this first session, we're not going to do any exercises, Matthew," Asad said as his strong, scarred hands vigilantly held the chair in place in the warm water. Matthew flexed his toes, captivated by how easy the fluid movement could be achieved. Matthew bit his lip as he shuddered a sudden breath. The warm water was disrupting the signal of pain that emanated from his body, just as predicted.
"You are very resilient Matthew, almost like a Sierra Leonean," Asad said genuinely meaning the compliment. "Despite the troubles of the past, blood diamonds and the civil war, my countrymen have a reputation as the world's most resilient people." The pride was obvious in his voice as he talked.
"Sometimes," Asad continued, "I want to go back, because I still think of Sierra Leone as my home. But I'm not brave enough." Asad's voice was reflective and genuinely poignant. "Despite the horror that made my family flee, now what I remember is only the good of my native land." He looked at the serene face of his therapist. Matthew wondered again about his age, presumably they were close contemporaries. Asad paused before asking a question.
"Does this make sense, Matthew?"
"Yes," he was able to whisper. "I understand." Matthew didn't know what was happening to him. But Asad's words about escape and compartmentalizing did made sense. He took a shaky, deep breath. There was not only stability, but consistency to what they had discussed.
"Time's up," Asad said, and there was no further talking between them. With expert finesse, his therapist assisted him, but everything was a blur. Matthew felt a strange, foreign sense of peace hovering just around him. Suddenly, they had arrived back at his hospital room. The white sheets of the hospital bed almost glowed, he was so exhausted. Matthew wouldn't say he felt better, but even feeling numb was an improvement.
"Next time, we will do more," Asad assured confidently as he said goodbye. Matthew nodded.
Suddenly, he was alone in the hospital room. He was extremely lethargic, but his mind couldn't bully him anymore. It had switched off. Matthew tried to take a deep breath but it quickly became a yawn. The door to his room clicked open. He opened his eyes and recognized his wife. She spun in a circle before him with a wide, charismatic smile on her beautiful face. In a day of surprising sensations that had actually given him comfort and relief, Mary's actions took the cake, so to speak. She laughed lovingly at his stunned reaction.
"What have you done to yourself?" he finally said in bemusement. Matthew gaped at his wife. It was all gone, he thought in amazement.
"Now we both have something to recover from," Mary said flippantly. She approached and settled herself as close as possible to him on his hospital bed. The message hit him loud and clear. The loss of her long, chestnut locks of hair did nothing to alter his belief in her beauty.
The pixie haircut made her positively beam.
"I did it for you," Mary said with a kiss as she framed his face with her hands. He brushed his fingers through what little hair remained.
"Do you like it?" she asked, her forehead leaning on his as she stooped over.
Matthew kissed her with all of his pent up love, hoping it would answer her question.
Thanks for reading!
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My Colossal thanks from the bottom of my heart to R. Grace.
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