I Asked for the Appointment

The thing I keep turning over is not the stair. The stair is just the stair. I have hit that same rubber nosing before and my ankle has had things to say about it since Day 6 and tonight it said them again. What I keep turning over is that I walked into Apex at twenty to ten on a Saturday and I asked Rob for the medical panel appointment first thing Monday.

I do not ask Rob for things. I tell him what I am doing. I tell him when I am sparring, when I am cutting, when I am skipping a session because the body said no. Tonight I asked. Like a customer. Like a man who has decided something is wrong and wants a professional to confirm it in writing.

What is wrong is not the cut. The cut is a cut. I have closed a hundred cuts at bathroom sinks at one in the morning. What is wrong is I caught my lead foot on the same nosing and I went down on the knee I boxed on six weeks ago when I thought I had a staph infection. My body is finding ways to remind me it is not a fixed thing. I am thirty and my left ankle keeps slipping me out of rooms I have already paid to be in.

Lev called me swimmer tonight. Loud enough for Quill's corner to hear. I did not answer because Quill was coming back to the stool and I had a round to call. That is the truth I will tell myself. There is another truth which is that I did not have anything to say back that would have landed without making it worse for the kid I was working. So I ate it. Swimmer. Clipboard. September. Three words and a public square and I am writing this down at midnight so I do not forget I knew what they meant.