The Finall Play novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Range of Motion

Elliot's first session leaves Tanner shaking; Coach Kestner then shows him Shane taking his snaps.

Tanner lasted ten minutes before he started complaining.

"This is a pendulum," he said. "My nephew does this on the playground."

"Your nephew's shoulder isn't torn," Elliot said.

Tanner leaned over the table with his right arm hanging straight down and made small circles with it.

The sweat on his neck said it was not as easy as he wanted it to look.

Elliot stood at his left and watched the shoulder blade, not the man.

That was the job.

He kept telling himself that it was the job.

"Slower," Elliot said. "Let the weight of the arm do it."

"I know how my own arm works."

"Then why is it hiked up by your ear?"

Tanner dropped it down an inch and made a face.

"There," Elliot said. "That's what relaxed feels like."

"It feels like nothing."

"Good. Nothing is what we want."

For a while neither of them talked.

The clinic hummed with the old fluorescent lights, and somewhere down the hall a washer thumped.

Elliot counted the circles under his breath and tried to ignore how much heat came off Tanner's skin.

"Do you always count out loud?" Tanner asked.

"Only when someone's trying to cheat."

"I'm not cheating."

"You rolled your ribs on circle six," Elliot said. "Again, from the top."

Tanner swore and started over.

Elliot hid a smile and turned it into a cough.

After the pendulum, they did the wall slide.

Tanner stood with his forearm flat against the wall and slid it upward an inch at a time.

At the top of the slide his whole face tightened, and he stopped breathing.

"Breathe," Elliot said.

"I am."

"You're not. Breathe out."

Tanner let out a long, shaky breath, and the arm crept up another half inch.

Elliot moved in without thinking and set his palm lightly on the back of Tanner's shoulder blade, to guide it.

The muscle jumped under his hand.

"Don't," Tanner said, too quietly.

"I need to feel the blade move."

"I know. Just." Tanner stopped. "Give me a second."

Elliot gave him a second, and then another.

He could feel Tanner's breathing through his palm.

It was too close, and he knew it was too close.

He stepped back.

"That's enough for today," Elliot said. "Sit."

Tanner sat on the table with his chest heaving and his hair stuck to his forehead.

"Twenty-two minutes," Tanner said. "I used to run two hours of practice."

"You used to have a shoulder."

"Thanks. That helps."

"It's not supposed to help." Elliot wrapped an ice pack around the joint and strapped it down. "It's supposed to be true."

Tanner studied him.

Then his gaze slid down, to the open collar of Elliot's polo where the edge of a scar showed, pale and thick, over the collarbone.

"That's from the Marlow game," Tanner said.

Elliot's hands stopped.

"It's from the surgery after," he said. "Nobody gets to see it."

"I wasn't..."

"You were."

He pulled the collar flat and tied the strap off tighter than he needed to.

Tanner hissed through his teeth.

"Sorry," Elliot said, not sorry.

"You did that on purpose."

"I did."

Tanner almost smiled.

Then his phone buzzed on the table, and he read the screen and the smile died.

"Coach wants me on the field," Tanner said. "Now. For film."

"You have an ice pack on."

"It's film. I don't have to throw."

Elliot should have said no.

Instead he walked beside him out the side door, and across the practice lot, and up the steps to the bleachers.

The team was running a seven-on-seven under the lights.

Coach Kestner stood on the sideline with his arms crossed.

"Look at that," Coach said as they came up. "Look at him go."

Elliot followed his gaze.

A tall quarterback in a red non-contact jersey dropped back, set, and fired a spiral thirty yards to a wide receiver on the sideline.

The pass was clean.

The whole line cheered.

"That's Ostrow," Coach said. "Sophomore. Hasn't missed a rep in three weeks."

Tanner did not say anything.

His good hand opened and closed at his side.

"He's taking your snaps with the first team," Coach said, easily. "Just so we're ready."

"Ready for what?" Tanner asked.

"Ready if the shoulder doesn't come back."

Coach Kestner patted his arm and walked away.

On the field, Shane Ostrow looked over at the bleachers.

He lifted the football, slowly.

Tanner turned to Elliot with his face white under the lights.

"Make it forty-five," he said. "Please."

Elliot felt something twist hard in his chest.

He had heard those exact words from the same coach once before.

"We'll see," he said.

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