Damian

The rain has just stopped, and Market Street shone with streetlights like polished silver. Damian stepped down from the porch of his house and tapped on the wet asphalt — the sound was irregular, dull: crutches. His right ankle, wrapped in an elastic bandage, throbbed with every movement.

The doctors said: two weeks without weight-bearing. Two weeks he is holding on with difficulty — the gym remains there, outside the windows, and his hands become unmanageable without work. That's why he went out: at least to take a walk, at least to the river.

(Six in the morning. Usually I’m already in the ring. Usually my body gets tired before the thought comes. And now — like this. I stand. I turn my head like a lost person.)

He walked past a familiar store, past the "Copper Teapot" café — the light was still off, Mrs. Abby would open later. And he stopped in front of the descent to the underground passage: the staircase went down, wet steps, handrails that he couldn’t touch right now — both hands occupied with crutches.

(Descent. Twenty-three steps down, twenty-three up. On crutches. With a foot that can’t bear weight. I used to fly over them in seconds. I used to not notice stairs at all.)

Damian froze at the edge, looking down. The sound of crutches fell silent — only drops from the awning fell onto the asphalt next to his sneaker.

(Funny. Two hundred seven centimeters tall, weighing under a centner, steel fists — and I’m afraid of twenty wet steps. Bars would laugh. Bars is sleeping and laughing.)

Here he exhaled and adjusted his crutches, inhaled the cold, rain-washed air and looked at the passage — then at the empty street, then back at the staircase.

(Decide. Either down — and it will be the first victory in two weeks. Or home, to Bars and a book, like a compliant patient. ...First option. Always first option.)