Life and a broken leg chapter one "How it all started" Jane sat on the hardwood floor of the gymnasium, her back against the sweat-streaked wall. Her cast-clad left arm lay listlessly at her side, her right hand clutching a crumpled tissue to her nose. Blood trickled down her face, staining the skin beneath her eye. Tears welled in her eyes, threatening to spill over and drip onto her newly-acquired injury. She didn't know how it had happened. One moment she was dribbling down the court, the next she felt a sharp pain in her knee, and then everything went black. When she came to, she found herself surrounded by a sea of concerned faces. Her parents, her sister, her friends, even some of the teachers she barely knew. They all clamoured around her, asking if she was alright, if she needed to go to the hospital. But Jane just wanted to be alone. She didn't want to hear their voices or feel their touch. She just wanted to be left alone with her thoughts and her pain. Finally, one of the coaches escorted her to the nurse's office, where she was given a pair of crutches and instructed on how to use them. As Jane made her way out of the office, she glanced around at the posters on the walls, each one depicting some sort of athletic triumph. She wondered if she'd ever achieve anything like that now. With her cast, she couldn't even play basketball. What would she do with herself all summer? She considered her options as she made her way back to her locker, the clicking of her crutches echoing down the empty hallway. School had let out early, due to the sudden influx of students with broken bones from the basketball court. Jane supposed it was a fitting end to her final season on the team. A tear dropped from Jane’s eyes as she thought of the kind of summer she was going to spend with her wrist. As she rode the car home with her parents, she stopped by a bookstore. “Dad?” She said, “Yes?” He replied, “Can we stop here? I wanna visit this book store.” “Sure,” her dad agreed. As she opened the car door. She walked out and got her crunches which gave her an annoyed thought about how she wouldn't be able to do anything except sit on the couch and watch her sister practise her soccer. As she opened the door to the bookstore, she felt like she never even got crunches. All her pain and annoyed thoughts slowly flew away as she walked through the shelves of books. She stopped by an area and read the sign on top of the shelf “Self care and mental health” she said to herself she walked in the row of books in the area and stopped by a book. “Enjoying life 101” She read to herself. “Mom?” Jane asked. And so, she didn’t know, but that was the book that changed her life forever. To be continued...
