“Thirty seconds,” Eli said. “That’s all today.”
Whitaker locked his wheelchair. Eli worked silently, securing his legs, movements precise despite his age.
“Tell me if something feels wrong.”
“It all feels wrong,” the general muttered.
Still, he let the boy help him up.
Whitaker gripped the parallel bars. Pain flared instantly—white-hot, unforgiving. His arms shook. His breath hitched.
Eli stayed close, shoulder against his side.
“Just shift,” he whispered. “Breathe.”
Ten seconds passed.
Twenty.
At thirty, Eli leaned in. “Sit.”
Whitaker collapsed back into the chair, drenched in sweat—not from effort, but from confronting fifteen years of fear.
“I didn’t move,” Whitaker said.
“You stood,” Eli replied. “Your body remembered.”
They met every day.
Some mornings were brutal. Pain. Sleepless nights. Anger. Whitaker cursed. Eli never argued. He just handed him a towel and said, “Again.”
Thirty seconds became a minute. A minute became two.
By week three, Whitaker could stabilize without Eli’s hands.
By week four, they stopped counting seconds.
They counted steps.
Two at first. Then four. Then six.