Page 188 of Top Shelf

“Goodnight, min fru.”

Neither of us hangs up for another few seconds, but when the line finally goes quiet, I lie there staring into space with my phone warm in my hand.

Chapter twenty-eight

Viktor

On the night my wife, Dr. Heidi Grant, opens her studio, I stand near the back of the room with a glass of water in my hand and an envelope tied with blue ribbon inside my jacket.

Heidi asked me to come, but she did not ask me to make myself part of the evening—so I stay where I am.

Return To Play is full enough that people spill between the reformers and gather around the reception desk with drinks balanced carefully in their hands. Athlete testimonials roll silently across a screen near the mirrors and the logo glows against the wall. Her name is everywhere it should be.

A reporter I recognize from one of the Denver sports networks catches my eye from across the room and starts walking toward me. Zoe intercepts him before he makes it halfway. I do not know what she says, but he turns around and walks somewhere else.

Good.

Carina sees me next. She is standing with Reid near the windows, and her gaze moves over my suit before settling briefly on my face. I cannot tell whether she wants to hug me or have me medically compromised. Possibly both.

Then Heidi walks into the room, and every other person disappears.

She is wearing a cornflower blue suit, with her hair pinned back from her face, and Ebba’s ring catching the light when she reaches for Zoe’s arm. Someone says something that makes her laugh, and the sound moves through me with enough force that my fingers tighten around the glass.

I have heard that laugh through a phone all week, and it hits me how much I have wanted to hear it in person again. Heidi turns and her eyes find mine across the crowd, but neither of us move. There are thirty feet and too many people between us, but her face softens as she takes me in, enough that that my nerves settle. I lift my chin and her mouth curves in response. She takes a step toward me, but a guest touches her elbow and the moment breaks.

I stay where I am. This is her night.

A few minutes later, Zoe taps a glass and calls everyone’s attention toward the front of the studio. People shift around me until I can see Heidi standing beneath the Return To Play logo with a microphone in her hand. She looks nervous for all of three seconds, and then she begins.

“I keep being asked why this studio is different,” she says. “And I understand the question. There are a lot of places where athletes can train and there are excellent rehab clinics, excellent gyms, excellent coaches. But there is a gap a lot of people fall into after injury, and if you’ve been there, you know exactly what I mean.”

The room hums with an agreement from those that have been through an injury and recovery process. She nods and smiles, her shoulders settling as she continues.

“You can be cleared on paper and still not trust your body. Return To Play exists for that reason. For the athlete who is technically back, but not fully home in themselves yet. For the part of recovery that doesn’t disappear because somebody signed a discharge form.”

My throat closes because this is what I tried to say in the interview. I had some of the words right, but the difference is that in Heidi’s mouth they belong where they were always supposed to.

“This studio came from years of clinical work, from every athlete who told me they were fine while their body told me something else, and from a belief that return to sport deserves more than luck and a handout sheet.” Her smile lifts. “It has also involved a terrifying number of forms, several extremely patient women, and more plants than I originally budgeted for.”

Laughter moves through the room, and Mila lifts her glass from beside a reformer, looking completely unapologetic.

“But mostly,” Heidi continues, “it took a refusal to believe that the end of rehab has to be the end of care. It isn’t. Not here.”

Applause breaks around me.

Next, she thanks Carina, Moreno Clinic, Zoe, Sloane, Nia, Lulu, Mila, the athletes who trusted the concept before the doors officially opened, and the women in sport who kept opening rooms that weren’t built for them, then held those doors open behind them.

The room is quiet as she pauses, her smile shifting as she glances toward the reception desk. I follow her gaze and my heart lurches at a vase full of blooming cornflowers, soft and private enough that no one else will understand it. I do.

“There’s also a family oceans away from here,” Heidi continues softly, and my breath stops. “A family who taught me this summer that some things are worth fighting for with your whole heart. That loving something means tending and protecting it, and believing in its future even when keeping it alive asks more of you than you thought you had.”

Her eyes drift over the faces in the crowd until they find mine.

“That’s how I feel about this studio. About every athlete who walks through these doors and about the work still ahead of us. Return To Play exists because I believe there are some things you don’t give up on just because they’re difficult.”

The applause comes harder this time and my vision blurs. She did not say my name or make me part of the headline, but she took the best part of me and gave it back in front of everyone as something worthy. Something good.

I press my thumb beneath my eye before anyone can notice, and Heidi is immediately swallowed by people once the speech ends. She shakes hands and accepts congratulations. Answers questions, and laughs when Mila pulls her into a photograph with Zoe and Carina. She laughs, flushed from the speech and the applause, surrounded by people who came because of what she built.