“Hold it Justin.”

“I’m trying,”

“You need to try harder,” Karen said sternly. “Now, try again,” she lifted his leg off the oversized bench that his body was laid out on and bent it towards his chest. “Keep it there.”

“I can’t fucking feel it damn it!” Justin hollered as his leg dropped again. “I can’t do it. Why can’t you just see that and forget about me already? Christ Karen…call my mom. I‘ll leave today.”

“You haven’t even been here two days yet Justin,” Karen informed him. “Don’t be so quick to give up.”

“I’ll give up if I want to,” Justin moaned. “I don’t have the strength to do this.”

Sheridan had witnessed this behavior countless times before. She didn’t know why some of them were so stubborn. They were here to get help, but yet they acted as if they didn’t want it. She knew that the man lying on the table would be much happier flipping through the television stations, thinking about how much pain he was in. She knew, because that’s what they did. She wondered what somebody like him had done to wind up like this. She had heard that Justin Timberlake had gotten into a car accident. But she had never bothered to involve herself in finding out the details. Hell, she wouldn’t have even known that he had gotten into the accident in the first place if her friends back East hadn’t been chatting about it at lunch one day.

And he had chosen to come here of all places. She was surprised her mother had taken him on as her annual patient. She usually worked with injured jockeys and such. This was the first case her mother had taken on that was outside of all that. This guy was a pampered celebrity. Sheridan knew that this was probably the reason he was whining for his mother. His mother had probably babied him from the day of his accident, until the day she had dropped him off here. He hadn’t expected her mother to be so demanding of him. He had expected to come up here, be in a peaceful setting, and sit on his ass. She almost laughed at the thought. It was so far from the truth.

“Are you happy lying there like that?” Karen barked, pulling away from him.

He didn’t answer. He laid there motionless, one side of his face pressed against the bench’s black leather cushion.

“Well are you?”

“Just go away,” he sobbed. “Just go.”

Sheridan straightened herself. For a moment, she almost felt badly for him. But then she thought about it, and realized she knew better. This was only the beginning. Usually, when somebody was acting as stubbornly as he was, it meant that they were just going through a lot of emotional trauma. So much, that it was hard for that person to concentrate on anything else. Curiosity began to bloom inside her. She began to wonder exactly what had happened to him, other than the outcome of his accident, that had left him so broken inside. It wasn’t her place to wonder all that though, and she knew how angry her mother would be if she dared to question her about it. It was Justin’s private business, and until he was ready to talk about it, nobody could try to coax it from him. It was her mother’s golden rule. She was a great doctor. And she was the reason that Sheridan was going to school to become a physical therapist. Giving somebody hope was more rewarding than anything in the world. Her mother had proven that to her countless times.

“You may be giving up. But I’m not,” Karen said, approaching the bench again. “Come on Justin. Don’t quit on yourself.”

“Don’t touch me!” he yelled. “I don’t want to do this.”

Karen shook her head, and pulled away from him again. “Fine. Then lay there all day. I don‘t care.” She walked away from him, and out the door, leaving Justin helplessly strewn across the bench.

Usually, her mother would have pulled Sheridan out of the room along with her, but this time she hadn’t. Sheridan wondered why, all the while continuing to gaze at Justin’s helpless form.

“Stop staring at me,” Justin seethed. “I’m not here for your amusement.”

Sheridan rolled her eyes. “Things aren’t that bad you know.”

“You wouldn’t know,” he muttered. “You’re not me. You’re not the one who can’t move. You’re not the one who can’t take a damn piss.”

“Oh I get it now,” Sheridan smiled, swaggering over to him. “I’m supposed to feel sorry for you right?”

He picked his head up from the bench, and glared at her. “Smart like your mother aren’t you?”

She allowed her smile to grow wider. “Yes.”

“Are you as big of a bitch as she is too?” he shot at her.

Her smile faded. Her mother had been right to leave him lying there. “I guess you really do want to lie here all day.”

“I’ll take this over having to look at your nasty ass any day,” he seethed.

“Good,” she turned on her heel and began to storm away from him.

“Oh c’mon,” he called out to her. “You can’t just leave me like this.”

Sheridan whirled around. “Like hell I can’t. You just insulted me. I‘ll leave you here for the rest of the week if I can.”

“This is inhumane.”

She rolled her eyes. “You’re inhumane.”

“Please,” he whispered. His eyes were sad, lost. Like a little boy who had lost his puppy. “I didn’t mean to…say those things I said just now, or before.”

Sheridan could tell that he wasn’t as much of a jerk as he was coming off to be. Underneath his hard surface, she knew that he was a kind, compassionate person. He had just had a lot happen to him in a short span of time. He needed somebody that wasn’t going to quit on him, no matter how much he protested and bickered. Someone that would be there no matter how hard things seemed to get. She smiled. Was her mother up to something? Sheridan knew she might be. If she cared for a patient this summer, her internship would be fulfilled and it would be one less thing she would have to worry about next semester. “I’ll show you the horses,” she said softly. “You’ll need to learn how to feed them anyway.”

Justin nodded. “Thank you. It‘s Sheridan right?”

She smiled, and helped him up and into his chair. “Right. And you’re Justin Timberlake the phenomenon I guess.”

He didn’t smile. “I was.”

Sheridan knew now, that Justin‘s demons ran deep. She knew that they were eating away at his soul.. But finding out what they were, and helping him to overcome them was going to be an extremely difficult task to take on. But like all missions, it had to have a beginning.

And this was it.