A lifetime of struggling and nearly a decade of grueling work had led up to this eventful moment. The constant sacrifice and promises of future fulfillment had pushed her through many exhausting days. Now, Arian Rhodes was finally free.

The servitude of schoolwork was over!

Sitting at her computer desk, she held her both fists triumphantly in the air. The screen in front of her displayed the results of her physiotherapy doctorate board: PASSED.

She had graduated, gotten a job offer from the exact clinic she’d wanted, and been working part-time on a temporary license until she could pass her board. Now, she had reached the finish line.

Unable to contain her excitement, she began dancing in her chair. This proved an insufficient outlet for her joy, so she jumped up to run up and down her apartment hallway, whooping in excitement.

“I did it! I did it! Iiiiiiiiiiii diiiiiiiiiiiiiiiid iiiiiiiiiiit!!!!”

The training dummy she kept in her sparse living room, Gerald, became the object of her bubbling energy. 

She threw four quick jabs at his chest—one for each year of undergrad; three roundhouse kicks to the obliques—one for each year of her doctorate program; and then finished him off with a high kick to the face, for clinicals and the NPTE exam. The dummy began to tip, and she rushed to stabilize it.

“Sorry, Gerald,” she apologized to the unresponsive man.

Arian would never admit to anyone how many one-sided conversations this dense foam dummy had been privy to.

Wrapping her arm around his shoulders, she continued, “This poor kid did the impossible. I achieved my dream! The instability of my childhood can be forgotten as I move into my new phase of life: stable relaxation!” Her hand was up, as if panning to a grand horizon, but it was only her furnitureless living room.

“I should tell real people about this,” she said as she smacked the firm chest and began to walk away, but not without throwing another kick to the overly sculpted abdominals.

Reaching for her phone, she put a message in her friends’ group chat, which was the primary way she had interacted with all non-school related human beings for the past eight years.

Arian: You must all refer to me now as Dr. Arian Rhodes, DPT.

Tasha: Who is this?

Max: Yeah, I don’t have this number in my phone anymore.

Bev: Woah, is this a GHOST? I thought you DIED!

Arian: Har har! I see you all became comedians while I was toiling away in school.

Bev: Celebratory sushi and drinks tonight at Django’s?

Max: Doctor, are you truly allowed to roam the wild free world again?

Tasha: Happy hour starts at 6pm. Don’t forget to wear a bra.

Arian: See you tonight jerks.

For the most part, these were the only people she felt close enough to tell about her achievement. Arian had grown up as a foster system kid and had no real family to speak of. 

People in her life had often been pedestrian, walking in and out in the blink of an eye. There was one other person she would need to tell eventually, but Arian had avoided serious conversations with him for years.

Sensei Ray was the source of her dream to become a doctor. The opportunity he’d given her in his dojo had been the start of her love for the human body and movement. All attacks could be distilled to joint biomechanics. Her understanding and desire to help others with their injuries had been cultivated in the space he’d provided.

Ray had kept her out of trouble as a kid by letting her attend all of the martial arts classes she wanted for free. He’d been a lifeline for a financially destitute kid with fluctuating guardianship. 

He had never even bothered trying to get a liability form signed for her. No matter how many times her living situation changed, her home at the dojo had never been more than a short city bus ride away.

Arian chewed her lip thinking about him, and her heart felt tight with guilt. In many ways, he was like the father she’d never had, but there was an awkward distance between them now. School had made her train less frequently, but that wasn’t the problem. A risk she’d taken had almost ruined the best thing in her life. They had yet to speak about it, and it hung in the air between them.

She closed her golden eyes, took a deep breath, and deliberately pushed her feelings away.

Later, she lied to herself. I’ll sort that out later.

Pulling her long black hair up into a bun, she returned to her empty living room to begin her morning mobility routine while her coffee brewed. Groaning as she found a stiff spot on her back with a foam roller, she planned out her day.

Since she was still part-time, Arian normally did not work on Fridays. She would run over to the clinic to tell them about her board results, go to the dojo to see Ray and do some training, then she would have plenty of time to get ready for dinner with her friends. And then tomorrow… nothing!

This weekend she would have no schoolwork to haunt her and no board exam to prep for.  A regular day job would be her only commitment in life, evenings and weekends were finally hers available to enjoy herself. 

She smiled as she imagined a period of ease in her life. The rest and laziness had been long overdue. After her morning regimen, she drank her coffee and ate a hearty breakfast, then left for the short walk across the street to the clinic.

On her way out of her apartment building she passed Mrs. Tena Lessman, the grumpy old landlady of the building. She looked two hundred years old with thinning white hair, and her face was always twisted up like she smelled something foul. She carried an empty medium-sized box but fumbled with the electric lock on her office door.  Her frustrated mumbles were loud enough for Arian to hear, but too quiet to understand.

“Morning Miss Tena! Do you need help with that?”

“Mind your business,” the old woman snapped.

Arian chuckled. “Take it easy and have a good day, Miss Tena.”

Slam.

The lock clunked loudly, and Arian walked out the front door feeling amused by the level of discontent fueling that old woman’s life force.

“Good morning, Dr. Sunabe.”

Dr. Ellura Sunabe was a pretty woman who looked to be in her early forties, with dark brown eyes and strikingly pure white hair that she wore in a short bob.  Ellura was Arian’s boss at the clinic, and she greatly admired the older woman’s endless knowledge.

“Morning, Arian. I didn’t know you were coming in today.”

“Actually, it’s officially Dr. Rhodes now!” she said while displaying some professionally subdued jazz hands.

“Congratulations on passing your boards!”  Ellura gave Arian a warm smile as she stood up from her desk. Arian was taller than most women, but her boss barely had to look up to make eye contact. “Do you have your results with you? We can give them to HR.”

“Do they need to be printed?” Arian asked, feeling disappointed in herself for not having done something so obvious. She assumed she could send them digitally while she was here. “I can go home and do that quickly.”

“No need to go home. You can access them here.”

“You sure? I live just across the street.”

Dr. Sunabe raised an eyebrow in interest as her eyes shifted in the direction of the apartment building. “The apartments across the street? How convenient.”

The quirk of her eyebrow made her look mischievous and young.  From a distance one might assume her to be older than she was, but her face had an ageless quality to it. Wise but wrinkle free.

“I am presenting at a conference on the east side of town, so I’ll also be leaving soon. If you want to use my computer to pull up your results, we can send them over before we both leave.”

“I’ll get right on it!” Arian said with the eagerness of a new graduate, and she held no shame about it.

Arian downloaded her results and sent the digital file to the human resources office. With her task completed she prepared to leave. As she turned out of the doorway, though, she plowed right into Dr. Sunabe, who’d been carrying a full cup of coffee. Her boss’ pristine white doctors’ coat was now covered in the hot dark liquid.

Arian was absolutely mortified.

“Oh no!” Arian stammered. “I am so sorry!”

“It’s alright Dr. Rhodes,” Ellura reassured her calmly. “It was an accident.”

“But your presentation! Do you have a spare coat?”

“I don’t, but if I hurry home, I think I can make it in time.”

“I have a coat at my apartment you can use.” Arian offered.  Solutions helped her push emotions away and her anxiety melted as the idea came to her. “We can run across the street to get it so you aren’t late.”

Ellura smiled affectionately at Arian. “That would be so incredibly helpful. Thank you.”

Grateful that she wasn’t behind on laundry, a freshly washed white coat was available to remedy the situation. Her embarrassment eased with a plan in place.  Worried about getting Dr. Sunabe to her conference on time, they immediately left for her apartment.

Arian never could have known that this helpful suggestion would uproot her entire life.  There would be no training at the dojo and no celebratory dinner with her friends. Her newly achieved relaxation would never be enjoyed.

She was unintentionally guiding an intruder to its prey, and the consequences would take everything away from her.