Chapter 5 - The Rehabilitation Room
The Rusk Rehabilitation Institute smelled of clean linen, floor wax, and rubbing alcohol—a familiar scent that had defined much of my childhood.
On Tuesday afternoon, I walked down the bright, wide corridor of the fourth-floor pediatric and adult spinal trauma unit. I wore a simple navy blue sweater and trousers, carrying a small leather bag.
I stopped outside Room 412.
Inside, a young woman sat in a manual wheelchair near the window, staring out at the East River.
Hannah Miller was small, with dark brown hair pulled back into a messy bun. Her skin was pale, her face bearing faint, pink surgical scars along her jawline. A heavy lumbar brace supported her spine, and her thin legs rested motionless on the wheelchair footrests.
Beside her sat an elderly woman—her mother, Mary—holding a plastic cup of ice water, her eyes rimmed with exhaustion.
I knocked gently on the open door frame.
Mary looked up, startled. "Can I help you?"
"Hello," I said, stepping smoothly into the room, the faint click of my prosthetic muffled by the rubber floor. "Are you Hannah and Mary Miller?"
"Yes," Mary said, standing up cautiously. "Who are you?"
"My name is Victoria Vance," I said gently.
Hannah turned her wheelchair around, her dark eyes widening as she recognized my name. "Vance? Like... Vance Kinetic Systems?"
"Yes," I nodded, taking a seat on the visitor's chair across from them. "And also... I am the elder sister of Chloe Vance."
Mary’s face instantly hardened, her hands clenching into tight fists at her sides. "If you are here to offer us settlement money to protect your sister, you can get out right now! That spoiled monster destroyed my daughter's life! She left her dying in an alley like trash!"
"Mom, wait," Hannah said softly, reaching out to touch her mother's arm. She looked at me, her eyes observant, noticing something about the way I moved my left leg as I sat down. "She's not here for that."
"I am not here to defend Chloe," I said firmly, looking Mary straight in the eye. "My sister is a criminal. She is currently sitting in a federal detention facility, and I personally handed the evidence to the Attorney General that will ensure she stays behind bars for a very long time."
Mary froze, stunned. "You... you turned in your own sister?"
"My sister helped run down a human being and tried to cover it up with stolen money," I said quietly. "She deserves everything the justice system is going to give her."
I turned my attention to Hannah.
"Hannah, four days ago, my company took over the entirety of your medical bills, rehabilitation expenses, and long-term care housing," I told her.
Hannah gasped, her hand flying to her mouth. "That was... that was you? The hospital administrator told us an anonymous foundation cleared our two-hundred-thousand-dollar ICU debt, but they wouldn't give us a name."
"It was me," I confirmed. "And it isn't a loan. It's a gift. You will never pay a single dime for your care, your housing, or your recovery."
Mary dropped back onto her chair, tears spilling over her wrinkled cheeks as she covered her face with her hands, sobbing in pure, overwhelming relief.
Hannah stared at me, tears brimming in her dark eyes, but her expression remained mixed with confusion. "Why would you do this for me? You don't know me. You don't owe me anything."
I reached down, pulled up the left cuff of my trousers, and exposed the dark carbon-fiber shaft and the microprocessor titanium knee joint of my prosthetic.
Hannah’s eyes widened.
"When I was ten years old," I said softly, "I lost my leg to bone cancer. My parents looked at me and decided I was broken. They threw me out when I was sixteen with three shirts in a trash bag."
I looked into Hannah's eyes—eyes that held the same deep, terrifying grief I had carried nineteen years ago.
"I know what it feels like to wake up and realize your body has been changed forever," I whispered. "I know what it feels like to feel abandoned by the world. And I swore to myself that as long as I had breath in my body and money in my accounts, no one in my sphere would ever be left in the dark the way I was."
Hannah looked down at my prosthetic, then back up to my face. A soft, trembling breath escaped her lips, and for the first time in six weeks, a genuine, beautiful smile broke across her pale face.
"Does... does it hurt?" Hannah asked softly, pointing at my prosthetic.
"At first," I smiled gently back at her. "Learning to balance again is terrifying. The physical therapy feels impossible. But then, one day, you step out onto the pavement, you take a stride, and you realize that your steel leg can carry you anywhere you want to go in this world."
I leaned forward, taking Hannah's cold hand in mine.
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"My top clinical engineers at Vance Kinetics are already building a custom robotic mobility harness designed specifically for spinal injury rehabilitation," I told her. "In six months, Hannah, you and I are going to take a walk along the Hudson River."
Hannah squeezed my hand with surprising strength, tears streaming down her smiling cheeks. "I'd like that, Victoria. I'd really like that."
