"You're lucky it's only sprained," Eric said. "Damn lucky it was your left knee or I'd be scrubbing up right now to cut you open."

I looked over at the tray of medical instruments beside me. One in particular caught my eye. It was a large silver syringe, with a needle of equal size. Eric noticed me looking at it.

"That, my friend, is for you. There's fluid building up in your knee and I'm going to use that to drain it. Then we'll give you a shot of cortisone."

"I think you're enjoying this too much."

"I do when people don't listen and then want me to fix them up."

He picked up the needle. "You'll feel just a little discomfort."

I grit my teeth and shut my eyes.

*****My sister and I rode down the street on her bike. She had one of those big "old fart" bikes, a giant rusting beast, that Pop won in a crap game. The only nice thing about it were the sparkly pink tassels Ma put in the hand grips.

She peddled hard to get us up the hill. We'd gone to the store for Ma. I rode on the handle bars and held the eggs she'd asked us to buy. The clacking sound of the baseball cards I'd taped to the spokes began to go faster as we reached the top the top of the hill and went down the other side.

We were flying now. My sister had her legs sticking out, the wind lifting and whipping up her skirt, while I watched the cards vibrate faster and faster in the spokes, becoming almost invisible.

Clackclackclackclack.

I looked at the wheel revolving and wondered what would happen if I used my feet to stop us.

So I did.

The back of the bike, along with my sister, flew over my head.

The last thing I saw, before my head hit the asphalt, was the eggs exploding into yellow and white fragments and my sister's leg snapping in two.

I crawled to her. A piece of bone stuck out of her leg.

*****

I opened my eyes.

The needle was still sucking fluid out of my knee.