Page 150 - Student: dazed And Confused

never said that - look at Stephen Hawking or Professor X or... Anyway, point is that your
brain still works so use it."

Like she hadn't been through these arguments in her own head already and she wasn't

convinced. So, Hawking and the Prof were cripples with brains. But even one of them was
made up

Why does it all have to be so real?
And why do we all have to feel?
Life is this falsely bright thing
And when we look, our eyes sting

"How exactly is this helping?" Cassie sat in the garden staring at the hated

wheelchair.

"Just get in." Paul glanced at his watch and sighed. They had been locked in this
stand-off for nearly half an hour. He wanted to give her a wheelchair race down the length

of a garden you could fit a football pitch in. With drills and cement bags and breeze blocks

all over it looked like more of an assault course but a geeky brother had picked out a course

weaving its way around everything. "Have a go, you might enjoy it."
Unconvinced, Cassie got up and sat in the chair with the grey cushion. Anything to

shut him up ! It wasn't especially comfortable or elegant looking but it could have been

worse - one of those chairs with the nails like in the torture chamber. Not that it felt much

different. Deprivation's what it was. Getting measured up for the chair had been a pain but
it hadn't seemed real a few months ago. The assessor had measured her hips, waist, legs,

total height and her weight. Then there were question about self propelling or being

pushed, how the chair will be used, where she would be going. Much of it had meant

nothing to Cassie. It had all seemed so far away, but now it was here and she knew she
needed it. More and more often her muscles rebelled. Her limbs didn't do what she told

them all the time. Confined to a wheeled metal cage, never to escape.

"Stop pretending this is a good thing."
"Get on your start line. It might not be a good thing and you won't be able to do the

things you used to but think of the energy you'll save by not doing that pesky walking."