Two Hundred Seventy-Two Steps

 

You don’t wake up in pain. That would be cleaner. Easier to understand, easier to justify. Pain with a clear beginning can be handled like a task. You point to it, contain it, work around it.

This isn’t that.

This is something that was already there. It settles in as you move through the morning, not announcing itself, just gradually taking control of the day while you pretend it isn’t.

You make it to the office anyway.

Ten o’clock. Late, but not late enough to matter. The kind of late that can still be explained without anyone asking follow-up questions. You sit down, open your laptop, fall into the usual routine. Emails, messages, small movements that signal everything is fine.

For a moment, it feels manageable. Not good. Not even stable. Just tolerable enough to keep going.

By 2 PM, the body stops cooperating.

Nothing dramatic happens. No sharp moment you can isolate. Just a shift. Something you could work around becomes something that works around you. Sitting takes effort. Standing requires intention. Walking becomes something you have to think through, step by step, like your body needs instructions it never needed before.

You don’t say anything.

You excuse yourself the way you’ve learned to excuse everything. Quietly. Politely. Without leaving anything behind that might invite attention. It isn’t about whether people would understand. It’s about avoiding the kind of attention that comes with being understood.

The hallway feels longer than it should.

You’re aware of how you’re moving in a way that feels wrong. Not just that you’re struggling, but that it might be visible. That someone could notice something slightly off. The delay between steps. The imbalance you’re trying to hide.

You keep going.

The garage is worse. Open space. Nowhere to pause without it looking intentional. The man there watches you a second longer than necessary.

He asks if you need help.

You say no.

You always say no.

Help feels like a line you’re not ready to cross. Once you do, it becomes real in a way that you can’t control.

He offers to drive you home.

You say no again.

You redirect instead. A café nearby. Fifteen minutes, you tell yourself. Enough time to reset. Enough time to get back to something close to normal.

The stairs are a problem.

Not in a dramatic way. Just in a simple, physical sense. They exist, and your body doesn’t agree with them. You climb them anyway, slowly, focusing more than you should have to.

You sit.

For a moment, it almost works. You think if you stay still long enough, something might settle.

Then you remember you forgot to order.

You go back down.

Then back up.

There’s no frustration left. Just compliance. You do what the situation requires.

You sit again.

You close your eyes and try to sleep. Not because you’re tired, but because it feels like the closest thing to stopping. If the body resets even a little, you can continue. That’s the assumption.

Then he walks in.

No build-up. No context. Just recognition.

A business contact. Someone you know well enough that you can’t ignore him, but not well enough that you can drop the act. The kind of relationship that lives somewhere in the middle.

There’s a brief moment where you think about pretending you didn’t see him.

It passes.

He sees you. He walks over. He sits.

And just like that, the situation changes.

You adjust. Not because it helps, but because it’s expected. You sit a little straighter. Your face resets. Your voice follows. There’s no visible shift, but internally it’s immediate. You move from dealing with pain to performing through it.

He talks.

Something about a potential partnership. Opportunities, alignment, things that could matter or might not. It doesn’t matter. The conversation requires attention.

You give it.

Or something close enough that it works.

He doesn’t see what’s happening underneath.

He doesn’t see the small adjustments you keep making just to stay seated. The way your breathing shifts slightly between sentences. The fact that every minute feels measured against how long you can hold this together.

What he sees is simple.

Someone normal. Someone present. Someone functioning.

And that’s enough.

There’s something strange about being forced into normalcy when you’re at your least normal. It isn’t strength. It isn’t resilience. It’s habit. You continue because stopping would require explanation, and explanation feels heavier than just continuing.

So you stay in it.

You respond, nod, ask the right questions. You keep the structure of the conversation intact.

Then it ends.

He leaves with whatever impression he formed. Probably unchanged. Maybe even better. A normal meeting. Something that just happened.

You’re left where you were.

Same chair. Same body. Same problem.

You close your eyes again.

This time, nothing resets.

The pain stays. Steady. Uninterested in your plans for the day.

Somewhere in your diagnosis, there’s a sentence that sticks. Not dramatic. Not certain. Worse than that.

The doctor said a wheelchair might be needed in the future.

Might.

A word that doesn’t commit to anything. Not when. Not if. Just a possibility that sits there, open, unfinished.

So you start thinking in a different way.

Not in years.

In functions.

How long until this becomes daily.

How long until walking stops being automatic.

How long until someone offers help and you don’t get to say no.

The uncertainty doesn’t make it easier. It stretches it out. Turns it into something you carry without resolution.

You think about a wheelchair.

Not emotionally. Just practically.

Then something else interrupts.

Batu Caves.

Two hundred seventy-two steps.

You don’t remember them being hard. That’s the part that stays. Not the height. Not the effort. Just the fact that it never felt like something you had to negotiate with.

You climbed them because you could.

You remember filming there. Running up parts of the stairs for angles. For timing. For no reason beyond the fact that you could do it.

You remember the view. Kuala Lumpur stretched out below in a way that made everything feel distant. Manageable. Even the air felt different.

You remember your dad asking you to get cigarettes and you running. Not pacing. Not thinking. Just running because there was no reason not to.

You remember not thinking about your body at all.

There’s no transition back.

Just the realization that those steps haven’t changed.

They’re still there. Exactly the same.

Which makes them something else now.

Not a memory.

A measure.

You sit there longer than you planned.

The pain doesn’t disappear. It shifts slightly. Enough to move.

Enough to stand.

Enough to continue.

There’s work waiting.

There’s always work waiting.

And somewhere, in a different country, there are two hundred seventy-two steps that haven’t moved, haven’t adjusted, haven’t softened.

They’re still there.

Waiting in the most indifferent way possible.