Page 17

17

JACK

PROMISES

“ H ands up, Jack! Go around.” Jon’s fist whistles by my face. “Get lighter, faster, fuckin’ move!”

Nodding, I skip to the side and work to maintain my stance even as I escape his wild arms. I don’t get even a second to recover before he rushes into my space in an effort to keep me off balance. Skipping to the right and swearing, I shimmy out of the way just as he blows past.

“Good,” he pants. “Keep going. Watch that left arm.”

Pressuring me, Jon stays up in my space and gives me no room to breathe. He’s trying to force me to fuck up my footing. He’s trying to force me to give away my tell; my left arm twitches just half a second before I strike.

After a full decade of full-time training, muscle memory is so deeply ingrained, no matter how badly I treated my body this year, it still works, still fights, still moves without my conscious decisions to do so.

Mostly .

My arm gives me away about half of the time.

The current round continues for two more minutes, and when the buzzer sounds, I drop to the floor like a drama llama and pour my half-full bottle of water over my face.

Jon leans against the ropes and wipes his sweaty face on a towel, but I lie on the floor, gasp for breath, and wish I didn’t fuck my lungs up so much this past year .

Water trickles along the side of my face and into my ears, but I simply lie, breathe, and flex my hands.

I’ve never in my life tired this easily. I’ve never hurt this much. But at least I’m not spewing anymore.

At the sound of excited panting, I roll my face to the side and pat the canvas, and the very second my hand touches the floor, Annie jumps into the ring and lies down beside me.

Jon scoffs as she snuggles close. “We’d never let anyone else have their dog in here, Jack. Especially not on the mats. What makes you so special?”

Smiling as she licks the sweat off my ribs, I scratch her ears and pull her in close. “She’s family, Jon. I don’t tell you to keep the boys out of here.”

“My boys are humans, asshole!”

I love teasing this guy. “Pretty sure your humans have messed this place up more than she ever has. She hasn’t had an accident in here.”

“Except that one time.”

I laugh. “Except that one time, but that was because your boys gave her cheese. Not just a slice or a square, but an entire block. So really, whose fault was that?”

Laughing, he leans heavily against the ropes as we both remember the unfortunate events from the winter before last.

Cheesegate , and the treasure map of shit we had to clean up.

‘X’ definitely marked the spot – every two feet or so. I had to buy this place an entire new set of mats – that’s easily five grand – and about six hundred scented candles, because my dog ate two pounds of cheese in secret.

This place reeked for months, like the stench seeped into the cement floors beneath the mats and promised to stick around right through until the following Thanksgiving.

At no sound at all, Annie’s ears flip up. Her head comes up next, then with glittering eyes and sparkling teeth, her lips pull back as she lets out a low growl.

The ears are normal. The head, too. But the growl is the very reason I flip to my feet before Jon even gets a chance to push away from the ropes.

Good mood and disgusting memories wiped clean, I rip my grappling gloves off, and tuck my mouthguard in to the waistband of my shorts. Scratching Annie’s ears, I jump down from the ring with Jon right behind me, and we walk toward the front desk .

Fucked if I know how she knew, since the front desk isn’t visible from the ring, but as soon as we round the corner, we find him .

Brad stands with his back to us as he pokes around the flyers decorating the front desk, but as soon as we come within fifteen feet, he turns with a smile.

Then his smile vanishes.

“Brad?”

Sneering, he looks me up and down. “Joshua?”

“Ha.” Let me rearrange your face, you useless piece of shit. “Jack. You need something?”

“Ah, yeah.” Nervously shuffling his bag when I don’t cower at his simple jab, he looks between me and Jon. “This your gym?”

“Yup.”

Pursing his lips in thought, his eyes flick back and forth from me, to Jon, to Annie. If Brad thinks he can look at me like I smell like shit and actually have me believing him, he’s got a thing or two to learn from my dog.

Ain’t nobody gives the stink eye as well as Annie can.

Standing beside me, she doesn’t growl, she doesn’t charge. But she vibrates against my leg. Hackles up, she waits for my command to go.

Part of me is excited for when she charges and rips his dick off. But the more realistic side of me knows Brad’s a pussy who’d call the cops in a fast minute. I don’t have enough favors to call in to get my dog off death row.

But then again, getting Alex involved might be a good thing. He should meet the asshole so intent on dating his baby sister.

“So?” Jon snaps. “Can we help you or what?” Jon remembers exactly who Brad is. “We’ve got shit to do, Brent. Sack up or fuck off.”

“Ah, yeah…” He clears his throat. “I was thinking of joining.”

Stepping forward, Jon pulls out a membership form and slaps it down on the desk. “Fill this out. Give me your credit card.”

As Brad nervously takes a pen from the cup on the desk, Jon runs through our prices… and doubles them. I smile at the inflation, but I don’t dispute a single thing he says.

Our friends come in here, we train them for free. If Britt came in here, I’d train her for free. Just like Bobby trained my sister forever ago, I see a girl I’d like to empower. She’d get world champion tutoring, and she’d get it for free.

But we don’t want to train Brad at all. He can pay double, or hell, if we’re really feeling like assholes, triple, then if he still wants to train, fine, we’ll take his money. Then we’ll show him how to spew.

Strolling into the reception area with a whistle on his breath, Bobby stops and cocks his head to the side at the same moment Brad signs his wavers.

He was smiling. He had his ‘welcome to our gym’ speech prepared, but then his eyes narrow and his chest fills. “Do I know you?”

“Yeah, B.” Crossing my arms over my still sweaty chest, I nod toward our newest member. “That’s Brad.”

“Met you ages ago with that chick, right?”

Bobby knows that chick’s name. But he doesn’t like Brad any more than I do.

“With Brittany.” Smiling, Brad stands proud. “Yeah, that’s my girl.”

“Your girl?” Bobby’s incredulous eyes come to me, then back to Brad. “She’s your girl?”

“Yeah.” Brad’s smile grows. “You saw me with her that night.”

“I did.” Bobby agrees. “I saw her that night.” Then under his breath, “Wonder if he knows his girl slept over with my boy a few weeks ago?”

I shoulder Bobby out of the way and step forward. “Alright Brock, you’ve got your gear? You wanna start tonight?”

“Yeah.” He throws his shiny credit card down on top of the paperwork. “Now’s as good a time as any.”

Sure is.

“I’ll take him.” Bobby works to step around me, but I stop him with an arm on his bicep.

“No, I got him.”

“Jack.”

I stop and glare. “I got it. You’ve got a PT appointment, yeah? Kit said she was coming in.”

Returning my glare, he studies me for a full minute. Like we have a million times in the past, we communicate with our eyes.

‘Don’t get arrested over this, Jack.’

‘I won’t. Promise.’

‘You’re a fuckin’ liar.’

‘Yeah, but nobody took Kit’s lessons from you, even when we thought you’d do better without the distraction.’

Nodding once, he steps back. Checkmate. “Alright. Watch your step.”

“Yeah.” Stepping around him, I take Annie’s collar and drag her away from reception. “Let’s go Brad.” I turn back to make sure he’s following. “Have you ever trained before? ”

“Ah.” He looks around the training room, at the walls lined with heavy bags, and the other people watching us the way Annie watches Brad. “Ah, no… Well, yeah.”

I stop and frown. “Yes or no?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

He guesses. Yeah, alright, dick. Watching Bruce Lee movies doesn’t count. “Do you need to borrow our gear?”

“No.” He shakes his head nervously as Mike steps past with a filthy glower. He doesn’t even know Brad, but his timing is impeccable. “I bought my own.”

“You got your own?”

Smiling sarcastically, I watch him arrogantly drop his bag to the mats. Kneeling, he unzips the black and white bag and pulls out brand-new gloves, shin pads, head gear, cup, wraps, and a mouthguard.

He looks like a pretentious douche with his bag of brand-new shit, considering most of the people watching us come here with nothing more than initiative and a good attitude.

Most of our clientele are lower income, ratty gloves, maybe even some legal trouble. They come here with too much energy and a desire to put that energy to good use, rather than get arrested.

Brad comes here with a trust fund and an inflated ego.

Or maybe I’m just predisposed to hate the prick, because he called Britt his girl. Last I heard, she was trying to ditch him, but I haven’t seen her in ages, so the fact she may have changed her mind makes my gut churn.

She’s too good for this rat prick.

“That’s some nice head gear you got there, Brad.”

“Yeah?” He looks up like a kid showing a shitty drawing to his dad. “I got the right one?”

You got the exact right one, asshole. I’m about to knock your block off, and any padding is better than none. “Yeah, good choice. Let’s go.”

Waiting for him to stand, I lead him to the main ring, and when I turn at the burn of eyeballs on my back, I’m not surprised to find everyone watching us.

Bobby and Jon stand in the middle of the room. Jim and Iz stand in the doorway that leads to the weight room. And Kit, with her arms holding a set of Thai pads for a client, watches me with her brows furrowed low.

No doubt, someone has already called Aiden.

And Tink has crazy lady witchcraft powers, so she’s probably burning rubber on her way, because she just can’t bear to not be in the middle of everyone else’s shit.

Rolling my eyes, I turn and hold the ropes open. “Alright, Brad. Get your gloves and shin pads. And your mouthguard, too.”

Eager like a puppy, he starts pulling everything on. “This is a lot of stuff.”

“Yeah.” Rolling my eyes, I turn away and glare at my family. Read my eyes, fuck off. “Safety first and all that.”

“Alright.” Dropping to his ass, he pulls shiny black shin pads over his feet, then jumps up like a bouncy cat that drank six gallons of pre-workout on the way here.

It’s going on five o’clock. And it’s a school day.

He saw Bambie today, but there’s no way in fuck I’ll ask this prick about her.

I’d rather get arrested and ask her brother.

“Gloves on.” Dumbass.

“Oh, yeah.” Spinning, he picks up his gloves and pushes one on. Like every incompetent tool that’s ever come in here, he stops with one glove on, and ponders the second like it’s a puzzle he simply cannot solve.

He’s fought before, my ass.

I help him with his glove like he’s a cute girl I want to help. But he isn’t cute, and I don’t want to help him.

Thank God we’re charging him out the ass for this, because I have better shit to do than stand around and teach this prick how to fight.

“Alright, Brad.” I fasten the Velcro and step back. “Let’s go. Show me your fight stance.”

“My–” He looks down at my feet, then at his. “Huh?”

I plant my left foot, then shuffle my right so wide, it looks like I’m doing the splits. I separate my feet almost four feet, just to see if he’ll do it, too.

He does.

Snickers roll around the gym, until, shaking my head, I tap his shoulder. “I’m kidding, man. Jesus.” Rearranging my feet, I watch him watch me. “Left foot forward, right foot back. Shoulder width apart, correct weight distribution, hands up.” I meet his eyes. “ This is your fight stance. Now show me.” When he does, I nod my approval. He’s as eager as a damn puppy, and if it were anyone else, I’d get a real kick out of having a student so eager to please. “Three-minute rounds.” I grab the timer remote. “Follow my instructions.”

He nods warily. “Okay. ”

When the timer starts, the music starts. “Let’s go, Brad. Show me a left, right, then a left uppercut.”

Throwing sloppy strikes that proves he’s never done this before, I help him fix them, then I ask for another set. We work them, faster and faster as he catches on. His breath comes harder, but his strikes improve.

He’s here to learn, and he’s not a slob. He’s not overweight, so his endurance brings us to the buzzer easily.

I lower my hands. “Burpees. Go!”

Instantly, he drops to the floor and does a full minute of burpees. As soon as the buzzer sounds, he’s up. “Alright, legs. Left low, right low, left mid, right mid, left high, right high. Go.”

His breath races, his posture slackens, and his stance evolves into something a three-year-old would show me… that’s actually a lie. My niece has never had a stance so shitty.

Three minutes later, the buzzer sounds and has his red face turning a little green. “Kyokushin star jumps. Go.”

Movement in my peripherals has me turning to watch Jon slide a fresh bucket into the ring.

Smiling, I nod and go back to watching Brad as Jon backs out of the splash zone.

I don’t want Brad’s money, and I don’t want to teach him how to fight. He won’t be coming back for a second session. I’ll make sure of it.

It takes thirty-five full minutes of go-go-go before he buries his head in the bucket and makes sounds only a birthing elephant might make.

The best thirty-five minutes of my day.

With my work done and my gut no longer churning, I toss my pads to Jon and head to the locker room.

No way in hell am I training this guy. I will not be teaching him how to throw a punch, then sending him home to Britt or any other girl. There’s something in his eyes, and I won’t be responsible for setting him loose with skills to hurt people.

Alert to my mood, Annie sticks to my side as soon as I walk away. Following me into the locker room, she drops to the bench near my shower and twitches her whiskers as I undress and flip the water on.

I’m ready to go home. I’m ready to see the kids.

Lathering up, I slide soapy hands along the scars on my chest and stomach. Three surgeries, a shit ton of prescribed narcotics, and six months of treating my body like a crash dummy, I have lots of roughly healed scars mixed in with the ink I so proudly had done while Steph watched on .

It’s been almost a year since she died; I’ve celebrated my first Christmas without her, I quietly watched her twenty-fifth birthday come and go, and I sat alone in my bedroom on our anniversary as accommodation reservations I’d already booked went unused.

I’m coping better than I was, but her absence still hurts. Grief is like a journey that never ends. There’s no final destination, no one point that I can aim for and know that the pain will finally go away.

It’s just a passage of time, a passage I cannot sidestep, and a penance for having been gifted her love in the first place.

Sometimes I can live with the knowledge that she was once mine. I can celebrate what we had, and I can still get out of bed and function and smile.

Other days, it takes everything I have to open my eyes. The fact I had her, but now I don’t, is too much. Instead of focusing on the gift I had , I can only see the punishment I now live.

Those are the days I’m one single drop of alcohol away from coming undone. Just one beer. Just a single sip to help me relax.

But I can’t.

One leads to two, two leads to a dozen, and that dozen leads me to becoming the man I hate.

My family deserves better than that.

Hell, even I deserve better than that.

Finishing my shower and drying off, I step to the locker and comb my too-long hair out. Steph’s magnetic smile shines from the photo I have tacked inside my locker door, with her wild curly hair, and her bright toothy grin.

She never looked older than seventeen. Her freckles gave her a youthful appearance right through college and after, and her quiet nature never made anyone question it.

Kissing my fingers and pressing them over her heart, I look three inches to the left and smile at the innocuous black hair tie. Picking it up and sliding it over my wrist, I run my fingers along the black material and enjoy the warm roll of comfort that moves through my stomach.

I’m smiling, not because it’s Steph’s, but because it’s Britt’s.

She left it on the bathroom counter when she stayed over, and I’ve been wearing it like an idiot ever since.

Britt and I aren’t a thing, but the memory of her smile makes me smile. The hurt in her eyes when I threw her out of my home was burned into my brain, but the damage and haunting dreams have eased since she was over for pizza .

I don’t mind that she and I aren’t a thing, but I’ll be eternally grateful that she allowed me the chance to make her smile again. That she’ll live her life thinking of me fondly, instead of the monster I showed her earlier.

The peace her smile provides, the fact I no longer dream about the hurt in her eyes, means I owe her a lifetime of bail outs from people like Brad. So I’ll always be here, standing on the outside, and if she ever calls out, I’ll jump in and provide her a solid alibi to escape a date with a creep.

That includes not teaching those creeps how to fight.

I need to figure out a way to slip her my phone number. I can’t save the day if she doesn’t know how to activate the bat signal.