Brawler

by Tracey Ward

  “I hear that.”

  “Is that why you did it?”

  “No, I started off doing it because I loved it. I loved the entertainment industry and it was exciting being part of it, but after a while it lost its shine and once that was gone, I didn’t know what I was doing it for anymore. The money wasn’t worth it.”

  “It was to mom,” Callum muttered.

  “So you wanted to help people?” Brett asked me, ignoring his son.

  “Yeah, initially.”

  “Lot of professions you can do that in, and most don’t require a suit. What about a doctor? EMT? RN?”

  The words all reminded me of my accident and the stay in the hospital. The specialists and nurses, everyone who had worked to help me survive, especially the first responders. The men who I was told had shown up at the scene of the crash and kept me alive until the EMTs got there.

  “What about a firefighter?” I asked.

  “There you go,” Brett agreed heartily. “It’s physical, it’s challenging, and it’s all about helping people. Strong kid like you, you’d do great at it.”

  “And women love firefighters almost as much as they love male strippers,” Callum added. “Maybe even more.”

  “I’m not looking to get laid,” I told him.

  “Not now, no, but it doesn’t hurt to think of the future.”

  My phone beeped. I picked it up to find a message from the realtor I’d contacted a couple weeks ago about finding Jenna a space for her shop. A property we’d seen that felt promising had sold. Jenna had stalled too long.

  “Shit,” I muttered, dropping my hand and phone to the table.

  The nerves in my right hand sang with a painful discord at the jolt.

  “What’s up?” Callum asked.

  “Another property sold out from under us. She needs to loosen up and look at more expensive places. We’re sifting through shit holes here because she’s scared to ask her dad for more money. We’re looking for a place budgeting with her income and it’s good, but not enough.”

  “Have you told her yet that you’re the real sugar daddy holding the purse strings?”

  I scowled at him. “No, and I shouldn’t have told you either.”

  “Hey, I can keep a secret. Like that party I threw Junior year when…” he glanced up at his dad standing at the end of the table, watching him. “When, uh, we celebrated Kwanza to enrich our cultural understanding.”

  I smiled. “Yeah, I remember that one. Rager.”

  “You’re an idiot,” Brett told Callum before disappearing into the kitchen.

  Callum snagged napkins from my pile. “So, you gonna tell her?”

  “Not yet. She’s nervous about spending her dad’s money. Think how rigid she’ll get when she finds out it’s mine.”

  “I can’t believe you’re loaded,” he chuckled, shaking his head.

  “I’m not. My dad is and he keeps throwing it at me like I’m center stage at a titty bar. I have to do something with it.”

  “You ever going to contact him? Say, ‘hey asshole, thanks for the dough and ditching me for my whole life’.”

  “No.”

  “Never?”

  I looked at him pointedly.

  “Alright,” he relented. “I get it. No means no. What about the firefighter thing? What are you gonna do about that?”

  “I’ll look into it. Make sure it’s something I want to do, but it sounds right.” I thought of Dan and his advice. “It sounds fulfilling.”

  ***

  “Alright, captain,” Ben told me, settling into his chair with a grin. “What are we talking about today?”

  I’d been seeing Ben a couple times a week for two months now and he’d taken to calling me ‘captain’ because of my strict rule about always knowing where our conversations were going. I was very clear that I didn’t like surprises.

  “Jenna,” I answered immediately, no hesitation.

  “What about her? What’s new? Have you found a spot for a shop yet?”

  “No, not yet. She’s still being picky about her price range and it’s making it difficult.”

  “And she’s still concerned about taking money from her father?”

  “She’d be even more stubborn if she knew it was from me. That’s not what I want to talk about, though.”

  “Alright, what then?”

  I shifted in my seat, unable to get comfortable on the little couch. “It’s about what she said.”

  I told him how Jenna and I had been shopping the slums, checking out shithole after shithole, and I was having no luck convincing her to look at other buildings. The latest one had been the worst. It wreaked of debris, water, sewage, and some scents I couldn’t identify. It made my gut clench forcefully thinking of her in a place like that. I couldn’t stand it.

  “This is not the one,” I told her decisively.

  “You’ve barely looked at it,” she replied, her nose involuntarily scrunched up in disgust as she stepped carefully over the piles of crap strewn everywhere. I couldn’t even see the floor. I started to wonder if the place really had one. “There’s a bathroom back here, I think.”

  “This entire place is a bathroom.”

  “Now you’re being a pessimist. What is it they always say on House Hunters about places like this?”

  “’Thanks to the triple homicide, it’s priced to sell?’”

  She glanced at me, smiling. “I think we’re watching different shows.”

  “House Hunters: Inner City?” I asked, feigning confusion. “Is that not the one?”

  “I was thinking of, ‘It has potential.’”

  “For contracting hepatitis.”

  “Pessimist!”

  “Pisser,” I grinned.

  She paused in the open door of the supposed bathroom and her face paled. “Alright,” she said, backing away slowly, “maybe this isn’t the one.”

  “Are we done here?” I asked, inching toward the door. I was hoping to ride the wave of her disgust to somewhere more expensive. And cleaner. “Can we go see one of the properties I picked now?”

  “We’ve been over this. You pick expensive ones, so no.”

  “I pick good investments.”

  “The money for which I do not have. This,” she said, gesturing to the hell hole engulfing us, “is what I can afford.”

  “On your own, but we talked about that.”

  “No, you talked.”

  “And you clearly didn’t listen.”

  “I really don’t want to ask my dad for money,” she replied glumly.

  “Do you want to own a space like this?”

  “Hell no.”

  “Then you need to ask him for a loan. Pay him back with interest if he’ll let you, but if you want to hit the ground running, you need his help. Don’t be so proud.”

  She laughed. “Are you serious? Pot calling the Kettle black, Kel! You’re the proudest person I know.”

  “But I’ve taken his help before, haven’t I?”

  She looked at me for a long time and I wondered what she was thinking. “You have, yeah,” she eventually admitted softly.

  “He wants to help you,” I said, skirting a fine line between honesty and deception.

  “How can you know that?”

  “Because we’ve talked about it.”

  Her eyes shot wide. “What?!”

  “He’s all in.”

  “When did you talk about this?”

  “A while back and then again last night.” Solid, one hundred percent lies. I hated telling them, but I swore to myself that I’d come clean as soon as I could. “I know what your budget is, Jen, and I didn’t pick any properties outside of it. So can we please leave this dump and see something worth looking at?”

  She looked at me again, her face going soft and pensive. I looked back, waiting and wondering what she was thinking. What she was feeling when she put her eyes on me that way, looking past my face and body, down below the surface to the murky waters underneath.

&n
bsp; “I love you,” she said plainly.

  I’d known it but I’d never heard her say it. I’d felt it, but now I could taste it, smell it, hear it, see it. It was everywhere. In her eyes, in her mouth, on her lips, in my ears, on my skin. It settled over me like a gentle wave washing onto the barren shores of the desert I’d made of my heart years ago. It was all encompassing because it was real. It was honest. She knew what no one else knew, what no one else was allowed to see, and still she stood there in all her glory and beauty and she loved me.

  I took two shaky breaths, not trying to fall inside myself, but trying to keep myself grounded. To stay in the moment with her while I felt like I was floating. It was that wild feeling. The untethered freedom she gave me just standing near me, but now she wasn’t near enough. I closed the distance between us, pressing my mouth softly over hers, sighing down into my soul with the feel of her. With the sheer relief of touching her and knowing it wasn’t wrong. Of having her kiss me back with the same slowness, the same patience that I felt, as though we had all the time in the world.

  As though there were nowhere else on earth either of us ever needed to be but there with each other.

  “So what’s the problem?” Ben asked when I finished my story.

  I stared at him blankly. “Seriously?”

  “Yes, seriously. What’s wrong with her telling you she loves you? You already knew it.”

  “I didn’t say it back.”

  “But you know that you do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think she knows?”

  “Yes.”

  “I still don’t see the problem.”

  “Why didn’t I say it back?” I demanded, getting frustrated.

  He shrugged. “You tell me.”

  I rolled my neck, trying to relieve the tension building in my shoulders. “I’m not ready yet.”

  “From what you’ve told me about your arrangement with her, it sounds like she understands that. You agreed to take it slow and not go stickering labels on things until you felt like you had everything under control again. Is that not still the arrangement?”

  “I thought it was, but doesn’t this change that?”

  “Not unless one of you says it does. Did she ask you for anything?”

  “No.”

  “Then you didn’t fail to deliver. Stop worrying about it. The woman you love was honest with you about how she feels, and what she feels is love for you. Stop trying to twist something beautiful into bad news. Take it for what it is – a gift.”

  I wrung my hands uncomfortably. “I’ve never been good at accepting gifts.”

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  One Month Later

  Callum sat on my feet, staring anxiously at the stopwatch in his hand. “Ten seconds, man! Push it!”

  I let loose a low growl as I slammed through the sit-ups.

  “Five… four… three… two… done!”

  I collapsed on my back, breathing heavily as my abdomen burned. “How’d I do?”

  “Was I supposed to be counting?” Callum asked in amazement. “I thought I was just the timer.”

  I glared up at him. “You better be kidding.”

  “I am,” he laughed. “You killed it.”

  “How many?”

  “Forty-six in one minute.”

  I let my head drop back on the mat and tossed my arms up over my head to stretch. “Yes,” I hissed.

  “So far your sit-ups are good,” he said, checking items off the list on the floor next to us. “Both your run times were insane. Your pushups are okay and your pull up score just barely clears the minimum.”

  “I gotta work on that,” I groaned, sitting up and pulling my feet out from under him. “My scores have to be better if I’m going to get through the Testing Phase. I failed it last time by a hair.”

  “Dude, if you can’t get into the Fire Academy, who are they accepting? Look at you. You have negative body fat.” He reached out to pinch the skin on my stomach.

  I slapped his hand away. “Guys who are stronger than me, that’s who’s getting in. I lost a lot of strength being bed ridden.”

  “You mean comatose.”

  “Both. What’s next? Bench press?”

  “Yep, last thing.”

  “Good. I’m starving.”

  We headed over to the weight machines in the corner of the gym. Passing the bags, I reflexively shook out my right hand.

  “How is that, by the way?” Callum asked quietly.

  “Shitty,” I admitted. “I’m not looking forward to my bout tomorrow.”

  “First one since the accident?”

  “Yeah. Once I throw that first punch with my right hand, everyone is going to see how much it hurts. They’ll go for that weakness.”

  Callum situated himself at the head of the bench as I laid down on it. “You doin’ anything about it?”

  “I’ve been trying to go Southpaw, but it’s not easy. My gut says use the right hand, but my head freaks out because it knows it’ll hurt. It’s making me slow. It sucks.”

  “Better than not doing it all,” he said, making his daily reference to the joys of my break up with Laney.

  I reached up with my weak hand and bumped knuckles with him. “Amen to that.”

  ***

  “Come on, Kellen!”

  “Keep moving! On your toes!”

  “Wear him down! You got this!”

  I heard them. All of them. I’d never been able to hear them before.

  The animal was still a no show. I couldn’t go into auto-pilot the way I always had, and I worried about what was happening to me. Was it good I couldn’t find the blind rage? Or was it a part of me I’d lost forever in the accident, like the strength of my right hand? With my instinct and strength gone, was it even worth being a boxer anymore?

  I dodged around the ring, trying to wear the guy down a little. I’d faced him before and he shouldn’t have been a problem, but sitting in the driver’s seat like I was, everything felt like it was happening faster. I was having trouble keeping up and I felt almost dizzy as we swung around and around.

  Out of nowhere he threw a punch at me.

  I lurched back from the hit. I ran from him.

  “No!” Tim shouted, angrily. “Dammit, no! Get—“

  The guy hit me hard in the face, my hands coming up to block too late. He immediately followed with an uppercut to my stomach that took the wind out of my lungs and made me wince, nearly cowering.

  “Hit! Him!” Tim shouted.

  I couldn’t. I was already heading for the ropes, somewhere I never should have been. I should have had this guy running from me by now. Last year when we’d faced off I had taken it easy on him. Now he was working me like a red headed stepchild.

  I took another hit to the face and my right hand itched violently inside my glove.

  “Fucking fight, Kellen!!!” Jenna screamed.

  My eyes darted to the floor where I caught a glimpse of her. She was a blur, just a flash of color, but her words hit me like a gunshot in my gut. The animal was gone or dead or asleep – I didn’t know. I couldn’t be the boxer I used to be. I had to get over it. I had to quit on the restrictions and rules and structure, the expectations that held me in place. That held me back.

  I had to cut loose.

  I had to fight.

  I shoved the guy off me, sending him stumbling back, then roamed around him. I made him turn and spin to find me, his footing going frantic underneath him. Finally he came at me again, off balance and angry. And open.

  I threw a right hook. I used my busted up hand, and it hurt just as much as I knew it would, but it also took the wind out of his sails. As he stumbled again, I shook my hand out, growling against the pain, then I launched myself at him. I landed three quick blows with my left hand and I felt the energy in my muscles when I did it. I remembered my speed. I reminded everyone in the room as well.

  I raced through the ring, moving as quickly as I could, dodging and ducking, throwing
that left hand whenever there was an opening. I couldn’t find my place in the ring, not yet, but I did find my pace, and today that was enough.

  “Coulter, get your ass down here!” Tim shouted right as the final bell rang. “What the hell was that?”

  I didn’t answer, not because I was shutting down, but because I knew from experience that the question was rhetorical. It was time for me to listen, not talk.

  “You froze up out there. I know you were in that damn accident and I’m sorry, kid, but I swear to God I never thought I’d see something like this from you. You’re tougher than that. Is it the girl? Is she the one that told you to quit before?”

  “No.”

  “Good. If this one ever gets in your business like that, you drop her like a bad habit, you hear me? I don’t want to see another day like today again. This was years of training forgotten and wasted in one afternoon! Every guy here thinks you’re finished. They’re gonna start talking and do you know what they’ll be saying? Coulter’s lost it. He doesn’t have it anymore. Ding dong, the king is dead! Is that what you want them saying?”

  “No.”

  “No. No, it’s not, ‘cause you’re not done. You’re a natural. You’re born for this. Whatever’s gotten in your head and got you hesitating, get it out. Do you hear me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Alright,” he said, his tone quieting. “Tomorrow we start again and you’re going lefty. I don’t want to hear anything else about it. Your right hand is a bust and we all know it. No use hiding it and dancing around it. Now we adapt. We lost one strength, but you got ‘em in spades. We’ll find another one.” He ran his hand over his head, turning his back on me. “Now go save your girl from Nunez.”

  I looked for Jenna, immediately finding her on the other side of the gym standing next to another fighter with short dark hair and olive skin. I knew him from years ago, back when I was tearing through my fan girl phase here at the gym. As far as I knew, he was still making the rounds.

  “Hey!” I called gruffly. “Back away, David.”