Long Shot: An MMA Stepbrother Romance (16 page)

My heart beats hard as we ride along to the gym. I find myself wishing I was in Nat’s beat-up civic, heading out of this town once and for all. Instead, I’m in Ash’s pick-up truck. It smells like cigarettes—the one vice that Ash still sticks to. He says it helped him through rehab, that smoking saved his life even if it might one day end it.

“I owe the cigarette company a debt, Joshie,” he’d said when I first met him at Frank’s club. It was the day after I’d beaten up the kid, and I was hiding out in the back of Frank’s gym, angry and undone.
 

“Frank said I’d find you back here. He said you’re a promising young fighter.” Ash had found me in the locker room. It was ten in the morning, and I was already drunk, cursing myself for leaving Nat behind, cursing myself for hurting a kid who was young, homeless, and stupid—just like I’d been. It was like hitting a younger version of myself, over and over again, the din of the crowd drowning out all of my rational thoughts.
 

“I’m nothing of the sort, Mister,” I’d said. Ash had ignored me.

“Name’s Ash. Well, Jonathan Ash. But Johns are a dime a dozen, and there ain’t many men named Ash.”

“What do you want from me?” I slurred, the anger flickering in my gut and rising in my body. My cheeks were flushed in the hot locker room, a deep purple bruise forming on my cheek. That was before Frank figured out that the razor blades drew a crowd. There were plenty of bruises back then, but far fewer deep cuts.

“You’re drunk,” Ash had said.
 

“Damn right. I’m celebrating the big win.” I hadn’t meant the words to come out sarcastic, but they had, and Ash nodded. He was sizing me up even then, and I knew it.
 

“The kid was sixteen, yeah?” I nodded and kicked at the dirty locker room floor. Ash had paused for a long moment. The gravity of my misdeeds hung heavy in the air. The kid’s nose was pummeled to hell—he’d be fine, but I was sure that I wouldn’t be.
 

“Well, Josh—it’s Josh, ain’t it?—let me tell you something. Frank used to be a better sort, but he ain’t anymore.” I looked up at Ash and saw the sincerity in his eyes. I couldn’t imagine a time when Frank didn’t pit kids against kids, when he didn’t demand that we beat the shit out of each other, that we fight outside of regulation, that we accept low pay, that we draw a crowd no matter what. “I can train you, Josh. I can train you to fight regulation, start getting you some more reputable fights. I’ve seen you a couple of times, and you’re good. But you’re rough, and you’re a drunk. Washed up at twenty-two.”

“You’d train me? What about Frank?”
 

“I’ll give you a hint—he doesn’t know what I do at my own gym. And he wants me to train you some here, to fight dirtier, harder. I can do that—and I can train you to go pro, granted that you stop drinking.”

“Why would you do that? What’s in it for you?”

“You’re not the only one who wants to go pro. If you get there, I have a chance to be a real trainer again.”

It took me months to stop drinking for good, but after I did, Ash was true to his word.

Three years of working, planning, getting fights behind Frank’s back and driving to Greensboro or Raleigh at four o’clock in the morning. If we could get this one fight, we’d be set to move Ash’s gym into the new place, we could make all those dreams a reality.

“You think we can really win it?” I ask. I look out of the window at the beach houses rolling by.

“If you don’t dislocate your shoulder again, we’re golden. Oh yeah—and if you don’t go running off to chase after your stepsister.” I look down at my hands.
 

“How’d you know that?”

“Summer.”

“Hell, she knows everybody’s business. Didn’t even know she knew you.”
 

“Well, there might be a lot of things you don’t know about Summer.” Ash smiles, and I see a glimmer in his eyes. “I met her back when I was in New York. It’s her personal mission to make sure Frank doesn’t destroy the young kids in this town—we both know what men like him are capable of.”

“Shit. It’s messing with fire, going up against that guy,” I say. Ash just looks at me sideways and raises an eyebrow. The tattoo of a tiger on his neck has long faded, but I can imagine he looked mean as hell back in the day with the ink that covers his neck and shoulders, all the way up onto his scalp. These days, he wears a baseball cap, shirts that cover how fit he still is. He could deliver a beat-down even still, but Frank’s long since written Ash off as a loser, a fighter who lost his fight before he moved down South.
 

But here’s an example, I think, of a man who stuck to everything he believed in. And here he is, a far better man than the one trying to make money off of innocent kids. And if Frank’s figured out that runaways are funneling out of his gym as quickly as they come in, it won’t be long before he comes knocking at Ash’s door. It won’t be long before he comes knocking at mine, after that. Frank ain’t no quick thinker—but he thinks
long
, and he’ll see the pieces for what they are when everything starts to fall together.
 

I never thought about how Nat fit into all of this. I followed that pull—like the rise and fall of the tide—that drew me back home to her. When I first learned she was home, it was all I could do to stay away from her. When I was hurt, beat to hell and panting on the floor of Frank’s locker room, I made the decision to go to her, to find her again and make everything right, show her that I might be able to give her all the things she needs.
 

If I’m tied up with all this fighting shit, I can’t be the man she needs. I can’t possess her, bring her into my fold, make her mine like I always wanted.
 

Ash pulls into the gym and turns off the car. Like he’s been reading my mind, he turns to me and speaks. “I know you like this girl, Josh. I never seen you stay the night, anyway.” He grins.
 

“Naw man, she’s just a holdover from my old life.” I don’t meet his eye.
 
Instead I look at the entrance of Frank’s gym. It looks like any other dilapidated gym in the Outer Banks, but it’s huge, taking up the space of an entire strip mall. The letters Frank bought after I first came here at sixteen just read “GYM,” though the M doesn’t glow anymore when Frank bothers to turn on the neon lights.
 

“That’s not what Summer said, Josh. More like an old flame. Summer said she helped you when you ran away, brought you food, came to your fights and watched you even you were high out of your mind. Says she stitched you up a hundred times and did it again this time even without seeing you for three years.”
 

I shrug. “Natalie’s my friend. We ain’t even family anymore. Our parents tapped out a long time ago.”

“Don’t drag her into this if you want to go pro. She don’t need Frank’s wrath. When he figures out he’s losing you and a whole bunch of other boys all at once, he’ll be mad as fire. And you know what happens—”

“Yeah, man. I said it was no big deal. She’s not my lady, got it? She deserves better, even if I was stupid enough to go back and try to get back in her good graces. Shouldn’t you be thinking the same thing, if you’re involved with Summer?”

“Summer can take care of herself. She’s got a mean streak a mile wide, even if you ain’t seen it,” he says. I look at him, but his face is blank, unreadable.
 
Ash claps me on the shoulder. I know he’s trying to reassure me, but the pain shoots through me, waves of it radiating through my body.
 

“Oh
fuck
man, be careful.” I shove his hand away and cradle my arm. The pain is whatever Natalie said—exquisite. That was the word.
 

Undeniable, immediate, can’t ignore it. “That’s what it means,” she’d said.

“Jesus, Josh. I didn’t know it was that bad.”
 

“Fighter threw me hard,” I say, trying the flexion exercises that Nat showed me earlier.
Nat
. I think of her, coming back home, finding the place empty. I’d run out on her again. “I think I’ll sit in the car a while, Ash. I’ll come in when I’m ready. Can’t let Frank see me like this, man, even if it just happened.”
 

“You okay, Joshie? Okay to start training again?”

“No, man. I’m not. But I’m going to anyway.”

“It’s a risk, Josh.”

“I get paid to fight in a cage, Ash. This is a comparatively small risk, man.” I smile and keep trying to flex my arm.
 

“All right, man. I’ll see you in there.” Ash exits the car and heads into Frank’s gym. For years, Ash has held up the image of working for Frank. Meanwhile, we’ve been squirreling away money, and Ash has prepped the few workers at his tiny gym for a big-ass move. Now, if we can only pull it all off. I sigh and lean against the window to take pressure off my shoulder. I try to steel myself for going into the gym, for warming up and throwing a few punches. I know it’ll only be with my right arm, but everything still feels tender, raw, sore to the touch. In the stillness of the truck, my mind roils with uncertainty, and I think of Natalie. With my right hand, I dig my phone out of the sad plastic bag and turn it on. I go to write a text to Natalie, but my fingers won’t move, and I’m not sure what to say.
 

I left, Nat, just like before,
I think
. I’m a loser, a degenerate. I’m trying to change, but if I can’t, I don’t need to drag you down.

None of it has a very good ring to it. Stalling, I scroll up through the old messages. The texts from this year are slim, since I stopped replying a long while back, but there’s the yearly “Merry Christmas,” a “Happy Birthday,” and one, more recent, sent just before she moved back. “I still miss you,” it reads.
 

I suck up my pain and write to her. This is not something I’ve done before, and I don’t know how I feel about it. I don’t text women unless I want to hook up, and I never tell them goodbye—I find it’s better not to give reasons for leaving. But Nat’s always been different. I’ve gone to great lengths to avoid her, but I finally came home. It occurred to me then—that’s what she was—not family, not a friend, but my home.
 

I care about Nat. I
want
Nat, body and soul. In my murkier moments, that womanizing asshole kicks in, and there’s a pang of panic in my chest—like I’m falling over the side of a cliff and there’s no way to stop it. It’s just that the macho bullshit keeps coming out of my mouth, keeps invading my thoughts just when things get serious.

Fuck. This is not a girl you walk away from. Not this time. No matter what kinda confused shit’s going on in your brain.

“I fucked up,” I grumble. “Goddammit.” An ache spreads through my body at the thought that she might not text me back, even if I reach out now. A normal guy might have said,
Hey I got some shit to take care of. Here, let me explain this shit. I will hit that fine ass when I get home, or you can come to my place, and I’ll hit that fine ass there.

Dammit.
My thoughts are eloquent as fuck, but I know I should send a sentence or two that doesn’t mention her ass. I just don’t know
what
those words might be.
 

I left home
, Natty, I type. Her phone would be set to silent from the time she got in the car until the end of her shift—but at least she’d know that I wasn’t that callous. This time, she’d know.
But I didn’t leave, like for real. I’m at my apartment. I don’t blame you if you want to leave me be for the rest of my life. But I just wanted you to know where I was. Come by if you want to.
 

I look over the text before sending it. Something about it looks cold, looks wrong. But anything else would be over the top, so I leave it at that and press “send.”

I type one more message.
I’m wearing the sling. I promise.
Send.

Sighing, I get out of the car and walk up to the gym, adopting that swagger that I’ve always pulled when walking into Frank’s gym. The man himself, his grin shining like a mad Cheshire cat’s, nods at me when I walk in the door. Frank is working with one of the younger fighters at the punching bag in the front of the gym, telling the kid to kick it over and over, but he ignores the kid once he spots me. He walks over and shakes my hand, gripping my left arm hard with his other hand. The pain rises within me, undeniable, exquisite.
 

“You’ve been gone a while, Joshie. Where you been?” His beady dark eyes search mine, and to me, it looks like he’s been using. His nose is red—from drinking, from snorting coke, from both.
 

“Been staying with Ash,” I say.

“Oh yeah?” That’s all he says, like he doesn’t quite believe me, but he turns and starts working with the kid again. My heart pounds hard for a moment, and I wait for him to turn back to me, to tell me he knows exactly where I’ve been and who I’ve been with. But he doesn’t. He just keeps working, and I walk over to join Ash in the cage. I’m careful not to favor my left side too much, raising the hand up to my cheek to protect myself, just like Ash always taught me—but Frank never had. He was strong, Frank was, but he was never meant to be a trainer.
Washed up old asshole
, Ash always said. But this washed up old asshole played an important part in getting me out of the place I was in. I hit Ash’s mitts, practice a few knee strikes, and then throw punches over and over with my right arm, slipping in an occasional movement with my left. I imagine each strike lands on Frank’s face, that I’m beating him bloody, stepping on him, punishing him with every movement.