𝚂𝚎𝚎 𝚃𝚑𝚛𝚘𝚞𝚐𝚑 𝚂𝚎𝚛𝚒𝚎𝚜 #1: 𝐒𝐞𝐞 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡

°27°

"Thanks."

Sensei Yusuf nodded, standing up and walking towards me.

"So, onto today's lesson." He began, and I nodded eagerly.

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~
I stood up and walked into the dressing room when I had regained enough strength to move, changing out of my sweaty Gi and into my white tee, boyfriend jeans and white shimmery sandals.

I strutted out of the dressing room with my tote bag in my hand after spraying perfume on me and waved good bye at Sensei Yusuf as I pushed the metallic door open and walked out. But almost immediately, I halted.

I was utterly shocked and scared at the person, whose head shook disapprovingly at me. I opened my mouth to try to speak, but nothing at all could come out, so I shut it back and lowered my head, gripping the handle of the tote bag tighter.

"Ifeoluwa, what are you doing here?" I asked.

"What am I doing here? Tammy, you said you were going to Mandel's place. What are you doing here?!" He told me, his voice was firm and laced with anger. I refused to look up at him. I knew he was mad.

I heard a sigh from him. "You know what, let's get home first. We'll talk about this there, not out here."

I looked up at him, and saw him glaring at me. "Get in the car." He told me.

My shoulders slumped and I sighed, following him as he walked towards a black jeep.

I was in big trouble. That, I knew.

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~
The entire drive home was set in an uncomfortable silence.

I was worried that Ifeoluwa was going to tell on me to our parents. I knew they wouldn't like it one bit, they had specifically told me never to participate in martial arts or physical activities in general but that only pushed me to want to do those things.

They didn't want that for me because of my health issue. They already had their mind set on the idea that was a glass material that could be easily broken and shattered. I hated that, and my reason for taking Karate classes was to prove that I was strong and able, to the people that saw me as the what my parents also saw me for.

Feeble.

When you couldn't even prove that to yourself.

I rolled my eyes at my self-conscious.

The car stopped minutes later, and Ifeoluwa came down from the car without a word, or a glance as he walked into the house, and I followed.

I couldn't understand why he was this mad at me. He knew the owner of the place I was going to, it wasn't like I was meeting up with a stranger. And all I did was attend a couple of martial arts classes.

"Start talking." Ifeoluwa said once we had gotten into the living room. "Every single time you've told me you were going to see Mandel or some other friend, you actually went to the Dojo? Who's paying for those lessons?"

"Sir Yusuf agreed to teach for free, he's a family friend after all." I said.

"That also has an unusual liking to you." He rolled his eyes. "Tammy, you had no idea how worried I was when I figured out you hadn't been going to visit Mandel—"

"And how did you know about that?" I arched my brows, folding my arms under my chest.

"Mandel told me. She said you hadn't come to see her throughout the term."

But I definitely needed to.

"Why would you just go off to that place without telling any of us, without even letting the driver take you. If something bad had happened to you, none of us would have—"