Quest and Tillie

Chapter 18: All The Difference

Quest texted me on Wednesday, telling me he'd pick me up at seven on Friday and that he'd made reservations for dinner at ten. In a strange way, I was looking forward to seeing Quest fight. When we'd been dating and he began fighting once he turned eighteen, he'd never let me come see him fight, wanting to protect me in case he took a hard hit.

I don't want you to see that, Til. If you had a panic attack because I took a hard hit or got knocked out, I couldn't get to you right away.

The story of our lives, actually, with Quest always trying to protect me and shield me from anything unpleasant. He'd had no objection to Benjamin coming to watch his fights, and my brother would come home full of stories of how hard Quest had been hitting his opponent, how relentless he was in the ring. Later, as my future husband became bigger and better, I'd hear about how quickly Quest had won by submission.

Then Quest would walk into our house not too long after my brother did and I'd look him over carefully to see if he had any visible bruises or cuts. He rarely did because he was becoming somewhat of a local legend as the man who barely allowed his opponents to hit him.

But he never relented and let me come see him fight, so I was really looking forward to seeing Quest in action tonight.

Mama came in and sat on my bed next to me as I pulled on my boots. They were red and they looked cute with my denim-blue dress. She'd come over to dog-sit Spring for a few hours and was looking forward to having some girl time with her granddog.

"What?" I asked Mama when she continued to sit there saying nothing.

"I didn't say anything," she protested.

"Mama," I said, fixing her with a disbelieving look, "you not saying anything is like someone else giving a whole entire speech."

With a smile, she pushed my curls off my shoulder. "Are you looking forward to tonight?"

I considered her question seriously.

"I am," I said. "I'm not sure if I can explain it, but this date already feels different. Quest never wanted me to see him fight before and now he's invited me to. And for the second time, he's picked the restaurant instead of leaving it to me and doing whatever I wanted and going wherever I wanted to go. And that sounds stupid when I say it out loud, but I've been realizing that it's not necessarily just the big things that we need to watch out for, but the little things, too."

"It doesn't sound stupid," Mama said. "It sounds like growing up."

Then, after patting my cheek gently, she went and leashed Spring to take her for a walk so she wouldn't be in the way when Quest arrived. Right at seven, Quest rang the doorbell, giving me a long look when I answered my door. 

"You look gorgeous, Tillie," he said, an appreciative gleam in his eye. "You ready to go or do you need to do anything? Walk Spring, maybe?"

"No, Mama's walking her right now. I just need to grab my purse."

He watched while I locked up -- Mama had her own key -- and we walked down to his truck. This time, it was less awkward and easier to talk as he drove us to the gym where the fights took place. He asked me about my classes and I asked him about his fight tonight. At one point, he looked over at me and just smiled, and the smile stayed on his face. I looked away because Quest Sullivan smiling was a thing of beauty.

When we walked into the gym, they had chairs set up all around the cage and people were already occupying almost all available chairs. Tickets were ten dollars each, a fairly steep price for this small town, but that didn't seem to stop people from filling the seats and making the gym standing room only. I would have been worried that Ray, the gym owner, would get busted by the fire chief for being over capacity, but both men were standing at the back of the room, talking quietly with the chief of police and a local judge.