Fighter's Block

Chapter 7: Size Doesn't Compare to Skill

After a two hour, rigorous, full-body workout that seemed to semi-prove myself to everyone else, it's soon 3am and everyone else was complaining about going home. I think the two girls had warmed up to me a little bit, seeing as how Aspen talked to me comfortably. We made some small talk in between exercises and I found out that Paris's tattoo, meant 'My Heart is Yours' is Hindi. She told me that her ear piercings and her tattoo is the only thing that she has to tie her back to her home, although she didn't explain why.

Amaya told me that she was adopted from a very young age, and while she appreciated her family, they never knew how to do her hair correctly. So when she met Gemini when she was young, his mother always did her hair and taught her adoptive parents how to do braids and take care of it. She also told me that Gemini's mother died a couple years ago, and that she took it really hard, and that's when she went to Gemini and asked him to teach her how to fight. She's been training with him for two years now.

Paris got into fighting because of Amaya. They were best friends in freshman year and drifted apart after that, but Amaya wanted her back so in the summer before their junior year, Amaya introduced this world to her as a way to get her friend back and her and Paris have never been closer.

Now it was time to go home, and I leave the building before the rest of the group because they were all talking to each other. I walk outside to see my red Audi sitting pretty in the same place I parked it. Now, paying more attention to my surroundings, I realize that there is another Audi, one of the same exact make and model, but the color was a deep charcoal grey. The other car next to it was an old-looking Honda that sported a ratty tan color. I make my way over to my car when I hear that the door behind me was being pushed open.

The first person I see is Paris. She's turned around and laughing about something with Aspen and Amaya, and Kade is smiling further back. Tyler walked out last, with a stony expression on his face, obviously either not apart of the joke circulating in the front, or just simply doesn't care.

Amaya clicks the set of keys in her hand that lights up the Honda, leaving the Audi for...

"Tyler," Paris's voice rings through the parking lot. She puts her hand over her head and makes a grabbing motion. To which Tyler responds by throwing her the towel that was resting on top of his bag.

He skips over the Honda and gets in the drivers seat of the Audi while Kade gets in the passenger seat. Before Tyler completely sits down, his eyes meet mine. They widen slightly and his eyebrow furrows as though he was trying to figure out where he knew me from.

I stare back to challenge him before Aspen's voice knocks us both out of our little staring contest.

"Bye Marley," Aspen grins widely and waves. "See you tomorrow?" they ask with their golden retriever smile growing with every word they say.  I smile to myself and call back. "I don't know," I shrug. "We'll see," I sit in my drivers seat with the trashy passenger seat and the packed backseat and trunk.

It doesn't take me long to get back to the motel. Although, it took me a few minutes while I was trying to find out how to get out of the secret-alley parking lot because every one else went out a back way that no doubt led them straight to wherever they live. So I had to go back up because the road to the hotel is accessible out the front of the gym.

As I'm parking my car in front of my motel room, my phone rings and Gemini's name comes across the screen. I slide the accept button and I'm instantly met with his warm voice.

"Hey Marley, I forgot to ask you if you had a place to stay?" he questions. "Right now I'm staying at a motel, but other than that I'm still looking for a place around campus. I already called housing and they said it was a little late to get a dorm so,"