chapter twenty-seven!
"DATE NIGHT? FRIDAY?" questioned Alex with her eyebrows raised. Miguel nodded in confirmation. Alex laughed, giving Miguel a hesitant smile. They were in the mall— not to buy anything, just to waste time— their hands intertwined, when he randomly asked her to go out with him on a date. It would be their first date— officially, of course. They'd been on many unofficial dates. "You know I have to work."
"Until 7:00," he reminded with a sly grin. Alex sighed, realizing where this was going. Miguel wasn't about to give up, and she knew she was going to give in sooner or later. "We could go afterwards. Then maybe I could man-up and ask you to be my girlfriend."
"Ooh, now that sounds tempting," she teased. She paused, stroking her imaginary beard before giving him a smile. "What if I just went ahead and asked you to be my boyfriend?"
"Right here? Right now?" he asked, slowing to a stop and spinning her around, pulling her close to him. He looked down at her with a mock frown as she nodded. "Well, I'm afraid I would have to say yes."
"Well, Mr. Miguel Diaz," started, backing up so she could dramatically get on one knee before him. Miguel let out a loud, obnoxious gasp, drawing the attention of a few people who were walking by. "After this long unnecessary wait, I feel that I cannot wait any longer to ask."
Miguel laughed at her theatricals, as did the group of people who were now surrounding them. He heard someone "whoop!" then shout about defying gender roles.
A person running a nearby flower-booth handed a yellow flower to Alex, the girl giving the man an appreciative smile before handing the flower to Miguel. "Miguel, my best friend, my soulmate, my binge-watching-partner... the Peter to my MJ, the Kendall to my Jo, the Sam to my Eileen, would you please, please, please be my boyfriend?"
"Boy, if you don't say yes then I will!" shouted some girl from the growing crowd. Miguel felt his face go red— he hadn't realized just how much of a crowd they had attracted.
"Yes, Alex, I will be your boyfriend," he grinned, holding out his hand to help her off the ground. He pulled her into a quick kiss, the shouts of people in the mall making the Alex bury her head into his shoulder after pulling away. "Will you still go on the date with me, though? It's 80s night at the roller rink and I know you're dying to dress up as Heather McNamara."
"You got this idea from Tory, didn't you?" asked Alex, knowing that her cousin worked at the roller rink and probably gave Miguel the date idea. Not that she minded— she loves the 80s and roller skating. Miguel nodded, somewhat sheepishly. "Yeah, sure. I'll go with you on a date, boyfriend."
━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━
"Mrs. LaRusso.... do you know why there's a bunch of teenagers cleaning the cars?" asked Alex as she approached her boss. Amanda was standing in somewhat shock, the few guys that she was talking to moving over to inspect some of the cars. Amanda shook her head giving Alex a confused look before looking at Mr. LaRusso, who was approaching the pair.
"No, honey, I don't," answers the woman. "but I'm sure we're about to find out."
"Hey, Mr. L," grinned Alex with a nervous smile, looking around him to see some of her friends cleaning the cars. Demetri, Robby, Sam, Noah and Chris were all amongst the kids who were scrubbing down the cars, making her realize that it was the Miyagi-Do kids who were doing the work. Daniel gave Alex a grin, turning to his wife, who gave him an unimpressed look.
"Child labor? Bold move," comments Amanda before Daniel could say anything. "It's crazy that no one's ever thought of it. Ten more minutes of training, okay?"
Alex looked between the two, wide-eyed. Even though they weren't openly fighting, the tension between the couple was unbearable. She cleared her throat, letting them know that she was still there, "Well, I'm going to go say hi to some of my friends. It was, uh, nice to see you Mr. L."
"You too, Alex."
Alex then awkwardly waved to the pair then jogged over to the car that Robby and Sam were waxing. The two teens perked up at the sight of their friend, Robby being the first to pull the smaller girl into a hug. Alex grinned, hugging the boy back. After a moment, she pulled back and pulled Sam into an even tighter hug. Mya gave Alex a narrowed look from a nearby car, quick enough to go unnoticed by everyone but Alex. Alex felt her stomach do a few uneasy flips.
"You don't know how good it is to see you," smiled Sam, brightly. She waved Chris, Noah and Demetri over, the two also giving Alex hug. At this, Alex forget all about Mya and grinned yet again. "It feels like it's been forever. And I heard about you and Miguel— I've honestly been waiting for this to happen and I am so happy for you."
"Yeah you'd think it would be awkward for either me or Sam to say this, but you guys are honestly a power couple," adds Noah. Demetri, Chris, and Robby share impressed looks from where they stood. They knew that Sam was fine with Alex and Miguel dating, seeing as Alex had made sure it was okay long before they ever made it official. However, they weren't as confident that Noah was going to act so cool. He must be a really good actor, considering the fact that he had been talking about Alex and Miguel all week, and had cried quite a few times to Chris about it. It was safe to say that a friendship between Miguel and Noah wasn't going to happen any time soon, because there was definitely some bad blood there, at least on Noah's end. Noah sent Alex a wide smile, "And that thing at the mall the other day? Absolutely adorable."
"Right!" agreed Sam. "And it was such a power move for you to ask him out I stead of it being the other way around."
"Yeah, I'm happy for you, Alex," said Robby, slinging his arm over her shoulder in a friendly way. Alex didn't fail to notice that his other hand was tightly intertwined with Sam's, making her grin. Talk about power couple, she thought.
"Aw, thanks guys. So, uh, do you guys wanna tell me why you're here waxing the cars and not learning karate?" she questions with a pointed look. Chris, Noah, and Demetri shrugged, just figuring that it was part of their training and not questioning it. Sam sighed, looking over at her parents with a frown.
"Long story."
━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━
"Yellow is definitely your color," compliments Tory after giving Alex's outfit a once-over. Alex had used one of her old costumes, which still fit her because she hasn't grown at all since seventh grade. It had a yellow checkered skirt and coat, with a bright yellow T-shirt underneath. She'd brought her own roller skates, which happened to actually be rollerblades. They'd worked out surprisingly well because they were yellow and black, which was a lucky coincidence.
"Thanks," grinned Alex. Miguel skated up behind her, coming back from the bathroom. He grabbed her by the waist, picked her up and turned her around to face him, making her let out a squeak in surprise. Sitting her down in front of him, he gives her a quick kiss before intertwining their hands. Tory scrunched her nose up in mock disgust.
"Ugh, can you save the cuteness for when my single-ass isn't around?" asked the blonde, giving the two a sarcastic grin before shoving them both in the arm.
"Yeah, whatever," teased Alex, pulling Miguel towards the rink. Miguel grinned down at his girlfriend— he really liked calling her that— and kissed the crown of her head.
She looked up at him, smiling. Seeing her smile like that made him feel happier than he ever had before. Alex smiled at lot, but she hardly ever really smiled. Like the type of smile that made her eyes light up and her dimples show. He'd only seen it a few times, and it filled him with euphoria to know that he was the cause of one of those smiles.
"Race you to the other side?"
━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━
"You are surprisingly good at skating," huffed Miguel, after having been out-skated by the girl for the fourth time. He gave her an incredulous look as she twirled around gracefully on the rollerblades. "What, were you like a figure skater back in New York or something?"
"Hockey player, actually," she told him, making the taller boys jaw drop. Hockey? Hockey? Hockey was the most violent sport he could think of, and Alex used to play? No way.
"Nuh-uh," he said in disbelief. "That's like super violent and you're... not violent."
"That was before everything happened," she informed, making him nod slowly. She skated backwards a bit, pulling him along with her. "Hockey was more popular than football in my neighborhood. I was on a local Bantam team and Lucas was just starting in the Pee-Wees. Me and my teammates would skate around off-ice all the time— to practice, to school— each other's apartments. I guess I got pretty good at it."
"Pretty good? I'd say professional. How do you even skate backwards anyway?" he asked, making Alex look down at their feet.
"Well, you've gotta do basically the opposite of how you skate forward. Instead of your toes pointing outwards, you point them in with your heels apart. Then you just kinda push backwards," she told him, demonstrating as she does so. Miguel nodded, fully confident that he could now do it. Following her instructions, he attempts to skate backwards. He got maybe two feet them slid and faceplanted, making Alex rush over and help him up. He laughed at himself, making Alex giggle a bit.
"Holy shit, are you okay?" she asked, grabbing his face and looking at each side to make sure it wasn't bruising. "Is your face hurt?"
"No," he chuckled as he rubbed his neck in embarrassment. "Just my pride."
"Maybe we should go get some food," she suggested, taking his hand. Miguel nodded, willing to take any chance he could get to sit down. "Take a break from skating for a minute, ya'know, to let your pride heal."
"Yeah, let's go annoy Tory," he agreed, the two skating over to the edge of the rink and over to where Tory was standing. Alex tilted her head when she saw a familiar looking long-haired boy talking to her cousin, along with a girl in pink. It took her a moment to realize it was Sam and Robby.
Miguel, however, didn't notice who it was and made his way over to Tory anyways, Alex a few paces behind him. Miguel stopped abruptly, an idea popping into his head. He turned to Alex, holding hsi hand out for her to stop. "Hey, how about you go and find us a good table? I've got to talk to Tory for a second."
"Okie dokie," she gave him a kiss on the cheek before making her way over to booth towards the back.
"Hey, Tory," starts Miguel as he approached her. "Do you think you could maybe have a certain song played in a few minutes? Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go, by Wham! ? It's Alex's favorite song from the..." he trails off as he finally realized who was in front of him. "80's. Oh, uh, hey. I didn't recognize you guys. Dig the costumes."
"Thanks," was Sam's brief answer.
"You should see Alex, though. She's Heather McNamara— it's iconic," he laughed, somewhat awkwardly. At the mention of Alex, some of the tension amongst the group was released. Robby tried to hold back a laugh at the idea of Alex as Heather McNamara— and it showed on the tight-lipped smile that he now wore. Sam grinned a bit, nodding.
"I bet it is. Date night for you guys too, huh?"
"Yeah," nods Miguel, grinning as he looks around for the said girl. He sees her sitting at a booth towards the back, scrolling through something in her phone. He then realized that he hadn't introduced the couple in front of him to Tory, coughing uncomfortably as he corrects his mistake. "Uh, this is Tory. Tory, this is Sam and Robby. They're good friends of Alex—"
"Yeah, we've met already," nods Tory, giving Sam a look. Miguel could tell by the sound of it that they didn't really get along. He wondered why. "Sam and I had a little run-in at the beach club."
"So, how do you two know each other?" asked Sam, shifting awkwardly where she stands as she changes the subject. The beach-club was a bad memory filled with embarrassment and anger, so she tried to shift the focus off of that. She also couldn't see Alex being friends with the girl, so that possibility wasn't even thought of.
"Oh, uh, she's Alex's cousin," Miguel tells her, and upon seeing the confused (and completely shocked) looks on both Sam and Robby's face, he elaborates. "Alex's dad and Tory's mom are twins. And she's in Cobra Kai."
"Figures," muttered Sam, although she was still in utter surprise that someone like Tory was related to someone like Alex. Although she wasn't surprised that it was on Alex's dad's side of the family.
"What was that?"
"Nothing," Sam answered, making Tory nod skeptically. Tory was surprised that her cousin was friends with such a rich, stuck-up princess. Although she shouldn't be surprised because Alex was friends with everything that breathed.
"All right, I got to get back to work," Tory told Miguel, giving him a pat on the shoulder. "I'll see about that song, though."
━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━
"So, boyfriend, how's karate going? Still learning the ways of ultra-awesome ass-kickery?" questioned Alex as she took a bite out of a fry. Miguel neglected to inform her about the awkward encounter with Sam and Robby, seeing as to how he knew she'd want to go and say hi to them, despite how uncomfortable the atmosphere was. He kinda just wanted this date to be about them, without the interruption of his ex. Miguel smiled at the noirette; it made him happy that even though karate was so not her thing, she still asked about it because she knew it was important to him.
"It's going pretty good. Sensei Lawrence got rid of Sensei Kreese— which I think might be for the better, actually," he admits, thinking back to what his sensei said. Alex nodded in understanding. She'd only met the man once— that time at the diner when he was with Mr. Lawrence— but something about him did seem off. Kind of creepy, actually. "What about you? Have you given any thought to that letter you've been carrying around for the past month or so?"
"Damn," sighed Alex, throwing a fry at Miguel's face. She lets out a forced chuckle. "I was hopping you'd forgotten about that. But, uh, yeah, I have. I think I'm going to visit him."
Miguel raised his eyebrows in surprise. He reached across the table and grabbed her slightly-trembling hands and gripped them tightly in his own. "Oh, wow. That's pretty big. How do you feel about that?"
"Nervous," she confessed, almost immediately. She let out a shaky laugh. "And kind of scared. But I think I need to do this— I haven't seen him since that day. Maybe it'll give me some sort of..."
"Closure?" finished Miguel, Alex nodding quietly. Miguel understood where she was coming from, but couldn't really get what she was going through. He couldn't even begin to imagine how hard it must be for her to even consider visiting the man who murdered her brother. "If you think that it'll make you feel better, then I believe you should do it too."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah," he confirms. He thinks for a moment, not really sure if he should say what he is about to. He decides that there would be no harm in asking, so goes ahead. "If you want, I could go with you. You don't have to go through this alone."
"You'd do that?" she asked, her eyes lighting up a bit. Miguel nods, rubbing circles on the back of her hands. She nods, somewhat happily. Alex didn't even really like traveling alone, so a trip to Nevada by herself sounded unpleasant as-is. And having someone there with her and her dad could likely make the experience easier. "That'd be nice. Thank you."
"You don't have to thank me," he gives her a soft smile. Alex smiled back, leaning forward to give him a quick kiss. After the two pulled apart, Miguel leaned back in his seat, taking a sip out of his milkshake. "You want to go back and skate some more? Maybe you can teach me a few of those tricks."
"Sounds like a plan," she said, standing up from her seat. Miguel follows suit, the two making their way back towards the rink. They were stopped, however, when they saw Tory crashing to the ground, platters of food that she was carrying falling around beside her. Sam stood a few paces ahead, with Robby staring in shock from behind.
"Tory!" Alex rushed over to her cousins side, kneeling down. She looked over Tory's face and arms, making sure that she wasn't visibly injured. "Are you okay?"
"What the hell, Sam?" asked Miguel as he and Alex each took one of Tory's hands, pulling her up into a sitting position. Tory muttered a quick thanks to the couple, rubbing her head with one hand and looping her other arm with Alex's, sending Sam a tiny smirk, as if teasing the girl for being closer to Alex.
"What? Me? She's the one—" starts Sam, and Alex holds her hands out as the security guards come over, hearing the commotion and seeing the mess.
"Whoa, how about we all calm down," said Alex, sending everyone a reassuring smile. "I'm sure this is just a big misunderstanding, yeah?"
The security guard wasn't having it, though, and gave Robby and Sam a stern glare. Pointing towards the door, he held his other arm out to make somewhat of a barrier in front of Alex, Tory, and Miguel, "All right, you're done! You're out!"
"She's the one who started it!" retorted Robby, motioning over to Tory as he comes to his girlfriends defense. Sam nodded, backing the boy up. She gave Alex a pleading look, hoping she believed her. Sam would hate if Alex got mad at her, especially over something that she didn't even start. Alex sent the couple a tiny smile, deciding not to pick sides because she didn't know the whole story.
"You're out!" repeated the security guard. Robby and Sam sighed, realizing that there was nothing they could do to change the man's mind.
"See you later, Alex," waved Sam, sadly. Looking down at Tory, Sam was somewhat surprised to see that the blonde was sending her another smirk, this time for the satisfaction of knowing that she got Sam kicked out.
Robby and Sam then turned around and left, leaving Alex and Miguel to help make sure Tory was okay. Tory shook her head, waving off the worried couple and sending her cousin a bright smile.
"Don't you guys worry about me," she informed them, pushing herself to her feet. Alex held her arm out, just in case, making sure she didn't fall. "I'm fine. Just focus on your date and have a good time."
━━━━━━━☆☆━━━━━━━
"You have got to give me roller-skating lessons," said Miguel rubbing his now-sore elbow as the two approached the driveway of their apartments. He'd fallen several more times than he'd like to admit, which was quite the opposite of Alex— who seemed to skate effortlessly. "That way, I won't leave with this many bruises next time. I swear, I'm going to be sore for the next year."
"I told you not to try and do a pirouette on roller skates. It's hard enough on rollerblades," she sassed, Miguel sending her an incredulous look. He had stupidity attempted to do a pirouette spin on the roller skates after seeing Alex do it easily and gracefully on her skates. He'd failed, of course, and had landed quite hard on his ass.
"The fact that you can do it on rollerblades just proves that you're absolutely perfect and that there's nothing you can't do," praised Miguel, making Alex shake her head, unconvinced. Sure, she could do a good amount of stuff, but there was still plenty that she couldn't do it even if she tried. She couldn't sew, play softball, or fly a kite; all of which she has at least attempted to do before.
"Yeah, right," she remarked, sarcastically. Miguel rolled his eyes, bringing his arm up to rest around her shoulders. She grinned, her arm going around his side, almost instinctively. They approached Alex's apartment door, seeing as how they were going to hang out there for a while and probably start their Gilmore Girls marathon. Then again, they might just sit around and eat snacks while talking. Depends.
Alex removed her arm from his side to dig into her skirt pocket (yes, she was still wearing her Heather McNamara costume; it had earned her a fair share of stares on the way back) to find her keys. Unlocking the door, she opens it up, stepping inside. Miguel followed afterwards, his eyebrows furrowing at the unusual sight of Xolani Ramirez not sitting on the couch watching TV.
Xolani was always on the couch watching TV. That alone being weird, it was also Friday Night— meaning that a new episode of Deal or No Deal was coming out, which made him even more confused.
Miguel wasn't the only one who noticed the oddness of the situation, seeing as how he hadn't even had the chance to question it before Alex was dropping her bag on the ground and looking around the house, "Mama?"
Miguel followed closely behind, also worried about the woman's wellbeing. Alex looked through the hall and down each room, her heart race increasing considerably as she does so. Her mother wasn't in the kitchen, her bedroom, or Alex's bedroom. That left the bathroom. "Mama!?"
The bathroom door was open, signifying that her mother wasn't using the bathroom— not closing the bathroom door was a pet-peeve of Xolani's. Looking in the bathroom, Alex was surprised to see Xolani hunched over the toilet, leaning partially on the wall as she coughed hysterically.
Alex rushed over to her mother, kneeling at her side and rubbing her back soothingly. She shared a worried look with Miguel, her eyes widening when she glanced back over at her mother— realizing that not only was the woman badly coughing, she was coughing up large amounts of blood.
"Miguel, can you please call an ambulance? She needs to get to the hospital," she tells him, her voice only wavering a bit. Miguel could tell she was trying her hardest not to start crying. He nodded, pulling his phone out from his back pocket and stepping back into the hallway to make the call. His heart began pounding too— this had to be really serious.
"Mama, what's wrong? What happened? Was it something you ate? Here, let me see if you're running a fever," let's out Alex in a single breath as soon as her mother had calmed down a bit. Xolani sighed, flushing the red liquid down, pushing her daughters hand away from her forehead.
"I'm fine, mija, really," said Xolani, unconvincingly. Her voice was weak and her face was flushed pale. Her eyes were watering and Alex could hear her wheezing. Alex shook her head.
"I know that's a lie, Mama," said Alex, her hands beginning to shake. Xolani sighed, realizing her daughter was not going to believe her lie. "How long have you been sick?"
"Just a few days. The blood just started this morning, though," confirmed Xolani, in a poor attempt to calm Alex down. It obviously didn't work, especially since Alex had been home between work and the date, giving Xolani plenty of time to inform her that she wasn't feeling well. Not to mention that her mother had been sick for days and i'm somehow managed to hide all symptoms from Alex. It made Alex wonder if Xolani was a really good actor or if she was a really bad daughter.
"Oh dios, mio," cursed Alex, running her shaky hands through her hair. Miguel got off the phone, peeking his head back into the room in time to hear Alex say, "Mierda!"
Sighing, he put his phone back into his back pocket and made his way over to Alex. No matter how much this scared the absolute shit out of him, he was going to be there for his girlfriend. Lord knows she needed him right now. He rubbed Alex's arms reassuringly, Alex leaning into his touch.
Together, the couple was able to get Xolani towards the front of the apartment— with a trash can, of course. Alex and Miguel stepped outside for a moment, awaiting the arrival of the ambulance so they could point the paramedics to the correct apartment.
Alex was a mess. She was holding it together better than anyone else could, but it was still visible that she was freaking out. "Don't worry, the ambulance will be here soon and the doctors will figure out what's wrong."
"Yeah, yeah," she nods, rubbing her hands on her skirt nervously. "You're right. She'll be fine."
"She'll be fine."
a/n: hello!! it's been a while, i know. but yay, schools out where i live!!!! meaning i'll be getting back into a regular updating schedule soon and to make up for not updating sooner, this chapter is one of the longest i've written so far.
hope you all have a wonderful day!!
~chloe