by Blair Young
I agreed. We spent the next hour working out and talking about nothing in particular, trying to avoid the subjects that were really bothering us. I wished Abby would open up about why she really didn’t want to be at her house. I had a feeling it had more to do with just Peter, but there wasn’t any way I could naturally bring it up.
But, she made it clear she wasn’t going to be long. She would get home and shower before putting on something more comfortable, then I would see her again in an hour or two. It was more than enough time for me to get ready, and Damon would already be down at Louie’s.
I headed upstairs to shower myself before getting ready, and was surprised to find Damon’s door open. He was staring at a piece of paper in his hand, and though he quickly turned it to the side when I walked into the room, I already saw what it was.
“An F?” I asked.
He nodded. “I blame you for this. You’re the one who’s supposed to be tutoring me!”
I grinned. “I’m doing my best. Maybe if we did more tutoring when it came to school and less on the bed we might improve that score.”
“Maybe,” he said as he stared at the paper. “I’m not going to tell mom.”
“I wouldn’t,” I said as I sat down on the bed. “I don’t want her to be on me for it either.”
“Not like it’s your fault,” he said with a shake of his head. “I’m the idiot who can’t pull up the grade.
“You aren’t an idiot. We just have to work harder on the problems. Math isn’t something you have to be smart for. If you know how to solve the problem, then you can figure it out, always,” I tried to encourage him.
“Thanks. That only makes me feel stupider,” he said with a shake of his head.
I grinned. “Well, we’re going to work harder on this okay? Next time you get a report card you can show it to Susan and she’ll be proud and we can all just forget about the tutoring thing.”
“I’m not sure I want to forget about that,” Damon gave me a look over his shoulder, and I wished he didn’t turn me on so much. But, I also knew that I had to stand strong. I wasn’t going to sleep with him again. I couldn’t. It wasn’t going to lead to anything good, that was for sure.
“Are you sure you want to come to the fight tonight?” Damon asked, changing the subject.
“I’m sure,” I said with a nod. “Abby’s going to come, too.”
“Really?” he asked as he looked up. “I thought she hated that sort of thing.”
“I think she just wants to get out of the house for a while,” I said with a shrug. “I just want to see you kick the ass of someone who thinks they can pin you in the ring.”
“That’s the plan,” Damon said with a smile. He looked back down at the paper in his hand and shook his head. “It would have been a lot more motivation if this had been nicer before going in, but whatever.”
“Use it as motivation to take out your frustration on the guy you beat up,” I said with a laugh. “That’s the way I like to look at things.”
Damon laughed, too. It was good to hear. A little too good, really, and I tried not to think about how much that turned me on, either.
“Well, I’m going to have to wrap this up,” he put the paper underneath a notebook so Susan wouldn’t see it if she walked into the room. I wanted to tell him that was a pretty easy guess if she were to really want to find it, but I figured he knew his mother well enough to know whether she was going to go through his things to try to find the grade report.
After all, if I didn’t hand in mine, she wasn’t going to know that we’d even gotten them that day. It wasn’t going to be a problem for Damon for a while, not as long as we got the grade up by the next time.
And I had faith that we’d be able to do that if we could just focus in the bedroom and not worry about putting our hands all over each other every time we were left unsupervised.
“I need to have a session before the fight. It loosens me up and gives me a better chance of getting a knockout,” he told me as he rose from the chair. I tensed, and I hoped it wasn’t visible. I didn’t want to have sex with him, and I had a feeling that’s what he was after.
But then, he walked over to the closet and grabbed his gear. “I’ll see you down at the ring, okay?”
“Okay,” I said, suddenly realizing he was talking about a sparing session. I was glad I didn’t say anything about sex, and I hoped to be down at the ring with Abby in less than an hour.
But, it was all dependent on how fast she got ready to get down there, and I had a feeling it would be sooner rather than later. As long as we were there on time for the fight, I was happy.
I hoped Damon would win, and though I tried to tell myself it had nothing to do with anything but the fact he was my roommate, I knew it would turn me on more than I could say if I saw him throw another knockout in the ring that night.
There was just something about seeing him do that that turned me on more than I could say. It always had, and I had a feeling it would be hard not to end up in bed with him all over again if he did manage to win the fight that night.
I just had to be smart, and I had to keep myself grounded. I couldn’t keep doing things that were complicating my life, and every time he and I slept together, it was a little more complicated, that was for sure.
Just go and have fun tonight. It doesn’t have to mean anything. You’re just supporting your friend, and you want to get out of the house with your bestie.
There’s no need to turn this into a thing, or a reason for the two of you to have sex again.
As much as I told myself that, I was sure it was a lie.
Chapter 15
Sutton
I wasn’t sure what to tell Susan after the talk we had. I wanted to hang out with Damon, and she clearly knew he and I were hanging out when she wasn’t around, but I had to have some sort of reason to not be home that night.
There was little doubt in my mind she knew he had a fight. Whether she approved of what he was doing or not, she always seemed to know the nights he was going downtown to fight with someone. There wasn’t anything she could do about it, that was for sure. Damon made that clear since the day I moved in.
But, I wasn’t sure how she would take the idea of me going down to watch another one of his fights. I’d never told her that I’d gone to any of his matches, I just asked her more than once why he did it.
I told her that he wouldn’t tell me, and I soon learned that she wouldn’t tell me, either. But, that was the end of the conversation. I didn’t tell her how much I would root for him, or how hot I thought it was when he laid a guy out in the ring.
It really didn’t seem hard for him to beat the other opponents. For as many of the fights as I’d seen – though not many – I did find it amazing that he never lost. Sure, there had to be some times in his life when he did, but I’d certainly never seen it, and I thought that was incredibly hot, too.
Tonight, I really hoped that he would come out the winner. I really could use that sort of boost after all that had been going on, and I had a feeling Abby wanted to see him win, too. Though she didn’t care for the fights and she made it clear to me the only reason she was tagging along was because she wanted to get out of the house, I knew she got caught up in the energy a lot more than she let on.
Not to mention, the outfit she chose for tonight’s match was a lot more provocative than what she normally wear, and I had a feeling I knew why.
“You ready?” she asked wen she met me at the door.
“Yeah, I told Susan I’m going to be out late, but I said we’re going to be at your house so she doesn’t ask too many questions,” I admitted.
“That’s fine, my parents aren’t home again so if she calls she’s not going to get through. Not that they answer the machine anyway,” Abby shrugged. “Come on! Let’s get down there so we can get good seats.”
Now that I’d been a few times, I felt a lot more comfortable slipping through Louie’s sports bar to get to the ring downstairs. I wa
sn’t sure if it was just my imagination, but it seemed to me that the place was getting more and more crowded each time she and I went to see a fight.
Perhaps the word was spreading around town, maybe I was getting more interested in what was going on around the room. I had been so taken with the moment the first night that I’d come to the fight, my eyes were glued on Damon the entire time.
Then, when I’d come again with Pete, he had encouraged me to start dating his friend, which only led to the fact of me wanting to stare at him all the more. It was hard for me not to stare now, but neither of the fighters were in the ring yet, so we had the chance to focus on where we wanted to sit.
“How about right here? We’ve got a good view of the ring but we’re still far enough away we don’t have to worry about getting anything on our clothes,” Abby said with a laugh. She was certainly the more morbid of the two of us, pointing out that we could get blood or other fluids on us sitting too close.
“Good idea,” I said with a laugh. “The last thing I need is for me and Damon both to go home with blood on our clothes after tonight.”
“Does Susan have any idea you come to the fights at all?” Abby asked with wide eyes. I shook my head.
“Not unless she just managed to put it together in her brain. Or Damon told her. But I can’t imagine he would do that with how much they fight about him coming to the fights after all,” I said with a shrug.
“I don’t get the impression he tells her much of anything to be honest,” Abby said with a shrug of her own.
“Probably for the best if you ask me. It’s not like the two of them see eye to eye on anything,” I replied.
Abby laughed. “I’m starting to feel that way with my parents, too.”
She let the words hang in the air, and I wanted to ask her what was going on. Maybe that was part of what was bothering her. But, I let it slide when we both settled into our seats with our sodas. We weren’t supposed to have drinks downstairs, but it was hard for the security to keep track of everyone, and many of the kids who were watching the fights managed to get alcohol in their cups.
It wasn’t ever anything I felt interested in. I would rather see for myself what was going on in the ring rather than be worried that someone was going to say something about what I had in my glass, so I stuck to coke or something similar most nights.
We sipped on our drinks and chatted, doing a better job avoiding the things that were really bothering us. The energy in the room was building, and we both knew the fight was going to start soon. It was one of my favorite moments, right before the fight erupted, and I looked forward to when Damon would come out into the ring.
The referee took his place in the center when suddenly Abby grabbed my arm.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said. I could hear the anger in her voice, and I looked across the room where she was pointing. Sure enough, Peter was there watching the fight as well. He couldn’t have been sitting more directly across from us if he had tried, and there was a part of me that wondered if he had.
It didn’t help the fact that he had another girl with him, and I wanted to kick his ass. It was bad enough that he and Abby had flown through each other as fast as they did, but to think that he had another girlfriend already was low, even for him.
“I thought he wasn’t that great with getting the girls,” I said.
“He’s not usually, and I have a feeling he’s just got her here to make me mad,” Abby said. It was clear that it worked, but I put my hand on her arm anyway.
“Forget about him. He’s not worth your time. If he’s really going to move on from you that fast and go with someone else, then you are better off without him in your life,” I told her.
“Yeah, I just thought things were a little different between us. I mean, he got me in ways that I didn’t think any other guy ever would. I guess he was just after that one thing most guys want,” she said with a sigh and another shrug.
Abby was clearly trying to put on a brave face, but I could see she was hurt and angry with the situation. There was a part of me that thought she might cry at the sight of her ex over with another girl, so I tried to brush it off.
“Hey, if you want I can go kick his ass like I did to Molly. We could have two fights tonight,” I said with a grin. “For as much trouble as I’m sure I would get in with Susan, it would totally be worth it to see the look on his face – and her face.”
She forced a smile and put her arm around me in return. “There’s a reason you’re my best friend, you know?”
“I know,” I said as I laid my head on her shoulder. “And there’s a reason we don’t let guys do this to us. We don’t need them.”
“No, we don’t,” Abby said. I knew she wanted to point out that we were here seeing my own crush, but she knew better than to bring that up when we were both talking about her ex. She knew I would go over there and let him have it if she wanted me to, and I knew that made her feel good, even if we were going to see Damon in the ring.
At last, the lights went down around the rest of the room and focused on the ring, indicating that the fighters were about to come out of their lockers. I looked forward to who Damon was going to fight that night. I never knew who any of the guys were, but it didn’t matter.
They were often ripped and looked like they could take just about anyone, but they were always beat by Damon without a lot of trouble on his part. It was a turn on to say the least.
Although I liked to pretend I wasn’t easily surprised, I had to admit that I was shocked when the two fighters came out to face each other in the ring. I could have imagined just about anyone facing off Damon, but tonight, the other fighter was Chad.
He was dressed much the same as his friend, but Damon was by far better looking in my book. He had a hard, chiseled body, and I knew it wasn’t going to be difficult for him to take Chad out. It just surprised me that the two of them chose to face off so publicly.
Damon had let me know how mad he was about what happened in the cafeteria, but to take the fight in front of all these people, and for Chad to agree, it was hard for me to wrap my brain around it.
“Chad?” Abby asked, clearly as shocked as I was. They’re really going to be the ones to fight each other?”
“I guess?” I said in disbelief. “I knew Damon was mad about what happened with the milk thing, but I didn’t think he was mad enough he was going to take it to the ring.”
“Chad’s pretty mad that Damon wants nothing to do with him now. Maybe this is the chance for them to square off once and for all?” Abby said with a shake of her head. “Men.”
Abby was always hard for me to read, but there was something about her attitude about the fight that really caught me off guard. Perhaps it was because I was already on edge with Chad being the one to go up against Damon. Perhaps it was the fact that there was a small part of me that was worried Damon could actually lose.
I had faith he could take anyone who fought against him, but there was another part of me that worried he might not fight as hard as he could since this was his former friend. I knew Damon, and he was a good guy.
He might be angry with Chad for a number of reasons, but I didn’t see him fighting the same way he would if he were fighting a stranger. Then again, I wasn’t sure how many of the men he fought in these cage fights were strangers. I didn’t know much about Damon at all when it came to this part of his life.
Maybe that was part of the reason Susan didn’t like it. Maybe that was why she thought he should get out of the ring and find a real job. I didn’t know, and I didn’t have any way of finding out.
Then, there was another part of me that thought the opposite. I knew Damon was mad at Chad, and I knew Chad was furious with Damon. I wondered if he would do something that was against the rules just to make sure he won the fight. I couldn’t see Damon doing anything like that, but I could see Chad doing something like that in a heartbeat.
I didn’t like Chad, and I never had. I didn’t like him
that day I went out on the date with him, and I really hated him since he forced himself on me in my bedroom that same night. I still had nightmares about what would have happened if Damon hadn’t shown up, and I knew that was the beginning of the end for both of them.
It didn’t matter to either of us that he had apologized, and I knew Abby and Peter were all but done with him as well. Even if Peter and Abby did break up, I never saw him hanging around with Chad, and I had a feeling he had told Chad much the same thing Damon had.
They weren’t going to associate with men like that, and Chad had blown his chance. It was hard for him to accept that, but he was the one who made the mistake that night, and Damon was going to stand not only by me, but by what he believed in.
I firmly believed it wouldn’t have mattered that it was me who had been attacked. Damon wasn’t the kind of guy who was going to let another man get away with that kind of behavior no matter who it was. And I felt Peter was much the same way, even if he was a douche.
Abby and I exchanged a glance. I knew she was thinking a lot of the same things I was. We could see into each other’s thoughts clearly, and she had that same worried expression on her face that I knew was mirrored on my own.
She might not be anything more than friends with Damon herself, but she did have a lot of respect for the guy, and she didn’t want to see him get hurt in a foul move made by a cheating opponent.
But, there wasn’t anything we could do about it. The fight was starting, and along with the others, all we could do was sit back and hope that the security made sure to check what was brought into the ring before the fists started flying. I knew there had to be some sort of rules to keep the sport as safe as possible, but still.
I had heard of stranger things happening, and I didn’t even want to begin to think of what Susan would say if something happened to Damon because of this. She already hated the fact he was in the ring at all, and to think that something might happen to him – by a guy who was once his friend no less – made me sick. I couldn’t imagine what it would do to her.