by Alynn, K. H.
“Mark!” I shout. “Mark!”
He can’t hear me, though. He can’t do anything but take punch after punch.
“He’s had enough!” Coomer cries out.
“No!” Smithy hollers. “He ain’t had nothing yet!”
Smithy then somehow hits Mark even harder. He hits him until Mark falls to the man’s ankles.
Afterward, Mark tries to push the big man over, but the man laughs at this—and he kicks Mark in the head, knocking him out.
“We have a winner!” Coomer yells, with everyone other than me hooting and hollering. At the same time, Smithy takes Mark’s wallet from his pants, and, of course, finds nothing.
“He’s a cheat!” Smithy howls while holding up the empty wallet, and the whole crowd descends on Mark like vultures. They kick and punch him, and even take his shoes. And there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t even get close to him. All I can do is call out his name.
Which Smithy hears—and he approaches me.
“What about you?” he growls, right after he drops the wallet.
“What about me?” I mutter, while slowly stepping backward.
“You got my money?”
“I don’t got nothing.”
“Maybe I’ll just take it out of your ass.”
Suddenly, he jumps at me—and grabs both my arms. And I'm scared. I’m real scared. But I’m also tired—tired of being pushed around, and tired of being hurt. And, recalling just a bit of my “training,” I knee Smithy hard in the groin, sending him to the ground squealing in pain.
Seeing this, the vultures turn to me in shock, with Mark lying unconscious at their feet.
“Get away from him!” I scream, with my arms shaking with fury—and I rush at them and push my way through them, before tumbling onto Mark.
“Mark!” I cry out, with my arms clutching him. “Mark!”
“Just go,” he mumbles.
“I won’t,” I tell him. “I won’t!”
“Well, now you know. Now you finally know.”
“Know what?”
“I’m a total shit.”
“You’re not. You’re a prince. You’re a fucking prince!”
“Some prince I am.”
“You are,” I insist, as I lift him to his waist. “It doesn’t matter who your dad is—you’re a prince.”
WITH A SURGE of strength I never knew I had, I help Mark out of the building and through the warehouse gate. I help him all the way to the grassy hill, where we both collapse onto the soft wet ground.
Then, while gasping for breath, I happen to look out at the port, and see millions of lights, and almost that many colors.
It’s almost beautiful, and I almost want to smile.
“They, they make it seem so romantic,” Mark mutters incoherently.
“What?” I ask.
“The movies. You know, Lionheart and Blood and Bone. The good guy always wins the big fight, and he always saves the orphan. But it doesn’t happen that way, does it?”
“I don’t need saving, Mark. You’ve already saved me. You’ve saved me a million times over.”
He responds by putting his arms around me, and his legs, too. I can feel the mountain all over me. I can also hear it start to weep.
“Don’t worry,” I tell him, while trying to hold back my own tears. “I won’t keep you to your promise. I won’t stop you. Tomorrow you can go on without me.”
“I can’t,” he hollers. “I wish I could, but I can’t.”
“What?”
“I can’t go on without my princess.”
Not believing what I just heard, I look up into his face, and surprisingly see a small smile. It’s the first one I’ve seen on him, and it looks good. He looks good. So good that I can no longer hold back my tears.
“Why are you crying?” he murmurs.
“You’re him!” I scream—not only to Mark, but to the whole fucking world.
“Who?”
“A rogue with a big heart!”
the end
other books by
K. H. Alynn
Love and the Punk Rock Grrl
College and the Punk Rock Grrl