by Melissa Keil
Adrian grins. ‘Seriously, Sam. You have a pretty mad-arse fist. I mean, I would’ve thought you’d punch like a girl, but dude – your right hook is insane!’
‘Ah, thanks?’
He nods. ‘No probs.’
I look at his eye again. ‘Did it hurt a lot?’
He shrugs. ‘Only for a bit. ’Sides, chicks seem to like it. You have no idea how many girls have asked me about my face this week. I had to tell them that I got jumped by three guys, but still. Annie Curtis sat next to me in legal. Dude, she touched my arm! It was awesome.’
‘Well, I guess then – glad I could be of help?’
‘Yeah. Though you had me seriously worried. And now Mike seems pissed off with me as well. He told me that I’m a dumb-arse, only he wouldn’t clarify. I have no idea which part of my dumb-arseness he’s talking about.’
‘I don’t know what that means. But that’s what I wanted to talk to you about. Mike. This whole situation with him. I think I made a bad call earlier this year. Things haven’t been right with him for ages, and I should’ve never let it go. I’m just hoping it’s not too late to do something now.’
Adrian brightens. ‘You wanna have, like, an intervention? I saw one of those on Law & Order once.’
‘Actually – sort of. Yeah. An intervention is probably not too far off.’
I explain my plan to Adrian. A slow, excited Adrian-smile blooms across his hamster face. ‘Sam – that is the best idea you’ve had all year.’
‘Yeah? Because I’m going to need your help.’
He nods decisively. ‘Just point me in the direction.’
‘So then … we’re cool?’
Adrian punches me in the arm. ‘Yeah. Course. Always. As long as you promise you’re not gonna try and kiss me or anything. Just in case you were planning on working your way through the group.’
I close my eyes. ‘Radley, I can safely say that if I ever try to kiss you, you have my permission to remove my head with whatever sharp instrument is within your reach. Or blunt instrument. Or just kill me with your bare hands, because clearly I have been possessed by a demonic spirit that is the harbinger of the apocalypse.’
Adrian grins. ‘Sure thing, Sam. Good to know. Even if Al did say you were an excellent kisser. Gotta admit, I’m a little bit curious –’
‘Adrian – do I need to punch you in the face again?’
‘Nah. I’m right, Sam.’
He looks up at me with a cheesy smile. I try to keep the grin from spreading across my face. I’m not successful.
We stand in silence for approximately thirteen seconds. And when an appropriate interval of time has passed, we turn and walk to school together.
•
I find Mike before class. He accepts that Adrian, Allison and I are now okay with a grunt. Mike still looks pissed at all three of us. I have no idea why. I decide that I don’t care. I babble aimlessly about my new Rob Zombie box set and ignore the annoyed-blank looks that Mike shoots me.
I grab my phone approximately eighteen times to call or text Camilla, because that’s what I would normally do in this sort of situation. But every time I click on her number, I remember that things can’t be the same between us anymore. I remember that I need to untangle myself from her, for my own sanity. I know she’s probably still curled under the blanket on my couch in her faded Nick Cave T-shirt and trackpants, my red notebooks piled on the coffee table in front of her, exactly as she was when I left her this morning. The inadvertent daydream of curling up alongside her with my arms around her made me walk down the wrong corridor and almost miss the first bell.
So I check in at lunchtime with a brief text, and then I turn my phone off. It seems like the healthiest thing to do. I pour all my mental energy into the Mike project instead.
I also track down Allison and explain my plan. She is silent for a long time. ‘Sam. Are you sure that’s a good idea?’
‘No. But it’s the best one I have.’
‘Yeah, but – seriously? Okay, so I’m a girl and we believe in boring things like, I dunno, talking about stuff, but –’
‘Allison, I know Mike. He isn’t going to talk to me without a serious shove. So – I’m going to shove. He might not care about his own self-preservation, but I have to believe he cares about mine. This is the only way to get his attention. Trust me.’
‘Um, I trust you. Trust is not what I’m worried about.’
‘Jesus. Thanks for the vote of confidence.’
She grimaces. ‘I never thought I’d say this, but Sam – I think you’ve seen too many movies.’
I face the rest of the day with rapidly increasing anxiety, steadily perspiring palms, and an escalating sense of doom.
The final bell rings. My intestines and I have a moment of panic. Then I decide – to hell with everything. I’ll face my fate like a man. Or at least, the closest approximation of one that I am able to manufacture on short notice.
•
I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve watched Mike do these things. Somehow, Mike can pull off wearing white pyjamas and screaming stuff that sounds like Japanese swear words while punching a plank of wood, and not look like a giant, raging tool. I do not think that I am so fortunate.
The main dojo of Yu Kan-do It Karate is warm and stuffy and smells like pickled armpit. I try not to look at myself in the mirror as the class fills. And I try really hard not to think about what is possibly lying in store.
Travis Azumi enters with a sharp bow. Everyone scatters into lines and stands at attention. Travis faces the class – all six-foot-something of him, with his perfect hair and his black uniform and his chin-arse. He considers me for two brief seconds. Our conversation from eleven minutes ago floats back into my consciousness:
‘You want to trial a class?’
‘Yeah.’
‘This is a fighting class. It’s full-contact.’
‘Yeah. I know.’
‘Haven’t I seen you here before?’
‘Um, no.’
‘Have you done any karate before?’
‘No.’
At this juncture there was a somewhat scornful pause. ‘You seriously think you can handle a fighting class?’
‘Yeah. I want to trial a class. And I want it to be this one.’
I glance at the doorway. Apart from a few white-belt observers kneeling at the edge of the dojo, the doorway is empty.
The class begins. I take a moment to question the wisdom of this plan. I take another moment to question the wisdom of entrusting Adrian with a key segment of this plan. I decide that, all things considered, it is probably too late to change the plan now.
So I yell. I throw my hands around and hope that I don’t dislocate a shoulder. I squat into something called a horseriding stance and I thrust my elbows forward in time to Travis’s shouting, wondering when exactly a horseriding stance is going to be called for in combat, and if anyone ever has the presence of mind to drop into one and then elbow someone else in the chin. I try to follow Travis’s barking, throwing my legs out in a vague guess at a roundhouse kick. I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror. I appear to be moving like someone is tasering my testicles. I give up trying to figure out the logic behind the bowing, and simply bend at random intervals, hoping it’s in the right direction. My lungs feel like they’re imploding. Every part of my body feels like it’s trying to run, screaming, from every other part of my body.
And then, apparently, the warm-up is over.
Travis bellows something and the class dashes to the perimeters of the room. Everyone kneels and faces the centre of the dojo with their fists on their hips.
I collapse onto my knees in a corner. Either lack of oxygen has given me the eyesight of the Fly, or there are now four identical Travis Azumis standing in the middle of the room.
Travis runs his eyes over the class. He yells something that at least one person understands, cos a brown-belt with a giant eye tattooed on the back of his head leaps to his feet and stands at
attention in the centre of the room. Then Travis glances around again, and he shouts something else. For a moment, I think it must be a complex Japanese command of some kind.
Then I realise that he is, in fact, shouting my name.
I stand on wobbly legs and hobble onto the mat. I face the brown-belt, because I figure if it’s a choice between him and Travis, the tattoo-head with the mouthguard that has the front teeth blackened out seems like the marginally more sensible choice.
‘Sam!’
I focus my watery eyes in the direction of the frantic yell. Mike and Adrian are standing in the dojo doorway.
Adrian waves. ‘Hey, dude – sorry we’re late. Took a while to convince him I wasn’t joking.’
Mike’s face is bewildered. ‘Sam, what the hell?’
Several people turn and stare. A couple of guys wave at Mike. Travis Azumi’s face becomes stone-like. ‘Guests sit at the back of the room,’ he says coolly. ‘And shoes aren’t allowed on the mats.’
Mike stares at Travis. Travis stares back. Then Mike kicks off his trainers, bows quickly and sprints into line at the side of the dojo. Adrian follows with a solemn series of bows to all four corners of the room.
Travis barks something, and the tattoo-headed brown-belt jumps into a fighting stance. I raise my hands, trying to remember which part of my fist my thumb is supposed to be on. Then tattoo-head kicks me in the ribs and I end up across the other side of the room in the lap of an amused-looking black-belt chick.
My lungs have apparently decided to go home without me. I curl into a ball on the floor and pray that tattoo-head doesn’t kick me in the face after I pass out.
‘One point,’ Travis says. He sounds almost bored.
Someone appears at my side. I don’t need to open my eyes to know who it is.
‘Get off the mats,’ Travis growls at him.
‘What are you gonna do?’ Mike snaps. ‘Give me pushups?’
A Mexican wave of hushed murmurs rockets around the room.
Mike grabs my arm. ‘Sam, what the hell are you doing?’ he hisses in my ear.
‘I … am … sparring,’ I gasp. ‘I thought that … was … obvious.’
Mike glowers. ‘Do you wanna die? You know what these guys do to smart-arsed newbies? They will kill you. What are you trying to prove?’
I drag myself to my knees. ‘You ready to tell me what’s going on with you?’ I manage to pant.
For all of six seconds, Mike looks confused. Then, I see realisation dawn. His face becomes twisted. ‘Sam, it’s got nothing to do with you –’
‘Okay then.’ I shove his hands away and stagger to my feet.
Tattoo-head is standing with his legs braced apart, staring at the back wall of the dojo like whoever is holding his remote has pressed the pause button. I shelve the part of my consciousness that is screaming at me to run, and I haul my moronic arse in front of him again.
Travis barks. I raise my fists. I feel, rather than see, Mike scuttle to the side of the room. I hear Adrian cheer. I pray that now is the time my dormant superpowers choose to make an appearance. Then the brown-belt does a spinning back kick that lands on my forehead, and the next thing I am aware of is the fluorescent lights on the ceiling. My brain feels like it is leaking out of my ears.
Mike and Adrian scramble to my side.
‘Two points,’ Travis says. Above me, his hand is raised in tattoo-head’s direction. Perhaps there is confusion over whom this point belongs to. I find myself hoping only that I don’t wet myself as I die.
I don’t know if my best friend has ever been subjected to a radioactive spider-bite. But Mike shoves his hands under my armpits and drags me bodily out of the dojo. I make zero contribution to these events.
Mike dumps me in the corridor. I fold myself in half and try to remember how this breathing business works.
‘Sit up,’ Mike hisses.
‘Yeah … okay,’ I gasp. ‘Just give me a moment to retrieve my lungs from my intestines –’
‘Jesus, you are a knob!’ He shoves my shoulders back, grabbing my hands and placing them, not at all gently, onto my head. ‘You’re squashing your lungs. Breathe. Slowly!’
I close my eyes and take a couple of giant gulps of air.
‘And open your eyes – you’re gonna get dizzy.’
I force my eyes open. Sure enough, the entire corridor spins in a not-at-all-pretty kaleidoscope. Mike and Adrian grab at my arms as I sway sideways. I wait for my vision to clear, and then I glance at Mike.
Mike’s face is twisted into an expression I’ve never seen on him. He looks sad, and scared, and defeated. ‘Sam, okay. You’ve proven your point.’
‘What point is that, Mike?’ I wheeze.
‘That I’m a coward and a loser – I get it! You think I don’t know that?’
‘I never said you were … a loser. I definitely never said … you were a coward. I just want to know what’s wrong.’
Adrian gives Mike his best look of school-councillor concern. ‘Dude, we’re just freaked. Talk to us.’
Mike’s gaze ping-pongs between us. ‘So, Sam’s gonna get pulverised cos, what, you guys don’t think I can deal with my own crap? Sam, I can’t believe you thought this would work.’
‘Right. Because you’re capable of getting your arse kicked but I’m not?’
‘Uh – yeah! Dude, do you even remember taking PE? Pretty sure twisting your ankle on a soccer ball that one time doesn’t count.’
Adrian laughs. Mike and I both glare at him. He wrestles his expression back into submission.
‘Mike … are you going to talk?’
Mike glowers at the corridor wall.
‘Fine. Then this is on you.’ I somehow make it to my feet, and I stagger back into the dojo, remembering just in time to bow before I collapse into line. Several people look at me with a combination of pity and disdain.
Mike and Adrian bolt into the room again. Mike drops onto the floor behind me. ‘Sam, seriously. Enough.’
Travis Azumi barks another command. In the centre of the room, two sweating black-belts bow curtly at each other and then dash back into line.
Travis looks at me, then Mike. His mouth does this almost imperceptible smirk-thing. He points at me and gestures to the centre of the room. Apparently, I don’t even warrant a Japanese shout now.
‘Sam, don’t do this –’
I ignore Mike. I stand and limp onto the mat. Perhaps the self-preservation sector of my brain has shut down in disgust – but I don’t take my eyes off Travis Azumi. He raises an eyebrow at me. I narrow my eyes at him. I think he almost looks surprised. Then he yells something else, and a black-belt the size of a smallish truck leaps up in front of me.
Oh well. At least this should be quick.
I do the bowing motions and then I raise my fists. I wait, not entirely sure what’s supposed to come next. Then the black-belt punches me in the stomach, and I resume what is becoming my signature position on the floor.
‘One point,’ Travis says blankly.
Mike stands and pushes his way through the line. ‘Okay, enough. Just stop.’
‘You’re going to tell me what’s going on?’ I gasp.
‘Yeah. Fine. You win. Just … let’s get out of here. Please?’
I glance up at the black-belt. He glares down at me. Mike squares his shoulders and scowls at him. The black-belt looks hurriedly away. Travis smirks. I stare at his chin-arse for seven seconds while I wait for the sensible part of my brain to kick in. Unfortunately, the sensible part of my brain appears to have gone home with my lungs.
I think about my top five all-time greatest movie heroes. I’m not sure any of them have ever been in a comparable situation. At least, not without a chainsaw or flamethrower. But I think I know what all of them would do right now.
I haul myself to my feet. ‘I can’t go. I have to finish. Just this one.’
‘Sam, are you crazy?’
‘Mike, I have to.’
Mike stares at me. He forces
his face into its customary blank mask. But for the first time in ages, I know exactly what’s going on behind it. He shakes his head and then grabs my hands. ‘Your arms are f lapping around like frakking baby birds.’ He shoves my elbows down by my sides and pulls my fists forwards. ‘Use your elbows to cover your ribs. Keep your hands up. And Jesus, at least try and block one goddamned punch!’
‘Block?’
Mike rolls his eyes and makes a sweeping downwards motion with his hands.
Oh, right. I knew I should have paid more attention to The Karate Kid.
I hobble back in front of the black-belt, who I think looks momentarily impressed.
I think there should be some logic to all of this that I might figure out, eventually. I’m sure that if I studied and worked at it and examined it from every angle – if I devoted my spare time and brainpower to it – I could figure out the logic. There is always logic and order. There has to be.
I think about all the things that have spun out of my control lately.
I think about Camilla.
A sound comes from someplace that doesn’t seem to be my lungs or vocal cords. I yell, and I wind my fist backwards as I launch myself at the black-belt with every bit of power and muscle and energy that I possess.
I wake up on my arse in the change room with an icepack on my face and my two best friends peering down at me with a mixture of concern and fury.
All things considered, a not-entirely-surprising outcome to this day.
Awkward revelations [that apparently were fairly obvious]
The floor of the change room smells only slightly better than the dojo: less armpit, more fungal cream and a thousand cans of Lynx. I try to sit up. I fail miserably.
‘How did I get here?’
Mike is squatting next to me. ‘Gavin helped me carry you.’
‘Gavin?’
‘The black-belt whose foot your face got in the way of.’
‘Ah, Gavin. Remind me to thank him later.’
Adrian crouches on my other side. ‘Dude, you should’ve seen it. It was like watching Gandalf bring down the Balrog. One moment you were standing, and then, bam! On your arse. It was –’