Fighting Hearts

by Annabeth Saryu

  “Hey, Mike,” I reply while looking straight at Louise.

  When our eyes meet, Louise shifts away from me, swinging her backpack off the shoulder it’s on and switching hands. It hangs suspended just off the ground by the tiny top strap she grasps.

  Shit.

  My day job makes me an expert at body language. Facial expressions can tell a story, but too many people can fake them. Faking a stance is much harder. Louise just freed up her striking arm while using the backpack to shield the injured leg. I wonder if Sweet Lou even realizes what’s she done, or if it’s just second nature to her. Whatever the reason, it’s hard not to feel like an absolute monster.

  My gaze shifts over to Mike, whose eyes dart back and forth between me and Louise as he rapidly transmits silent guy code. I’m working it, dude—move on.

  I don’t budge.

  “Oh, hey sorry.” Mike glares at me over Louise’s shoulder when it’s obvious I won’t go. “Madman, this is Louise. She lives with my cousin’s wife. Louise this is—”

  “We’ve met,” I announce.

  Mike looks stunned.

  “You two know each other?” He glances at Louise for confirmation.

  “We do,” she admits.

  Her admission feels like pulled teeth, involuntary and painful. Louise’s eyes lock with mine, and both of us refuse to look away first. Well, I’m the wrong guy for that, because those beautiful amber eyes immobilize me. Hell, I could stare at them all damn day and never get tired.

  “Hello, Louise,” I say.

  “Usalv,” she replies.

  “How were classes?”

  A slight smile plays on her lips. “Today was a lot of do as I say, not as I do… Hope people weren’t too let down.”

  “With you? Never,” I promise.

  “I hope not.” She looks worried and her tension distresses me.

  Beside us, Mike takes a step back and his hand releases Louise’s elbow. I don’t have much time before he diverts her attention back to him.

  I hesitate a moment before pointing toward the ground. “How’s your leg?”

  “Painful.” She reaches down and rubs her inner thigh gently. “I’ve got a huge bruise on my inner thigh. It felt a lot better after kickboxing, but for the first half it was super sore. Don’t worry though.” Her voice rings with reassurance. “It’s much better now.”

  “What happened to your leg?” Mike interrupts, looking back and forth between us.

  “She got hurt it in a sparring accident,” I reply.

  “Actually it was more like drilling,” she corrects me.

  “With who?” Mike looks down at her leg.

  Louise starts to speak, but I cut her off. “With me.”

  “What?” Lucky Mike’s easy demeanor disappears. “Louise you were sparring with…him?”

  “Yeah.” She gives Mike a regretful smile.

  I don’t think Louise wants to discuss this in front of Mike either. But who knows when we’ll see each other again, and I couldn’t let this to fester for weeks. We had to talk about it.

  To hell with Mike. This is none of his fucking business.

  “I wanted to apologize again. It was my fault, and I’m very, very sorry.”

  “You didn’t strike me—you blocked with an unpadded elbow. It was an accident.” She reaches out and touches her gloved fingertips to my forearm. “I’m sorry for not asking sooner, but how’s your arm?”

  “I’m fine.” My God, she’s adorable. I hadn’t felt a thing.

  Mike snorts with disbelief. “Louise, do you know who he is?”

  She shrugs. “I do now.”

  “No way,” Mike erupts. “You didn’t tell her?” He glares at me like he’s going to explode.

  While Mike stands here ranting at me on the sidewalk, I try to stifle my guilt. I feel like a total shit about the whole thing, but Lou and I both know the truth. It was an accident.

  “That’s enough,” Louise cuts him off. “Stop it, Michael.”

  I’m surprised to hear Louise speak.

  “He did tell me he was a professional MMA fighter who had experience with taekwondo opponents. The rest of it wouldn’t have mattered.” She turns to me. “It was an accident.”

  I nod in agreement. “It was. And I’m sorry.”

  “Are you fucking crazy?” Mike continues his rant. “How could you?”

  “Mike, I owe her an apology. Not you.”

  “Forget it. Please,” she asks.

  I nod. “Are you heading to the El?” I ask her.

  “Yes she is,” Mike cuts in. “I was about to take her there.” He smiles down at her. “We haven’t seen each other in ages, and it would be good to catch up.”

  That easy playa charm returns, cutting through the tension. For a moment, anyway.

  “Sure. It would be nice to catch up a bit,” Louise replies. “Thanks, Mike.”

  Mike’s face wears a smug grin as he glances back toward me. “Madman, if you see Drew, could you tell him that I’m running late?”

  Jerk.

  “I’m headed out to get some lunch. You should text him.”

  Mike looks toward the door and hesitates for a minute. Drew will be pissed, and that’s not a pretty sight.

  “Thanks, Madman,” he sounds irritated.

  But my satisfaction is short lived. I watch Mike put his arm around Sweet Lou’s shoulders and steer her toward the sidewalk. As they move away, Louise looks down where Mike’s arm rests, her expression a mixture of resignation and annoyance. She shifts her backpack to the opposite shoulder and scrapes Mike’s hand off with the strap.

  She looks down to check her shoulder, then back at me. She gives me a quick apologetic smile then turns back to Mike and nods in response to something he says. I watch them walk down the street together absorbed in their conversation.

  Lucky Mike Daughtry. Really, Louise?

  His frat boy popularity, good looks, and big fat bank account allow him to avoid success while still attracting plenty of women. Of course, some women don’t care how a man makes it, just that he has it.

  Truth be told, my bank account is pretty impressive. But I don’t want a woman who considers that my best quality. Sweet Lou seemed different. The black belt thing, the trauma nurse thing. Hell, she’d even stood up to Rodgers.

  But Mike?

  If Louise is the type who lets a guy like Mike insist on being in her life, then she’s not the woman I thought she was.

  And that’s a fucking shame.

  8

  “Yabba dabba doo!” The thud of the apartment front door shutting fills me with a sense of relief. It’s Wednesday morning and my last twelve-hour shift for the week is history.

  “Do you want to get a drink tonight?” I call out to Macy. When she doesn’t answer, I slide my Dansko clogs off and plant my backpack on the tile floor.

  “Macy?” I call into the kitchen from the doorway. She’s usually up by now making coffee.

  Macy’s not in here. She made the coffee today, but the pot is almost empty. A cough erupts from my now scratchy throat, and that’s when I notice the thick cloud of cigarette smoke that hangs in the air, burning my eyes. Macy’s a social smoker who’s always trying to quit, but we agreed she wouldn’t smoke inside.

  Something’s wrong.

  “Macy?” A veil of dread washes over me.

  This time, a loud anguished cry erupts from the living room and I race out toward it.

  “Oh my God, what’s wrong?” I ask.

  In the living room, Macy sits with folded legs on her favorite chair. The fingers of one hand drum out a disjointed rhythm on the end table. The other hand holds a cigarette between her delicate fingers.

  The foil lid from a yogurt cup rests askew on top of the Betty Boop clock. It serves as a makeshift ashtray that’s filled with at least half a dozen butts, some of them still smoldering. Ash drops onto the table, displaced by the vibrations of Macy’s tapping fingers.

  “Paul’s been hurt.” Her voice sounds str
ained and hoarse from stress and cigarettes.

  “Hurt?” I struggle to process the word. “He’s an engineer that builds roads and bridges. How did he get hurt?”

  “The corps of engineers decided to build a new hospital next to where the old one was bombed out.” Her eyes are puffy from crying and smoke. “They were scouting the job site when a bomb they hadn’t cleared went off.”

  Macy stops speaking, her words replaced with quiet sobs. I kneel in front of the chair, grasp her cigarette-free hand and rub it gently for several minutes.

  “He wasn’t close when it went off. Thank God. But he caught a lot of shrapnel on his right side.”

  I nod silently. “Sweet Christ.”

  Macy grinds her cigarette out on the makeshift ashtray, spilling a sticky stream of ash over Betty Boop’s coy eyes.

  “He was treated at Bagram Air Force Base before being taken to Landstuhl in Germany.”

  I take a deep breath, exhale slowly, and ask the question I already know the answer to. “How is he?”

  She grabs her pack of Marlboro Lights from the table and smacks it against her knee, forcing the end of a cigarette out the top. “Not good.”

  “Yeah.” I nod. “So what’s the plan?”

  “His estimated rehabilitation extends beyond his end of service.”

  “How long did he have?” I sit back on my knees in front of her. “Like another year?”

  “Nine months.”

  “Damn. Still, that’s a lot of rehab.”

  “They’re giving him an early discharge.” Macy pulls a cigarette out of the pack, folds her arms and tucks it beside her ribs.

  “Then he’ll do his therapy close to home.” I try hard to sound positive. “That’s a good thing.”

  Macy leans away from me to grab her lighter, which lies on the table next to an ash covered Betty Boop. “For Paul. For me, maybe.” She pauses. “Not so much for you.”

  “What?” I ask, confused.

  “Sometime in the next month, Paul will be home.” Macy’s voice is tired, sad, and scratchy as she blinks back tears. “Louise… We need you to move out. The sooner, the better.”

  “Move out?” I repeat, confused and shocked.

  “You know the drill. We’re going to need to put a hospital bed in the living room, plus other medical equipment.” I watch her throat as she swallows hard. “And I’ll probably need a home health aide for the times I’m not here.”

  “But we’ve talked about this before.” I stand up and move away from her. “You told me that you and Paul wanted a bigger place after he was discharged and that I could keep the apartment.”

  “Our plans are down the shitter right now.” Macy lights her cigarette and takes two long drags. “We assumed Paul would be working when he got back, not doing physical therapy. On my salary alone, we can still afford this apartment.”

  I sit on the edge of the coffee table and stretch out my long legs, trying desperately to quell the acidic wave of nausea that threatens to overwhelm me.

  “Things are a little tight at the moment. A big fat tuition payment was just due, and I won’t get hospital reimbursement until after grades are reported.” I rock bath and forth to soothe my stomach. “And since we’re three weeks in to the semester, I’ll get next to nothing back if I withdraw.”

  “We can give you your security deposit back. And we owe you few months rent for breaking the lease. If you need more to get settled, let us know. We’ll figure it out.” Puffy dark circles protrude from underneath her eyes.

  “It’s not just the money, Macy. I’m working two jobs and I’ve got classes on Fridays, plus two eight hour shifts to keep me full time for the month.” My knees start to bounce. “I don’t have a lot of time to look, and my crazy schedule hardly makes me the ideal roommate.”

  “Louise…I know your name is on the lease and you could give us a lot of shit about this if you want to…but I’m asking, I’m begging…please don’t.”

  Tiny lines have become etched in the pale skin around her mouth, and she looks like hell. It makes me both sad and alarmed. Macy’s like a sister to me and has been for ages. Paul is like the older brother I wish I’d had. Of course I’ll help them, any way that I can.

  “Don’t worry, hon.” I force my tone to be calm. “You two have enough on your plate. I’ll figure something out.”

  9

  “Louise?” I approach her from the path behind the Tin Man statue. “Is that you?”

  Sweet Lou’s hands grasp her hips while she leans over in front of the Tin Man, her breathing deep and rapid.

  “Usalv? I thought that was you back there.” She smiles and stands straight up. “I didn’t know you ran in Oz Park.”

  By unspoken agreement, we’ve both moved on from our drills disaster a few weeks ago. Neither of us ever mentions it. Ever since that day, our interactions have been friendly but casual.

  “My favorite is the zoo. Unless I’m headed to my uncle’s.” I pause a few seconds more so she can catch her breath. She paces in a circle and stops, then reverses and repeats.

  Sweet Lou arrives at the gym about the same time I leave, but somehow we always manage to run into each other. We chat about how our day went, Rodgers’ current mood, and my fight schedule. Once she’s out of ball-busting mode, Louise is very sweet in a low-key way.

  “That’s a fast clip you were running at. It was tough trying to keep up with you.”

  “Thanks,” she replies when her breathing normalizes.

  “You’re a serious runner.” Another discovery that surprises me.

  Louise laughs. “Back in the day. During high school, I made it to the state finals in cross-country. Twice.” A distant look crosses her face. “I was fast back then.”

  “You’re fast right now.”

  “Not really. I don’t train the way I used to. Hell, I don’t even get to run every day.”

  She’s here to train, not to hook up, she’s made that very clear to everyone in her no-nonsense, cut-through-the-crap way. Mike hangs around on the nights she’s there, but Lou makes short work of blowing him off. I can respect that, even if I think she’s too nice about it.

  “Do you miss it?” I ask.

  “Not so much as I thought.” She looks up at the Tin Man and gives him a conspiratorial nod. “My dad loved to run. He loved to run with me. Then he loved to watch me run.” Her voice is tinged with pain. “When that ended, I didn’t care anymore. After that, running was mostly a fitness crutch and stress management tool.”

  “What happened?” I ask.

  She looks up at the Tin Man statue while she answers. “He died.”

  “I’m sorry, Sweet Lou.” Regret courses through me.

  Those big amber eyes swallow me whole. “It’s not your fault,” she assures me.

  “When did it happen?”

  “In college.”

  I nod and change the subject. Or hope to, anyway. “Is Tin Man your favorite? You started and ended your run by him, and you always look up every time you’re nearby.”

  She laughs out loud and blushes scarlet red. Relief courses through me.

  “You noticed, huh?”

  I notice everything about you, Louise Becker. “Kind of hard not to.”

  “Yeah, he’s my favorite.” She glances up toward the polished pile of auto parts at the park entrance. “Whenever that scary witch or hideous monkeys showed up, I’d freak out until the Tin Man arrived.”

  “So he makes you feel safe?”

  “I guess.” She shrugs. “He also reminds me of my dad.” She looks up again at Tin Man, like she’s embarrassed to talk in front of him.

  The topic seems to put her in a good mood, so I push it a little. “How’s that?”

  “He was strong in lots of different ways. And much, much smarter than he got credit for.” Her eyes dart from the statue then back to me several times. A pensive look flashes across her face, but it’s gone in an instant.

  “Yeah. He never seemed to need the crackerjack keyc
hain heart that Oz gave him either.” Weird. I don’t remember much about it, but I do remember that.

  “Not your favorite movie?” she asks.

  I laugh. “Uh, no. Saw it my teens. An American rite of passage. I passed.”

  She shakes her head. “To be fair, most kids here see it when they’re smaller. It makes a much bigger impression then.” She looks down the paved trail and hesitates. “I need to walk or I’ll be sore. Would like to come with me, or do you have more to go?”

  “I’m done. Walking’s good,” I tell her.

  “Well, come on then,” she orders in a fake bossy voice and gestures for me to stand by her side. I fall in next to her, my pace an easy match for hers.

  It’s late Saturday afternoon, and neither of us are in a hurry to be any where. My uncle doesn’t expect me at any particular time, and Sweet Lou hasn’t checked her phone once since we ran into each other.

  A dense plop of water hits my shoulder and diverts my attention to gray waves of layered clouds moving briskly overhead, shedding slow drops of rain as they pass. I glance down at Louise, who wipes a raindrop from the tip of her nose and keeps walking. If she doesn’t mind, then I don’t either.

  “An American rite of passage?” she asks. “Did that go okay for you? It must have been hard, coming here so young.”

  I look down at Sweet Lou and watch as several drops hit the top of her head, but she doesn’t seem to care.

  “Things were fine at first. But I wasn’t supposed to stay that long.”

  “You weren’t?” She looks up and waits for me to explain.

  “No. I was supposed to come back when things settled down after the war.” Christ. I’ve never told anyone about that. And outside of my family no one knows that’s why I stayed here.

  “The war?” Her voice quivers with distress and astonishment.

  “Yeah. My parents sent me to stay with my mother’s brother. But then they decided that I should live here.” My father informed me of that decision in a five-minute telephone conversation on my fifteenth birthday. No one in my family had spoken about it again. I just…stayed.

  “Why?” She frowns, etching deep wrinkles across her forehead.