“I knew it!” my mom says. “I could sense it. I told you, Larry,”
My dad takes in a deep breath and pats the top of my mom’s hands trying to calm her.
And then he looks right at me, dead in the eyes.
“Is this true?” he asks.
I nod. “Yes,” I say.
“So let me get this straight. My best friend…supposedly…is in love, his words not mine, with my eighteen-year-old daughter…the girl who’s not even half his age. The girl who’s twenty years younger than he is. Is that your story? Is that what you two are telling me?”
“Yes, that’s right,” Maddox says.
My dad stands. “Get the fuck out of my house! Both of you!” he says pointing to the door.
Maddox said this might happen and well…it did.
We do exactly what he said we should do.
We turn and go peacefully. For a big guy who makes money with his fists he says violence is almost never the answer, especially in a case like this where we’re sure to regret it later. I looked at him sideways when he first told me that but it makes sense. He explained that he is a performer selling very real violence that allows the audience to live vicariously through him. It sounded strange at first but once I processed it it made complete sense.
We live in a world of political correctness and manners. We make compromises all day long in the name of social harmony and getting along. There’s only so much of this you can take and then you snap, but snapping and going to jail is a lot worse than cutting loose for a few hours at an MMA fight watching guys pummel each other, if you’re lucky strangely enough, and then that pent up aggression fades and you can return to “normal” life.
But telling this kind of information to your parents may never qualify as normal and it sure isn’t normal now.
We leave the house and are back in Maddox Jeep and headed out of the city and back to Bear Lake right away.
Right now the sanctity and peace of the mountains is exactly what we need.
And Maddox doesn’t need any distractions before his final fight. And I certainly don’t want to cause him any stress, especially at this time in his life.
It’s my job to support him just like he supported me in front of my parents right now…or more accurately how he took the lead with them.
And as confused as I am at the moment I do know I’m making the right choice and one of the many reasons why is because he is exactly that…a leader.
And leaders lead from the front and I trust his decision and know they’ll lead to the kind of life we both want.
And he assured me my parents will come around in time. I believe him and I trust him.
Because I love him more than anything on earth.
CHAPTER 13
Maddox
Two weeks later
I hear my song and step out of the dressing room with my crew.
We’re in downtown L.A. at the Staples Center and it’s fight night. My fight night.
The one I’ve worked my entire life for, and the last time I’ll step inside the ring.
And while I make my way down the aisle as the crowd chants, “May-hem, May-hem, May-hem,” it’s not what’s inside the ring right now that counts, but what’s on the outside of it.
Her.
She’s in my corner tonight both literally and figuratively.
I’ve got my team on the ropes and she’s right there behind them in the first row on the corner supporting me as she’s been doing these past two weeks.
Pushing me. Making me work harder than I’ve ever worked before. And giving me the one thing I never had in all my years of training.
Love.
All these years I’d just pushed and pushed and pushed and when I couldn’t push anymore I’d down about four espressos and keep on pushing.
That was the old way.
Now there’s the new way I’ve learned thanks to her.
Work hard as hard as you can but when you’re done unwind all that energy in your mind and body with the one you can’t get enough of. It takes my mind completely off the upcoming fight. No stress like in all the other matches in my career.
But I can’t lie there is one bit of stress, or more appropriately…disappointment.
I’ve always had my best friend Larry walk out with me for my matches in Southern California and Vegas. It’s our tradition, but tonight that will be broken.
We’re about half way down the aisle when I hear my security guard.
“Out the way!” He reaches for a man who’s just jumped the railing and is wearing the color red, the same color I always wear on my shorts.
But this isn’t any man.
“Stop! He’s with us,” I say.
I feel Larry’s arm around my neck and I wrapped my glove hand around his waist. I’m already covered in a light sweat from my shadow boxing backstage, but he doesn’t care…not one bit.
“You know I wasn’t going to miss this.”
“And break our streak of doing this together.”
“Our lifetime streak,” he says and extends a fist to me, which I promptly fist bump.
With Larry by my side and my woman in my corner I’m invincible.
Even if I were to lose I’ve already won.
But there’s no way I’m losing tonight. I’ve got the most important people in my life by my side and that’s all the inspiration I need.
Not three minutes later the judge is announcing the rules and we’re staring down.
I literally laugh at the stare down, filled with confidence and knowing I’m completely unbeatable tonight.
The bell rings and he comes right at me…and into a fist that stops the fight at seven seconds breaking the previous record of thirteen held by another legend of our sport.
But today I’m the legend. As the judge holds my hand high the realization that I’ve finished my career undefeated hits me.
And when her arms wrap around my waist and her lips hit mine I realize I’ll spend the rest of my time on this earth undefeated.
Together we’re invincible.
“Amazing!” the announcer says as he sticks the microphone in front of me. “Words can’t describe what we just saw, Maddox, but you want to give it a shot?”
I take the microphone from him. “If you think that was something you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!” I say and the crowd goes wild.
And when I take a knee they absolutely lose it.
I take the box from my hand which my corner man slipped me as soon as the fight ended and I open it, placing the ring at the tip of her finger.
“I’m a man who knows what he wants and as you just saw when I want something I go and get it. And I don’t waste time. Beautiful, this is happening faster than anyone could have imagined…anyone but us that is. And life happens fast too, and I don’t want to spend another second of it without you. Today I’m the champion of the ring, but what I really want is to be your champion. Your lover. Your protector. Your husband. And soon the father of your children.”
The decibel reading on the side of the wall shows a new record for loudness at an indoor stadium. It’s louder than a jet engine at take off, and if she says yes that’s exactly what’s going to happen…our lives are really going to take off.
“Will you marry me?”
She grabs the microphone from my hands, holding it in both of her small hands. “Yes!” she yells and the decibel reading goes even higher.
I reach for her finger again, but this time it’s not getting away. Not before I slide the five carat diamond ring on it and then place my lips on top, sealing our love and my commitment to her forever.
The crowd chants my name and my team puts me on their shoulders, but I motion for them to put me down.
I scoop up my fiancée and put her on my shoulders. She’s the real champion today.
She won my heart and that is a competition that will never happen again. She’s got me forever.
And I’ve got her…forever.
EPILOGUE
Maddox
Four years later
“Wave at mommy!” I say taking our daughter Nastya’s little hand and waving it furiously as her mom walks across the graduation stage.
Her eyes catch us in the crowd and she waves back before blowing a kiss.
“Congratulations, Larry,” I say shaking his hand.
“Congratulations, Lucy,” I say kissing her on the cheek.
“Your girl did it,” I add.
“Our girl did it,” they both say at the same time and the three of us laugh.
“Mommy did it!” Nastya says.
“She sure did and you’re next, beautiful,” I say.
She looks at me like she’s confused, as she should be. At three years old she’s got a long way before it’s time for college, but I must say if the next fifteen years are anything like the first three it’s going to come way sooner than it seems. I feel like I blink and a month is gone.
One day she’s in diapers. The next she’s walking. Then she’s talking.
One of these days she’s…
No way. And once those boys find out about daddy’s history inside the ring she’s gonna be a virgin at least as long as her mommy was.
But when those boys watch videos of me inside the ring they’ll learn the most valuable lesson any man can learn…especially one who wants to learn about life.
My moment my life inside the ring ended and then my life outside began…because I put a ring on her finger.
I committed one hundred percent and have never looked back.
Technically I committed at that barbecue, but I just didn’t know it yet.
And in that line of thinking I committed the day I was born because I saved myself for the perfect mate, just as she did.
MMA has a lot of guys who think they’re “players.” They get as many women as they can but then wonder why they feel empty when the deed is over, or even worse when they’re older and beaten up.
And the worse beating you can take isn’t always inside the ring…it’s the one you take if you have a lonely heart, and thankfully I won’t have to ever know that feeling because I’ve got her, our baby girl, and my best friend and his wife by my side.
And grandma and grandpa love little Nastya, especially babysitting which allows me time to show just how much I still hunger for Anastasia.
And now that she’s finished film school it’s time for another vacation. Nastya’s gone on a few with us, but mostly it’s just the two of us. And since we’re celebrating this time I think we might need some alone time, but I’ve planned for the best way to accommodate that…as a family man.
“You got plans for next week?”
“Who me?” Larry asks as he tucks his video camera into the bag on his lap now that Anastasia is off the stage and out of a good viewing area from where we’re sitting. “Nothing out of the ordinary.”
“How about you, Lucy?”
She opens her phone and scroll through the calendar. “Nope. I’m free. What’s up.”
“Great,” I say. “Because I might need your help with…” I slide my hand inside my sport coat and remove five tickets to Buenos Aires… “these,” I say.
“Oh wow!” Lucy says grabbing them away from Larry and looking at the names on them.
“Please tell me we’re going to—“
“Tango? You know the saying, but we’re changing it.”
“Come again?” she says.
“Now it goes like this.” I pause raising my open hand to show all my fingers. “It takes five to tango.”
“Woo-hoo!” she says. “I’ve always wanted to try that dance!”
“And try playing polo,” Larry says and I remember his favorite animal in the world is the horse.
“And maybe even some Malbec,” I say.
“All of it! We’re going to try everything,” Lucy says.
“Including the boat to Montevideo and then a private driver to Punta del Este,” I say.
“Punta del what?” Larry asks.
“The South American Riviera that…isn’t widely known by Americans,” I joke. “Better brush up on your Spanish. It’s not the most gringo accommodating spot, which is why we’re going.”
“Off the beaten path. I love it!” Lucy says.
Nastya claps her hands together furiously for no apparent reason and then starts laughing uncontrollably.
“Apparently she likes it too,” I say.
“Mommy! Love!” Nastya says and the row of people in front of us turn around and admire our beautiful baby.
“She’s so pretty,” a lady in front of us says as she squeezes the hand of the man next to her.
“I highly recommend it,” I say. My gaze switches from her to her husband. “Children will make your life so much better in ways you couldn’t even imagine. Just when you think being a couple is perfect you’ll see how much better it is to add one of your very own…or two.”
The woman looks at her man. “Oh honey.”
They stand up and quickly shuffle towards the exits.
“I guess they took your advice,” Lucy says in-between laughs.
“I just hope my wife takes mine,” I say.
“And can we ask what that might be?” Larry says.
“My advice, if I can say it like that, was that if life was so much fun as a family of…five,” I say making sure to include grandma and grandpa, “then just imagine how much fun it would be with a perfect ten!”
“Ten! Oh heavens,” Lucy says.
“Heaven is right!” I say. “Ten would be heaven.”
And I’m not going to quit trying to convince my woman until we get there.
She’s the most incredible woman I know and I know she can balance being a career woman with a family, and if the family cuts into her career just a little too much then she always knows that daddy-o’s at home all retired and all he wants to do is enjoy his life with his family.
Every minute of every day.
Forever.
EXTENDED EPILOGUE
Anastasia
Ten more years later
“We did it, honey,” he says wrapping me up in a hug.
“We sure did,” I say.
“Okay, you did it. But I was here for support every step of the way right?”
“Right,” I say hugging him back. “I was just kidding anyways” he says.
I pause. “Do you still love me?” I ask.
“Of course! What are you talking about?”
“This is my sixth childbirth now Maddox. My body has been through a lot. I can’t look as beautiful as when we first met. Plus all those late nights at the office, and—“
His finger comes up to my lips. “Shhhh. You’re talking nonsense right now. You look amazing as always, better even in some ways.”
“Now I know you’re lying.”
“Never. You know why you’re looking even better than the best. You know you are the best looking woman in the world, right?”
“I’m not so sure about that, but no…why am I looking even better?” I ask wondering how he’s going to answer this one.
“Because this beautiful woman right here,” he begins tapping me on the nose, “with this sexy body right here,” he says patting me on the stomach, “has given me six amazing children and we’ve hit our original goal of ten in the family.”
“Our goal?” I ask, but wow, do his words ever make me feel better.
“Okay, my goal, but you never protested…much.”
“Apparently you didn’t hear me in that hospital last week,” I joke…sort of. The last one was the longest and I’m glad it’s our last…although I’m never sure with the way he can’t keep his hands off me.
“I did and that’s why we all chipped in.”
“You all chipped in for what?”
“Well we knew you were working hard helping all of us by giving us another beautiful member to our family and we wanted to thank you with this,” he says handing me an envelope.
“What coul
d this be?” I say playfully getting excited.
I carefully open the envelope knowing I’m going to put it in my box of things I save. My memento box that I look at once every month or so remembering and cherishing our lives together.
Coached by the MMA Fighter_An Older Man Younger Woman Romance Page 5