“We are going to have to do a blood test or a sonogram to find that out.”
“And you are sure?” I asked, reaching out for any glimmer of hope that they could be mistaken.
“Over ninety nine percent.” the words hit my heart like a dagger. It was a nightmare come true. I was pregnant, and the father of the baby was already in prison, and facing more charges.
“Do you need a minute?” he asked, sensing my panic.
“Please.” I wasn't even sure who to call first. When he left the room I sat and stared into the corner of the all white room.
One minute I was on top of the world, the next my world was upside down. My mind raced to a picture of me with a three year old child, one who had never met his father. I knew exactly how far along I was, it was easy to trace because we only had sex the one night. It had been three months. I cleared my throat, and took hold of my composure. I needed to ask Doctor Snow a few questions before leaving. He came back in and we did a few more tests, and then I was allowed to leave.
I drove carefully home, and locked myself in my apartment. I needed time alone to think.
Seventeen - Cage
It was a different judge from before, and a different court. The same stuffy, I do not belong here feel. I didn't trust the situation, and knew that I was fucked. There were some big things working in our favor, but Victor warned that they weren't going to let me off the hook entirely after what I did to one of their own.
The guard whose bitch little ass I beat was wearing a sling in the front row, and his face was freshly bruised from when it had attacked my fists. The truth is that he was one man, an untrained one. I could have held him down easily and not done any damage, but I had decided to use him to make a point. Do not fuck with me. It went too far, and everyone was going to see plain as day what took place in my cell that night, including me finishing a kimura lock to destroy the officer's shoulder for life.
The whole thing boiled down to two factors. One, the guard being an asshole. Two, my being a grenade with a trigger available to be pulled. When officer Porky made his way into my cell alone, holding only a bobby stick, I knew there might be trouble. He looked like the kind of guy who probably played a lot of video games in his mother's basement.
“Cage Edwards. Former champion, current cellmate number 5400201. A loser.” he said, dragging his weapon of choice along the bars to rattle me. I knew more than he ever could what little a threat he was to me, even with the stick. The untrained don't understand what swimming with a shark is until it's too late.
“How we doin' officer?” I asked, choosing friendly for a change. Doing my time is all that I was there for, and I was laying down on my bed.
“I'm doing great. I have my freedom. Get up when I'm talking to you!” he kicked the bed and filled with intensity. “I said get up!” he slammed the club against the bars, making a big scene to try and scare me. The typical show put on by one who can't throw a punch to save his life. I knew right away the type I was dealing with.
“Okay, okay. Give me a second.” I leaned up slowly, holding up my hands to signify that I came in peace. Luckily there was clear footage that showed this. “What's this about?” I asked. It was late, the wee hours of the morning, and there had never been anyone show up in my cell at that hour before.
“Shut your fucking mouth prisoner.” he barked, getting in my face. It was adorable because he had to look up about four inches to see my eyes. I don't know what he was thinking. “Do you know what I can do to you?” he was deadly serious, and death stared me to prove it.
“Bah! Ha ha ha!” I burst out laughing. Obnoxious even for me, but I couldn't help it. A doughy little turd had seriously threatened me with bodily harm.
Boom! The moment of impact was surreal. I didn't react until a second later. That little fucker hit me in the side of the leg with his stick, almost knocked me down. My eyes went wide, and he froze staring back at me. The pain was getting worse but it wasn't anything I couldn't handle. He tried to swing again, this time getting no further than the back swing.
I was in a rage, and couldn't remember precisely how I dispatched him until I was watching there in court with everyone else. It reminded me of watching my first amateur fights, when I mowed through the opponents with absolutely no resistance. It started with a hip toss. We landed hard with me on top, and two elbows quickly followed. He turned away when I followed with another punch, an attempt to escape, but I had already transitioned to the kimura grip and was running on instinct. I am used to opponents knowing what to do in each position because I compete with the best in the world, so I didn't realize how far ahead of him that I was until it was too late. I wrung his shoulder joint like a wet wash rag, and could feel his joint explode like a bomb. The hollow crack and tear of God knows how many ligaments, I remember that it felt good to break it. Showing someone the truth of physical reality is one of my favorite things about fighting.
“Ahhh! Oh my God! Please don't kill me. Help!” he screamed, writhing around in pain on the floor holding his shoulder. I stood over him with my hands up, ready for the worst. His blue crew goons would come needle dicking their way into my cell all huddled up together ready to beat me down.
But no one came. I waited a moment, and then had a seat on the edge of my bed. I was going to need my lawyer. “Fuck, it hurts so bad.” he was actually crying, and tears were streaming down the sides of his cheeks. I actually felt bad even though fuck him. I wouldn't wish that pain on anyone in the world, but actions have consequences. I laid back, put my hands behind my head, and waited for mine. My knee was throbbing but I ignored it.
It turned out there was a reason for the lack of backup. Porky wasn't even on duty that night, let alone authorized to be in that area. Quite literally, a douche bag on a power trip. That all bode very well for me, so did the list of prior prisoner complaints against him.
What didn't make me look good was my image. People expected it from me, and there I was affirming their false notions. The video of the guard flying through the air, being so helpless and trying to escape, only to have his arm ripped from its socket made me look scary to regular people. I understood that. That's why I have Victor.
“You shouldn’t have left him there to pass out.” Victor whispered. Everyone in the room was transfixed on the video, the multiple angles. The guy was in so much pain that he went in and out of consciousness while I laid there. There wasn't anything I could do to help him, I'm no surgeon.
It was another ten or fifteen minutes of the guard passing out and waking back up before anyone realized he was in there. They pulled him out of my cell and put the cuffs on me. That lead us to court, and them trying to figure out what had happened. In the meantime the guy had already undergone two shoulder surgeries, and they weren’t sure if he would ever regain the full use of his arm.
“I was stressed out. I really don’t know why I went in there except that I really wanted to meet Cage Edwards.” the guard lied through his teeth, and tried to play the victim card.
“Is there a reason you entered the cell carrying a weapon?” Victor asked.
“Look what happened. I knew that he was a loose cannon.” he said, trying to put it all on me. He had been coached, but the video didn’t lie.
“Even though you stuck him first? When you were not even authorized to be in the building that night. Is that correct?”
“It is.” he said.
Two days went by of sitting in court all day. They reviewed the evidence and Victor argued against everything that they came up with. The assaulting an officer felony charge was reduced to a regular assault charge. They found me guilty and added more time to my stay, putting the total at nine months.
I didn’t even know what people were saying about me on the outside, didn’t want to. Back to my cell, rotting away one day at a time. It gave me a lot of time to think, to play things over in my head.
Once I settled down and accepted my situation, my thoughts moved to Angela. I wondered what she wa
s up to, if she was seeing anyone. The last time I saw her was when she came to visit. She had to hear about what happened, about my sentence being extended. If there were any glimmering hope, I assumed it was dead after that. That one night with her in my bed would have to last me nine months to life.
There were other things burning me up inside. That I wasn’t a free man. That I allowed others to dictate my path. Chase would turn eighteen without me, might even have his first pro fight before I got out. Made me want to hulk smash my way out of the cell, right through the bars. I had to sit and focus on my breath instead, and get through days full of being treated like cattle with the other idiots.
You come to a lot of realizations sitting in a cell. It doesn’t take long. There will always be another side to the story, something to put the blame on if you want to. The situation wouldn’t have arisen if that weren’t the case. You have to see both sides for what they are, without biasing yourself emotionally, and then take responsibility for your part. I am the one who punched the glass into homeboy’s face, walking away was an option. Or a hard knee to the groin would have been less messy. The point being there is more than one answer, and using anger to choose the most destructive one is rarely a wise choice. How different would things have been had I only subdued the guard after tossing him, instead of annihilating him and forcing them to keep me locked up for longer. If I wanted to really be in full control of my life, I had to be in control of myself and my surroundings. Lesson learned. The time had come for me to start making decisions that were in my best interest long term.
There wasn’t enough stimulus in there to keep me sane. More on edge than at any other point in my life. I had just made it, the struggle was supposed to be over. There was nothing to do that would distract me from my own mind. There was time to lift weights, and my little cell had space enough for me to shadow box in and do pushups. That only takes you so far. Stupid shit you did and what it cost you creeps back in. Finally found me a girl I could vibe with, someone to call mine. Blew it and then some.
Angela was rare to me. Someone I could be myself around, who could handle my personality, and laugh me off. She was one I desired possessively. Automatically. The girl trained MMA for the love of God. Listing reasons I needed her is something I could do all day, and sometimes did while waiting to get out of there. There was some undeniable it that I couldn’t shake. My motto was if you want something, go get it. With nothing but time, I started to write letters. Mostly to Angela, but some to others. Chase, coach. I remembered the city she lived in but not the address, so I sent them to the post office.
Her cell rang twice when I called to tell her, and then clicked over to voice mail.
“Hey, ugh, it’s Cage. Been thinkin’ a lot in here, wrote you a couple letters. I know you are mad and shit, but they’re at the post office. So pick em up. Sorry for bein’ a dick, I appreciate you coming in here to see me. Not a lot of people have. Anyway, five more months.”
Eighteen - Angela
Pregnancy changed everything. My priorities now centered around a little person who didn't quite exist yet, and who would be entirely dependent on me. No more drinking, or being involved with dangerous boys like Cage who would be nothing other than a bad influence.
With every day that passed I grew stronger, more able to handle my new responsibilities. Days were about work, and adding content to the site. The money was rolling in, and for once in my life I was financially stable. Nights were when I read, and learned about babies and developing adolescent brains. Every article that I read, each organic meal that I choked down for my little someone made me fall deeper in love. It was my job, and mine only to protect and take care of my child.
Cage was tuned out of my mind. There was no other way for me to deal with it. He came out of nowhere into my life, teased my heart and owned my body, and then left me behind to fend for myself with a baby. Not that he was aware of that part. Some of life's challenges aren't meant to be tackled alone, but that doesn't mean they can't be. As much as I hoped the best for Cage and his future, I couldn't let him in mine. For my sake, and for the sake of the baby. I made the decision not to tell him, and tried to block it out after that.
Something like a month after I got the news about being pregnant, a call from the state prison came through to my cellphone. I was home in front of the computer, typing away alone. After the second ring I pressed ignore. It was a fine metaphor. With five months to prepare for the arrival of my first child, there was no time to waste. The tip of my finger tapping against the number seven on my touchscreen erased the voicemail so I didn't have to hear his voice. I didn't want to. The call made me think of him, and even though I was mad, imagine his smile. A quick reminder of the day I mistook him as the one, and how quickly he showed the truth.
Doing things alone empowered me. Approaching it any other way would have been disaster. Living for two leaves little time for weakness, so it was full speed ahead. With my income increasing every month, I could take care of the little things. The lease on my apartment expired conveniently a few weeks after I was set to give birth, and I had the money to look for a more suitable place. A house. I could buy it or rent, the decision was mine.
After weeks of late night research, and more than a dozen interviews, I hired a nanny. The only male that I interviewed, and my favorite of all the applicants. His name was Brady, and he was fabulous. His accent and expressive personality made him stand out, and he struck me as a good person with a high motor. He would be helping out for a few months after I gave birth, with the baby, with decorating whatever new place I ended up in, etc.
You get kinda used to being pregnant. Some of the changes are subtle, some are hard. You learn about how much your biology controls you. Mood swings, crying, eating binges worse than when I smoked weed. Entire days when I could hardly eat at all. Watching your belly go away, and a new one appear in its place. No longer feeling pretty. Feeling tired instead, or having a clammy forehead. Going to the doctor all the time. Being scared and wondering how you are going to do it. Talking to my mom. Thanking her.
Work became a release, a place to dial in my focus. Bryan and I couldn't believe the site was pulling in thirty and forty thousand a month, but we stayed on it. The bigger the site became, the easier is was to grow it. With recognition comes access, and doing exclusive interviews with TFC contenders became the norm. I was proud of myself although I didn't have much time to think about it. My life's work was paying off, and overnight I was a financially independent woman with a healthy savings account.
At twenty weeks I had the mid pregnancy ultrasound. Yours truly was being blessed with a little baby girl! She had feet, and hands, and a face! It was so real, and tears of joy rolled over my cheeks. The realization of how life changing this little girl was going to be continued to deepen, and there were still sixteen weeks remaining.
They went fast. By the time I was twenty eight weeks I was enormous, and starting to take the house hunt seriously. The site had gotten to the point where we hired an employee, and I started to establish a more realistic and sustainable work balance. Forty hours a week, and no more.
Nineteen - Cage
The first person I had to see when I got out was Chase. He was eighteen, officially a man. Had to keep things extra on the hush because of probation, and probably should have laid off the ganja anyway because of testing, but I owed Chase a birthday blunt. Nothing was going to stop that from going down. My cab driver gave me the eye when he heard me place my order.
The cab dropped me off at my bike. Chase had picked her up, fired her up, and drove her around periodically to keep her running. Made me promise to buy him one for himself in exchange, but that was fine. I owed him, not that I thought for a second I could buy back time.
The real feeling of freedom didn't kick in until my engine roared, and I was tearing down the road.
“Wooh!” I yelled into the wind. The sun was warm and shining, and being on my bike for the first time in so long put butterflies in
to my stomach. No more bars, no more fence around the yard, and no more chow. I found the highway and punched it, bound and determined to see 100 MPH on my speedometer for the first time in a year. “Ha ha!” I nailed it, pushing 105, but backed off because a ticket could mean disaster. Had to try being good for a change.
Chase knew I was getting out but we didn't know what time. I was supposed to call him to come get me but I decided to surprise him with a blunt instead.
“Dude!” he smiled, and ran toward me. My eyes stung with tears, and I bear hugged him to the ground.
“I missed you man. You grew.”
“You too.” he said. We were sitting on the carpet of the living room, catching up when Walker entered the room.
“Cage. You ready to train?” he asked.
“Gonna smoke this first.” I said, reaching into my pocket. “How you been? Hows the gym?” one thing I learned behind bars is that life goes on without you. The same way life is going on in Paris or Afghanistan or wherever right now, it goes on without you. It was good to be back, participating in the game of free society once more. There was so much to catch up on, to consider.
“The gym is steady. You know how it is. The fight team is strong and we get the other randoms in. The lights are still on.” Walker was still Walker, and that gave me a sense of comfort. I was still there, he was still there, nothing had really changed. A year had passed, that was all. We could still be the best in the world, bring back an epidemic of violence to the ring.
“I'm gonna take a couple weeks. You know, drink some, think some, all that.” I said, letting him know I wasn't looking to hop right back into training. Coach knew how to handle me, to give me space. He nodded.
“All that time in there and you didn't have time to think?” he asked, being a smart ass. “No, I know what you mean. Re-charge. Let me know when it's go time. We gotta get our title back.”
Scrapper: MMA Badboy Romance Page 12