Chapter 1 The Job #7
I don’t want to tell him—not because words like stumps and blisters and sweat are too gross for him to handle, but because the whole thing is proof that I’m not like the rest of them.
I’m not like him.
“Oh, that…” I clear my throat, forking a hand through my hair. “I was fine. I was just… avoiding someone.”
Bruiser nods slowly, like he doesn’t trust me as far as he can throw me. Or maybe that’s an inappropriate metaphor in this case, because he could probably throw me across a football field.
“Leia Cooper?” he guesses.
“Yeah. You probably noticed how she kept trying to pair up with me.”
Bruiser nods. “Try not to encourage any favoritism, kid. It’ll get you in more hot water than you can handle.”
“Hey, I’m not the one who’s—” I freeze mid-sentence when my boss cuts me a stern glance as if to say, You’d better stop there. It’s a look that makes me feel three inches tall.
“We’ve got a six and seven tomorrow,” he says, glancing at the class schedule on his desk. “The first class will be the usual, but for the second I want to go heavy into sparring. So if you’d rather sit that one out, I understand.”
I cross my arms over my chest, irritation prickling at the back of my neck. “Why? Were you not happy with my sparring tonight?”
“Tomorrow we’ll be going harder. We’ll be in the ring.” Bruiser slides his gaze to me, that stone-cold brow unflinching. “I’m just giving you a heads-up. Making sure you know what you’re getting into.”
Would you be giving me a heads-up if I didn’t have a disability?
That’s what I want to say. But there’s no need to ask a question I already know the answer to.
“I’ve been in plenty of fights,” I say, my voice flexing with confidence. “Without boxing gloves. Without headgear or a ref to break things up if it gets too ugly.”
Bruiser cocks his head to the side and shrugs. “It’s your choice, kid.”
But it’s not my choice. I can tell by the look in his eyes, the tone of his voice. He doesn’t want me to come tomorrow. He doesn’t want to push me, punish me, cause me pain. All because of my stupid legs.
What’s gotten into you? I want to yell. That first day, Bruiser was as tough as a drill sergeant—even after he knew I was an amputee, he put me to the test. He pushed me to the breaking point and watched me bleed, sweat, and grit my teeth through the pain. He didn’t care.
What the hell has changed?
All throughout this trial week, he’s gone softer and softer on me.
Encouraging me to go home early, take a break, sit this one out, etc.
Does he think I’m stupid? Does he think I don’t know why he’s suddenly being so nice to me?
I’ve had plenty of people give me the easy treatment before.
I’ve had plenty of people underestimate me. And I hate it.
But anger has a funny chemical reaction in my body. It never makes me want to lash out or start a fight or smash something.
It makes me want to prove a point.
Prove myself.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” I say, and walk out.
If Bruiser thinks he’s doing me a favor by putting me in timeout, he’s dead wrong. There’s nothing I like better than a challenge.
Outside, it’s the golden hour—Tessa’s favorite time of day. The whole street is lacquered in shades of pink and orange as I make my way towards the spot where I parallel-parked my mom’s car. I toss my gym bag into the backseat, swing the door shut, and boom.
There she is.
Standing on the sidewalk right behind me.
I reel back a step, surprised.
“Sorry,” Leia says with an amused smirk. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”
My mouth runs dry as I stare at her, the car key clutched in my hand. “I… thought you left. With Devon.”
“Oh, he wanted to grab something from the liquor store before we head back.”
I frown, trying to figure out how Devon can be old enough to buy booze at a liquor store. Maybe I miscalculated his age, and he’s actually a twenty-one-year-old with an unfortunate baby face?
Leia sees me trying to puzzle it out and explains, “His dad plays golf with the owner.”
Ah, now it all makes sense. Who needs an ID when you have friends in high places?
Better question: What is Princess Leia doing stalking me and not hanging out with her premature-drinker boyfriend?
“I wanted to catch you before you left,” she begins, stepping closer. It takes all my self-control not to retreat. “About what I said earlier… I hope it didn’t come across sounding petty. I wasn’t hanging out with you because I wanted to spite Devon or something.”
“I understand.” I nod quickly, spinning my keychain, glancing up and down the street, trying to think of the most tactful way to X out of this conversation. “Don’t worry about it. I know you were just trying to train and—”
“I like you, Weston.”
It’s hard to describe the gut reaction that happens when she says those words. Similar to the feeling you might get if someone stopped you on the sidewalk and said, I have a gun. Don’t move.
“What?”
“I said I like you.” Leia smiles sweetly, eerily, taking another step closer. “From the moment I first met you, I felt like there was something special between us.”
The only thing between us is not enough space.
“I don’t like you, Leia,” I blurt out. Plain and simple, just how I prefer hurting girls’ feelings. It’s the only way to send a clear message. “There’s nothing between us, okay? I have a girlfriend.”
“So?” She hums a smoky laugh under her breath, drawing even closer. Warning alarms start firing off in my brain, like a car’s backup camera when you get too close to running over your neighbor’s dog. “You have a girlfriend. I have a boyfriend. That doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun together.”
Dear God, she’s touching me now. She has her hand on my chest, but I can’t move. It’s like my feet are cemented to the sidewalk.
At last, I croak, “I… don’t want to have fun.”
And that’s when she grabs my neck, pulls me down to her level, and kisses me. My knee-jerk reaction is to lurch backwards and get away from her—these are not Tessa’s lips, and they do not belong on mine.
But then her tongue is in my mouth.
My keys slip out of my hand and crash to the cement.
I jolt away from Leia, breaking the kiss. My heart is hammering, and my face is blazing hot. I want to undo what just happened.
“I told you I don’t like you,” I bite out, trying to lay down the law once and for all. But my voice is shaky, cracking like I’m on the cusp of puberty.
Leia only grins and quirks one eyebrow. “Your girlfriend doesn’t kiss you like that, does she? Hm. What a shame.”
I clench my jaw, bending to snatch my fallen keys. “It’s none of your damn business how my girlfriend kisses me. I don’t know what kind of game you’re playing, but I’m not gonna be a part of it. So just… knock it off.”
With that, I unfreeze my feet from the sidewalk and storm around the car, diving into the driver’s seat and locking all the doors in case she’s crazy enough to jump in with me.
By the time I pull out onto the street, she’s just a smudge in the rearview mirror—walking back towards the liquor store.
I’m still reeling, as if I just had a near-death experience. My heart is racing, and my mouth tastes like peppermint even though I haven’t been chewing gum.
She was.
I lean into the gas, driving away as fast as legally possible.
A few minutes later, I’m in Tessa’s driveway, texting her to ask if she’s around and if she would come out on the porch for a minute. She messages me back with “Be right out!!” and even has time to send me a heart emoji with it.
I’m sitting on the porch steps when she swings open the front door. “Wes! I didn’t think I’d be seeing you tonight. Did you just get out of work?”
“Yeah. Sorry I’m sweaty and gross. I just had to see you.”
Call it guilt. Call it absolution. Call it the kissing equivalent of washing your mouth out with soap.
Sometimes a guy’s gotta do what a guy’s gotta do.
I pat the step beside me and say, “Can you sit down for a minute?”
Tessa sweeps over in her pretty little sundress and plops down next to me. She doesn’t even need to be asked or prompted—she just leans in and kisses me softly on the lips.
It’s perfect.
Tessa draws back to look at me in the faded pink light of sunset. “Something’s wrong.”
My heart backflips into my stomach. “What?”
Dear God, does she know? Can she taste a foreign woman on my lips?
“You just seem like something’s bothering you.” Tessa looks down, taking my hand in hers. Brushing her silky-soft thumb over my rough, split knuckles. “Ever since you started that job, you seem… I don’t know. Stressed out. Do you want to talk about it?”
“About what?”
“Work. Whatever is happening at that boxing gym every night.”
I look down at the cracks in the wood. There are a thousand things I could tell her—about Leia, about Devon, about Bruiser, about the way I keep running into this wall of self-doubt, afraid to speak my mind, afraid of what might happen if I don’t.
Some part of me wants to tell her all of it. Cut open my chest and let her see the mess I’m keeping locked up inside.
Maybe I would feel better if I just let it all out.
But sitting here with Tessa, who looks so beautiful in the hazy, rose-tinted light, I don’t want to think about what happens at that boxing gym. I just want to sit beside her. Feel her in my arms. Listen to her breathe. Be overwhelmed by the fact that she loves me.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” I whisper, squeezing her hand. “Why don’t you tell me about your day instead?”
She smiles and gives an easy shrug. “My day was… inconsequential.”
“I have no idea what that word means.”
“It means—”
I kiss her again, rudely interrupting the Merriam-Webster definition that she was about to rattle off, which would probably make me feel like I have the reading comprehension of a third grader.