Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
FALLON
I’m trying to punch myself into a version that won’t destroy her.
The bag swings back. I pivot, throw combinations.
The impact sounds are loud enough to anger my neighbors but I don’t care.
The physical repetition doesn’t help. Nothing helps.
My body’s demanding something my principles forbid and I’m running on fumes and discipline and the fading theory that I can want something and not have it.
The fading theory that I can want something and not become my father.
The fading theory that I’m not my father.
Except I’m becoming increasingly unsure I’m right about that.
By 10 AM, I’m meeting with Ty to review footage from the morning’s training session. He can see it written all over my face. The lack of sleep. The exhaustion that goes deeper than physical tiredness.
“Fallon,” he says, not even looking at the tablet. “Whatever this is?—”
“Don’t.”
“She’s in your gym.”
“I’m aware.”
“You’re her coach.”
“I’m aware of that too.” My voice comes out sharper than intended. “So unless you have something constructive to say about how to fix a power differential that might not be as fixed as I think it is, I suggest you keep watching the footage.”
Ty sits back. He doesn’t apologize because we don’t do that in this family.
But he stops pushing. He knows when I’m at the edge of something I can’t control.
He’s spent his whole life watching me control things.
Watching me quantify and measure and systematize everything in my life so that it conforms to the architecture I’ve built.
By noon, I’m second-guessing everything.
The power differential. The fact that I’m still her coach.
The ghost of my father in my decisions. Whispering in my ear that I’m choosing to repeat his pattern.
That wanting her means I’m becoming him.
The voice sounds like him. The doubt sounds like his justification disguised as my conscience.
The rationalization of a man who convinced himself that his desires were legitimate because he was the person in power.
Because he’d earned the right to take what he wanted.
I can hear him in my own head. This is the terrifying part.
Not that I’m becoming him. I already know I’m not.
But that I understand exactly how he thought.
Exactly how he rationalized it. The calculation that power difference is just a fact of professional relationships.
The argument that consent is irrelevant when mutual desire exists.
The insidious logic that says: she wants this too, so isn’t the power differential beside the point?
By 4 PM, I’m cooking anyway.
I make his favorite dinner because I’ve been paying attention for six months.
The observation is something I do without thinking.
I notice things about people. Their patterns.
Their preferences. The specific way Bailey orders his coffee at the café next to the gym.
The specific way he stretches his shoulders on Mondays after lifting.
The way his breathing shifts when he moves into grappling.
Grilled salmon. Brussels sprouts roasted with garlic.
Rice pilaf made with actual stock instead of water.
Nothing fancy. It’s intimacy I’ve been resisting.
The kind of intimacy that says: I know what you like.
I’ve been watching. I’ve been thinking about this.
For six months, I’ve been thinking about this.
The cooking takes two hours. The precision of it calms something in my nervous system.
The measured movements. The counting. The specificity of temperature and time.
Salmon at 400 degrees for exactly twelve minutes.
Brussels sprouts turn golden at the right moment.
Rice cooks for exactly eighteen minutes.
By 7 PM, the apartment smells like food and garlic and the particular scent of someone who’s prepared something that matters.
The table is set. The wine is breathing.
I stand in my own apartment and understand that I’m performing ceremony.
I’m preparing a ritual. I’m creating the conditions for something that’s going to change everything.
At 7:56 PM, the knock comes. Four minutes early, like he did at the parking lot in Vegas. His precision. His respect for time. His understanding that early is better than late.
I open the door and he’s there. Bailey. Standing in my doorway in dark jeans and a soft sweater and the knowledge that everything between us is about to become real.
“Hi,” he says.
“Hi,” I respond.
But he comes up the stairs instead. This time he’s coming to my apartment, my space, the place where I sleep and exist without an audience. The place where I hit the heavy bag at 2 AM. The place where I lie awake thinking about him. The place where I’m most myself.
I let him in and the door closes behind him and we’re suddenly in a small space that’s about to get smaller. The apartment is maybe 600 square feet. The bedroom is visible from the kitchen. The living room is visible from everywhere. There’s nowhere to hide here.
“I made dinner,” I say.
“I know you did,” Bailey says. “I can smell it.”
He takes off his shoes. He’s comfortable here already. Or he’s pretending to be comfortable. I’m not sure which. The distinction matters.
We eat at my kitchen table and the whole thing feels impossibly domestic.
He tells me about his week. Apex’s pressure campaign intensifying.
Jake’s presence steadying something in him that had started to fracture.
The way his brother’s strength is changing his ability to stay.
I tell him about coaching. About the specific technical adjustments I’m making.
About how his footwork has improved twelve percent since he started training with me.
I measure. I quantify. Numbers become armor.
“Your footwork has the precision of someone who spent years training against larger opponents,” I say. “The economy of movement. The understanding that you can’t waste energy. It’s changed the way you fight.”
“You taught me that,” Bailey says.
“I taught you technique. You learned how to survive.”
We talk around the reason he’s here, until the food is gone and there’s nothing left between us but the truth.
The thing that’s been building since the parking lot.
The thing that’s been accelerating through every training session.
The knowledge that we’re about to cross into territory that we can’t map our way back from.
“I need to tell you something,” I say.
Bailey sets his fork down and waits. This is one of the things I respect about him. He doesn’t fill silence. He understands that some things need space. He understands that vulnerability requires room to breathe.
“My father was a coach. At a mid-level MMA gym in San Diego. He had a fighter named Carmen Reyes. She was twenty. I was fifteen. He had power over her—financial power, professional power, the kind of authority that made it so she couldn’t say no to him.”
The words come out stilted because they’re not words I’ve spoken aloud since I was nineteen and had that conversation with my therapist that I then stopped seeing because I couldn’t stand the way it felt to articulate it.
The words feel dangerous. Once said, they can’t be unsaid.
Once the story is told, you can’t pretend you don’t know it.
“He coerced her. Into sex. Into a relationship. He told her that if she quit the gym, he’d blacklist her in the circuit. That she’d never fight again. That no gym would take her. That she’d be finished.”
Bailey’s watching me and there’s no judgment in his face, just absolute attention. The attention of someone who understands that this is hard. That this matters. The attention of someone who’s also learned what it means to be trapped by institutions and people in positions of authority.
“She left anyway. Walked away. But the damage was done. She stopped fighting. She stopped training. My father destroyed her life because he had power and he wanted to use it. Because he convinced himself that his authority made his desires legitimate. Because the gym was a place where his authority was absolute. Where no one could question him. Where a twenty-year-old girl couldn’t say no without losing everything. ”
The apartment is quiet. I can hear the refrigerator humming. I can hear the distant sound of traffic outside. I can hear Bailey breathing.
“You’re not him,” Bailey says.
“I have power over you. As your coach. I have authority. I control which techniques we drill. I control how long we train. I control whether I’m in the gym alone with you. I control the whole structure.”
“You do. But you’re not using it. You’re terrified of using it.
There’s a difference between being afraid of repeating a pattern and actually repeating it.
Your father wasn’t afraid. He wanted what he wanted and he took it.
You want what you want and you’re still asking permission.
You’re still checking. You’re still doubting. ”
I stand up because I can’t sit still for this conversation. I need movement. I need my body to process what my mind is trying to articulate. I need to move through the space and not suffocate. I walk to the kitchen and start clearing the dishes even though the conversation isn’t over.
“Your father exploited power differentials,” Bailey continues from the table. “He weaponized them. He used them deliberately. You’re terrified of exploiting them. That’s not the same thing. That’s the opposite.”
“What if I hurt you?” I ask, running water over the plates. “What if this is just me rationalizing what I want the way he rationalized what he wanted?”