Epilogue
Brooke
The sun is warm on my face as Dara and I walk down Fifth Avenue, both of us still riding the high of the meeting we just left.
We’d managed to get full budget approval for the investigative series in under twenty minutes, unheard of for a project this size.
The kind of win that calls for champagne, or at the very least a celebratory text thread that will last well into the evening.
Dara catches my eye, laughing and shaking her head as we weave through the crowd of tourists and businesspeople and dog walkers, and I smile right back.
Shortly after I’d been promoted to Senior Editor, they’d offered Dara the role of head of investigative journalism.
Originally it would have meant stepping back from her own writing completely to oversee the department, which she promptly declined.
She told them they would increase her pay, she would do the managing, and she would keep writing her own pieces too. Non-negotiable.
Since Dara is the equivalent of ten normal people, they agreed to whatever terms she wanted. As they should.
“Did you see Richardson’s face when you pulled up the engagement numbers?” Dara says, shaking her head as she dodges a woman with a stroller. “I thought the man was going to fall out of his chair.”
“It helps when the work speaks for itself,” I say, still smiling from the way the whole room had shifted when we’d laid out the scope of what we wanted to do.
“The crew we’ve put together is incredible.
They’re the ones who made that pitch easy.
Plus you and I make a damn good team. Between the two of us, we’ve got all the bases covered. ”
“Damn right we do,” she says, bumping her shoulder against mine. “Speaking of bases, we still on for Saturday? Jay’s been asking when we’re going to have you guys over again. I think he’s already planning the menu.”
“We’re on,” I say, laughing. “Dom’s already cleared his schedule. He’s been talking about it all week.”
“I never would have thought they’d become such fast friends,” Dara says, rolling her eyes affectionately. “My sweet nerdy husband and your intense boxing coach boyfriend. Who would have thought? Thick as thieves, those two.”
“I know,” I say, shaking my head. “It’s deeply weird and I love it.”
We walk another half block, the late afternoon light catching the windows of the buildings around us and turning everything golden. Spring in New York is its own kind of magic, the city shaking off the gray of winter and coming alive again.
“Alright,” Dara says as we approach the corner where she needs to turn off. “This is me. Jay and I have reservations at that new Thai place in the Village, and he’ll pout for a week if I’m late.”
“Go,” I say, pulling her into a hug. “Love you. Text me later about Saturday.”
“Love you too, babe,” she says, squeezing me tight before pulling back. She points a finger at me with mock seriousness. “Tell Dom I said hi. And have fun with your parents tonight. Give them my love.”
“I will,” I say, and I watch her disappear into the crowd, her bright red coat visible for another half block before she turns a corner and is gone.
Fifteen years of friendship, from junior reporters sharing a cramped desk to running an entire editorial division together. Some things just get better with time.
My phone buzzes and I pull it out to find a text from my mom, along with a photo that makes me stop right there on the sidewalk.
It’s a selfie of my parents in the stadium seats, both of them wearing matching Yankees caps and matching grins.
My dad has mustard on his chin and my mom is holding up two fingers behind his head like bunny ears, both of them looking so purely happy that it makes my chest ache in the best way.
The bright green field stretches out behind them, perfect and pristine under the afternoon sun.
Mom: We’re here! Your father has already had two hot dogs and I’ve had one. We decided to get here early to soak in the atmosphere. Text me when you guys are on your way!
I smile and type back a response.
Me: That photo is adorable. Dad has mustard on his chin by the way. I’m about to be at Dom’s gym now, then we’ll head your way. Save me some peanuts.
Mom: Will do! Dad says to tell Dominic the Mets are going to crush it tonight. And I agree. We’ve been studying the roster.
Me: Of course you have. I’ll pass the message along. Love you both. See you soon.
I tuck my phone away and keep walking, turning onto the block where the gym is. Even after all these months, the sight of it still makes me pause for a second to take it in.
The old Kowalski’s sign is still there, preserved and restored like the artifact it is, the faded lettering now visible again after decades of neglect. But beneath it, in clean black lettering, reads MIDNIGHT BOXING NYC. Old and new, history and future, everything Dominic wanted this place to be.
The windows that were boarded up and broken the night he first brought me here are gleaming now, catching the late afternoon light.
The brick facade has been restored to its original deep red, the whole building transformed into something that honors what it was while becoming something entirely new.
Hank Midnight would be proud of what his son has built here. I know it in my bones.
I push through the front door and the sounds of the gym wash over me like a familiar song.
The rhythmic thud of gloves hitting leather, the squeak of shoes pivoting on the mat, trainers calling out combinations, the skip of a jump rope somewhere in the corner, the grunt of effort from a sparring session in one of the rings.
The space is incredible, with exposed brick and polished concrete floors, state-of-the-art equipment arranged in careful stations throughout the room.
But it’s the vintage touches that make it special, the details that nod to the building’s history.
Old black-and-white photos line one wall, fighters from decades past frozen in their prime, and among them hangs the one of Hank that Dominic and I found the night we broke in here.
Now professionally framed, it sits in a place of honor near the front desk.
His father, young and hungry, fists raised, jaw set with determination. The man who started it all.
The place is packed, which has become normal.
Word spread fast after Roman’s title defense, and now there’s a waiting list of fighters hoping to train here.
Dominic’s had to turn people away, something he never imagined he’d have to do back when he was rebuilding his reputation one client at a time in Dark River.
I spot him in the far corner, standing at the edge of one of the rings, and my breath catches the way it always does when I see him after being apart. He’s watching Roman work with a young welterweight, both of them focused on the fighter’s footwork as she moves through a combination.
Roman moved out here a few months after Dom opened the gym, because he wanted to be where his coach was, and watching them together now I can see how right that decision was.
They’ve built something special here. Three fighters in serious title contention, with more coming up behind them every month.
Another fighter stands nearby, a heavyweight from Detroit who just signed with Dominic last month.
He’s leaning against the ropes, watching the session with the kind of hungry focus I’ve come to recognize in the people who train here.
They all have it. That drive. That desperation to be better than they were yesterday.
Dominic has a gift for finding them, the ones who have the fire but just need someone to believe in them.
Dominic is talking with his hands the way he always does when he’s explaining technique, demonstrating some kind of defensive movement while Roman nods along.
He’s wearing a black t-shirt that stretches across his shoulders.
His hair is a little longer than he usually keeps it, curling slightly at the nape of his neck, and I make a mental note to tell him not to cut it.
I like it like this. I like everything about him like this, in his element, doing what he was born to do.
Then he looks up and sees me standing just inside the doorway.
His whole face changes. That smile, the one that’s just for me, spreads across his features and softens everything about him.
The intensity melts away and something warmer takes its place.
He says something to Roman, claps him on the shoulder, and then he’s crossing the gym toward me, weaving through equipment and fighters with the easy confidence he carries everywhere he goes.
“Hey, you,” he says when he reaches me, his hand finding my waist and pulling me close.
“Hey yourself,” I say, tilting my face up toward his.
He kisses me, slow and thorough, right there in the middle of his gym with fighters and trainers all around us. When he pulls back, his forehead rests against mine and I can feel his breath warm on my lips.
“Missed you today,” he murmurs.
“You saw me this morning,” I say.
“Too long ago,” he says, and kisses me again, softer this time, lingering.
I laugh and pull back just enough to look at him properly. “My dad says the Mets are going to crush it tonight. His words. They’ve already arrived early to scope everything out.”
“Of course they have,” he says. “Your parents don’t do anything halfway. I love that about them.”
“They love you too,” I say, and it’s true.
My dad had been skeptical at first, the way dads are supposed to be, but somewhere around the third time Dominic visited them in Dark River and spent an entire afternoon helping him fix up his boat, that skepticism had turned into something closer to adoration. My mom had been won over even faster.
“Come on,” he says, stepping back but keeping hold of my hand. “Let me grab my jacket and we can head out. I’ve been looking forward to this all day.”
I watch him jog toward his office in the back, and I let myself take in the gym one more time.
This place that started as a dream he shared with me in the dark, standing in the dust and the silence of an abandoned building.
Now it’s alive with sound and movement and purpose, full of people chasing their own impossible things because he gave them a place to do it.
We’ve figured out a rhythm that works, Dom and me.
His place in Dark River, my place in New York, and we move between them like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
A few weeks here, a few weeks there, and somewhere along the way it stopped feeling like long distance and started feeling like home.
Both places. Both lives. My parents visit more now too, any excuse to catch a game, and I’ve spent more time with them in the past six months than I did in the decade before.
I didn’t realize how much I’d missed them until I finally let myself slow down enough to notice.
Dominic comes back with his jacket over his arm, his keys in his hand, and that look on his face that still makes my heart skip.
“Ready?” he asks, reaching for my hand again.
“Ready,” I say.
He laces his fingers through mine and we walk out together, into the warm evening, toward the subway that will take us to the stadium where my parents are waiting with mustard on their chins and matching Mets caps.
The city hums around us, alive and loud and full of possibility, and I lean into him as we walk.
I’m happier than I ever thought I could be.
And this is just the beginning.
—The End—
If you enjoyed Until the Stars Fall, check out the entire Midnight Men series, and please flip the page for a note from Nate.