4. Hunter
4
HUNTER
Now
“ H e bit my fucking nipple, Hunter!”
Mallory Kent’s inappropriate declaration is punctuated by the sound of her taped and gloved fists colliding with the pads in my hand. She packs a hell of a punch, but there’s not enough force behind it to make me move. When she realizes that, she spins and hits me with a roundhouse kick I’ll happily take if it means that she’s less likely to lose it on her son, Eric, who’s apparently a little too enthusiastic about breastfeeding.
“Do three-month-olds even have teeth?” I ask, swinging the pads down so they absorb the brunt of the kick. There was a point in time when Mallory and I would train, and the only words I’d speak would be directives and critiques, but somehow—probably because of that one time years ago when I agreed to an impromptu session that ended up being more talking than fighting—this is our new norm.
Mallory talks.
I try to get her to shut up and fight.
She throws out a few combinations to show me she remembers that I’m her trainer, not her therapist, and proceeds to treat me like one anyway.
Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
I’d be more upset about it if she wasn’t such a good client, friend, and now business advisor. That last part of our relationship is still pretty new, something that happened when Mallory came to me with an investment proposal from the venture capitalist firm she works for and grand ideas about franchising. That was a little over a year ago, and now there are multiple Legacy Training Centers around the state, most of them in college towns, so we can serve young women in the same age range Mallory was in when she found me. All the new changes have been good for business, and even better for my pockets, but I won’t lie and say that becoming the face of a brand that extends beyond New Haven hasn’t been daunting.
I never wanted the gym to be more than what it was when I started it, when a dream that didn’t spark in my heart became mine to make a reality, but here I am, doing branding shoots and filming self-defense videos for a YouTube channel that’s seen by more people in a month than I’d ever want to know in a lifetime.
“That little jerk does,” she says, huffing her way through a combination she used to execute with ease before her pregnancy with the twins. Now that she’s fully recovered from her cesarean, she’s determined to get back to where she was before becoming a mom.
“Widen your stance.”
Her brows fold in on each other as she throws a jab that will cause her to stumble because her weight isn’t evenly distributed. “My stance is fine,” she grunts, following through with the move and proving me right. She stumbles forward, and I catch her, releasing her as soon as she’s steady.
“Your center of gravity has changed, Mal, but you’re still throwing moves like it hasn’t. If you keep it up, you’re going to hurt yourself or someone else.”
Both of her shoulders drop, curved with defeat as she twists her lips to the side. I watch her process my words, the reluctance to accept the truth of the statement dancing in her brown eyes. Finally, she nods and begins to unwrap her hands.
“I guess we’ll have to work on that later this week.”
“You got it,” I tap her on the shoulder with one of my padded hands and give her what I hope is an encouraging smile. “You still did good today. Not bad for a mom with a fucked up nipple.”
This time, when she throws a jab—aimed directly at my stomach—her stance is perfect, and there’s power behind the blow. It stings but not enough to steal my breath or anything, which makes her annoyed.
“My nipple isn’t fucked up, asshole.”
“That’s how you made it sound. What am I supposed to think when you start talking about teeth and nipples?”
“I don’t know. Not that.”
We’re both moving over to the bench where she dropped all of her shit when she stormed in here asking for a one-on-one session. I was on my way out the door when she showed up, and I paused my plans for the day to make time for her because she looked like she needed the physical outlet.
I toss my pads on the bench beside the bouquet of flowers I bought earlier, drawing Mallory’s attention to them. Her brows lift and sparked interest makes her eyes light with a curiosity I don’t want aimed in my direction.
“Who are the flowers for?”
“Nobody you know,” I say, picking up the bouquet, my keys and phone. “You ready? I need to lock up.”
She stands, grabbing her stuff too. “Really, Hunter?”
“Really, Mallory.”
My answer is followed with a wave of my hand that indicates my impatience and, thankfully, gets her moving out the door. She’s clearly annoyed but that doesn’t stop her from waiting on me while I lock up.
“I’m not trying to be in your business,” she says as we begin moving towards our cars. “But I do hope you’re going to shower and change before you go on your date.”
Even though she’s got it all wrong, I still look down at what I’m wearing and ask, “What’s wrong with what I have on?”
Mallory cocks a brow, sweeping her assessing gaze over the black shorts, shirt, and sneakers I’m wearing. “Are you serious? If a man showed up to a date wearing that, I’d walk right out.”
“Good thing you’re married, and you don’t have to worry about things like that anymore.”
Her jaw drops as she opens the driver’s door. “Excuse you? Chris and I go on plenty of dates!”
Seeing her get so riled up is funny, especially when we both know that she’s got an amazing husband and marriage. She and Chris went through some hard times over the years, but they’re a great couple with one of the strongest bonds I’ve ever seen. Their little nipple-biting babies will grow up with two parents who are in love, which is nothing like the dysfunction of the family I grew up in thanks to my father, who left his first wife and son for my mother. A year after getting married, they had me, leaving me to grow up with a brother who despised me for having a full-time dad who constantly compared me to him.
“I know, I know, you and your husband are very in love.”
“That’s right, and you could be, too, if you put in a little effort before your date.”
“Noted. See you on Thursday.”
“Take a shower!” She calls out, and I wave her off, not bothering to respond as I make my way to my car.
The drive to the cemetery usually takes me twenty minutes, but today, I do it in fifteen. I sit in the car for a while, looking at a sky full of gray clouds and hoping the impending storm won’t interfere with my plans to honor a life lost too soon. Eventually, I make the trek, walking a path I know by heart, remembering, as I always do, what it felt like to take these steps while sharing the burden of a casket with the members of a security team I left when the weight of my guilt got to be too much. When I reach her grave, I crouch down, brushing away dirt and random bits of debris until the letters of her name are clearly legible.
Legacy James.
A client turned friend whose death sent me flying off the edge of the wagon of sobriety. What felt like the end of the world at the moment actually resulted in the kind of goodness being brought into my life that didn’t last long because I didn’t know how to hold it, how to cherish it, how to feel like I deserved it.
“Happy Birthday, Legs. I can’t believe you’ve been gone for so long.”
The words are carried off by the wind, whipped around the headstones of lost loved ones. My parents are buried out here, and so are a few of my friends who failed to get a handle on the vices that brought us into each other’s lives. Because of that, I spend a lot of time here, bringing flowers to graves that are my job to tend to, either because no one else can do it or because they just don’t care enough to. I try to limit my visits to important dates—anniversaries of their deaths or their birthdays, or holidays like Mother’s or Father’s Day—so my whole life isn’t marked by grief and loss, but even when I’m not here, I still feel it.
The emptiness.
The hollow.
The negative space in my heart, mind, and body that used to be taken up with good things and even better people. I miss one of them more than everyone else. Her absence isn’t a result of a physical death but an emotional one. The loss of love that couldn’t sustain the blows that refused to stop coming.
Visiting Legacy’s grave makes me think of her more than usual, which is saying a lot because she’s always a constant in my mind. The increase happens naturally, having something to do with the way Legacy’s death overlaps with her arrival in my life. I used to be grateful for that overlap, convincing myself that good things could come out of even the worst situations, but now that I’ve lost them both, it just makes days like today hurt even more.
I’ve barely settled the flowers against the cold, granite slab when the first drop of rain breaks free from the gray clouds looming overhead and lands on my head in a fat, wet drop and rolls into my eye. Rising to my feet, I wipe the drop away, only for it to be replaced by several more in the span of a second. A clap of thunder sounds out, and the skies open up completely, prompting me to sprint up the path toward the parking lot. Ahead of me, there’s a little girl holding the hand of a woman who is all but dragging her over the freshly formed puddles.
“Mommy, slow down. I want to splash,” the girl pleads, her little legs working overtime to keep up with the long strides the woman is taking.
“Riley, no, you don’t have on your rain boots,” her mother replies, and I stop short, cocking my head to the side as the notes of her voice make their way to my ears, slipping in between heavy raindrops and claps of thunder with the sole intention of sending sparks of recognition down my spine.
The pause costs me precious time, allowing more rain to soak through my shirt and the duo in front of me to make it to their car, which is, by some twist of fate, right beside mine. The familiar stranger is now digging her keys out of her purse while the little girl— Riley. Her daughter’s name is Riley —uses her mother’s distraction to her advantage, driving her feet through the rainwater gathered on the ground around the car and giggling with delight.
“Riley, please, stop. You’re going to be upset when you have to ride all the way home in wet socks.”
“They’re already wet, Mommy,” Riley returns quickly. A little too quickly for a child her age, but I guess that’s what happens when you have a mother like the one she does. You get to be all fire and sass, dancing in the rain without a care in the world.
Finally in possession of the keys, she unlocks the car and opens the rear passenger door, waving her hand to rush Riley into the dry confines of the vehicle. She goes without argument, happy to have gotten to splash in the puddles, even if it was for just a moment. When she’s settled in the seat, Riley’s eyes collide with mine. She stares me down fiercely, unafraid even though I’m a stranger.
“Mommy, who’s that man?” she asks, clicking her seat belt.
“What man, sweetie?”
Riley points at me, and I’m close now, closer than I should be to a stranger and her child. Closer than I should be to my lost love and the living, breathing representation of how far she’s moved on from me. Closer than I should be but still too far away.
She turns away from Riley, closing the door to put a barrier between her child and the threat she’s yet to identify. I stop near the trunk of my car and wait for her eyes to find my face. It takes too long because she starts at my feet, sizing me up the way I taught her to back when she spent all of her time inside the walls of the gym I named after the friend whose death brought her into my world.
In the time it takes her to meet my gaze, I’ve already marked every change she’s made to her appearance since the last time I saw her a little over a decade ago. She’s older, her brown eyes wiser, but she’s still just as beautiful as she was the day she left me. Her hair is longer, hanging in thick layers of coiled, black curls that cling to her shoulders, a striking contrast against her caramel skin.
Her almond eyes are narrowed when they finally land on my face. When she realizes that it’s me and not a complete stranger, they grow wide with recognition and surprise, but not fear.
“Hunter.” Her lips curve around my name, but the sound of it is washed away as the rain picks up.
The torrent catches us both off guard, but it’s still somehow the least surprising thing happening in this moment. We’re more shocked by each other. By the reality of sharing air with someone you haven’t seen or spoken to in years and, at least on my end, the pressing urge to know what it means for us both to be here—in New Haven, in this cemetery, in this moment—together after existing apart for so long.
“ Rae .”