The Will To

T W E L V E (shame & co.)

Sweat poured down my forehead. My legs were on fire. Numbness overtook my fists as I continued to strike. Hit after hit, I kept pounding in quick, sharp punches, trying to deplete my supply of unwanted emotion. But it wouldn't empty. A fraction remained no matter how hard I went. I kept punching.

Nothing else mattered. I was connected and moved fluidly. I felt each punch like it'd been delivered by my entire body. It was just me. The room faded. My focus was unstoppable. I was unstoppable.

"Will! Will!"

Like I'd been floating in the air, my bubble popped and I landed in reality. The bright room showcased a group of sweaty women (though not nearly as sweaty as I was) staring at me like I had, in fact, dropped from a bubble in the sky.

"You good, Will?"

I snapped to the voice. Talia's mouth was hardened with concern. After shaking my head to get a grip, I wiped the back of my hand over my forehead and responded, "Yeah. Fine."

The women continued staring. We'd concluded the self-defense class with a kickboxing circuit aimed at improving our cardio and form. Talia liked to add kickboxing into the mix frequently. I enjoyed it, too, apparently, as I'd managed to punch my way out of reality for a moment.

"Alright," Talia finally said, granting me another quick glance before addressing the class, "Well, that's all I have for you today. See you all next week. Practice some of what we went over—with your friends, significant other, whoever. It helps to reinforce everything."

Soft clamor filled the room. I wiped my glistening forehead again and tried to regain my breath as the women filed out of the door. Talia strode towards me.

"What was that?"

"What?" I asked.

She narrowed her eyes like I could read her mind. I didn't possess that power, but at this moment, I somehow knew exactly what she was thinking.

"You were in quite a trance, there, Will."

"I like kickboxing. You know that."

Talia licked her lips and sighed. She wasn't an idiot. She knew something was on my mind, and, though I hated to admit it, she could read me better than most people.

"Is this about what happened on campus?" she asked. "The woman who was raped?"

I felt like taking a swing at my punching bag again. It had been four days since the attack, and as far as I was concerned, my rage had only increased. Nothing seemed to remove it completely, but punching mindlessly helped dull it for a while.

"It made me crazy when I heard about it," Talia stated.

"It made me angry."

My words hung in the air. I could feel them—their weight—and I wondered if Talia could too. She leaned towards me but didn't take a step, keeping herself at a distance.

"I attended WSU. You know that?"

I flicked my eyes to hers and shook my head, unaware of the fact. Her studio was about twenty minutes from campus; it had been around since I started WSU, but I wasn't sure how long she'd been teaching classes.

"Are you from here?" I asked, though I highly doubted it. Not many people hailed from the town, which was about as populated as a ghost town. Many of Talia's clients were from the university or commuted from larger towns, even as far as the city, nearly forty-five minutes away. I'd never understood why she'd opened a self-defense studio in, basically, the middle of nowhere.

"No," she answered simply. "Back when I was in school, over twenty years ago, I went to those parties—the Greek parties. Everyone did."

"Everyone still does. Hasn't changed much," I muttered.