A Lover To Him

Chapter Thirty, I paid the price

November 7th, Six years ago 

Caine Williams, Eighteen years old at the time 

"Dude, have you trained this morning?  You need to be prepared for tonight. The fight is big, at least, that's what Marco told me this morning. He said he got a lot of money invested in this game, he was assured of our victory." Cameron told me through the phone as I walked around my room, pacing back and forth and thinking deeply. 

"Yeah, I have. I ran some miles on the treadmill, and I practiced my punches. Nothing too serious though, I need to keep my strength and energy for tonight. The guy I'm fighting likes to put up a challenge for his opponents, it might take a lot more strength than usual to take him out." I said, looking out the window to see my mom drive off in her black Range Rover. 

"You'll be fine, I'll see you in a bit. Marco wants to speak to both of us in thirty minutes, he had some news to share before the big fight. I'm not entirely sure what he wants to tell us, but I could tell it isn't going to be great news." Cameron told me, and I closed my eyes in irritation as I tried to control my temper. 

I could feel the anger rise under my skin, seeking a way to find release. I had been feeling my anger rise more often ever since the beginning of the school year, and the only two things that could calm me down were either fighting someone or being around Mia's presence. Mia had something around her, the way she walked this earth with peace and kindness even though she had no peace with her own past. 

It was strange how only being in her presence could calm me down, a touch helped even more. I relaxed whenever her hand touched my skin, it was almost as if she was doing magic on me. I wasn't even sure if she had a clue that she calmed my anger, that she made sure I didn't lose my temper when I was angry. She could be so clueless sometimes, it was somewhat funny.

Oh, how deep my love ran for her, she had no clue. I had no clue how I could tell her, something was refraining me from confessing my love towards her. I wasn't entirely sure what held me back, it might be because somewhere deep inside of me I knew we weren't going to work out. Yet, I refused to listen to that thought, I would make sure we made it. I was going to get out of this fucking shit world, there had to be away. 

Besides, I must have paid all of my debts back to Marco, and if I didn't, I was sure I had enough in my savings to cover the rest of it. I was already fighting for him for over a year, I won a lot of fights in all these days. The prize money should cover all of those four hundred thousand dollars I had in debt, the red numbers next to my name should be gone. 

I looked up, forgetting I was lost in thought and had somewhere I needed to be. I grabbed a black sports bag from under my bed, it covered all of the things I needed for my fights. I had everything stocked away in the bag, burying it deeply under my bed where no one could find it if they didn't know it was there. I didn't want my family or Mia to find out it was there, it would raise questions I didn't want to answer. They all knew I fought, the wounds all over my body were hard evidence of the created truth, but they had no clue about the illegal fights I did. My mom thought the fights were part of my time as a teenager, she wrote it off as wanting to release those frustrating hormones. 

I walked downstairs, looking around to see if somebody was home. I saw Willow sitting in front of the tv, she was watching some kind of high school romance movie. Her eyes were fixated on the moving screen, and I could see Mia sitting in the exact same position as she watched a dull movie. It was adorable how Mia too was always focused on what happened on the screen while I was always distracted, mostly by her presence.