Blue Belt

Chapter 9

                                                            IX.

        Three more weeks had passed and I continued to make an effort to go down to the dojo and work on my form.  I was beginning to have much more solid technique in what I was doing.  It was no longer thinking in terms of what move to do in what sequence.  I was now able to focus on the quality of the moves themselves in hopes to gain some of the crispness which I had seen more advanced students having.   

            One Saturday night that I went down, thinking I would certainly have the dojo to myself after having multiple people being down there the last couple of times I tried, I found just Brett down there doing some stretching.  However it did not end up being a problem because he watched me do the form and gave me some tips.

            "You should have been here last night for practice."  He was referring to the Friday night form sessions.  Being that Mr. Vargo had made it clear that it was completely optional for us to go, we had only made it on one additional occasion other than that first time.  The last time we went half the time was spent doing all group forms; the type where Cammie would count off the moves.  Only on that ocassion she counted off the moves and we went through the routine twice like that, and then even a third time where the whole group would go through them and she did not repeat what the moves were.  Charles had joined us on that occasion and the five of us were just completely lost. 

            "We think we'll wait a bit before doing that again."  I said in response.

            "No, you can't think like that."  Brett responded somewhat expectedly.  Suddenly his phone rang loudly.

            "Hmmm.  It's Chang."  He said as he looked down at the screen on his phone.  He talked for a few minutes as I propped my leg up against the bar in the back of the room to continue to work on flexibility.  I could tell Chang was asking him to go somewhere.  I thought I might call Tomas then to see if he wanted to come down and continue to do some practice.

            "Okay, I'll be at Derek's in about a half hour to an hour.  Later."  Brett ended his call.

            "Hey Matt, you should come with us tonight."  Brett shocked me with this invitation.  It's not like I knew him all that well.  In fact tonight was the most I had spoken with him in extended conversation period.  "We're going over to this guy Derek's.  He is not a part of this school but I think it would be cool for you to meet him."  As he said it I was more interested in going because, first, I thought Chang was pretty interesting and it would be another chance to see him, and second, because this would be something to tell Jed about when he got back.  He was back home for a week and this would give him reason to believe I did not just retreat into a shell in his absence.

            "That's cool."  I nodded back to Brett.

            "Well let's head back upstairs then.  We should be ready to split in about fifteen."  We headed back up to our rooms and I got changed and ready for what I thought should be an interesting evening.

            Derek lived back away from the beach by quite a ways on the South side of town.  It was in more of a Suburban house which guessing from the neighborhood was built in the early 80s or so.  The house was kind of an off white with green trim.  Before we could reach the door the front light came on and the door opened.  Out came a skinny guy, about 5'11", with a white tank top on.  As we got into the light I noticed that he had shaved his head but that it would otherwise be blond.  I did not think he was bald or anything.  He had blue eyes and kind of a skinny nose.  He also had some noticeable acne.  On both his arms and his torso he had an array of tattoos.  The largest of which was a large pirate ship on his right arm.