Fight Back

4| ruin me with a picture

Right hook.
"You're going down, Kobra," the girl in front of me spits. She dodges my right hook, and quickly thunders her way behind me and kicking me down to the ground.

Kick.
This girl is a rookie, she hadn't taken my fall to her advantage. Instead she opens herself up thinking if I'd gone down, I'm an easy match.

"See ya, Thunder," I hiss back at her face, before I accelerate towards her, beating her to the ground.

Left jab.
Everyone's voices cheering. "Thunder!" "Kobra!" "Kobra!" "Thunder!"

Right cross.
My punches cause her to stumble out of balance, she uses the border ropes as her anchor to not catapult to the ground.

Left hook.
I move fast and quick, my usual pattern: left jab, right cross, left hook. Right jab, left cross, right hook.

Right jab.
She goes down, allowing me to straddle her and lock her in place as I throw a couple power punches.

"Kenley!" A familiar voice grabs the attention of the whole room.

I drop my knuckle to the floor, seeing as the girl in front of me was already gone and knocked out.

My toffee brown eyes turning to the person that had called out my name.

What's Tyler King doing in an underground fighting match? And how the hell did he find out it was me?

My knees quiver at the thought of him spilling my secrets out to the whole school. If he'd exposed Karen's adultery business, what more could he do about my fighting?

Without sharing another glance, I stand up, walking to the hallway that enters my changing room. There, Dionne awaits to use his first aid skills on me. He checks for injuries and such.

"Good match," Dionne greets as I enter the room with a loud thud.

I take my balaclava off as he does his usual check up.

"Anything in your mouth?"
"How's your vision?"
"How's your breathing"
"Can you lift your arm like this?"

And so on.

About 5 minutes later, a 6-foot-5 enters he doorway.

"What the hell was that?" He barks, pointing at the boxing ring.

"Hey. Hey. Man! Didn't you see the no entering sign in the hallway? You're not allowed here!" Dionne stands up blocking the shocked Tyler.

"It's fine, Dionne," I say to him. Walking past the furious dark man, Dionne, I stand in front of Tyler King, boldness lacing through my voice as I say, "What the hell do you think you're doing, King? Revealing my name to all these people, do you know how that just put me and my family in danger? Go back to where you belong, King."

He clenches his jaw in reply before turning around and letting out a few curse words under his breath as he leaves.

"Why is he-" my voice is cut off by another loud bang of the door followed by a camera flash that grabbed my attention.

"Asswipe!" I surge furiously. "I think you're in the wrong place, reveal my identity and I will make sure you will spend the next hour picking up your teeth along with your masculinity off the ground."

"That doesn't scare me, Kenley. Give me back my bracelet or I will press send."

I fumed in anger racking my brain for what bracelet he owned in my jewelry box. I don't know how I'd end up with a belonging of his.

"Thievery is not my thing, if that's what you're getting at." It's causing me a great deal of distress how anyone would even think I'd steal anything from them.

"Well clearly it is, since you're the only person in the male locker room watching me shower. My things were on the bench beside you."

"Well I will tell you now, King. I don't want anything to do with you. Not a bracelet or anything, ever."

"If you hadn't taken it, you will help me look for it or I will hit send. How would everyone react having their beloved president of leadership be an undercover fighter?"

----

Falling asleep is hard to do when your own thoughts are gnawing at your chest.

"Arghh!" I groaned in dismay. Agony occupying my chest, I punch the wall creating a crater on the wall. Footsteps in the hallway grew louder and louder, my door swung open revealing my worried mother.

"What happened?!" she asks in a panicked tone.

"Uhh- I-um." Unable to comprehend my own actions, my eyes started brimming with tears.

"Honey," my mother says, squatting to the ground and picking me up to the bed. She holds me tight to her chest, sweeping the stray hairs off my face. "What happened? You can tell me anything. Breakups, failures."

I didn't know how to tell her about Kobra. Silence surrounded the place, I felt so special being wrapped around my mother's arms.

"You know, when your father left us 14 years ago, you found me exactly the same. Weeping with a hole in the wall. You and Mark were 4 and you held me tight, tighter than Mark did. You said 'Mama, I hate it whenever you get sad. Everything looks so bright except for your brown eyes.' And then from that, I decided to change. Started the bakery shop and dropped the alcoholism."

I sniffled at her chest, falling into slumber. Everything was warm and I could feel her heartbeat against my my weary body. Slow, yet beating.