To Love A Fighter |||| l.p.

Laughter and Frustration

Stella's POV

People are dumb. Wanting to establish their dominance when they feel threatened. Girls do so by snarkness and gossiping. At least at the gym while more violent,  guys tend to be more obvious, which makes it easier to knock down when necessary. Jab. Cross. Knee. Kick. I watch Romel as he moves the mitts to where the next blow needs to land. I love reaction drills, they force you to assess and analyze quickly. Each blow I land harder and harder, because I just get angrier and angrier. Why are people like this? Why did they make me so quiet and secluded? Why do people have to be so mean and vicious? It's just easier to keep everyone away. Besides, that guy will thank me later for kicking his ass. But dammit! Now people are more scared of me. But I couldn't just let him get away with talking like that, if I did he would have done it to other people and he would have gotten killed by another one of the fighters. For his sake I knew it had to be me. Anyone else would have sent him to the hospital. "Just hands, 30 seconds, go!" Romel orders. My hands start to move faster and faster Jabcrosshookcrossjabjabslipcross...

...

...and exhale...done. I just finished my last pose for yoga. I feel good, tired, complete. I reach over to grab my coconut water and walk towards the hammock. Oh yea, Liam's hanging out today. I wonder when he's gonna get here? I breathe in deeply and exhale with a loud sigh as I look at the stars. Looks like another clear night.

"You sound depressed or tired, which is it?" a british voice chirps up. I jerk up and see Liam walking up with...his own chair and food? He notices my confused face, "oh I hope you don't mind, I brought a more comfortable chair, I won't leave it here if it bothers you. And I brought some food! I figured that with all that training you must be hungry, I know I am! You probably don't eat much junk food so I just bought a lot of sushi in hopes that its a healthy option and that you'll find something you like" he says sheepishly.

I'm a little speechless. That's so sweet! "I LOVE sushi! Oh my goodness Liam you didn't have to go through all that trouble!" Although I have to admit I'm pretty excited at the thought of sushi on the roof. Liam smiles as he prepares his chair, a portable recliner with a pillow. My heart flutters again, NO! No no no no. I tense, then sigh again and look away for a minute to compose myself. He's so cute, but he's a superstar and I train too much. I will just be happy with being friends because thats it and eventually my little crush will go away and I'll laugh about this later, I rationalize to myself. I'm not girlfriend material, never will be.

He opens up the bags with lots of boxes of sushi. He really did buy a lot of sushi! "Yea....don't worry if we can't finish it, I didn't know what you liked so I got a little bit of everything" he said as he pulled out the food. "Oh don't worry, I'm not a picky eater and I have a big appetite! Thanks for the food!" I let him know excitedly.

"So," he says as we start to eat "how do you know about me? Are you a fan of the band? I've been curious since we met, you don't seem to fit into what our fans normally look like" he playfully points out. I laugh, "not really a fangirl persay. I like, like 2 of your songs and have sisters. They're pretty big fans of you guys. They're probably the fan types you're used to. I do know enough about the band to know who Liam Payne is!" I laughed, thinking about my sisters. Oh my goodness,  should I tell them about him yet? I'll find out later. He perks up when he finds out my sisters are fans "thats so nice!" He coos.

We talk about my family, his family, what we did before we got to where we are now, before his fame, before my MMA, about training and how hard his first day was. The more we talk the more I notice him. I guess I assumed he'd be a little more...prissy...with his extreme celebrity status, but he's so down to earth, willing to put himself through the ringer in some place he didn't know. He came up without a shirt on. It's pretty common with fighters to train without a shirt on, I stopped noticing after a while, but suddenly I notice him. He's in great shape, his biceps and triceps ripple as he moves around. His tattoos seem to just enhance his body. I look down at my sushi, it doesn't seem like he noticed me staring.

We realize we both like superheroes, we get into a pretend heated debate on DC vs Marvel, we settle it by me agreeing that batman is a pretty cool hero (although not as cool as Iron Man). "You are such a dork!" he laughs, "hey you are right here with me batman!" I shoot back. We laugh until our sides hurt and eventually settle down.