We Bent Fate

Chapter 8.

Her breath hitches as I pull her closer to me and just when I was about to close my eyes and close the distance between us, she moves away and jumps off the bed.

I fall on my face on the pillow.

"Where are you going?" I sit up, holding her wrist with my hand. She smirks at me and turns, without answering me.

I sigh, grinning widely at her.

She stands outside a door and for a minute, flicks a glance back at me, checking if I had followed or not. Then opens the door, revealing an open courtyard with trees around it and a green grassy patch on the ground.

"Lila tells me this used to be one of my favorite places of this house. I used to read books here and wrote some of my poems here. I even wrote one this morning." She closes her eyes for a minute and a small smile splits on her tiny face.

"Beautiful." I look at her, grinning as her animated face smooths back into the realization of the present.

"Yeah, I know-" She says and then stops when she catches me looking at her. "Oh, uh..I thought you were talking about the place."

"Yeah, right. How is my girlfriend supposed to compete with an empty courtyard with trees and grass, anyway?" I say with a deadpan look and she bites her lower lip to stifle a smile.

The lingering feeling of her soft lips on mine leaves a tingle through my skin and I sigh, breathing hard. "So?"

"You will teach me here." She chirps with a smile and I could already feel myself smiling. I come closer to her.

"Okay. So first let me tell you the basics of harming anyone. If someone attacks you and you think you don't have the energy or any weapons for you to disarm them, just scream." I say and she nods dubiously. "But make sure there are people around to help you. O-Otherwise this won't work."

What am I talking about? She would already know this much, I am sure. I am just making a douche-bag out of myself in front of her!

I sigh, trying to calm down. "Go on." She says, encouragingly and I nod.

Okay, Austin. You need to save your girlfriend. Might as well help her with this or you will lose her again.

"And-and to harm someone even if you don't have anything to save you, you can always use your fingers and nails. You can punch someone in the eye, or better yet poke your fingers inside their eyeballs and they won't be able to see you anymore, let alone kill you." She was making a distasteful face but was still nodding as a vote of confidence. "You can punch their nose as well. It is sensitive and hurts like a motherfucker when it gets hurt. Same for the jaw."

I repeat the same sentence again and again for a minute and I notice Martha battling back a laugh. Oh, I am such an idiot.

"You can use your elbows, nails, fingers, teeth, your knee. Anything. Knee someone in the crotch. That always works. So does hitting on the knees. Hit them there and the guy would drop to the ground and you'll be on the top." She nods and I hear a few crickets singing.

God, I am not doing this right. I am supposed to teach her properly. Gods would not be stopped with a knee on the crotch. There is only a slight chance to win there.

But what other alternative do I have? I would probably just make her practice some of the moves I know from Dad's training. I need to make her fight me first.

"Okay so this was some of the basics. Now, stand up." I said and she obliges, standing across me. "When someone attacks you, they obviously would not fight fair. So first let me teach you how to throw a punch."