𝙶𝚁𝙾𝚆 𝚄𝙿 𝙽𝙴𝚇𝚃 𝚂𝚄𝙼𝙼𝙴𝚁 ,, robby keene

one ,, drunk face

chapter one
drunk face

I felt at peace. Jonathan Davis was crooning the words to 'What It Is' and I felt perfectly relaxed as I flowed through the motions of my karate kata, blissfully ignorant to the pain in my right shoulder.

Two years ago, I was a rugby player and I was actually pretty good at it. During our semifinals, a ruck went wrong and permanently messed up my shoulder. I forget exactly what my physiotherapist said, but essentially I was sidelined for life.

I could barely wear my backpack some days without my shoulder feeling like it was on fire, so competing in karate was out too. But one of my mom's old friends used to be a karate champion, and he wasn't about to watch me quit.

So now I hold the title of All-Valley Karate Kata Champion.

All because of Daniel LaRusso.

"Ringo." Someone shouted, but I couldn't hear over the 'American Satan' soundtrack I had playing through my AirPods.

"Ringo!"

Finally fed up with trying to get my attention, whoever was trying reached over and pulled out one of my earbuds, the chorus of 'Mother' by Prep School screaming at Mr. LaRusso.

"Mr. Larusso!" I shouted, reaching to pul out my other earbud. "I am SO sorry."

Daniel shook his head "Don't worry about it, I used to zone out as well. What were you listening to today?"

"The soundtrack to 'American Satan'. They released the trailer of the TV series a few days ago and I'v been on a nostalgia binge."

"I've never seen someone relax the way you do to heavy metal. It's really unsettling." Daniel chuckled "Anyways, I need you to work with Demetri tomorrow. He's scared of getting hurt, and you're the one person here who probably won't knock him out with a kick. If your shoulder is fine, of course."

Unconsciously, I reached up to rub my shoulder as I suddenly remembered that it felt like it was burning. "Yeah, I should me fine." I cringed

Mr. LaRusso nodded, looking around the dojo with a thoughtful expression. "Where's your brother? Wasn't he supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago?"

I shook my head "I have no idea where Corey is or what the hell he's doing, but I'm sure he'll get his act together. He has a college interview this afternoon."

"Mr. LaRusso!" A kid shouted, throwing open the door to the main house "Demetri fell into the pond again!"

"Jesus Christ." Daniel muttered "If Corey doesn't show, call me and I'll drop you off."

After Mr. LaRusso had left, I chuckled grimly to myself as I pulled off my workout shirt and began to rub a deep muscle relaxant cream to my shoulder. It hadn't been this bad in ages, but the guy at physio said to keep working at it.

"Ringo?" A smell voice called from the doorway, making me jump

"What is it with people and sneaking up on me today?" I chuckled, looking over at Robby Keene, one of my closest friends.

"Sorry about that. How's your shoulder doing?"

I held up the tube of cream. "It's been better."

Robby held out a hand. "Let me help."

"Thanks." I grinned, passing him the cream

The Keene boy took over massaging my shoulder while I checked my phone to see if there were any updates from Corey, who in my mother's eyes could do no wrong.

Instead, I found this.

Youtube: New video from You Alright Corey?

You know how when you're watching Fail Army and they have that segment that's just people named Corey doing something stupid and you think to yourself 'there cannot possibly be that many stupid people named Corey'? Well, half of them are my brother. He started this stupid parkour channel when our cousin Ian moved in after Aunt Stacy kicked him out. Ian's been mooching off us ever since, and just feeding Corey and my other brother Freddie stupid ideas.

"For the love of god." I murmured, opening the video

Robby laughed "What's Corey done now?"

Apparently Corey was late because he was busy recording takes of him falling off a couch that his best friend Stan Hartman was dragging on a dolly down the street behind his F150 pickup.

I live in a family of idiots. And somehow this idiot got an interview at Berkley law school.

My phone pinged, the little white bar at the top of my screen proclaiming a text from Corey.

I'm in the parking lot and I am really damn late to my interview. I can't srop you off at home, sorry.

*drop

"Guess I'm hanging around law school for a few hours." I sighed, pulling on my denim jacket.

"If it gets too boring, give me call."

"Thanks, Keene." I grinned, grabbing my peach hydroflask and my duffle bag before walking out of the dojo to find my brother's idling, lemon yellow Ford pickup.

"Yeah, we're not making it to Berkley in time." Corey scoffed, reaching to turn down the Duran Duran song that was on the radio. "Sorry Ringo."

I sighed, settling back in the seat to look at my battered brother "Not gonna lie, I did expect this to happen."

"We lost track of time!" Corey defended, puling onto the freeway "Hey, at least I'm not Ian, who slept through his fifteenth job interview this month."

"Ian needs to pull his life together, and so do you. You can't live off YouAlrightCorey? forever."

We got to Berkley with less than five minutes to spare. As soon as he got out of the car, Corey took off, leaving me in the dust.

I made my way to the women's bathroom, where I quickly changed back into my street clothes and fixed the tape on my aching shoulder. The cream had slowed the burn to a dull ache, but I was still in a ton of pain, and I t looked like I was going to be stuck here for a while.

I pulled my phone out of my pocket and dialed Ian, who I hoped would at least be a little bit helpful.

"Ian, I'm stranded at Berkley because Corey thought falling off a couch was more important than picking me up on time."

Ian laughed "Yeah, I saw that. Sorry, I've got an interview with Chick Fil-A."

"No he doesn't!" I heard Freddie shout in the background. "I'm beating his ass at Grand Theft Auto!"

"Shut up!" Ian snapped back "Well, the longline is that I can't pick you up. SorryRingoBye!"

And then he hung up. I was stranded.

Hallelujah.