“I fucking loved it,” I answered with a nod. “Just what I needed.”
“Good,” she said and reached for the half-full wine glass she had poured earlier.
This was something new for me. I’d fucked her raw, with no condom on, didn’t suck on her tits like I’m wont to do, and didn’t care. I’d heard about the effects of being in the afterglow of sex with someone you loved, but since I didn’t know Ariana from a hole in the wall, I ruled that out. I'd overheard two women one day as they talked about insta-love. It was an unfamiliar term to me, so I approached them. One was reading a romance novel by someone named Lawrence Hall. He appeared to not be noteworthy as an author because he relied on the insta-love concept. The one reading his drivel was warning the other to stay far away from his works. She'd used words like "insane," "talentless," and "moron," when she described him.
I wasn't interested in supporting his nonsense, whoever he was, but insta-love caught me. It couldn’t happen in real life, she explained and told me to think of it as love-at-first-sight. Lust at first sight, sure, but I for damn sure wasn't at risk for letting love happen to me. So, if insta-love or love-at-first-sight wasn’t my thing, then why did I respond to Ariana the way I was?
I couldn’t focus on these questions, I had a match in a couple of hours. I placed my hands on her hips, pulled her close, and planted a deep, slow kiss on her lips. Her eyes were shut and she had a satisfied smile on her face when I pulled back. “I’ve got to go,” I said, barely above a whisper.
She nodded and matched my volume as she replied. “Don’t be a stranger, Damian.”
With her eyes still shut, I gave her a gentle kiss on the tip of her nose and returned to my car. As I sped away, my insides churned with mixed emotions. “Get a grip, Dame,” I command myself as I stared into my own eyes through the rearview mirror. “Get a grip.”
#
“YOU DID, WHAT?”
Derek was my boy. A good friend, and even better trainer, he was the one that introduced me to The Pit. Most people were familiar with the concept of underground fights because of the movie made in the nineties. That was fiction. These were real-world, modern-day gladiators, each with their own motivations to put their bodies on the line.
The Pit was an underground fight club with an online following in the millions. It consisted of promoters that extolled the virtue of two men who knew nothing about one another coming together to beat the shit out of each other. These were amateur fights that were not regulated and officiated as loose as possible. There was plenty of money to be made. Spectators paid for admission and left with the feeling of money well spent. People like the thrill of gambling, so bets were placed with the house taking a piece of the action. Everyone liked to bet on a winner. Oftentimes, the guys that participated were hard up for cash, and the fights were a good way to make quick cash. Winners were paid, losers weren’t. If a fighter were a big enough draw because of prior performances and win-loss record, they could stand to make a substantial amount. Some fighters came to blow off steam from a rough day. Others sought the adulation and glory of becoming an internet sensation if they put on a good enough show.
I liked the competitive aspect of it all, me and another man one-on-one, seeing who was the best. Fights could range from combatants exchanging a few punches and calling it a day, to full-out, one-sided affairs in which the loser was beaten so badly they required medical treatment. Of course, when they went to the hospital, the story was akin to something like the fighter was assaulted in the streets. Even though the fights were streamed all over the internet, it was rare to find any concrete information on any of the participants. These were illegal bouts after all.
The event was named The Pit even though the locale often changed to stay one step ahead of the law. When the organizers first created it, it was held in the basement of an indoor arena, and the floor was in the shape of a giant U. Hence the name. Today, the event was on the asphalt of a park where spectators pulled up in expensive cars and formed an enormous circle. The interior of the circle was the arena where the spectators observed from, and inside of that was the actual place where the fight would be. Headlights were left on to serve as the lighting for the event.
One day, when we were teens, I rode the bus home from school. I’d always been the quiet type, and didn’t believe in hanging out with people. I kept to myself, went to school, did my classwork, and came home. On this particular day, I’d notice a classmate being ridiculed relentlessly by a few of the boys everywhere he went. I didn’t know the reason for the torment they inflicted on the poor boy, and I didn’t care. It was only words and it was none of my business. At the end of the day, we all boarded the yellow bus and headed home. These boys continued to harass the young teen, and he’d finally had enough. I was happy he'd shown some balls and decided to stand up for himself. We all unloaded at the bus stop that served the apartment complex we all shared, and tormented boy stood his ground while the others surrounded him. He talked shit, but was smart enough to wait until the bus drove off. Once clear of adult supervision, he swung his fist into the jaw of the leader of the group. The rest of our classmates stayed to watch what happened, but I walked home. Or at least that was my plan until I heard a collective “ooh” from the crowd. I pivoted back around and the scene in front of me moved me to action. The tormented boy chose to attack the leader, which I respected. It was fair and it was one-on-one. However, the underlings didn’t see it the same way. They chose to defend their leader and jumped the boy, beating and stomping him senseless. One-on-one is fine and respectful. You win some, you lose some, but you stand and fight like a man. It's the law of the jungle. Three-on-one as the leader directs the others is more than any person can take. So, I decided to even up the odds. And by that, I mean I jumped in the middle of the fray and beat the shit out of the tormenters and the leader. None of them was spared my wrath, and it was talked about for the rest of the year.
The tormented boy was so grateful, he begged me to teach him how to defend himself and followed me home. My mom cared for his wounds since he was from a single-parent home and his mom was at work. She worked three jobs to put food on his plate and was unaware of what he experienced. Over time, my mom became his defacto mom with his mother’s blessing and we grew to be good friends. I helped him learn how to use his fists and he helped my social skills. Derek and I became inseparable that day and remained so to this day.
So, he felt he had the right to chastise me at a moment’s notice since we'd been through so much together. He’d stumbled upon the fights in The Pit, and knew I’d be a good fit. Intelligence was my thing. I'd scored high on the college exams and had my pick of any school I applied to, being accepted by all. The problem was the thought of college didn’t excite me. School in general never stimulated me. My mom said I had tested genius level on intelligence tests when I was young and was bored by the standard academic curriculums. She didn’t have the money to send me to a higher education facility that could stimulate me the way I needed, which is why my social skills weren’t the greatest. It’s not that I thought I was better than others, it’s that Iwasbetter than others. I had the ability to absorb my surroundings and calculate outcomes at a much faster rate than others. Which is why I was untouchable as a fighter. I could predict my opponent's moves and counter or attack before they had a chance to defend.
I never got bored with fighting. Unlike most things in life, fighting could come down to an unpredictable outcome. The potential for a flash knockout, a blind punch thrown by an opponent that connected at the right speed and velocity, was always there. No matter how much I mitigated against that outcome, knowing the chance that Icouldbe beat existed, excited me. Fighting gave me motivation.Notto be beaten was always the goal.
“You don’t understand, Derek. She was incredible,” I told him as we walked toward the circle that formed the location of The Pit's arena. The closer we got, the louder the sounds of the crowd and the more their bloodlust could be felt in the air.
“A woman will take your legs, dammit. You know this!” Derek’s screams fell as little more than crowd noise. If we were alone in a quiet area, his words would have hit me harder, but Ariana’s scent still filled my nostrils. It was hard to focus on him.
“She was more than a woman, Derek.”
“Fuck that!” Derek spat. “She’s another woman with a vagina. You’re acting as if you’ve never had pussy before.”
“It was more than pussy, Derek,” I sighed. It amazed me how this one-night-stand had me feeling. I’d had plenty before her, but there was something unexplainable about Ariana.
“I can’t believe you did that. Man, how stupid can you get?’
“Calm down, Derek,” I sneered. “You’re the one acting brand new. I’m going to go in here and do what I do, which is whip whoever I’m facing’s ass.”
“You stupid motherfucker! Iknowwho you’re fighting. This isThe Midnight Prizeyou’re going after. Did you think they were bringing in a scrub? I didn’t know I had to remind you of all people of how high the stakes are?”
Whoa. This was different. In the underground fight game, fighters never have an idea of who they're fighting until they arrive. The fact Derek knew my opponent gave me cause to pause. “Who?”
“You’re fighting Dustin Munoz, man.”
“The guy from overseas?”
“Yeah. That guy. The guy they call a vampire, because of how much blood he spills from those that fight him. And you just spent all your energy fucking a random broad.”