Page 22 of Until We're More
Whenever I thought about those days, the pressure to ensure I didn’t end up living in filth and squalor ever again hit me.It’s okay. I have a steady-paying job.
But people on the bottom of the totem pole were the first to go when cuts came around. Panic squeezed my throat, a threatening reminder of how important it was to move up. How important it was to hold on to my sense of purpose and keep going.It’s okay. I’m stronger than Mom is. I won’t give up, no matter what life throws my way.
At that thought, guilt came crashing in. My mom might not be perfect, but I’d never gone hungry. I had clothes to wear, even if they were secondhand clothes that I had to wear until they were a little too small and a lot threadbare.
I should go see her. At least check that she’s taking care of herself.A guilt trip for not doing so sooner would definitely be in order, and those were my kryptonite, causing me to enable her far too much. The worst part about visiting her, though, was that trying so hard and not seeing a difference made the hope that the old her might miraculously make a reappearance more slippery. And while it might be silly, I wanted to believe that if she and Jesse weren’t always so stressed about money, the odds of that happening increased.
I just have to land that promotion, and then at least I can say with a certainty one way or the other.
The sound of a buzzer brought me back to the present, and I walked past the chairs where I’d lived all those fictional lives and to the open doorway of Blake Roth’s office. It’d been updated since I’d left, not with paint or furniture, which was still on the well-worn side, but a huge whiteboard with fighters’ names, weights, and their upcoming matches claimed the far wall, and there was another, much newer one that detailed the class times for the gym.
“Chelsea,” Blake said, shooting me a warm smile and pushing away from his desk. “So glad you stopped by.”
“Yeah, I missed you the first time around, so I had to come back.”
He didn’t seem to know whether to pat my shoulder, shake my hand, or what, so I initiated a hug.
As if Liam’s size hadn’t been intimidating enough when I’d met him, Blake Roth took the big and burly thing to the next level—I could barely fit my arms around him. For the first few months, I’d ducked my head and fought the urge to hide every time he glanced in my direction. Living next door, I’d also heard him yell at his kids, and that’d only solidified my fear. If my desire to hang out with Liam hadn’t been so strong, I would’ve completely avoided the former light heavyweightandheavyweight champ. It took several months of spending a lot of time in the gym to realize his bark was worse than his bite. Blake was gruff, even less verbose than Liam, and didn’t express a lot of emotions, but he’d always been kind to me. Instead of chasing me out of the gym, he’d let me spend hours here, despite his voiced concerns about me being a distraction for his son.
Liam assured him we were just friends and that I was so quiet he hardly noticed me sitting on the sidelines. He’d added that if anything, I made himmorefocused because I wasn’t needy or demanding, helped him study, and did all the talking so he didn’t have to. At the time I’d taken it as a compliment. Once my feelings for Liam shifted a year ago, it was a bit like a squeeze of lemon on an open wound and added to the ridiculousness I felt over accidentally liking him.
Good thing I’d gotten over that. Mostly.
Blake asked about my job, and I filled him in and asked him about Team Domination. As soon as we’d sufficiently caught up—meaning I realized we’d gone several minutes where I’d done the majority of the talking while he just nodded—I excused myself to go see how much longer Liam would be.
Only I ran into Brooklyn, who had Carlos “Guerrilla Warfare” Guerra with her. “Hey, Chelsea. You remember Carlos?”
“Of course. You still train at the gym up north?” He was about a decade or so older than Liam, but they’d crossed paths both in and out of the cage. He was one of those guys Liam hated to fight, not only because he was tough—which he was—but also because they genuinely liked each other.
“Now I stick mostly to coaching, but I’m dipping a toe into the role of promoter.”
“Carlos is working on finding more venues and how to get more people into seats, which would be good for our guys,” Brooklyn said. “More opportunities to fight and bigger purses when they do. On the side of everything else I do around here without technically working here, I’m trying to help him out, although I’m a bit out of my comfort zone.”
“You’ve just got to find the right target market, then get the information to them.” I shrugged. “Marketing’s kind of my thing. I can totally help out if you’d like.”
“Yes, please,” Brooklyn said, and Carlos enthusiastically nodded.
“We could use all the help we could get.” He nudged me with one heavily tattooed elbow. “It’s nice to be back in your good graces.” He glanced at Brooklyn, and as I studied the tattoos on his neck, I idly wondered if he had any un-inked skin left. “Did you know Chelsea once gave me the cold shoulder for a couple months? Even after I apologized?”
I crossed my arms, remembering now that he’d brought it up. “You punched my best friend in the face. Repeatedly.”
“We were in the cage! He knew what he was getting into.”
Carlos had wanted to go back to buddies seconds after his and Liam’s last knockdown, drag-out fight, when Liam’s nose and the cut on his forehead had still been oozing blood. And regardless of the fact that Liam had given him a bro hug and congratulated him on the win, I’d held a grudge for a while. “All’s I’m saying is, you didn’t have to hit him so hard. Especially when he was already hurt.”
Carlos laughed, and Brooklyn joined in. “Clearly you’ve never taken one of Liam’s punches like I have. You have to knock the fucker on his ass or he’ll get back up and knock you on yours.”
“Well, now that I’m remembering the fight better, I’m reconsidering whether you’re in my good graces or not.” I dramatically lifted my chin for emphasis, although my smile probably clued him in that I was only teasing.
Carlos dragged a finger around his neck, as if I’d successfully scared him. “Yeesh, I should’ve kept my big mouth shut.” He chuckled and checked his watch. “I’ve gotta get going, but I’ll be in touch.” He pointed between Brooklyn and me. “Let’s get together and brainstorm soon.”
“Thanks for helping out with that,” Brooklyn said to me after Carlos had walked away. “You and I still haven’t had much of a chance to catch up. Care to entertain me as I sort through the bills?” She grabbed an accordion file off one of the chairs, sat down where it’d been seconds ago, and patted the spot next to her.
I glanced toward the cage and saw Liam was still training along with a group of guys, so I figured I had some time to kill, and Brooklyn was an excellent person to do that with. I sat in the chair she’d indicated, automatically tucking my legs under me. “For not working here anymore, you certainly seem to do a lot of work here.”
“Tell me about it. Just when I thought I was out”—she made fists with her hands and dramatically tugged them back to her chest—“they pull me back in.” Thanks to Liam making me watch that long-ass movie, I recognized the Godfather impression. He’d tried to get me to watch the sequels, but I’d pretty much run screaming at that suggestion, the way he did when I brought up period dramas. “Maddie, our new receptionist-slash-accountant sometimes gets behind and overwhelmed, and since I’m trying to ensure we keep her, I help her out whenever I can.”
Her fingers grazed the top of the accordion file before she reached inside and pulled out a giant stack of envelopes. “So, tell me about Colorado. How do you like it?”
