Chapter Thirty-Three
Braxton
I went out with Jaimie to World Market on Thursday night. We stopped at a bar on the way home, and both got a little tipsy. She wanted me to spend the night, but I resisted and assured her there would be plenty of night-spending when I got back from Vegas the following week.
“This will give you something to look forward to, at least.” I twined a lock of her hair around my finger, suppressing a fierce urge to kiss her. “I’ll come over on Monday night and make stir-fry. We’ll play Old Crow’s new album and watch the second Before movie—which one is it?”
“Before Sunset,” said Jaimie, her hands on the collar of my shirt. “It’s the one where they meet again after nine years apart.”
“See, and we’ll watch that, and I’ll try not to fall asleep.”
“Don’t pretend you weren’t fascinated by the first one,” she said with a smirk. “But yes, I would like that very much.”
On Friday night, I flew down to Vegas with Coach, Carruthers, Bruce, and Nick. Once again, we stayed in the Bellagio. By now the place was so bound up in memories of Jaimie that I could hardly walk out of my room without being reminded of that first night. Once in the dining area, I was startled by the sight of long auburn-tinted hair on a pair of slender shoulders and thought for one wild moment that maybe she had come to surprise me: but a second later the person in question turned around, revealing himself to be a man, and the illusion was shattered.
But I still carried a faint hope that she would show up for the fight. So when I heard a knock at the door on Saturday night just as I got out of the shower, I nearly ran to the door.
But it wasn’t Jaimie. It was Nick, and he was wincing as though he had just eaten something sour.
“Hey, what’s up?” I motioned for him to come into the room. He was still wearing his slacks and jacket. “Why aren’t you dressed yet?”
“I’m not going to be in the fight,” said Nick, letting out a deep breath.
I stared at him in surprise. “Wait, why? Did you withdraw your name?”
He shook his head. “No, I got taken off the card. Coach found out that I had accepted Bruce’s offer.”
“But the drug tests haven’t even come back yet.”
“I know.” Nick lowered his head. “I couldn’t take the guilt. I had to tell him.”
He strode over to the window, staring out over the balcony at the fading daylight. “I think I did the right thing in the end, but I should’ve done it a lot sooner. I can’t tell you how embarrassed I feel about it.”
“Are you being taken off the team?”
“No.” He chuckled to himself. “Turns out, the pills Bruce had been giving me weren’t actually growth hormones. They were placebos. Coach had asked him to go around making the pitch, seeing if he could find any takers. I stupidly fell for it, but because I didn’t take any actual drugs, I’m being let off with a penalty. He says I can play the next match.”
“Well, I suppose it could be a lot worse.”
“Yeah.” Nick blushed, still grinning idiotically. “They could have been real drugs. I could have lost my job.”
He seemed pretty badly shaken by the experience. With trembling hands, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette, which he lit as he stood on the balcony, letting the smoke twine around him.
“You know I was fired from one of my first jobs as a grocery stocker?” he asked me. “When I was seventeen and living in Jersey, I worked three nights a week stocking cans in the cold grocery store. It was a lonely job, and I had only the muzak to keep me company.
“There was a girl I sometimes ran into on my walk home—cute girl in her mid-twenties, but with terrible hygiene and threadbare clothes. Her name was Margo. And I eventually realized that she didn’t have a place to live. She would hang out at McDonald's each night until it closed and then wander around town until sunrise. God, it broke my heart just to see that.
“So what did I do? I started sneaking food out in my coat when I left for the night. A jar of peanut butter, a bag of crackers, a baguette… And I wasn’t exactly discreet about it, and it didn’t take my manager very long to figure out what I was doing. She called me into her office one night and fired me on the spot.
“So when Coach called me into his room just now, it was like reliving that moment all over again. I really thought I was about to lose my job. If that happened, I have no idea where I would go. MMA is my whole life. It’s the one thing I’m good at.”
“Well, you got off easy,” I said in a reassuring tone. “You’ll get your chance in the octagon soon. And until then you can be my bitch water boy.”
“Screw you,” said Nick, laughing in spite of himself.
We hung out and talked for another ten minutes until it was time for me to get ready. Coach came to the door and ushered me out into the hallway, leading us downstairs and into the green room where we found a mini-fridge stocked with small bottles of fruit juice. I took one and drank it down in one gulp, tossing the bottle across the room and into a wicker wastebasket.
“This event sold out in record time,” said Coach, poking his head through the door. “Everyone saw your performance on social media, and they’ve shown up hoping for a repeat.”
“Well, let’s give it to ‘em,” I said with a grin.
“Just remember,” said Nick, “Bones is a master of manipulation. He’ll taunt you, insult you, and say anything he can to get a rise out of you. I almost wish we were sending you out there with wax in your ears so you couldn’t hear him.”
“I’ll be fine,” I assured him. “Just focus on bringing me my water.”
Nick looked me over approvingly, wiping a stray strand of hair off my shoulders. “You ready for this?”
I gazed at the door. It was open a crack, and white light was spilling into the room from the auditorium, illuminating Coach’s feet.
I turned to Nick and smiled. “Fuck, yeah,” I replied. He took me by the hand, and together we walked out onstage.