Page 19 of The Dragon

“It’s finally Friday, and I’m looking forward to the weekend. I can hit the jiu-jitsu studio tomorrow.”

Patrick leaned against the end of the locker and drank from his Gatorade bottle. I sat on the bench and leaned forward to open the locker. When the combination lock popped open, I toed off my shoes, pulled off my shirt, and looked up at him.

“But the best part of the weekend is the TCF fight tomorrow night,” I said.

“Man, that Top Cage Fighters stuff is brutal,” he said as he walked to the other side of the lockers to where his was located.

“I love it. I want to become a fighter. My parents said if I still had the interest this summer, they’d find me a mixed martial arts trainer so I can compete.”

“Damn, man. You really want to step into the ring—”

“Cage,” I corrected him.

“Whatever, the cage. You want to fight?”

“I want to compete,” I said before I closed the door to my locker. “I’m heading to the shower,” I called over the lockers to him.

While I showered, I decided to invite Patrick over to watch the fight tomorrow night. If he couldn’t come over, no big deal, but I thought it’d be nice to invite him. He didn’t seem to have any friends and wasn’t a bad guy, despite his gruff, tough-guy attitude he sometimes threw around. I was surprised he hadn’t appeared in the shower yet, but maybe he was shy. When I finished, I wrapped a towel around my waist and walked back to my locker. Patrick breezed by me on his way to the shower as I pulled clean underwear out of my gym bag.

After I was fully dressed, I took a tennis ball out of my bag, laid down on the bench, and tossed the ball in the air. As soon as the ball was in the air, I quickly moved my hand in a certain pattern before the ball came down for me to catch. It was a task I continually did to work on the speed of my hand-eye coordination.

I heard wet feet hurry across the floor and raised my head off the bench in time to see the last bit of Patrick’s towel zip by. I sat up and bounced the tennis ball off the floor. When it sounded like he was done and shut his locker, I pulled my backpack and gym bag out of my locker and stood when he came around the corner.

“What are you doing this weekend?” I asked as we walked outside.

“Fuck, I don’t know. I’ll be at karate tomorrow morning and then who knows. Hide out at the library maybe.”

“The library? Fuck that.”

“Trust me. The library isn’t so bad.”

“Who are you hiding from? The kids you want to be able to defend yourself from?”

“No. Forget it.”

“Okay, well, would you like to come over to my house tomorrow night and watch the TCF event?”

“What?”

“The event that’s on tomorrow night. We were just talking about it.” I frowned and gestured back at the gym.

“Hollis!” A kid in the distance called my name, and when I looked in the direction of the voice, I realized it was a group of kids from the wrestling team. I held my hand up to wave and then returned my attention to Patrick.

“The Top Cage Fighters event is tomorrow night. Want to come over and watch?”

“You’re serious?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you having a bunch of people over?”

“No. Just you. Well, and my brothers will be there. The three of us pooled our allowances together so we could get the event on Pay-Per-View. Stuff starts as early as six, but the main fight won’t be until after eight or so.” I shrugged. “We make a whole night of it, so if you don’t mind my brothers being there, you’re welcome to come by.”

“Yeah, thank you. I’d love to.”

I glanced around the student parking lot, and there was only my SUV left and a couple of trucks that the guys from the wrestling team were standing by.

“Do you have someone coming to pick you up?” I asked.

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