Page 78 of There Is No Love

I nod, “yeah. So?”

“I got you a fight, you’re up at the end of the night. But it’s with Wild Bill”

I smiled, a laugh escaped my nose. “Fine with me.”

Nick shook his head, “ok, please don’t die, Al will kill me.”

“I highly doubt that, I bet she thanks you if I die.”

“No, she will be mad, trust me.”

The two of us made our way into the middle of the crowd, watching the other fighters go at it. It was bloody, one guy hit so hard blood sprayed from his mouth over the crowd. A few fights in, I look across and see Wild Bill. The two of us gave each other a nod. I had seen him fight once before. He got his nickname because he was always calm. A poker game, a fight, the middle of a gunfight. The man stayed cool as a cucumber. He was a force to be reckoned with though, and a good fighter. This would not be an easy fight. But that is what I needed. Being knocked around had become my medicine. Since that first time Arturo punched me in the face, as Stefano watched from the sidelines, I craved violence. Maybe it started as a way to impress him, to show him I was a man. But I liked the way I felt when I took a punch, the visceral feeling of being able to take a punch better than the guy I was fighting. I knew Arturo blamed himself for Charlie being taken, but I blamed myself for just sitting there. For doing nothing when these slimy men around us bid on all those girls. I could still see their faces. Like a movie playing over and over in my head on a loop. Every time we got a few girls out, I searched for just one of them. But we haven't found a single one of the girls from that night. I wondered if we would ever find Charlie if we would ever find any of them. And so, the fighting, the pain became my way to self-medicate, to fight the demons in my head.

“Luka, you’re up.,” Nick spoke, breaking me from my thoughts. I nodded, making my way under the ropes and to the middle of the ring.

“Wild Bill,” the man Nick had talked to earlier said. Wild Bill gave him a nod. He turned to me “Savage,” I nodded. “No rules. Go until someone taps out, passes out, or dies”

Wild Bill and I knocked knuckles and took a step back waiting for the bell to ring. The bell rang, I pushed to the middle as the two of us started throwing punches. Both landing and dodging. His fist connected with my face, splitting my lip wide open. I shook my head, gathering my composure when I felt him connect with my ribs. I took a deep breath, and swung up, catching him under the jaw. We go back and forth, round after round. Both of us matched punch for punch. I felt overrun with exhaustion; he was barely standing.

“TAKE HIM OUT!” I hear Nick yell from the corner of the ring, but it’s muffled. I stepped forward, lifting my arm, they felt like they weighed a hundred pounds. I reared back, swinging with everything I had left. I connected with his jaw; his body spun before crumbling to the ground. I hear the crowd erupt. I stumbled trying to focus as everything around me blurred together. I saw a blurry Nick jump into the ring. He stepped in front of me, cheering. My head pounded in my ears, and my mouth and tongue felt like sandpaper on the roof of my mouth. “You ok?” Nick asked.

I felt my legs wobble underneath me. I looked up at him, “Alora” and then everything went black.

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