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He’d laughed, which made me feel better for him. Since then, he decided to come in on off days for me to help him. If he kept coming to his regular class once a week, training with me once a week, and practicing in between, he was going to be awesome at this. He seemed dedicated and kind of stubborn—a perfect combination when it came to dealing with assholes like the Cassidy brothers.
I pointed to the floor. “Lay down,” I told him. “I’ll show you again, and then you can try on me, okay?”
David nodded and lowered himself to the floor. He laid flat on his back with his knees in the air and feet on the mat. I straddled his torso and placed his hands on my shoulders.
“Okay. So, if you have an opponent you take to the ground and you’re on top of them, the first thing they’re probably going to try to do is put their hands on your chest or shoulders to hold you up and away from them. This would make it difficult for you to punch them since their arms are blocking your swing.”
I did a slow swing to demonstrate. He nodded and adjusted his hands to a more comfortable spot on my shoulders right where they attach at my chest. I placed my right hand behind his arm on the center of his chest, while my left hand wrapped around the front of his arm and laid flat on top of my right. This made it so his arm was trapped between mine, giving me the ability to move around.
“You’re going to put your hands on their chest like this and lean forward.” I leaned forward just enough to get my point across, but not enough to compress his chest. “This is going to take your weight off your legs and allow you to swing them around.”
Leaning forward, I swung around so my right leg was wrapped inward around his shoulder, while I knelt on my left knee.
“Now that I have you here, I’m going to lean forward again.” I leaned forward, once again pressing my hands into his chest for leverage. “And this leg I’m kneeling on, I’m going to swing it around, so it’s draped over your face. At that point, I’ll have your chest pinned with my right leg, your head pinned with my left leg, and I’ll have a hold on your right arm and pulling it back.”
I moved quickly, demonstrating everything I just told him. When I fell back onto the mat, I had him pinned as I’d stated and his arm between my legs and across my abdomen, his wrist in both of my hands. The bend of his elbow faced the ceiling, and I pulled down on his wrist, bending his elbow backwards.
He tapped my leg, signaling he’d reached his limit, so I let go. I scooted back off him, and we both sat.
“What do you think?” I asked. “Think you can do it?”
He nodded. “Yeah, I think so. I might need you to coach me through it as I do it, though.”
“Yep. No problem.”
I flattened myself out on the mat with my knees in the air and feet flat just as he had earlier. He straddled my stomach, and I placed my hands on his shoulders. I guided his hand placement on my chest. The placement seemed confusing to him at first, but I was seriously impressed. Once he got his placement right, he swiveled around perfectly and had my arm pinned and bent backwards almost immediately. It was so smooth.
“Damn!” I said as I tapped his leg. “Nice job! See? I told you you’d get it!”
David was all smiles. “Thanks! I feel like once I get the first few basic moves down, I’ll feel more comfortable.”
I nodded. “Definitely. It just takes some time. I’ve been doing this shit since I was a kid. I’ve always been in sports and stuff, so this is natural to me. You’re just getting started. You just gotta give yourself some room to make mistakes and grow. You’ll get it. You did that one great.”
The rest of the class went smoothly. Around halfway through, David practiced with the other kids and seemed to be evenly matched with them. This group of kids was the group I liked best. They were slower learners, but they were good kids. The others were faster learners and acted just like the little shits I went to school with every day. Just their very presence pissed me off, honestly, but I dealt with it for Randy, the owner of the gym.
Once I’d finished up with the class, I walked through a door that led to an open gym full of weights, bars, benches, and pretty much any equipment you could dream of. Toward the back was a boxing ring and all the boxing training equipment. I dabbled in it, but I wasn’t good enough to get in the ring with anyone with any level of real talent in the sport.
I’d get my ass kicked.
I took off the jacket to my Gi and stuffed it in my bag, followed by the pants. I had on a tank top and ball shorts underneath, which I was perfectly comfortable working out in. I walked over to the mat and began stretching. I wasn’t much in the mood to work out, but I knew I needed to get my mind in it. In a few days, Damian would get everyone together for group workouts, and they’d be brutal.
We had to get ready for football season, and I wasn’t looking forward to it at all.
Once I finished stretching, I put in my ear buds and started my playlist. I jumped on the treadmill and hoped I could stand to make it through the five miles I needed to get through.
CHAPTER SEVEN
TEMPERANCE
Over the course of the next week, I had several calls to my room offering me everything from money to random gifts for exclusives. Late last week, one suspected reporter was good enough to get scrubs and pose as a nurse to get into my room. I’d been napping and woke up to the sound of someone digging through my trash.
She startled when I groaned as I tried to reposition a little. My IV had started beeping, so I asked her about pain meds and if she could stop the beeping. She looked at the IV pole like she was staring into the engine of a plane, and someone asked her to do maintenance on it.
It took no time at all to realize something wasn’t right.
If there had been students on the floor, they would have told me. They only came in on Wednesdays, and it was Tuesday. So, I had a feeling she wasn’t who she said she was.
“Can you stop that beeping? It’s driving me crazy,” I asked again, knowing she had no idea what she was doing.
