{When you're on next, a prompt for you} "Just what happened last night?"
@doubting-tomas
For a moment she acted as if she simply hadnāt heard Tomasā question and ignored his question in favour of tending to her grazed knuckles. After so many years of boxing and, quite frankly, punching anyone and anything that looked at her funny sheād hoped the skin on her knuckles would be too tough to be damaged anymore, but no such luck. At least the amount of scars on her knuckles made her look tough. Eventually she sighed, glanced up at him over the fire with tired eyes. There was no point in ignoring him, heād just end up cornering her about it later, or acting all concerned and wounded like some kind of kicked puppy and dammit, why did he have to care so much? Wouldnāt it be better for them both if he just did a runner like the rest of the people who were meant to look out for her? She felt guilty for thinking it, but not nearly as guilty as she felt for hoping he would never stop caring.Ā
āYou know that bar, the one by the hairdressers with the creepy, weird mascot? Itās like, scissors with boobs or something, you know the one. Anyway, thereās a bar next to that, itās pretty decent if you donāt mind your shoes sticking to everything. I was meant to be meeting this girl, just for a bit of fun, yāknow, nothing serious,āĀ
Thom waggled his eyebrows in the way he always thought was suave and she laughed and settled into her chair and her story. Ā
āWell yeah, anyway, there I was just drinking, waiting for her to show, but thereās this dude there and heās like, a total creep. Iām talking leery face, looking at everyoneās tits, probably has a dead body in the boot of his car creepy. And he uh, he keeps hitting on this girl at the other end of the bar, to be honest I think sheād sneaked in with a fake ID, but he keeps hitting on her even though sheās like, obviously uncomfortable. So I go over and Iām like dude, sheās said no, and then he called the two of us sluts and I obviously wasnāt about to let that go.āĀ
A hesitation, she watched his features darken and offered across her following words carefully.Ā
āAnd well uh yeah, long story short I may have hit him, and uh, got into a bit of a bar fight. Well, I dunno if Iād call it a bar fight so much as a bar, I dunno, disagreement. The point is he came out of it worse than me, and I text the girl I was waiting for and walked this teenage girl to the taxi rank because she was crying a lot and thatās uh, thatās pretty much that.āĀ
When she finished her tale, Thom at least looked torn before he started grilling her for getting into fights and putting herself in danger, and even then she could tell he was, under all of the concern, proud of her, kind of, because alright it was a stupid thing to do, but the guy had it coming anyway. At least it didnāt look like heād bee angry for too long.Ā
Which was kind of the point, actually, because that wasnāt what had happened last night at all.Ā
What had happened was this: it had been one of those days that was just too much, where it felt like her skin wasnāt sitting right and her hands wouldnāt stop shaking no matter what she did. And sheād tried, she really had, sheād gone for a run, and when that hadnāt worked sheād tried praying and art and-well none of that had worked so in a last ditch effort to not feel so terrible sheād gone to the cheap gym in the town to work it out with one of the punching bags. Except, on the way back from the gym, there had been a guy, and he had been a creep, that much was true at least. Heād catcalled her (kat-called, there was a pun there, for a better day) when sheād been walked back in her shorts and sheād justā¦snapped.Ā
Two punches, she reckoned the guy managed to get in two punches before sheād floored him. Poor bastard had never stood a chance. When the fog had finally lifted sheād checked to see if her was still breathing (he was, and groaning, thank God, thank God, oh God what had she done?) before calling an ambulance and running.Ā
She couldnāt tell him that. Better to sit there and listen to Thomās lectures about looking after herself than admitting to him, to anyone, what had happened. It sat in her stomach and twisted it though, and crushed down on her chest till she could barely breathe. Once, when she was little, sheād beat up a boy from school whoād called her a freak. It was one of the only times she saw her mum really angry (an anger that turned to concern eventually, and Kat was sorry, she was so sorry). āYou canāt beat up everyone who does something mean, Katherine,ā sheād said, āor youāll become just as bad as them. You need to learn to think with something other than your fists or I donāt know whatāll happen to you.ā Well, that question had been answered when sheād ended up in a cell at 17 for half killing a guy on the streets of North Cana, hadnāt it?Ā
āYouāre alright though, yeah?āĀ
Thomās voice cut though through her thoughts. She nearly told him. God, she nearly told him, but she stopped herself last second because she was selfish, she was selfish and she couldnāt bare to see disgust in his eyes when he looked at her, so she lied, again.Ā
āYeah, Iām fine.āĀ













