"…"
"I said let's have a real fight."
"That's the first time I don't find you funny." What nonsense was she on about?
"Um, It's not funny because I'm not joking?" She had a straight face.
"Don't get all weird on me, sparklers. Just give me a call when you want to come by, it's not too much to … sparklers?"
She turned away from me and took a few steps towards the door, I almost thought she was heading out of my room when my head started playing tricks on me all over again today.
The tiny thing could NOT have possibly done a full spinning heel kick right in the middle of my small room, right in front of me. Right?
I rubbed my eyes once, and then again, but the scene was not changing, the tiny thing had taken a guard position.
"Sophie, did you just…"
"I'm just getting warmed up, big boy. Watch me better this time."
She delivered one heck of a front kick that I had to dodge, it was followed by a straight punch and then a roundhouse kick that almost got me. To my horror, my body automatically took the southpaw boxing stance. Recognizing that there was a dangerous fighter in front of me while my brain was still in denial.
"Are you…"
"About to kick your high and mighty butt? I sure am!"
"Hah! I'd like to see you try that!" Li was not being sarcastic as he suddenly came in through my door and the already small room got impossibly smaller.
"Why don't you take this to my room where I can be the referee, I might just witness my little brother's tears for the first time in our lives after all. I wouldn't miss it for the world."
My brother smiled widely, he was enjoying the idea of me getting hit a bit too much.
.
.
.
On the short way from the third floor where my room was to Li's room on the second floor, and right by a final couple of stairs, I learned something new about Sophie. In one word, she was amazing.
"A black belt?!"
"Olivia called me before Sophie came here, she said she was on her way, I naturally objected because it was dark outside and offered to come to pick her up instead, that was when this little monster's mother broke it to me."
"Hey! stop talking about me as the third person singular who is not standing in the same room with you! It's rude!"
"It's not, Soph, little bro needs a moment to digest exactly how cool you are." Li had his own nickname dedicated to sparklers.
"Let me ask you this now, is there something you CAN'T do, sparklers?"
She scratched her head and twisted her lips up, exaggerating being deep in thought, acting her age for once.
"Nah, a girl should never expose her secrets. Now, will you stop stalling and surrender your butt to me already?" She was joking but her confidence was solid. When I realized that she believed she had a chance to win against me, something squeezed my heart.
"Sophie, if a guy my size ever attacked you… if you were ever in this situation…"
She picked up on the thought that hurt me, as intuitive as ever. She smiled softly and her eyes were tender, suddenly, it felt like she was three years older than her real age to me.
"Theo, it's why I asked you to fight me, one year later, maybe not, but this me today will take this you down. There's no doubt about it."
I nodded once, I knew that I had to prove her wrong, even if she was really good. If a guy my size ever attacked her. I wanted her to run.
We moved things around a bit in Li's already spacy room, I was in more of an advantage now in this small space that fitted a boxing ring much better than a karate arena. The little girl looked like she didn't care, I felt my anger creeping up on me all over again.
This was not me, when did I get upset this easily?
"Ready?" Liam was having fun. "Fight!" She immediately jumped on me.
She threw a side kick that would've reached a shorter man's throat and crushed his Adam's apple, we both counter-react with kicks; I did that with a half-serious side kick to the face; Sophia with a back kick to almost hit my groin.
"Soph! My future nieces and nephews!" Li half panicked half laughed out loud.
"Tell daddy to take me seriously." Sophie was not joking.
She made a come around with an elbow smash to my face, knocking me back a step. Right before my head processed that the tiny thing landed one on me, she repeated her full spinning heel kick, knocking me backward another step. I sat on the butt she just kicked laughing, I tapped the ground next to me three times.
"Referee! What's the dummy doing!?"
"Hahaha it's called a corner stoppage, he just gave you the game."
"Oh come on guys! He didn't even take me seriously! I can't believe he's still looking down on me after what I just showed him!"
"Who's using the third person singular now? Ha sparklers?" I was laughing but not at her, I was laughing so hard because of how peaceful my heart became after she was able to push someone like me back twice, the girl was a one-mean killing machine. I was so relieved.
It was the end of the day and tomorrow was a school day. Sophie, Li, and I all went out to take her back home, it wasn't to keep her safe anymore, it was because we didn't want our time with her to come to an end.
We talked about martial arts all the way, in Sophie's head, while traditional karate was not flashy, it was without a doubt one of the most wholesome methods of combat on the planet.
She was quite impressed that I laughed so hard after being hit by a full spinning heel kick. Other "opponents" just dropped then and there according to her, I wasn't taken aback, it was normal to lose your consciousness after receiving that kind of a hit from a blackbelt since you could get ridiculous amounts of power on a spinning heel kick even when pulling it.
On the way back home after dropping sparklers, Li and I discussed the best defense against a spinning kick, we both agreed that it was to move into the opponent past the knee. Whether front kick or back kick, it was hands down the best defense. We just considered the physics behind the momentum generated from the spin or the swing. It was pure science.
All the way there, something nagged on the back of my head, I couldn't shake the feeling that multiple eyes were on me.
I was probably just being paranoid.
It was pretty late by the time we got back from the bus walk. I still had homework to do, so I took a quick shower before Li did, changed into a pair of dry sweats, then sat in my room to study.
I liked studying at night.
Nighttime concentration was always second nature to me, taking after mom for sure. She was a freelancer who did consulting gigs on a variety of different topics that were all related to management somehow, and she always worked the nights away, we never felt anything missing from our daily lives with her. She ran a perfect house and dedicated her all to her husband and children.
I had to admit that I did get jealous of dad as a young boy, I knew she was madly in love with him, her time was divided equally between all of us, and she did not put us first when it came to him.
Why was I asking for heartache now?
I dived into the math problem inside my textbook, vaguely wondering if this burning sensation whenever I thought of my parents would ever go away.
How did people move on anyway?
I sighed and went to the next problem. It wasn't until a couple of hours before I finished everything. I had decided to turn in for the night a bit earlier, but since that plan had already failed, I decided to get a second round of the leftovers from the earlier dinner, I went through two matches after all today.
I was smiling and shaking my head as I went down the stairs to the kitchen, and I wasn't surprised to see my brother taking out a plate from the cupboard, he took notice of me, then he took out two instead, knowing too well that I came down to do exactly what he planned on doing.
"Her food should be illegal man," Li said.
"I hear you. No guilt there, let's finish it all up." I encouraged.
"So? What's for tomorrow's dinner?" he asked warily. I had already decided on learning to do the bare minimum which led to coming up with something edible, the problem was that Sophie's constant interference was spoiling me.
"You have it easy man, you can always dig outside under the snow and get by on a few scoops of dirt." He threw his used fork at me which I caught with ease, but that move had a penalty to it, he'd get it after our second round of dinner, so he smiled at me expectantly.
We ate while we talked about his university for a few more minutes. It wasn't uncomfortable for him. And for that, I was truly glad. We all but licked the plates clean afterward, neither of us was bothered by the quiet that progressed naturally. In some ways, Li and I were always intuned with each other like that.
We were the perfect family, and not only for the sake of appearances.
"So, have you made any friends?" he asked as we started attacking what was left of the cheesecake.
"Besides everyone? A couple of boys stand out, Elijah and his twin brother Liam." I saw an interesting look on his face. "They're not identical if that was what you were thinking." Maybe he wanted to know if I was able to tell them apart.
"It's not that! It's just that you have two Liams around you now." He smiled broadly.
"…If I told you I just noticed that his name was the same as yours, would you think I'm crazy?" I disliked the guy so much; that I didn't even link his name to my brother's.
"Ouch Theo! You know it hurts right? It's not like my name is that common. What? You go to school and just forget about me?"
He surely liked his drama. I gave him a bored look.
"Any interesting girls there?" He said as he stuffed his mouth with the perfect amount of cheesecake.
The fullest amount possible.
It made me laugh and bought me some time. I avoided answering directly.
"I let down one today actually, it sucked." I cringed as I remembered her unshed tears.
"That soon, huh. Well, there was no way around that." I nodded to that once. He turned thoughtful.
"Maybe getting a girlfriend might help again this time?" I shook my head in a firm no, I didn't want to go there, I hated that the girl's image popped into my head when Li mentioned the word 'girlfriend'.
"That's cool man, you should do whatever makes you comfortable."
.
.
.
I should just tell him.
"Li, so you know Mrs. White, mom's friend?"
His eyes immediately hardened.
"What about her?"
And it hit me again, he was also upset the first time Olivia talked about her. I wondered if he knew she had a daughter but decided to close the subject.
"I asked what about her, was she weird with you?" He demanded uncharacteristically.
"No man, she stood behind the line I drew for her."
"Good."
What was up with Li?