Nicole fell asleep a few minutes after our mom left, so I turned off the movie and carried her upstairs. Kissing her on the forehead, I closed the door and went into my room.
I wasn’t really tired, so I decided to get started on drawing the picture of Ashton I took earlier that day. I copied the picture from my phone to my computer so I could see it better. At around 10:00, I finished the initial pencil sketch and decided to go to bed. (Yeah, I know that’s early. I was tired, okay?)
I turned out the light and was getting ready to go to bed, when I heard a noise from Nicole’s room. I crept across the hall and put my ear up to her door.
“…I can’t, my mom would kill me… Ok, fine. Just wait. I’ll be there soon.”
I heard her get out of bed, so I moved to the shadows of the corner. A small light flicked on in her room and she started opening drawers. When I heard her moving toward the door, I realized that I had no time to move.
I stood perfectly still, hoping that her eyes wouldn’t be adjusted enough to the dark to see me. Nicole tiptoed past me and down the stairs. She unlocked and went through the front door, silently closing it behind her.
I watched her walk out to the sidewalk and decided to follow her. I ran back upstairs to get my phone, just in case, and came back to the front door. Nicole started walking toward the park in the middle of our neighborhood.
I sprinted from our front door to the large tree in our neighbor’s yard. From behind the cover, I watched Nicole walk over to the playground and stand there, as if waiting for someone. I continued moving from cover to cover until I was only about twenty feet away from her.
After a few minutes, a tall figure showed up. He walked over to Nicole and started talking to her. When she responded, the conversation started getting heated.
“What do you mean ‘we can’t be together anymore’?!” He shouted as Nicole tried to calm him.
He reached for Nicole and she pulled away. When she angrily told him to fuck off, he stopped dead. Then, he reached for her again, more aggresively this time. She slapped him hard. He shoved her backwards and she stumbled, falling to the ground.
It was at this point that I decided to intervene. I made my way over to them, but when Nicole looked at me, the guy turned around and saw me.
“This is none of your business.” He said dismissively.
“That doesn’t matter.” I growled. “Get away from her, fuck-face.” I walked forward so I was only a few feet away from him.
“Leave now, and I’ll pretend you didn’t say that.”
“You leave now, and I won’t rip your hands off for touching that girl.” I had decided not to use her name so the guy wouldn’t know who I was later.
“Fuck you.” He replied as he reached into his pocket.
My years of karate kicked in. One of the most important things you can learn in self-defense is that if someone reaches for his pocket in a heated situation, he’s probably about to pull out a weapon. I quickly shoved him backward to allow Nicole time to get up.
Sure enough, he pulled out a short tactical knife, the kind that’s sold in camping stores. It was too dark to see who he was, but he was a couple inches shorter than me and slightly built.
“Get out of here, girl.” I warned her, never taking my eyes off of the attacker. Nicole ran home, tears streaming down her face.
Luckily, I could tell that he wasn’t an experienced knife fighter. Someone who knows what they’re doing holds the knife blade-down to allow for powerful overhead strikes. He gripped it blade-up and advanced toward me.
I shifted my center of gravity lower and got ino a fighting stance. At the same time, I started talking to him in a calm, calculated tone, trying to stop him from attacking or at least distract him.
“Stop now while you still can. You’ve never stabbed anyone, have you?”
He didn’t respond, but the nervousness in his motions confirmed my suspicion.
“What’s that, a four-inch blade? Do you know what that would do to me?”
“Shut up.” He muttered.
“Say you stab me with that. First you’d puncture my skin and rupture some blood vessels. Then, you’d go through a layer of muscle and fat. After that’s the good stuff; if you miss my bones, you’d probably ruin some vital organs.”
“Shut up!” He said, more insistently this time.
“I might die.” I added, trying to pick my first move. “Do you think you could handle that? Watching my skin grow pale as my eyes lose their light?”
“SHUT UP!” He screamed, sounding like he was going to be sick.
“It’d be a slow, painful death, too. It might take hours. How would you feel if–” I stopped suddenly as I made my move.
I lunged forward and hit him squarely in the nose with the palm of my hand. This served two purposes. The first was that the pain of a broken nose distracted him from the fight, and the second was that his eyes teared up, which blurred his vision badly.
He reeled backward, waving his knife hand blindly. I kicked him in the stomach so he would double over, then moved behind him. I grabbed his wrist and twisted it until he dropped the knife out of sheer agony. After that, I forced him to the ground so I could pull his arms behind him, disabling him.
“I suggest you go to the hospital.” I coolly said. “I’ll let you go if you never go near that girl again. Ok? Otherwise, you’ll be going to the morgue instead of the hospital.”
He didn’t respond.
“Ok?” I twisted his arms even farther behind his back.
“Ok, fine.” He gasped.
“Now, I’m going to get off of your back and you’re going to stay on the ground, facing down, for sixty seconds. If you get up, I’ll come back to you and break something else. Something important. Something not so easily fixed. Ok?”
“Yes.”
I cautiously lifted myself off of him, grabbed the knife, and began backing away. True to his word, the guy stayed on the ground. I jogged back to my house, checking on him every few seconds. On the way, I threw the knife in our trash can outside. When I walked in through the front door, he was gone.
I entered to find my mom sitting with Nicole in the living room.
“Sit.” She commanded.
I realized I was in trouble, but I didn’t really care. Nicole was fine, I was fine, the bad guy learned his lesson, end of story.
“I’m glad you’re alright,” She hugged me. “but neither of you is to do anything like this again. Nicole, you are very grounded. Aaron, I’ll let it slide this time.”
“Thanks, mom. I’m sorry.” I was grateful that she saw it this way. Also, I realized that Nicole must not have said anything about the knife.
“Now, back to bed. Both of you.”
I grabbed Nicole in a one-armed hug and walked her upstairs.
“Who was that guy?” I asked.
“Just a guy I was trying to break things off with.” She said.
I got the feeling she wasn’t telling me the whole story, but I didn’t press her on it. Nicole hugged me good night and then ushered me out of the room. Despite being all wired from the fight, I found that I was extremely tired and fell asleep quickly.
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