Fighting For Life (published)

Get away

Aubry's POV-

We'd been training for far too long. In all honesty, I was simply stalling because I had truly no idea where the dude was going to drop me off at when the time was to come. I was screwed.

When Aiden finally put his foot down at my stalling, I had to comply. I didn't want to, but I had to. I forgot that he actually had a family and people cared about where he was all night long...

I sat in the chair feeling like crap. I was in pain from going way too hard during training. I was tired from the lack of sleep in my life. I was hungry from not eating more than a few scraps. I was exhausted...

I could feel his eyes on my back as he put the ice down. I knew that it looked pretty awful... It was pretty awful. When he circled back around to my face, his eyes held pity for me... Pity and worry.

To distract him from the awfulness of my back, I spoke up unexpectedly, "Aiden, what was your childhood like?" In all honesty I wasn't sure what was going to come out of my mouth, and I was just as surprised as him by what came out of my mouth. I was seriously curious, though.

I could tell he wasn't expecting the question and struggled for an answer for a second. "Well, um... it was good for the most part, I guess. I can't really remember a lot of it, to be honest. I lived with my mom and dad until my dad left when I was four years old." He got a haunted look on his face as he spoke. "Then my mom had to work a lot to support us. My grandma and grandpa had us a lot growing up, that's why we're all so close with Pawpaw. My uncle Johnny had me a lot too, that's how I got into fighting. My uncle pretty much became my father after that. I trained here at the gym with him and T all the time." I swallowed harshly at his obvious distress. I felt so bad. The boy went through far too much... "And then... When I turned twelve, my dad came back. That's why there's such a big age gap between Bri and Cece; they didn't have Cece until he came back. And then me and my dad became best friends once again. We worked on cars together, that was kind of "our thing." I kept on fighting and I stayed into cars with my dad... And then he died."

I sucked in a deep breath at the last line. Then he died. I quickly pushed away my thoughts that wanted to berate me. I couldn't do that right then... I quickly and firmly grabbed his hand in mine. I just wanted to give him some comfort.

He looked at my hands in his. He ran his fingers over mine. His smile was small, but it was real.

In that moment, I felt... I don't even know what the feeling was, it was just good.

After a while, we finally got up. We both knew it was time to go. My nervousness returned with a vengeance, I still wasn't sure what sure where I was going... However, the nervousness slightly dissipated when Aiden grasped my arm softly. It was weird, just his touch calmed me.

"Do I ever get to hear about your childhood?" He whispered hesitantly.

"Someday, okay?" I told him with a promise in my voice.

I really did want him to know... I just wasn't sure if he could handle it.

----
"Where to?" He asked as we settled into his truck.

The little park that I had been sleeping in came to mind. I told him the direction of the neighborhood near that park, and he nodded his head. He seemed to know where he was going.

The silent car ride was pretty comfortable, but I was overly nervous. Nervous about sleeping in the cold, nervous about him dropping me off at some random place, nervous about him finding out about my predicament... nervous about my whole life in general. I was a wreck, as was my life...