There was something to be said for repeating the past, at least then you could already see the future sprawling ahead of you. The problem was that you were doomed to repetition so somehow you would make the same screwups all over again. Johnny didn't get it, this time he had been on the side of the losers, bolstering the confidence of the geeks and the nerds, and somehow it had still ended the same way. Well almost, this time the dirty tricks had warranted victory instead of loss but he had still felt the same shame of failure. Hearing Miguel boast of the pride he had in his sensei had Johnny thinking of John Kreese and his desire to win at all costs.
First Hawk had opted for a backstabbing kick resulting in a disqualification, and then Miguel had taken the title of champion by exploiting a weakness in his perceived enemy. Enemy. Johnny had put that word in their minds little knowing just who their enemy was going to be. His apology may as well have been spit on the bewildered Robby's eyes. It was the first Johnny had seen his son without the heated anger, instead there had just been sorrow and somehow that was worse.
Seeing Daniel guide Robby away from the cheers of the enemy to some sanctuary Johnny could never find for himself had filled him not with the expected loathing for LaRusso but only envy. LaRusso was living up in the rich hills Johnny had started in only he had the family and the love Johnny had been denied there. It seemed like some sick joke from the universe to visit the LaRusso household in a neighbourhood all too familiar to him and see that you didn't always have to pay a price for the wealth, if your name was Daniel you could have both the love and the money.
The irony of the role reversal was not lost on Johnny. His wealthy beginnings were Daniel's reality now and Daniel's poverty stricken start in life was Johnny's grim present. As if that wasn't enough to sting, Daniel had taken the role of father figure to Robby- father, sensei, and friend, Daniel was all the things Johnny was meant to be to Robby.
Johnny had tried to parent Miguel instead and he had screwed that up, passing onto him all the blood thirst and egotistical demand for victory that Kreese had pushed upon him. History was repeating itself and somehow Johnny couldn't stop it. He had to figure sardonically that perhaps it was better he hadn't parented Robby after all, evidently he would have only screwed him up.
Johnny stared down at the line up of shots before him, the bartender had offered them with a sultry smile figuring he was on a victory roll. He eyed them up as small doses of oblivion to subdue the sense of failure he was plagued with.
The blonde glanced over as the bar door opened and a rowdy female entered.
"Tequila," she called cheerfully as she shook her hips slightly. "Oh tequila," she almost sang it as she stepped up to the bar.
Johnny watched numbly as she pushed back a dark curl of hair and exposed a bloody trail seeping from her nostril. He wondered dubiously if she was licking war wounds or skating on a serious high.
"Tequila," she continued to sing, almost forcefully as she fumbled to tug out a wallet before smacking a note down on the polished mahogany bar surface.
Johnny's disinterested blue gaze rolled back to the other patrons. He saw a blonde in the corner shooting him a small smile. He thought of Ali and her cute blonde curls. The woman was wearing a headband too, sleek and gold compared to Ali's eighties white, wide headband but Johnny figured it was close enough. He snatched up a shot glass and swallowed, it was time to start numbing the pain.
Johnny felt the headache even before he recognised consciousness. He gave a low groan as his skull pounded in irritation letting him know two things, one- he had definitely drunk too much last night and two- he was not lying in a nice, comfortable bed.
Johnny kept his eyes closed as he caught a flashback of golden curls and tried to stay with the memory. There she was, his high school sweetheart, that one moment of untarnished happiness he still had left in his mind. He considered Cobra Kai momentarily, they were his pride and joy were they not? Seeing Miguel's hate filled eyes had him cringing- no mercy, only winning, values Johnny had instilled him. He had given Miguel all the skills to kick his own son's ass. Johnny had failed both of them in one day, hell he had failed Hawk and Aisha too, Hawk considered playing fair as a pussy move, and Aisha didn't know how to lose gracefully.
Johnny muttered a curse as he realised he was going to have wake up. The loud rattle of glass as someone abused a door with their fists let him know that there was something else to wake up for.
His eyes opened and he let out a hiss of, "shit" as his eyes burned with the searing of the morning L.A sun.
Johnny pushed his head up slowly from the hard wooden floor and he heard the humming of 'Tequila' in his head. He remembered dancing with a blonde. He frowned as he wondered where the hell the blonde was now. Johnny rubbed at the side of his face, banishing dried up drool as he took in the bouncing image of his dojo.
The cobra on the walls shifted up and down prompting an uneasy frown from him. He looked hastily for a bin that might double as a sick bucket before he heard the banging on the door again. It was hard on the glass prompting him to shift his hangover aside for rage.
Johnny jumped to his feet, bypassing an abandoned bottle of beer, and charged for the front door. He reached for it and was surprised to find it locked. He wondered why he'd bothered with that when he heard a low moan to the right.
His blue gaze shifted over wearily before his mouth parted slightly in surprise.
There was a woman lying there in a heap. Johnny made out a black, leather skirt creased in various spots and a pair of bruised bare legs bent inwards protectively beneath it. She shifted a tousle of dark waves aside to expose a bloody and bruised porcelain face.
"What the..." Johnny murmured wearily.
The woman gazed about her slowly with a calm confusion. "Well this isn't Disney World."
"You're...not blonde," Johnny stated dumbly as he tried to work out who this mess of a woman was and why in the hell she was lying in his dojo.
She attempted to turn his gaze up to him but the budding bruising on her right eye and the cut above her left eye made it a little difficult.
"No sunshine that's you," she said.
Splinters snapped through the air as the door came flying inward with the force of a brown booted foot.
"Hey!" Johnny exclaimed angrily as he looked to the assailant.
The blonde's rage switched suddenly to alarm as he took in the khaki uniform of the L.A County Sheriff's Department.
Two large, sun weathered hands were firmly clutched at a gleaming black Glock aimed straight at the karate school sensei's chest.
Johnny raised his hands up in the air instinctively although he contemplated a suggestion of mistaken identity.
"Back up," the cop ordered bluntly.
Johnny obeyed, taking a couple of steps back prompting the officer to step into the dojo. When his mirrored sunglasses cocked towards the beaten woman Johnny readied himself for an accusation.
The Glock was swung round suddenly to point down at the woman.
"Don't even flinch Jennifer," the officer snarled.
"Morning Greg, guess it must be Monday then," she retorted brightly as she raised her hands slightly.
"Don't even give me that shit."
The cop lowered one hand from the gun to fumble with a pair of handcuffs at his side.
"What the hell is going on?" Johnny pondered aloud.
The cop turned his sunglasses concealed stare on to Johnny. Despite getting his reflection doubled back Johnny knew he was getting the stink eye. He frowned back and offered up a cold stare, hoping the cop might recognise his surroundings and consider some caution.
The cop's slightly sun burned head bobbed up and down, taking in the cobra insignia on the wall before the silver sheened shades settled on Johnny again.
"I wonder if you were involved in last night's incident too ninja man," the cop barked out.
The woman let out a barely disguised chuckle, prompting her to clap a hand on her mouth as the Colt was aimed back at her. She waved off the cop with her other hand as the edges of a grin slipped out through her fingertips.
"That's sensei," Johnny corrected sharply, "and it's karate not ninja."
"All the same," the cop grumbled. "Hitting, kicking and hurting, taking lawful matters into your own hands with violence. Got you dead to rights on that one Jennifer, got witnesses and CCTV footage, would love to know what daddy's going to say about that one."
Jennifer had her hands up in a half-raised position once more exposing her marked up face.
"Take a look at me Greg," she said cheerfully, "does it look like I did the damage?"
"Looks like you were in one hell of a fight and to look at the others guys hell yeah, you did do the damage."
Johnny's blue stare darted over to the woman again, he wasn't getting any sense of embarrassed libido or rising lust so they definitely hadn't come back here to bump uglies so why in the hell was she here then? He heard the hum of 'Tequila' again and caught a slightly blurry image of pool cues cracking off each like swords.
The blonde winced suddenly as he remembered the black eight ball soaring through the air and straight into a man's junk with an unpleasant thunk.
The woman saw Johnny's wince and offered him a smile that was marred by the swelling in the corner of her mouth.
"It was a good game of pool last night, wasn't it?" she quipped innocently.
"That's it Jennifer, you're under arrest," the cop snapped.
He started reading her his rights, the words a fading murmur to Johnny as he kept staring at her and catching flashbacks of last night. There she was at the bar ordering tequila shots, blood streaking from her nose, bruised knuckles shaking as she took the shot glass and spilled half it with her quivers.
Johnny remembered dancing with a blonde who for a fleeting moment he'd let booze convince him was Ali. They'd made a dance floor of the sticky tiles between the booths and the bar, swaying along awkwardly to low playing music. She'd said something about adding him on 'Facebook' and he had looked at her like she'd sprouted horns.
The bar door had opened and in had spilled the vermin of the street. Johnny racked his brains for the bar's name but it wasn't there, it had been the third one he'd stumbled to that night. There was a group, Johnny didn't recall numbers, just a couple of the men crowding round the tequila woman at the bar.
He remembered someone screaming about their eye and then the shit had started.
Johnny had kept dancing, he wasn't there to be involved, he wanted to be back in the eighties sharing a prom dance with Ali. His stepfather had always said he wouldn't keep her, that he couldn't keep girls because he couldn't keep focus on anything. Johnny was the loser who kept losing things- girlfriends, karate tournaments, grades.
Johnny's right hand reached round to his back and he winced again remembering a pool cue striking off it. That was when he had become involved.
Johnny blinked, bringing himself back into the now. The woman was in cuffs and on her feet getting marched out of the place.
"Goodbye then," Johnny murmured dully.
He wasn't getting involved again and getting himself arrested with her.
The problem was Johnny had been involved, striking out with karate moves that came because he'd been pissed off that his fantasising had been interrupted not because four men were beating up on one woman. He looked to the cop who'd mentioned CCTV and wondered why the woman was in cuffs, Johnny knew she hadn't started it. Then Johnny thought about the bar and the group again, men in suits, shirts and shiny satin ties who'd queried Johnny's scruffy presence and laughed at his dance moves. The barmaid had shrugged and said he was a winner but Johnny couldn't smile at that. He remembered spilling half his beer on the floor while trying to dance, that was why the floor had been sticky.
The bar had been fancy, not his usual type, but news had spread about Cobra Kai's win and places he was usually banned from were ready to welcome him.
The blonde had asked about his trophies, said something about seeing him at the tournament and queried about the prize money. Yeah, he was a real winner, luring in the ladies because they wanted a taste of his newfound fortune. Except the prize hadn't been much and it was as much for Miguel as for him, his shares would cover debts, they wouldn't extend to anything new.
"It's just another Manic Monday," the woman sang chirpily.
Was it delirium, was she drunk or was she just trying to piss off the cop? Johnny didn't know and he didn't care, she had to go, she was trouble and he had his own problems.
Johnny winced at the sunlight lighting up the car park and closed the door.
"It's definitely a Monday," he grumbled to himself.