CHAPTER 47

That evening, as promised, Miguel got in his car and drove over to the Moonlight Diner, where Emily worked. His stomach ached in nervousness and his head was completely messed up. He was still thinking about the events of training earlier. Kicking Mr. Larusso had been a huge mistake. His selfishness and need to be the best had ruined what was actually a really cool demonstration by the sensei, and now Miguel risked Eagle-Fang being kicked out of Miyagi-Do. Although him and George for now were safe as they were strong enough to fight the Cobras, he knew that his other friends in Eagle-Fang weren't safe at all and already had targets painted on their backs by Cobra Kai. He had texted Johnny multiple times, knowing that Johnny was probably with Mr. Larusso, and he had asked Johnny to apologise to Mr. Larusso from him and that was honestly all he could do.

Needless to say, as Miguel walked into the diner, his head was completely in the wrong place. His mind was in other places when it should've just been on trying to make this girl like him. However, as Miguel stepped into the diner and saw her behind the counter at the front, the spinning in his mind slowed to a halt. Immediately, upon seeing her gorgeous face, the turmoil that was crashing through Miguel's mind like angry ocean waves calmed. For about the hundredth time since he first saw her last night, Miguel had to pinch himself to double check that this was reality. That a person could actually have this effect on another person without even talking to them. Thankfully, he wasn't dreaming, and this person was 100% real. This person was real and if Miguel tried hard enough, would eventually fall for him as hard as he had fallen for her.

Putting all of his fears and worries out of his head, Miguel took a deep breath. You got this, he told himself. Although he was a far from perfect person, he was slowly improving and hopefully would soon be worthy of the stunning girl before him. The strange thing was for all he knew, she could be a serial killer or something. He knew absolutely nothing about her, but at the same time, he felt drawn to her like he had never felt drawn to anyone before. So Miguel, looking at his watch and seeing that it was 7:55, walked over to the front of the diner where she was working, and sat in the exact seat he had told her 24 hours earlier he would sit in. As she looked up and saw him right in front of her, she jumped back in shock.

"Jesus Christ!" She exclaimed in surprise, not expecting him to be sitting there. Frankly, she hadn't expected him to come at all. She thought he was lying through his teeth to try and get a date with her but there he was, sitting right in front of her, giving her a small half-smile that although Emily wasn't completely sold on him yet, she found irresistible.

"Seriously, again?" Miguel laughed at her jump. "What, do I need to buy one of those cowbells and tie it around my neck so you can always hear me coming?"

"What… what are you doing here?" She stammered.

"Well, I said I'd be coming here every day until I get a date with you and I'm a man of my word." Miguel replied.

Miguel and Emily then got lost in the evening getting to know each other. It wasn't a date because they could only talk for short few seconds during the time Emily was behind the counter making drinks or collecting plates of food that she needed to deliver to tables, but still in that time, they learned a lot about each other. Miguel learned that Emily Cahill was also a senior, but she went to a private all-girl's school in Encino. She was Italian, Dutch and British by heritage, but both her and her parents spent their whole life in the States. Much to Miguel's Ecuadorian side's delight, because of her ethnicity and her grandparents, she was also an avid soccer fan. She was captain on her school soccer team and school volleyball team and was also a school prefect/ambassador and straight A student. This was all on top of the fact that she was an extremely passionate musician, and she knew how to sing, play the piano and play the guitar. Though the evening was fun, if anything, it only showed Miguel how out of his league this girl really was. She was this drop-dead gorgeous, all-round genius, compared to what was he? A former nerd, then bully, aspiring UFC fighter who really should be in juvie for some of his antics. How the hell was he supposed to have any shot with her?

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"Your student's an asshole, Johnny." Daniel remarked that night, as him and Johnny sat in Daniel's backyard and discussed the events of the day.

"Don't get your panties in a twist. It was an accident, Larusso." Johnny responded lazily. He had more pressing issues to be honest than Daniel getting angry because of his pride taking a hit. "Besides, I just showed you my texts with him. He apologised. So let's just move on."

"No, look, I'm sorry. You have to admit that Miguel is a lot of the reason why there's so much tension between our dojos. He's so influential with the other kids so as long as he hates Miyagi-Do, they will too."

"Yeah, so I'll tell him to tone it down a bit. Easy." Johnny remarked. Daniel shook his head.

"Only for him to do what? Exactly what he did today? Rather than vocally voicing his displeasure, he physically harms a Miyagi-Do. This isn't like Bert or Nate feuding that we can easily control. Miguel… he's bigger and stronger than either of us now, Johnny. You know that if he attacks a Miyagi-Do, unless we're both around to pull him away together, we won't be able to stop him. I'm sorry but I'm not going to risk my students getting hurt like I did today."

"Let me get this straight… you're kicking Miguel out, just because he's stronger than you?!" Johnny exclaimed, disbelieving.

"Look, it's not that simple." Daniel said. "This is for the safety of all of the students in the dojo. I don't want to do this but I don't see another choice."

"Just put yourself in his shoes for a moment." Johnny said. "At the beginning of last year, I started teaching Miguel Karate under the Cobra Kai way: strike first, strike hard, you know the catchphrase. Then when you got involved, I immediately began to pit him against you and your family. Then, Robby came to town and in Miguel's eyes, stole Miguel's girlfriend, before joining Miyagi-Do, under the tutelage of Miguel's ex-girlfriend's father, the man whose family I spent ages convincing him to hate. So he's currently feuding with Robby and Miyagi-Do, and then the one time Miguel tries to be a bigger man against Miyagi-Do, Robby almost kills him. So Miguel goes back to Cobra Kai, training under Kreese now. And you know how good Kreese is at manipulation. So Miguel hated Miyagi-Do more than ever, and Kreese built him into the machine he is. Can you seriously blame him for harboring anger against Miyagi-Do? Miyagi-Do, to him, is still the dojo that nearly killed him. Robby's dojo. Demetri's dojo. Sam, his ex-girlfriend's, dojo."

"Yeah, so what am I supposed to do about that?" Daniel asked. Johnny groaned in annoyance.

"Do I really have to spell this out for you, Larusso?" He snapped. "Miguel, and George too to be honest, don't trust Miyagi-Do because they don't know what the true Miyagi-Do is about. Show them what Miyagi-Do is really about."

"That's… actually a great idea." Daniel said, slightly surprised. "Yeah, I could invite Miguel and George over to the main dojo tomorrow morning for private training! If I can convince them to trust Miyagi-Do, tension's bound to disappear! And I'm presuming you're going to do the same with my students?"

"What?" Johnny grunted.

"Come on, Johnny. You know that my dojo are not fully convinced of you and your training methods either. Especially Sam and Demetri."

"No! No, no, no, no, no! Hell no! I am not coaching them 2 on 1!" Johny exclaimed.

"Why?! What's wrong with them?!" Daniel cried.

"Your daughter's fine. It's Mouth that's the problem.

"His name's Demetri." Daniel grumbled. "And I know he can be a lot at the beginning. But deep down, he's just a scared kid who has probably been beaten up and bullied more than anyone. So yeah, he's scared of Miguel. Scared of Eagle-Fang. Scared of you. Show him that Eagle-Fang isn't Cobra Kai."

"Ha, the issue there is that kid isn't willing to be teased at all. He's the epitome of this snowflake generation. The way I teach is I make fun of them. And when we're sparring, I don't hesitate to whack them around. Miguel can take it. Your daughter can take it. Everyone in this dojo can it. Hell, even Bert and Nate can. But Demetri can't. I remember back when he joined Cobra Kai. The second I made fun of him and his friend, he quit."

"Well, he's not going to quit this time, but you need to show him you're on his side. So yeah, I'll take Miguel and George. You take Sam and Demetri. If we get those 4 fully supporting this dojo merge, I'm sure everyone else will too and we'll be okay. And we need to do that real soon."

"Why's that?" Johnny asked. Daniel raised an eyebrow.

"Well, asides from the obvious fact that Cobra Kai could attack us at any moment and we need our students to be in sync, Robby's out of juvie in two months."

Johnny nodded and couldn't help but smile. Things between him and Robby were actually, against all odds, going pretty well. He was visiting Robby every week and so was Daniel. Robby had started to forgive both of them for the things they'd done.

"Yeah, you got a point there." Johnny replied. "If Robby comes and this dojo isn't in happy fucking harmony, Miguel's going to want to fight him, then Miyagi-Do are going to side with Robby, and Eagle-Fang are going to side with Miguel. We'll be back to having two warring factions."

Daniel nodded.

"Exactly. But if it doesn't implode like that, we'll have Miguel, Robby, Sam and George all on the same side." Daniel commented, and Johnny grinned.

"Cobra Kai won't stand a chance…"

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Miguel's feeling of unworthiness was only amplified as Emily's shift as a waitress ended and she went up for her two hour singing shift and Miguel was greeted by her golden-throated singing. Her enchanting voice had him hooked like a drug. Time flew by and before he knew it, it was 2 in the morning and her shift had just ended. When she was done singing, he said a quick goodbye to her, complimented her singing so much, and then left the diner for the night, in pretty bad spirits to be honest. Everything he learned about her made him realise how far he was from being with her. However, as he left the diner, what he didn't notice was that a pair of gorgeous ocean-blue eyes lingered on his retreating figure for a bit too long…

Miguel got in his car and as he started the engine, he opened his phone. He had turned it off for the past 6 hours so he had quite a few unread messages. One, however, particularly caught his eye. It was from an unknown number…

Hey Miguel. This is Daniel Larusso. I got your number from Johnny, as well as your apology. No hard feelings. That was a solid kick though! Just wanted to see if you were able to come to training a little earlier tomorrow morning? Is 10 am okay?