CHAPTER 51

DING DONG! DING DONG!

The piercing sound of the doorbell roughly dragged Miguel out of his dreamless slumber. He groaned as the sound loudly rang out, and for a while, he lay in bed, praying that his mom or yaya were home to answer the door. However, another loud ring on the doorbell said otherwise, and Miguel was forced to pull himself out of bed and stumble into the living room, making his way over to the door. On the way, he read a note on the kitchen table from his mom. She said that she had already gone to work, and his yaya had gone out for a morning errand, but their conversation from the previous night wasn't over. Miguel sighed as he read it, knowing that further confrontation was to come, but a fourth ring on the doorbell was enough to force him from his train of thoughts and pull him towards the door. He opened it and when he saw who was standing there on the front porch, his eyes widened slightly. He found himself face to face with none other than his ex-girlfriend's mom, Amanda Larusso.

"Oh, um… hi Mrs. Larusso." Miguel murmured, before glancing into the house. He assumed she was hear to talk to his mom. Apparently the two had remained friends even when their kids had broken up, and apparently she had been helping his mom a lot with the pregnancy. Having had 2 kids in L.A herself, she had been helping give Carmen advice when it came to decisions during the pregnancy, and decisions they knew would be coming up in the near future. "Um… I'm really sorry. My mom's at work right now. I don't exactly know what time she'll be back but I can tell her to call you."

Amanda shook her head.

"I'm not here to talk to your mom, Miguel." She said. "I'm actually here to talk to you."

She then noticed Miguel's dishevelled appearance and realised that he had just woken up.

"I can come back later if you want. Sorry if I woke you up."

Miguel shook his head.

"No, it's fine. Don't worry about it. It's like noon. I should be awake by now anyway." He murmured, as he looked at her, wearily. It had been a long few days with all of the confrontation he had received about joining Cobra Kai. His mom, his yaya, Johnny, Sam, Mr. Larusso, Hawk, Demetri, Robby and Tory were only a few of the people he had had confronting him about his decision, and only the latter one could be said that it had gone even remotely well. He didn't need yet another person yelling at him about it. However, little did he know that it was the exact opposite. Amanda had always considered herself to be one of the few people with their head treading above water in this karate war. One of the only unbiased lenses. And so seeing Miguel with Silver yesterday morning… while it had been a real shock to her like it had been for her husband and daughter, she hadn't gotten angry like they had. She had always really liked Miguel. Out of the three guys her daughter had brought home, he was by far her favorite. He seemed more… genuine than the others. More sincere. Funny. Someone she would have really liked to get to know better if they hadn't been so wrapped up with training for the tournament. Which is why Amanda wasn't going to give up on him or immediately paint him as evil like some of the others had. She wanted to hear his side of the story, because from what she had seen from him in the past 6 months, chances were he had a pretty legitimate one himself.

"Miguel, I swear I'm not here to yell at you or anything. I'm guessing you've gotten enough of that in the recent past. I just want to talk. Is that okay?"

Miguel stared at her for a few moments, trying to gauge if she had any hidden agenda. If she was trying to bully him into quitting Cobra Kai, given all the dojo had done to her daughter. Or if she was going to insult him like her husband had 24 hours ago. But she seemed pretty sincere on just wanting to talk, and she didn't seem like she was going to leave without talking to him, so he eventually nodded.

"Alright. Sure. Let's talk…"

HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

"So…" Miguel remarked, as the two of them sat down at a nearby Starbucks that Amanda had driven them to.

"So…" Amanda replied, not exactly sure where to start.

"What did you want to talk about?" Miguel asked. Amanda nodded.

"Well first of all, I wanted to apologise to you about some of the things my husband said to you yesterday." Amanda stated. "When he said that he couldn't believe he let his daughter date someone like you, he didn't mean that. He was just really shocked to see you with Cobra Kai."

Miguel chuckled.

"Well, I believe you about half of that sentence." Miguel replied. "I'm sure he was really shocked. But did he mean it… I think he did."

"Miguel…" Amanda said, but Miguel shook his head.

"Mrs. Larusso, it's okay. I understand. I was never going to do what I did without expecting to accidentally ruffle quite a few feathers." Miguel commented. "Mr. Larusso was just thinking about his daughter's safety, and I can't disrespect him for that."

It was Amanda's turn to shake her head.

"No, Miguel, please trust me when I say this… my husband didn't mean what he said. He and I both know how happy you made Sam during the time you two dated. Despite how it ended, both of us have commented at one point or another that we've never seen our daughter happier. Neither I, nor my husband, have forgotten that. Heck, why do you think I'm sitting here opposite you right now?"

"Well from the sounds of it, sounds like you're about to pull the whole car saleswoman pitch to get me to come back to Miyagi-Do." Miguel commented. Amanda chuckled and shook her head.

"No, rest assured. I'm not here for a sales pitch. Just here to hear your point of view." She replied. "I heard Hawk's recount of what happened at the party the other day."

"Oh yeah? How'd that go?" Miguel laughed, knowing exactly what Hawk would've told Sam, who would've in turn told her parents.

"It was… colourful. Didn't exactly paint you in the best light though." Amanda admitted, to which Miguel sighed and nodded.

"Why am I not surprised?" Miguel remarked.

"Yeah, so why don't you tell me what really happened that night?"

Miguel did. He told her the whole story. Nothing to lose telling the truth, he thought to himself. He explained everything, from the moment he had pulled up in the Ferrari to the moment he drove away. He told her everything Sam had said to him, everything Hawk had said to him, everything Demetri had said to him, followed by his confrontation with Hawk and Robby later that night. He left out no detail, telling her the entire story. An unabridged version. An unbiased version. And by the end, all Amanda did was nod, deep in thought.

"Well that's certainly different to the story I got from Hawk." Amanda commented, when Miguel's voice finally trailed off as he was done with the story.

"That doesn't come as a shock to either of us, I feel like." Miguel remarked, and Amanda nodded.

"Wow. You really got to be careful about where you get your information from this karate war." She stated. "I mean, even if things didn't go exactly how you said, if they were in any grey area between your story and Hawk's, that's certainly a very different picture."

"Yes. Yes, it is." Miguel mumbled quietly, staring down at his coffee cup. He didn't know what to say. I mean, what do you say in this situation? Sitting opposite his ex-girlfriend's mom, a woman who was supposed to hate his guts for what he did to her daughter. I mean, even his former best friends seemed to hate him now. But Amanda just… didn't. It was really weird, but really refreshing too.

"Can I ask you something, Miguel?" She said. "Why did you go back to Cobra Kai?"

Miguel furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.

"Pardon me?" He murmured.

"In your story, you talk all about the incident at the party. But you don't actually mention at any point why you went back to Cobra Kai in the first place."

Miguel raised an eyebrow. He didn't know whether he wanted to go into the details of the money side of things, so he decided to just stick with the surface stuff: the Robby stuff.

"Isn't it kind of obvious?" Miguel remarked. Amanda tutted and shook her head.

"You know what? It isn't." She responded. "I've not known you for long, Miguel, but I have known you for long enough to know that you aren't a vindictive person. After your back injury, you could've easily been seduced by Cobra Kai. Your anger towards Robby, and I'm sure Johnny too, must've been pretty high. But you didn't. You stuck by Johnny. Until now. What changed? What are Cobra Kai offering that Johnny isn't?"

Miguel sighed. She was right. She had seen through his lie immediately. There was more to it than just that. He nodded.

"Yeah, okay, there's a bit more." Miguel admitted. "Do you remember that dinner your family, my family and Johnny had back in like February? We were talking about what Sam and I were doing after high school."

Amanda nodded.

"Yeah, I remember that night." She replied. "You knocked a drink onto my husband, right?"

As Miguel remembered this, he blushed deep crimson but Amanda was clearly just trying to make fun of him, laughing hysterically at his reaction.

"I, uh… I um…"

"You wanted to go to Stanford, right?" Amanda cut him off from his embarrassing stuttering. Miguel nodded.

"Yeah, I did. I still do. But do you remember what my mom's response was?" Miguel continued. "She wanted me to push for St. Monica College because of Stanford's crazy tuition."

"Sure, but St. Monica isn't that bad either." Amanda stated. Miguel shrugged.

"Maybe so, but if money was a problem before this baby, what happens now? You've had two kids, Mrs. Larusso. You of all people would know how expensive it all is. My family barely had enough to send me to college before. I mean I'm really happy for my mom and everything, but with this baby, I can kiss any chance of affording college goodbye. Until Sensei Silver came along and offered me money."

Amanda's eyes widened. So that was the reason Miguel had joined Cobra Kai. That made a lot of sense too. Miguel wouldn't go back to Cobra Kai for nothing, and this was a pretty valid reason why he would want to go back.

"Look, Miguel, if money's the problem, I'm sure I can offer you a job at the dealership." Amanda offered. "Flexible hours so you can still train with Miyagi-Do or Eagle-Fang. Part time so you can still enjoy the summer."

Miguel chuckled and shook his head.

"I really appreciate it, Mrs. Larusso. I really honestly do. I mean you're the first person to offer any remnant of an alternative option, rather than just yelling at me about joining Cobra Kai." Miguel remarked, causing Amanda to nod sympathetically. She couldn't imagine the verbal abuse this boy had gotten for something that in her eyes, was hardly his fault. He was just a teenager, with his back to the wall, feeling like he was out of options and unable to have a future.

"It's no problem at all, Miguel." She replied. Miguel hesitated for a moment before continuing.

"But I'm sorry but I'm going to have to decline. I mean the money Sensei Silver's offering me would help me get into my first choice schools. I highly doubt whatever your dealership would be offering would pay even close to that."

"Whatever Silver's paying you, we'll match it." She stated boldly. Miguel raised an eyebrow.

"You're about to pay me 5000 bucks a week?" Miguel asked. Like Johnny, Amanda's face turned into one of shock and disbelief as she heard the staggering figure.

"5000 a week?" She stammered, shocked. "That's…"

"260k for the whole year." Miguel finished. "Enough to pay for all 4 years of Stanford, or any other Ivy League school."

Amanda was floored by what she was hearing. How could someone be so invested in this stupid karate war that they would throw that amount of money at a teenager?! How could someone be hell-bent on creating chaos and destruction that he was willing to go to such lengths to do so. Only a cold, cold man would prey on the insecurities Miguel had to rope him into fighting against his former friends.

Noticing the guilt on her face and knowing that there was no way that the Larussos could offer him that much, Miguel sighed.

"Look, Mrs. Larusso, let me put your mind at ease." Miguel said. "All the money in the world won't change the fact that Miyagi-Do and Eagle-Fang just aren't the places I need to be right now."

"And Cobra Kai is?" Amanda asked. Miguel shrugged.

"Maybe. You know, I've been in Cobra Kai before any other teenager in the Valley. I've been there under Johnny's teaching, under Kreese's whenever Johnny was away, and now under Silver's too. Having learned from all 3 Cobra Kai senseis and having watched the dojo evolve, I know better than anyone its flaws. I've let myself get brainwashed by the dojo into becoming a bully before. Maybe with me being there, I can help the current and future Cobra Kai students from doing the same thing. Going down the wrong path."

Amanda nodded, though worry was still evident on her face. And Miguel noticed.

"Mrs. Larusso… I really appreciate what you're trying to do but I'm sorry. It's just not going to work. I'm sticking with Cobra Kai." Miguel said. "I totally understand why you're worried but I promise you, no matter how sticky things get between the dojos, I'm never going to lay a hand on your daughter. And for as long as I'm breathing, I'm going to make sure that no member of Cobra Kai does either. I swear to you, Sam's not going to get hurt…"