Mike saw that Jane was shivering as they walked. From the knapsack he was carrying, he pulled out a long sweater, Jane's size, and handed it to her.

"Thanks," She said. "Wait a minute, I thought I wasn't allowed to change?"

"You weren't, but I'm not heartless, I see a girl shivering, I offer my jacket or sweater."

He didn't see Jane look down and smile as she put on the sweater.

"I don't need to tell you that the Paparazzi are taking photos us right now. Do I?"

"Welcome to my life." She said sounded bored.

"You have to watch what you do while we are out here. I have a sound jammer thing I turn on so they can't hear what we say if they use a dish microphone. But I can't stop them from taking photos from far away."

They stood at the top of the hill at the back lot, they would see the sunrise when it came up.

"First of all, I want to apologize to you. Today I may say some nasty things to you. Please know that I don't mean them. You can verbally retaliate all you want, but stay with the training.

"That's for the distraction right?"

"Yes. I will apologize to you before and after every training day. And after each fair?"

She smiled. "How about a tentative, yes?"

"Fair enough," He smiled at her.

"Ok, some ground rules. You can say stop whenever you want, when you need a rest or whatever. If you say it and touch my forehead, it doesn't count. No hour off. Think of stop as your safe word. Always works. I stop immediately. If I think you are about to collapse I will steady you or help you to the ground. Seem fair?"

She smiled at him and nodded.

"So what we are going to do is a variation of what's called in Wing Chun Sticking Hands . We'll actually be doing the Bruce Lee version of it, called Chi Sao. It lets you determine an opponents force, so if you are actually grabbed you can use it against them."

"It's a very good energy exercise for close quarters. You will constantly be pressing forward looking for an empty space to move through. Now if you look up Youtube videos you'll see they they hold their arms out touching wrists, rock side to side for a few times and then someone makes a move. We are going to do it a bit differently, I want you to learn the flow, the grace, and to me it's much more effective, and you'll see this in a bit."

"Hold out you hands, one palm down the other palm up. Mike touched his palms to hers. "With the hand that's touching my palm, go ahead and slowly move to touch my forehead with your index finger."

As Jane lifted her hand towards his face, he moved his hand with hers almost touching her palm the whole distance, when she curled her hand to use her forefinger in an attempt to touch him. He curved his hand up and wedged hers gently out of the way and she ended up with her finger pointing to the right of his head over his shoulder.

Her eyes went wide. "It's like you didn't put any effort into that at all!"

"Correct, I used your energy against you. Ok, I'll try to touch your forehead, you do the same."

As soon as Mike moved his hand, she grabbed it. "Gotcha!"

"My fault. Two things wrong here. And I should have explained them first. You aren't allowed to grab, the reason for that is simple, now that hand becomes useless as it's tied up holding my hand or arm. So no trapping my arm between your arms, wrists, or hands. That makes both of your arms useless."

"Second thing, while yes, you stopped my hand, but you didn't use your other hand to touch my forehead. Remember in old swashbuckler movies, the hero could take his sword swirl it around the other guys sword and fling that guy's sword away? It's something like that."

Jane got the hang of it very quickly, and her and Mike where constantly moving their hands in a gentle flow of motion pushing each other's out of the way. Neither had touched the other yet, Mike wasn't trying, wanting her to get used to the flowing motion.

"Stop." Jane said panting after ten minutes. "I need to take this sweater off."

"It doesn't take long to heat up does it?"

"We aren't really doing anything why am I starting to sweat?"

"Oooh, Jane. Girls don't sweat, they perspire." He grinned at her.

"Maybe, but I'm sweating my ass off."

"You are holding your arms out in front of you, everyone can do it for a minute or so, but doing it longer and using pressure, or muscle requires upper body strength. You don't have a lot of that yet so you are feeling the effects already. We will take it easier tomorrow because your arms and whole upper body will be screaming tomorrow morning."

"Let's keep going," Jane said determined.

After another twenty minutes, Mike called out, "Stop." He looked away

"Why do you want to stop? You aren't even breaking a sweat." She said.

"You are though. You are really sweating."

"I'm ok with that." She said through her panting.

"Um, uh, yeah, but I think for these you will need to wear a sports bra."

Mike could tell she looked down at herself."

"Oh, my God. Mike I'm sorry, I'm surprised I didn't poke your eyes out."

Mike wanted to chuckle but he needed to keep it respectful between them.

"It's ok. I can um, ignore… uh, them if you want to continue."

XXXXX

"Tell me the truth Mike. You are holding back right?" Jane asked him. She thought her flow had improved a lot over the hours, but she had made mistakes that she was sure he knew about but hadn't taken advantage of.

"Yes, I am. I wanted you to learn the flow first, I tried different things, and even though you were awkward you were able to redirect my hand using my own energy. You are a very fast learner. Now that you know all the basic moves, we are going to talk to each other."

"Ok, what do we talk about."

"We can tell each other stories about our life, or our experiences, it can be as personal as you want. Just know that I will use personal stuff against you for a distraction."

"Noted." Jane said.

They continued their training, their hands flowing against each other's. To Jane it looked like a combination between ballet and Kung-Fu. But they never hit or even touched each other.

"So," Mike said. "Tell me about that asshole Jason Snortiass."

Jane paused. Mike touched her forehead. The first official touch. The sensation was electric, just like last time. Is it going to be like this every time he touches me? God I hope so. I may make mistakes on purpose. But she was pissed off right now. So pissed off that she didn't think there'd be a next time.

"Stop and fuck off." She smiled brightly. "Thank you Mr. Wheeler for a full day of training. Your services will no longer be required."

He gave her a deadpan expression.

"I know why you said that. To distract me. I'm not stupid. Personal shit is off limits." She lowered her hands and started to walk away.

Mike said from behind her.

"The guy who attacks you may call you a stupid bitch. It's personal, you going to walk away from him? Or drive your knee into his nuts. Personal shit is so not off limits."

She stopped in her tracks. She couldn't let what he said get to her. She turned around and went back to stand in front of him.

"I get it."

"Sorry Jane."

"That's Miss Ives to you."

Mike nodded, "Sorry Miss Ives." Jane could see that when he said it, he was embarrassed but that he actually meant it.

"So I can say shit to your face?" She challenged.

"If you think it will distract me. Sure. Fair warning. I have been called, and told a lot of things. You are unlikely to shock me enough to distract me."

"Ok let's go."

Within seconds they were back into the rhythm of Sticking Hands. "So nothing will distract you frogface?"

Mike closed his eyes. He's heard that before El thought. He's been bullied by that before. El felt like shit. She never insulted people. She felt bad trying to get back at him. The worse part of this is, his eyes are closed. That's how much it stung him. But he's still keeping the flow! How is he doing that? He was very good at it."

"Stop," she said her voice wavered. She put her hands to her face and cried. "I'm sorry Mike. I didn't mean that. I think you are cute… I would never… I'm sorry."

"It's ok Miss Ives. Much worse things have been said to me. It maybe hurt a little more because I thought we were getting along, but it's ok. Really it is. I'm the trainer you are the student client."

"Really, it's not ok. Call me Jane. That's really not me… I don't hate. I'll try not to be the over-privileged child movie star that has tantrums… Do you forgive me?"

"Nothing to forgive. You tried to distract me that's all. I know you didn't mean it to be personal.

Except i did when I said it. El thought.

Her next thought wasn't totally unexpected.

I think I like Mike Wheeler.

A lot.