"Can you stop recording?" Miguel yelled at Lee.
"What? I'm going to make a very inspiring clip when you're walking again? It'll probably go viral." She was taping Johnny hoisting him up.
"I hate this. This is ridiculous." Miguel felt humiliated.
"What's ridiculous about it?" Johnny stops pulling him up to ask.
"I look like a giant baby." He was wearing a full-body harness. He couldn't help but notice that his legs were dangling like babies do when you lift them.
"The way you're whining and not walking, you might as well be a baby." He pulled him up enough so his feet were touching the ground.
"Isn't there a more badass way to do this?" He was hoping Johnny would be able to do this without making him feel useless but it seemed there was no way to do that.
"You think tapping your foot at a concert makes you ready for badass training?" He snorts.
"He's right, Miguel. You don't want to hurt yourself by doing too much." Lee put her phone away to make him more comfortable.
"Your legs are still pussies! Now, are you ready to stand?" He yelled. Miguel nods. Johnny let go of the rope and Miguel fell like a limp noodle. "Better fall that time…. Let's take five." He went into the kitchen to grab him a beer. Lee took a seat on the couch and sipped her frap.
"You know, moms have been talking about you a lot lately." Miguel pulls himself up into a sitting position.
"Oh yeah?" He yelled from the kitchen.
"She says thank you for taking me to that concert." He pulls himself to sit next to the coffee table.
"Does she say anything else?" He asks.
"No… you writing a novel?" He nods to the laptop.
"No, that's a Facebook message." He put an energy drink in front of Miguel.
"That… to who?" Miguel thought that was too much for one message. Lee leaned over to read it.
"A babe from high school…. Ali" He opened his beer.
"Ali… like thee Ali." The teens looked at him shocked but happy. "This is huge! So huge!" Miguel cheers.
"Are you sending this?" Lee thought that if someone sent her this, she would put off reading it and then never get back to them.
"Oh yeah, you can't send her that message." Miguel agrees.
"Why not?" He narrowed his eyes. He didn't see anything wrong with it.
"It's like 80 pages and in all caps." He points out.
"I have 35 years' worth of stuff to say, alright?" He turned it away from them.
"Okay, but she is not going to read that. She's a working mom of two. She doesn't have the time. If you want to keep the conversation going, keep it short and sweet." She advises.
"Yeah, and this looks desperate and a little creepy." Miguel grimaces at the message. "Sending her this would be like if you liked all her pictures." Johnny looks like a kid who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "Oh, no!"
"What the hell, man! I enjoyed the photos! And there is a button for exactly that, why would I not click it?" He points at the laptop.
"Because she can see that!" Miguel yelled.
"It makes you look thirsty. If an ex is like that after 35 years it's gonna make you think about getting a restraining order." Lee knew she would.
"Alright, I got amped up, okay?" He defends himself. "Look, she put a smiley face. It's even got little red cheeks. Is she getting hot? Feeling hot? What am I supposed to do with that?"
"I think it's just a smiley face… let's see." He scrolls up to see the message. "Okay, she wants to know what you've been up to. That's good, we can salvage this. Let's make you a kick-ass profile. Then you'll be sending your message from a position of strength."
"First you are going to need some pictures. This is looking like a catfish right now." She looked at his blank page.
"Do you have any photos?" Miguel asked.
"Yeah, I got photos. Don't move." He pointed at him while getting up. "HAHA, I said don't move." He laughs while going down the hall. Lee helped Miguel get into a wheelchair. He came back with a box of photos.
They look through the box. All the pictures were from high school. "Do you have anything more recent? To have one or two throwback pictures is okay but this would be too much." Miguel asks. Lee flips through the shirtless pictures. Teenage Johnny seemed to be very proud of his abs and she appreciated that.
"Those are the only photos I got, I don't have much after high school." He shook his head.
"Do you have any wearing a shirt?" He asks.
"It would be a crime for this to wear a shirt." Lee held up her favorite picture. It was of him on the beach, the water dripping off of him.
"She gets it. But… I do have this one." He hands Miguel a picture.
He looked down to see Johnny was in a tank top that had the sides cut out, half of his chest was showing. "You know, we're probably better off going with new photos."
"Like the present day?" Johnny tilts his head. "Not sure I want you to grease me up. Baby oil gets over everything."
"I can do that." Lee volunteers.
"NO! No one is greasing up anyone." Miguel sighes having to deal with a clueless Johnny and a pervy Lee. "I was thinking we could go with something more contemporary."
"Yes! We'll look at what Ali is into and we'll take pictures of me doing the same stuff." He clicked on her page to look through her pictures. "I'm not doing yoga. I will pet a dog. Think the aquarium will let me in with the dolphins." He turns to them.
"We can't do that because you liked all her pictures, so that would be obvious." Lee put down the old pictures to join the conversation.
"Then what are we supposed to do?" He asked.
"We could do a combination of her likes and what you're doing now. I'll upload a video of you training the guys. Today, we could go get sushi, go to an art gallery, take a picture in front of the angel wings on the wall," She listed.
"Are you just saying things you want to do?" Miguel cocked an eyebrow.
"Who cares, I say we do it? Come on, Hot Wheels." Johnny pushes him towards the door. Lee smiled, feeling like today was going to be a great day.
Hawk was doing everything he could to not shake in fear. When he saw Sensei welcome Kyler and his crew, he felt all his old insecurity coming back. After watching Kyler put Mitch in a choke hole and making him tap. He felt like his world was crumbling. A world that he broke his best friend's arm to keep. Sensei shot him a smug look before telling Kyler. "Finish him." The teen didn't even think about it. He lifted Mitch by his gi to throw the knockout punch.
"Lights out, baby." His chest bumped his friend.
Mitch got up to make his way to the circle. "Where are you going?" Kreese asks.
"To my spot." He pointed to it.
"You lost to an untrained fighter. He's going to take your spot on the team." Mitch looks back at Hawk for help.
"Sensei, Assface has been loyal to the dojo." He wanted to help his friend. The problem was he and Kreese didn't have anything close to what Johnny and Miguel had.
"I'm afraid he's not Cobra Kai material." He throws Hawk's words about Kyler back at him. "I told you that only the strong will survive."
The trials went on and half of the members kept their spot and others lost it. Tory kicked a girl in the face, knocking her out. "You chipped my tooth, bitch." The girl glared at her from the ground.
"You need braces anyways." She sneers.
Kreese kicked the girl out before nodding to Brucks. "You, big boy."
"Oh yeah, who's it going down next?" He jumps to the center of the mat.
Hawk took a deep breath, reminding himself he had been waiting for this moment since he learned how to fight. The moment when he could take out his old bullies. "He's mine." He marched to the center of the mat.
"Get him, Lip." Kyler laughed at the loser's confidence.
"Okay, alright, let's see if I can fix that lip of yours," Brucks smirks. Hawk took off the top of his gi to show his back tattoo. "Dude." His eyes widened at the ink. He was able to recover quickly. "Can you give me your chubby friend's number? After seeing her at that car wash I got a real hard-on for her."
When Kreese saw the rage in Hawk's eyes, he waved his hand to tell the student holding the flags that this wouldn't be about points. Right when he called for the fight to start, Hawk delivered a spinning kick to his face. Brucks wasn't able to land a punch with the lean boy being much faster than him. Hawk lands hit after hit to the body and face. He stumbled away from Hawk with blood dripping from his mouth. "Stop, please."
Hawk scoffed, remembering all the time he begged the bigger boy for mercy and didn't get any. "Finish Him." Kreese couldn't be more proud when Hawk threw him to the ground and jumped on top of him to pound his face in before he could finish the first word. No one, not even the biggest savages of the group: Kyler or Tory, could watch the beating. They turn their heads, not being able to see someone who was unconscious getting hit over and over again. Hawk stood up when his knuckles were soaked in blood. He spits on Bruck's face.
He walks up to Kyler. When he looks down in submission he is satisfied enough to take his spot next to him. "Alright class, I think we can call it a day." He was happy with the champion he was making. "Somebody pick him up." He looks at Brucks in disgust.
Miguel was taking a picture of Johnny on a bench while reading the book, The Queen of Hearts by Kimmery Martin that Lee was currently reading. He flips through the pages pretending to be lost in the story. "Alright, you get it." He was tired of this act.
"Got it." He nods.
He got up to see the picture. After he approves it, he throws the book towards the trash. "Hey!" Lee let out a breath of relief when she was able to save it in time.
"Sorry, forgot that was yours." He shrugs. "Let's go, we got a lot of ground to cover today." He walks towards the art gallery that was across the street.
They took pictures of him posing in front of art pieces. "No, you can't touch it." Miguel scolds.
Johnny looked at a loss as to why he couldn't. "Excuse me, sir." A guard yelled.
"Wha… oh sorry, didn't know." He apologized.
Miguel's arm was starting to get tired from having to take Johnny and then Lee's picture in front of the wings painted on the wall. "Come on, Lee. You already did a dozen poses." He whines.
"What? Come on, a few more." She pouted.
"Fine, two more, so choose your poses wisely." He gives in. She did a wonder woman pose and in the last picture, she did a mean glare. She plans to put a dark filter on it to give it a dark angel vibe.
"Okay, let's go eat." His stomach was growling.
At the sushi place, Lee went crazy ordering every roll she liked. When it came, Johnny stabbed one with a chopstick to hold it up to get a closer look. "That's one way of doing it." Miguel watches him stare at the food.
"What is this shit?" He couldn't figure it out.
"It's a dragon roll, basically you have fresh avocados, chopped up cucumbers, snow crab, and unagi on top." He explains.
"Unagi?" He questioned the word he didn't know.
"It's freshwater eel." He told him.
"Eel? People eat that crap." He watches in disgust as Lee pops one into her mouth.
"It's popular…. Just have an open mind." Miguel sighes.
She swallows her food. "I find it crazy that you got so into karate and didn't try to explore other parts of Japanese culture."
He sighs. "Just take a picture." It was the teen's turn to watch in disgust as he bites into the sushi like a drumstick. Rice and seafood were everywhere. A piece of seaweed was hanging out of his mouth.
"Got it." Miguel wasn't planning on posting this pic.
"Napkin." Lee hands it to him when she sees he is going to spit it out.
He spits it on the napkin. "I'm going to the bathroom to wash my mouth out." He got up to go inside.
Lee took a picture of the food to post on her Instagram. "It doesn't look half bad." He showed her the picture. He did look childishly cute with the seaweed hanging from his mouth.
Tory turns the corner to see them huddle up together. "Miguel, Lee. How did you find out I work here?"
"I didn't, I thought you worked at the roller rink." He looks up at his ex.
"That's at night. I have to work two jobs now that my mom is not doing well." She grips her backpack strap.
"I need a refill." Lee picked up her full glass and went inside.
"I'm sorry." Miguel was sad to hear about her mom.
"I'm sorry." She sat down. "I know I should have come to see you. I just didn't know how to help."
"I didn't need your help. You being there would have been enough." There was no excuse Tory could give that would be good enough. He knew she was busy with two jobs and taking care of her brother and mother at home but she always found time for him before.
"I felt guilty about everything. But, we're doing everything we can to get back at Miyagi-Do for what they did. It's like Sensei Kreese says when one of us gets hurt, we all get hurt." She thought that would make up for it.
"Nobody else got hurt, Tory. I'm the one in the wheelchair." He scoffed.
"I just meant…" She didn't expect him to be angry about that.
"I know what you meant, I never cared about Kreese or Miyagi-Do. I cared about us." He felt betrayed by her.
"Did you? Or did you go out with me to get Sam's attention? You seem to have moved on quickly." She looked at Lee who was awkwardly standing by the door. She was looking everywhere but at them.
"Is that what you think of me?" He was hurt by the accusation.
"I saw you with her. The way you look at her. I didn't have a choice." She was tearing up. "Then to see you here with Lee. When I think back to it, you looked at her with more love than me."
"Yes, you did Tory. You had a choice. You could have talked to me about it. You could have let it go. You didn't have to attack her…. Don't think of doing anything to Lee." He shook his head at her thinking she was in the right. "I know you're helping your mom but you need help."
"You think I'm crazy." She scoffs.
"No, I didn't say that." He was frustrated with her twisting his words.
"No, it's okay, everyone thinks it. I don't give a shit. Because all that matters is who wins in the end. Nice to see you." She walked to the door. She stops in front of Lee. "Good luck, being his next distraction."
When the door closed behind her, Lee went to the table. "You told psycho we aren't dating, right?"
"Don't worry, Lee. She won't bother you." He promised.
"Good, I don't need a scar. She probably aims for my boobs or something." She wraps her arms around her chest.
Lee was rewatching the training camp episodes from Haikyuu when she got a text from Miguel. She opens it to scream at the video of Miguel standing on his own. She called him. "Seriously, the day I don't come is the day you decide to stand."
"Are you upset that I'm standing?" He was taken back.
"I'm upset that I missed it… but at least I can use the clip for the video. I was thinking of the song, I Will Survive for the background." She opens her laptop to add the clip to Miguel's recovery folder.
"I wanted to talk about us. I've been having a lot of time to think now that I can't do much less." He wanted to talk about it for a while now but Johnny was always around.
She tensed up. She hoped that this would never come up again. "Yes?"
"With my confusing feelings for Sam and Tory. I think I wanted something consistent. Someone who is willing to talk things out instead of jumping to conclusions. Me wanted you made so much sense to me but…" He trailed off not knowing how to finish.
"But, you don't love me like that. I get it. You're perfect on paper but I can't force anything." She had been struggling with that when he kissed her.
"I'm sorry I made a mess out of nothing." He hated that he put her through that.
"Hey! It's not that big of a deal, a cute guy kissed me, no harm done." She tries to bring up the mood.
He laughed. "I just wanted to clear the air so you could feel comfortable to date if you wanted to."
"I think I'm happy being single. Not ready for another relationship right now." She looks at Bokuto, wishing anime boys were real.
"Doesn't have to be a relationship. You could date around." He felt like she was waiting for Hawk to turn back into Eli. It wasn't healthy.
"Maybe, the same could be said about you." She didn't know why he was pushing her when he wasn't jumping back into the dating pool.
"Maybe… we could go on speed dating or something." He jokes.
