So the first thing that I noticed was that Johnny and Mr. LaRusso didn't exactly know what they were doing. Or at least they hadn't made it clear what we were supposed to be doing. We looked around at each other. I was pretty sure that none of us knew what they wanted us to do. You know I couldn't help but wonder if they had planned this ahead of time or were just trying to make things up as they went along. It didn't seem like it was the best plan to be honest, but I assumed they knew what they were doing.
"Begin what exactly?" Some guy asked. I hadn't had enough time to learn anyone's names. The two of them looked at each other like they didn't know what to say.
"Begin a new era." Mr. LaRusso improvised. "Many of us used to be enemies, but rivalries don't need to last forever. The All-Valley Tournament is just a few months away and this year the stakes are higher than ever."
I mean having to shut down your dojo did seem like pretty high stakes, but I was pretty sure that there was a way for them to be higher.
"We know that Cobra Kai is going to use every dirty trick in the book. There's only one way that we're going to beat them…" He continued.
"By kicking their asses." Johnny interrupted. "You gotta take things to the next level. I'm gonna teach you an aggression stronger than anything Cobra Kai can throw at us."
Mr. LaRusso didn't really look like he was on board with that.
"They strike first, we'll pre-strike." He added. I wasn't sure what he meant by that. At that point, the two of them gave mixed messages. This was going to be a challenge.
"Okay let's just warm up with some simple exercises." Mr. LaRusso suggested.
"Line up!" Johnny stated.
The first lesson made it clear that they didn't know how to work together. It was probably because the two of them had been taught different styles and both of them looked different from what I had been taught. I wondered if that put me at a disadvantage. Maybe I would be able to get by on raw skill since it seemed like I had been doing it longer than any of them. I was matched up against a guy twice my size and was able to easily take him down.
Also Mr. LaRusso had us cleaning some cars. I understand why he was doing it. It was muscle memory, but wasn't there a better way to do it? Johnny seemed to just have them cleaning out his car…which I was pretty sure wasn't the point of the lesson. Then there was some sort of obstacle course. I couldn't help but wonder if I should wait to come to another lesson before they got all of the kinks sorted out. This kind of seemed like a waste of time because I didn't really feel like I was learning all that much.
After practice was over, I decided to talk to Sam. The two of us were the only girls in the dojo, so we at least had that going for us.
"So I don't think our dads really know how to work together." I stated.
"Yeah, but it was the first lesson." She countered. "It's going to take some time for them to find out something that works. How did you learn how to fight like that? You took down Chris like it was nothing. I've never seen some of those moves before."
"My sensei taught me how to overpower a bigger opponent when it became apparent I was done growing." I answered.
"So how are you feeling? It can't be easy for you to have grown up thinking someone was your father when he really wasn't." She responded.
"To be honest, I'm relieved." I answered. I couldn't have been more thrilled to not be related to him. "That guy is horrible. I wouldn't be surprised if he thought my eyes were going to change shape if I kept doing karate."
She smiled a little about that. At least I could make her laugh.
"So do you want to go do something?" I inquired. It probably wouldn't considered a date, but I still had hope. I supposed one thing that I would need to do was figure out if she liked girls. I had to determine the best way to ask that without being weird.
"Sure." She replied. "Where do you want to go?"
"You're the one who lives here. You probably have a better feel for the area than I do." I stated.
"Then I know just the place." She stated before she took me to her car. I hoped this wouldn't be too weird.
She ended up taking us to the pier. I was not used to being so close to the ocean. I kind of felt like I should be wearing a bikini since I couldn't help but notice a few girls were wearing them. It also made me think about what Sam would look like in a bikini.
"So did you have a boyfriend back home?" She asked me. I had to say that I was a bit surprised by that.
"What?" I retorted. I wanted to slap myself. She probably thought that I was an idiot now.
"I was just asking if you had a boyfriend in Colorado." She repeated. Hopefully she just thought that I wasn't listening.
"Um no. I've never had a boyfriend." I answered calmly. I hadn't had a girlfriend either.
"You're lucky. Boys are a lot of trouble." She declared.
"What about Miguel?" I responded. I could see that the two of them were close. I wasn't sure if it would be worth pursuing her if there was a chance that she could get with him.
"Miguel and I decided that the two of us would be better as friends." She explained. Okay, now I was definitely more interested in her. "Unfortunately, I don't think Robby saw it that way."
Oh that made things kind of complicated. She used to date my brother.
"You dated my brother?" I asked her.
"It's not the most embarrassing guy that I ever dated." Sam replied. "His name is Kyler. I thought I wanted to be popular, so I dated the popular jock. The thing is popular jocks a lot of time just want someone to bone them."
"I see." I responded before asking. "Did you?"
"Did I what?" She questioned before I blushed. I was pretty sure that she picked up on my blush because she started to blush too. "No I didn't. I'm actually still a virgin."
"That's good to hear…not that it would be a bad thing if you weren't." I babbled. Am I really this bad at talking to girls that I like? This would make telling her what I wanted to say kind of hard.
"So, are you going to be going to school here?" She asked. Thank God for her changing the subject.
"Yeah, maybe you can show me around when it starts back up." I suggested. "If you're not busy that is."
"I can do that." She declared. "Now we should probably get going. It's getting kind of late and you probably need to get home for dinner. So is your mom going to be moving here too?"
"Well she still has to finish divorce proceedings and she has to do that in Denver." I remarked. "I don't know how long it will take for those to finish up."
Not to mention, she still didn't say that she was going to be moving here. For all I knew, we would be going somewhere else. She only agreed to let me stay for the semester.
At that point, I got a call from Johnny.
"Hello?" I answered.
"Do you want to come over for dinner?" He asked. "There's someone that I want you to meet."
"Uh sure. I'll be there soon." I replied. "Can you take me to my dad's place?"
I hoped that Sam knew where Johnny lived because I had only been there once and I didn't exactly know how to get there.
"Yeah, I'll just drop you off." She declared.
When I got there, I found out that he wasn't the only one there. In fact, there were multiple people there, including Miguel.
"I want to introduce you to my daughter, Jenny." Johnny replied as I noticed that was some kind of Mexican dish. I didn't really like Mexican food, but I supposed that if he wanted me here, I would have to eat it.
"Jennifer Lawrence?" The woman asked. From what I understood, she was Miguel's mom and also his girlfriend. I couldn't help but wonder how many times I was going to hear that.
"I actually haven't changed it yet." I declared. I wanted to change it, even though I would probably be better off just going by Mills. I would hear a lot less jokes if I did.
"So, you do karate as well?" She asked.
"Yeah, I just learned a different style." I replied. "Today was interesting."
"Well I'm glad that you and Daniel are working together." She said as she looked at Johnny. "I just want to make sure that Miggy's safe."
"I said that my back is better than ever." Miguel replied. Okay, that I didn't know anything about. What was she talking about? "You don't have to worry about me."
"She's your mom. She's always going to worry." Johnny declared before looking at her. I took a bite of the food. "Don't worry. I'm watching him."
At that point, Miguel's grandma said something in Spanish and I almost choked. I knew enough Spanish to know that it was kind of sexual.
"Sam and I aren't back together. We thought that we would be better as friends." Miguel replied. He actually seemed like he believed that which made me feel relieved. He then looked at me. "So is your mom going to be moving back here?"
Why did he ask me that? Oh was Johnny not dating his mom right now and he thought that my parents might get back together? I did not think that was going to happen.
After dinner, I was with Miguel. I felt that there was something that I needed to get off my chest.
"So, you and my dad are really close." I commented.
"Listen, I don't want you to feel threatened by this. I tried to tell Robby that I'm not trying to take him from anyone." Miguel replied.
"Well while we're on the subject of not trying to take anyone, there's something that I want to ask you. So do you still like Sam?" I questioned. I didn't want things to become awkward if I ever did date her.
"Why did you phrase it like that…oh." He remarked as he seemed to realize what I meant. "You like Sam."
"Yeah," I admitted. "I don't know if she likes me as more than a friend and I haven't even told her that I'm a lesbian yet."
"Well like I said, we decided that we would be better as friends, so if you want to try to date her, but you do need to realize that she might not be interested in you like that." He declared.
"I know." I replied. "I should get home."
The following day, I was in yet another class. I supposed it was easier to do one every day while school was still on winter break.
"Ready Bow!" Johnny ordered before we all bowed.
"Sensei Lawrence and I have the same goal of preparing you for the tournament." Mr. LaRusso said.
"But we have different ways of getting you there." Johnny explained.
"We realize that teaching you opposing viewpoints at the same time can be a little confusing." Mr. LaRusso added. That was a bit of an understatement. Had they already come to a solution?
"So we've discussed and come up with a solution. We're going to divide and conquer." Johnny finished. "Eagle Fang trains out front."
"I'll be out back working with the Miyagi Dos." Mr. LaRusso stated. Where did that leave me? I wasn't really affiliated with either style.
"I thought we were stronger together." Miguel piped in.
"We are still together." Mr. LaRusso said.
"On opposite ends of the dojo." Johnny added.
"So where am I supposed to go?" I inquired. I kind of wanted to show off to Sam some more, but it looked like I wouldn't be able to do that.
"We figured that since you don't know either style, it would best to teach you both and you're going to be starting with me." Mr. LaRusso replied. It looked like I would get a chance to show up off after all. I just would have to make it look like I wasn't showing off.
So, inside the dojo with him and we all sat down.
"We all have anger inside us." He explained. "But I want you to let it go. Don't let your emotions control you. You have to be the one in control. Now everyone close your eyes and relax."
I had to admit that I had never done meditation before. We also learned one of the problems with paper walls. They are really easy to hear through. It was definitely hard to focus. Mr. LaRusso had to go outside to talk to him.
I started to walk around. I wanted to flirt with Sam, but I also figured that maybe I should get to know some of these other people. I noticed some of the guys were hassling Hawk. I remembered his name because of the giant mohawk. It was hard to forget.
"What's going on, here?" I asked.
"He just doesn't belong here." Chris explained.
"I wasn't asking you. Hawk, tell me what's going on?" I asked him. "The rest of you should leave."
They all walked out, leaving the two of us alone.
"I just feel like no one here trusts me." He stated. "I know I was a dick, but I'm trying to change and no one believes me."
"Have you heard the old saying 'Trust is the hardest thing to build, but the easiest to break.'?" I asked. Maybe it wasn't an old saying. Maybe it was just something Sensei Haruko said.
"Not with those exact words but I get it. I just want to show them that I'm not the enemy anymore." He declared.
"I get it. I don't know if anyone here trusts me. Well they might because I'm one of those girls here." I stated. "Or maybe because I'm Johnny's daughter. Some could say that I couldn't have a leg in this fight."
"So why are you in it?" He asked me.
"Because I want to do it for my dad and I do want to try to have a relationship with my brother, even if I don't know how likely that is." I admitted.
I learned that Mr. LaRusso and Johnny still seemed to have issues with each other and still didn't know to work together.
"So I have something that I want to do and it's going to be extremely difficult." Sam told me. "I want to talk to Robby and I was thinking that maybe you could come with me since he's your brother."
Sam's attempt to talk to Robby did not go well. I knew that I had to step in at that point.
"Don't talk to her like that." I demanded.
"You don't know what it's like to be constantly let down by him. Do you think he loves you? You're just an attempt for him to try to get a kid right after screwing up the first time." Robby told me.
"So what you're just going to be bitter about it?" I asked. "Yes, he might have fucked up but you have to let him put in the effort. He can't change if you don't let him."
"I don't care." He said before he walked away.
"Alright, I think it's time for you to tell me what all happened here. I'm tired of being out of the loop." I told Sam.
She gave me a rundown of what happened, including a massive brawl that took place at the school causing millions of dollars of damage and Miguel ending up in a wheelchair. Also, Cobra Kai had broken Dmitri's arm and even destroyed the dojo. I had never known things were so bitter between them and I could see that was one of the reasons that people didn't like Hawk.
"I'm sorry that things didn't work out with Robby." I told her. "I want to have things work, but I don't think that there's anything we can do if he's not willing to forgive. Hopefully, he'll be able to make the right choices on his own, but he's the one who has to make them."
"I know. It just seemed like your dad and my dad will never get along and I thought that Robby might have been able to act as the bridge to bring the two of them together." She replied.
I had to admit that I really admired her passion about this. It was kind of hot to be honest and I still couldn't believe that I was falling for her as hard as I was. I knew that I wasn't supposed to and I didn't know how my dad would feel about it. I didn't think that he would care about the fact that she was a girl because he didn't really have the right to do that. However, he probably would care that she was a LaRusso.
"What are you thinking about?" She asked as she seemed to notice that I seemed to be lost in thought.
"How much I want to kiss you right now." I declared before I blushed. "Did I just say that out loud?"
"What's stopping you then?" She asked.
"Because I've never…" I started before she cut me off by pressing her lips against mine.
The following day, we went to the dojo to find that Hawk wanted to build an Okinawan sparring deck. I wasn't sure what that was, but it sounded like a place to fight. Somehow, it seemed to be the thing that Johnny and Mr. LaRusso could agree on. I wasn't sure why that was the thing that managed to get them on the same page, but I was happy that they managed to figure it out.
So Jenny and Sam kissed but we don't really know things went after that. Are they going to date? Will Ali move back to the Valley? How will things work out with Jenny and Robby? Please don't forget to review.