"Heeey, El Serpiente—!" Hawk exclaimed as soon as Miguel opened the door. He offered his hand for their fist bump handshake and laughed. "What's up, man?"

Miguel frowned but answered the greeting nevertheless. "You know, living on the edge—" he shrugged. "Dude, what… what are you doing here?"

That was a good question.

What was he doing here, at Miguel's front door, was still a bit of a mystery to Hawk. He had gone to Rickenberger's party, had worn his arrogant grin like a mask, had laughed with his friends loud and rude. Hell, he had even started talking with a hot babe - a beautiful blond with big tits who was called Mia or Maya or something like that, he couldn't remember. She had giggled at his jokes, had laid a hand on his chest and kept it there for a moment too long for it not to mean anything, and her pink lips had turned into a soft smile that had been fucking kissable—

But when the time had come to make his move, Hawk had chickened out.

He had known he couldn't do it. That he didn't have it in him to take that girl into the bathroom or a spare bedroom, and kiss her, undress her, fuck her–

Because that girl wasn't Sky.

So he had walked out, he had just left that girl who had a gorgeous body and who was totally into him, had made up some stupid excuse and just left her standing there with a drink in her hands as he walked out of the house.

And now he was standing at Miguel's door, wondering how the Hell he had gotten here.

"I was at this lame-ass party," he replied with a laugh. "And I just… I guess I just thought I'd have more fun with you, man. I brought some beer, thought we could hang out and catch up—"

"Beer? You do realize my Yaya's home." Miguel said in a low voice, glancing over his shoulder to make sure his grandmother hadn't heard.

Hawk let out a dry laugh. "So what? Come on, let's get out of here."

The six-pack and the bottle of vodka - of which he had already consumed a big portion - were still in his backpack. He was in the nice state of getting drunk - the phase where all the crap that had happened in the past couple of days was starting to feel like it had happened to someone else, where his heart was still beating. Screw Rickenberger and his stupid party, this was where Hawk wanted to be.

Miguel glanced at Hawk as if he only now realized his intoxicated state but in the end, he let out a resigned sigh.

"Just wait a sec. I'll be out in a minute."

Hawk leaned on the wall next to Miguel's door and waited as Miguel pushed his wheelchair back inside. He heard Miguel talking to Rosa, saying Hawk was here and that they'd be outside for a while, heard Rosa's reply though he didn't understand all of it since she spoke Spanish. All that was a bit hazy in Hawk's mind, the words went through his mind leaving no prints behind. He thought about the pretty blond he had left at Rickenberger's party. She'd had tits as big as his head. Fuck, he should have at least asked for her number… But that thought was slippery, and as he thought about fucking that girl on the bed so that her huge tit's bounced, her image morphed into Sky. There she was on the bed, in a post-orgasmic haze, looking up at him with her impossibly green eyes, begging for him to make love to her, begging for him not to break her heart again–

That thought hurt like a dagger through Hawk's gut, making him groan.

Why am I still thinking about her? She fucking dumped me. I could be fucking that hot blonde now—

His thoughts were interrupted as the door opened again and Miguel pushed his wheelchair out onto the courtyard.

"Need help?" Hawk asked, picking up his backpack, hoping Miguel wouldn't notice the emotion that shadowed his face.

"No, I'm good–" Miguel replied a bit pointedly, making it clear he didn't want Hawk touching his chair.

Hawk could see why. Miguel had been one of the best, he had been the first Cobra. And to see him paralyzed, tied into a fucking wheelchair—

It sucked ass big time.

He couldn't understand how Miguel endured that shit. If something like that ever happened to Hawk, he would fucking kill himself.

He followed Miguel, as he pushed the wheelchair to the other side of the courtyard to get some distance from the front door of his house. They passed a fountain that smelled like it was full of piss and stopped at the small parking lot, where Hawk had parked his bike next to a row of trash cans.

It was clear Miguel didn't want to go further - and again, Hawk couldn't blame him. If he was the one in the wheelchair, he wouldn't want to leave his house either - so not caring about the crappy surroundings, Hawk sat down, his back against the wall, and opened his backpack.

"How did you get here?" Miguel asked while Hawk was still searching for the beers.

"My bike," he tilted his head towards the bike.

"You drove? Dude, you're drunk—"

"I'm not that drunk." Hawk rolled his eyes. "Stop bitching, you sound like my mom."

"Maybe that's not such a bad thing—" Miguel muttered, but Hawk shut him up by tossing him a can of beer.

"Dude, lighten up a bit. Let's get wasted and catch up. I've fucking missed you, man."

"I'm not supposed to—" Miguel said, but kept the can nevertheless. "Mixing meds with this stuff? It can mess up my head."

"Come on, you can have one, it's not a big deal."

A bit reluctantly Miguel opened the can and took a sip, then another. Hawk emptied half of his own in one gulp. The beer wasn't cold anymore but he didn't even care. There were things slipping into his mind, things he didn't want to think about. The way Sky had smiled at him before she walked away from him in the Janitor's closet. The scattered Legos on the floor. Dad's fist connecting with his cheek. He didn't want those memories, he wanted them out of his head, he should have stayed at the party to fuck that pretty blonde, he wasn't drunk enough.

"Sorry I've been such a crappy friend," he said to get something else to think about. "I should've come by more often, but I just—"

"It's fine," Miguel muttered and took another sip of his beer. "I get it. I wouldn't want to visit me either."

"It's not that—" Hawk replied, but then stopped talking mid-sentence. He wasn't going to lie to Miguel. They both knew the truth anyways. "Well, shit. I'm still sorry."

Miguel turned his eyes to Hawk, those dark eyes that always saw too much.

"What happened to your face?"

His question startled Hawk. He turned his eyes away, resisted the urge to cover his cheek with a hand.

"Nothing. A training accident."

Miguel snorted. "Bullshit."

Hawk didn't say anything. He leaned his back against the cold wall and closed his eyes. Damn Miguel, damn Nicholas, asking about things that were none of their fucking business. Hawk didn't want to talk about the bruise on his cheek, the cut on his lip. He certainly wasn't drunk enough. With a groan, he tossed away the empty beer can, opened another, and took a long gulp.

"Seriously, dude—" Miguel pressed on. "What happened? You got into a fight with someone?"

"Just let it go."

"No, talk to me. Was it Kreese? Is that how he makes you train nowadays?"

"Kreese? Shit, no!"

Maybe he should just lie? To tell Miguel it had been one of the Cobras - but Hell, Miguel would see through that lie so easily, like he saw through all Hawk's lies and bullshit. And maybe it was the beer, maybe it was just the fact that he was so fucking lonely, but the truth just slipped off his lips before he could stop it.

"It was my dad."

Miguel's eyes widened, his mouth fell open and immediately Hawk regretted he had said anything. He had never told anyone, except Demetri. Not even Sky knew what Dad sometimes did. The shame felt heavy and sticky, it made Hawk feel dirty, as if he hadn't showered for a week. What a disappointment he had always been. So broken, so flawed that even his own dad couldn't love him.

Why would anyone else?

"Your dad hit you?" Miguel asked, sounding horrified.

"Yeah, well," Hawk groaned and flexed his fingers, observing his bruised and scraped knuckles. "I hit him harder."

An image of Dad spitting blood on the sink entered Hawk's mind. It was both sickening and satisfactory, the mixed feelings made him nauseous, they made him wish he was drunker than he was. Beer wouldn't be enough to wash away the shame, the bitterness on his lips. He opened his backpack and found the bottle of vodka, uncorked it, and took a swig.

"Dude, what's going on?" Miguel asked, his frown deepening. "Maybe you should slow down a bit?"

"Sounding like my Mom again," Hawk noted and rolled his eyes.

"Speaking about her… Does she know? About your dad?"

"No," Hawk replied shortly, even if it wasn't completely true. Mom didn't know about this time, but she did know Dad had hit Hawk before. Hawk knew perfectly well that had been the reason Mom had almost divorced Dad a couple of years back - and that Dad had kept his anger under control since then, not because he hated Hawk any less, but because he didn't want a divorce to ruin his perfect image.

Mom would come home the day after tomorrow, and Hawk still didn't know what to tell her when she saw the bruises on his - and Dad's - face. He didn't want to make Mom upset, but on the other hand, if she finally divorced Dad, it might be worth it.

"Dude, what's going on?" Miguel's voice brought Hawk back to the moment. "You're not acting like yourself."

Hawk let out a bitter laugh. So, Miguel didn't know yet. Apparently, Sky hadn't come here to pour her heart out to Miguel after all, telling him all Hawk's evil deeds.

"Have you seen Sky?" he asked, turning to look at his friend. Miguel was still holding the beer in his hands, but it was clear he wasn't really drinking it.

"No. She used to come to visit me pretty often, but now I haven't seen her in days. Why?"

Hawk definitely wasn't drunk enough to be having this conversation. He took another sip of the bottle, grimaced as the booze burnt all the way down. Drinking didn't help one bit, the taste of alcohol was also the taste of Sky's kisses, and he remembered the night of the Canyon Party when they had made out against the tree trunk and she had been a living flame in his arms.

He couldn't believe he had lost her. It hurt too much. Shouldn't a pain this strong kill him? Why the fuck was he even breathing anymore?

"She… she dumped me."

"Seriously?"

"Yeah."

He saw her standing there in front of him, in the middle of the shattered Legos, tears running down her face and someone was carving out his heart, he was bleeding onto the floor and dying at her feet.

"I wish I'd never met you!"

Hawk took another gulp of vodka. If only he had something stronger, something that would really take off the edge of the pain. He had never done drugs if you didn't count some pot he'd smoked in Assface's basement, but now he was thinking about the small white pills Sky had talked about so many times. How they killed the pain, how they healed the wounds of the soul, and offered sleep for the restless. He wished more than anything that he'd had some now, but he didn't, and the alcohol wasn't doing shit.

"Why?" Miguel asked, sounding like he couldn't believe the truth either. "I thought things were going great with her. She seemed so happy the last time I saw her."

"I fucked up, man. I fucking ruined it."

"Is she okay?"

"I don't know. She won't talk to me. She blocked me on insta—"

He had tried to scroll through her pictures earlier today, just to see if she had posted anything new so that he would know she was okay, only to notice he didn't have access to her account anymore. It had felt like a punch to the gut, so fucking final that it would kill him.

"But—- why? What happened? What did you do?"

Hawk let out a bitter laugh. He leaned his back on the wall, shaking his head, not giving a shit if his mohawk got disheveled.

"You wanna hear what happened?" He asked, closing his eyes. "I'm a fucking idiot, that's what happened."

A short silence followed. Miguel didn't ask him to explain, but just waited for him to do so. And Hawk knew Miguel would hate him once he knew the whole story, but somehow it didn't matter, because this was Miguel, this was El Serpiente, this was his Karate brother who had stood by him since the first day they had met, and there was no one else Hawk could tell the truth, there was no one but Miguel.

He had lost everyone else.

"We fucked in the school." he spoke, staring at the bottle in his hands so that he wouldn't have to look at Miguel. "During the lunch break, in the janitor's closet. And it was fucking beautiful. So fucking perfect—" he swallowed but the lump in his throat wouldn't move. He knew he shouldn't be talking about this, that all the crap that had gone down had happened because he had talked, just like now, but right now he didn't even care. The words just slid out of his mouth, the twisted, bitter creatures. "—and I told the guys about it. Assface and Rickenberger."

"Oh, you didn't—"

"Oh, I did. Bragged about it, even. Told them every dirty detail."

"Shit," Miguel sighed. "And Sky found out?"

"Yeah. And then I broke her science project. It was this… this big as fuck Lego thing. And I kicked my soccer ball straight in the middle of it."

He mimicked the action with his hands, showing how Legos had exploded everywhere.

Miguel's confused frown deepened. "Wait, what? Why?"

"Cause I didn't know it was hers," Hawk brought the bottle back up, drank until he couldn't feel his lips. "I thought it was Demetri's. Just wanted to get back at him. He's the one who ratted me out to Sky."

"Well, shit." Miguel said and took a sip of his beer. "Man, you really screwed up."

"Yeah. And I got suspended for three days."

"That's why your Dad got pissed?"

Hawk nodded. "Yeah… But it's not like he needed another reason to be disappointed in me."

A silence fell over them, a soft dark silence that lasted maybe a minute, maybe an hour. Hawk was truly drunk now, the vodka had finally caught up with him making his whole body feel numb and strengthless, but funnily enough, it still didn't stop the pain in his chest. Sky's image was even clearer in his mind than before, her loss a sharp knife in his windpipe.

"I'm sorry," Hawk rasped after some time, turning his eyes at Miguel. "So fucking shitty of me to show up and just whine about my issues. When you… you're—"

"When I'm in a wheelchair and might never walk again?" Miguel replied a bit pointedly.

"Don't say that. You'll fucking walk again. And when you come back to Cobra Kai, it's gonna be just like before. It's gonna be fucking awesome—"

"Dude, it's never gonna be like it was before," Miguel let out bitterly. "I don't know if I can even stand up ever again. I might never do Karate. And I'm never coming back to Cobra Kai."

"What?" Hawk frowned. He must have misheard something.

"I don't belong in Kreese's Cobra Kai," Miguel stated firmly. "He's not my sensei. And neither should he be yours. If you just quit Cobra Kai–"

"I can't quit Cobra Kai!" Hawk exclaimed angrily. "It's for life! It's all I have left!"

"No, it's not. If you walked away from Cobra Kai, Sky might give you another chance too."

Miguel's words hurt so much that Hawk couldn't take them. He showed them away, refused to hear them or believe them. His hand was shaking, maybe from emotion, maybe from too much vodka, but he brought the bottle back up to his lips and drank some more.

"Sky will never give me another chance," he spoke slowly. "And she's right. I would only hurt her more."

"That's not true," Miguel replied, his voice softer now.

"Yeah, it is."

Miguel sighed and took a small sip of his beer as if in deep thought. "Well, who am I to give any advice? I kissed Sam while I was still with Tory, and I fucking lost them both."

"True," Hawk muttered, and let out a dry, bitter laugh. "Man, we suck."

"If you have more beer, I could have another."

Hawk poked about his backpack until he found the beer cans, and tossed one at Miguel. "So, not worried about your grandmother finding out anymore?"

"No, not really," Miguel replied and drank some of the beer. "Yaya's cool. I don't think she would mind even if she knew. My Mom on the other hand—"

Hawk chuckled. "She'd totally freak out."

"Good thing she has the night shift," Miguel replied.

They both drank silently for a while. The night was dark, and Hawk's mind kept slipping, back to Rickenberger's party and the pretty girl with huge tits. Hell, he could be fucking that girl right now, fucking her tits—

Yeah, right. I probably couldn't even get it up.

That thought was depressing as fuck, but true nevertheless. He hadn't even been able to kiss that girl, because he couldn't stop thinking about Sky. He couldn't stop thinking about the way she had smiled at him when she'd walked out of the janitor's closet, he couldn't stop thinking about her tears, the phoenix pendant that lay on the floor, broken, forgotten.

"I loved her so much," he breathed, his voice broken and thin. "I loved Sky. And I fucking ruined it."

Miguel didn't say anything, because no words would change the truth. But he sat silently by Hawk's side when the tears finally came.

Not much to say about this chapter. I'm stuck in the angst.