Ria
The gym never really slept, but it had moods. Daytime was alive—mitts smacking, sneakers squeaking, the smell of sweat thick as fog. At night, though, when everyone cleared out, the place held its breath. That's when you could hear the building talk: pipes knocking, the faint hum of the old refrigerator, rain dripping through the roof in the back hallway.
I liked the quiet. It let me see Lachlan without all the noise.
He thought he hid it well, but I saw it—the way he carried himself heavier since San Diego. His body was sharp, sharper than I'd ever seen it, but his eyes… his eyes looked like they were always half-turned toward something none of us could see.
That night, he came back soaked through, hood plastered to his hair, knuckles raw. He didn't say much. He never did when something was gnawing at him. Chiron met him in the office, voices low, too low for me to catch. I stayed on the steps by the ring, hugging my knees, listening to the storm rattle against the windows.
When Lachlan finally came out, he looked older. Not in his face—his face still had that unpolished, too-young defiance. No, it was in his posture. Shoulders braced, jaw set. Like he'd just signed a contract no one else was allowed to read.
I didn't ask. I just handed him a towel. He didn't thank me, but he took it, and that was enough.
Later, after he disappeared into the back room, I lingered. Maybe I was waiting for him to come back out. Maybe I was just waiting for the sound of his breathing to even out, proof he could still sleep when the world was trying to carve him into something else.
Instead, I caught Chiron pacing the far side of the gym, phone pressed to his ear, his voice low and sharp in Thai. I didn't know the words, but I knew the tone: business edged with warning.
He hung up fast when he noticed me. Didn't even look embarrassed, just studied me like I might be another piece of the puzzle he had to account for.
"You should be home," he said.
"I'll stay," I answered. "He sleeps lighter when I'm here."
For a second, something softened in him, like he wanted to say more. Then he just nodded and walked past, ledger under his arm.
I stretched out on the couch in the office, but I couldn't sleep. My mind kept circling back to Lachlan's silence, to the car I thought I'd heard outside earlier, to the way Chiron's shoulders had been pulled tight as bowstrings.
It felt like we were all standing at the edge of something. The fight in San Diego had opened a door, and now shadows were bleeding through.
I wanted to believe I could keep him safe just by being here, by being someone who reminded him of before. But the truth dug at me: before was gone. Whatever was coming, it would demand more than comfort.
Somewhere in the back, I heard Lachlan stir. A restless sound, half dream, half fight. I closed my eyes and prayed—not to win belts, not to make headlines, but just for him to wake up tomorrow still belonging to himself.
Because that, I realized, was what they were really trying to take.