Chapter Twenty Two: Broken Rib
River Jenkins

“River, wake up!” A familiar voice calls.

I physically feel my eyelids flutter but I couldn’t open my left eye.

I think it was swollen.

Or I was dead… either way, it felt good to be numb.

“River, you have to wake up!”

I feel someone tugging my arm, but I still couldn’t open my eyes.

“River. Wake up!”

W-wait… Is that… Sophia’s voice?

No. It can’t be her voice.

I try opening my eyes again and this time it managed to open, barely. My right eye was completely closed and it couldn’t open at all, the left one was very blurry, I had to squint just to see who was crouched beside me, tugging my arm.

It was Myles.

I imagined Sophia’s voice after all.

I look around me, smelling the stench of sweat and blood from the locker room.

I could hear the cheers coming from outside the locker room as the crowd cheered for their new champion—the one who nearly beat me to a damn pulp.

I guess I should’ve expected it.

I wasn’t always going to be the undefeated champion, but the thought of being defeated after having so many fights were I was undefeated made my heart sink.

My dad’s words reminded me now that I was, in fact, a nothing after all.

“River…” Myles asks, looking concerned. “Are you alright? Can you hear me?”

It must have been a damn hard blow to the face if Myles was worried about me.

“I can hear you loud and clear. Stop talking so fucking loudly.” I grumble, lifting my right hand to shield my partially open eye from the bright, piercing light coming from above me.

“Sorry.” Myles apologizes, talking softer this time. “You’ve been hit pretty hard. I’m surprised you don’t have a concussion.” He says, sitting beside me.

“I think I have a concussion.” I tell him. I try to sit up but groan when there was a sharp, shooting pain in my side. I choose to ignore it. “I heard a voice. One I couldn’t have heard because they weren’t here, in the same room as me.”

“You might have mental confusion right now, if that’s what you mean?”

“No,” I shake my head at him, “I mean, can you hear things? People who aren’t even here if you have a concussion?”

“I believe not, no.” He replies, shaking his head. “Having a concussion can cause confusion and even hallucinations, but not hearing things. But I must add that if you heard something, it might’ve been your subconscious telling you that you wanted that person to be here.” He says.

I scoff.

I don’t want Sophia to be here.

I have made peace with the fact that I never want to see Sophia ever again.

I don’t want to see her. I don’t want to hear her. I don’t want to think about her.

I hate her for being there when I was at my weakest, again. I hate it that she saw me flinching when she lifted her hand into the air. I hate it that she might connect the dots to what happened to me in the past.

I hate it.

I hate her.

“So,” Myles clears his throat, “who… did you hear?” He asks me, curiosity clear in his tone.

“No one.” I swipe my hand across my face. “I must’ve just had a dream.”

He nods. “Okay, let’s forget about that for now. We should get you cleaned up. You look like shit… like a bus hit you.” He stands up from the dirty ground of the locker room and reaches his hand out towards me so he could lift me up.

I take his hand and he lifts me up from the ground, but I groan in pain when I feel the same stabbing pain shoot through my abdomen, directly by my ribs.

“Are you okay?” He asks, looking at me with a frown settled between his eyebrows.

I lift my shirt up, and sure enough, there was a purple bruise forming on the right side, against my ribcage. That explains the pain I had every time I tried to move.  I might’ve broken a damn rib, or two.

“I think I broke a rib.” I tell him, letting my shirt fall again to cover the bruise.

“Your opponent did kick you a lot of times, even after you passed out.” Myles explains. “I had to pull him off of you, so it’s not unlikely that you might’ve broken a rib…” Myles says, throwing his arm around me to lift me up. “But he was Lionel’s brother. He saw how you nearly kicked him to death the other day.”

“The guy I barely kicked to death the other day?” I groan, feeling the sharp pain in my ribs again. “Ah, that makes sense. He wanted to return the favour, but at least I managed to make it out of the ring alive.”

“Yeah, barely.”

My left arm was around Myles’s neck, keeping myself up as we walked.

“Are you taking me to the hospital?” I ask him when we near his truck standing beside the barn, along with the other cars that belonged to the crowd of people.

“I need to take you to the hospital, River.” He says. “If there’s even the slightest chance that you did break a rib, you need to get it checked out by the doctors. If the broken bone pierces your lung, you can die of internal bleeding.”

“I can’t go to the hospital, Myles.” I groan out in pain when he lets me go. “My aunt won’t let me fight again.”

“At the moment, I don’t want you to fight anymore either.” Myles says, unlocking his truck after he fished his truck keys from out of his pocket.

I sigh in defeat and get into his truck with his help. “Fine. Just don’t tell my aunt.”

“I’ll try not to, but it’s not a promise.”

I grab him by his shirt, keeping him from moving away from me and closing the door behind him. “I need you to promise me, Myles.” I look at him, “I need you to promise me that you will not tell her.”

I waited for his response until he finally just nodded. “Fine. I promise I won’t tell her.”

It didn’t sound promising, but I trusted Myles, more than anyone at the moment.

He closes his truck’s door and walks over to the driver’s side before getting in.

• • •

The drive to the hospital was the most excruciating pain I have ever felt in my entire life. Myles decided to drive over every bump there was, but he didn’t want to keep the traffic up, so he had to drive a little fast over the bumps.

I know he didn’t mean to, but a guy can at least try to miss the bumps every now and then, right?

Fuck. It won’t surprise me if the rib pierces my lung after all.

“I’m sorry, River.” He notices my scrunched up face. “I am trying to go slow.”

“Just. Drive.” I tell him, wincing between words.

The pain was unbearable but it felt good to feel something again.

I just hope my rib wasn’t broken, because that shit was going to be difficult to hide from my aunt when I have to walk up the stairs in the house, and to sit down at the dinner table on those uncomfortable wooden chairs she owned.

“Who would even jog in this cold?” Myles asks, jerking his head towards a girl jogging on the sidewalk, her hair flailing in the wind. She had earphones in her ears, her phone propped into the back pocket of her jeans. She had on a thin cream coloured cardigan that didn’t even help against this cold, but when Myles drove past the girl, there was a layer of sweat against the girl’s forehead.

Myles starts to drive slower, focusing on the girl jogging in the snow. “Wait, I recognise her.” He says. “She was at the barn the other day.”

I noticed the scar running along the entire left side of the girl’s cheek.

Sophia.

“Nah, man.” I shake my head. “That can’t be her.”

Myles starts to pick up speed. “I’m telling you that it’s her.” He says.

“You’re certain?”

“Yes, fart brain. It’s her.” He nods. “I asked her if she was fighting or just watching out of a joke, but my looks probably scared her off. She couldn’t get away from me fast enough.” There’s silence for a few beats before he started to talk again. “She left just after you beat Kane up. I remember now. It looked like she was in shock.”

I scowl and sink back into my seat, clutching my rib.

“Do you know her?” Myles asks me.

“I wish I didn’t.” I sigh, turning to face the other way in case she recognises me.

“You know, maybe if you weren’t such an asshole, you might get a girlfriend.”

“Who said anything about me wanting a girlfriend?” I frown at him.

“Guys always say that and end up with the girl of their dreams. Never say never, my man.”

“She said the same thing the other day.”

Before everything went to shit again.

“Just because it happened to you doesn’t mean that it will happen to me.” I run my fingers through my hair, looking at Myles. “I also don’t want it to happen. Girls are just a complete waste of time and energy.” I look out of the window.

I never had a girlfriend before and I’m not planning on getting one in the future.

Mackenzie is the only person I tolerate.  It’s strictly friends with benefits and nothing else, but not even I could tolerate her anymore. After leaving her stranded at the party, she became unbearable. She wants me back, but I don’t.

“Well, keep telling yourself that, man.” Myles chuckles. “When it happens to you someday, I’ll make sure to tell you ‘I told you so’ with a pat on the back.”

“I can assure you that it won’t happen.”

• • •

I was never fond to see a hospital before, but when Myles stopped his truck in the parking lot, I got out as fast as I possibly could, away from that death trap. I didn’t even accept his help when he wanted to half-carry me inside the hospital.

When one of the nurses spotted me clutching my side and saw my bruised and bloodied face, she grabbed the nearest wheelchair and demanded me to sit down.

I grab Myles’ shirt and glare at him. “If you tell my aunt, it will be you sitting in this wheelchair.”

He nods, shaking his head at my threat.

I release his shirt and smirk at him. “Thanks for the ride, even though it was a painful one. I’ll see you later.”

The nurse wheels me into an empty room and helps me to sit on the bed.

A doctor enters the room not long after.

The doctor lifts my shirt after I told him that my rib might be broken.

He examines my ribs, letting me breathe in and out.

“If it hurts, it might be an indication that it’s broken.” He says. “I also notice some swelling around your ribs.”

 My mood falters when he says the words I didn’t want to hear.

“Your rib is broken, I’m afraid.”

Fuck.

• • •

“Is everything okay?” My aunt asks when I enter the house, clutching my rib.

I quickly let my hand fall to my side, hiding the fact that my rib was broken and that I was trying to press a packet of ice against it, compliments from the doctor.

“I’m fine.” I tell her. “Today’s fight was just a little difficult.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re okay.” She says.

I nod, moving to go to the staircase, but she stops me by talking. “It’s almost Sophia’s grandmother’s birthday. I invited her and Sophia over next week for dinner. I hope that would be okay?”

It wasn’t okay at all but I couldn’t exactly tell my aunt to un-invite them even after she invited them, so I nodded. “Sure,” I shrug.  “Whatever.”

“Good!” She grins. “I will be making my famous pot roast. I am so excited to catch up with her again.” She exclaims, clapping her hands together happily.

“Can’t wait.” I smile, faking amusement. “I have to get to my room. I have homework I need to finish.”

I need to get away from her before she notices my broken rib.

She’ll never allow me to go back to the barn to fight if she knew that I was being so reckless today.  I nearly let my opponent nearly beat me to death and for one brief second, I loved it when the darkness pulled me under.

For one brief second, I loved it when I thought I was dead.

I loved that my opponent nearly beat me to death, because if he managed to kill me in that ring today, I would’ve been with them again. I would’ve been away from the gut-wrenching nightmares and I would have been free from the hold he still has on me, because even from where he is right now, he still torments me.

For that one second, I was free.