Chapter 18 - The Rematch
The following summer, Juniper Hollow held another block party.
Someone joked that MMA equipment should be prohibited.
Logan arrived carrying gloves.
Everyone laughed.
He walked toward me.
"Oh, absolutely not," I said.
"Relax."
He handed me one glove.
I turned it over.
Everyone had signed it.
Grant.
Noah.
Neighbors.
Even Mercer.
Across the center, Logan had written:
THANK YOU FOR NOT GIVING ME WHAT I DESERVED.
I looked at him.
"That's dramatic."
"I have forty thousand followers. Drama is part of the business."
"How many now?"
"Eight hundred thousand."
I groaned.
He smiled.
"Rematch?"
"No."
"Scared?"
I looked at him.
He immediately raised both hands.
"Bad joke."
"You're learning."
Then Noah appeared carrying two lemonades.
He was sixteen now.
Taller.
More confident.
He handed me one.
Logan looked at him.
"You still training?"
"Sometimes."
"Your mom teaching you?"
Noah smiled.
"Mostly how not to become you."
Grant nearly choked on his drink.
Logan stared at Noah.
Then burst out laughing.
A year earlier, that joke might have started a fight.
May you like
Now it became one of the loudest laughs on the street.
That was progress.
