Page 15 of After the Knockout
He looked up from where he was standing near the counter, flashlight beam casting shadows across his face.
“I’m good,” he said.
Dakoda looked between us, then back at KO, already halfway into his sandwich.
“You should eat,” he said matter-of-factly. “Mama makes the best peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”
I smiled. Dae-Dae loved my peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. They were all he really ate. Well, that and chicken nuggets.
“Is that right?” he asked, pushing off the counter.
“Yeah.” Dakoda nodded, serious. “She do.” He pulled his sandwich away from his mouth, looking at it for a second like he was thinking something through. Then he picked up the other half and held it out. “Here.”
KO paused and just stared at Dakoda with a small smile forming on his face. Then he stepped forward and dropped down into the recliner next to the couch.
“’Preciate it,” he said, taking the sandwich from his hands. Dakoda grinned like he’d just done something big, and honestly, he had.
“You live here?” Dakoda asked as he and his father ate together.
KO shook his head. “Nah.”
“You be here, though? You train here?”
“Sometimes. When I’m not training at home.”
“You train at home?”
“Yeah. Got a whole ring in my crib.”
Dakoda nodded like that made perfect sense. “You got snacks there?”
“Yeah,” KO said. “I got snacks.”
“What kind?”
KO leaned back a little in the chair, sandwich in his hand. The look on his face showed that he was enjoying the conversation. “What you like?”
Dakoda lit up at that. “Fruit snacks. And those little chips in the purple bag.”
“Takis?” KO asked.
“Yeah!”
“Cool,” he said. “I don’t have those, but I’ll get them.”
Dakoda nodded, satisfied, like that answered something important. I sat there, quiet, my sandwich untouched in my hands. All I had the capacity to do was watch them and regret every choice I’d made that led us here. KO looked up like he could hear my thoughts. His eyes burned daggers into me. Had Dakoda not been sitting between us, I knew he would have lost it by now. I looked down fast and started picking at the edge of my sandwich just to have something to do, because that was easier than staring at the hurt in his eyes. This was not the day I had signed up for, but it was one I couldn’t run from anymore.
“Hey . . . what I do?” KO’s voice cut through the dark, pulling me out of the text I was still trying to send to Nia. I’d never gotten the chance to text her and let her know we were safe.
Me:
We found somewhere safe. I’ll text when I can.
I held my phone out in the staircase like it would help me get service. Nope, just like clockwork, the little rednot deliveredmessage appeared on my screen.No signal.I stared at it a second longer and shrugged.
“At least I tried,” I muttered under my breath.
“Lyrius,” KO called again, making me turn around. My eyes bounced between him and the phone one last time before I locked the screen and slipped it back into my pocket.
