Julien's Book (4 page)

"You want anything?"

"I'm good," she said. "Thanks anyway."

"Thank Julien," he said.
"This round's on him." He held up the twenty with a smirk and turned to head to the bar.

Julien just shook his head.

The other two guys went to the bar with Carlos, which left Julien standing there next to Raven. She looked up at him, waiting for him to say something. Julien wasn't really the type who made a lot of small talk, so he just sort of stood there with his hands in his pockets for a few seconds until he realized he should probably think of something to say. Julien smiled at her, but didn't have time to speak before one of her girlfriends came up and whispered something in her ear. They giggled and talked for a minute before she looked back at Julien.

"Did you read that book?" he asked.

She cocked her head to the side and stared at him, confused.

"Your note said 'to the guy with the birthmark', and you knew my name, so I just figured—"

Her expression told him she had
no idea
what he was talking about. "I just put
the guy with the birthmark
because I didn't know your name when I wrote the note. I had learned it by the time you came in just now because I explained which fighter you were to these guys, and they said your name was Julien."

"So, you have no idea what book I'm talking about?"

"No. Should I?"

Julien shrugged. "Not really. I just thought that's why you wanted to hook up
or whatever."

"I wanted to hook up
for obvious reasons," she said. She pointed from his head to his toes for added emphasis. "But now you've got me curious about this book. Must be pretty good if you thought it'd have me wanting to hook up with you."

"It's
a romance novel. A lady from our gym wrote it. The main character's name is Julien, and he has a birthmark like mine."

She gasped. "You're the main character in a romance novel? That's the coolest thing I've ever heard.
You're famous?"

"I wouldn't say famous, she just wanted to use my birthma—"

"He choked the shit out of that guy tonight too. Did you see that?"
Carlos interrupted. He held Julien's beer and change in the same hand, and handed it all to Julien.

"I saw that," Raven said.

"Was he telling you about his alias as professional fighter and lover extraordinaire
Julien St. James
?"

"Did you
just say
extraordinaire
?" Julien asked, raising an eyebrow.

Carlos ignored the question.

"Was that the character's name in the book?" Raven asked. "Julien St. James? That's so hot." She was like a kid in a candy store, all sparkly-eyed and eager.

Julien tried to shrug it off.
Believe it or not, he would have preferred if she
didn't
know about the book. It didn't really matter anyway. There was no way he could make it work with someone like Raven. He'd only been there five minutes, and she was cute and everything, but he knew she wasn't the one. That wasn't going to stop him from having a little fun, though.

Chapter 4

"Where are y'all staying?" Raven asked. They'd been at Fast Eddie's for almost two hours, and had been having a good time hanging out with her and her friends. The guys who came in with Julien had been talking to a few girls too, but mostly they were all just playing pool.

Raven was all over him
like white on rice. Julien didn't really mind, he just dreaded telling her goodnight. He wasn't the type who had one-night stands no matter how cute the girl was. As far as he was concerned, if Raven was willing to sleep with him the first night they met, just imagine how many other guys she'd been with.

"Hello? Are you there?" she asked, waving a hand in front of his face.

"What?" he asked.

She put her arms around him and pulled him in for a hug. "I was asking where y'all were staying. I was thinking I could go back to your hotel with you."

"Yeah," he said apologetically, "we're gonna have to get on the road first thing in the morning, and uh, I'm sharing a room with another guy anyway."

She ran her hand through her long, dark hair and shot him a sweet expression. She was really cute, and for a second, Julien hated himself for not being
the type of guy who slept with every girl who was willing. She must have seen that moment of self-doubt because she pounced on it. She kissed him on the lips right there in the bar in front of everybody. She was sitting on a barstool and he was standing next to her. It started slowly at first. She looked up and barely touched her lips to his. But once she picked up on the fact that he didn't seem to mind, she pulled him closer and began trying to deepen the kiss. She put her hand on the back of his head, using her nails to gently scratch the sensitive skin at the nape of his neck. He opened his mouth to her slightly, and she didn't hesitate to respond by doing the same thing. Their tongues touched for a few electric seconds, and he caught himself reconsidering the idea of a one-night stand.  Maybe she'd picked the exact right moment to do that, or maybe she was just a good kisser—either way, Julien was officially enjoying himself with the ring girl, Raven.

She stopped the kiss, grabb
ed his chin and shifted his head to look at the side of his face. "Has anyone ever told you your birthmark looks good on you?" she said.

He looked at her
, laughing. "Not until about a year ago, but since then, I've heard it about six hundred times."

"Oh, you mean because of that book?"

"Yeah."

"I'm gonna have to read that."

"The guy in that book's not really me, though. I mean, he looks like me, and has my job, and my name, but he's just a character she made up. He's way cooler than I am."

"I can't imagine that," she said. She reached up and scratched the back of his head again. "I usually don't like mohawks," she said.

"But you like mine?"

"I love it."

"Hey Julien,"
Carlos said. "We're about ready to get outta here, dude, and you're driving."

Julien looked at his watch and then at Raven, debating for a second about trying to work out a little extra time with her.
All this in spite of the fact that he knew she wasn't right for him and he'd probably regret it in the morning. Raven could see Julien's internal battle, and she snuggled up next to him, hoping to make his decision a little harder.

"I can give you a ride back to your hotel whenever if you want to hang out a little longer," she said.

"I'm driving," he said. "And we need to head home pretty early in the morning. I have to be at work at noon."

"Tomorrow's Saturday."

"I know."

"You work on Saturday?"

"Not usually, but I have to fill in for someone."

"Where do you work?"

"At the gym."

Raven just looked at him as if that wasn't enough of an answer.

"The gym where we train. I teach MMA and kickboxing."

"You
work
at that place too?"

"Yeah, I pretty much live there."

"Really?" Her eyes lit up again as if living in a MMA gym was the hottest thing she could ever imagine.

A random guy
had been listening from the next table, and Raven's enthusiasm must have been a little too much for him to ignore. "You think living at a gym makes you a fighter?" The guy laughed and then turned to his friends mumbling, "I'd like to see what he's got in a street situation."

Carlos was always up for a bar fight, and he lit up at
the sound of those words. "Hey ese, you got something to say to my friend? I thought I heard you say something about a street situation. Did you need to ask him something to his face?"

"I
ain't your ese, you fucking wetback."

Julien turned to the stranger with a measure of calmness that seemed unnatural in the tense situation.
A few feet of space separated them, and Julien crossed it. Without so much as a word, he reached out and wrapped his right hand around the guy's neck."

"I'm not a figh
ter because I live at the gym, ese. I live at the gym because I'm a fighter."

The stranger's face was a mask of terror, and
despite him holding a pool cue in his hand (which he could have used as a weapon) he was completely motionless, petrified with fear.

Julien's grasp around his neck was unrelenting, and he was prepared to finish the job if the guy refused to back down. "Now, apologize to my friend for what you just called him, and we can all go back to what we were doing."

"I'm sorry," he choked out.

"Sorry for what?" Julien asked, tightening his grip.

"Shit dude, I'm sorry for callin' you a wetback," he sputtered. Julien let go of the guy's neck, and he bent over, gasping for air with a little too much drama.

"Is
that
what you were talking about with the street situation,
Ese
?" Carlos said. "Is that how y'all do it on the streets?"

Just about everyone
who was standing around laughed at Carlos' comment, but Julien wasn't entertained. He loved to fight, but it would have been just plain sadistic for him to engage with this idiot and his "street situation".

Fortunately, the incident gave
Julien an out with Raven as well. He told her he had a good time hanging out, but really needed to be getting back to the hotel. Raven wasn't accustomed to being denied, and she got a little pouty about it, but she shook it off and settled for writing her number on a napkin.

"You only live two hours away. Maybe you could come back and see me sometime," she said, handing it to him.

"Maybe so," he agreed. He folded the napkin and put it in the back pocket of his jeans. Considering how far most girls got with Julien, this minimal amount of interest was a compliment.

Julien and his friends
left Fast Eddie's and headed back to their hotel. The fighters and coaches were on the road the next morning by 9AM. They stopped for coffee before leaving New Orleans. Julien caught a ride with Christian and a few of the other guys from the gym. None of them had been with them at Fast Eddie's the night before, so Julien gave them a recap on everything that went down. They all got a kick out of the guy thinking he could handle himself against a trained fighter in a street situation.

"All I want is for someone to come up to me in a bar and tell me I
couldn't take him in a street situation," Brett said. "That'd be like a fuckin' Christmas present."

"It wasn't as gratifying as you might think," Julien said. "All I
did was grab his throat, and he was done."

"Damn, he didn't even take a swing?"

"No," Julien laughed. "And he was holding a pool cue."

"I'll bet he peed himself," Brett said.

They each shared stories about people who thought they could fight better than they actually could. Most guys thought they'd know what to do if they got in a bar fight, but they never realize the amount of cardio you need to make it past throwing a few punches. It's one thing to watch UFC and be familiar with the sport, but another to engage. All three of the guys in the car had been in the cage and knew for themselves how hard it was. They got a kick of recounting examples of how other people assumed they could do it with no training.

Everyone riding in
Christian's car made it back to the gym at just after 11AM. They'd all left their cars at the gym the day before since there was no need for them to drive separately. Julien had an old Jeep, but he was always working on it, and knew it would have been fine to make the trip. It was his baby and he loved having it as a project, but it didn't have air or heat, and he was much more comfortable in Christian's car. None of them even went inside the gym. They just said their goodbyes in the parking lot and went separate ways. Julien's house was only a ten-minute drive, and he decided to go home to put his stuff away and take a shower before he had to be back to fill in for class.

Julien had a small, Acadian style house nestled on a wooded lot.
The house itself was verging on condemnable when he first bought it, but he'd been chipping away at it for almost three years, and while it was still rustic, it was now clean and comfortable. He loved to fish, and being able to access the bayou from his backyard was priceless.

He laid his keys on the table by the door, unpacked all the stuff he'd taken on the trip, and took a quick shower. The house was quiet without
his dog (a handsome, tan and white, fifty-pound mutt named Max) but Julien decided he would wait until he was done with work to go pick him up from his sister Nikki's house.

He sent
his sister a text letting her know what the plan was and she said Max was doing fine. She asked how his fight went and he told her he won. She congratulated him, but wasn't interested enough in the sport to care about
how
he won or ask any further questions about it.

Julien's pantry looked about like you'd assume a single guy's pantry would. He didn't mind cooking, but didn't do much of it since
he lived alone. He had a few slices of bread left, and he used them to make a turkey sandwich. Then he grabbed a banana for the road and headed back for the gym.

****

"What are you doing here?" Julien asked Christina as he turned the corner into the main gym area and saw her standing there. He usually didn't work on Saturdays, but was filling in for Christina who wasn't able to coach her women's Jiu Jitsu class.

"I had to come in for kids class, but I have to get outta here. Thanks for covering for me."

"Not a problem."

She reached out to give him a hug. "Congratulations on the win last night. I'm sorry I couldn't be there. Coach Tim said you
won with the rear naked again. That's a good submission for you."

Julien shrugged. "
Hard to pass up when they give you their back."

"Ain't that the truth," she said, giving him a high-
five. "It's perfect, too, because that's what y'all are going over today at women's class."

"I know. I
just took a look at the curriculum."

She reached up and
faked a kiss to his cheek. "Okay, you got it then. I need to take off, Brian's waiting in the car."

"Okay. I got it," he said.

Christina reached up and touched him on the temple near his stitches. "Lookin' tough," she said.

He smiled.

"Speaking of how good you look, I heard you hung out with one of those ring girls last night."

He looked at her sideways. "How'd you hear that?"

"Carlos posted a picture on Instagram. You were with some girl in the background, and there were a bunch of comments about her being a ring girl and you making out and then throat slamming some guy."

"I
did not
throat slam anyone," Julien said, laughing. "I barely grabbed him by the throat, and it was just to make him shut up."

"How about the girl?"

"That part was true—although I wouldn't say we
made out
. We kissed a little, that's all. She was cool."

"Do you l
ike her?" She drew out the words, teasing him. Christina was a sucker for some juicy gossip, and was so excited she forgot her husband was waiting.

"No
, I don't like her. I don't even know her. I thought you said Brian was in the car."

"Oh yeah, okay. You're right." She
reached out and pinched his rear end on the way out, because that's just the type of thing Christina did. "Congrats on the fight and the making out." She was already headed to the lobby as she said it.

"We didn't make out," he yelled after her.

At that very moment, when Julien was shouting "We didn't make out," John David rounded the corner looking like he was scared to find out what he'd see when he got there. He had a girl with him, and both of them were wide-eyed at the outburst.

John David looked at the girl and started in on his damage control. "Coach Julien doesn't normally teach this class. It's usually
Christina, the one you just saw walk that way."