Authors: Fiona Knightingale
“I know that you’re tired, Naomi, but you and I both know that you can do this. Take the training that you got from Miguel and come up with your own variation. She seems to know all the basic moves and it’s not going to be easy, but you need to surprise her.” I was thinking about the Kimora lock and how it was put on and for some reason I thought that I could switch gears and instead of going after the arm, I could go after the leg.
I came after her, but she got two good swift shots to the side of my head. One was with a roundhouse kick and the other one was with a swinging fist that caught me off guard. She followed it up with pummeling my stomach, hoping to get me into position for the guillotine. Unfortunately, I knew of that move and I was able to prevent it by pushing back on her shoulders.
“There’s nothing that you can do to beat me. I don’t even know why you try.” I watched for any weakness, an opening that I could use to try this move.
We were into the fifth round and over an hour had transpired. Everybody was on the edge of their seats and I could see the blinking eye of the camera that was now sending the signal out all over the world. This was no longer on the Internet. This was part of the mainstay of this industry.
On the sixth around, I saw something, but I wasn’t sure if it was anything that I could use or not. It seemed that she was favoring slightly the left leg.
I pretended to go after the right, but then I turned it and brought my ankle around and struck her in the meaty part of her thigh. This buckled her down onto one knee and I was able to find myself in back, performing an ankle lock that turned into a sort of Kimura. My legs were around hers. I pulled back, extending the knee and making it, as painful as possible.
She did not tap out, but she did pass out after the pain had gotten too much for her to handle. This gave me the victory, but not in the way that I wanted. It was enough that my hand was raised and then I turned to see that Griffin was waiting for me with open arms.
I celebrated my victory in bed and when I woke up in the middle of the night, I turned to see that he was still there. I was afraid that he was a fleeting moment, but I didn’t have to be. I’d gotten everything I wanted and more and all I had to do was fight like my life depended on it. It was time to start my life anew and finding that apartment was now going to consist of Griffin joining me. Nothing would make me happier.
THE END
Nairobi grew up in South Africa and her mother had done her best to protect her. She had taught Nairobi how to speak English the best that she could and had taught her the ways of the West. She had begun explaining to Nairobi at a young age how important it was for her to find a husband in America. Nairobi’s mother had ensured that Nairobi would have the opportunity to be a mail order bride. She had done her best to make sure Nairobi looked beautiful in the photo that the men took of her and that was not hard to do.
Nairobi was naturally light skinned and had beautiful dark brown eyes. Her lips were plump and even though she was thin she still looked healthy with her round perky breasts and full hips. Her mother kept her hidden away as much as she could in a shack that was made out of mud. She knew that if the Guerillas saw her daughter they would take her away quickly. She had heard the stories of what happened to the girls that were taken by the Guerillas and she did everything that she could to protect her daughter.
Nairobi had grown up without a father and that had made it even harder for her mother. He had been killed when Nairobi was a young girl, but that only made her mother want to protect her even more. Each night before Nairobi went to bed her mother would tell her tales of the land she called America. Nairobi had met a few people from this country, those who had brought over food and medical supplies, mostly nurses or missionaries. They were very sweet and loving people and Nairobi dreamed of the world that they came from.
At the age of 18 Nairobi’s mother had taken her to become a mail order bride. It was the only way that she could think of to get Nairobi out of South Africa and into the United States. The men that owned the company told Nairobi and her mother that they would have no problem finding her a husband and they were correct.
Within a month of Nairobi turning 18 the men came to her mother’s house to pick Nairobi up and send her to her future husband. The men gave her mother more money than Nairobi had ever seen and she wondered how much the man had actually paid for her. She cried as she hugged her mother and told her goodbye and then she was loaded into a truck. They drove for what seemed like hours before they reached a small airport. Nairobi was shuffled onto a tiny plane and accompanied by one man.
The small plane took them to a much larger airport where Nairobi was escorted to a jet and told to board it. She was told that she would be met when she landed and taken to her future husband. Nairobi shook with fear the entire flight. She did not know how she was supposed to act when she saw this man for the first time. She was afraid that he would be mean to her or that he could possibly kill her.
She imagined the pain it would cause her mother if something happened to her. Nairobi closed her eyes and let out a deep breath, she tried to focus on the stories that her mother had told her as a child. Stories of houses with real floors that were not made out of dirt, houses that were made out of wood and that were heated and cooled. She had told Nairobi how the houses have windows that did not allow the bugs in and that she would not have to sleep under a mosquito net any more.
Then there were the stories of the stores. Nairobi’s mother had told her that there were stores that were taller than trees and that they were filled with beautiful things. Nairobi had no idea what was in store for her, but as she thought of her mother’s stories she began to relax.
The man that she was going to marry was named Mitch. He was a wealthy man that owned a chain of hotels in the wild western area of the United States. Mitch had been married before to his college sweetheart, but as it turned out she was not only in love with him, but she was also in love with the pool boy, the gardener and a few other men around town.
His ex-wife loved his money more than she loved him and that became very clear to Mitch in the later years of their marriage. Mitch was 47 and had been married for 5 years before he ever questioned his wife. The divorce had almost taken everything from him. His businesses did not matter, his money was just money to him, but it was the sadness that took over his life that almost destroyed him. Mitch had done everything that he could to take care of his wife. He had loved her with everything he had and treated her like his queen.
When he realized that she had never really loved him, he wanted to give up on life and came close to it. After a few years of therapy Mitch had begun dating again, but found that it was awkward and that he did not enjoy it at all. That was when he decided to look into getting a mail order bride. He wanted someone who would adore him, someone who would treat him just as well as he treated them not someone that he could boss around our miss treat, but someone that would respect him and respect the things he gave to them.
More than anything Mitch just did not want to be alone any more. He had decided that his best option was a mail order bride because it would be a win win situation. He wanted to have someone to come home to as sad as it was, he didn’t care who it was as long as he was not alone and he knew that the woman would benefit from the life he was able to give her.
He knew how his friends felt about what he was doing and he knew how his family felt as well. None of that mattered to him all that mattered was not being alone any longer. He tried to explain to them what it felt like to come home to a big empty house each day, what it was like to eat all of his meals alone and to only have himself to talk to. None of them seemed to understand. The ones that were married thought that Mitch had the perfect life, the ones that were single told him all the things that they would do if they were him.
Mitch felt as if he was completely alone in the world and there was no one out there that could understand. That was why he decided that he was going to order a bride and when he had seen Nairobi’s picture he knew that she was the one.
He knew that she was much younger than him, she had just turned 18 and he was going on 48 but that did not matter to him. She had not been ruined by other men. When Mitch had been dating he found that most of the women had in fact been ruined by other men. They hated all men for the way that they had been treated in the past and they were determined to make someone pay. Mitch knew that Nairobi was not going to be that way. She was still young and innocent, all she would know of men was what he would show her.
He had decided early on that he was going to pamper her and spoil her if for no other reason than to thank her for her company. She was, after all, giving up everything she had ever know so that she could come to live with him and be his wife. For that he was grateful.
Mitch had planned to take a few weeks off of work so that he could get to know Nairobi. He was not needed at work most of the time. He let all of his employees run the business and he only went into his office to have something to do. He had built the business from the bottom up. His father had been a successful businessman as well and had taught Mitch everything he knew.
When Mitch graduated college his father bought him his first hotel and that was the beginning of the rest of his life. Many people thought that Mitch was wealthy because he came from money, but what they did not know was that besides the first hotel he had earned everything he had ever had. When his father passed, he left all of his money to charities.
He had raised Mitch to understand how important it was for him to make his own way in life as a part of his self made cowboy mentality. He had taught Mitch that although it was great to help people get started that they should not be carried and they had to learn how to live with their own mistakes. Mitch had made plenty of mistakes along the way when he was building up his businesses, but his father had refused to bail him out of them.
At the time Mitch did not understand why his father would not help him. He wondered what he had done wrong to make his father turn his back on him, but in the long run he understood that his father was teaching him a lesson. It was important for Mitch to learn how to be responsible for his own decisions and his father knew that. Mitch’s father did not want his son to grow up as an entitled brat that had no responsibilities in life.
Mitch only wished that he had the chance to teach his own child the same lessons his father had taught him, but he knew that he was not likely to ever have children. The years of having kids had come and went while Mitch was trying to make his wife happy.
His ex never wanted children and had made it very clear to him. She did not want to wreck her body and spend all of her time raising his children as she put it. As Mitch drove to the airport, he hoped that he was not setting himself up for more heartache.
He had decided before he ever ordered Nairobi that he was not going to fall in love with her. He was going to make her an offer, as long as she was kind to him, listened to him talk and spent her time with him he was willing to give her anything that she wanted. He did not want to die alone and that was what it came down to.
It did not matter how many friends he had or how much extended family, he had, he knew that if he were to die he would be alone. No one would sit next to his hospital bed and mourn for him, no one would miss him when he was gone. Life would go on as if he had never existed and that thought hurt him more than anything his ex-wife had ever done to him.
Mitch pulled up to the airport and parked his car. He had made a small sign with Nairobi’s name on it. He had wanted to buy balloons and flowers, but he was afraid that he would scare her. He made his way to the terminal and waited for her plane to arrive.
He wondered what was going through her mind and how she would handle the next few days. He wanted to make sure that she felt comfortable with him, but he was not really sure how to do it. Mitch was an extremely smart and handsome man what he was not was a social genius. He was beyond socially awkward and he knew it. He would often say the wrong thing and upset people, he had employees that ran meetings for him so that he did not upset investors.
The majority of the time Mitch was quiet and just observed what was going on around him. He had not always been that way. Before he had gotten married, he was very socially outgoing. He went to all of the parties and was known as the life of the party. He had no problem joking around with people, but his ex-wife had changed all of that. She had caused him to question everything that came out of his mouth and draw back from social interactions.
Alice, Mitch’s ex-wife was not all bad. She was a demanding woman who knew exactly what she wanted out of life. She had married Mitch because she knew that he was going to be successful and that he could give her the life that she wanted. She was a dominate woman who did not like to be told what to do or where to be. Mitch wondered what it would be like to have a wife who actually listened to what he said.