The Dino and the Trainee
TLOU2 - Fight Club 6
It’s been weeks since the ‘incident’. At least that’s what Dina calls it. The night Ellie thrashed around and scratched at her arm like it needed to come off. Dina still didn’t quite understand what happened that night, but was simply grateful she was there to calm the red haired girl down.
It’s February now. Valentine’s Day is tomorrow, but when Dina invited Ellie to come along with her friends and go out for a few hours to celebrate, she declined. The prospect of not being near Ellie on the day ‘of love’ seemed wrong. Maybe illegal. So, Dina pulled her phone from her pocket.
“it’s pretty home of phobic that your not coming with us tmr”
And, send.
A chat bubble appears within seconds.
“tuff nuts big man”
Dina rolls her eyes.
“my nuts are indeed ‘tuff’ as you would say”
“you’re annoying”
Dina returns her phone to her pocket and rolls her eyes, smiling a little smile to herself.
ELLIE
———
“Kiddo! Phone down! How many darn times I gotta tell ya?!” Joel groaned from across the ring, looking at Ellie in defeat.
“Yeah, yeah, old man..” She grumbled. Snuck in a eye roll too.
“Ellie, i don’t mean to be strict on ya or anythin’, but you just got tha’ real big fight tomorrow.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Ready to get back to it?”
Ellie nodded and the odd pair resumed their sparring to ensure that Ellie had her shit on lockdown for tomorrow. The training was rigorous on the both of them and by the time they finally called it quits, they dripped with sweat and were about ready to collapse to the ground.
“Ya know, kiddo, you’re gettin’ real kid at this whole fightin’ business. Ya know that?” Joel gave Ellie a firm but gentle pat on the shoulder, a proud look on his face.
“Yeah and you know what, old man? One of these days I’m gonna beat you. Loser.” She grinned, a look of pure smugness coming over her features.
“Yeah, well, you about damn near killed me today, shithead.” Joel rolled his eyes, and took his hand off of his adoptive daughter’s shoulder, but not before giving her a good smack to the back of her head.
“I didn’t know an old dino could still smack that hard.” Ellie grumbled, rubbing the back of her head as she sulked off.
“I’ll see ya at home in a bit, kiddo, okay?” Joel called after her.
“Indeed you will.” Ellie called back, trying to pull the most serious voice possible.
Ellie felt guilty. She knew what she was going off to do. How long had she been clean for..?
DINA
——
There was an obnoxiously loud beep coming from outside the front door and Dina knew that it was time to head out. She could already hear her friends yelling things like, “hurry up, D!”, and, “we don’t have all day, pal!”
She rolled her eyes and stepped out the door, holding both middle fingers up like trophy’s. Just to send the convertible full of teens into laughter.
She got in the car, grumbling something about how annoying they could be.
“So.. where are we going first?” Jesse tapped the wheel with his fingers a little impatiently.
-
The group was out for hours before they finally began to dwindle in energy. But before they could get too tired, Jesse spoke up.
“You guys ever been to Deeno’s?”
ELLIE
——-
Was she really going to do this? Almost three years clean and she was about to give it up for a short high?
Well, not yet anyways. It was finally time for the fight.
Ellie made sure she took extra time to herself to prepare in the locker room. Both mentally and physically. She stretched, her arms and neck popping a little as the bones cracked. She cracked her knuckles and took in a deep breath, closing her eyes.
I can fucking do this.