“Hollis, stop it. He loves you so much. When he called me, he begged me not to tell you. He didn’t want any of this to affect you and everything you worked for.”
“I don’t fucking care about anything I worked for. Fuck TCF. Look at what it cost Chase.”
“You being who you are didn’t do this to Chase.”
“If I hadn’t been so—”
“I swear to God, Hollis, if you dare say ‘selfish’ I might have to knock some sense into you.” Patrick put his hand on the back of my neck and squeezed hard enough to grab my attention. “You get that woman’s jealous and self-serving words out of your head.”
I remained quiet and opened my eyes when Patrick tapped my lips with another vanilla wafer cookie. I opened my mouth and let him feed it to me.
“I’m sorry I was kind of a dick to you tonight when we got home.”
“Don’t be. I know how shitty of a day it’s been.”
“Still. I’m sorry.”
“Things could have been worse,” Patrick said.
I shook my head against his abdomen.
“I don’t know how they could have been any worse,” I mumbled. As quickly as it tumbled out of my mouth, I knew exactly how it could have been devastatingly worse. Patrick might not have made it to Chase in time, or Chase may have gone through with it, without any second thoughts.
Hollis
Twenty-four-years-old | December
Iwas bent at the waist with my right palm resting against my knee. Sweat dripped off my face and hit the mat below. I stared at the droplets of sweat as fans cheered and the referee began speaking.
Stand upright. Don’t be a dick. You did this to yourself,I reminded myself.
I straightened to being fully upright just as the referee announced Brendan Rowe as the winner. At least my first loss was to a fighter I respected and wanted to be like. I turned to face Brendan, and we came together to bump fists followed by a hug. Brendan put his hand up to block people from seeing his mouth as he spoke close to my ear.
“Keep at it, Hollis. You’re a force, man. You’re the new face of this sport. Don’t get down on yourself. You fought a good fight,” he said to me.
“Thank you. Great fight, Brendan,” I managed to say as I patted his back.
This was my first loss; therefore, it was a loss for everyone at Team Dragon. I let all my trainers and coaches down. My entire team was waiting for me at the foot of the stairs as I exited the cage.
“Sorry, guys,” I said.
Marty pulled me close and spoke into my ear.
“There’s nothing for you to be sorry about, kid. You’ve had a rough month. We’ll take some time off and refocus after the first of the year. Your family comes first.”
“You guys are my family too,” I told him.
As I walked past the row of seats where I knew some of my family were sitting, I couldn’t bring myself to look at them. Only Morgan and my grandparents were able to make the trip. Regardless of who was or wasn’t here, I’d let my entire family down too. With everything that had happened, I couldn’t even get a win to show them that I appreciated their support.
When I got backstage, I quickly wiped my face off and pulled on a white t-shirt with the Team Dragon logo on it. Normally, I had a few minutes to myself, then I’d shower and get ready for the press conference. I wasn’t in the mood for the press conference and just wanted to get it over with.
“Hey, are you heading out there for the conference now?” Patrick asked.
“Yeah, I just want it over with.”
“Here, take these then.” My agent shoved a bottle of the sports drink that sponsored me in my hand. He put one of the Team Dragon baseball caps on my head and reminded me to turn my head to the left and right so the sponsors’ logos had equal time being seen during the press conference. I nodded and headed to the banquet hall where the conference would take place.
This press conference would be the first for me as a losing fighter. It wasn’t something I was proud of, nor would I grow complacent or comfortable with. This was a terrible position to be in. I gathered my thoughts as best as possible as I climbed the steps to the stage. I shook hands with all the people that I was expected to. The TCF owner, Vin, tightened his grip on my hand so I wouldn’t walk away.
