Bearding the Lion

Bearding the Lion is a collaboration with Sween McDervish. We hope you enjoy it.

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1.

David Levy looks completely out of place in the Triple Hit Mixed Martial Arts gym. Tall and long-limbed, dressed in a crisp white shirt, narrow black tie and slacks, dark framed glasses with a messenger bag cutting across his chest. One could, in fact, conclude that he is trying not to fit in.

“So what’s the name of your thing again? The publication?” asks Ken Kelly, the beefy fifty-something gym owner.

“Zeitgeist,” answers David. “It means spirit of the times. But it’s entirely online—a digital magazine, not a print publication.”

Kelly shrugs his bulky shoulders. “I’ll let you shadow a guy for a day—”

“A week,” interrupts David. “Two weeks would be better. I think you agreed with my editor.”

“A week then. But I want a fair story. No drama, no shit. And a say before it gets published.”

“You know we can’t let you have a say in what we publish. But I’ll be fair.”

David holds out his hand to seal the deal. Kelly waits a beat, then sighs with resignation and shakes it. His thick palm feels as rough as tree bark. David checks his own palm as Kelly turns away, half-expecting breaks in the skin. Hell.

“You’re gonna be, what’s it called,” Kelly gestures vaguely. “Persona non grata. No one training wants a reporter around.”

“Mr. Kelly, if there’s nothing to hide, there’s no problem. I assure you, I will be fair.”

“This is a personal space. No one wants to be watched. No one wants some dick doing a story about MMA being bad. Every one of these guys is gonna want to put your face through a wall.”

David flips on the recorder on his phone, asking “Would you repeat that for the record?”

“No,” says Kelly, “I will not.”

“So why, for the record, let me do this story, Mr. Kelly?” David presses. “Knowing MMA fighting has come under scrutiny for the damage done to fighters? Knowing that there are legitimate concerns about this high risk activity being glamorized to children, especially at-risk youth?”

Kelly tightens his lantern jaw, eyeing the phone. “Because if you’re gonna do a hit piece, you might as well see who we really are.”

“Very kind of you,” says David, “but this is not a hit piece. I’m not a hitman, I’m a reporter.”

“The fuck you’re not,” says Kelly, his flinty blue eyes narrowing. “I read that pit bull piece you wrote. Is MMA risky? Yeah. So’s anything worth doing. But it’s not like you think. So come see. Maybe you’ll learn something. Write your story.”

David pauses the recorder. “If everyone hates me so much,” he asks, “how will you get me a fighter to shadow?”

“My nephew,” says Kelly, “my sister’s boy. He doesn't pay dues anyway so he owes me. Does odd jobs when I need. This is a pretty odd job. Nothing’s free in this life.”

They walk through the gym, dense with musky scent and the wet smack of strikes against leather and flesh. David takes it all in, jotting down notes on his tablet.

He opens the draft he’s already written—a file titled Blood Sport—and scans the text. It frames the narrative perfectly. Now he just needs the sensory details to back it up.

“At the heart of the so-called Den, the city’s most troubled neighborhood, is Ken Kelly’s Triple Hit MMA Gym. It occupies a brick warehouse space from the days when The Den was a hub for shipping. The edifice survived the great fire of 1901 which took half the warehouses and shut down commerce forever after. The area later became a hub for itinerant workers, merchant seamen and old-school sex trade. It finally became a dumping ground for unwelcome immigrants and has remained that since. 

“'This should have been an Eden for those seeking refuge,' Mayor Pasquale famously said in 1938, 'but it has become a den of poverty and vice.' The nickname The Den stuck, and is still used generations later by people who know it only as a neighborhood to avoid, especially after dark. With only the most grudging civic investment, it has the city’s highest rate for violent crime and substance abuse, the lowest for educational attainment and income. 

“Today, amidst squalid tenement housing and seedy convenience stores, where it’s easier for children to lay hands on cigarettes than a piece of fresh produce, sits the Triple Hit, square and steadfast as a boxer’s jaw“— No. Resolute. “Square and resolute as a boxer’s jaw.

“Its massive industrial skylights are dusty and yellowed but still allow for slow shifting rays of sunlight. The wide open space seems perpetually humid, fed by sprays of sweat and spit flying from tough guys trading blows. This is especially so in the three sparring rings that circle the gym’s central feature, an octagonal steel cage. Young would-be gladiators practice striking and grappling techniques, invoking a host of disciplines, from boxing to Muay Thai to Judo to Capoeira and more.

"The estimated injury incidence rate in MMA is greater than in other full-contact combat sports, and the most commonly injured body region is the head. In a recent study, fighters with more than six years of ring experience were observed to have reductions in size in their hippocampus and thalamus, while fighters with more than twelve years of ring experience were observed to have both reductions in size and symptoms such as memory loss. 

"Those training at the Triple Hit are not dissuaded by the known risks, no doubt believing themselves to be the lucky ones who will avoid permanent damage, or simply not caring. In the dismal surrounding of The Den, there is a certain acceptance of the more grim realities of life. This is embodied in the stoic gym owner Ken Kelly, the paterfamilias who keeps the unruly lot in line through force of personality, exuding more testosterone than the rest combined... 

David looks up from the screen, watching Kelly walk ahead, giving encouragement or warning to those training as needed with just a glance. You should see his square ass hugging those sweats, dear readers. Good lord, how many squats a day does this man do…?

David shakes himself from his drifting thoughts as they reach a corner where a tall young man with golden red hair is silently unpacking his duffel bag. He pulls off his T-shirt just as David and Kelly approach, revealing an impressively athletic physique. David watches the muscle in his wide back ripple and shift. It takes effort not to stare.

“Ryan,” says Kelly, “This is the reporter I told you about. He’s gonna shadow you for… the week at the gym. Just your usual training every day.”

“I told you before, no fucking way,” he spews, without making eye contact. “I have a fight in three weeks. I don’t need this shit.”

“I’m sorry, but the fuck did you say? You will do this if you wanna still use this gym,” Kelly asserts, his voice dropping an octave, “Family works both ways.”

The fighter grunts at Kelly in frustration and spins around to size up the intruder. His jaw is thrust forward, covered with a short scruff of tiny gold bristles. David notes it’s the same color as the hair on his broad chest. His shoulders are rounded mounds of muscle covered with a spray of freckles, like spots on a feline coat.

“Fine,” says the fighter, offering David the barest of glances. “Just don’t fuck with my training.”

David holds out his hand, saying “David Levy. Sorry, Ryan? I didn’t catch your last name.”

The fighter looks at his outstretched hand with disdain. Then under the glare of his uncle, he reaches out. His palm is hot and damp as their hands clasp.

“Ryan’s his last name,” says Kelly, “Connor’s his first. Most guys here go by last name.”

Standing toe to toe the two shake hands. David feels the fighter’s strength, sees the tendons in Connor Ryan’s forearm coil. He could probably break all the bones in my hand if he wanted to, David thinks. 

As he makes a mental note of this for the story, a flush of heat betrays him. He feels his cock swell against his zipper. 

Whoa.

---

2.

At home, David sits before the expansive screen of his 27-inch iMac. A message notification pings in the corner of the display. It’s his editor, Jeff.

David’s fingers dance across the sleek aluminum keyboard: Shadowing a fighter, Connor Ryan. The gym owner’s nephew.

Jeff: Connor Ryan? Sounds Irish.

David: I suppose.

Jeff: Jewish reporter and an Irish fighter? Any more stereotypes to add?

David: Curmudgeonly editor with a heart of gold?

Jeff: Nice try, smartass.

David: Privileged readers worried their kids will get into fighting?

Jeff:  Attitude, Mr. Levy! Those Whole Foods yoga class helicopter mommies are our bread and butter, sir. And your last story about the correct way for a man to roll up his sleeves did not set the readership on fire.

David: Yes sir. And the Italian style is preferred, in the sleeve roll.

Jeff: So this fighter good-looking?

David stares at the blue text bubble on the large, bright screen. He types: He’s hot. He looks at the words, stark against the white background, backspaces to delete them, and retypes: I guess. He mostly looks like he wants to break my legs. LOL. But he’s cute enough for a red haired brute.

Jeff: Ooooh a ginger. Hot stuff?

David: Yes you big homo, a ginger. He’s good-looking, a little rough around the edges. To be honest I wish they had someone else for me to shadow.

Jeff: Why someone else?

David hesitates again, his hand hovering over the mouse. The image of the locker room, the spread of his shoulders, the gold-red stubble on his jaw. He types: He’s hostile. 

And a little more attractive than is helpful, frankly, thinks David. 

Jeff: Connor Ryan. Ryan the Lion. I like it.

David: I’m thinking The Main Event for the title.

Jeff: Maybe. Don’t get too far out ahead of yourself.

David frowns at the monitor. "Don't get ahead of yourself," he mutters to the silent apartment. He knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s written this story a dozen times in his head already.

David: Yes, Mr. Editor. Have a good night.

David closes the messaging window and puts the computer to sleep, the screen fading to black.

He moves to the kitchen to prepare a light dinner—chicken breast, pan-seared until the edges are crisp, served over arugula with shaved parmesan and a lemony vinaigrette. He plates it on matte black stoneware. He mixes a drink to go with it: Hendrick’s gin, a splash of tonic, and a thin slice of cucumber, precise as a surgical cut.

He sits cross legged at his coffee table, taking a sip of the botanical gin, pondering the story. He’s already drafted the skeleton of it. Shadowing the fighter will put a little flesh on the bones, so to speak. He needs a few quotes, a description of the sweat and the grunting, and maybe a solid paragraph on how this kind of sport draws in disenfranchised kids growing up in places like The Den. If you expect a short and violent life, you might as well throw up your hands and put training gloves on them, he supposes.

It’s tragic, really. And tragedy sells.

It’s all a far cry from David’s own life. His days are orderly as newsprint, punctuated by met deadlines and shifts from morning espresso to evening cocktails. Even his apartment in the trendy Pearl District is aggressively monochrome. The white walls of the renovated space are lined with black floating bookshelves; the mid-century modern furniture is clean—classic. By design, it looks like a black and white photo—vintage, but for some modern amenities.

He finishes eating and washes the few dishes immediately. He wipes the counters down, cutting a few corners near the backsplash. It all looks good if you don’t lean in too close. It’s all about the angle. 

For the moment, however, his curated peace is being disrupted. He leans against the counter, drying his hands, but his mind is back in the humid gym. Connor Ryan. He’ll be a tough nut to crack, but holy Hell, those shoulders. 

David settles in his lounge chair, picks up his iPad and pulls up an article from The Atlantic about mixed martial arts—the ritualization of masculine aggression. It’s ponderous and dry. Exactly how David likes to consume his violence: theoretically.

He reads the same paragraph three times, failing to retain a word. The words on the screen feel thin compared to the memory of the afternoon. 

David sighs and tosses the iPad onto the coffee table. He stands and stretches, the silence of his apartment ringing in his ears. 

---

3.

“How did you get into fighting?” David asks, watching the leather smack against the heavy bag. Connor Ryan is working a 70-pound Everlast with a rhythm that sounds like a heartbeat gone wrong. 

Th-thud-th-thud th-thud.

“Kelly said you had to shadow me,” he answers, not breaking his rhythm. His jaw juts forward, sweat dripping from his chin. “He didn’t say I had to talk about personal things.”

“Come on. You’re my window into this world. Don’t you want a good story out of this?”

“None of my business,” he smirks, firing a hook that makes the chain rattle.

David sighs, shifting his weight in his Chelsea boots. It’s been two days and he has nothing to show for shadowing the tight lipped fighter, other than a growing appreciation for the man’s deltoids. He lets his eyes graze over Connor’s powerfully muscled arms, and the way the training gloves wrap tightly around his thick wrists.

“It’s easier if you tell me,” says David. “It helps to get the story right.”

“I’m not a story.” He stops the bag with a gloved hand. “Just a guy.”

David looks around the gym. It’s ethnically and racially diverse, like a United Nations of guys who want to hit things. They’re otherwise variations on a theme: young, fit, muscled and—with the exception of Connor—sporting abundant tattoos. They’re generally quiet but occasionally social until they remember there’s a reporter in their midst. Their glares remind David he’s not welcome.

“How do I break in here?” David asks, dropping the professional facade. “Be a buddy. We’re about the same age. I’m just trying to make it, same as you. Maybe I’m just a different kind of fighter.”

The suggestion freezes Connor, who for the first time that day actually looks David in the eye.

“You’re a fighter?” he asks the reporter, then shakes his head and laughs. He’s so boyishly charming David can’t even take offense.

“It’s not so crazy,” David insists, straightening his glasses. “I fight things. Institutional corruption. Secrecy. People who think the rules don’t apply to them. Things you can’t just punch.”

Connor’s expression shifts from incredulous to amused to thoughtful. He looks David up and down. “Let me take you into the octagon.”

David looks to the center of the gym at the polygonal cage, which has been empty since David arrived, as if it was reserved for fighters deemed worthy. Does this mean I’m in?

“Okay, let’s go,” says David, rising to his feet. He secures his bag over his shoulder and opens his tablet case. “I can take notes from the corner.”

“Not like that,” Connor says, stepping into David’s personal space. “Sparring. Let’s get you in some gear and spar.”

David swallows hard. “Oh yeah, no. I don’t think so.” He holds up his hands to fend off the idea.

“You’re gonna write about us, you ought to try. Fair is fair.” 

Connor raises an arm to scratch his head, staring at David as he awaits his answer. His armpits are matted with golden-red hair and his sides are striped with sweat that hugs his lats as it runs down his body.

God, his body is incredible, David thinks. The idea of being closer to it — maybe even touching it — is undeniably appealing. He glances over his shoulder at the intimidating cage, then back to Connor. 

“If I do this,” David bargains, “you tell me how you got into MMA afterwards. No one-word answers.”

“I’ll get you some gear,” says Connor, a smug smile on his handsome face as he loudly rips the velcro straps of his gloves.

---

4. 

Fifteen minutes later David stands in the center of the gym, awkward in low hanging borrowed shorts and a sleeveless white t-shirt, at least a size too big. 

“We’re gonna go easy,” says Connor, leading him to the octagon. “No body protectors or thigh pads. You won’t need them.”

“I look ridiculous,” David mutters, glancing from side to side.

“More than usual?” Connor laughs. “Here’s a bite guard.” He holds the plastic piece up to David’s lips. “Kelly will have my ass if you write about how I made you bite your tongue off.” He smirks. “Though the quiet would be a nice break.”

David takes the bite guard into his mouth, his lips briefly brushing the fighter’s steady fingers. Unbidden, his cock responds, twitching in the loose fitting shorts.

Connor looks him over. His skeptical expression gives way to something more analytical.

“You have a little muscle,” says the fighter, running his hand down David’s arm from shoulder to wrist. He squeezes the tricep, testing the firmness. David feels warmth spread through his body at the touch, but tries to keep his facial expression detached. “Wiry,” Connor continues. “Good definition. And long arms. Really good reach. Impressive, if you could pack any power behind it.” He helps David put on a pair of training gloves.

David holds the bite guard between his front teeth, sucks in his saliva, and articulates carefully around the plastic, “I have a trainer. Twice a week.” He sounds like he has the mother of all lisps.

The fighter raises a dismissive eyebrow. “Pilates?”

“Core strength is important,” David mumbles.

Being scrutinized this way makes David unusually self-conscious. He has a decent body, and he knows how to dress to show off his lean build. In a tailored suit he’s a catch. But here, opposite Connor’s slab of functional muscle, he feels like a greyhound facing a pitbull. Worse, a crowd is gathering.

“Qué onda?” calls out a stocky fighter.

“Just a little practice, Guzman,” Connor calls back. “Let’s see what the reporter’s made of.”

Guzman nods enthusiastically and pulls up a folding chair. The others sidle up to the steel mesh. It seems like every person in the gym has suddenly decided to take a break. David wonders if this was what the fighter wanted, taking him into the cage, rather than one of the training rings.

He glares at Connor, determined to not be intimidated. The fighter holds up a protective boxing helmet, the kind that shields the jaw and cheeks, then points at David’s face. 

“Glasses. They look expensive.”

“Oh right,” David says. He reaches up but is stymied by the bulky gloves.

“Here, let me.” Connor tucks the helmet under his arm, and steps close, pulling the Prada spectacles off with a careful tug. His fingers brush David’s temples as gently as a caress. He looks through the lenses, then up at David with a smirk.

“You don’t even need those to see, do you? Just part of the hipster uniform?” 

“Yeah I do,” David protests weakly around the plastic, “for driving.”

“Uh huh,” Connor smiles. He sets the glasses down at the far edge of the cage, then comes back, stepping close once again. He takes the helmet out from his armpit and fastens the clasp behind David’s skull. The tight padding squishes his face, pushing his lips out as if inviting a kiss. He steps back with a look of smug satisfaction.

“All right, Driver, put ‘em up.”

 David raises his two fists, plants his feet and tries his best to ignore Connor’s spicy scent lingering on the mask.

“Seriously? Did you not even watch a single video of MMA before taking this assignment?”

David thinks back to the YouTube clips he’s skimmed. One foot forward. He puts his right fist forward, and pulls his left back.

“So you’re left handed?” 

“No right handed,” David says, his words muffled by the bite guard. “Why?”

“Then switch. Left foot forward. Left hand forward. Dominant hand in back”

David switches his stance.

“Ok now stop my fist.”

“Wait, wha—?”

POW! 

David takes a glove in the face and falls flat on his back. 

Straight above he can see the clouds overhead through a grimy skylight, and he can hear the jeers and hoots from the other fighters. 

Connor offers a gloved hand to help him up but David bats it away. He hoists himself up on his long legs. The gawky reporter trying to regain his footing, he narrates internally, resembled nothing so much as a baby giraffe being born.

Guzman slaps down a massive boom box and shouts “Esta encendido!”

A boom box? Is this whole gym an anachronism? David wonders. But as the Latin beat starts, complete with rhythmic hand clapping, the energy shifts. It’s showtime.

He resumes the position as Connor instructed, relieved that he remembered it. 

This time he spits the bite guard into his mitts and says “I’ve never been punched before. That wasn’t so bad, it just surprised me.” His words smack with spit and he slides the plastic back into place.

Connor smirks. “That was a love tap. This is a punch.”

This time David doesn’t even see it coming and flashing lights erupt before his back hits the canvas. The laughter is louder now. David feels a flash of genuine anger. Fuck these idiots. He pushes himself up off the mat, and then up onto his legs, one and then the other. Other people do this. If they can do it I can too.

David stands at his full height and shakes his head. He meets Connor’s gaze and raises an eyebrow. “I liked the love tap better.” 

Connor’s expression changes and his face reddens slightly. It’s momentary and his tough guy smirk returns quickly, but David notices. Gotcha, he thinks. Flirt with the straight guy to throw him off balance. You’re not the only one with moves, Ryan the Lion. 

 “Alright Driver, if I didn’t knock your brain out of your skull, get back in position. How can you avoid getting hit again?” Connor twists his left fist toward David’s face, but this time in slow motion, giving him a chance to think.

David holds his left up. “I could - knock it aside? Like this?” he says. He brings his right hand forward to knock the slow punch off course.

“Right, that’s called a parry. But look what’s coming next.” 

Connor’s right hand crosses over the top. David sees one option: if he twists in the opposite direction and crouches slightly he can dodge the right. “Good, that’s called a bob. Now let’s speed it up.”

Connor throws the same combination again, and David manages the parry, but the right catches him full in the face, knocking him back against the steel mesh. He rebounds, stumbling forward, and instinctively grabs Connor’s arms to keep from falling. He feels like a limp noodle wrapped around a steel pole, and he lowers his head to Connor’s chest. 

Hell, he thinks, you’re okay, you’re okay. Just keep it up. 

Even through the gloves he can feel the rock of Connor’s arms; his nose is almost planted in the red and gold hair of his chest.

“This is a clinch,” Connor says, his voice vibrating against David’s ear. “You can use it to tie up the other guy’s arms.” But not too long or the fans will think you’re in love.” He pushes David away sharply.

David puts his fists up again. “You said you were going to explain the stance.” 

“Okay. You got good instincts on defense, so let’s talk about punching.”

“Whoa, whoa, was that a compliment from Mr. Hard Ass?”

Connor smiles again, and David decides he’s even more dangerous when he smiles.

“Don’t get a big head,” Connor gibes. “Easier target. The reason your left is forward is so you can use it to jab. Your jab is your weakest punch but the most important because it helps you keep the other guy at a distance when you need to.” He shoots his fist out again and David backs away, proving his point. “And set up the power shot with your dominant hand.”

“You’re right handed too?” David asks. His flirt move is backfiring—the adrenaline and contact are going straight to his cock.

Connor switches stances effortlessly. “I’m a southpaw naturally, but I can go both ways.”

Unf, David thinks. Go away erection. Dead kittens. Maggots. Sticky toilet seats.

Connor runs through the basics. Jab, hook, cross, uppercut. He knocks David flat again and the other fighters in the gym laugh. He’d forgotten them. Go ahead and laugh, assholes. I’m not done here. He forces himself up again, looking at Connor’s face to see if he’s doing it right. He sees something in those lively green eyes that wasn’t there before. Respect?

“Okay that’s boxing,” Connor says. “But remember it’s called Mixed Martial Arts.”

Connor sweeps a leg forward and knocks David’s feet out from under him. David hits the canvas hard on his back, and before he can even blink, Connor drops on top of him, straddling his hips. They’re literally crotch-to-crotch. 

“Time for some BJJ.”

David sputters: “Wh-what??” He’s hard as a rock now, and pressed into the canvas by two hundred pounds of muscle, there’s no way Connor doesn’t feel it.

“Brazilian jiu-jitsu,” Connor chuckles. “What did you think I meant?”

Fuck he’s gorgeous, David thinks, staring up into the sweating face, just inches from his own. I have to stop this before I spurt in borrowed shorts.

He spits out the mouth guard. “Well this Jew is Jitsu’ed out I think.”

Connor groans at the pun and springs up. He reaches down and pulls David to his feet. Leaning in close enough for David to feel the heat of his breath, he whispers, “Go shower. The hot water’s out though, just so you know.”

David turns and holds his gloves in front of his crotch as he exits the ring. Not a problem.

After showering and dressing—tying his thin tie precisely and tucking everything in its proper place—David calls his due.

“So,” he says, leaning against a locker. “Now you have to tell me how you got into MMA.”

“My friend wanted to do it and needed a sparring partner,” says Connor, packing his sweaty gear into a duffel bag. “So I helped him out. Then he quit and I stayed with it.”

“That’s it?” asks David, his eyes on the fighter’s damp clothes being packed away. “You didn’t have some burning desire of your own? Your uncle owns the place. ”

“Not really,” shrugs Connor. “My dad was — my dad. When I was a kid, if bigger kids hassled the littler ones, or the ones that didn’t know how to fight, I’d defend them. And that pissed my dad off. He’d come down on me for fighting. So yeah, I didn’t think much about it because not such a good association, y’know?”

“Interesting,” murmurs David. A protector who was punished for protecting. “That’s actually really interesting.”

“Why didn’t you get into it?” asks Connor, zipping the bag.

“What do you mean why didn’t I get into it?”

“Well, you ask why do it. Like it’s a freak show or something. Why didn’t you get into it?”

“I don’t know. It’s just not the kind of thing that ever came up in my family life or growing up. It never occurred to me. And I’m not—”

“Not? Not what?”

“I’m not—” David lowers his voice. “I’m not built like you.”

Connor laughs out loud, a bellow that draws looks from the guys still in the locker room.

“Fuck, man,” he says, “I’m not built like me either. Not without training all the time.” He flexes his right bicep, pointing at the iron mound. “That’s hard fucking work. You think any of these guys would look like they do if they stayed home playing video games all day?”

“No. I guess not,” says David. He looks at Connor—the damp hair, the easy confidence. The masculinity that seems to radiate off him like heat. “Well also—I mean—maybe it shouldn’t matter—but I’m gay.”

He waits for the shift. The awkwardness. The retreat.

Connor bites his bottom lip, runs a fingertip over one reddish-blond eyebrow, blinking. David is struck by how the green irises are flecked with gold.

“Well, fuck,” chuckles the fighter, “maybe that’s what I’ve been doing wrong. I never knew that was supposed to stop me.”

Connor turns on his heel, shoulders his duffel and walks away.

David stands frozen. He blinks, processing the words.

“Wait!” shouts David, scrambling to pull out his phone, “I meant to ask—can I take a photo? Not to publish. It just helps me when I’m writing. Y’know, to have a visual record.”

Connor turns back at the door. He lifts a hand to wave goodbye and holds the pose as David takes a shot. He flashes a toothy grin.

---

5.

At home David messages Jeff.

David: Believe it or not I got in the ring with an MMA fighter today.

Jeff: Nice of them to let you keep your laptop in the ICU.

David: Ha ha fuck you. I acquitted myself well. And got good information out of the deal. From Ryan.

Jeff: Ohhhh Ryan.

David: Stop.

Jeff: Look at you, buddy. Bearding the lion in his own den.

David: What?

Jeff: Come on man, you’re the Jew here. Read your Torah.

David: I’m an atheist. What is it?

Jeff: In the Torah David the shepherd has a lion take a lamb. They really give a fuck about lambs. So David goes into the lion’s den. He takes the lion by its beard—that’s what they call the mane in the day—and slays it right there in its own den.

David: Okay?

Jeff: So it’s to confront an adversary on its own ground. And win.

David: Cool story, but I’m not his adversary.

Jeff: Sure sure. But get the story.

David sits back, rubbing his temples. He wonders if it was a mistake to give Jeff specifics about Connor Ryan. That could complicate things.

He switches windows on his iMac to research the story. Having been chastised by Connor once already for being unprepared he’s not going to get caught short again. He opens a glossary of MMA terms and immediately snorts at some of the terminology. Side control. North-south position? Rear mount? Ground and pound? He laughs. 

“This reads like the kama sutra,” he mutters. Not too homoerotic at all.

He looks over his notes on his iPad, and adds the photo of Connor he took in the locker room. He zooms in. Is it possible for this guy to take a bad photo? Even in fluorescent gym lighting, he looks like a Caravaggio painting—all shadow and muscle.

He remembers Connor manhandling him in the cage, and how pissed he was every time the fighter took him down. It made no sense to be so irked. Of course he handed David his own ass. He’s an MMA fighter just weeks out from his first professional match, and David had never been in a fight in his life. Still, it was infuriating. David hates being bad at things.

Even now, the memory stings. But he minds less when he remembers Connor’s chuckle, and how his green eyes lit up. And his smell, of briny sweat and soap.

David opens his zipper and reaches into his briefs to wrap a hand around his long, dripping dick. He strokes it with one hand, and with the other zooms in further on the photo he took of Connor. He brings the tablet down under his cock so he can see the fighter’s handsome face below it while he strokes off. 

He brings to mind how Connor looked in the ring. How he danced side to side on his toes. The way he jutted his jaw and tightened his lips with determination. The golden bristles of beard against his ruddy skin. How he loomed over him crotch to crotch at the very end. It catches him suddenly, the name for this position—Ground and Pound.

Fuck.

David manages to catch his breath but his cock erupts hard, spraying hot jets of cum straight onto his tablet screen, streaking the photo of Connor’s smiling face.

“Oh fuck… Oh fuck,” David murmurs, then yelps “Oh fuck!” as he sees the cum running down the screen toward the bottom edge. “No no no!” he gasps.

He tilts the iPad frantically to keep his load off the crevices around the home button that lead to the interior workings. The new angle draws the fluid stream to another side of the tablet, nearly spilling over onto his vintage rug. David tilts the device until it levels it out again.

He struggles to get to his feet, his pants at his knees, doing an awkward waddle-walk to keep his tablet balanced, and makes his way to his sink where he lets it spill. He laughs at himself as he wipes the screen with a linen kitchen towel.

“What a dork,” he mutters to himself, still giggling. He notes that he’s genuinely smiling. 

Connor Ryan, he thinks, watching the screen gleam again, you are making me into a ridiculous person.

---

6.

“Why do you guys hate reporters so much?” David asks, watching Connor dress for training. 

“Because, one, you spread shit about us.” He peels off a flannel shirt, revealing a white ribbed tank top that does little to hide the definition of his chest. “Two, the absolute last thing anyone wants is some reporter writing about how they train, or using a photo of whatever, and an opponent finding a way to manipulate that. The first rule is you don’t let anyone know your moves.”

“Oh,” says David, sitting on a locker room bench. “I’m not spreading shit. But the other stuff I hadn’t thought of.”

“Also,” he adds, pulling off the tank top to swap it for a loose, sleeveless training tee, “you dress like a dick.”

“Hey, this is what I wear for work. It’s very respectful and professional.”

“Man, lose the tie at least.” He snaps the elastic waistband on his shorts, at David’s eye level. The sound is sharp—a thwack against his firm lower abs. A trail of golden curls runs down his abs, disappearing into the waistband, pulling David’s gaze irresistibly. 

“This is a really nice tie!” David responds, forcing his eyes back up. He holds out the vintage skinny silk knit for Connor to see.

Connor looks it over. “It’s not as bad as Kelly’s ugly tie he pulls out for weddings and funerals. But dude, wear that on a date or something, not here.”

The word hangs in the humid air between them. Date.

David rises to his feet, a slow smile forming as he seizes the opening. “Hey, Ryan, just to show I’m not a total asshole, I really did not think about accidentally disclosing something an opponent could use in the ring. That’s a fair point. So, what if we take it out of the gym? Let me buy you a burger and beer.”

“Out? With you?” the fighter scoffs.

“Yeah, then I can ask you questions, you can answer without me accidentally spilling the beans on anyone’s secret Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique,” says David. He bunches up the fingers of his right hand and pushes them against Connor’s chest.

Fuck, he’s solid, David thinks, quickly pulling his hand back. 

“What the hell is that?” asks Connor, his eyebrows raised as he looks down at the spot where David made contact.

“The Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique. Kill Bill? You know? Don’t you ever watch movies?” He laughs, adding, “I mean not the real thing obviously, or you’d be dead.”

Connor eyes the reporter skeptically and says, “Yeah, if we go out you have to not do things like that in public.”

“Friday night?” 

“Mmmm, how about tomorrow?”

“Eight o’clock?”

“Six. I have to get up early for cardio. And tacos, not burgers. I have a weigh-in coming up.”

“I know a place.”

“Okey doke,” says Connor.

Outside the gym, the cool evening air hits David’s face. He raises his right hand up to his nose to see if his fingertips carry any scent from the brief contact with Connor’s chest. He has a strong sense of smell, often joking that his generous nose isn’t just for show, but there’s no trace of Connor. Just the smell of his own oaty soap.

The reporter could vividly recall the firmness of the fighter’s chest from the brief contact, David writes in his head. It was like slamming his hand against a wall. Not that the reporter had ever done such a thing.

---

7.

The next morning, David pulls up to his favorite cafe in the Pearl District. It’s a cathedral of reclaimed wood, where the air smells of roasting coffee beans. He takes a seat at the marble bar top, pulls up and opens his slim laptop, already synced from his tablet.

A barista with an undercut and sleeves of geometric tattoos approaches. “Americano with two percent milk, not cream?”

David nods at his usual order, surprised and bemused that he’s remembered. He offers a practiced, low-wattage smile. “You have a good memory.”

“For some customers,” the barista grins, lingering a moment before heading back to the machine.

David is a known face at a few cafes and more than a few bars where he brings his work. He thinks of himself as solitary, but like a lot of his peers in the Pearl District he enjoys taking his laptop out to sit side by side with other solitary types, eyes on their screens and wireless buds in their ears. 

They were like cats, he thinks in story form, testing the sentence in his head for a future column. Stray cats with expensive haircuts and top of the line devices. Their prideful self sufficiency betrayed by hearts desirous of the company of others—near, if not too near. The most practiced slid in and out of their seats without disrupting the space of others, as deftly as fighters glide between the ropes of a training ring…

Unf. Fighters...

Today there’s an additional reason to be out in the world. He misses seeing Connor at the gym, after only a few days of shadowing. It makes him eager for dinner tonight, even though he’s not likely to see the fighter change into his gear over tacos. 

Damn, he has an impressive physique, David muses. It’s not the body David is used to seeing—or touching. The men in David's orbit tend to be sculpted show ponies. Perfectly manscaped, their bodies built for aesthetics, for filling out a t-shirt or looking good on Grinder.

Connor Ryan is different. He’s big in all the right places—thick and sturdy. Built for impact, not display. And that curling golden red chest hair.

Ever since that day in the cage, Connor has been a more useful source. He told David that all fights have judges, determined by state regulations. He explained that competitive athletes in the US are required to keep logs of almost everything they do, and the inspectors can examine these logs, depending on state regulations. 

His most surprising revelation came when David asked if MMA had any positive impact on his life.

“Mostly it helped get me out of the rut I was in socially,” Connor had said, toweling off his neck. “Weight lifting was a solo thing to me. So I got to a point where my life literally consisted of just work, gym and college. Throwing MMA in there helped me… be more social. I’m shy.”

“You’re shy?” David had asked, rolling his eyes.

“Yeah, asshole. I’m shy,” the fighter replied bluntly. “I don’t express my feelings well. MMA lifted my self-esteem. I tend to overthink everything, and fighting taught me to think and react quicker.”

Connor Ryan, the overthinking Mixed Martial Arts fighter, thinks David. Ryan the Lion.

He remembers how when they agreed to dinner Connor said “okey doke.” What kind of guy is a brutal fighter, a guy who lives to commit violence, but says “okey doke”? The contradiction is maddening. And why does it give David half an erection?

Searching for more information, David finds a few amateur videos on YouTube. 

Aha, he thinks, watching a pixelated Connor move in the ring. He shakes off a clinch the same way he shakes me off conversationally when he doesn’t want to answer a question.

Then there’s the thing he does when he’s thinking. On screen, the fighter tightens his lips, pressing them into a thin line. When he releases them, the blood rushes back, turning them from pale to red again. It’s so hot, and he probably doesn’t even know he does it.

David shakes himself and clicks over his keyboard. He pulls up the draft of the promo he wrote before he walked into the Triple Hit, sitting right there on his desktop.

“Blood Sport_Promo.docx”

He opens it. It begins by noting the risk of romanticizing an inherently dangerous activity for kids. Get that out first to get the attention of the Zeitgeist helicopter mommy readers, he had thought at the time. It goes on to discuss normalizing extreme violence, and all at a cost to the fighters who are exploited.

He scrolls to the bottom. He needs to update the hook.

He types: In the weeks to come I will shadow one of them, Connor Ryan.

Connor.

He was so sure about it all when he wrote it. But now...Fuck.

He was dumb to have written so much of the story without the research. It was a waste of time. Worse, it’s garbage. Just crude caricatures and black and white worldviews that don’t fit the man he’s actually shadowing. 

There might be something he could salvage from the draft, but he needs to start over. 

Suddenly, a porcelain saucer slides onto the table, right next to his hand.

“One Americano. Two percent.”

The barista slides the cup within David’s reach, and next to it a little tin of milk. He leans in, crossing his arms, elbows on the bar, entering fully into David’s space. 

David looks up, startled. He glimpses the face behind his laptop screen. The barista is definitely flirting now—the body language is open, the smile inviting. It’s terrible timing, just as David is getting into his work, but he’s only human, and the validation feels good after feeling like a clumsy child in the ring yesterday.

“You’re always so focused on your laptop,” says the barista. “Are you a writer?” He cocks his head. Yeah definitely flirting. 

David feels a flush of vanity. He forgets the cursor. He forgets the save button.

“Yeah,” David says, feeling a blush on his cheeks. “I’m a writer."

He snaps the laptop shut. 

---

8. 

That night they meet at Rocco’s Tacos. It’s a hot spot in David’s neighborhood, the kind of place that strikes the perfect balance between dive bar grit and Pearl District polish. It serves good tacos, but its real claim to fame is its restoration of the historic landmark space, including a vintage jukebox that glows neon in the corner, and a hand fashioned copper bar. David insists they sit there, rather than a booth. The amber lighting is low, flattering David’s features.

“Interest you in a tequila?” David asks, sliding onto a stool. “They have a Reposado that people swear by.”

“Nah man, lite beer,” answers Connor, scanning the menu.

David pauses, then nods to the bartender. He orders two Miller Lites and a round of seafood tacos. 

“Lite beer it is,” David says. “Not very macho.”

“Gotta stay in my weight class with a fight in two weeks. And…” Connor looks down at his hands, and then sideways at David, “I save tequila for people I trust.”

“Aha,” laughs David. “I see how it is. Once an asshole reporter, always an asshole reporter?”

“I’m not quick to trust,” says Connor. But he says it with such sincerity David can’t find a witty retort.

When the tacos arrive David notes how disciplined Connor is. Without mention, he eats just the seafood from his tacos and the side salad. He takes a sip of his beer but doesn’t touch it again. Someone less observant than David wouldn’t have noticed. 

As he eases into his own beer David broaches the topic he most wants to ask.

“So off the record, not for the story…” David leans in, lowering his voice. “A gay MMA fighter? How does that work?”

“Well it doesn’t, mostly,” laughs Connor. He stabs a shrimp. “I mean, I love these guys. But there’s still a lot of homophobic shit here, like everywhere.”

“Not more?” asks David.

“Maybe less. Some guys—y’know fighting and fucking are pretty close in the mind.” Connor chews thoughtfully, swallowing before continuing. “There’s a lot of... ”

“Intimacy?”

“Yeah, intimacy. Adreneline. After a fight it’s not unheard of for a guy to be super boned. Throw in some booze and guys can get surprisingly open minded.”

“No way.” David pauses with his drink halfway to his mouth.

“Not saying it’s an orgy every time, but shit happens. Booze is a great social lubricant.”

“Ha! Well now you have to let me buy you a tequila!”

Connor rolls his eyes, laughs and finally acquiesces. “One.”

Waiting for their shots, David follows up. “I noticed something. You have to be the only guy at the gym without any tattoos.”

“And Kelly,” Connor answers. He wipes his mouth with a napkin, looking pointedly at David. “What did I tell you is rule number one?”

“Don’t let anyone know your moves.”

“Right. Dumb fucks say everything about who they are in ink. They announce it,” Connor says. “They tat their baby’s face, or RIP for their mom, and then they’re thrown off when their opponent says their baby looks like Godzilla or rags on their dead mom. You can’t tell people how to get under your skin and expect them not to.”

He glances—almost too quick to be seen—at the inside of David’s forearms, where lines of script are inked into the pale skin.

“Not everyone’s an opponent,” David says, reflexively turning his arms inward against the cool copper of the bar.

Connor smirks in response as the shots hit the bar counter with a heavy clack.

“Here’s to fighting,” David says, holding up his shot glass. “And writing.”

“May the best man win,” Connor says with a wry smile, tapping David’s glass with his own.

David smiles in return and downs his. Connor takes his in a few sips. 

“As a kid,” he says, setting the glass down and picking at the label of his beer bottle, “I wasn’t allowed to fight. I’d see little kids getting bullied and I’d try to defend them, and my asshole dad would come down hard on me. Still pisses me off. When I fight now I blow a lot of it off, and come out feeling clean, y’know?”

“Not really,” says David, surprised by the sudden openness. “But I believe you.”

Their silences grow easier and the conversation winds on, lubricated by the tequila and the hum of the bar.

An hour later, Nowhere to Run comes up on the jukebox. The bass kicks in, filling the space.

“Fuck, I love this song,” says David, drumming his hands on the copper. “You wanna dance?”

“Oh Hell no.”. Connor laughs and leans back on his stool, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Come on,” pleads David, “This is Martha and the Vandellas. Classic Motown. How can you not dance to this?”

Connor shakes his head no, immovable.

“I’ve seen you in the ring,” says David, swaying on his stool. “You’ve got moves.”

“I read in college that some anthropologists believe dancing evolved from fighting. Something about being like the mating displays of birds?”

“Yeah yeah, nice parry, Professor, but come on,” David says, “I just really like this song.”

“I don’t dance when I’m sober,” says Connor firmly. 

“Well we can fix that,” says David, signaling the bartender. 

“Besides, I’m more comfortable in the ring.”

David nods as the next round arrives. He looks at Connor—the broad shoulders, the stubborn set of his jaw. It seems a shame to waste this energy.

Then, the alcohol provides a spark of inspiration.

 “Oh my god,” says David. “Brilliant idea! You don’t want to dance—so let’s fight?”

“Here?” asks Connor, looking around at the crowded bar.

“No, let’s go a few rounds in the ring. Right now. Come on Ryan. Please.” He spins his bar stool to face the fighter, stopping his momentum by catching Connor’s thigh between his knees. He leans in close, smelling the soap and the tequila, and notices a slight reddening of the fighter’s neck.“I will never ask you for anything again.” 

Connor shakes his head, laughing again, but he doesn’t pull his leg away. “Dude, a few rounds? You wouldn’t last one round.”

“Is that a yes?” David sees a slight raising of Connor’s eyebrows. 

“I do have keys to the gym,” shrugs the fighter.

David sits up straight. He tugs his tie knot into place with a grin and says, “Let’s go!”

---

9.

The Triple Hit MMA gym seems a very different place at night as Connor and David stumble in, nearly tripping over the threshold. The door slams shut, and their breath and footsteps echo in the otherwise still space. 

The gym is awash in cool blue light as moonlight shines through the grated utility skylights, artifacts from its industrial past life, David writes in his head. There’s an almost sacred silence and a beauty you wouldn’t expect—I—wouldn’t expect.

He inhales deeply, taking in the scent of the space—cleaning solutions masking the years of musky sweat that permeate the air. It sinks in that they’re really alone. It’s the first time he’s felt comfortable in the space, and he lightly trots through the gym, whistling. 

“This is great!” he calls back to Connor, who is locking the deadbolt behind them.

Connor smiles and shakes his head at the reporter’s delight. David calls out in the dark waiting for echoes to bounce back, declaring, “Now for some music!”

The reporter scrolls through his phone playlists, turns up the volume, and drops the device into an empty drinking glass he finds at the water cooler to amplify the sound. First up is You Keep Me Hangin’ On by The Supremes. The jury-rigged sound system isn’t worthy of classic Motown—it’s tinny and distorted—but it does the job in a pinch.

“Come on,” says David, kicking off his shoes and climbing awkwardly into a practice ring through the ropes. “Are you drunk enough to dance now?” 

“Not quite,” says Connor, slipping between the middle and top ropes with a fighter's practiced ease. “But you’ve had a little too much.”

“No no no,” insists David. “I swear I’m more sober than I seem.”

He loosens his top button and unknots his tie, taking either end in his hands to run the length back and forth through his collar.

“Aren’t you hot—in that shirt?” he asks the fighter.

Connor shrugs and pulls the bulky tan chino shirt up over his head without unbuttoning it, revealing for a moment his abs and the golden treasure trail leading south. His white ringer t-shirt is snug on his muscular frame, the red trimmed sleeves pulled taut over biceps that twitch as he moves. David sighs.

“Ryan, you look… delicious,” he says, stepping up close. “Dance with me.”

David flicks the end of his tie in Connor’s face. The fighter swats it away, unamused.

“Come on Mr. Hard Ass,” says David, snapping the silk tie at Connor again as he sways to the music.

“Don’t do that, Driver” Connor says more firmly, batting the tie away.

“If you can fight you can dance,” says David, throwing his tie one more time

The fighter snatches the tie out of the air faster than David’s eyes can track. He jerks it, pulling the writer in close to his face. David can feel the hot breath on his lips, and see that Connor’s skin has flushed and his blond brows are furrowed in warning.

“I. Said. Don’t. Do. That.” Connor says gravely, word by word, his jaw jutting forward.

“I’m sorry,” says David, breathless, taken aback by the sudden heat in Connor’s voice.

Connor pulls the tie, and with it David, crashing his lips onto the reporter’s. David moans low in his throat and tries to pull back a half inch. “I just—” he whispers.

“Do you ever shut up?” asks Connor, before plunging his tongue into the reporter’s mouth.

With one hand on either side of David’s shirtfront, Connor jerks hard. Pearl white buttons fly, pinging across the canvas like hail. David gasps for only a moment, before responding in kind. He grabs the fighter’s t-shirt front and tries to rip it, but the fabric holds, stretching it out.

“That’s—not—how—” whispers Connor, planting a kiss between each word, “you—rip—a—shirt.” 

He takes his own t-shirt in his fists and pulls. The sound of shearing cotton fills the quiet gym. David’s erection stiffens at the noise, and the reveal of the fighter’s red-blonde chest hair as it spreads wide.

 “Holy fuck,” groans David, shoving his face into the fighter’s chest, pulling at the split fabric to make room for his kisses and bites. His tongue circles the pink nipples, and he marvels that Connor’s body is so hard, like granite wrapped in velvet.

Connor growls out loud. He dips down, wraps his arms around the reporter’s thighs, and lifts him up over his shoulder effortlessly. He then drops down to a full squat and powers back up. Then squats again. 

David snorts, clutching the hard shoulders. “What are you doing you goof?”

“Showing you,” grunts Connor, flipping David around to drop him to his feet, “that you’re light work.” 

As their lips lock again, Connor loosens his belt and jeans and slides them down, kicking them away to reveal the white jockstrap he wears. He pulls David close and wraps the writer’s hands around his firm ass. Crotch to crotch, David sighs and bites Connor’s bottom lip.

“Mmmm, I was hoping you’d show me that. And everything else.”

“I wanted you to see,” Connor says, pulling ruined David’s shirt off, “how soft my ass is.”

David paws the muscle there and moans, “Yeah right, soft. Fuck, that’s the hardest ass I’ve ever touched.”

The moment hangs there. Connor looks David in the eye and smiles, a slow grin. “Not on the inside.” 

David’s breath catches. The sudden, explicit invitation hits him harder than any punch.

Connor turns his back to the writer and bends over, exposing his white rear in the moonlight. David’s eyes go wide. Whoa. Didn’t see that one coming. 

He crouches behind the fighter. He grips Connor's hips, his thumbs digging into the dimples of his lower back. He kisses the fighter’s pale cheeks, tasting the salt on his skin, then uses his hands to spread the mounds wide. The pink pucker is there, inviting. David dives in, swirling his tongue around before plunging in with his tongue, long and hard.

“Aw fuck yeah,” Connor gasps, his knees buckling slightly as he grips his own thighs. “Right there…”

David pauses, pulling back just an inch. “You like that, Mr. Hard Ass?”

“Hell yeah,” groans Connor. He spins around and undoes David’s belt, saying, “But I need to see it, Driver.” 

With his pants and underwear at his feet, David’s long, thick cock springs straight up, almost reaching his belly button. “God-fucking-damn,” Connor breathes, “I’ve wanted to see it ever since you walked into the gym wearing those tight fucking pants. Jesus, I could see your bulge from 50 feet away. I couldn’t even look you in the face.”

David gazes down, amazed and utterly flattered as the ripped fighter licks and sucks at his meat, coating it with spittle. “Well—” he gasps, “—pretty much had a semi the moment I walked in.”

Connor jacks David’s hard dick in his hand and looks up at him. “Yeah,” says the fighter, “testosterone kind of hangs in the air here.”

David spurts a glob of precum seeing that handsome green-eyed mug next to his own cock. He recalls how he lost control over a photo of Connor’s face on his tablet and does his best to hold back now that he has the man himself in the same position.

Connor stands up, his heavy boots thumping on the canvas, bringing them face-to-face. “But Driver, the guys who want to fuck, they all want me to top them. It’s been forever since someone took my ass.”

“I’m the lucky guy?” David asks. He spits into his own hand, a thick glob of lubrication.

He steps in close, pressing his hips against Connor's. He reaches one hand around behind the fighter, using his long arms, finding the cleft of his ass, and slides two wet fingers past the sphincter.

Connor gasps into David's neck and grinds his hips against the reporter, his ass muscles clamping down tight on the invading fingers.

“Other guys, they look tough,” says Connor, gritting his teeth as David works his fingers in deep, stretching him out. The wet, sloppy sound echoes in the quiet gym. “But it hides a lot of insecurity. You got in the cage with me, even though every guy here watching was against you. I knocked you down four times. I was sure you’d bail after the first one. But you got up every time and came back for more.” He smiles wickedly. “You’re no wimp, Driver,  even if you dress like one.”

David withdraws his hand. He scoffs. He places a flat hand on the fighter's chest and shoves, hard. Connor stumbles back, tripping over the jeans bunched at his ankles, and hits the canvas with a heavy thud.

David looms over him. He grabs the heels of Connor’s heavy boots, yanking them off one by one, then drags the denim completely off the fighter’s legs, tossing the pile aside.

He stands over the supine fighter and makes a circular “roll over” gesture with his index finger. Connor smiles wide and flips onto his stomach like an excited puppy, then draws his ass up into the air, wiggling those perfect mounds.

“Fuuuck Ryan—” breathes David.

“That’s the idea, stud, get in me already. Fuck my Irish ass.”

David squats down on the rough canvas and lines up his long cock, dripping with spit and pre-cum, at Connor’s hole. He presses in slow. Connor moans as David’s cockhead pries open his sphincter. He slides in an inch and then another, the tight ring of muscle gripping him like a vice. Connor writhes while David gasps: “Fuck that’s a tight ass. You sure you’re not a virgin back here Mr. Nobody-Will-Top-Me?”

Connor tries to scoff but it comes out more of a yelp as David plunges in another two inches. “N-n-no, but out of practice. And usually I’m more drunk.”

David pauses to check in, “Too much?”

Connor takes a deep breath and David can feel him relax against the invasion. The fighter slides his ass back to swallow up the rest of David’s rod. “Juuuuuuuuust riiiiiight,” he sighs.

“Then let’s rumble,” David says, and pulls out almost all the way before plunging back in hard.

“Yes!” Connor moans into the canvas, “Drive that cock into me, bro.  Fuck my tight hole, you horse-hung stud.”

David can hardly believe Connor Ryan’s transformation from taciturn muscle man to dirty-talking cock-hungry bottom. He falls onto Connor’s broad back and reaches around to maul his hairy muscle-tits, tweaking the hardening nipples he finds there.  Connor gasps as David presses his mouth to the side of his ear.

“Yeah, you like that? Take my cock deep, baby. Gonna split that pretty ass  in half.” David  has topped plenty, but a burning feeling from his core drives him to want to destroy Connor’s hole with unique ferocity. Knock me down will you? I’ll show you skills you’ve never seen.

Connor gasps as David reams him harder. The friction is incredible, velvet heat gripping David tight with every thrust.

Suddenly, Connor’s eyes widen and look like they’ll burst out of his head. “What the—what the fuck? Jesus fuck I’m gonna, I’m gonna—FUUCKKKK!!” Connor’s swollen cock spurts an explosive cum shot that splatters the canvas. David moans as Connor’s sphincter tightens spasmodically around him, milking him, nearly coaxing a load out of him deep inside the fighter. He’s still gasping as he feels Connor’s whole body go limp. 

He pulls out and rolls the muscled fighter over on his back, then sits back on his haunches, his own pole still rock hard and standing at attention. 

Connor’s green eyes stare up at him amazed. “I’ve never cum like that, not touching myself. You’re fucking magic.”

David is full of goofy confidence. He strikes a playful pose, flexing his arms.

Connor reaches up, his rough hand tracing the long, smooth line of David's torso, lingering appreciatively on the wiry muscle there, subtly pumped from the exertion. “Behold the power of journalism,” David crows. He’s riding high, having never before talked like that during sex.

“I’m convinced,” Connor says, reaching up to pull David down to tongue-wrestle. When they part lips again he pants, “You gotta pound me again, Driver.”

“Yeah, you up for some Ground and Pound, Connor Ryan, mixed martial artist? Well guess what? That wasn’t a pounding,” David says, spitting on two fingers and probing that hot Irish hole, “that was a love tap.”

“Fuck yeah,” says Connor dreamily, spreading his legs wide. “Work my ass like a speed bag.”

“Hold onto those ropes,” David warns bluntly, and he plunges his cock back into the soft center of the hard-bodied fighter.

An hour later, David is fucking down into Connor’s sweat-drenched body, the fighter’s muscled form pulled up, his shoulders on the mat, his calves crossed behind David’s neck. It’s their fifth position of the marathon fuck and the reporter’s girthy dick has long since wrung every ounce of cum out of the fighter’s balls. Music continues to play in the background, the drinking glass amplifier giving Aretha Franklin’s Rock Steady an ethereal, dream-like quality even as the driving beat helps David keep rhythm. 

He amazes himself that he’s managed to hold off his own orgasm this long. But the fact that he has been able to last, to resist, while making this tough guy lose control over and over, engenders a powerful feeling of dominance in him. But now, with the exhausted Connor splayed out below him, his green eyes locked on David’s own, he knows he’s reached his limit. Connor fingers a rivulet of his own cum that is crawling down his abs toward his chest and then brings it to his flushed red lips. The look of surrender that Connor Ryan gives David as he licks his own seed is devastatingly sexy.

Please, Connor mouths wordlessly.

David gasps as a switch flicks in his brain and cum suddenly floods Connor’s ass like a dam breaking. His whole body spasms as his hips pump hard until they slow to a soft grind and then stop. He collapses on the canvas panting hard. They lie there together until their breathing slows and their skin tingles with evaporating sweat. Even then David is taken by the sight of Connor’s body in the moonlight, so strong but so yielding.

“That was fun,” David sighs, tracing a line of sweat down Connor's chest. “Can I take you out tomorrow?” 

“I guess. But just dinner. No fucking again,” Connor breathes.

“What?” David gasps, propping himself up on his elbow. “Why?”

“It’s my thing. No sex for two weeks before the fight. To stay focused.”

David props himself up, staring down at the fighter in disbelief. “Are you fucking kidding me? You don’t want to do that again for two weeks?” The thought hits him like a bucket of ice water.

Connor kisses and nuzzles David’s neck and says “I want to. That’s the point. But tonight’s the last night I can.”

David considers this. “So we still have till morning?”

Feeling the reporter’s cock stir against him, Connor smiles and says, “You better not make me regret this.”

“I said I wanted to go a few rounds,” the reporter says. He slides his hand between the fighter’s cheeks, spreading them wide, and presses his hardening length against the wet heat of Connor’s opening.

---

10.

David normally wakes on schedule at 7 am without an alarm, his body tuned to the rhythms of the city and the caffeine that fuels it. But his late night at the Triple Hit has thrown his internal clock into chaos. It's nearly 10 when his eyes finally open, gritty with sleep.

He rolls over, groping for his phone on the nightstand.

David texts Connor: Good morning.

Connor: Hey.

David: That was amazing.

Connor: Speak for yourself. I don’t think I’ll ever walk right again.

David smiles at the screen, a sigh of longing escaping him. He types quickly, before he can overthink it: Dinner at my place? I can cook.

He stares at the three dots that appear and disappear. Five minutes pass. Then ten. David gets up, brushes his teeth, checks the phone. Nothing. He makes coffee, checks the phone. Nothing.

It takes almost twenty minutes for the vibration to finally buzz against the marble counter. Okay. 

Then five minutes later, No funny business.

It’s odd to see the fighter in David’s own apartment when he finally arrives at 8 pm—two hours later than they’d loosely agreed on. Connor’s out of context here. His shock of ginger hair and bright blue flannel shirt make David’s place seem even more monochrome in contrast. 

The apartment is a study in greys and blacks, sleek Italian furniture and cutting-edge technology, all curated to perfection. Connor looks like a splash of paint on a black-and-white photograph.

It’s odder still when Connor greets him with a casual kiss and an embrace, tracking grit from his heavy boots onto the vintage rug.

“Nice digs dude,” Connor says, surveying the space, David’s sleek furniture and cutting edge technology. “Reporting must pay!”

“Ha!” David replies, as Connor drops his duffel bag on a Barcelona chair. “This is all hand me downs from family. I don’t even have a dining table. I use the space for my desk. I didn’t figure you’d mind.”

“No table? Where will I put my elbows like the slob I am?” Connor hoots with laughter, the sound too big for the room. 

“I made herb crusted halibut. And a salad with greens and edamame and pistachios and, I guess pickled shallot and… I remembered you need to stay in your weight class.”

“Fuck,” Connor responds, coming up behind David to kiss the back of his neck, “You cook too? Let’s get married!”

Connor laughs, but David steps away to dress the salad, his movements stiff. “It’s weird to not go to the gym to see you,” David says flatly. “Thank you for doing this instead.”

You were two hours late, David wants to say, and didn’t say a word. I sat here staring at the fish for an hour thinking you blew me off.

“You bet,” answers Connor, dropping his voice into a mock serious TV news baritone. “Did you just turn into a reporter again?”

“No, I just appreciate your time is all,” says David, his tone formal. He places their dishes on the low coffee table. As Connor picks his up, balancing the plate on a knee, David asks, “So. Being a gay MMA fighter—are you out?”

Connor sighs, stabbing a piece of fish. “Man, it’s nobody's fucking business who I sleep with. Or don’t sleep—am I right?” He looks at David, fishing for laughs but gets none. 

David chews slowly, swallowing before speaking., “Are the guys you sleep with—are they other fighters?”

“I told you,” says Connor, a mash of salad and fish visible in his mouth as he speaks. “It’s no one’s business.”

David clears his throat, turning a bit of salad over with his fork. They eat in silence, the only sound the scrape of cutlery on ceramic. When Connor is finished, he sets his plate down.

“So, Driver,” Connor asks, leaning back, “are you asking as a reporter? Or as the hot guy who fucked me all night?”

“I don’t know,” David admits, putting his own half-eaten meal aside. “I just—we did that and now we’re done because you have this fight coming up— ”

“Hey wait a minute. I can’t do anything for two weeks. Just two weeks. It’s not forever.”

David shrugs, picking at a loose thread on the sofa. “Okay.”

“What do you want to know, Driver? That the other guys I’ve fucked around with are all fighters? They are. If I’m out? I don’t know, man. Some people know. Kelly knows. Why does it all have to be words with you?”

“I just want to know where I stand, Ryan” says David. “Words are how I know.”

Connor glances at the lettering inked into the inside of reporter’s forearms. “Like those words?”

David flinches, reflexively pulling his arms to his chest.

“Let me see,” Connor says, nudging the reporter with the toe of his chunky sneaker. “I’ve seen every inch of you already dude. Open up.”

Connor reached across the gap to take David’s hands. He turns them out to reveal his forearms. David’s fully dressed in a cashmere sweater and jeans, but he feels more exposed than he did in the ring. 

The tattoos are in an old-fashioned typewriter font. The one on his right forearm reads “Rarely pure, never simple” and on the left “1/10,000.”

“What do they mean?” asks Connor, tracing the letters with a rough thumb.

“Well this one on the right is Oscar Wilde, a notorious Irish buggerer. He said the truth is rarely pure and never simple. The left is Lord Alfred Douglas, who himself buggered with Wilde. He said ‘There is only one man in ten thousand who will brave the full violence of public opinion.’”

“And?”

“Just…” David holds out both arms, balancing them like scales. “Scrutiny is important. You have to be tough and tenacious. But also the truth is complicated. So you have to be patient and kind. When I write I want to remember both.” He looks Connor in the eyes. “Sometimes the greatest struggle is the one you fight in the silence of your own heart.”

Connor sits back. A warm glow softens his features, and he says, “Maybe you are a little bit of a fighter, Levy.”

“Levy? Not Driver? I don’t know if I’m more impressed that you’d say that or that you remember my name.”

“Come here,” whispers Connor, pulling David close to him around the table, kissing him deeply and reaching down to wrap his heavy hand over the reporter’s bulge through his jeans.

“I thought you said no funny business,” groans David, rubbing his face against the rough stubble of Connor’s jaw.

“I can’t cum,” says the fighter, his voice husky “But that doesn’t mean I can’t have any fun.” He adds in hushed tones, “Some people would say it’s even better to fool around and not cum.”

“I like those people,” says David, sliding down to his knees to unzip Connor’s jeans. Pulling them down to expose Connor’s long white cock and heavy balls, in a nest of red-gold hair. “Fuck yeah.”

He swallows Connor’s cock whole, burying his nose in the fighter’s red bush and wrapping his hands around those steely thighs.

“Unnff,” groans Connor, his head falling back against the sofa. “Slow down there, Levy.”

David reluctantly releases Connor’s cock from his throat, but can’t resist a proud smile as his eyes water up. Getting Connor off right seems like the most appealing thing possible. The fighter’s two weeks of celibacy is a challenge that makes it so much more tempting, as a good challenge always does. 

He glides his tongue from the tip to the base. He takes one ball in his mouth and rolls it gently with his tongue, then releases it to take the other with barely a pause in between. He slathers the full length of Connor’s cock in spit and goes down on it whole again, feeling its swell in his throat, bobbing slowly up and down. When Connor whimpers David almost growls with satisfaction.

Connor grunts as he wraps his hands around David’s head and pulls him off his crotch with a resounding smack. He leans down and plunges his tongue into the reporter’s spit slicked mouth.

“Fuck!” he says between hard kisses “That’s a gift, but you have a lot to learn about edging.” David wraps a hand firmly around Connor’s cock, squeezing. “Uffh, the point is to not cum.”

“I’m willing to learn,” David says, clearing his throat and slowly pumping Connor’s meat.

Connor’s eyes narrow as he studies David’s face and eager expression. “Mmmm yeah, I don’t think so.” The fighter wraps his own hand around David’s wrist and lifts it off his own erection, now slick with saliva and leaking a stream of precum. “See? Look at what you’re doing to me. I’m about to blow.”

“Are you serious?” David asks, disappointed.

“Yeah,” says Connor, rising to his feet and pulling his jock up over his cock, and then tucking the whole package back into his jeans with a wince. “You’re a little too good.”

David frowns. This is an awkward first in his sexual history, being stopped for being too competent.

“Hey we can still get you off,” Connor says, nudging David’s stiff crotch with the toe of his boot.

David’s own pleasure seems strangely secondary to the idea of them getting off together. Especially after the night in the gym, seeing Connor’s ecstatic face as he came again and again. Without that shared release, it feels hollow.

“Nah, Ryan, it’s cool,” David says, hoisting himself up to stand toe to toe with Connor. “But I’ll take a kiss.”

Connor growls halfway through a sloppy tongue wrestling match and then breaks away, breathless. “Enough, Levy. You’re making this too hard.”

David cups Connor’s erection through his jeans, squeezing gently. “You mean I’m making you too hard.”

“Exactly,” groans Connor, giving David a last peck on the lips.

He picks up his bag and makes his way to the door. As he walks out, he turns back. “Text me tomorrow if you miss me.”

Why wait till tomorrow? David wonders, as the door clicks. His home seems so empty already. The silence, usually a comfort, now feels heavy.

He groans and tries to shake it off as he brings dishes to his kitchen. As he washes them he asks himself, Who am I when I’m this guy? Get it together Levy. He realizes that he’s calling himself by his last name, and laughs.

The next morning David texts Connor, Hey stud.

There’s no response.

I had a good time last night, David texts an hour later.

Ryan? David texts at midday. 

Are you pissed at me? David texts at four pm.

After nine Connor responds, Busy day, Levy. See you later.

David checks his memory. Connor did say Text me tomorrow if you miss me. He’s certain.

David sets down his phone and pulls up his laptop to work on the story. 

---

11. 

“The dead have risen,” says David, answering the door to see a boyishly grinning Connor, holding a pizza box in one hand, a brown paper bag in the other.

“Yeah sorry. Work and training. I’ll make it up to you. Dinner?”

David gestures for Connor to enter. It’s been a week since they last saw each other. After several texts inviting him to dinner, to lunch, to a walk, and to a visit at the gym—all met with silence, or vague deferrals—David finally stopped asking. Similarly stalled is his story, the cursor blinking on the same paragraph for days.

Connor rests the pizza on the coffee table and lands solidly on the sofa, kicking his boots off. From the bag, he produces a bottle of gin and a bottle of tonic water.

“I remembered you like the fancy stuff,” Connor says, holding up the gin.

David smiles, despite his irritation. He gets tumblers and ice from the kitchen. When he returns, Connor has opened the pizza.

As David has seen, Connor’s discipline extends to food as well as sex. He eats only two slices, and even then, he picks the pepperoni and cheese off the crust, eating the protein and discarding the carbs. But the gin and tonics pour freely.

“How’s the story?” asks Connor, chewing a mouthful of cheese.

“Oh y’know—getting my head around it,” answers David, swirling his drink. “Fighters are like—like—”

“Pit bulls?”

“What?”

“Like pit bulls. You think you know the animal until the day you strike a nerve. Y’know?”

David’s brows furrow. “That’s from my story. That’s the first line of my pit bull story.” He’s halfway off his ass when it hits him. “You read my story?”

“Fighters, pit bulls. Raised without love, trained to go for the throat and never let go, can't be trusted no matter how affectionate they seem, blah blah blah."

“You read my story, Ryan?”

“Yeah. It was wrong about everything,” the fighter says, swigging the last of his drink.

“Well fuck, Ryan, if I’m so wrong about everything why are you here?”

David pours another round, unsure if he wants a reply. His vanity is bruised, but his curiosity is piqued.

“Because I like your nose,” answers Connor. His rough fingertips trace the bridge. “And your hands.” He traces a finger over David’s long digits resting on the glass. “And your mouth.” He leans in and kisses the reporter, tasting of gin and grease.

“You’re making me insane,” gushes David as their lips part.

“I like your writing,” Connor continues, settling back into his seat. “When you’re not busy being wrong. And you're not wrong about everything. You're dead on about education. And—I don’t know—how to roll up your sleeves and shit. But fighting you don't understand at all. And I want you to."

David’s feelings confound him, equal parts outrage at the criticism and delight at the flattery. He begins to mount a defense three times but gives up on each, instead deciding Connor might be right. And that prompts an idea.

“Ryan!” he says out loud. “You can let me be in your corner at your fight.”

“Ohhh fuck no!”

“Why not? You want me to understand.”

“Fuck me! No! For one thing, I have to be focused. This guy’s out to murder me. I don’t need to be worried about you and what you see.”

“Why would you worry about me? I can handle myself.”

Connor looks down and smiles for a second before meeting eyes and running his thick fingers through David’s silky hair. “I’ll bet you can. But I don’t know how many of your great ideas I can survive. And I don’t think you’re ready to be in my corner.”

“I can do it. Say yes.” 

“You’re so hard to say no to, Levy,” says Connor, rolling his eyes and pulling the reporter’s hand down to the bulge in his jeans.

“It’s a deal,” says David, immediately reaching for the zipper. “Now let’s see that cock.”

“Oh no no no,” says Connor, grabbing David’s wrists firmly. “I haven’t blown a load in a week, and I have a week to go. I’m not letting your mouth on my dick again.”

“Ryan, you put my hand on your dick.”

“Ugh, I know. I’m conflicted.”

“Why do you DO this?” asks David. “I looked it up. It’s just a myth that having sex before a fight hurts performance.” He slowly drops to his knees, face level with the bulge in Connor’s jeans. “In fact, Connor Ryan, there are studies that show there is no physiological basis to this myth.” He rubs his face against the stiff denim and kisses it. “It has even been demonstrated that sex prior to sports activity can elevate the levels of testosterone in males, which potentially could enhance their performance.” He buries his face between Connor’s legs, inhaling the scent of him, even as the fighter holds his wrists tight.

“Levy,” groans Connor, “you’re killing me here.”

“You make it hard,” pleads the reporter. “You make me hard.”

“Dude, look... You want to know why no cumming? What is the first priority of any living organism?”

“To fight?”

“Stop, you’re not even trying. It’s to reproduce.” David releases his wrists, resting back on his heels.

“Okay,” sighs David, sitting back on his rear, “enlighten me., Professor.”

“Dude, men are driven to have sex, and who gets it the most?”

“Not me tonight, I’m guessing.”

“Winners. Winners get access to the most sex. That’s what drives our competitive spirit. Without it we wouldn’t have musicians, fighters… even reporters. Your body wants you to reproduce and that drives your fire to beat every other guy. But when you have sex you lose your edge because your body thinks you already succeeded, basically.”

“One problem, Ryan. You’re gay. You’re not reproducing anyway.”

“Nooo,” insists Connor, “my balls don’t know I can’t knock you up. When I blow a load, my boys just think fuck yeah, mission accomplished. The point is, when you cum your body thinks you got the reward so you lose the hunger to fight for it. Ask anyone in fighting. Having sex before a fight takes away your motivation to succeed.”

“So your body is tricking you into wanting to win? And you’re tricking your body to make it win for you?”

“I guess,” Connor shrugs. “Y’know, go with what works.”

“Ugh, you’re making me dizzy,” grunts David, in plain surrender. “Whatever.”

“Hey, Levy,” says Connor, softening. “Some guys don’t fuck for months before a fight. Two weeks is nothing.” 

“Okay,” says David, with new resolve. “I’m on board.

“Just like that?”

“Just like that,” says David, intent in his eyes and his jaw firm as he looks up. “Let me see that hard ass again.”

Connor rolls his eyes and laughs, standing up and turning around. He slowly drops his jeans to his ankles. His pale ass is framed by a white jockstrap, the faint golden hairs springing free. He looks back over his shoulder and asks huskily, “You like that?”

“Like meat loves salt,” sighs David.

He rises to his knees to kiss the firm mounds of ass. He spreads the hard glutes and licks at the pink pucker, while reaching into his own pants front to adjust himself. He rises to his feet behind Connor, presses against his back and whispers: “Can you do that Muay Thai leg lift?”

“Oh Jesus,” says Connor. He shifts his weight to his left leg and slowly raises his right thigh, keeping his lower leg tucked under, his foot pointed straight down. The muscles in his standing leg twitch with the effort of balancing.

David smears his fingers with spit and then slides his hand down to finger the fighter’s hole.

“Good job Ryan,” he whispers with heated breath into the reddening ear. “What do you call this pose?”

“Fuck man,” laughs Connor, bracing his hands on his own knees for balance. “It’s kind of—Hanuman Charges His Knee Up, I think.” He groans as David’s hands cup his blond furred ass, the long fingers prying at his hole.

“What else can you do?”

“Croc—unhhh Crocodile Sweeps Its Tail,” moans Connor. He extends his raised leg straight out behind him, his core tightening with intense concentration. David’s slicked fingers enter him, one and then a second, a third teasing at his hole.

“Oh I like that,” says David. “How long can you keep that up?’

Connor gasps as the reporter’s dexterous fingers open him, stretching him. “Fuck, not long, Levy.”

David strokes the fighter inside, reaching in deeper to tease the hard nut of Connor’s prostate, saying, “Just tell me if I could make you cum right now.”

Connor gulps and nods, his head falling forward. “Yes. Fuck! Yes. My jock is soaking.”

Satisfied with the fighter’s admission, David withdraws his fingers with a wet pop, and straightens up. “We’re done,” he says, slapping Connor’s rear and stepping back.

“We’re done?” asks Connor.

“For now,” says the reporter. “Now show me Grateful Lion.”

“That’s not a thing,” Connor responds, pulling up his jeans. “You made that up.”

“Improvise.”

Connor turns around and plants his full mouth on David’s for a long wet kiss. He pulls away, licking his lips. “I have to go now. I can’t hold back if we keep this up.”

“I know,” says David. 

“But you go ahead,” says Connor. “Don’t let my fight stop you. You can do it for both of us.”

“Nah, it’s our fight now,” says the reporter. “If you’re waiting, I’m waiting too.”

Connor smiles, a genuine, boyish expression that lights up the room. He pulls his belt tight. They exchange one more kiss at the door.

As Connor walks down the hall, David leans out the door, calling out more moves. “Drunk Waterfowl… Pull the Lion’s Tail… The Viper Stands Erect… come on fighter!”

Connor shakes his head, throws a mock martial arts kick in the air, and laughs as he disappears around a corner.

---

12. 

It’s the one place he never expected to miss, but entering the Triple Hit Gym, David is hit with a humid waft of masculine scent—stale sweat, rubber mats, and leather—that makes him ache for the night he and Connor came in after hours for a marathon fuck. 

Get ahold of yourself, he thinks, adjusting his messenger bag. It was barely a week ago.

But as delighted as he is to be there, the gym regulars eye him with equal disdain. They must have thought they were through with him, and couldn’t have expected he’d be back to pick up Connor for social reasons. 

Well, whatever, David thinks, lifting his chin. If they don’t like the white shirt and tie it’s their problem. They’re not why I’m back anyway.

He can see Connor in his training gear glide easily between the ropes of a training ring. He’s so deft he doesn’t appear to touch them at all. Fuck, how does he do that?

Connor stretches out his muscles and cracks his neck, then bounces on his toes rhythmically and starts to shadowbox, throwing out jabs, hooks, and uppercuts in rapid succession. He’s so fast David’s eye can barely follow, but the fighter manages to catch sight of the reporter.

“Hey,” he mouths, his lips turning up in a smile that floods David with heat. His brows knit up as if to say what are you doing here?

David swallows and steps up to the ring apron. “Hey. I just - I realized I don’t have a release from you. For the story. And I thought we could take some better promo pics. Y’know, all I have is that one I took with my phone.”

He pulls a form and a pen from his bag, putting on his most officious facade. It’s a more dignified reason than you didn’t respond to my texts.

“Release, huh?” the fighter asks with a smirk. “Okay… but you’ll  have to come… and… get it.” He holds up a hand, waving David into the ring. The reporter nearly growls in response.

Damn it, he thinks, trying to shake out a leg to accommodate the torque in his briefs from the hard on he’s sporting. It’s hard enough to try to get through the dumb ropes without a full on boner. It’s not just Connor’s sexy invitation, but the sense memory of their frantic kisses, the heat of being inside him, even the cooling of his evaporating sweat as they lay on the canvas building strength for another round.

“What do you want me to do?” Connor asks, taking the form and pen in hand.

“Just a standard release,” David says, “so I can use your name, photos, whatever.”

Connor eyes him skeptically. 

“I know, I know. Don’t let anyone see your moves,” David replies. “I swear, no one is going to get anything from this to use against you.”

“Whatever dude,” Connor responds, holding the sheet in his hand to awkwardly sign his name.

As he hands the form back to David their fingers brush, lingering. David pulls his digital camera out of the messenger bag, catching Connor’s apprehensive expression. 

“I’m no model.”

“Relax. Just keep doing what you were doing.” He clicks away as Connor resumes his shadowboxing.

“Fuck, you look…” David whispers.

“How do I look?” A twinge of anxiety in his voice betrays a self-consciousness that seems unjustified.

“You look amazing.” David flips back through the shots on his camera and they are all great shots. “You’re so handsome you’d almost think you’re a movie star playing a boxer…”

Connor can’t suppress a blush, but both of them turn as Kelly yells from the gym floor. “He’s NOT a boxer!” The gym owner is standing with what, to David, looks startlingly like a dead body over his broad shoulders. He presses the load over his head and then throws it so it sails up over the ropes and drops to the mat between them with a loud thump that echoes through the gym. It looks for all the world like a heavy bag with arms and legs—a grappling dummy.

“He is NOT a boxer,” Kelly repeats, practically growling at David. “He’s a mixed martial arts fighter. You been here over a week and you haven’t even figured that much out yet?”

“I know that, it’s just —”

“Especially for your story. Don’t you get it? MMA is hot and boxing is on the way out. I will not let you tell the world he’s just a boxer. And you—” he turns his gaze on Connor and points at the dummy. “You’re done with stand-up striking. You like it too much and it’s gonna end up a weakness if you don’t work more on your grappling. I want you to show me—” he jabs a finger at the reporter, “—and show him your Ground and Pound.”

David raises his camera, and as innocently as he can, locks eyes with the fighter. “You heard him, Ryan, show me your Ground and Pound.” Connor’s face flushes entirely red in an instant and he practically dives onto the dummy, swinging his left arm into its head in an elbow strike. 

“Asshole!” he grunts and David doesn’t bother trying to figure out if he means him or Kelly. He just steps up the photo shoot with Connor tossing the dummy about the ring. He suplexes the dummy once, twice, slamming the ring mat so hard that David wobbles on his feet. He sits up on the dummy’s chest and crushes fist after fist into the head. 

Satisfied, Kelly turns to go back to his office. Connor keeps up the brutal intensity for another ten minutes and then stands up, his chest heaving, sweat glistening on his shoulders.

“Are we done?” he asks, but less gruffly

“Got one more for me,” David says coyly.

Connor chuckles. He slow-mo extends his arm to its full length, the gold hairs on his thick forearm at attention, the red training glove brushing the reporter’s cheek. He winks.

“Fuck,” whispers David. Connor is suddenly cheeky and vulnerable at the same time. Exposed, for a change, and the unexpected intimacy of it catches David’s breath.

Without premeditation, the reporter extends his own arm up to Connor’s face. The two stand toe to toe, eyes locked, arms raised. He notices that Connor’s fist is against his cheek, but his own fingers have the reach to wrap around the fighter’s neck. 

“Heh,” he says, “my arms are longer.”

“Useless unless you got power behind ‘em,” Connor gibes, tapping the reporter’s head with his gloved fist, hard enough to make his point. “What’re you gonna do now Levy?” 

“I don’t know, maybe this,” David says, tracing a finger slowly over Connor’s ear.

Somewhere outside the sparring ring there’s a snicker.

With lightning reflexes Connor jerks his head away, thrusting his jaw forward. Any hint of intimacy is gone as quickly as it arose. “It’s not a gay bar,” he says low in a stern voice.

David drops his arm. “Sorry. Okay.”

As David exits the ring he looks down at the form. Connor’s signature is cramped, controlled, almost childish.

“Hey,” David says, drawing Connor’s attention, one last time. “I won’t let you down. I’m in your corner.”

---

13. 

While Connor changes, David glances around the gym at the hard bodies working the bags and the mats. He’s been comfortable for a long time with not fitting in; he’s courted it at times. He doesn’t know why it sits so poorly with him now. 

He watches a hairy, bearded heavyweight grappling on the mats with a partner, their limbs entangled. It’s hard not to wonder which of these guys Connor has boned. Connor said it was "no one's business," which probably means "some of the people standing right in front of you." He’d like to know the competition and how he stacks up. Is he the smartest guy Connor has been with? Almost certainly. The richest? Probably. The best in bed? That one gnaws at him. 

Their connection drew an unfamiliar, animalistic aggression out of David that was hot, for sure, but what if you were already part animal? He couldn’t help thinking that if Connor was in bed with that heavyweight, now pulling down the straps of his singlet to show off muscles and a dark pelt of fur that would shame a grizzly, the sex would be off the charts. And David wanted to be number one on Connor’s chart. Desperately.

David goes to Kelly’s door, while he waits, knocking on the open frame to get the owner’s attention. Kelly looks up from his ledger, an eyebrow raised.

“So,” David says, leaning on the doorframe with his arms crossed. “MMA is ‘hot’? Is it? Boxing’s ‘out’?”

“Your shadowing thing is done, right?” Kelly asks, pointedly avoiding David’s query. 

David notices, not for the first time, how much he looks like Connor. Blond, not a ginger, and packing fifty more pounds of muscle and a couple of decades of living. But still, the resemblance is unmistakable—they’re cut from the same cloth.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

Kelly mulls this over. “And when’s the thing coming out?”

David clears his throat uncomfortably. Kelly’s not the only one wondering that. Jeff has been at him, and he’s been asking himself too. It’s just gotten more complicated than he expected. He can’t incorporate both sets of ideas—the preconceived hit piece after Connor — into one story.

But if he’s really honest, he just doesn’t care about the story as much any more. And he’s surprised that Kelly does.

“I didn’t think you guys even wanted me to write a story,” he responds. “What happened to hating reporters? And since when did you start using publicity lingo like something’s ‘hot’ and something else is ‘on the way out’?”

Kelly shrugs, looking down at his papers. “I don’t give a rip what you do. It’s just the kid’s fight is coming up.”

“I thought maybe we’d publish after the fight. Say what happened,” David says with as straight a face as he can maintain, testing a theory.

Kelly’s face contorts ever so briefly before he regains his composure, “Yeah that’s a way to go.”

Whoa, thinks David. He scrutinizes Kelly’s studied nonchalance and smells a bluff. He’s a good tough guy, a good coach maybe. But he’s out of his element here, and just a little more interested than he ought to be. 

Gotcha.

“What’s another way to go?” David asks. “I mean before the fight, sure, but why? What’s the point?”

The handsome gym owner glances away. “It’s the kid’s first pro fight. If he wins he moves up out of the ammy circuit.”

Fuck, Kelly can’t even look me in the eye. What a bad liar.

“But a story doesn’t help him win.”

“Nah, but it’s... exposure. If he wins he goes pro. He has to train twice as much for peanuts more. Kid already doesn’t have time as it is. But if he can get sponsors, get his living expenses covered, that’s… better.”

You sly fucker, David thinks, the pieces all coming together in his mind. You played me the whole time. You let the fox in the henhouse because you wanted the fox to write a promo piece. 

David shakes his head, a reluctant smile forming. “And the story would gin up some interest in his fight. You really had me with that see-us-for-who-we-really-are business.”

“That was real,” Kelly says, and David can feel the force of the truth behind it. “But this is too.”

“Fair enough,” David replies, the weight of their agendas balancing between them.

“The kid’s not young for a fighter,” Kelly says. “Y’know?”

“I do,” David answers. “Kelly, we... Ryan and I…”

“I don’t need to know,” Kelly interrupts, throwing up his hands, as if he’s fending off a blow. 

Just then, Connor turns the corner, fresh from the shower, ginger hair damp.

“Want some grub, Levy?” he asks.

“You bet,” David answers, dropping his phone into his pocket and giving Kelly a knowing glance as he leaves the gym.

At home that evening, David tries again to dive into the story, but the words won't come. He stares at the screen until his eyes burn, then grabs his phone and messages Jeff.

David: I was thinking, maybe this is the wrong story.

Jeff: Oh yeah? Is that why I’m still waiting on what should have been done in a weekend?

David: Sorry about that. It’s just… it’s more complicated than I thought.

Jeff: Say more.

David: Maybe it’s a different story. More a profile on the fighter. On Ryan.

Jeff: Buddy he isn’t even supposed to be in the story at all. Just a little observation to get the complexion of things right. You know I don’t set the agenda.

David: Or The Den. There’s this whole neighborhood that’s been shit on for generations. There’s generational poverty, there’s a move to gentrify the place—there’s a real story there.

Jeff: Buddy who do you think our readers are? They ARE the gentrifiers. I can run it up the flagpole, but just to be realistic here, how do you think that’s going to go over?

David: Fuck. This just isn’t what I thought reporting would be, you know?

Jeff: I can pull the story. I can re-assign it. I can. Just say the word. But I can’t just change it.

David mulls this over. He can’t bear to hand it over to another writer. Someone else would come in, see the blood and the sweat, and write the hit piece David was supposed to write. They wouldn't see Connor. If he writes it, at least he has a hope of influencing the outcome, giving MMA a fair shot. And Connor.

David: No. I’m on it.

Jeff: Good. I want you to do it, if you can. You know the drill. Get the promo and the story and photo in the template, upload it. Photo release too.

David groans. He tries to imagine Edward R. Murrow typing in a content management template. Or Woodward and Bernstein dicking around with photo releases and click-through rates. 

David: Okay. Just… do you ever wish you could just smell newsprint again?

Jeff: Buddy, I don’t know. I never smelled it to begin with.

---

14.

The bedsprings groan under the weight of the struggle.

“You have a lousy guard, Levy,” Connor grunts, his voice thick with lust. He has David pinned flat on his back, his heavy thighs clamped around David’s hips, locking him in place, while his broad hands press David’s wrists into the pillow. It’s a playful pin, but the strength behind it is real.

But the real torture is lower down. Connor is naked, heavy, and hot. He grinds his hips down, trapping David’s erection between their stomachs. The sensation is maddening—two hard, leaking cocks sliding against each other, slick with sweat and pre-cum, rubbing raw with every heavy rotation of the fighter’s hips.

“Fuck,” David gasps, arching his back to chase the friction. “You’re too heavy…”

“Make me move,” Connor challenges. He bears down harder, flattening David into the mattress, letting the wet slide of their erections do the talking.

David tries to buck him off, but it’s useless against Connor. He tugs at his pinned wrists.

“Let me,” David begs, staring up into Connor’s dilated pupils. “Let me touch you.”

Connor hesitates, caught in the pleasure of the grind. Slowly, deliberately, he loosens his grip on David’s right wrist—permission granted.

David wrenches his hand free. He doesn’t push the fighter away; instead, he reaches down between their sweating bodies to where they are fused together.

“I don’t need to tap,” David whispers.

He wraps his hand around Connor’s cock and his own, squeezing the two slick shafts together. Connor is brutally hard, leaking clear fluid that slicks David’s palm instantly.

Connor hisses, his hips snapping forward instinctively, driving into David’s grip. The leverage shifts in a heartbeat. Connor’s focus dissolves from maintaining the pin to chasing the sensation. His head drops to David’s shoulder, his breathing ragged.

“Fuck,” Connor groans. “Yeah. Like that.”

David strokes Connor’s thick cock slowly, teasing a steady stream of pre-cum from the slit. He uses the slickness to swirl his thumb around the sensitive ridge of the glans, applying pressure until Connor’s hips push off the mattress.

“Come on,” Connor begs, his hips stuttering in a rhythm David refuses to match. “Harder. Finish it.”

David speeds up, his grip tightening. He feels the pulse of the erection jumping against his palm, the heat radiating from the fighter’s groin. He feels Connor’s muscles coil, preparing for the release, the fighter’s body tense as a drawn bow.

“Levy, I’m close, I’m—”

David stops abruptly. He removes his hand completely, licking slickness from his hand with his tongue, smearing his lips and chin.

Connor let out a sound that is half-gasp, half-whimper. He collapses on top of David, burying his face in the pillow, his hips twitching in the sudden absence of the reporter’s touch.

“Fuck, Levy,” Connor laughs, though it sounds like a groan of genuine pain. He rolls off, putting his hands over his face in frustration. His cock bobs in the air, angry and unfinished. “You sure figured out edging with a vengeance.”

David props himself up on his elbow. He feels powerful. “You shouldn’t have said I couldn’t do it.”

That catches Connor’s attention. He grins, a genuine look of appreciation.

“You got a defiant streak, don't you?” Connor muses, reaching out to tap David’s chest. “You don't like losing. Even when you're on your back.”

“I like to win,” David says.

“Dangerous,” Connor murmurs.

He rolls onto his side and slides over on his bed to press his shoulder against Connor. The sweat is cooling on their skin now. “I watched some videos of the guy you’re fighting.”

“Pffft, don’t bother,” Connor responds, tracing his fingers over David’s chest.

“He looks rough. A grappler.”

“He’s trying too hard.” 

David can hear in Connor’s terse answers that he doesn’t want to talk about the fight. But the wrestling match they just had sparked a different question, gnawing at him, growing louder in the silence. 

“Are those guys at the gym guys you’ve boned?” he asks.

Connor opens one eye. “Some,” he shrugs.

“I don’t suppose you want to tell me which ones.”

“Ah man, I don’t kiss and tell,” the fighter chuckles.

“What are they like?” David persists. He hates himself for asking, but he needs to know. “In bed. Is it… like this? Wrestling?”

“I don’t know,” Connor answers. “Just guys. Not like you, that’s for sure.”

The fighter’s reply stings David. He hears ‘Not like you’ and translates it to ‘They belong in my world and you don't. He imagines Connor with those other men—equals in strength, sweat, and violence. Men who don't need to be protected. No holding back.

He shakes his head to clear his doubts. There’s something there between them. He’s so sure of it.

As usual, Connor gets dressed to leave instead of spending the night. Going home. Or wherever he goes.

“Gotta rest up,” Connor says, pulling his shirt over his still-damp skin. “Big week.”

He leans down and kisses David—a quick, hard peck. “Thanks for the… workout. Even if you left me hanging.”

“Keeps you hungry, Ryan,” David says, trying to sound confident.

“Starving,” Connor grins.

Then he’s gone.

David is only half surprised when Connor doesn’t respond to his text the next morning. Still, he’s relieved two days later to receive the message Training. Busy. 

But as he spends the rest of the day waiting for a follow up, the minutes grind into hours and the reporter feels tired and uncertain by the time he goes to bed that night, alone.

Three days later, David chalks Connor’s silence up to the last days before the fight. But the fighter’s absence makes David’s time seem strangely hollow. He struggles to reconcile the affable Connor in the ring, the Connor who drinks and gets slutty, and the one who disappears. The one who says text me if you miss me, and the one who doesn’t text back.

His heart races when he sees the text pops up on his screen.

Connor: Hey babe. Miss me?

David: Yeah I guess. How’s training?

Connor: Crushing it. Wait till you see me take this guy down.

David: If you still want me there.

Connor: Uh oh. Did I piss someone off?

David: No. I was thinking. You got pretty scarce all of a sudden.

Connor: If you say so.

David: You do. And you do it a lot.

Connor: Get it off your chest Levy.

David: Ryan, I was thinking about the guys you’ve been with, and wondering if I’m just wrong for you.

Connor: Why?

David: They’re really different than me. And that’s what you’re into. Maybe the way you do this works better with them than me.

Connor doesn’t respond. The bubbles appear, then vanish.

David feels a surge of adrenaline. Not fear, but the familiar itch of a debate. In his family, argument is a form of intimacy. If there is a misunderstanding, you hash it out.

David: And I guess I like you. And want you to like me.

Connor: YOU’RE what I like. Or hadn’t you noticed?

David: But LIKE like. You know?

Connor: No I don’t know, spit it out, Levy.

David: Look I just think I’m into you more than you’re into me.

Connor: Man, let me give you some advice for your next research romance. Stick to writing. You suck as a mind reader.

David: I don’t HAVE research romances. Until now. But you’re like two different people and I never know which one I’m going to get. Maybe you just like those guys and I’m a diversion?

Connor: Fuck dude we already talked about this, I’m turned on by your confidence. So guess how much of a turn-off this needy bullshit is.

David: Ow… 

David is still wincing from the blow when the throbbing microphone icon pops up, indicating a voice message. When David presses play, he’s taken aback.

“I can’t fucking believe this. When I said you weren’t like those other guys it was a compliment, you idiot. I like you BECAUSE I thought you were different. But I guess you got your wish, Levy, you’re no different at all from those other guys after all. Just as fucking insecure. I don’t need this crap in my life right now. See you around.”

David thumbs the record icon furiously.

 “Fuck you Ryan. I might be a wimp, and I might be needy. But you’re inconsistent as fuck. Your back and forth is bullshit.”

David waits for a response, but there is none. Not a minute later, not an hour later, not three hours later.

“Wow,” David whispers, listening again to the last message from the fighter. “Wow.” 

He stares at his own reflection in the dark screen of the phone. In every other relationship he’s ever had, David has been the one in control—the one who was aloof, the one who was busy, the one who was wanted more than wants. He was the prize.

He realizes now that he pushed Connor because he wanted the fighter to push back. He wanted Connor to argue, to defend himself, to say “No, I want you.” He wanted the fighter to fight for him.

The awareness settles in, slowly at first and then as solidly as a punch to the chest: Connor can be done with him that quickly. For all his tenacity in the ring, Connor isn't willing to go even one round for David.

---

15. 

The next day, David goes to the gym to look for Connor, but he’s not there.

He finds a shirtless Kelly punching the heavy bag by himself. His torso is thick with beefy muscle and gray matted hair covers a powerful chest soaked with sweat. Every hit sounds like a gunshot in the empty gym.

“Everything’s fucked up,” says David as he approaches. “I thought I could tell him about how I was feeling but he turned on me.”

“Aw geez,” says Kelly, stopping a punch mid-swing. He glances around to be sure they’re out of earshot of the few guys training. “Grab the bag, kid. If we’re gonna talk about this kinda shit you’re gonna at least help me with my workout.”

David goes to the other side of the bag and holds it lightly. Kelly slams a hard right fist into the leather, and David is knocked back by the force, almost losing his balance.

Kelly raises a grayish blonde eyebrow. “Kid, the idea is I can punch harder with someone holding the bag so it doesn’t go flying. Lean into it. Brace your core.”

David holds tight to the bag and leans, planting his feet wide, while Kelly starts punching hard. The force transmits through the bag and David can feel it vibrate in his bones. It’s weirdly erotic, the transference of raw, physical power, and David starts to chub a little despite himself. What is it about this place, he wonders. 

As Kelly works the bag, his breath coming in rhythmic hisses, David relates the text conversation from last night and Kelly grunts in response. Finally, he stops. He takes a water bottle from the bench, drinks from it, then splashes some on his sweaty torso. He rubs a towel over his chest and under his arms to dry off. As his thick muscles swell and flex, David is reminded again how much Kelly looks like an older, even rougher Connor.

Kelly tosses the towel at him with a smirk. “Eyes up here, kid. You sure you’re still stuck on Connor? Looks like maybe you have a new crush.”

David rolls his eyes, clutching the damp towel. “You look like him, is all.”

Kelly grunts again and turns to go into the small gym office. 

The office looks like a time capsule from the 1960s. There are ancient putty colored file cabinets, and shoe boxes as old as David overflowing with paper. The desk itself is square and heavy looking, oak, covered with phone messages written on scrap paper. There’s no computer—Kelly still uses paper ledgers. Plate glass windows let him keep an eye on the main floor of the gym.

“That’s true, Connor has more Kelly than Ryan in him. Thank fucking God,” Kelly says, settling into his heavy desk seat that creaks under his weight. “His old man was an asshole to that kid, and an asshole to my sister. Everyone had to walk on eggshells because you never knew where you were, when he’d lose it, when he’d get rough.”

“I heard a little about that,” David says, trying to convey that Connor has confided in him.

Kelly grimaces and grips the desk as he speaks. David can see the muscles of his forearms flex and wonders if solid oak can stand up to Kelly’s strength.

“Insecure is what my sister used to say about him. Insecure. Nicest way to put it. And when he got insecure, he drank, and when he drank he got violent. She only left him when I told her I’d kill him with my bare hands if she didn’t. Problem was, she started drinking too, thinking they’d be okay if they had that in common.” Kelly’s voice goes low and he looks down. “But she handled it worse than him. Robert used it against her in family court, so the kid had to stay with Robert until she got clean.”

“Fucking hell,” David breathes.

“It was. When Connor was little, anything sissy… anything like that, his old man would try to beat it out of him. So the kid toughened up. He’d get into scrapes, started taking on bullies. You shoulda seen. He’d wail on a kid twice his size to defend some littler kid. He didn’t care. He knew how to take a punch by then, I guess.”

“He told me he fought bullies at school,” David says.

“School?” Kelly lets out a dark, humorless bark of a laugh. “Kid, the bullies at school were nothing. My sister told me, later. Cried her eyes out. Connor was ten years old, standing between his drunk father and his mother. He’d provoke the old man on purpose—mouth off, knock things over—just to draw the fire. He took the beatings so she wouldn’t have to.”

David stares at Kelly, stunned. The image of a ten-year-old Connor, terrified but standing his ground against a grown man, makes David’s chest ache.

“He was the shield,” Kelly says softly. “It’s how he showed love. By bleeding for you. But the old man tried to beat that out of him too. Kid couldn’t win for trying, whatever he did.”

“I didn’t know that,” says David.

“What the old man would say if he knew his son was hooked up with a guy,” says Kelly with a shudder. “Jesus fuck. The shit that asshole would say would just be the start.”

The two sit in silence together, both looking for a next step. The sounds of the gym outside—the rhythmic thumping of feet, the slap of gloves—drift through the open door.

“Listen Levy, you like Connor. He likes you. Maybe you’d be good for each other. But you oughta think about what he’s like. He goes internal when he needs to focus, like for a fight. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t like you. Believe me, he’s hardly shut up about you. Levy this, Levy that. Jesus fuck.”

“Really?” David is heartened briefly, but then turns glum realizing he was so off the mark.

“He’s his own man now. Trying to be. Y’know? After being under another man’s thumb like he was. Step lightly. Kid’s got a—” Kelly stops abruptly. “Y’know you’re a little too good at this game, Levy. What am I doing discussing family with a reporter?

“But this isn’t a game, Kelly. Not today.” David says, his voice steady in his sincerity.

“Well, let’s just say, he’s still got some Ryan in him.”

“But he hates his dad.”

“Ya think?” Kelly replies, running a hand over his matted hair. “We all got our demons to fight, right? The ones we know about are bad. The ones we don’t even see, they’re the ones that kick your ass.”

David sighs. “Look, this has just been a few weeks. But I do like him and he says he likes me. Maybe we’re too different for this to work, but I want to see if we do. How do I fix it?”

Kelly plops back in his desk chair, and puts his arms behind his head. David focuses on Kelly’s flinty blue eyes, so like Connor’s but for the color. The set of their jaws is so similar, their stoicism. He thinks of Kelly defending his sister, and Connor defending bullied kids. And of Kelly letting David into the gym to begin with. Even having this conversation he doesn’t want to have. He’s what David’s grandparents would call a mensch. Connor, that’s the man you could be.

Kelly’s biceps flex as he shrugs. “What do I look like, a gay couples counselor? I’ve done what I can. You figure out the rest.”

Fair enough, thinks David. It’s more than he had a right to expect. 

David sighs again, turns and exits the office. He realizes he’s still holding Kelly’s sweaty towel. He puts it to his face and inhales. Fuuuuck. He smells like Connor too. His cock goes rock hard.

“I saw that!” Kelly yells. 

David laughs and throws the towel into a bin as he leaves. 

---

16.

How did I get here? wonders David at home. How did this fighter get so far into my head in such a short time?

David has dated before. Plenty. But he never felt sparks like he does with Connor. He tries to remember that he genuinely liked his life before this. His friends, flirting with bartenders, writing. Always writing. Until these last few weeks, when his carefully curated existence began to smell like gym sweat and gin.

Get your house in order, Levy, he tells himself. Let Ryan focus on his fight. You focus on the story. And maybe try again.

It makes sense, so why does it suck so fucking much?

And how did he miss every deadline since this started? Punctual, precise…uptight David Levy, off his game. It’s too late to get the story out the way Kelly hoped, to promote the fight. But he can still get a promo blurb out for the story. That’s something. He can generate some interest, maybe some coverage.

He pours a stiff gin and tonic, the ice cracking in the glass, and opens his laptop. Music would be good too.

He runs the cursor over a playlist, selecting the soundtrack to Good Night and Good Luck. It’s a favorite movie, about a time when reporters could be heroes instead of click-baiting bloggers. He skips to Dianne Reeves. Her smoky voice fills the room, crooning One for My Baby and One More for the Road. It’s apropos—the lonely writer drinking in the dark—but a little too on the nose.

With a mouthful of gin and tonic he chooses another playlist, White Nerds in Love, and starts Elvis Costello’s Everyday I Write the Book. This he likes better—it’s got a beat—but in less than a minute he turns it off. The lyrics feel like a taunt—too much about writers and fighters. His subconscious, it seems, is working against him using his voluminous music collection. He opts to message Jeff instead.

His subconscious, it seems, is working against him using his voluminous music collection. He opts to message Jeff instead.

David: I want to publish a promo. On the MMA story.

Jeff: Oh boy FINALLY. Is it ready to go?

David: This story is shit. But I’ll pull it together. But I need to get the promo out. Tomorrow.

Jeff: Whoa buddy, what’s going on there?

David: Am I needy?

Jeff: This isn’t about the story?

David: Am I that transparent?

Jeff: Last time you sounded like this you talked me into taking a rescue dog.

David: How is Roger?

Jeff sends a photo of a gray and white pit bull on his back, tongue lolling out. David stares at the image, thinking of Connor’s "pit bull" comment. Raised without love, trained to go for the throat.

David: He’s a cute little bastard.

David uploads his photo of Connor to the chat, the candid shot from his first days shadowing. It gives him a pang to remember jerking off on the photo, without realizing he’d soon have the real thing a few days later, and now knowing it’s all done. It was so fast.

Jeff: Speaking of cute bastards. Hot stuff, if you go for built tough guy gingers. TBH, I expected a little more handsome based on what you said so far.

David is incredulous. Jeff ought to get his eyes examined.

David: Heh, you should see the uncle, he might be more your type.

Jeff: You’re a… tenacious reporter. You go in head first and you don’t back down no matter what.

David: Thanks.

Jeff: But is there a conflict of interest? Because we can pull the story, David. We’d HAVE TO. You know that, right?

David stares at the cursor. If he says yes, the story dies. If the story dies, Connor gets no press. If Connor gets no press, he stays in the amateur circuit, fighting for scraps.

David: No. No conflict. I have this. Just needed a pep talk. Give me a couple of hours. Can you get the promo published first thing tomorrow?

Jeff: What’s the rush?

David: Ryan has a fight in two days. Promo ought to go out beforehand, build some drama he pauses and adds, for the story.

Jeff: We need hits, David. Is this going to get shared? Or is it just a puff piece about a gym?

David: It’s not a puff piece. It’s a culture war. It’s got violence, redemption, and a guy who looks good with his shirt off. It’s going to drive traffic.

Jeff: Mmmm. I like that. Okay. Get the promo in the CMS tonight for the morning click throughs.

David sends five smile emojis. Jeff loves his emojis.

Jeff: David. Keep it punchy.

David stares at the screen.

An hour and two gin and tonics later, David swirls around on his wheeled desk chair. He flips through his playlist to Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings. He hits play on 100 Days, 100 Nights. The heavy, stomping soul beat rattles his speakers.

"Punchy," he mutters. "I can do punchy. I am punchy!"

He’s never wasted much time with false modesty or false vanity. When he was off he knew it, when he was good he knew it. This was headed someplace good. Not having sex drives us to succeed. Maybe Connor had a point. 

“Fuck you, Connor Ryan,” he whispers, pouring another gin and tonic.

He logs into the Zeitgeist Content Management System. The screen glows white in his dark apartment. He sees the fields waiting for him: Headline, Promo Blurb, Body Text, Media.

He knows the drill. Jeff will tear the actual 3,000-word feature apart, obsessing over every comma and adjective before it sees print. But the website is a different beast. The beast needs feeding every day, and Jeff gave his senior writers the keys to the backend to post their own teasers.

He navigates to the Homepage dashboard.

"Feed the beast," David mutters.

He checks the Media tab. The promo image field is already populated. He doesn’t remember uploading it, but good—one less thing to do.

Now for the words.

Writing has always been the way out of everything. It will be this time too. Connor will see that, at least, will understand his intentions.

He minimizes the browser to find the file. His desktop is a mess of icons. He spots “Blood Sport_Promo.docx”. The old draft—the bad one.

"Don't delete it," he mumbles, trying to be professional. "Version control, Levy. Version control."

He opens the file. He stares at the paragraph about bullies. He feels sick reading it.

He hits File > Save As.

He names the new file “Blood Sport_Promo_FINAL.docx” and hits save.

He highlights the text in the _FINAL version and deletes it. A clean slate.

He cracks his knuckles and starts typing. The gin loosens his inhibitions, but this time, it lets the truth flow out.

“When I entered the Triple Hit MMA gym I expected to find the hangout of the bullies many of us knew in our youth. I imagined their glee at a place—and an age—which requires even less restraint than what once limited them. What I discovered was more complex, and something I am still struggling to understand. My guide into the MMA world was attached to a human face, at once both infuriating and compelling, in the form of Connor Ryan. 

"My full profile drops next week. But you can see the upstart fighter in action tomorrow night. Stream the bout live at 8:00 PM EST via the link below. Love it or hate it, you won't be able to look away.”

David sits back, satisfied. It’s perfect. It has the hook, the photo, and the link. It’s the apology he can’t say to Connor’s face. But he’ll see soon enough.

He minimizes the document window.

"Just get it in the queue," he whispers, rubbing his eyes.

He grabs the word doc icon from the desktop and drags it into the browser's upload box.

He feels sure he’s forgotten something, and then remembers: He drags the PDF of the release Connor signed into attachments. He smiles, thinking how Jeff will see he was thorough. No loose ends.

The progress bar zips to 100%.

He scrolls down to the scheduling tools. He sets the time for the default 6:00 AM, right when the morning email blast goes out.

He hovers over the big blue SCHEDULE POST button.

He glances down at the inside of his forearms, where the black ink stands out against his pale skin.

1/10,000. Only one man in ten thousand will brave the full violence of public opinion.

He looks at the right arm. Rarely pure, never simple.

"Ain't that the truth," he whispers.

He clicks.

Status: Queued.

David smiles, closes his laptop lid and reaches for the gin.

---

17.

David’s head is pounding as he wakes up, fully dressed on the couch, the empty bottle of gin lying on the rug next to him. He realizes the pounding isn’t just inside his skull—it’s on his apartment door. 

He staggers to his feet, the room spinning, and opens the door to see Connor Ryan standing there.

The fighter’s face is violently red, his pale eyebrows stark against the flush. His chest heaves in shallow gasps, and his shoulders are hunched up, the trapezius muscles knotted tight as stones.

“WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?” roars Connor shoving David inside and stomping in after him. 

As David grabs at the wall to catch his balance, Connor slams the door shut behind him with a force that rattles the frame. “WHAT DID YOU DO?”

David cringes, feeling a spasm of panic as his stomach drops and his hungover brain tries to get a handle on what’s happening.

“Ryan, please just calm down,” he says, putting his hands up. But the fighter shoves him down on his sofa, hard. A lot harder than the play in the gym ring. He flashes on his first handshake with Connor, remembering how it felt like the fighter could crush every bone in his hand easily. “What are you so upset about?!” 

The reporter is increasingly wary, noting how Connor’s body is coiled with energy, vibrating like a taut spring.

Connor spots the tablet charging at his desk. He jerks it from its station and throws it across the room at David.

“You’re scaring me,” says David, after flinching to dodge his tablet. It lands with a soft thud on a sofa cushion.

“You ought to be fucking scared,” seethes the fighter. “You even used the picture—the picture you fucking SAID you wouldn’t use! The one that was just for you? Asshole!” Connor’s shoulders twitch.

“What? No, I didn’t — ”

Connor’s roar dims to a mutter, plain with disgust. “You said that was between us.” 

David frantically tries to remember the night before. He submitted the promo. And then, fuck. 

He picks his tablet off the sofa and opens the browser to Zeitgeist, fingers trembling.

There’s the photo of Connor, waving and smiling, the candid shot David took in the first days. And below it a two paragraph promo.

###

BEARDING THE LION

If you wondered where the bullies of our childhood have gone, look no further than the Triple Hit Mixed Martial Arts gym. Anyone who grew up different, weaker, lesser will recognize the familiar faces and attitudes that populate this and similar gyms. I know all too well my own emotional scars from their type. In the weeks to come I will shadow one of them, Connor Ryan. 

What adults do of their own consent is arguably their own affair. But we must also consider the societal cost of the increasing glamorization of violence and the violent. Even as our schools institute appropriate and necessary anti-bullying policies, MMA fighting is not only cheering on bullies, it is encouraging all children to become bullies themselves, by demanding that the only response to violence is to be the best fighter in an unrestrained world.

###

“Oh my god,” says David, horrified. “This isn’t it! This is the wrong promo!” The photo was a placeholder, but he doesn’t know how to say it so Connor will understand.

Connor angrily knocks the tablet from David’s hands and grabs his shirt collar. He lifts David up and shoves him hard against the exposed brick wall.

“You’re fucking right it’s wrong, you fucking liar!” Connor’s face goes a deeper shade of red. His eyes are wet and bleary..

“Ryan,” David coughs, winded from his back hitting the masonry, “I wrote this as a draft—before I knew you. Before I knew anything! I thought I deleted it—I wrote something different to publish! I swear!” 

Connor leans in and sniffs with flared nostrils. “You’re fucking drunk!” he screams, and throws David to the floor.

He grabs the tablet from David’s hand and twists it until the glass and metal wail and the device snaps in two in his thick hands. He tosses the pieces aside and his hands shake. Connor’s eyes dart around and David quivers in fear that he’s next. Instead the fighter picks up the empty gin bottle. In one powerful movement he throws it at one of the street facing windows. The windowpane, no match for the thick glass of the bottle or Connor’s raging strength, shatters outward, raining tinkling shards on the sidewalk below.

“You fucking made me a target for every fighter who thinks I gave you that bullshit!” shouts Connor. He pauses and then wails, “WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT TO ME?”

David is frantic. He cowers and feels his bowels gurgle. “It was a mistake—I shouldn’t—I shouldn’t have written it.”

“But you did!” roars Connor, dropping to his knees to get in David’s face.

“Ryan…. Connor…” says David, trying to calm the fighter. “Talk to me.”

“You wanna know why I don’t dance?” Connor yells, “I’ll fucking tell you. When my father would come home reeking of booze, just like you, he’d pull me out of bed at any hour of the night, just like this.” 

He jerks David up from the floor till they’re face to face. Connor wraps one powerful arm around David’s waist, clamping him tight against his hard chest. It’s a parody of an embrace, suffocating and inescapable.

“He’d drag me around on the floor dancing like he would do with my Mom.” Connor spins David around in a rough twirl, fingers digging into David’s ribs, and then lets him drop to his knees, the reporter’s eyes at crotch level. 

“He’d hold me so tight my fucking face scraped against his belt buckle. I had bruises on my cheeks from it.” David can see Connor’s own sturdy belt buckle just menacing inches from his face. “And he’d ask ‘Who do you love, Connor?’ till I say I loved him.” He stands at his full height, his voice lowering. “So when you want to dance that’s what I fucking think about. His fucking belt against my face and not knowing what he’d do next, but knowing for sure that it was the same belt he’d hit me with.”

“Connor...” David begins, in tears himself.

“And you told the world that I’d hurt kids? I’m a bully? NEVER! And now that’s what everyone will think about me. You fucking asshole.”

“Listen to me,” David pleads, “I’ll fix it! It was just the wrong promo. They’ll run the right story.”

“Get the fuck out of my life,” says Connor, his voice the most calm since he stormed in. David gasps as Connor spits on the floor, a fractional sprinkle of wet hitting David’s lips. “I thought my father was the biggest villain in my life. But I just got taken out by a skinny reporter. TKO, Levy. I hope you’re happy.

Connor stares down at him, his eyes dead and cold, tamping the echo of his father back down deep— for the last five minutes, he had become the very man he hated.

“At least he never pretended to be my friend.”

He turns and as he exits slams the door so hard it sounds like it’ll snap in two like David’s tablet. The shelves on the wall rattle so long it seems they will never settle into silence again.

---

18.

The concrete hallway of the arena vibrates with the muffled thrum of the gathering crowd and the heavy bass of warm-up music.

Kelly stands with his Popeye forearms folded across his chest, blocking the doorway of the assigned locker room. 

“Are you fucking out of your mind? You wanna kiss and make up, now? He’ll bite your head off your shoulders and shit down your neck!”

“Kelly, please. I’m not here to make up,” David says defiantly, gripping his new tablet like a shield. “But I have to show him what I did to fix the story. You need to know too.”

Kelly throws his hands up in disgust. “Whatever, kid, it’s your funeral. Should’ve fucking known this was gonna end bad.”

David squeezes past Kelly’s bulky form and enters the locker room. The air smells sharp with Wintergreen and rubbing alcohol. 

Connor is sitting on the edge of a massage table, his hands already wrapped in thick white tape, resting on his knees. He’s naked except for his fight shorts. He looks like a weapon: stripped down, hardened, and dangerous.

When David enters, his head snaps up. His eyes look cold—dead almost.

“Go the fuck away, Levy,” he says flatly, emotionless, though his taped hands tense. “After everything? Don’t you know when to stay down??”

“I guess not, Ryan,” David says, stepping closer. “But you need to see this.” 

David thrusts the tablet forward, holding the screen right in front of Connor’s face.

Connor recoils, turning his head away sharply. “Get that out of my face. I don't want to read your narcissistic shit. I don't care what you wrote about me this time.”

“Then listen,” David demands.

His voice shakes slightly, but he steadies it. He pulls the tablet back and clears his throat, the sound echoing in the small room.

“Dear Readers,” David begins, reading aloud.

Connor flinches at the sound of David’s ‘reporter voice’—formal, but laced with a tremor of emotion. He keeps his head turned away, staring at the wall, but his jaw clenches. He’s listening.

“‘To get at the truth is a constant battle. This week I lost the fight, and I have failed you and many others.’”

Kelly steps closer, his arms uncrossing. He leans against the lockers, listening.

“‘A promotion published yesterday came from an early draft of an article… It was an accident that this was published. What was not an accident was drafting the first version without having yet done my work to properly inform it.’”

David takes a breath. Connor is staring at the wall, but his breathing has hitched.

“‘It may be that Mixed Martial Arts fighting is indeed a dangerous and irresponsible activity… It may also be that it is appropriately regulated and a legitimate sport… or even an art. I am disqualified from saying, because I have lost my critical sense. I let my pride obscure a conflict of interest that should have barred me from writing this story at all.’”

David pauses. He looks up from the screen to look at the back of Connor’s head.

“‘This embarrasses me, and to demonstrate the seriousness with which I regard my actions, I am leaving Zeitgeist.’”

Connor’s head snaps around. He stares at David. “What the hell?”

David keeps reading, raising his voice over the interruption.

“‘I apologize to you, and to the fine people at Zeitgeist. I apologize also to Ken Kelly… whose good faith I squandered.’”

David steps closer, right into the fighter's personal space. He lowers the tablet. He doesn't need to read the last paragraph. He knows it by heart.

“‘Lastly and most of all, I apologize to Connor Ryan… Nothing in the published promotion came from Mr. Ryan or from my time shadowing him. My story has besmirched his honor.’”

David’s voice cracks, but he forces the words out, fierce and absolute.

“‘For the record, Mr. Ryan is as good and noble a soul as any I have known, and I have no doubt the same is true of many of his peers. David H. Levy. '”

Connor winces, as if the compliment is a physical blow. The aggression has drained out of him, replaced by what looks like confusion playing at his eyebrows.

“You quit?” Connor asks, his voice raspy. “You quit your job? How could you do that?”

David hesitates. He doesn’t know if the question is because Connor knows what this means to him. If it’s just that if you’re from The Den, you can’t just quit your job like that.

“I had to. I couldn't have a conflict of interest if I wasn't employed. I—"

He looks Connor in the eye.

“I’m sorry Ryan. I fucked up.”

“You sure did, Levy. And you’re wrong again. I’m no noble soul. Yesterday proved that. I was exactly who I swore I wouldn’t be.”

“No,” David says firmly. “You didn't hit me. You broke a window. You broke a tablet. You stopped yourself. That's the difference.”

Connor looks at David, stunned by the distinction. His chest heaves, the tape on his hands creaking as he clenches his fists.

“Ryan, you didn’t hurt me. I’m tougher than you think.”

Connor’s eyes water slightly. “You’re as tough as wet newspaper. But you tried to fix it, and you said you’re sorry. And you walked away from your job. I guess that’s a different kind of tough.”

The two lock eyes and their faces get closer, the magnetic pull between them reasserting itself even here, in the shadow of the fight.

Kelly steps over and catches David’s head in his big mitt of a hand. “Hey hey hey!” he interjects, physically turning David’s face away.

“What the hell, Kelly?” David protests, 

“I need the fighter, not the lover, out there,” Kelly growls. “You see the guy he’s up against, he looks like he can spit nails through a two by four. You soften him up now, he gets killed. Get out of here. You did your bit.”

“Oh please, Kelly,” Connor smiles, though the expression is tight. “I got this. That asshole ain’t all that.”

Kelly continues to give David the evil eye while he grabs a glob of Vaseline to grease Connor’s brows.

“Well. I guess we’ll see won’t we,” Kelly concludes.

David backs toward the door. “I told you, Ryan,” he says, holding the fighter’s gaze one last time. “I’m in your corner.”

---

19.

As Connor, Kelly, and David enter the octagon, the crowd erupts into jeers and boos. Connor said the story would make him a target, but David wasn’t prepared for the visceral wave of contempt. He’s reminded of the day Connor took him in the ring at the Triple Hit, knowing every person watching wanted him beat, humiliated. This is so much worse. 

You’ve got this buddy, he thinks, glancing at Connor. The young fighter is steeling his jaw, staring ahead, as if he can’t hear the hecklers calling for his blood.

On the opposite side of the cage, Connor’s opponent is warming up, throwing quick combos of punches at the air. He’s a heavily tattooed Brit with a shaved head, and a jagged scar running through one eyebrow. David’s studied him on video, but it’s a different thing to see him in person. He’s wiry, David notes, not as thick as Connor, but taller and with a longer reach. 

He remembers what Connor showed him about his own arms—long enough to be a problem if he had enough strength. He couldn’t pack much of a punch, but “Tattoos” over there can. His fists look like cinder blocks. Feeling suddenly uncomfortably hot, David takes off his suit jacket and rolls up his sleeves.

Kelly is giving Connor some last minute pointers, but David can’t help but stare at the other fighter. Kelly was right, this is the meanest looking motherfucker David has ever seen in his life. But even as he thinks this, he catches himself. Have you learned nothing through all this, Levy? People are not always what they seem.

David and Kelly exit the cage as both fighters meet at the center with the referee, a beefy bald black guy about Kelly’s size. Tattoos stares at Connor like he wants to carve him up into little pieces, while Connor acts cool, returning his gaze blandly.

The bell for Round One sounds. Connor advances only to have Tattoos immediately plant a stiff jab right on his nose. Connor backs away, chastened. It’s an inauspicious start and he’s on the defensive the rest of the round. 

He clinches with Tattoos twice and David is confused. I thought he said you clinch in order to get rest, a breather, he thinks. Why would Ryan need that in Round One?

When he clinches a third time, wrapping his arms around the Brit to stop the onslaught, the spectators boo. Tattoos pushes Connor away with his gloves and advances, tagging him again with another hard jab.

“What’s going on?” David asks Kelly.

“Kid can’t fucking focus. You messed up his head.”

“Me?”

“I don’t know what’s worse,” seethes Kelly, “that you wrote that fuckin’ story, or that you apologized for it just before the fight. When he was mad at you I was sure he was gonna destroy this guy. Now it’s like fucking ballroom dancing.” 

Dancing.

David feels a chill. Connor isn't just fighting bad; he's stuck in the memory of his father dragging him around the floor.

The bell ends Round One and Connor comes back to his corner, clearly frustrated. Kelly enters the cage and gets in his face, dressing him down. David is surprised but then he gets it—he’s trying to get Connor angry again.

David stays behind the steel mesh, suddenly self-conscious. 

“It was a mistake for me to come,” David whispers to Kelly as he returns to the coach’s seat outside the cage,

“Ya think?” Kelly growls.

The bell sounds for Round Two and Tattoos comes out even more aggressively than before. He throws out another left jab which catches Connor in the face and then pumps a right to his body that makes David wince empathically, even though Connor’s solid abs take the hit. But again, the hits seem to make Connor think twice about getting in range of those long tattooed arms. He dances around, throwing jabs that don’t come anywhere near the mark.

Eventually Tattoos starts taunting him by dropping his hands and shrugging. David can’t hear what he says through the roar of the crowd, but he can read his lips: “You gonna dance, or you gonna fight?”

Kelly raises his voice to shout to Connor, “Get in there kid!”

Connor moves in, but clumsily, and Tattoos tags him with a left jab and then nails him with a follow-up right cross. 

Hell, David thinks, those were the punches Ryan showed me that very first time. The most basic ones. And he just walked right into them. The bell to end the second round dings.

This time David rushes in with Kelly as Connor returns to the corner. He has a bad gash across his forehead where the cross nailed him. David rinses the blood from Connor’s face with a sponge while Kelly works on the cut with a glob of Vaseline.

David crouches down and takes Connor’s meaty forearms in his hands to massage them. “Talk to me,” he says, “what’s happening here?”

Connor sputters, spitting out his mouthguard. “I don’t know, I can’t focus. I lost it yesterday and I almost killed you.” He chokes. “Oh my God, I fucked up. I fucked up so bad...”

“We both did,” interrupts David. “Get it out of your head now.”

“This dude looks the part, but I’m the brute,” says Connor, panting. “I don’t know if that’s who I wanna be.”

David stares into the fighter’s green eyes. He sees the little boy standing between his mother and a monster, taking the hits so she wouldn't have to.

“It was a mistake for me to come,” David says. “I’m going.”

He moves to make his exit but freezes as Tattoos stands up from his stool in the opposite corner and makes a nasty sucking sound.

“Oi! Nancy Boy! Let’s get this poof festival over with so I can get to the fucking pub!”

David glares at him with disgust as Tattoos continues to spew abuse. He holds his fists side by side, revealing letters tattooed across his fingers. David pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose and reads clearly the small lettering across the distance of the ring. 

S T A Y D O W N

David feels a familiar determination in his gut at those words. Who the fuck is this guy to tell me to stay down? To tell Ryan?

He looks at Connor, gears turning frantically in his head. Connor isn't fighting because he's afraid of being the bully. He needs to remember he's the shield.

Aw fuck it, thinks David. He turns back to Connor on his stool. He grabs the fighter's sweaty chin and bends over to plant a sloppy, wet kiss square on his mouth.

The entire arena goes dead silent for a heartbeat. Then, the shock breaks, and the crowd explodes into a deafening mix of gasps, whistles, and slurs.

Connor looks dazed as David stands up again. Tattoos makes a retching sound.

“What the fuck? Leave that shit at home, princess!”

Gotcha. 

“You hear that, Ryan? Sound like anyone you know?” 

Connor looks up to him with confusion plain on his face. David can’t tell if he’s shocked by the insults or by the kiss. He raises his voice, cutting through the hostile noise.

“Connor, does that sound like your father?”

Connor nods yes. His shoulders twitch involuntarily. He snorts, nostrils flaring.

David stands and glares again at Connor’s opponent. The heat in the arena is stifling, suffocating. Impatiently, David yanks at the knot of his silk tie, loosening it until the ends hang limp and undone, unbuttons his collar.

He locks eyes with Tattoos, matching his hostile stare. He stands erect and juts his jaw forward, the way he’s seen Connor do, and sneers at the fighter, inspiring another volley of insults. 

He’s not worthy to kiss Ryan’s boots, David thinks.

“Are you going to let him talk to me like that?” David asks, leaning into Connor’s face again, as Kelly watches skeptically. “To talk to you like that?”

Connor is sweating and his breathing is shallow as he shakes his head. “Fuck no.”

“For the rest of this fight that asshole over there is your father,” David says firmly. “Understand? Now go kick his ass. And when you’re done, you get whatever you want.”

Connor grabs a loose end of David’s tie, yanking his face down to mash their mouths together in another wet, bruising kiss, tasting of blood and iron. 

When they break the kiss, the silk slides through David’s collar, into Connor's hand. 

Tattoos gags and spits, “The fuck with that! Let’s fight, missy!”

“Don’t go far,” Connor says flatly to David. His eyes have changed. The guilt is gone, replaced by a cold, predatory focus. “I want to fuck again. But this time we flip.”

David looks at him, amazed. “You’ve fucking got it,” he says.

Connor stands abruptly as the bell rings. He’s a different man from the one that sat. He stares down Tattoos so hard David is surprised that lasers don’t shoot from the fighter’s eyes. Holding his opponent’s gaze, Connor winds David’s tie around his fist in tight loops. 

David rests a hand on Connor’s firm shoulder and whispers in his ear, “He obviously likes the mean look, why don’t you knock out a few of his teeth?” 

He lifts his hand and walks to the open cage door where the referee is waiting to seal them in. He steps out of the octagon as Connor moves in, diving low for a takedown.

David whips his suit jacket over his shoulder and passes through the arena crowd without once looking back. 

Behind him the crowd roars—not in jeers, but in shock. He hears the sickening thud of a body being thrown to the canvas, followed by the rhythmic sound of punches landing heavily on a skull. 

THUD THUD THUD

He feels his dick getting rock hard and he smiles.

Ground and Pound, Connor Ryan.

Poof festival, indeed.

---

20.

In the locker room David waits, impatiently.

He paces the concrete box like a caged animal. The noise from the arena thumps through the walls like the heart of a leviathan that’s swallowed him whole. 

His heart jumps to his throat when the doors swing open with a crash, letting the full-volume roar of the arena spill inside before Connor and Kelly shove their way in.

David freezes, mid-stride. 

Connor looks like he’s been through a meat grinder.

Sweat and blood—some his, some Tattoo’s—slick his torso. His left eye is rapidly swelling shut, an angry purple crescent, and his lip is split. He is heaving for air, his chest rising and falling in jagged rhythms.

“Jesus, Ryan, look at you,” David breathes, rushing across the room.

He reaches out, hands hovering—wanting to touch but afraid to hurt—quickly inventories the damage, counting each gash and bruise. His eyes catch on Connor’s right hand—the black silk tie is still there, wrapped tight, ruined.

“Shoulda seen the other guy,” scoffs Kelly, kicking the door shut and tossing a blood-spattered towel into the bin.

Connor staggers forward, but doesn’t collapse. He presses up against David with the weight of a falling building. He leans heavily, trapping the reporter against the bank of gray lockers. David gasps as he feels the furnace heat radiating off the fighter’s skin, burning through his own shirt.

“Did you see?” he gasps. His voice is wet, thick. “I…”

“I know,” says David, choking up. “I listened to everything.” He reaches up, cupping Connor’s battered face, and kisses him on the mouth, careful of the split lip. “You were amazing.” 

Connor drops his full weight against the reporter, exhaling a long, shuddering breath. David runs his hand down the fighter’s broad, slippery back, then around to his chest.

“You shaved,” says David, his fingers light on the smooth, hot skin of the fighter's pecs. 

“For the fight,” grins Connor, though the expression winces at the edges. “Less friction.” 

He flinches as David’s fingers trace over a fresh bruise blooming on his ribs, but he leans into the touch rather than pulling away, a low hiss of pain mixing with a sigh of relief.

“I miss the hair,” says David, tracing a finger over one of Connor’s pink nipples.

“You guys,” says Kelly, leaning against the doorframe and rubbing his face with a calloused hand. “I’m right here!”

“You okay?” David asks Connor. “You seem… steady.”

“Hard as fuck,” he grunts.

He bites his bottom lip until a fresh drop of blood beads up. He regains his fighting posture. The exhaustion seems to vanish as he grinds his hips forward, pressing a rock-hard ridge against David’s thigh.

He wraps his taped hands around either side of David’s white shirt. The ragged end of the tie brushes against David’s neck. With a single, violent jerk, he sends buttons pinging across the room, clinking against the lockers. David shivers as the cool air hits his chest, followed immediately by the searing warmth of Connor’s bare skin.

“Kelly,” says David, voice dropping an octave. “You might want to leave now.”

“This is a locker room!” barks Kelly. “We got post-fight protocol! Ice! Hydration!”

“Time to go, uncle,” says Connor, his eyes locked on David’s. “Unless you want to see me smash this nosy reporter.”

“Aw Christ,” groans Kelly, grabbing his med kit. “I’ll tell the press you’re puking. Give you fifteen minutes.”

He opens the door.

“I won’t last five,” Connor mumbles, as David tangles fingers in the fighter’s wet, red-gold hair.

Connor pulls him up by his collar and plants a bruising hard kiss on his mouth, ignoring the sting of his split lip to devour him. 

Kelly leaves, letting the door slam behind him. The latch clicks shut, sealing out the world, for a brief respite. 

Connor doesn't waste a second. He drops one hand to David’s waist, fumbling with the belt buckle. His fingers are clumsy with tape, ruined silk and ache, but he rips the zipper down with a feral growl.

“Help me,” Connor gasps.

David shoves his own slacks down, kicking them away along with his boxers. He’s breathless, exposed in the cold air of the locker room, his shirt hanging open.

Connor squats slightly, hooks his hands under David’s thighs, and lifts, biceps bulging.

David gasps as his back hits the cold metal of the lockers. He locks his ankles behind Connor’s lower back, clamping himself onto the fighter. Connor groans, his quads trembling, as his exhausted bodystrains to support their combined weight against the steel.

“Hold on,” Connor pants.

He brings his hand to his mouth. He spits into his palm—thick, blood-tinged, and wet. He reaches between them, smearing the spit over David’s entrance, forcing two fingers inside to stretch him open. It’s crude, fast, and incredibly hot.

“No edging, Levy” Connor whispers against David’s neck.

He lines himself up and thrusts.

David chokes out a gasp, lost in the heavy thud of their bodies hitting the steel. Connor fills him completely, claiming his prize with a single, brutal stroke.

“Fuck!” Connor grunts, jaw jutting. “You’re so tight.”

There is no rhythm at first, just the shock of invasion as Connor holds David there, impaled against the locker, both of them gasping for air.

Then Connor begins to move.

It isn’t the measured pacing of a lover. It’s the explosive energy of a fighter who's been holding back for weeks. Connor’s hips snap forward, driving deep, retreating only an inch before slamming back home.

Thud. Thud. Thud.

The sound of flesh on flesh and the rattle of the locker door fills the small room. David weaves his fingers into the damp hair at the nape of Connor’s neck, yanking his head back to bare his throat.

With every violent thrust of Connor’s hips, David’s cock slides against the fighter’s rock-hard abs, rubbing him raw and close to the edge.

“I can’t… DAVID! I can’t hold it,” Connor pants, his voice wrecked. “I’m gonna…”

“FUCK, CONNOR,” David begs, pulling on his hair, desperate for friction. “Smash me, Connor. Do it!”

They aren't even kissing anymore—just gasping hot, wet breaths into each other’s open mouths, their faces inches apart, eyes wild and unseeing.

TH-THUD-TH-THUD-TH-THUD

Connor buries himself to the hilt and stiffens, his entire heavy frame seizing up. David feels the hot pulse of the fighter’s release flooding him, a torrent of heat that sends David over the edge instantly.

David shudders, body bowing backward off the lockers as he cums, shooting white-hot spurts between their pressed-together stomachs, coating Connor’s abs and his own.

They stay like that for a long time—Connor pinning David to the steel, his legs shaking violently from the exertion, twitching through the aftershocks, David’s face buried in the crook of Connor’s neck.

The silence of the room is replaced by the harsh sound of their lungs fighting for oxygen in the same space.

Slowly, shakily, Connor pulls out. He lowers David’s feet to the floor, forehead against the reporter’s. Sweat drips from his nose to mingle with the mess on their chests.

“One in ten thousand,” David whispers, breathless.

Connor can’t speak. He just nods. The fighter who finally, completely, won.

END

---

Epilogue

Three months later, the smell of the Triple Hit gym—old sweat, leather, and Wintergreen—smells like home.

David sits on the edge of the ring apron, his legs dangling. His tablet sits next to him, buzzing incessantly against the canvas.

Jeff: TMZ just ran a piece: "The Fighter and the Writer." Sounds like a bad sitcom.

Jeff: Las Culturistas just declared "Bagging a Fighter" as Rule of Culture #84..

Jeff: David. I am fucking begging you. Give me the exclusive. I’ll even let you keep the adverbs.

David ignores the messages, for now. It is the great irony of his life: he’s sitting on the inside scoop of the year, and he’s the single reporter on the planet who can’t report on it. He’s part of the story now.

He holds the tablet in his lap. Connor is sitting on a stool in front of him, getting his hands taped by Kelly. Months out from his next fight, Connor’s thicker now, his neck broader, his eyes clear.

“Ready?” David asks.

“Read it, David,” Connor says, eyes closed. “And skip the big words.”

David takes off his glasses and wakes the screen. The document is open. He’s deleted three different titles. Currently, the header just reads: THE DEN.

He scrolls to the final paragraph.

“We are told that violence is a failure of communication,” David reads aloud. “We are told that physical aggression is the domain of the unevolved. But looking around the Den, I see something else. I see men who have been discarded by an economy and a culture that has no use for their specific kind of energy. They aren't here to hurt anyone. They are here because the world is chaotic, and the cage is the only place where the rules are absolute. It’s a monastery of impact. A place where the unwanted become the undeniable.”

Kelly pauses the taping. He grunts. It sounds almost like approval, but David never knows with Kelly.

David lowers the tablet. “It’s a bit rough. I’m still tweaking the sociological angle.”

Connor opens his eyes. “I like it. Fancies up the place.”

“So, who’s printing it?” Kelly asks, ripping the tape with his teeth. “You selling it to the papers?”

David sighs, tapping the edge of the tablet against his knee. “I can’t. They want ‘My Life with the Gay Gladiator.’ I’m not writing that.”

He glances at the screen, where another text from Jeff has managed to slip through: Just give me 500 words on the kissing. David. Buddy.

Kelly finishes the wrap and slaps Connor’s shoulder hard. He looks at David with a sneer that has softened just enough that he has to remember to put it on. “You wanna report, go work for the papers. You wanna be a philosopher and say whatever the hell you want? Go write a blog. Stop clogging up my ring with your devices.”

Kelly turns and stomps off toward the heavy bags.

David freezes.

“A blog,” he whispers.

He looks at the glowing manuscript. He thinks about the comments section on the viral video of their kiss—the vitriol, yes, but also the thousands of messages from kids, from other athletes, from people who felt seen.

He doesn't need to be "objective."

“The Den,” David muses. “Weekly dispatches from the canvas.”

Connor stands up, rolling his shoulders.

“You gonna write about me?” he murmurs, hooking a taped hand behind David’s neck.

“About the Den,” David says, his mind racing with the possibilities. “You’re part of it. The good, the bad, and the sweaty.”

“Make sure you mention I won,” Connor grins.

“I’ll mention you got lucky,” David counters.

Connor laughs. “Get to writing, David,” he whispers. “I got work to do.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Connor.” 

He watches Connor turn and walk to the center of the ring to touch gloves with his sparring partner, raising his fists.

Ryan the Lion, he notes, a name he hasn’t used in print yet. But may.

Rarely pure. Never simple.

But worth the fight.

---

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