I scrub at my face again. “Oh.”

He smiles at me. “Let’s not borrow trouble. For now, you and I have work to do. A lot of work. How’s the running? And the weights?”

“You’d put yourself on the line for me and Cassie?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Why?”

“All men aren’t like your father, Brick.”

Docker’s nothing like Floyd. I can trust him, that’s what he’s saying.

Another secret bursts out of my mouth. “I like running. I might even get good at it.” Then I wait to see if he’ll laugh in my face.

“You’ve got the right build,” he says casually. “No excess fat.” He glances at the clock on the wall. “We’ve done enough for today. Saturday at ten?”

My head’s whirling, and I’m so tired I can barely stand up. “Can I bring Cassie?”

“Sure. In the meantime, practice everything we’ve covered so far. And Brick—“ He grins at me. “There’s plenty of power behind your punches.”

11.4 [“The Razor’s Edge”]

THAT NIGHT I shove my chair under the door handle and sleep the night through. I surface with a tactic staring me in the face. Beat Floyd on stamina.

Flab around his gut from too many Tostitos and too much TV. His idea of Ultimate Fighting is to wallop his kids. The only exercise he gets is strolling around the lot at the dealership. Sure, he can still flick a mean punch. But how many in a row, and for how long?

I go for my run because Floyd’s working, even though it’s Saturday. It’s painful for the first few minutes until I loosen up the soreness from yesterday’s slugfest. But gradually I start feeling how easy I breathe and how strong my quads and calves are. Strength and energy: I drink ’em in like Gatorade.

Already I’m on Swamp Road. As I round the sharp turn by the brook, a deer is browsing on shrubs in the ditch. A doe. Her head jerks up, leaves sticking out of the corner of her mouth. She leaps onto the bank and bounds through the stumps in the clear-cut, white tail flashing. Graceful. Elegant. Wish I could run like that.

Later, I practice karate in the backyard, pushing myself— sometimes dancing around like a boxer, sometimes planting my feet for balance.

Kiai still gets stuck partway up my throat.

Doesn’t matter. Yelling isn’t going to defeat Floyd.

Defeat Floyd? Defeat Floyd? Is that what I’m thinking of doing?

Not a breath of wind, heat gripped by the clearing, the woodpile shimmering. I drop to the ground, head between my knees. I’m outta my mind.

Okay. So not this week. Or next.