“Eighteen months ago I killed a man. I didn’t intend to, but it happened anyway. I’m a fighter and it happened in the cage. The ref ruled it a clean hit, but it doesn’t change that it was my hand that dealt him the blow that killed him.
I’ve spent the last year of my life under a cloud of guilt and shame. I went on, going through the motions every day, but I was dead too. I grieved for the loss of the man, and the loss of who I was. For a whole year. A year of my life that I can’t get back. But it wasn’t until today that I realized I even lost it.”
Nico pauses and I hold my breath as I watch his head slowly rise. His eyes find mine instantly, just like every other time. Everything else in the room disappears and it’s as if we’re the only two in a long tunnel, sitting on opposites ends, but inexplicably drawn to each other.
“Then today I was given a gift. A gift by an amazing woman. She gave me the gift of forgiveness because I thought that was what I needed to move on. But I was wrong. No one was keeping me from moving on, only me. She taught me more about fighting for what you want than I’d learned spending half my life in the cage. I finally get it…what makes us move on is to accept what we feel and share it.”
Nico’s voice becomes shaky and I fight the urge to go comfort him, but I can’t hold back the stream of tears that fall from my face silently.
“Today I made peace with it, Babe. And you gave that to me. I only wish there was something I could give you back that meant as much as what you did for me. But there isn’t one thing big enough to call it even. So if you’ll have me, I want to spend the next fifty or sixty years trying to repay you…saying thank you every day. Because you, lady, are all I need.”
My feet can’t get to him fast enough. I almost knock over two rows of folding chairs in front of me, trying to make my way. But when I finally do, he holds me so tight that everything else fades away and I know we’re going to be okay. As long as we have each other.