In My Final Match, My Girlfriend Beat Me Down in the Ring

The rest room door burst open while I was still sitting there in a daze.

The man who came in looked frantic, the words tumbling out of him.

"Jacob, it's bad."

"The Swansons are redeveloping Longwood Street. They're seizing every house on the block by force."

"Your grandmother's been thrown out."

I shot to my feet, and the pull of it tore straight through my wound.

I waited a few seconds for the pain to ease, then threw on my jacket and ran.

The sky outside hung low and gray, like it might start snowing any minute.

By the time I got home, the noise inside was chaos.

Grandma Fisher sat slumped on the floor, and the little furniture we owned had been smashed to pieces.

A few men in suits had her hand pinned down, forcing her thumbprint onto a contract.

"Let go of her!"

I grabbed the broom and swung it across their backs, and in the scramble I planted myself in front of Grandma.

The contract had fallen to the floor in the confusion, stamped now with a few black footprints.

I looked down. Where the compensation figure should have been, there was a bold, glaring zero.

The blood roared up into my head. I stared at them.

"This is robbery!"

Next door, Old Man Lambert's door opened, and his shock of white hair poked out.

"Jacob, son, you ought to talk your grandmother into signing that contract."

"Five million. That's enough to treat her illness."

The word rang hollow in my skull. My voice came out dry.

"What five million?"

Old Man Lambert looked puzzled.

"The compensation. The whole street's on the same rate."

I turned my head toward the men.

"Why?"

The one in charge let out a short scoff.

"If you want someone to blame, blame yourself for crossing the wrong person. A little pain's the only way you learn."

"My advice is, sign the contract and be good about it. Otherwise, a sickly little ghost like your grandmother, how many days of us going at her do you think she'll hold up?"

My heart sank.

The wrong person. The Swansons.

"This was John Swanson's idea?"

The men said nothing, which was answer enough.

I thought back to the night Georgia James confessed to me, when John Swanson, healthy his whole life, was suddenly struck down by a rare illness and rushed into intensive care.

The whole Swanson family had come apart.

When the call came, Georgia was fastening the James family's heirloom pendant around my neck.

"John's in trouble."

She left those words behind and walked out without looking back.

By the time we met again the next day, that pendant was hanging around John Swanson's neck.

Georgia stood in front of him, as if I were some raging beast.

"John's very fond of it. I'm letting him wear it for a while first."

When I didn't react, her face darkened.

"Since when did you get so petty, nickel-and-diming a sick man."

John Swanson took my hand, his other hand resting on the pendant at his chest.

"I don't have many days left anyway, Jacob. Don't hold it against me."

He said it feebly, but his sharp nails dug hard into my flesh, leaving trails of red.

That was the day I finally understood how John Swanson felt about Georgia James.

He hated me. Hated that I'd come along later and taken what he wanted.

But it never crossed my mind that his hatred went far enough to want me dead.

Once the men were gone, I turned and helped Grandma up.

As we went inside, fireworks bloomed in the distance, one after another.

Brilliant. Dazzling.

I looked up and realized that at some point the snow had started to fall.

Late last fall, Georgia had held my hand and made me a promise.

"When the first snow comes, I'll give you a grand fireworks show."

"I'll let all of Ridgeport witness how happy we are."

Now the snow had come.

But the fireworks and the woman no longer belonged to me.