Anchor

Part 19 - Jule

    "I thought maybe we could arrange a time to meet and you could teach me. I didn't think you'd be free right this second. I need to shower and change..." I really needed that shower. Honestly, I wouldn't want to train someone if they smelt as bad as I did. 

    "Hit the bag. You can do all that other stuff after."  His voice was stern and the dominating aura coming off him had me obeying. 

    I walked passed him and straight to the bag. The first punch I threw was a swing and a miss, it definitely hurt me more than it should have. "Don't be a p***y and really hit it," Jule's voice moved closer as he walked across the grass and to my side. I clenched my fist tight and punched again, this time it wasn't as painful. "Again, but this time spread your legs apart a little more and put your weight behind your punch." 

    I followed his commands and in no time I was enjoying it more than I thought I would. There weren't many words of encouragement on Jule's part, but his training was working just fine without them. I worked up a sweat and that was a good sign, right?

    "Mediocre punches, Kitty. You think if someone attacked you then you could defend yourself?" 

    "Hey, I've gotten a lot better from when we started!" I was proud of my progress. My knuckles were red raw but my determination was still strong.

    "Answer the question." There was no emotion on his face. He was a blank canvas, one that constantly had me on my toes. 

    I'm not saying that I could take on an army but holding my own against a lone attacker - maybe.

    "I reckon I cou-" The wind left my lungs with a hard crash. With speed I hadn't had time to process, Jule had pinned me to the ground. His forearm pressed to my chest applying minimal pressure. I winced at the pain radiating my back as he removed himself from above me and held a hand out to me. 

    "If that was a real attacker, you'd be dead already." That large hand of his stayed put in front of me waiting for me to grab it. Having the air knocked from your lungs wasn't something I wanted a repeat of but in the corner of my eye I saw Jodie sitting on the stairs to the house watching us, I knew I'd rather take my chances with Jule. I swatted his hand away and leaned up on my elbows.

    "d**k move, Jule. That hurt," just breathing was painful. "You could have given me some sort of heads up." 

    "Do you wanna learn to defend yourself or not? If you want someone to go easy on you and baby you, then go ask Gavin or Saph. I'm sure you'll learn a lot from them." The sarcasm in his voice was evident and I had my reasons for asking Jule. He was ruthless, intimidating and probably the only one who would really show me the ropes as opposed to giving me excuses on why I don't need to protect myself. 

    I huffed, slowly stood and brushed off the dirt from my clothes. After witnessing my dads murder, I told myself that I wouldn't be another statistic and since that night I had done no training or even made preparations to learn to fight. It's a sight that would be forever embedded in my memory, I couldn't change that but instead of letting it burn me from the inside, I would use it as a compass and turn it into something other than a weakness. 

    "No, let's go again." A smirk appeared on his lips and he gently shook his head before stepping closer to me. I held my ground and lifted my head up to look him in the eye. 

    The smirk faded and his emotionless facade was back. "Go, hit me." He spoke low, commanding me.

    "I...I can't." It sounded stupid but I was worried I would hurt him. 

    "Do it," he all but shouted in my face.

    I flinched. 

    "Don't be a f*****g puss-" 

    I waited for the thud of my fist against his cheek but it never arrived. I finally went to hit him but it was more for him to prove how unprepared I was. The fist I threw at him had been caught in his grip which had me flipped around and pressed into his chest. His large, tattooed arm held me in place just underneath my breasts. Warm breath fanned my face as he whispered, "too slow." I shuddered in his grasp but I put it down to him catching me off guard.

    After he released me, we took a few more rounds on the boxing bag, this time him getting me to kick as well as punch. By the time we finished, it was getting in to the evening and the sky was that beautiful orange haze from the setting sun. Jodie had disappeared from view a few hours prior and I figured she knew I was avoiding her, which I was fine with. 

    Jule walked me back to the house and offered to make us dinner as being a necromancer meant he still needed to eat too. He made us breakfast for dinner which really hit the spot. If I had been asked when I first arrived here who I would be least likely to get along with then I would have said Jule. Who would have thought he and I would hit it off? It's not like we were the best of friends but it was a mutual understanding that we were the only ones in the house that weren't vampires and in a way that made us more connected than the others. At least that's how I saw it. 

    "So how did you come to be here?" I asked with a mouthful of bacon, hiding it with a hand over my mouth.

    He wasn't as talkative as let's say Gavin was or Otto, but when he did speak it wasn't one worded answers and I happily enjoyed spending this time with him. 

    "The million pound question... I uh, I was in a shitty place in my head and Ben found me and stopped me from..." The sound of the fork tapping on his plate bounced around the room. I paused my chewing and swallowed loudly as I mumbled an 'oh' under my breath. 

    "It's all in the past now. I don't think about it anymore..." It was a tricky subject and one that I didn't want him to talk about if it made him feel uncomfortable. My mouth was still slack at his words, he was an expert at hiding how he was feeling most of the time but this was more than unexpected coming from the strong, stoic and fearless man in front of me. 

    "What about you? You turned up the other night in quite the state. Ben threatened to kill anyone that laid a hand on you, didn't tell us anything about what made you come here." 

    "Oh, well I was staying with Stellan and Jodie after... my dad was murdered, you know that right?" I didn't know how much about my life any of the people here knew. 

    "Yeah," a flash of sadness flickered over his face before he pushed it away. "I'm sorry for your loss, really."

    "Thanks... He uh, he was really great guy. The best dad anyone could have asked for." I felt a tear slide down my cheek. I sniffed and wiped it away before I fell down the rabbit hole. "Sorry." I took a sip of my water. "Yeah so anyway, I was staying with Stellan at his and I thought it was nice of him and everything but it turned out he knew things about my dad and about me that he kept from me, and... I guess it kinda piled up on me and I ran." 

    He wasn't saying anything so I continued, "I know it sounds childish, running without letting him explain and stuff, but at the time I was really broken, and I cried so much that I sort of fell asleep in the forest. When I woke up Ben was carrying me and voila, here I am." 

    "Stellan is a good guy." That was all he had to say to me opening up to him. I didn't know what to think. Jule stood from his chair and rinsed his plate off in the sink. The atmosphere in the room had changed, it felt heavy and I wanted nothing more than to go back minutes before to work out what caused it.

    I followed suit and cleared my plate and rinsed it off before placing it in the dishwasher. I guessed our conversation was over by the way Jule hadn't taken his eyes off the kitchen counter. I was almost out the door when his voice stopped me in my tracks, "Six o'clock in the morning, be at the boxing bag." A small smile graced my lips as I looked over my shoulder at him, still somewhat deep in thought as he now stared out the window to the garden. "Goodnight Jule. See you in the morning."