[center]Location: his gym
Time: night
Interacting with: that girl who wont fuck off [@Dirty Pretty Lies]

yes i know this header is poorly formatted get off my dick
[hr][hr]
One week down. Thirty-five to go. Didn’t seem so bad when he thought about it that way, huh? What was that? One hundred, seventy-five days? Multiplied by eight… Fourteen hundred hours left. Not bad, Troy could do that. Fourteen hundred more hours of these people, and he was done. That was easy. [i]He could handle that.[/i]

Absently, the young man looked over his shoulder at a picture that hung on the wall, one of him and his mentor--Owen--after his first victory at a local tournament. Okay. Might be harder nowadays. Staring at the picture, Troy big back anger, bitterness. Life sucked, and then you died. Wasn’t the old man’s fault. Troy’s breath shouldn’t be used to tarnish his memory. Wasn’t the old man’s fault. He was old. Frail. [i]When Troy met him.[/i] Troy was lucky they’d had the five years to get to know each other.

Now, all he had left was distant memories, a box of letters that he wasn’t allowed to open, pictures… and this building that he was standing in. Sure, there was more that had been [i]given[/i] to him, but Troy had only asked for--and received--the keys to the gym. The rest of it was waiting patiently for him. He’d deal with that when he finished high school.

Once upon a time, the gym Troy stood in had been opened to the public; even some local legends had trained here, but now under Troy’s ownership, it was locked down. His haven. He had the only key, and he locked the door behind himself, and he would keep it that way forever. He didn’t need other people damaging his place with their… [i]existence[/i].

Bitterness rising--honestly, when wasn’t Troy bitter?--Troy stretched his arms over his head, leaning to his left side. He looked around the gym, toward the ring in the center of it, then at the sets of weights, before turning his attention to the clock hanging on the wall. Eleven at night. Great, looked like he was sleeping here tonight. Again. The house was on lockdown, for sure.

Sighing, Troy walked over toward the office, grabbing his phone off of the edge of a weight machine and clicking the Bluetooth off. If he was going to wallow in his bitterness, then he would do so in [i]silence[/i]. He let himself into the office and headed to the fridge nestled in the corner of it, opening it and grabbing a beer from it. He cracked the lid of it and sat down in the desk chair, kicking his shoes off and leaning them up on the desk as he sipped at the alcohol and mused to himself about his current situation.

Turning up the bottle at eleven at night. Alone. In a dark office.

Yep.

He was [i]officially[/i] pathetic.

Troy flicked his phone on and pulled down the notifications bar, scoffing slightly at the message:

[quote]From: Audrey
[color=deeppink][i]I can't stop thinking about you or that night. Let's make it happen again. Meet me up?[/i][/color][/quote]

Staring at the screen for a few seconds, Troy sipped from the beer before he flicked his fingers across the keyboard. She was disturbing his sanctity and his peace.

[quote]To: Audrey
[color=3545c4][i]No. I’m busy. Bother somebody else.[/i][/color][/quote]

That'll show 'er.[/center]