He did the math three times. It came out the same every time.
He was short. Badly short.
He rubbed his eyes and stared at the photograph on the refrigerator. Sarah, sunburned and laughing on a beach in San Diego, holding a baby Emily in a floppy hat.
"I'll figure it out," he whispered. "I always do."
What Daniel didn't know was that someone had seen the bills.
Earlier that week, Blake had come over for training and found the kitchen door open. The stack of envelopes was sitting right there on the counter. A red stamp on the top one said FINAL NOTICE.
Blake didn't say anything to Daniel.
But he went home and thought about it for a long time.
The training sessions had changed Blake in ways he couldn't fully explain.
At first, he'd come because of guilt. Because he couldn't stop seeing the look on Emily's face when he'd shoved her father. Because for the first time in his life, someone had beaten him without throwing a single punch, and he needed to understand how.
He made Blake stand still.
"Ten minutes," Daniel said, the first week. "Don't move. Just breathe."
"That's it?"
"That's it."
Blake lasted ninety seconds before he got restless.
"This is stupid. What does standing still have to do with fighting?"
Daniel looked at him calmly.
"Everything. The man who can't stand still can't control himself. And the man who can't control himself will always be controlled by someone else. By his anger. By his pride. By anyone who knows which buttons to push."
Blake opened his mouth to argue. Then he closed it.
Because he remembered the party. He remembered how easily his own anger had pushed him into making a fool of himself in front of a hundred people.