Hitting the Punching Bags (Open)

[Josef Muller]

He really shouldn’t be nervous. There was nothing to be nervous about. It wasn’t like he hadn’t taught a class before. And he certainly knew what he was doing. But he had never taught a class in his own setting, and had always worked for someone else. To not have someone he was supposed to report to was both liberating and terrifying in turn. He wasn’t used to not having anyone to direct him. Still, he’d done his best. He’d outfitted the area. There were pads on the floor, new and relatively clean. Punching bags in the corner: always a must. Hand-pads as well, gloves, towels, mirrors on the walls so the students could watch themselves, chairs so any onlookers or even the students could rest…

He was listing off every single thing he’d bought for the clinic. If that wasn’t a sign of nerves, he didn’t know what was. In addition, the man also realized he was pacing. He shook his head and forced himself to stand still in the middle of the pad on the floor, flexing his hands as he let out a slow and steady breath. He could do this. He really could.
At least he looked the part. Although he felt quite nervous, he seemed calm. He was clean-shaven and looked respectable, and in his black, loose-fitting pants and grey tank-top, he looked exactly like the stereotypical karate teacher, complete with muscles. That had been done on purpose. He wanted to teach it in plainclothes, but there was no point in teaching a class if you didn’t look like you knew what you were doing, and that included looking like you should have been on a fitness commercial.

The sign to get the business started been simple enough. “Self-Defense Clinic” was what it said on the front. Boring? Oh yes. But Josef didn’t plan to make this any larger than it already was. Flyers had gone up over town, advertising the opening and a free self-defense class for anyone who wanted to attend. Three hours long, and after the school let out. That way, people could stop in whenever they wanted, if they were interested, and stay as long as they’d like. And he shouldn’t get too burned out so long as he didn’t go mimicking anyone for too long. He knew his limits. This was well within them. The class was due to start in twenty minutes. Josef didn’t know if he’d have anyone interested at all, although he’d been sure to also put some posters in the school—with the permission of the staff, of course. Pilot Ridge didn’t have a high crime rate, but with some luck, someone would be interested.

Right?

[Ann Hudgins]

It's been about three weeks now, and Ann could happily admit that she was part of the employed force of America. She worked at Patching Adams as some sort of secretary, office-pick-up person. It wasn't difficult and about the only difficult thing to do was talk with the customers on the phone, because she didn't want to give them any false information, though Riley and Rina helped her when she needed it and were fun to be around.

And it was thanks to this job of hers that she discovered this Free self-defense clinic flyer as she walked from the office to Alex's house (on the week nights she worked she didn't bother walking back to Hammel and just crashed at his place--it was awkward at first because Alex refused to let her sleep on the couch, but now it was just another part of her routine). She'd folded the flyer up--yes, she had taken it with her--and stowed it in her bag until further notice. The idea of trying out the class festered at the back of her head. Thanks to her training Moe in taekwondo, she'd only reminded herself how much she'd lost in the three, almost four, years she had been since her last training class. She'd forgotten most of the ju jitsu things she had in her arsenal. On top of all that, she'd also convinced herself that she would start to look for a class to start taking to help get her back to her former glory, because now that she had a job, she had money to pay for it. (so long as it wasn't crazy expensive)

You can understand when she saw the FREE part, she was even more drawn to taking it.

The days counted down to the date on the flyer, and when the day arrived, Ann finally made her decision. She would take it. It was a great opportunity for her, and she would be fool to miss it. So she packed a workout bag and walked from Hammel, she aimed to arrive ten minutes early so she could get her pre-pre workout stretches in, and to also speak with the instructor. Both to explain her situation, history, and warn the person just in case her powers malfunction and she sucks someone in and faints. She hadn't lost control in a while, her almost constant contact with Alex had strengthened her shields to bricks and she was very confident in her control nowadays.

She followed the address (she knew Pilot Ridge pretty well these days) on the flyer and upon arriving at the place, she let out a slow breath and then walked in. "Hello," she chirped as the doors closed behind her. She spotted someone in the room and since he was the only person, and also early, that he was the instructor, she bowed her head respectively (her black-belt in taekwondo means she has some long, deep-rooted habits), and then moved to a chair to sit down and remove her converse.

"I saw a flyer like last week. Uhm. What sorta thing are you planning on focusing on, if you don't mind me asking?" One shoe off, she paused to look up at him. "Oh how rude...excuse me. I'm Ann Hudgins. I've got a black belt in taekwondo but I've been inactive for three years. Ohm...I also go to Hammel." Other shoe off. She pulled off her socks and stuffed them into her shoes then pushed them under the seat. She was now barefoot and ready to work out. She sat down on the floor with her legs straight out in front of her.

"No need to be nervous. I made sure to get here a little early." She felt his nervousness floating in the air, it wanted to raise the hair on her neck, but she was more excited about it.

[Josef Muller]

Josef hadn’t been expecting anyone so early. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure he’d been expecting anyone at all. Words of certain members of his family kept floating around in his ears, such as “why are you doing this?” and “Do you know how much of a risk this is?” Thankfully, he hadn’t ever been much of a guy who over-thought his actions—well, until lately—so he hadn’t considered it that much. Still, when Ann arrived, he felt… All right, he felt relieved. He had at least one person coming. But he didn’t physically show it, except a faint little smile that appeared on his lips and a slight relaxing of already-tensed shoulders. His brows lifted slightly as she bowed her head and then settled down to remove her shoes. Hm. That was interesting.

“Hello,” he greeted back, bowing his head—although a fraction less than she had—in a greeting as well. As she took off her shoes and spoke, he sat down on the pad, cross-legged, and watched her curiously, listening but not seeming inclined to speak yet. He would rather just listen. This also seemed to calm him down: this was something that he was more accustomed to. He’d done one-on-one training things for years, and he was always better with just one person. All right. So she had a black belt. He wasn’t very familiar with taekwondo, but martial arts’ training was fairly similar across most of the fields, and he would guess they would be able to manage. Plus, he was a fast learner.

When she addressed his nervousness, however, his brows climbed, and he seemed slightly startled. Still, Hammel student…probably an Empath. He’d known this stuff when he had actually worked for Hammel…as it was, he could just ask her.

“Well, for starters,” he began, once he was relatively certain she was done. “My name is Josef Muller. I’m not particularly used to being called Master or Sir, so you can call me Josef or Mr. Muller if you want.” Formalities tended to make him wince. He was an easy-going fellow and preferred to be known by his real name, thank you very much. “It’s very nice to meet you, Miss Hudgins,” he added. “And especially nice to meet someone else who has training. I wasn’t expecting that.” Self-defense classes didn’t seem to attract those kinds of people, but what was it she’d said? Inactive for three years? Yes, that could do it. “To be honest, I was planning on starting with the basics on how to punch and to break holds. But as you already know those kinds of things, why don’t we start stretching and warming up and you can tell me about taekwondo? I studied Isshin-Ryu and judo, but I’ve heard it’s very different. How long did you study it? And, of course, feel free to mention anything else or ask any questions.” That way, if she wanted to speak about her meta abilities, she could, or ask about other things. In the meantime, it was time for basic stretches

[Sakhmet Richmond]

Shortly after the Richmond family had settled into their home flyers had begun popping up all over Pilot Ridge, advertising self-defense classes. Sakhmet had torn one off the door at the grocery store while shopping and, laden with groceries, traveled over to the address given. Nobody had been there, but it had been rather late in the evening, so she'd returned home, filling in April 28th on the calendar, making a note to take Horus with her for the free lessons the flyer offered.

After all, she reasoned, bullies would leave him alone if he took a few self-defense classes. And besides, he was always worrying over his weight. She thought his weight was fine, but a little exercise never hurt anyone, particularly when attempting to lose weight and gain muscle definition. Of course, this was assuming that her baby brother didn't fall asleep during the class, which was always a danger, but Hammel was supposed to be teaching him how to control his tendency toward narcolepsy.

So it was that as soon as Horus had flown through the door she'd swooped him up and hustled him off with her, promising cookies later if he cooperated. Not that he had a choice, exactly; she fully intended to drag him there cooperating or not. It would simply make things easier on her if he was cooperating and cookies generally were the most effective bribe she could offer both because of her natural talent toward baking as well as Horus' taste for sweets.

There were already two people there when they arrived, a girl around their own age and an older man. Both bare-foot and in practical clothing, which only served to drive home the point that she hadn't thought this through well at all. She'd shuffled Horus with her without even giving him the chance to change clothes, and she herself was in leggings and heels. She'd brought refreshments (lemonade and the promised cookies), enough for about ten people packed in the basket on her arm, but appropriate attire hadn't occurred to her at all. Oops. She hoped that the instructor would take into consideration that neither Richmond had ever done this before and be kind.

"Ummm." She paused with the door half-way open, motioning for Horus to go in first. "Is this the free self defense class?"

[Horus Richmond]

Horus was slightly sulky when he arrived, dragged along by Sahkmet. So he'd said he wanted to be fit but not in front of people - and he could defend himself! He just bit and scratched and generally hit till he either won or got knocked unconscious. Either way, he was only along for the promise of cookies, that and he knew if things got too much effort he could just poke himself asleep and intentionally ride out the lesson under the pretense of his narcolepsy attacking.

Oh hey, wasn't that Ann?

Giving a halfhearted wave over to the girl -who seemed totally more prepared than Sakhie and himself - he nudged his sister and pouted. "Okay, I came, I can has cookies now?" He whined, tugging on Sakhmet's sleeve with pleading puppy eyes. Shuffling around the doorway in a manner only described as awkward, the short blonde dug his hands in his pockets, gave a halfhearted sigh and flopped on the floor.

After a long moment of just lying on his back in a corpse-like pose, the narco began humming Kung-Fu fighting, trying to get into the mood of actually doing something that involved moving and exercise. "So hi." He eventually waved over at the instructor. "'M Horus an' this is Sakhi- Sakhmet. She dragged m'here s'I can defeat Jesse next time h'shows his asshole face around here." After that charming introduction, Horus finally got to his feet once more.

"NOW can I have a cookie?"

[Ann Hudgins]

Ann had never worked out (strictly martial arts) a day in her life with shoes on. It was just a silly notion for her to even think about doing; it just wasn't done. So, when she faintly noticed his noticing of her taking her shoes off, she just looked back down and continued her business by removing her socks. She wriggled her toes for a moment and stretched them out straight in front of her and started to go through the old motions of warming up. She was pretty sure the guy would lead them through stretches as well before they really got started (because, again, Ann had never worked out a day in her life where she didn't stretch for at least fifteen minutes).

Ann was actually pretty comfortable with her powers now, so by directly bringing attention to the fact she could sense his nervousness...well she had a bit of confidence and because she was about to work with an instructor (even if it wasn't one of her old instructors from Jacksonville), her old self was coming back to her and she just generally felt...good. She switched through her stretching while she spoke to the man, however she paused when he started talking to her, because not doing so was rude in her eyes. She nodded her head, Mr. Muller it was. Ann was a pretty big stickler about formalities--at least when it came to calling people by their name, since he was going to be an instructor, he got the title Mr. unless, of course, he asked her otherwise. You can blame that habit of hers on her father (military, remember).

"Nice to meet you," she echoed with a faint smile on her face and she chewed her lip as he mentioned the things he has trained in and asked her about taekwondo. She really could go on all day. "I've not taken it since I moved here from Jacksonville. But I had taken it for six years, give or take a month or two. I've been in an assortment of tournaments and even went to nationals a few times. I qualified for the Junior Olympics, but thanks to an injury I couldn't make it that year." She still got mad about that when she thought about it, but doctor's orders were orders. "Anyway, taekwondo focuses more on kicks than hand techniques, at least in tournament sparring. Forms are also pretty important, and if I remember correctly there are a few different sets of forms different gyms teach so not everyone that takes taekwondo necessarily all know the same form. I've also had some training in Brazilian jujitsu--my parents knew a guy-- so I'm familiar with holds, throws, and locks and counter locks, with a bit of a ground game, but I've probably forgotten most of it--I was too young to really get a good understanding of the moves. It might take me a while to get to back, hopefully I haven't lost too much of it. I'm really looking forward to your class." Honesty was the best policy, right? She hoped she'd covered the bases to his questions because at that time the door opened.

Now Ann really wouldn't have minded the class ending up just being the two of them, but she also wanted to see that other people in Pilot Ridge were interested in this sort of thing--and also for Josef's sake (she got the feeling he was still anxious/nervous about the turn out, even if Ann was a bit early). So when the two blond people walked in, Ann actually smiled at them, and then glanced at Josef with that smile still on her face; almost in a 'see, no need to be nervous' sorta way. Ann glanced back over at the two that entered, the one asked for a cookie which struck her as pretty strange. But just as their eyes met, she got a sense of recognition from him. Which made her feel pretty lousy because she honestly had no idea who he was. Maybe he went to Hammel? That was probably it. He waved so she waved back, a little, with a smaller less noticeable smile on her face.

Horus, he said his name was (eventually), and introduced the girl as...Sakhmet? What a cool name... Ann got to her feet, only to continue with her stretching by going through a few rounds of stretch kicks on each foot. Each time she lifted her hand over her head and kicked with the corresponding foot, and let out a hiss of air during the kick and grinned when she managed to kick her kick up a little higher (the point of sticking her hand over her head was to kick it with her foot, but she wasn't as flexible as she used to be so her kicks were only about at neck level).

[Josef Muller]

((Sorry for the totally late post guys.^^*))

Josef nodded as he listened to Ann’s statements, although his brows climbed slightly as the girl said that she could have participated in the Junior Olympics. “Very impressive,” he said. “I see. Well, for today, I’ll probably just help you gain some of your flexibility and strength back, by teaching you some of the techniques I’ve learned. However…” He leaned over and fetched a flyer with more information on the classes he was offering, then a pen from his pocket. He offered them to her. “If you write down some of the techniques you knew or were interested in learning, if you give me a couple of days, I’ll be able to help you with them.” That was one benefit to his ability. He wouldn’t ever get that middle step of actually learning something, but if it was specifically taekwondo she wanted help with, he’d be able to do it. Not bad, huh?

But he was surprised when other people walked in—he’d known that Ann (or Ms. Hudgins) was early, but he hadn’t really thought that anyone else was going to come. That was the pessimism talking, he supposed. It was a FREE class. He was likely to get more than one student just because people would be interested in something that was free. Well, he’d take anything that he could have. These two didn’t seem as prepared as Ann did, but he’d also guess they were inexperienced. The girl looked to be about eighteen, and he’d guessed the boy who walked in was around the same age as Ann. And did the girl have cookies and lemonade in her hand? That was unexpected.

“Yes,” he told her with a smile. “You’re in the right place.” Taking his cue from Ann’s reaction to informality, he added, “I’m Mr. Muller…” He rose to his feet to offer her his hand, but paused as the boy, who had been looking rather sulky anyways, started shuffling around the floor and then, without much more warning than that, flopped down on it.

His brows climbed. Right. And he was humming now. Josef was half-tempted to order the boy to his feet, military-style, but didn’t immediately do that, casting a questioning look at the blonde young woman before turning his gaze back down to the small blonde boy on the floor.

“Nice to meet you, Horus,” he said with more cheer than he otherwise felt. “And Sakhmet. Would you put the, uh, snacks on the table over there for now? Thank you.”

Who’s Jesse? was what he REALLY wanted to ask, but he resisted. Obviously, the boy had a grudge with someone. That was all right. He could handle that.

“If it’s all right, Miss Sakhmet—” he hadn’t been giving a last name, so that’d have to do “—I think the snacks should wait. If you could both take off your shoes. Horus, do you stretch?” This was probably going to be his most difficult part. “We’ll start with that,” he said, “and then you can tell me about your self-defense experience while Miss Hudgins here finishes her list. Or maybe your reasons for taking this class. Miss Hudgins, tell me when you’re done, and we can start on the punching bags with some kicks.”

There. He could do this. It was just like personal training with younger people, right?

[Sakhmet Richmond]

Sakhmet shook Horus off her sleave. "We just got here!" She chided firmly, looking about for a place to set down her basket. "You can have a cookie after the class."

Fortunately she didn't have to make a decision about the refreshments, as the instructor pointed her in the direction of a table. She beamed at him, trotting over to the table and arranging things as neatly as was possible without the help of tablecloths and doilies. "Oh, of course we can wait. I didn't mean for us to eat them until after!" She adjusted the plate of cookies so that it was the exact same distance from the edge of the table as the pitcher of lemonade. "I thought everyone might get a bit hungry after working out." She explained, as if she needed an excuse to feed people.

This done she plopped down onto one of the seats provided for potential students, divesting herself of her heels as instructed.She slowly unstrapped her heels, surreptitiously watching as the other girl kicked her legs into the air; what impressive flexibility! Sakhmet felt a sting of envy. She could cook and she could dance at clubs, but she doubted she could lift her legs anywhere near that high without injuring herself.

A sigh escaped her lips as she neatly arranged her shoes underneath the chair before returning to the middle of the room. "It's Richmond." She offered the instructor. He was kind of cute. For an old guy. She wanted to guess that he was older than Ra, and since Ra was her eldest sibling anyone older than him was definitely old. "Sakhmet and Horus Richmond. It's lovely meeting you, Mr. Muller."

She folded her hands in front of her and nudged Horus gently with one foot. "I've never done this before." She admitted apologetically, "I hope it's quite alright, you didn't mention any experience level on your fliers. I thought it would be useful to try out, just in case mace doesn't quite cut it."

She cut her eyes to Horus, "and to discourage bullies." Horus could add to that explanation if he so desired. She just hoped he would stay long enough to learn something useful. After all, she didn't want that awful Jesse boy picking on her baby brother ever again.

[Horus Richmond]

Horus stared mournfully at the cookies, then down at his shoes. But those were his FAVOURITE shoes. What if someone stole them? Fat chance, the things are falling to bits, but Horus looked utterly sulktastic as he pulled them off and placed them within his eyesight. At Ann's dynamic power posing, Horus decided he'd try and imitate her to show off, and found himself yelping as something in his leg disagreed with what he'd done. Now he really was sulking.

Stretches? Sure, as long as they involved yawning afterwards, he did plenty of them. "Uh... yeah, doesn't everyone?" Horus replied, looking a bit confused as he demonstrated his get-out-of-bed stretch for the day. He added a yawn for effect, then flumped wholeheartedly on Sakhie's shoulder, listening to her apology. "Yeah, t'discourage blonde assholes who hurt others." He nodded in agreement, before doing another stretch to prove how awesome he was.

"S'm'personal fightin' stuff?" He scrunched up his face to think, curling his toes up, then wiggling them. "Well, me an' Sett play Tekken a lot. 'M always Yoshimitsu with his badass lightsaber sword shit." Horus scratched the back of his head and looked to Sakhmet for a further prompt. "... 've punched someone in th'face before. An' I know how t'win a fight." He nodded sternly, then pointed at his teeth, then bit down at an imaginary target.

"An' if that don't work I punch 'em in th'nuts." He added cheerily, watching Ann with intrigue. "Fuckin' hell y'so EPIC Ann." The boy said suddenly, letting out a cheer as the girl did her kicks. "Man 'm never pissin' y'off EVER." He nodded, before snapping back to Josef with his head tilted. "Couldya teach m'how t'kick people in th'face?" He asked with a grin.

He started to zone out rather quickly at that thought, imagining punting Jesse across a room, dressed as Yoshimitsu with the sword. That thought transformed into kicking Vincent for being Vincent, and then suddenly he was picturing himself doing matrix style moves and flying out of windows. His glazed expression turned further glazed when he realised it was probably naptime. Mm? Was that a yawn? ... He silently challenged himself to fall asleep with his eyes open, focusing a little over the left of Josef's shoulder.

"Mmm." He said in agreement to absolutely nothing, making sure he made the right sort of noises to signify awakeness. Oh god Sakhmet I am so sorry for his appalling behaviour. I blame Vincent and Sammy.

[Ann Hudgins]

The kicks of taekwondo were simply like basic math equations. Front snap kick, axe kick, roundhouse, and side kick were the simplest of them. Then when you started adding things, like jumping, running, or spinning (in some cases all three) then you got to the more complicated things like a tornado kick, butterfly kick, mule kick, etc. Ann remembered each very well, it was just she wasn't sure her body was in the shape it needed to be in to preform those kicks. It would take basic stretching and just working the old muscles to get those back. The same went for the hand techniques. As for the forms, well he probably could help her on that, but she was a little confused because of how he wanted her to right down the techniques she knew or needed help on. However, she was enthusiastic enough at getting her chance to work out again, she took the flyer from him and quickly scribbled down the forms she had known at one point; Palgwe's (pronounced like Paul-guh-ways) one through eight, Pyung-Ahn 1 through six, Koryo (Core-eh-yo), Kuemgang (Khoom -gah), and Bassai (Bah-sigh). Ann couldn't even begin to think about how the black belt forms started--Koryo, Kuemgang, and Bassai--but she vaguely remembered her Palgwe's and Pyung-Ahns. She looked at her list and nodded, satisfied she had remembered the proper spellings of them (her instructors had made it a point that they learned the proper Korean pronunciations) and then scribbled beneath her list: W.T.F. (World Taekwondo Federation) forms). Which meant the exact branch of Tkd she had studied under because believe it or not, there were different ones floating around. The more Americanized schools had different sets of forms entirely.

Ann missed a bit of back and forth between Sakhmet and Horus and Mr. Muller, but she didn't really care that she did--they weren't speaking to her. After she had handed the flyer and the pen back to the instructor she went back to stretching, though now, she was also doing her deep breathing pre-meditation rituals to ensure that her emotional chi shields stayed firmly in place. If he had them do hand-to-hand one step sparing, then she needed to be prepared for that. She'd hate to get sucked in and freak out, scaring everyone. Well Horus would vaguely know that her powers were messing up but still. Better safe than sorry.

Ann felt a twang of envy, like a hot fire poker to her heart chakra shield and she nearly stumbled sideways from it, her eyes glanced from the three people in the room, her eyes landing on Sakhmet. She was the only one that was looking at her at the moment and Ann's face turned down slightly in a frown. What on earth did Ann have that the girl could be envious of? That girl was pretty and even though she had readily admitted that she had never done this sort of thing before, she had come in confidently and proudly with her cookies and all. Ann could never do that. She let out a small sigh, and looked away. Ann shouldn't be privy to the girl's feelings like that, but Ann really couldn't help her power.

Before when she had felt a negative emotion she hadn't hesitated to bring attention to it, but that was different--it had just been him and herself at the time, now there were more people. Again, Horus might understand what she meant and while she got that Sakhmet and Horus were related somehow (same last name and all) she didn't want to cross a line. She looked down at her feet meekly, embarrassed now, and glanced up again when Horus turned his attention to her. "Oh it's uhm...just a stretch kick, not even really a good kick for attack, my knees not bent at all." Any kick that landed on someone else with her knee locked straight like that would do more damage to herself. She didn't expect him to know that, but she wasn't 'epic.' At least not with just warming up. She used to be epic, that she would admit to. But now? No. She was just above average.

"Yes, I'm done," she replied to Mr. Muller when he brought up her work on the list. She smiled a little. She liked working out on the bag. She bounced from foot to foot in the mean time.


(y'all can string me up and whip me for my lateness. I totally understand.)

[Josef Muller]

((Okay, I'm going to have more consistent posts now, I sweeaaarrr.^^* Sorry!))

Josef had decided, executively, that new martial arts students should not have to deal with students like Horus on their first day. However, he chided himself, this also wasn’t his first day. He had been a personal trainer for years, a recruiter before that, and had taught karate even before THAT. In spite of the nerves of starting something “new,” there was really nothing “new” about this except that he was his own boss and so had no one to blame but himself if he messed up. On the other hand, he also couldn’t get into trouble with anyone. Completely responsible for his own actions—that was definitely a new step. At least Sakhmet and Ann seemed…relatively normal. As normal as anyone could be in this town. And Ann just needed to get back into practice, something that he didn’t think should be that difficult to help with.

So. He would take one thing at a time and slowly, slowly, figure the mess out.

“It’s nice to meet you too, Ms. Richmond. Mr. Richmond.” He nodded to both and tried not to be distracted by Horus alternating between staring like a lonely puppy and leaping around like a madman. “And no experience is necessary, of course.” He turned back to her and smiled at her. “Miss Hudgins is experienced, but this is just a basic self-defense class. Now…” He looked over at Horus and did his best to seem properly attentive and not completely baffled by the boy’s words. It wasn’t entirely working. Ah, poor Ann. She was probably getting an earful out of him.

“No, those aren’t stretches,” he said patiently, and only a blink signaled his confusion at his description of “fighting.” At least Ann’s kicks—which were very impressive, and he personally was a little jealous at the flexibility that he could just barely manage now—seemed to make an impression on him. “But yes. I can definitely teach you how to…” Was the boy zoning out on him? He leaned over so he was standing directly in Horus’s line of sight. “If you pay attention, Mr. Richmond, I can indeed teach you how to kick people in the face.”

Would that work? Probably not. He nodded his thanks as Ann passed him the flyer and scanned it, then folded it neatly and slipped it into his pocket. All right. Time for some multi-tasking. So he directed the stretches—as he’d performed them before, he did them for a short time to demonstrate before watching to make sure they were done correctly. If he had his way, none of them should be too sore by the end of the class.

“So, Miss Richmond, Mr. Richmond, what do you want to get out of this? Except kicking people in the face.” As he spoke, he moved over to Ann.

“Let’s start with the basics, okay?” He smiled at her. “How about a roundhouse kick?” That was a similar move between his style and taekwondo, he thought. It might do. “At different levels, so I can analyze your form. One here…” And he spun to kick at the bag, but tapped his foot lightly against the bottom, middle and high part of the bag. “Not conventional, but it’ll help me see where you’re at. Once you’re done with stretches, Mr. Richmond,” he added over his shoulder, “I can teach you to do this as well.”