Hit me

I could not see my opponents eyes behind her face mask, but I knew they were in there watching me as she intended to give me all she got, ready to pummel me, blow after blow after blow upside my head, hammering into my meaninglessness, but I had no intentions of giving up.

At first I said without clenched fists,

"No, no, no. That's not for me; no thank you ma'am," waving my pointer finger back and forth right up in her face and she just decided to humor me, walking away from our fight all high and mighty knowing she'd be back, unceremoniously whispering,

"Fat chance. We all know who's gonna win this one when the fat lady sings."

Like a windswept egg dropped from its nest onto the pavement, it came upon me so suddenly with the refusal still glued to my tongue, the pressure mounting and mounting until I believed I had no choice but to walk out to the end of the pier.

"Oh, that's how it is," as I decided the time had come to surrender. So I said,

"Hit me. Hit me again and again till my bruised skin falls off and jumps in the boat with the pain and I don't even need to watch because I can already hear them all singing,

"Row row row your boat gently down the stream. Merrily merrily merrily merrily, life is but a dream."

After some time, one by one, uninvited, from the point of no return, the boats began to come back and I told them to stop but there was no one left within them to navigate, so naturally they began to amass, to pile up, stacking themselves so haphazardly suffocating everything near and dear, including me.

"Excuse me! Excuse me!" I said to her waving my fists in the air, "Do you think we can start over?"

And my unmasked opponent said to me, "You do know you already crossed the finish line, don't you?" Fat chance."