Chapter Text
It was amazing how fast things could change. How Johnny Lawrence could turn, in a span of less than an hour, from a bully, to a peer, to a victim. Not Daniel's, obviously, but… seeing Johnny so defeated, so hurt, so betrayed at the hands of his sensei made it hard for him to remember the boy who'd nearly killed him in October.
The Cobras were all scattered like bowling pins across the blacktop, but Daniel's eyes were locked on Johnny, red faced with tears in his eyes and bruises blooming on his neck.
Mr Miyagi walked over to him and helped him to his feet.
"Where mother? Father?" he asked and Johnny swallowed, tears spilling over onto his cheeks now.
"She's- she's at home," Johnny said, finally. "She doesn't like seeing me get hurt."
Daniel closed his eyes and breathed out through his nose.
"Miyagi will take you home," Mr Miyagi continued and Daniel startled a little.
But really, what else could they do? Leave him here?
So that's how Daniel ended up wedged between Mr Miyagi and Johnny Lawrence, driving up to the Hills on the night of his great triumph. His eyes flicked over to a stone faced Johnny. He didn't feel all that triumphant.
When they got to Johnny's place it took Daniel aback. He thought he knew rich. Ali's family were rich. This was something else.
Johnny saw him gaping and turned further towards the window, pushing the point of his shoulder somewhat painfully against Daniel's as he turned away from him. Daniel didn't say anything.
He stayed in the truck as Mr Miyagi walked Johnny up the (long) drive to his house. He wasn't close enough to see how Mrs Lawrence reacted, but he could imagine it. He knew well enough how a mother reacted when someone hurt their kid.
Mr Miyagi was gone a long time before he came back and when he did he had a pinched look to his face.
"Well?" Daniel asked as Mr Miyagi put the truck into gear.
"Well what?" Mr Miyagi replied.
"What happened? What did she say?"
Is Johnny okay? he didn't ask, and not just because he already knew the answer.
Mr Miyagi sighed.
"Not much," he said. "She cried."
Daniel swallowed thinking of a (blonde, she had to be blonde right?) woman holding Johnny Lawrence and crying. Crying that someone hurt her baby.
"She say thank you. And I should be ready be served subpoena," Mr Miyagi continued. "You too."
Daniel blinked, but like… obviously. You don't attack someone, a minor, in front of witnesses and get off scot free.
"Yeah," he said out loud. "Yeah, of course."
Mr Miyagi hummed under his breath and pulled out of the drive.
*
Daniel spent the winter break thinking about Johnny Lawrence. What he was thinking, how he was feeling, where he was going, who he was talking to.
"For the fifth time," Ali said, blowing her hair out of her face with a huff of breath. "No, I have not spoken to Johnny."
"All right!" Daniel threw his hands up. "I'm just…"
Worried? God…
"No one's seen him," Ali said, more softly.
"What, no one?" Daniel asked.
"Bobby Brown went to his house last week and was sent away at the door," she said with a shrug.
"I guess he was really shook up," Daniel said, picking at a hangnail.
"Yeah," she agreed.
*
Back at school Johnny was more than shook up.
He heard through the grapevine that Johnny's parents were splitting. Which, great timing, folks. As if the attempted murder wasn't enough to process.
"He's better off," Ali said. "Johnny hates his step dad. That's why he latched onto Kreese like he did."
Johnny's friends (not Cobras anymore) closed ranks around him and walked him between classes like a security detail, always with one of them keeping a hand on his shoulder, his back, his arm. Daniel stared after them and wished he knew how to… talk to him, something.
'Hey man, I'm sorry that the thing I might have to testify under oath about y'know… happened.'
Jesus. Maybe he was better leaving the guy to lick his wounds in peace.
It was strange being all but invisible to Johnny now. Where he used to have eyes full of fury tracking him across a room now he had a vacant stare looking right through him.
His friends still glared at him, although it never went any further than that. He guessed they blamed him for what happened. Which was bullshit, because who tries to kill someone over losing a youth karate tournament? Still though… that didn't stop him from blaming himself sometimes.
But if that had been in Kreese to do at all then it wasn't Daniel winning the fight that was the problem. He kept telling himself that.
He wished he could talk to Johnny. He wished he had talked to him that night when he had the chance.
His first chance, as it turned out, would be prom.
Fresh off a breakup and full of spiked punch, Daniel wandered out to the bathrooms to find Johnny Lawrence, once again rolling a joint in a cubicle.
He looked thinner in the face, maybe, than he had at the start of the semester. Daniel swallowed.
"Hey," he said, standing outside Johnny's cubicle.
Johnny sighed.
"Hey."
Neither of them said anything for three long seconds. His big chance and here he was stumped for something to say.
"If you want me to share you can at least ask," Johnny said finally.
"Oh!" Daniel said. "Drugs! Yes, uh, yes, that's what I wanted to ask you. Totally."
Johnny groaned and kicked the door to his cubicle closed.
Daniel knocked quietly and then let himself in, suddenly aware as he did so of the close quarters they were now in.
"I don't wanna talk about it," Johnny said to the floor. "I just… I want to feel normal again, okay? I don't want to feel like this anymore."
Daniel put out a hand and placed it gingerly on Johnny's shoulder. He'd seen Dutch and them do this a thousand times. Maybe… maybe this was okay.
Johnny at least tolerated his hand on him and breathed outwards carefully.
"If you want to stay, then we're getting high."