Walking Disaster

This companion novel retells the love story of Travis Maddox and Abby Abernathy from Travis's perspective, revealing the emotional wounds beneath his reckless exterior.

A prologue establishes the core of Travis's character. At three years old, he watches his terminally ill mother, Diane, die at home under hospice care. Before she goes, Diane gives Travis a set of instructions: it is okay to feel sad, he should enjoy being a kid, his brothers should look after one another and their father, and one day he should fight for the girl who does not come easy. Travis's eldest brother, Thomas, carries him upstairs and promises to take care of him. Frozen with grief, Travis silently vows to honor his mother's words once the sadness lifts.

Years later, Travis is a student at Eastern University, notorious for sleeping around and fighting in an illegal underground ring called the Circle. He lives with his cousin Shepley and divides women into two categories: disposable hookups he calls vultures and the elusive pigeon, a loyal, brave soul who mates for life. When Shepley's girlfriend, America Mason, brings her best friend Abby Abernathy to the cafeteria, Travis is immediately drawn to her dismissive indifference. He nicknames her Pigeon and persuades her to visit the apartment.

Their antagonism softens into friendship over dinner, where Abby tells Travis she does not dislike him but refuses to be treated as a sexual conquest. Over the following weeks, they eat lunch together, study biology, and fall into an easy routine. Travis confides to Shepley that he has feelings for Abby but considers himself unworthy. His jealousy flares when Parker Hayes, a wealthy fraternity brother, begins pursuing her.

When the boiler breaks at Abby's dormitory, she and America temporarily move into the apartment. Travis offers Abby his bed, a space he has never shared with anyone. One night at the Red Door nightclub, their unspoken tension erupts when Travis kisses Abby's neck on the dance floor and she pulls away furiously. Their argument outside escalates until Travis blurts out that she is beautiful, disarming her. Back at the apartment, a drunk Abby asks him to hold her, and he does.

Travis proposes a bet before a fight: if his opponent, Brady Hoffman, lands a single punch, Travis will abstain from sex for a month; if not, Abby must stay at the apartment for a full month. Travis wins without taking a hit, and Abby learns the dormitory boilers have already been fixed. She accepts the terms.

The arrangement proves volatile. After overhearing Abby tell America she could never date him, Travis gets drunk and brings two women home. Abby's cool indifference the next morning wounds him more than anger would. When Abby begins dating Parker, Travis forces himself to act supportive, though he drinks heavily and waits up for her every night. During one argument, Abby inadvertently reveals she is a virgin who left Kansas rather than marry her high school boyfriend. The revelation deepens Travis's protectiveness. When he visits his father, Jim Maddox, and his brother Trenton to vent, Jim smiles knowingly at Travis's description of Abby as a pigeon, recognizing the connection to Diane's final words.

Travis organizes a surprise nineteenth birthday party for Abby, where she shocks everyone by downing 15 tequila shots with professional composure. That night, holding a sick Abby on the bathroom floor, Travis privately recognizes he has fallen in love. The next morning, he gives her a cairn terrier puppy she names Toto, after the dog in The Wizard of Oz, since she is from Kansas.

During the final two weeks of the bet, they enjoy their most harmonious stretch together. On the last night, Abby initiates sex, and Travis is overwhelmed that she is giving him her virginity. He falls asleep believing they have turned a corner but wakes to find her gone. Travis destroys the apartment in a rage.

After days of unanswered calls, Travis confronts Abby outside her dorm and confesses his love. Abby borrows his phone and calls Parker to end things, telling him she is in love with Travis. They reunite as a couple.

At poker night at his father's house, Abby reveals a hidden past. After pretending to be a novice, she demolishes Travis's brothers hand after hand. Thomas recognizes her surname and asks if she is related to Mick Abernathy, a legendary poker figure. Abby confirms that Mick is her father and that she was a teenage prodigy known in the press as Lucky Thirteen. Travis realizes she deliberately lost their earlier bet so she could stay at the apartment. Abby asks him to keep her past secret; she came to Eastern to escape the gambling world.

At a date party hosted by Sig Tau, Parker's fraternity, the evening is disrupted when Mick appears on campus. He owes $25,000 to a Las Vegas mobster named Benny and expects Abby to pay. The group flies to Vegas, where Abby plays poker but falls $5,000 short. When they visit Benny, he sends two bodyguards after Travis as a test. Travis defeats both men, and Benny offers a deal: Travis will fight Brock McMann, a former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) fighter, and Benny will forgive the remaining debt. Travis wins decisively, and Benny offers him a lucrative ongoing fighting contract.

Travis tells Abby he wants to accept Benny's offer. She refuses to accept anything connected to Benny, packs her suitcase, and leaves. Travis later declines the contract, but when he begs Abby to take him back on campus, she says they are too dysfunctional and walks away.

The breakup lasts months. Travis convinces Abby to cook Thanksgiving dinner at his father's house as a favor, and they share a final night together, but she will not reconcile. Travis tells her he will always love her but accepts they are over. He returns to his father's house, where his brothers surround him as he breaks down. Over winter break, he destroys his phone on New Year's Eve to keep from calling her.

At a Valentine's Day party, Travis's persistence finally breaks through. He carries Abby out over his shoulder, and back at the apartment, declares that he belongs to her. She grabs his face and kisses him. The next morning, she reveals she was ready to reconcile at Thanksgiving but was too proud to say so.

Travis arranges one final fight at Keaton Hall, an aging campus building under renovation. He defeats his opponent, but a hanging lantern falls and ignites the basement, trapping dozens of spectators. Travis reaches an exit but turns back to find Abby. He kicks down a locked door, discovers her pounding on a sealed window, breaks the glass with his fist, and pushes her outside. He fears Trenton, who was guarding Abby during the fight, died in the fire, but Trenton calls from a safe location.

That night, Abby proposes marriage. Travis produces an engagement ring he bought weeks earlier, and they elope in Las Vegas the next day. When they break the news to Jim, his eyes well up; he tells Travis that his mother would say he did good.

An epilogue set years later reveals that Travis works as an undercover agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), recruited through his connections to Benny. His eldest brother Thomas, also an FBI agent, has been secretly investigating Benny for years; during one operation, Travis killed Benny after Benny threatened Abby's life. Travis and Abby have twin children and a third on the way. Abby has discovered Travis's secret career and offers evidence to help close a case involving her father. Travis reflects that Abby gave him back the peace he lost when his mother died, fulfilling the promise he made as a three-year-old to fight for what he loves.