My t-shirt was drenched from a round on the jump rope, already damp with humidity when I came in, after half an hour, I was sticky with sweat.
In the ring, though, it was different. Hands strapped up and chalky, jabbing at pads, or with gloves on going a round, I knew exactly where I was and what I wanted, and each landed punch was catharsis.
Footwork, drills. It didn’t matter what. I could switch off in the rhythm of my fists making contact. It made me feel alive and in control, and like my anger had a purpose. It only worked for me when I breathed enough to control it, and think my plan through.
Better still, sometimes I could hit someone for real, though big beefy Joe hardly ever let me fight for real. The only girl, I grew into the only woman here, and try as I might, I couldn’t grow the muscle even the guys younger than me had.
They paired the younger kids with me to spar, strapping on pads until I knew the combinations with every part of my body. I went home dancing footwork and feeling the pull of muscles through me with every jab and swing. When I closed my eyes, I was boxing in my sleep.
The rocking hit of the punchbag and the crunching sting of my knuckles of a punch landed awkwardly, or solidly and true hummed in my body memory when I was at my desk in class, or mixing Old Fashioneds at the bar. That escape was the only thing that got me through.
And now that the end was in sight, boxing was going to be my only constant.
It was a sport of calculation and decision making as well as technique and stamina and I was going to need all of those things to carry out the plan I’d hatched on the morning Pierce signed the consent form to switch my mother’s life support off.
I hadn’t looked back since Cassie had sent me here.
Two years on, the scent of the mats, the chalk, the leather of the gloves and so much stale, male sweat made the tension in my shoulders drop.
I knew I could be myself in here, with my hands strapped up and my gloves on. I could throw combinations at a bag for hours, or spar with one of the kids. Sometimes Mitch even paid me pocket-money rates to come in and assist with the younger kids on the weekends or on school holidays. He didn’t have to. I would have done it anyway.
Wherever I ended up after the summer, the things he’d taught me were going to stick with me forever.
Maxim
I followed Elizabeth to a gym on the outskirts of Hammersmith and I took my time before going in.
This was where she’d learned her craft. Where she’d come all those times I couldn’t follow, when I’d wondered what she did when she wasn’t at home or school, or working.
I hadn’t expected it to be in a neighborhood like this. I’d pictured a bright, airy space, maybe on the river, down by Battersea, just across the bridge, or somewhere else other than here.
The place was away from the main road, which hummed with traffic speeding out of town. She turned onto the kind of back streets that girls like her were told not to walk down alone and I quickened my pace to close the distance between us.
I wanted to be within reach if she came across any trouble. Around here, that could be anything from the group of young guys across the street, spreading out wide across the pavement, stalking down the street in classic pack formation, to the spaced out guy on the corner, rubbing his hands against his threadbare jeans and talking to the pixie on his shoulder.
Elizabeth came here all the time, but that didn’t mean today wouldn’t be the day something went down that was too big for her to handle on her own. I wasn’t going to let that happen.
I could tell from the sign over the doorway that it was the kind of place with a reputation rather than subscription plans.
Elizabeth
I was going a couple of practice rounds with Jamil, one of Mitch’s kids who was starting up with the under eighteens, when the guy from across the street walked right in like he owned the place.
Because boxing went on weight rather than much else, usually, I was a good fit for the kids to practice with. And that’s all I’d wanted. A fair fight. Where we both got something out of it.
But suddenly I was all too aware that I had an audience. My skin prickled pleasantly under the guy’s gaze and I refused to let myself look at him.
Focusing my concentration, I got in another jab to my opponent. Jamil shifted and I knocked his gloves down and moved to smack him around the face. I did it every time he got distracted by the fact that it was a girl he was trying to hit.