Bonnie nodded to show Felix it was good. She had already been strapped into her headguard; she would prefer to fight without it, but the ever-cautious Pavel had insisted.
“We ready for gloves?” Felix asked.
Bonnie smiled faintly. People don’t realize it, but with a good trainer a boxer is always a we.
“We’re ready,” said Bonnie.
Round one, they felt each other out. Danya had the confidence of a man who had not yet been truly tested. His body was sparse and economical, lean muscle cleaving tight to the bone. Bonnie pawed him with her jab, testing his reflexes. She left herself open a fraction too long and he flicked a jab to her forehead, without much power, but enough to jolt her. She had seen the punch coming and parried in her mind, but her hands had not cooperated. She exhaled through her nose.
Ring rust. Those two words were dreaded by all fighters. They meant the loss of speed and acuity that can come after a break from the ring. But Bonnie’s mind was sharp as ever. In fact, she felt more acutely tuned in to Danya’s movements than she had to anything in months. She could see his heartbeat pulsing in his throat like a butterfly trapped beneath the surface of his skin. She could practically hear the whirring machinations of his thoughts. But her body was slower than she was used to, as though the air around it had grown thick with resistance. Just as she was thinking this, Danya caught her at the end of a blistering double jab. He stretched his lips into a satisfied smile, and she noticed his mouthguard was painted with the daggered teeth of a shark. His movements were sharklike too; he swam through their first round in a smooth, constant motion punctuated by vicious, darting attacks. She withstood a flurry of punches to the body, then another, before pivoting out of range. Right before the bell, they both released their right at the same time, but while he jerked his head to avoid her blow, she caught his fist clean below her eye.
She headed back to the corner with electricity fizzing behind her eye socket. Felix’s gaze darted quickly over her face with concern. She would have a black eye by nightfall.
“How you feeling?” he asked softly.
She gulped at the short stream of water he spurted into her mouth. She was only allowed a sip to avoid the liquid sloshing in her belly. Hard and thirsty, that’s how a fighter needed to be.
“He’s quick,” she gasped.
He swiped the back of her neck with a flannel.
“You’re just warming up.”
Bonnie gave him an imploring look.
“What do I do?”
“You do like we practiced. Three-punch combinations and get out.”
“I can’t get close to him.”
She had never felt this before, this doubt in her own abilities. Unlike Danya, she knew what defeat was like now. And every time she glanced over, she could see Pavel watching her like she was some stranger who had stumbled into the ring.
“Hey.” Felix put a hand on her shoulder and lowered his lips to beside her headgear. “He ain’t all that, Bonnie.”
Whether he was talking about Danya or Pavel, she could not tell.
Round two. Bonnie dragged herself back into the ring. Boxing is composed of only four punches—jab, right, hook, uppercut—which, like the four distinct layers of Earth, combine to create something infinitely more beautiful and complex than its parts. But Bonnie could find no beauty in it today. Her combinations felt wasteful, uninspired. There was no sting behind her jab, no snap in her hips. It was just sparring, she reminded herself; the goal was to practice technique, not to win. But it was personal between these two, anyone could see that. The former favorite and the rising star. Danya was covetously defending what was newly his; since Bonnie left he had been the center of Pavel’s cool, life-sustaining attention. Bonnie, meanwhile, was just trying to prove she still belonged there. She did not, she told herself, care what Pavel thought of her performance. The only person Bonnie needed to prove herself to was Bonnie.
But Danya was out for blood. He shot for her nose, her temple, her throat, her jaw, whatever vulnerable part of her was not covered by her headgear. By the end of the second round, she felt as though she had been battling a swarm of bees.
Felix grabbed her wrists and shook her arms out.
“You need to relax out there,” he murmured. “Breathe. Breathe. He’s not working the body much, so keep those hands up.”
“I got…ring rust,” she managed to say between great heavy breaths.
Felix twisted his dark eyebrows into a frown.
“Ring rust? I don’t believe in ring rust. That kind of talk’s for losers, Bonnie. And you’re a champion.”
“Former…champion.”
“Nah, Bonnie. I mean you’re a champ. You move like no one I’ve ever seen.”
With great effort, Bonnie raised an eyebrow.
“We talkin’ recently?”
“I’m talking last week.”
He slipped her mouthguard back into place and gave her head a rough shake.
“Don’t forget who you are, Bonnie Blue.”
Round three. Boxing, as any fighter would tell you, is ninety percent mental. The other ten percent is sweat. Danya and Bonnie traded uninspired blows for the first minute and a half, each managing to avoid the worst of what the other had to offer. Until Bonnie realized something important: Danya was momentarily flagging. He’d get his energy back, but he had tired himself out early beating up on her in the second round. Finally, something stirred deep inside Bonnie. She caught Danya’s eye. You think you’re it? Well, you ain’t shit. Bonnie managed to feint with the jab, rip an uppercut through the middle, then deliver a beautiful straight right to his face. She followed up with a stomach-busting hook off the jab. “Boom, boom, baby!” yelled someone from ringside. For the first time so far, Bonnie was disappointed to hear the bell.
Felix was grinning when she got back to her corner.
“You like that?”
Bonnie nodded, trying not to smile.
“Then go get some more!”
Round four. Bonnie went on the offensive and launched toward Danya right after the bell. She momentarily shook him with another well-timed hook to the body. Danya backed up and switched from an orthodox to a southpaw stance, trying to confuse her. The first time it worked; she got clipped in the cheek by his jab. But, over the course of the round, he did it once too often and eventually Bonnie timed it, catching him with his arms spread too wide to defend himself. She thought of Psalm 18, the hours and hours she’d spent staring at that faded piece of paper during training, preparing for moments exactly like this. The feet of a deer. She leapt forward. My hands for battle. Her cross slammed under his rib cage. Right hand sustains me. She could hear the air explode out of Danya’s lungs like a valve busting open. He staggered backward, a look of keen surprise on his face. That’s right, motherfucker. Her right was as dangerous, if not more so, than any male fighter’s her size. Before he could get his feet back under himself, she pounced forward. My ankles do not give way. He managed to tuck his elbows into himself and get his hands up as she pummeled him from the inside. Bell. Bonnie bounced back to her corner with fireworks in her heels.
“When you go for the right, swing from your hips and your heart,” said Felix. “It’s got to land in your heart first.”
