Chapter Text
“Jecka, you have got to keep your wrist straight,” Megan taps her foot anxiously, leaning against the wall. “If you bend it like that much more, you’re gonna twist it.”
Jecka sighs as she crouches to put her hands over her knees, wiping the sweat from her face. “My wrist is straight. It’s my elbow that’s bent.”
“No, I’m talking about your left jab. You’re angling it wrong.”
Jecka stands up, rolling out her neck. She shifts her weight as she positions her legs apart and throws a single left jab. “...Huh.”
“See?”
The blonde sighs. “Yeah, I see.”
Jecka stood in a practice room with her trainer, Megan, who owned the boxing gym she had frequented for almost two years. She panted, standing in white trainers, black training shorts and a pink tank top, which was currently soaked in sweat. Her blonde hair was pulled back into a bun, the rest falling down behind her in a ponytail. Megan was in loose leggings and a sweatshirt, her arms crossed over her chest as she analyzed Jecka’s movements.
Megan grabs a water bottle by her feet and tosses it towards Jecka, who catches the plastic easily and takes a gulp.
“I love you Jecka, but if you’re going to be actually fighting this year, you need to not get injured first. Your right arm is great, it’s just your left jabs and punches. And especially your hook. You need to stop reaching further out, that’s what’s making you extend your wrist to reach.” Megan points to where the bag has craters from Jecka’s impacts. “If you look at a point on the bag and aim there, you won’t bend as much.” Megan demonstrates as she throws a punch, her form slow to demonstrate, but still beautiful as she connects cleanly with the bag. “Like that.”
Jecka sets the water bottle down and wipes the water from the corners of her mouth. “I don’t know why I train with you. Isn’t it boring to teach me things I should already know?”
“Please,” Megan steps back to once again lean on the wall. “I like seeing you get better. It took me years to get this good.”
“You’re telling me your 8-year-old students bend their wrists too?” Jecka spits.
Megan sighs. “It’s your second year, Jecka, and you’re starting out much later than most other boxers. You have to give yourself grace. You don’t mess it up every time, and that’s good.”
Jecka turns from the bag and steps over to Megan, throwing her bottle up against the wall by the trainer’s feet. “Not good enough.”
A ding from behind Jecka signals to her that someone else entered the gym. Kelly, another boxer going into her second year, saunters in with a towel and bag over her shoulder and a water bottle in her hand. She smiles when she sees Jecka.
“Jecka, hey!”
Despite her exhaustion, Jecka manages a smile and gives Kelly a fistbump, wincing at the ache in her knuckles. “Hey Kelly. Is it really 10 already?”
Kelly glances at the clock on the wall. “Yeah, it is. You been here a while?”
“No, not really.”
Megan coughs. “Yes, she’s been training for three hours.”
The bleached blonde girl’s eyes widen as she puts her hair up. “Three hours? You need a break, Jecka.”
The blonde sighs, leaning down to pick up her bag and sling it over her shoulder as she moves out of Kelly’s way so she can get ready for her lesson. “Yeah, yeah. I’m just nervous about starting.” She pulls the velcro of her hand gloves off, peeling the small covers off of her knuckles.
“Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll be great,” Kelly smiles, putting a hand on Jecka’s shoulder.
The blonde nods, her lips pulled tight in a line. “Yeah. Well, I hope your lesson goes well, Kelly. I’ll see you later,” she waves a bit, turning to the entryway of the corner of the gym where the gym bags and mats were, where they practiced. The practice room itself had a good amount of gym mats hanging from the ceiling, with a few machines and weights towards one side. Mirrors were along one of the walls, bright fluorescent lights above them.
Leaving the side room puts Jecka into a big warehouse-style gym, with multiple rings laid out, mats between them like sidewalks. The walls of the gym were lined with trophies won by people who trained here, as well as banners hung from the ceiling rafters. Mirrors lined the far wall, and an office desk and small lockers were placed to Jecka’s right, as she exited the practice room. There were still no windows into the gym, the white, harsh lights illuminating everything.
Jecka stops by her locker for a minute to throw her practice gloves into. The small nametag reads Jecka! in pink ink, with a few hearts around it. It used to have her full name, but Megan had all of her students make custom nametags to feel more at home in the gym. Some of the other people have trinkets in their lockers, but Jecka had only her practice schedule taped to one side, an air freshener taped to the ceiling of the metal box, and a few old receipts from her payments to the gym. She shuts the door.
The changing rooms were to the left as Jecka turned to the main hallway, and she threw her bag onto a bench when she stepped in. She groaned at the ache in her joints as she peeled her sports bra off, along with her training shorts and underwear. The velcro of her knee brace peeled off cleanly and she sighed, tossing the brace into her bag.
Jecka hissed at the cold water coming from the showers, but as it turned warm, she let herself relax and sigh underneath the heat as the steam built up.
She dries off and puts on sweatpants and a light blue hoodie after she rinses off, wringing out her hair and pulling it back. She grabs her bag again and throws it over her shoulder, leaving the changing room.
She can hear Kelly and Megan still practicing. Kelly has her lessons well into the night, usually- unlike Jecka, who has work pretty early, Kelly works the graveyard shift so it’s easiest for her to go to the gym first. She can hear Kelly land her blows against the gym bags, can hear the squeak of her shoes on the floor.
“Move your weight more, Kelly. Your throws are strong, but they’ll be stronger if you shift your weight… Good! Like that…” Megan’s voice carries, her praise clear.
Jecka sours a bit. Even Kelly is better than her, and she remembers when they started together.
The door dings as she exits, the cold air running through her still-wet hair. She climbs into her car, shivering as the car starts up, and the air hasn’t heated through the vents yet. Music turns on through her phone, and Jecka winces at the volume before she can turn it down.
She drives mostly in silence, her mind tired and her arms aching. She doesn’t live far from Megan’s gym, but it’s long enough for Jecka’s mind to race. Luckily it’s late, and there’s not many cars on the road alongside Jecka. She presses the brakes at a red light and sighs, putting her head against the steering wheel.
She knew she had work tomorrow, and she practiced late anyways. God, she was gonna be tired in the morning.
A car behind her honked, and she jerked her head up to see the green light. She waved an apologetic hand out the window as she hit the gas, continuing down the road. She pulled into the apartment parking lot a little past 11.
Jecka practically passes out on her couch as soon as she steps through the door to her flat, throwing her keys and wallet on the coffee table and her bag on the floor as she flops face-first into the cushions. She doesn’t even feel herself slip into sleep until her eyes creak open the next morning to the blaring music of her alarm.
Heavy rock and drums flood her senses.
I am the mastermind… Leaving you all behind… and that ain’t no fuckin’ lie…
Jecka groans. She can’t believe she still has that shitty grunge music from high school on her playlist. She flips herself over on her couch to shut the alarm off, rubbing her eyes to look at the time on her lock screen.
7:42am.
“Fuck!” Jecka jumps out of the couch. She’s supposed to be at the hospital by 8, and it’s 15 minutes away. She must have slept through her first alarm.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck–” she mumbles, throwing her clothes off to change into her scrubs, which take her forever to find, thrown haplessly in her closet. She pulls on the pink suit, scrambling to brush her hair and her teeth, grabbing a protein bar as she runs to her car with her keys, phone and wallet shoved in her purse.
She pulls into the hospital parking lot at 8:09, shifting her car into park and running into the doors, half-eaten protein bar sticking out of her mouth. She pants as she walks in, throwing her hands onto the reception desk.
“Someone had a rough morning,” the receptionist raises her eyebrows. Jecka pants.
“I had a late night,” she huffs, shoving the rest of her breakfast in her bag.
“Late night?”
Jecka scoffs as she punches in. “Not that kind of late night.”
“Yeah, I can tell. You seem pissy.”
“I’m tired.”
“Well it’s not gonna get better here. You’ve got three rooms, on the second floor. 2009, 2012 and 2023. Not much goin’ on today so it shouldn’t be too busy for you.”
Jecka nods, sighing. “Okay.”
It was a busy day.
Her three assigned rooms weren’t bad, they just needed vitals taken, medication administered, and some sheets cleaned and food delivered. Everyday things. Until a patient coded on floor 4 and all nurses were called to help, and then patients from a nearby accident came flooding in through ER, and as workers got reassigned, Jecka was left running around the place for hours.
She clocks out, exhausted, at 5pm. Her knee burns, as she realized she was in such a hurry this morning she forgot to throw on her brace.
The blonde closes her car door, throwing her purse in her passenger seat and pressing her forehead to her steering wheel. She sighs deeply as she closes her eyes, and hisses as she bends and extends her leg. Jesus, she hates this job sometimes. But she needs the internship to get credit for her degree.
Her degree– god, she has class later. Maybe she’ll just call Karen and tell her she won’t be coming today. She’s got an A anyways, she can miss one class.
She dials in. “Hello?”
“Hey, Karen. I won’t be in Stats today.”
“Oh, okay. Everything okay?”
Jecka sighs. “Yeah, I had a long shift this morning and a late night last night.”
Karen hums. “Okay. Do you want the notes from the lecture?”
“Yeah, that’d be good.”
“Okay! I’ll send them when I get back to my dorm tonight.”
Jecka smiles. “Great, thank you Karen.”
“‘Course.”
The blonde hangs up, putting her phone in the cup holder as she puts her car in reverse and leaves the hospital.
Instead of going back to her apartment, Jecka takes a left at her exit and drives to Megan’s gym. She doesn’t even really realize where she’s going until she pulls into the parking lot.
“Huh.”
Jecka grabs her extra bag out of her backseat and throws it over her shoulder, lugging it into the gym. She opens the door and the little bell rings, but Megan isnt at the front desk. It’s mid-day, she can hear her teach the youth class in the kids’ gym.
Still, she walks forward into the changing room, swapping her scrubs for a loose sweatshirt and leggings, pulling her messy ponytail from work into a more efficient bun to work out. She rolls her shoulder out in her hand as she walks to the practice room on the opposite side of the gym.
She throws her bag on the ground and stretches out her arms as she strides towards the punching bag, lopping a jab right to the center of the bag. She didn’t wrap up her knuckles, she didn’t have tape that she kept in her other bag, currently in her apartment. Nor did she bother stopping by her locker to grab her practice gloves. She didn’t have her water bottle, also left at home. She didn’t even have her earbuds to listen to music while she worked out. It was just Jecka and the creaking of the bag as she threw punches.
Hit after hit struck the nerves up her knuckles to her elbows. The chain holding the bag groaned as it swayed, just to be knocked the other direction by a following strike. As she shifted the weight in her legs to punch with her opposite hand, the tendon in the side of her knee jolted with a sharp pain.
“Shit!” Jecka spat, hands moving down to grab her joint. She put pressure carefully on the limb, tensing her knee. It ached dully, but didn’t seem to be too serious. Fuck that injury. She stood back up to continue beating the bag. The pain of her knee and the tingling in her hands faded away as she took her frustration, tiredness, her anger out on the sandbag. She stepped forward, jumped around the bag as if it was real, ignoring the inability to put weight on her right, and the increasing pain of every hit.
“You know I have to clean that now, right?”
Megan’s voice startles Jecka out of her trance, making the blonde look behind her.The brunette had come in, leaning on the open doorframe, a towel over her shoulder. She tossed it to Jecka. It was only then that Jecka realized she had broken open the skin of her knuckles, bloodying up the bag and leaving drops on the floor.
“Shit. Sorry, Megan,” Jecka sighed, wrapping the towel around her hands after wiping the sweat from her forehead.
The brunette waves a hand. “It happens. Your form was the best I’ve seen it, though. Your punches were solid. I don’t know what happened today, but bring that attitude to your matches. It’s a good look for you.”
Jecka nods, fiddling with the towel in her hands. “What time is it?”
Megan hums. “A little past 8.”
“8?” Jecka’s eyes widen. “How long have you been there?”
“A few minutes,” Megan takes the towel back. “Now go home. You’ve overtrained yourself enough this week. I know you’re anxious for your match in a few weeks, but you’ve got to take it easy until then.”
“I know, I know,” Jecka says, wincing as she bends her knee, walking past the owner to grab her back and head out the door. “I’ll get out of your hair.”
“Jecka.”
She turns. “Yeah?”
“I’m serious. Don’t come back to train until Monday, okay?”
“We have training Friday night.”
“Not this week,” Megan takes the towel to wipe Jecka’s blood off the canvas of the bag.
“But-”
“No buts. I’ll see you Monday.”
Jecka purses her lips, knowing there’s no bother arguing. Megan was a stubborn bitch when she wanted to be.
She shrugs her bag over her shoulder as she leaves the gym, blood coagulating on her knuckles and fingers as the cold air hits her skin. She takes her hair out of the bun and runs her fingers through the tangles as she walks to her car across the lot, all the other vehicles having left.
In her car, Jecka turns on the heat and puts her hair back up as she puts the nearest bar into her GPS. If there’s anything she needs right now, it’s a drink. She knows she’s hot, she could find a guy to flirt with long enough for him to buy her a drink.
She drives in the dark, her headlights illuminating the road as she takes the winding backroads to a small bar off the main road. Jecka pulls into the small parking lot, stepping out. She realizes then that she’s still in a sweatshirt and leggings. Shit, that’s not sexy. Whatever.
The blonde fluffed her hair up as she walked into the building, strutting right to the bar and sitting in a stool a seat away from another woman, her back to the blonde. When she turned, Jecka could make out her features.
She wore a light blue hoodie underneath a black windbreaker, black jeans over her long legs, and dark sneakers. Her straight dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail, though she left her bangs over her forehead, half-covering her eyes, and a few longer strands framing her pointed jaw. She had a straight nose too, and sharp eyes, with long eyelashes. Her ears were pierced, gauges in her lobes. and a piercing on her right bottom lip. When her eyes locked on Jecka, she felt the piercing blue like it was looking into her soul.
This woman was pretty. No. She was hot.
And Jecka had never felt so conflicted about thinking that.
The woman flashed the blonde a smile, a dimple forming in her left cheek. “Hey.”
Her voice was deeper than Jecka would have expected, but it soothed over her skin like music. Her fingers, tapping on a whiskey glass in front of her, were topped with chipped black nail polish.
“Hi.”
“I’ve never seen you here before.”
“Never been.”
“Want a drink?”
Jecka laughed through her nose, a smile playing on her lips. “Sure.”
The woman called the bartender over. “I’ll have another whiskey, and, uh…,” she looked over at Jecka. “What do you want?”
“A vodka soda is fine,” she says, waving a hand.
The woman nods. “A vodka soda.”
The bartender agrees, and turns around to make their drinks. The woman’s eyebrows raise when she sees Jecka’s hands.
“Shit, someone crossed you, huh?”
Jecka glances down, shaking her head. “Ah, nah, I just got back from boxing training.”
The brunette’s eyes light up. “You box? Me too.” She splays her own hands out, showing rough bruises and light scars over all of her knuckles.
“Damn.”
“Been doing it a while, it’s all good,” she waves her hand, and takes her drink from the bartender who had come back over. “Thank you.”
“Thank you,” Jecka takes her own drink.
The other woman takes a sip, sighing. She turns towards Jecka, bringing her elbow up to the table, pressing the back of her hand against her jaw.
“So, what’s your name, stranger?”
Jecka giggles, taking a sip of her own drink, the lime sour down her throat.
“I’m Jecka.”
The brunette smiles, extending her hand. When Jecka grabs it, her palm is warm against the blonde’s.
“Nice to meet you, Jecka. I’m Nicole.”