Chapter 8: Three Points

On Sunday night, Gina let me spar.

The gym was closed, and she had turned off the overhead lights and left on only the two lamps over the ring.

We stood on the canvas in our socks, in the amber half-dark.

She wore a black sports top and shorts, and she had wrapped my hands herself, slowly, because I had asked her to.

She had not wrapped her own.

"Why not?" I asked.

"You'll do it after." She raised her bare fists. "Rules. Light touch. Anything above the shoulder doesn't count. First one to get three points wins."

"What does the winner get?"

Gina's mouth curled.

"Whatever she wants."

I moved the way she'd drilled me.

Chin down, elbows in, feet apart.

She came at me lazily, and I slipped her jab by a hair.

I tapped her ribs with my left, hard enough to count, and she grunted.

"One," I said.

"Lucky."

I did it again, and she laughed in surprise.

"Two."

"You're cheating."

"I'm slipping."

She stopped playing.

Her next combination came fast, and I felt the air ripple past my ear.

I backed into the ropes, ducked under her arm, and came up behind her.

I set my glove, which was just a wrapped hand, flat against the small of her back.

"Three," I said.

Gina went still.

She turned around slowly, and I was close enough to see the sweat shining at her throat.

"That's the game," I said. "I win."

"You do."

"I get whatever I want."

"You do."

I put my palms on her shoulders and pushed her back.

She let me.

She sat down on the canvas with her legs out in front of her, and I knelt over her thighs.

Our faces were an inch apart.

I took hold of her wrists, one in each hand, and held them lightly against the mat on either side of her.

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