Mixie Moxie (COMPLETED)

Reminisce

I leaned back against the wall with a smile on my face. Jinx placed a hand on my leg and sighed. He nodded in agreement. The look on his face seemed so reminiscent.

"Remember when I trained you?" He mumbled slowly, biting his lip slightly as he tried not to smile too hard. I nodded.

"Yeah, what about it?"

"You were five years old and I was thirteen, But you punched way harder. You hit the bag so hard on the first try that it broke off the chain..." he paused for a second, his arms straddling his knees as he thought to himself, "What were you thinking when you did that?"

"Um..." I tried to remember that day.

...

It was kindergarten in Ohio, Brimfield Elementary School. I had just got out of a fight with four fifth graders who had jumped me. I had a black eye that dripped with blood--they popped a vein in my eye. They cracked one of my ribs when they stomped on me in turns. I stayed in the nurse for hours with a frozen pack of peas on my face. Jinx walked in that day to pick up his little brother and saw me on that table. Most people pitied me, some chuckled when they walked by and saw my face. But when he came in, the first thing he asked was if I was okay.

"Fuck no," I answered, feeling my face get numb as he looked at me.

"Woah, how old are you cursing like that?" He said, shocked and silenced.

"None of your damn business."

His face loosened, and he looked over his shoulders for any teachers that gave even the slightest fuck, but he forgot that he was in a school with people that didn't care about anything.

"Okay kid, come with me," He asked. I remember making the funniest bitch what face a five-year-old could make. He rolled his eyes and picked me up. I remember punching him until we got out of the school when I realized how weak I actually was at that age. He dragged me all the way to a rundown room and placed me on an old bean bag.

"What the hell--"

"Just shut up for once," He shook his head and walked into a different room, leaving me alone with my thoughts. For a second I thought he was gonna kill me, and I wasn't strong enough to fight him. He came back two seconds later with a first aid kit. I thought I was going to say something, but I stayed quiet while peroxided my wounds and he wrapped my face with gauze. He was the first person to actually take care of me outside of my mom.

That's how he became the most important person in my life.

"You don't always have to fight," He said slowly as he bit the tape off of the roll. I watched him move. Delicately, carefully, like he didn't want to break a single strand of hair as he moved it out the way of the gauze. My hair used to be short and curly, tangly even.

"Well, it's all I know,"

"Why?" He cut me off. He pulled my chin up to his face and waited for me to answer. It sent shivers down my skinny little body.

"People like to fuck with me," I answered. I crossed my arms tightly over my body until he let out a giggling sigh.

"Well, I won't. Here," He got up again, disappearing into the shadows. I wondered how that room was ever so big, and yet the shadows made it seem vast and never-ending. It was like a tunnel that you stare down and can't quite seem to make out the ending... but you knew it was there. It was always there.

I remember watching the darkness until I saw his silhouette return, but this time he held two small teardrop looking things that I hadn't known about yet: boxing gloves.

"Put these on," He suggested, placing them firmly on my lap. They were about half my size back then. I did what he asked, and stood up in front of him. He pulled a chain in the corner of the room, and with loud, screeching squeaks came a raggedy, beat up punching bag that looked like a giant Lima bean to little me. "Hit it," he commanded.

"What the hell is it?" I asked, squishing my face into a confused and slightly intimidated expression.

"A boxing bag."

"Why should I hit it?"

"Why shouldn't you?"

He sent my head spiraling with that. Images bounced in and out of my mind of fight after countless fights I had lost, some I had won after fighting for minutes on end. I thought about my mom who was pregnant with my twin siblings... and how much I wanted to protect her. Even dad flowed through my mind, and even though he was never home... I wanted to protect him when he could be home.

"You don't have to hit the bag," Jinx spoke again, cutting off my train of thought. "I'm not forcing you--"

"UURAGH!" I remember that ricochet of sound... when the whole room echoes. Like a slow-motion ripple effect that stops time for a few short seconds, and the sound of the connected hit just chimes through your eardrums. You get caught up in the moment...everything just--doesn't exist.

"...Holy shit." Jinx's mouth was left stunned. I was panting. We stood in silence while that old squeaky chain swung back and forth, now free of that raggedy old bag. Still unaware of exactly where my head went, the bag laid defeated on the other side of the room.

...

"Good times," I teased, nudging Jinx's arm. He put his hand around my waist.

"That's what made me want to become your trainer, kid. Even though you won't ever be on my level," He joked, "You have way more power than any boxer I've ever met... Even Max."

"Shit at least someone said it," I laughed. We let the air calm down, letting the moonlight keep us company until the sun came up. I heard Jinx yawn and watched him switch his position on the bench until his head rested on my lap. Just before he went to sleep, he mumbled,

"Nobody's a match for Red Bull."