"I promise-I don't care how hard it's gonna be or how long it takes because when it's my time, when I'm up and it's my turn to fly, I'm taking you to the sky with me, I can't do it without you,"
They never expected it to happen this way. It seemed l...
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"She can sit with us when she gets here," Javen smiled, getting settled in their usual places at the gym. It was Thursday, and an hour before Xavion's match started. He was slightly nervous, as he was before every match.
"Aight," he nodded. "She gon have on purple scrubs," he told them. "Don't be weird, KJ," he chuckled and she waved him off.
"I am not weird! I just wanna be her friend, my only friends are y'all, so please allow me to be nice," she bucked at him, making him laugh. "Where's your sisters?"
"They—they're right there," he nodded as Dymond and Desireé walked in arm in arm, laughing about something. "What's so funny?" he signed to them.
"Nothing! Where is your girlfriend, Xavi?" Dymond signed back with a smirk, making his jaw drop slightly. "What! I wanna say hi,"
"You dropping me for my girlfriend, Dymonnd?" he squinted his eyes at her and she laughed.
"Stop being dramatic," she shook her head.
He talked with them for a little bit more before Ant called him back to where he usually got ready. Sometimes his mom went back with him but today she was at some event with his father for his firm. He wouldn't make a big deal of it simply because she was there for all of his other matches.
"You ready?" Ant asked, as Xavi shadow boxed in the mirror. Xavion only nodded, preparing himself to get in the proper headspace, ridding himself of any bad energy lingering in his mind. Boxing was one of the few times he felt truly confident in what he was about to do, he had been told he was a different person in the ring before, and he believed it.
He saw his opponents as nothing more than moving targets, simply obstacles to his next step, and he didn't let anyone get in his way. Of course he'd lost matches before, more than he'd like to admit, but in this facet of his life, his mistakes didn't plague him like in his everyday life. Whatever happened in the ring stayed in the ring, and he couldn't change it after he left the ring, so dwelling on it would do nothing for him.
The most he'd do—which was a bad habit was over analyze his moves after the fight, critiquing his steps and missteps, to see where he could improve. He felt, while that was constructive, it led to overly negative thinking so he worked on leaving the analysis to the gym, when he set foot outside, he left it behind.
Whether he won or lost, what mattered was how he reacted and how he moved forward and he did both humbly, head held high.
He heard the challenger getting announced, and he knew that meant it was his turn in a moment. The love and comfortability he felt in his home gym was something he'd never trade for some fancy ring, he loved it, he felt the most energized here, and at home with people in the crowd who he knew were rooting for him.
He scanned the crowd, like he usually did, seeing Dymond and Desireé signing that they loved him, and Javen hollering like she had no sense, while Tyler laughed at her, and even though he didn't see her in the front, from the corner of his eye, he saw Emari coming in, a big smile on her face because she'd made it on time. His heart skipped a beat seeing her standing by the door waving at him, he was sure everyone saw him smiling even in the mouth guards.
