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No one likes a dirty fighter.
She’s spent an entire week in her apartment, living off cereal and delivery ordered under a fake name. The internet is off limits, and the only TV she’s watched has been Netflix. Ozpin says it’s best for her to just lay low for a little while until they figure out what to do with her; she knows there’s nothing they can do, and she’ll never be allowed in another boxing ring as long as she lives.
And Yang was sure, at first, that she’d done nothing wrong. Mercury had tried to kick her feet from under her. It had been an accident, stepping on his ankle like that, and she hadn’t meant to do it. But the news clips look bad. The match was over and she stepped on him and now he’s in the hospital with a broken ankle and it’s all her fault.
She hasn’t heard from anyone but Ozpin since the fight. Not even Ruby has come by, and Yang doesn’t blame her. If it wasn’t for the extra security on her apartment she’d probably be the target of some less than desirable attention.
Yang is starting to think maybe she deserves it, anyway.
The garbage needs to be taken out. There’s two bags sitting by the door, waiting for her to toughen up and go outside. They were there before the fight, but she had different reasons for neglecting them then. She’s staring at them over the back of the couch, has been for the past twenty minutes.
“Come on, Yang,” she mutters, because maybe a pep talk will do the trick. “The garbage chute is right down the hall. You can walk down the hall. You’ve done it every day for the past two years.”
It’s thirty-four steps away, give or take. She can do that. If she could just get over the first one, just start the process, she’d be home free.
Yang doesn’t get off the couch.
She doesn’t get off the couch and she doesn’t throw out the trash, just stares at it and hates herself for being such a coward. Time keeps ticking by and she keeps sitting there, motionless.
And then the lock on the door clicks open.
Yang drops to the floor as the door swings open.
“Hello, Yang.” It isn’t Ruby, thank god; Yang doesn’t want her near any of this, whatever it is. The door clicks shut behind Blake and one of the garbage bags falls over. “I see you’ve been taking care of yourself.”
“Shut up.” Yang doesn’t get up. Blake’s seen her in worse condition, anyway. “Where’s Ruby? Weiss?”
“Holed up in their apartment, same as you. Ozpin’s got us all on lockdown.” Blake comes around the couch and stops in front of Yang. “I would ask how you were holding up, but I don’t think I need to anymore.”
“Why doesn’t Ozpin have you on lockdown?”
Blake sits down on the ground and shrugs. “He thinks he does. I left a decoy.”
“You probably shouldn’t be disobeying him like that,” she says. “He’s trying to keep us safe.”
“Yeah, well. “Trying” is the operative word, there.” Blake is looking at Yang like she knows some kind of secret, something Yang isn’t allowed to know. A lot of their interaction feels that way. “Yang, when was the last time you slept?”
Yang spends a minute thinking about it. Truth be told, she isn’t sure she’s slept since she got home after the fight. Everything has been a little hazy. And Yang realizes, suddenly, that Blake knows exactly what that feels like.
“I talked to Ruby and Weiss about it,” she continues on, “and we think you need to leave town for a while, Yang.”
Yang pushes up onto her elbows. “No,” she says. “I can’t – I can’t run away, Blake. I – It will make it look like I’m guilty, like I hurt him on purpose, and I didn’t. I have to deal with that.”
“Ozpin needs to deal with that,” Blake corrects her. “You need to deal with what’s happening inside your head.”
“I’m not running away, Blake!”
Blake leans forward until she’s eye to eye with Yang. “Why did you keep hurting Mercury after the fight was finished?” she asks.
Yang wants to scream. “I didn’t!”
“Are you sure you didn’t?” Blake presses.
“I didn’t – I don’t – I,” Yang falters, eyes flicking around the room, searching for something she can’t find.
Blake doesn’t stop. “You have a history of losing your temper, Yang,” she continues, and every word is like something out of a nightmare, “and it isn’t like you haven’t hurt someone before.”
“It was never – I wouldn’t – I don’t do that, you know I don’t!” She remembers his laugh, the sound of movement, the gut feeling that something wasn’t right. In her mind, Yang sees it play out over and over again. She didn’t start anything.
But then there’s the tape, the clip they keep playing on the news. He’s lying on the ground, completely still. It cuts to Yang, smiling. Then her brows furrow, there’s a crack, everything goes static.
“I didn’t want to hurt him,” she says, but it’s a little less certain now. “He was going to hurt me, Blake.”
Blake doesn’t reply immediately. She stands up and moves away, out of Yang’s sight. Dishes clash from the kitchen, and the garbage bags rustle.
“People are going to be asking you that question every day for the rest of your life, Yang,” Blake says eventually. “You’re never going to get away from it. And if you falter every time someone asks, no one is ever going to believe anything you say.”
Yang makes her way to standing, watching Blake clean up. She’s never felt smaller. “Do you believe me, Blake?” she asks, afraid to hear the answer.
Blake stops what she’s doing. “Does it matter?” she asks.
There’s a breath of silence as the words sink in. They may as well be a death sentence; Yang knows that Blake may as well have announced her guilty.
“What about Weiss?” she tries. “Ruby?”
Blake sets the plate down and looks Yang straight in the eye. “Go take a shower. I’m going to pack you a bag, and we’re going to get you out of town.”
“But–”
“Yang,” Blake orders, in a voice that leaves no room for argument. “Go.”
Yang remembers this Blake, callous and shut off. She thought they’d moved past it months ago. Seeing it all over again, like they’ve never even spoken before, is almost more than she can handle.
It would be best if she didn’t dwell on it. It would be best if she knew her friends believed her when she said it was an accident. It would be best if she had something to keep her mind busy.
She takes a shower.
--
“Is anyone else coming?”
Blake lifts the final bags into the trunk of her car, a black station wagon with tinted windows and the back seats tucked down. There are duffels packed in alongside sleeping bags, and Yang thinks she even sees a tent before Blake pulls the door shut.
“Weiss has a fencing match next week,” Blake says. “Ruby has class.”
“Oh.”
She wants to ask why Blake can come. Normally, Blake is busy enough with her own business; Yang doesn’t always see her as often as she sees the other girls. A road trip like this, a week off of work and away from the city? That’s normally an impossibility.
Under different circumstances, it would have meant something for Blake to take time off and drive Yang around. It would have been an adventure. Today, it feels like a punishment.
They’re both dressed in jeans and heavy boots, so different from the clothes they normally wear that it almost feels like a costume. Yang has swapped out her trademark brown jacket for a white one that feels a little less recognizable. Blake has wrapped herself up in a black sweater. It feels like they’re going into hiding.
Blake slips into the driver’s seat. Yang follows.
“Where are we going?” she asks. It’s safer than other questions she wants to ask.
Blake reaches over and pops open the glove box. It’s full of maps. “Pick one,” she says.
As the engine starts and Blake maneuvers out of her parking spot, Yang flips through them. Every map is covered with marker and pen, scribbled notes along the edges. They focus on Beacon and the surrounding countryside, but some stretch into neighboring territories.
She picks one at random, a winding path out toward the Haven coastline. When Blake sees it, she grimaces; it only lasts a second, about the same amount of time it takes for Yang to remember how much Blake hates the ocean.
“Just kidding,” Yang says, trying to backtrack. “I’m actually picking--”
Blake takes the other maps from her, shoving them all into the center console. “No,” she says, “we’ll do the first one. North?”
Yang nods, staring at the map in her hands. The handwriting isn’t Blake’s; it’s blocky and messy, sprawling out over the smaller towns and counties. “Where did you find these?”
“They’re mine.”
The radio is turned off. The only sound is the thrum of the engine, making it even more obvious when Blake doesn’t elaborate. Yang doesn’t push it; they make their way to the city outskirts in complete silence, Yang switches between watching road signs and examining the map, and Blake stares straight ahead.
Yang manages to bite her tongue for nearly an hour, concentrating on navigation and nothing else. But once the other cars have disappeared and the road has straightened out, it gets harder. There’s nothing to distract her from what got her here in the first place.
She tries her best to stay busy. She searches road signs and license plates for letters of the alphabet, searches the surrounding landscape for wildlife, and even digs through the glove box for something to do. It’s obvious she’s getting fidgety; she can feel Blake watching her every now and then, bright eyes burning a hole straight through her.
And then she doesn’t really want to stay quiet anymore.
“I didn’t mean to hurt him,” she states. “He was trying to trip me up!”
Blake maintains her silence. Yang feels the doubt like a knife in the throat; it’s almost enough to keep her quiet, but she’s spent so long waiting for a chance to defend herself that now that she can feel all of the arguments she hasn’t said rising up to the surface.
She can’t sit here knowing Blake doesn’t believe her. She has to keep trying. “It wasn’t on purpose, you know it wasn’t on purpose!”
That earns her a split second of attention; Blake’s eyes flicker over to her, just quick enough to make eye contact but not long enough to read very much from them. She maintains her silence, keeps a straight face, and goes immediately back to watching the road.
“You know me better than this!” Yang shouts, slamming her hands down on the dashboard. “You know – you know I would never hurt anyone, Blake! You have to believe me!”
Something she says makes an impact. Blake clenches her jaw and huffs a breath out of her nose, both hands clenching the wheel. “I know you,” she agrees. “I also know what I saw.”
It’s Yang’s turn to stare. She watches the way Blake refuses to meet her eyes, the way she tenses up and stays that way; it takes a minute to realize that it isn’t anger she’s seeing. It’s fear. The anger seeps out of her almost instantly and she sinks back into her seat, defeated.
“Why are you doing this if you don’t believe me?” she mumbles, arms wrapped around herself.
Blake doesn’t respond immediately. She wants to; her mouth opens and closes a few times, like she wants to say something but she doesn’t know what. Yang’s heart is pounding. Eventually, Blake seems to settle on something. She lets out a shaky breath.
“You helped me,” Blake states. Every word is measured out, like she’s practiced it hundreds of times. “When you found out what I do – what I did.”
It should help, knowing that Blake is thinking about the good things Yang has done for her in the past. It doesn’t.
They drive quietly on for the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, pulling into the parking lot of a rest stop after the sun has set. Blake immediately gets to work, climbing into the back and rearranging their luggage until the sleeping bags are spread over the floor and two duffels are doubling as pillows.
“We’re sleeping here?” Yang asks.
Blake unzips one of the sleeping bags and tucks herself inside, not even bothering to get changed out of her clothes. “We’re still close enough to the city that a bed and breakfast is going to be crowded with people,” she says. “We might get some unwanted attention.”
“I think you’re overthinking this,” Yang says. “It isn’t like we’re on the run. I didn’t break the law.”
But Blake is already asleep, or at least pretending to be. Yang sighs and climbs into her sleeping bag, ready for a restless night.
--
They met two years ago.
Yang hadn’t been a household name yet, although she’d been building up a reputation in the smaller boxing circles. She’d been fighting for a few years, earning what she could to pay for Ruby’s education and their own little hole-in-the-wall apartment. Weiss was a friend, sort of; sometimes she would stop by to help Ruby with homework or lecture her on napping in class.
It was after one of the harder matches. Yang had come home with a busted lip and a black eye, as well as some bruised ribs and a limp. The other guy had been a rough fighter, didn’t exactly follow the rules, but that was the sort of shit she had to put up with in an unregulated league. She’d come home late. Ruby was awake, at first, excited to hear every single detail of the fight and maybe even reenact the better bits, just like they always did.
Yang kept the lights low, partially because of her splitting headache but mostly to keep Ruby from seeing how bad her injuries really were.
“Did you miss me?” Ruby demanded. “Did you win?”
Yang held up a thick envelope, full of the night’s winnings. “Of course I won! Who do you think I am, huh?” She made her way to the kitchen table, trying her best not to wince or groan when Ruby jumped up to give her a hug.
“Congratulations!” Ruby yelled, wrapping her arms tight around Yang’s neck. “I knew you would win. I said so before the match. Didn’t I say?”
“That’s cause you’re my good luck charm. Every time you say I’m gonna win, I do.”
Ruby bounced back out of the hug, huffing out a little laugh. “I say it every time, Yang. It’s cause you’re a really great fighter.”
Yang dropped down into one of the kitchen chairs, glad to get the weight off her aching leg. “Yeah, well, you know what they say,” she said, winking. “If you can’t beat them, put on some boxing gloves and try again.”
“Nobody says that.”
“Maybe not,” Yang conceded. “But they definitely do say ‘It’s bedtime,’ which is the next thing I’m going to say.”
“Aw, but Yang! You just got home!”
“It’s bedtime,” Yang said again, motioning toward the bedroom. “You have class in the morning, and Weiss is going to come and yell at you if you sleep through your first period again.”
Ruby’s nose crinkled up. “Yuck.”
“Yeah, I know. So go to sleep and maybe it won’t happen.”
And, because Ruby is a much better kid than Yang ever was, she did as she was told with minimal fuss. She brushed her teeth and tucked herself into their too-small bed and then it was just Yang, alone in the kitchen with a first aid kit and her bruises.
It really was late; Beacon thrummed with life outside the window, but inside the apartment the shadows were still and silent. The clocks blinked back at Yang, a constant reminder that she would be up just as early as Ruby to make sure she got to school on time with a lunch and all her homework.
She got to work patching herself up with bandages and cold packs, mostly temporary solutions until she could calm down enough to sleep it all off. The adrenaline rush of a fight was wearing off now, giving away to mind-numbing exhaustion.
And then the curtains moved.
It might have been a breeze moving through them. Ruby liked to leave the window open while she worked; the noise of the city helped her focus. Sometimes she forgot to close it. That was the immediate explanation, anyway, until the window clicked shut.
Yang set her cold pack down. “Who’s there?” she asked, feeling equal parts stupid and alarmed. Squinting, she searched the shadows.
Someone was definitely there. They were crouched down under the windowsill, fingers resting on the ledge. If they noticed Yang there, they didn’t seem too concerned about it. The buildings outside were painted blue and red in the glow of police lights.
“Hey,” Yang persisted, pushing up and away from the table. Her ribs ached in protest; she ignored it and moved forward. “Either answer me or go right back through that window, your choice. Who’s there?” She limped her way out of the kitchen. Hopefully, the dim light that kept her from seeing the intruder would hide her injuries.
Apparently aware that their hiding spot was at risk, the stranger stood up and, finally, spoke. “Keep the lights off,” they said. “I’ll be out of your hair soon.”
Yang spluttered and searched for some kind of response, annoyed. “Excuse me?” she demanded, clenching her good hand into a fist. “You can’t just come in here and make the rules! This is my apartment!”
The stranger turned to face her; their dark hair spun with them and their golden eyes glinted in the low light. They were dressed from head to toe in dark clothing, edges bleeding into the surrounding shadows.
“I’m not going to rob you, or hurt you,” they said, holding a hand forward. “I just need somewhere to hide.”
“Find somewhere else!” Yang hissed, pointing to the window. “You have plenty of choices.” She took another step closer to her opponent, every time lurching a little more. Every part of her was throbbing in pain, worn out from the night’s fighting.
She must have fallen then, either because her leg gave out or because she tripped over something. Blake never gave any sort of explanation, and all Yang remembers is the sensation of falling. She hit her head on something, and the force of it combined with the exhaustion she felt in every part of her body was enough to knock her out until the next morning.
When she woke up, her head was bandaged and her ribs were wrapped. There was a glass of water and two ibuprofen on the end table, and Ruby was at the kitchen table eating a muffins that definitely hadn’t been there when Yang got home the night before.
“Good morning, sleepyhead!” Ruby greeted her, smiling around a mouthful of chocolate chips. “Your friend from last night left a note for you.” She waved a folded paper over her head.
Yang hadn’t remembered any visitors at first. When she did, she’d rushed to the table and snatched the note out of Ruby’s hand, fear and anger welling up in her chest.
Hope you don’t mind that I spent the night. Used your shower, too. Got the muffins this morning as a thank you. I even paid for them – receipt is on the fridge.
B xx
--
Yang wakes up first, slipping out of the car as the sun is rising. She brushes her teeth and splashes her face with water in the rest stop’s bathrooms before walking out and looking for something to eat. The rest stop doesn’t have much, just a couple of vending machines; one has ice cream, another a collection of dry snacks. The third dispenses coffee, and Yang makes a beeline straight for it.
Automatically, she programs in her own preferences – dark roast, black – and scans the listings to see what else they offer: mochas, hot chocolate, and even cappuccinos, but no tea. Blake will be disappointed, if she didn’t think to bring some bags with her.
She grabs her coffee and a hot water, just in case. The other machine has trail mix and granola bars; Yang picks up a couple of each and, hands full, makes her way back to the car. It isn’t exactly the kind of breakfast she’s used to having, not anymore, but it’ll do.
The keys are on the floor in the back, near Blake’s head. Yang sets the drinks down in their holders and throws the food into the passenger seat before she swipes them, starting the engine and buckling herself in.
The map is still spread out over the dashboard. Yang takes a look at it; yesterday had been a pretty direct route, but it starts to wander a little bit now that they’re out in the country. Granola bar gripped solidly between her teeth, Yang pulls out of the parking space, ready to get started on the next leg of the journey.
Every few seconds, she checks on Blake in the rearview mirror. A year ago – even a few months ago – the sound of the engine starting would have been enough to wake her up. She was a light sleeper when they first met, constantly jerking awake whenever anyone entered the room she was napping in. As she got more settled, though, she got a little better.
Despite her behavior yesterday, Blake isn’t startled awake by anything Yang does. She stays curled up inside her sleeping bag until the coffee is gone and the water’s gone cold. The sun has moved up into the middle of the sky before she stretches herself awake, and Yang counts it as a sign of good faith, a sign that not all of Blake’s actions are rooted in honest feelings of distrust.
Until she actually wakes up and throws herself up against the driver’s seat, anyway. “What are you doing?” she demands, scrambling to grab the map from the center console. “Where are we?”
She sounds alarmed and frightened, a complete reversal from her quiet resting. Yang’s heart drops down into her toes.
“I’m following the map,” she says, pointing to where it’s spread out over the center console. “It didn’t make sense to wait for you when I could take over for a while.”
It wouldn’t hurt so much, maybe, if she didn’t understand where Blake was coming from. She knows what it must look like to Blake, to have only seen what the cameras could catch. It doesn’t look good. It looks like Yang is violent and cruel, unpredictable in a dangerous way; even having known her beforehand, that kind of portrayal is kind of hard to ignore.
She’d like to think that, if Blake or Weiss had been the ones accused of foul play, she would immediately take their side. A part of her believes that she would. But she doesn’t know, and hopefully she won’t ever find out.
“You could have woken me up,” Blake says, still guarded but not quite as scared. Yang hopes that’s a good sign. “If we can find somewhere to stop, I’ll take over for you.”
It will be a while until that happens; they’ve moved off the highway and onto a smaller road, winding through farmlands and past wandering livestock. The bit about not trusting Yang to take them where they need to go is left out, but Yang hears it anyway.
“I got you some hot water in case you brought teabags,” she says, hoping her voice sounds stronger than she feels. “It’s probably too cold now. Sorry.”
A quick glance in the rearview gives her a view of Blake’s face, the way her eyes soften up just a little. “Thank you,” she murmurs, loosening her grip on Yang’s headrest. “I, um. I appreciate the thought.”
Yang doesn’t have anything to say to that. She keeps her eyes on the road. Blake grabs the water and moves around in the back, packing up their sleeping bags and cleaning herself up. She returns after a bit, folding up the map so she can climb up into the passenger seat. Her hair is in a thick braid down her back and she’s changed into a tank top and cardigan. With her comes the scent of lavenders.
“We’ll be on this road for a few more miles,” she says, “but there’s a small town up ahead with a diner we can get lunch at, if you’re hungry.” She isn’t looking at the map.
“Do you go to this place a lot?” Yang asks her.
She doesn’t respond right away, pulling her braid over her shoulder and twisting the tail around her fingers. Yang starts to think she won’t get an answer at all, and they’ll have to keep up the uncomfortable silence they sat through all of yesterday, but after a minute or two Blake seems to come around.
“I used to.” She’s still playing with her braid, avoiding eye contact when Yang glances over. “Back before I met you and Ruby.”
“I thought you hated the ocean.”
Blake’s mouth twists into a wry smile. “I didn’t back then,” she says.
Yang wonders if it’s actually the ocean that Blake hates. She doesn’t ask. Chances are she wouldn’t get a straight answer, and anyway she doesn’t want to scare Blake back into being closed off and quiet the way she was before.
--
The crops give way to homes give way to storefronts, the diner they stop in for lunch, the gas station they stop at to fill up and buy snacks for the ride. The town gives way to crops, to more crops, to nothing but grass for miles. Yang sits with her feet on the dash and then with her knees under her chin, with her head full of doubt and then blissfully empty. The clock on the radio moves steadily forward just like it always has. The sun beats down on them and then falls behind the horizon.
They drive under the curtain of starlight for a while, headlights painting the world in front of them harsh and overexposed, washing the color out. Yang’s eyes prickle in protest, adjust, and eventually start slipping closed. When Blake finally pulls the car over to the side of the road, it takes Yang a while to notice they’ve stopped moving; by then, Blake is already out of the car and surveying their surroundings.
She pokes her head back inside. “How do you feel about sleeping outside tonight, Yang?”
It occurs to Yang that this is a way to keep her from repeating what she did this morning and driving off without letting Blake know ahead of time. Somewhere in her sleep-addled brain, she realizes that Blake is still rattled from all of this, even if she seems to have calmed down.
It also occurs to her that she isn’t completely recovered from anything that’s happened in the past few weeks, either, and she shouldn’t judge Blake for being overcautious. She grabs her sleeping bag from the back and practically rolls out of the station wagon, immediately setting up her space on the ground.
They could be in a hotel if Yang hadn’t gone and given herself a bad reputation. Hell, if she’d kept her cool, they could even be back in her apartment.
“We have a tent,” Blake offers halfheartedly. She’s standing over Yang, holding the tent and her own sleeping bag. “We don’t have to sleep completely out in the open like this.”
Yang pats the grass next to her. “Come on, Blake, it isn’t going to rain or anything. We can sleep out here.”
She hesitates for a moment. It’s enough for Yang’s smile to falter; she’s still unpredictable, and while they could sleep side by side in the confined space of the car at a rest stop, it’s just the two of them here now, out in the open. The road is empty but for the two of them, no livestock or homes in the surrounding fields; if anything happens, no one will be there to stop it.
Yang knows that Blake is contemplating getting back in the car, weighing out the pros and cons. She can see the wheels turning in her head and wants to reassure her that nothing is going to happen. She wants to convince Blake that she can be trusted again.
She doesn’t have to. Blake grits her teeth and unrolls her sleeping bag alongside Yang, crawling inside and pulling her knees to her chest.
“Goodnight, Yang,” she says.
“Sleep well, Blake.”
Or, well, that’s what Yang means to say. Instead she finds herself sitting up, fists clenched at her sides. “You need to make up your mind. Do you trust me or not?”
Blake doesn’t move, peering up at Yang. “What do you mean, Yang?” she asks, but her voice is tight.
Yang punches the ground. Her knuckles crack with the force of it. “I know you aren’t sure if you believe me,” she starts, forcing herself to breathe deep, “but you keep acting like you’re afraid of me, Blake, or at least afraid of what I might do to you if you don’t keep your guard up.”
Blake pushes up onto her elbows. “That’s not what I’m–”
“Yes, it is,” Yang insists, staring her down. “When you woke up this morning you thought I was driving off course, and every time I try to do something without asking for permission you start acting like I’m plotting against you somehow!”
“Yang, I–”
She’s got too much left to say to stop talking. “Let me finish!” she demands. “I know you saw something that scared you, and I know it changed how you see me. But you have to know, you have to believe I would never hurt you! You know me well enough by now to understand that.”
Blake continues to stare at her, apparently waiting to see if the explosion has blown over. When she’s sure, she pushes herself fully upright and swallows before speaking. “I don’t think yelling is going to help your case,” she says, finally.
“Yeah, well,” Yang stares down at her sleeping bag, plucking at a stray thread. “It got you to listen to me, didn’t it?”
Blake hums thoughtfully. Yang can feel her eyes on the side of her face. “I’m sorry, Yang,” she says. “I didn’t understand when I first saw the tapes from your match. I couldn’t believe that you would do that to someone, intentionally hurt them when they couldn’t even fight back.”
Yang keeps her eyes trained on her fingers. Blake sighs and presses on.
“I decided right away that I wasn’t going to forgive you for it,” she says. Yang looks up, startled, and Blake offers an apologetic smile. “I’ve told you before, I don’t support violence. But then I remembered you probably didn’t support illegal activity, back when we met. And you fought with me over it at first, but you gave me a second chance to prove myself.”
Yang snorts. “Is kidnapping me for a cross-country adventure your idea of a second chance?”
“Not exactly.” Blake shrugs. “I was hoping that if I could get you alone, I could find out what really happened. I could figure out whether or not you were the person I thought you were, and then I would know what to do.”
“But you haven’t figured it out yet.”
Blake shakes her head. “I didn’t do a very good job investigating,” she says. “It’s hard trying to forget the things everyone has been saying about you.”
“Yeah, well. Tell me about it.”
She huffs out a laugh. “Sorry. Just – I wanted to hear your side of the story, but I couldn’t stop thinking that you’d been lying to me about who you were. I went into this believing that you’d prove all of the horrible things I’ve been thinking.”
She seems to deflate then, all out of steam. “And now?” Yang prompts her to continue, bumping their shoulders together.
Blake looks down. “Now I’m not so sure you will,” she says.
“You can trust me, Blake,” Yang insists, because she’s stubborn and she wants to believe this conversation will be all they need to sort this out. “I’m not going to do anything stupid, at least not before we get to the safe house.”
“You promise?” Blake asks, meeting her eyes once more.
Yang nods. “I promise.”
That seems to be enough for now. Blake lies back down, pulling the sleeping bag up to her chin. “Goodnight, Yang,” she repeats, a little softer this time.
Yang follows her lead, tucking herself in. “Goodnight, Blake.” She stares at the sky overhead, waiting for sleep to come. “See you in the morning.”
--
They met each other properly at Junior’s gym.
It was well after the doors had officially closed to the public, the time of night when Yang was usually left alone with her punching bag and one flickering fluorescent light. She’d been looking for a way to let off some steam. The past few matches hadn’t been good to her.
Blake was on the upper track running laps. Her shadow fell over the lower level, stretching her out like a rubber band. While Yang worked away her frustrations, Blake’s pace never wavered; she kept running steadily as the time passed.
It was only when she entered the locker room that she seemed to notice Yang at all, coming to a stop just a foot or two away. Yang didn’t bother looking at her, working herself over with a towel instead.
“Like what you see?” she asked, only half teasing.
Blake didn’t say anything. She walked around Yang to her own locker and pulled off her tank top. Yang busied herself with drying off the ends of her hair, staring resolutely at her hands.
“So how do you know Junior?” she tried again. “Normally he only lets friends use the gym at this time of night.”
“He owes me a few favors.”
She wasn’t really expecting an answer; she certainly wasn’t expecting to recognize the voice that said it. When she looked up suddenly, her companion was smirking at her.
“You,” Yang accused, frozen with the towel gripped tight in her hands.
“My name is Blake, actually.”
Yang stepped forward, gritting her teeth. “What are you doing here?”
“Same thing you are.” Blake pulled a brush through her hair, apparently unaffected by the sudden change in the locker room’s atmosphere. “I’m training.”
It was alarming, seeing someone she knew to be a criminal in yet another place she would like to think of as safe. “What could you possibly be training for? Some kind of robbery?”
“A marathon, actually. I’ve got one coming up in about six weeks,” Blake said, still mostly unbothered. “Are you training for a match, or are you just here to blow off some steam?”
“Are you following me around?”
Blake had reacted to that, finally; her brow furrowed and she tilted her head to the side, confused. “No,” she said. “I didn’t know you knew Junior. If I had, I wouldn’t have come here.”
“Why? Are you afraid I might turn you in?”
Blake sighed. “You don’t even know that I did anything wrong.”
Yang pointed a finger at her. “You were running away from the police! Why would you even do that if you hadn’t broken the law?”
“You make it sound like the law is inherently worth following.” Blake pulled a sweatshirt on, zipping the front. “It isn’t always.”
“That doesn’t mean you can just break it whenever you want to!” Yang argued, throwing her hands in the air.
Blake pulled her duffel bag up and over her shoulder. “It isn’t because I want to,” she said, as if that was the end of the discussion. “You should probably get changed; Junior doesn’t like anyone to be in here past midnight.”
“I know that,” Yang snapped. “I’ve been coming here for longer than you have.”
“Are you sure about that?”
She wasn’t. Blake walked out of the locker room, leaving Yang in an uncomfortable silence. Yang took her time getting changed, feeling dazed. By the time she’d packed up her bag, it had been long enough that Blake would be long gone.
That was not at all intentional.
Yang closed up as she left, checking every lock and turning off the lights. There wasn’t exactly anything worth stealing from the locker rooms, but Junior would revoke her after-hours privileges if he found out someone broke in. Even worse, he’d make her pay for any damages.
She used the spare key to lock up the outer door and stepped out into the alley behind the gym. The streetlights didn’t illuminate much; it took a minute for her to realize that she wasn’t alone. Something rustled a few yards away and she spun to face it, fists up automatically.
Someone had Blake pressed up against the wall, forearm pressed against her throat. Her eyes were closed and her feet were off the ground. Her attacker didn’t let up at all; they stayed completely still, apparently aware of Yang’s presence but unsure of their discovery.
“Hey, asshole! Put her down!” Yang said, before she could think of all the reasons why it would be terrible to get involved.
A head turned to face her, mostly obscured by shadow. The attacker stepped away from the wall and Blake slumped to the ground, head lolling to the side. Yang stood her ground as they advanced toward her.
Light from the street reflected off something in the stranger’s hand. Yang could just make out the blade of a knife. Blake was limp on the ground behind them, apparently unconscious. Yang was on her own, apparently.
“Man, this is so intense,” Yang commented, holding both hands up in front of her. “You could cut the air with a knife.”
The advancing figure didn’t react, maintaining their pace until they were less than two feet from her. A breath of stillness fell over both of them as they sized each other up.
Yang dropped her duffel bag to the ground.
They both acted at the same time. Her opponent lunged forward, knife extended; Yang dropped to the ground and swung a leg out, aiming for their ankles.
“Not a fan of bad jokes?” she asked. She rolled out of the way as the stranger brought their foot down. “You’re not gonna like me much, then.”
Now that Yang was closer, she could see they were wearing a mask. They moved toward her and she jumped up, fists at the ready.
“Who are you supposed to be?” she asked, dodging as they struck at her shoulder. “Phantom of the Opera?” She brought her knee up to their gut as they fought to get the knife from the wall. “Or maybe just a hockey goalie.”
They stumbled away from her, clutching their stomach. Yang followed them and threw a punch, aiming for their head. They caught it and twisted her arm. Yang cried out, shoulder shooting lightning sparks of pain. Her knees buckled underneath her.
Yang swung with her other arm; it was knocked out of the way before she got any proper momentum. Her opponent let go of her fist and threw a punch of their own, landing solidly under her ribcage. Yang fell to the ground, gasping for breath.
The stranger pulled out a second knife from under their coat, kneeling down beside her. Yang pushed away from them, still wheezing. She wouldn’t make it very far, and she knew it.
“Leave her alone!”
Blake tackled the stranger from the side, knocking them away from Yang. The two of them fought each other in a mess of limbs and shadow, mostly indistinguishable from one another. Yang pushed away until her back was against the brick wall.
She put a hand to her chest, feeling her heart pounding beneath her fingertips. Her breath was coming in shallow gasps and she closed her eyes to center herself and refocus. When she opened them, Blake was pinned underneath their adversary, legs kicking frantically.
Yang could have left. This wasn’t her business anyway. She could run out of the alley and call the police and let them deal with it instead. That would have been the sensible thing to do. Instead, she pushed herself up off the ground and rushed over, aiming a kick straight at the attacker’s head.
They collapsed down on top of Blake, who immediately rolled out from under them. She looked just as overwhelmed as Yang felt; her chest was heaving and she had a cut just underneath her eye, dripping blood down her face and onto her clothes.
She brought a hand up to rub at the skin of her throat. “Why did you help me?”
Yang didn’t know the answer to that question. She ignored it. “That cut looks pretty bad,” she said instead. She went to her duffel bag and dug through it until she found a clean towel and tossed it to Blake. “Are you hurt anywhere else?”
Blake held the towel up to her eye, watching Yang warily. “You’re acting weird,” she said. “Did he hit you in the head? Are you concussed?”
“I’m fine.” Yang picked up her things and walked back over to Blake. She held out a hand. “You look like you were hit by a car, though. Come on, I have a pretty good first aid kit back at my place.”
“I know,” Blake said. “I had to use it when you knocked yourself out on the coffee table.”
They walked home together, Blake with the towel against her eye and Yang holding her side. The streets were filling up with nightlife but they were mostly left alone, reaching Yang’s apartment without incident.
Ruby was already asleep for the night, had gone to bed a few hours earlier. Yang turned on the overhead light and pointed to the kitchen table. “Sit,” she said, and then went to the bathroom for the first aid kit.
The bleeding had slowed down, but the cut looked pretty bad. Yang contemplated stitches; if Ruby had been there, she would have done them. But her hands were shaky and the adrenaline was wearing off; any attempts at sewing up wounds would probably do more harm than good, so she focused instead on cleaning it.
Blake was a good patient, occasionally fidgeting or gritting her teeth at the sting but never once complaining. Her fingers were wrapped around the edge of the table, gripping tight enough to turn the knuckles white. Yang tried to keep the process as quick and painless as possible.
When it was all finished, she took the tools and towels to the sink and started washing. Blake stayed where she was at the kitchen table; Yang could feel her watching.
After a few minutes of silence, Blake spoke up. “Why did you help me?”
“I don’t know.” Yang turned the water off, draping the towels over the rim to dry. “It seemed like the right thing to do.”
“You didn’t even know why I was being attacked.”
Yang turned around and leaned against the counter, meeting Blake’s gaze. “Yeah, but you were in trouble. I didn’t have a lot of time to ask why.”
“I’m sorry,” Blake muttered, eyes shifting to stare at the floor. “I didn’t want you to get involved.”
Yang shrugged. “Hey, that was not your fault,” she said. “Some of it was because a strange person was coming at me with a knife, but at least half of it was me being reckless.”
“You didn’t have to do it.”
Blake hopped off the table. As soon as her feet hit the ground she was stumbling, practically falling onto the fridge for support. The skin around her neck was dark, a bruise in the shape of a hand. She looked exhausted.
Even so, she started moving toward the door. Yang was baffled.
“Where are you going?” she asked, stepping forward and putting a hand on Blake’s arm.
Blake blinked at her, eyes hazy and confused. “Home,” she said.
“No, oh my god,” Yang insisted, leading her away from the door. “You can barely walk! You have to stay here tonight. It’s already late, anyway.”
Blake tried to shake her off. “You’ve done enough, I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Better a burden than dead.” Yang herded her onto the couch and pushed at her shoulders until she was lying down. “Sleep,” she ordered, when Blake opened her mouth to protest.
It seemed to work. Blake stopped fighting, curling up on one side of the couch. Yang pulled the afghan off the back and tucked her in, reminded suddenly of when she used to do the same thing for Ruby.
“Good night, Blake,” she said, turning away.
She was almost to her bedroom when Blake called out to her. “Wait,” she said. “What’s – what’s your name?”
Yang smiled to herself. “Yang,” she answered. “My name’s Yang.”
She collapsed on the bed beside Ruby, with just enough energy to kick off her boots before sleep overtook her. When she woke up in the morning, Blake was gone.
--
They’ve been on the road for a few days by the time Blake finally caves and lets them check into a motel for the night. The sleeping bags have lost their appeal, as have truck stop showers and trail mix breakfasts; nothing sounds nicer than a long shower and an actual bed. Yang practically sprints to their room after they’ve checked in.
It isn’t the nicest place she’s ever spent the night in, but it isn’t the worst either. The walls are covered in aged floral wallpaper and the comforters are decorated in a hideous ivy motif. There’s only one bed for the two of them to share, and not nearly enough shampoo or conditioner for both of them.
But it’s a bed and a shower and Yang can do her laundry in the basement. She’s ecstatic.
Blake laughs at her when she says as much. “You make it sound like you’ve never seen a bed before,” she says.
Yang throws herself on top of it, arms spread out wide. “Ugh,” she groans. “It’s so comforterble.”
“I will make you sleep in the car,” Blake warns.
Yang rolls over to look at her. “Even if I shower you with affection?” she asks, waggling her eyebrows.
Blake sets her bag down and starts digging through, searching for dirty laundry. “You should go use the shower,” she says, “before I lock you out of the room.”
“You wound me, Blake,” she says, hand held to her chest. Blake rolls her eyes and scoffs. “No, but you should really shower first. I won’t have anything to get changed into until after I’ve done my laundry anyway.”
Blake sits back on her heels, looking at Yang. “I definitely packed you more pajamas than you’ve worn,” she says.
“What you and I classify as sleepwear is very different.”
Blake huffs a laugh and goes to shower. Yang rolls off the bed and digs through her bag for laundry. On her way out of the room, she grabs Blake’s bag too.
The laundry room is mostly empty. Machines are humming away, all full but for one near the end of the line. After buying some detergent from the dispenser, Yang dumps the dirty laundry inside. She’s paying for the cycle when two more people enter the room.
It’s a little girl and a woman. Yang looks over; the girl is wearing a shirt with her face on it. The colors are a little faded. It must be old, a promotional thing for one of her earlier matches.
“Mommy,” the little girl says, hand outstretched, “is that Yang?”
Yang freezes up, afraid to move. Her hand is halfway to the start button, but she can’t seem to move it the rest of the way. Suddenly she’s painfully aware of her location; if she wants to exit the room, she’ll have to get past both of them. She’s trapped.
“Come on, honey,” the mother says, hand protectively on her daughter’s back. She’s frowning. “We’ll come back for our clothes in a little while.”
Yang watches them leave, still frozen in place. It feels like her insides are rattling. The footsteps fade as they make their way down the hall; Yang waits until she can’t hear them anymore before she slams the start button and rushes back up to her room.
Blake is still in the shower, leaving Yang completely alone with her thoughts. She paces back and forth along the length of the room, hands wrapped around her middle.
She doesn’t know what’s going to happen. The mother had looked so upset. She could be talking to the front desk now, or even calling the police. Yang doesn’t even know if that would be a problem; she hasn’t been allowed to check her phone since they left the apartment. They could be looking for her, they could come bursting in through the door any second.
If they found her she could end up in prison for something she didn’t mean to do. It was only an accident, but it still hurt someone – she hurt someone, whether she meant to or not, and even with Ozpin and Glynda working to save her public reputation there are still mothers frowning at her when they realize who she is, and that’s not something she’ll ever be able to fix.
Yang doesn’t know how it happens. One minute she’s standing in front of the mirror staring herself down, and the next she’s got the comforter spread out on the ground and a pair of scissors from her first aid kit in her hands. There are strands of blonde hair floating through the air around her, even more littering the comforter around her feet.
“Yang!”
Blake is standing in the doorway of the bathroom, eyes wide. She takes a step forward, hand outstretched, and then seems to think better of it.
“Oh, Yang,” she says again, quieter this time. “What happened?”
It feels like she’s shaking apart, crumbling from the inside out. Yang grips the scissors tight. “They recognized me,” she says, and she almost doesn’t recognize her own voice. “I was – in the laundry room, they recognized me, Blake, she wouldn’t let her daughter near me, and.”
Blake moves forward slowly, never once breaking eye contact. She kneels down in front of Yang and holds out her hand. “Can I have the scissors, Yang?”
Instinctively, Yang shrinks back. She holds the scissors close. She isn’t really sure why it matters so much. A part of her screams that Blake is going to turn her in or leave her.
“I’m just going to finish up for you,” she says, voice low. “I’m going to cut the rest of it off for you, okay?”
Her hand is still outstretched and she’s still looking directly at Yang. She stays that way, almost completely motionless, until Yang finally uncurls enough to hand her the scissors.
“Let’s try facing away from the mirror,” Blake suggests. Yang follows her instructions, feeling numb and empty. “Can you sit up a little straighter for me?”
Blake keeps murmuring small comments and requests while she cuts Yang’s hair, most of it going right over Yang’s head. She sits and she very carefully thinks of nothing, letting Blake do all of the talking for her.
Yang doesn’t know how long it takes. While Blake works, she tries not to think about anything. Her insides feel like they’re going to vibrate apart and her lungs are so tight she isn’t sure she’s getting enough oxygen. But with every snip of the scissors, she feels part of the weight resting on her chest fall away.
“We can finish up once you’ve showered,” Blake tells her after a while. “I’ll be able to even out the ends once your hair is wet.” She places a hand on Yang’s back and urges her upward to standing. “Okay?”
Yang swallows. Nods. Says nothing. Blake keeps her hand where it is, leading Yang off the comforter and into the bathroom.
“Will you be okay on your own?” she asks, fighting to make eye contact.
Yang nods again, choppy.
“Okay.” Blake moves to the shower and turns the knobs, testing the water. “I’m going to check on our laundry, but I’ll come right back. I’ll be here when you’re finished.”
She starts to leave. Yang sees her pause in the doorway out of the corner of her eye. She hesitates, takes a deep breath; it looks like she’s going to say something. Instead she sighs and walks out, pulling the door closed behind her.
Yang doesn’t look in the mirror. She strips and steps into the shower. There’s enough shampoo for both of them now, she thinks, and then she sits on the floor and wraps her arms around her knees.
--
Blake doesn’t ask why.
Yang isn’t sure she could answer anyway, so it’s probably for the best. Her head feels lighter now, almost like she’s dizzy; every time her hair brushes her shoulders, she’s reminded that it’s gone now.
A part of her feels relief; the rest is uncertain, waiting for the moment of realization and regret. Like maybe there are consequences to her actions she doesn’t realize yet, and when they come they’ll be catastrophic.
The countryside passes by them in a blur, mostly; they don’t stay in any more motels, sleeping almost exclusively in the back of the car. They don’t say much at all; Yang doesn’t know what she could say, and Blake leaves her alone to figure it out. At the pace they set, it only takes two more days to reach the safe house.
The house is squat, one level made of wood worn down by wind. One side faces out to the water; opposite that is the forest they’d spent the past day driving through. Inside there are two bedrooms, a kitchen, and a bathroom; there’s no furniture but the beds, apparently. It’s tight, just a bit more than what they need to get by. Everything is bare and plain, but dry food lines the cupboards; it’s enough to last them at least a few months.
“Electricity should still be hooked up,” Blake says, stepping over the threshold, “but I’d prefer we use as little as possible.”
The sun is setting over the water outside. Through the tiny kitchen window, Yang can see the sky painted purple and pink.
“It’s nice.” She feels like she should be saying something here, like it’s her job to fill the silence she created. “Did you sea the view?”
Blake smiles at her, seeming genuinely surprised. “That’s your worst pun ever,” she says, without heat.
“Dam?”
She gets a laugh for that one. The knot in her stomach loosens up just a little bit.
“Dinner?” Yang asks. She goes to the cupboard, surveying their choices. “We can have rice, dry cereal, or plain pasta. Your choice.”
“Ah, right. I’ll have to run to the store tomorrow.” Blake comes to stand behind her. “Rice for tonight, I think. We should have a few herbs and spices somewhere around here, at least.”
She moves away and starts digging through the drawers, but they both startle when something starts beeping in the quiet. Blake digs through her pockets and finds her phone.
“Sorry,” she says. “Do you mind if I…?” She motions toward the bedrooms, brow furrowed.
Yang nods, heart in her throat. That phone could be anyone: Ozpin, looking for her, or Glynda intending to reprimand Blake for her actions. An angry fan wanting to give Blake – and, by extension, Yang – a piece of their mind.
“Yeah, of course.” Yang fights to keep her voice nonchalant. “It wouldn’t be very rice to ignore them.”
Blake doesn’t fall for it. “If you’d prefer I keep you company, I can do that,” she offers.
Yang shakes her head so hard her vision goes a little blurry at the edges. “No, no! You can go. I can – I can make dinner, I’ve done it before.”
After a moment of hesitation, Blake nods and walks into one of the bedrooms. The door clicks shut behind her and Yang is left alone in the kitchen. She opens the window right away, hoping the sound of the waves will keep her from overhearing the conversation happening just one room away.
It isn’t hard to keep herself busy at first. She’s unfamiliar with the setup of the kitchen and it takes her a while to figure out the stove, to find the pots and pans and clean one out in the sink. She takes her time preparing the food, hoping that Blake won’t be long.
But rice isn’t all that hard to make and she’s finished before Blake is, sitting on the floor with an empty bowl and a mostly-full stomach. The door between her and Blake has become something much bigger, a manifestation of the things she spent the first half of this trip overcoming.
Blake hasn’t gotten a phone call since they left Beacon, not that Yang has seen. She’d thought they were both running off the grid. This is something new, something she doesn’t know how to deal with; if Blake has been in touch with someone this whole time, she might have been lying about her motivations.
She didn’t bring Yang here to repay a favor. She did it to help someone else decide if Yang was guilty. The feeling makes her stomach twist, starts her hands shaking.
Yang moves to the door, turning the handle as quietly as she can and pushing it open before she can wonder about the potential consequences of her actions. Blake is still talking on the other side.
“We might be here for a while,” she’s saying. Her back is to the door; Yang pushes it open a little more. “No, it isn’t like that. I just don’t want to rush this.”
It doesn’t sound like she’s reporting back to Ozpin or Glynda. It sounds like she’s talking to a friend, someone she trusts.
“It hasn’t been easy, no. I think she’s still having a hard time.” After a beat, Blake laughs. It startles Yang; she jumps, clamping a hand over her mouth and hoping she hasn’t just given away her spot. “I’m sorry you couldn’t come, too. I could use the help.”
Yang takes a step away from the door, ready to go back to the kitchen.
“Actually, don’t go yet. I think she wants to talk to you.” Blake looks over her shoulder, catching Yang’s eye. Yang feels like her blood has been replaced with cement. “Yang,” she says, motioning for her to come in. “Ruby wants to say hi.”
Ruby. Ruby.
Yang rushes forward, grabbing the phone. “Ruby?” she asks, feeling breathless. “Ruby, is that you?”
“Hiya, Yang!” Ruby chirps. It’s the first time Yang has heard her voice in almost a month; the sound of it sets off a flood of emotions: guilt, relief, love. “How are you? I heard you went bald. Oh, Weiss wants me to tell you she won her match yesterday. I got to sit right up next to the platform and watch. It was so cool.”
Blake leaves the room; Yang almost doesn’t notice.
“How come you never let me come to any of your matches, Yang?” Ruby demands, a constant babble in her ear. “I would be the best cheerleader! I could make a sign with your face on it and a shirt with your name and everything.”
“Maybe you can when I get back to the city, huh?” Yang drops down onto the bed. “Weiss could come too. But only if you don’t have class in the morning.”
“I always have class in the morning!” Ruby whines.
Yang laughs in spite of herself. “Yeah, well, maybe that’s why you’ve never been to one of my matches!”
The line goes quiet. Yang pulls the phone away from her ear to make sure she hasn’t disconnected, but then Ruby is talking again and she’s scrambling to catch it.
“When do you think you’re going to come back?” Ruby asks, sounding vaguely unsettled. Yang can picture her standing in the kitchen of her apartment, staring down at her socks. “Blake says you’re not doing okay right now.”
Yang hesitates. She doesn’t want to lie to Ruby, but she’d rather not have her worrying so much when she’s got other things going on. “Do you believe that I didn’t mean to hurt Mercury?” she asks, after the silence has stretched on for too long.
“Yes,” Ruby answers. There’s no hesitation, not a trace of doubt. “I believe you. Weiss does, too.”
Yang nods her head. Her hair brushes against her shoulders. “Then that’s enough,” she tells her. “I’ll be fine.”
“If you say so.” Ruby doesn’t sound convinced, but she doesn’t seem so upset anymore. “Besides, Ozpin says he’s going to sort it all out, and Ozpin can do anything.”
“The Wonderful Wizard of Oz…pin,” Yang sings. Ruby groans through her giggles.
“Yang! That was terrible.”
--
They didn’t interact much at first. Blake would be at the gym every once in a while, running laps as Yang trained. They would talk while they packed up, and Blake would walk with Yang to her apartment building on the way to wherever it was that she actually lived.
And then one day Yang walked in to find Blake at her punching bag, hands wrapped and teeth bared.
“Hey there, tiger,” she said, coming to a stop a few feet away. “That’s my station.”
Blake stopped instantly, whipping around to face her. “Fight me,” she said, fists still held at the ready.
“You don’t want that.” Yang grinned, stretching her fingers out. “You’ll lose.”
“It’s going to help more than using that punching bag,” Blake told her, still bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Come on, fight me. I could use the workout.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
Blake paused, smirking. “Let me worry about that. Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.” She started circling Yang, fists held at the ready.
Already, Yang could see faults; she was leaning too far forward, likely to lose her balance if she actually threw her own punch. Her fists were too low, in front of her chest instead of her face. One quick hit and she’d have a broken nose or a black eye.
Yang sighed and shadowed Blake, watching her closely. She brought up her fists. Blake laughed.
“Good,” she said.
Blake threw the first punch, a quick thrust. Yang ducked down and followed with a punch of her own, a light blow to Blake’s shoulder.
“Fists up,” she instructed, and then shot out again. Blake danced out of the way, adjusting her hands. Yang swung at her again and again; every time Blake stepped back out of range. “You gonna throw a punch, or are you just going to dodge?”
Blake glanced down, a quick observation; Yang saw, blocked a throw aimed straight for her abdomen.
They sparred for a while. Yang trailed Blake’s retreating footsteps around the floor and Blake mimicked her punches surprisingly well, even landing a few hits. The gym was quiet but for the sound of their breathing bouncing off the walls, empty but for their shadows stretching out over the floor.
It was a dance. Normally, Yang felt a rush of adrenaline and fear when she entered the ring. Her opponents have broken bones and given people concussions. And doubtless Blake had done some terrible things in the past, but Yang knew she wouldn’t do it to her. There was no fear in their movements. Yang felt light, almost dizzy with the intimacy of it.
Blake’s golden eyes were bright and focused in on her, observing every move and learning from it. Yang saw her absorbing the tricks, settling down into her stance and adjusting her balance until she was a mirror image. The punches grew more accurate, closer to their target, and Yang felt excitement surging through her.
She threw her punches, ducked and weaved, walked Blake back into a corner. It ended when Blake dropped to the floor, swinging out a leg and knocking Yang off her feet. She landed on the mat and all of the air rushed out of her lungs, eyes wide. Blake copied that move, too; Yang remembered using it during the fight in the alley.
It took a minute for her to recover. She rolled over onto her side, reaching a hand around to press against her back. Blake still knelt on the floor beside her, one leg outstretched and a huge grin on her face.
“That’s a dirty trick,” Yang huffed out.
“I’m not a professional boxer. I don’t have to fight fair.”
“I’m not a fan of people who fight dirty.” Yang pushed herself up off the floor. It brought them much closer than they’d been before, faces just inches from one another. “So you’d better clean up your act.”
Blake’s eyes flicked down to Yang’s mouth. “I knew you wouldn’t break the rules,” she said, voice low. “Best way to defeat a professional is to go against protocol.”
“And how do you beat a dirty fighter?” Yang asked.
“You play their game.”
They both stayed impossibly still for longer than Yang could measure, close but not touching, the air charged.
And then something broke. Blake pushed up and away, out of Yang’s reach just like she had been all night. “Better get to the showers,” she said. “Junior doesn’t like it when we stay here past midnight.”
She walked away, arms stretched out over her head. Yang watched her go with a frown and slowly made her way to standing. Her skin was buzzing with tense energy, aching for the release she’d been hoping to find in a few hours with the punching bag.
Somehow, sparring with Blake had only accentuated it.
It was later than she thought. If she intended to shower, she would have to do it now. There was no more time to take out her frustrations on any more equipment. So Yang did what she was told and followed Blake into the locker room, grabbing a towel on her way to the showers.
Now it was Blake trailing after her.
Blake didn’t usually shower at the gym. She waited until she got home, instead taking the extra time to run a few more laps around the track. Yang didn’t understand why today was any different; she wished it wasn’t.
The water was cold at first, a sharp bite against Yang’s tense muscles. She tried to relax into it as the water warmed up, but it was hard not to think about Blake standing less than two feet away, only a short brick wall and a couple of vinyl curtains between them.
Yang wasn’t blind. Blake was beautiful, possessed a kind of elegance and delicacy that Yang couldn’t even come close to when she was walking down the street, much less fighting. She had her secrets and clearly came from trouble. She was a bad idea.
But Yang was never the posterchild for great decisions.
--
Blake started sitting front row for almost every match, focused on Yang and learning from every move.
--
It’s late and Yang feels homesick for the first time since they left the city.
The window is open and the sea is crashing against the shore just outside, a steady reminder of how far she is from her sister and her own bed. The moon is sitting low in the sky and the night is well into its short life, but sleep is still far away.
Yang pushes the blankets down past her waist for the millionth time, too hot despite the breeze coming in off the ocean. Everything lives and breathes with the waves, from the curtains to the closet doors. Yang decides to follow along, evening out her breathing with the help of the tides.
The air is heavy around her, advancing on her with the shadows. It’s the first time in over a week that she’s been left alone in her sleep, no Blake tucked in behind her. The room is too full for one person, too full of air and heat and sound.
Yang doesn’t think. She swings her feet over the edge of the bed and rushes out, headed straight for Blake’s room.
When the door swings open, she can’t see much. The curtains are drawn and the windows closed. All she makes out are golden eyes, blinking at her from the bed.
“I can’t sleep,” Yang says, throat thick and voice rough.
Blake shifts around for a minute, making room on the bed. She lifts the comforter and Yang fills the open space provided for her. They lie there for a while quietly, staring at each other through the darkness.
“Thank you,” Yang says eventually. Blake looks a little startled. “For letting me talk to Ruby today, and for – for this. I needed to take some time.”
Blake nods. Yang can hear the sound of her hair against the pillow. “How are you doing?” she asks after a moment.
Her room is much quieter than Yang’s was, or at least it feels that way. Even so parts of her are screaming that this is too much, to be with someone else when she’s in her current state of mind. Her thoughts are racing even as her breathing slows.
“I didn’t mean to hurt him,” Yang says finally.
Blake takes a minute to process that before she responds. “What happened, then?”
“He was on the ground. I thought he was out. But then I heard him.” Yang can remember the entire thing with much more clarity than she could before. The memory is flashing through her mind faster than she can explain it. “He called me “blondie” and told me it was going to be my last match. Then his foot was coming for me, so I stepped on it.”
“Why did you do that?”
Yang hesitates, just barely. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I just wanted to stop him, to protect myself.”
There are no more questions after that, just the two of them watching one another. It reminds Yang of the first time they sparred, each of them mirroring each other to find a rhythm. Nervous energy is bouncing between them now, the air tense with questions they haven’t asked.
“Do you believe me?” Yang asks eventually.
“I do.”