A Hard Night's Rest [For Daaharu]

[url=http://afwrpg.informe.com/forum/boxing-federation-f54/saldano-vs-rodriguez-queens-of-the-ring-t10093.html:3hgye7g2]Continued from here...[/url:3hgye7g2]

Carmen detested being in hospitals, with all her body and soul.

She didn't like to be served, for one thing. Her whole life, she'd been more than capable of doing what she needed to do for herself, by herself. It was more satisfying, that way, and if she messed things up, she had only herself to blame. Here, though, she was being waited on hand and foot, and she couldn't even get out of the damn bed without pressing a button for assistance.

To make matters worse, she had an eyepatch on left eye and a cast on her right hand - both major irritations. The doctor assured her neither would be permanent, and that she could take them off in the month, but in the mean time she had to go through life as a one-handed cyclops, having to turn her head all the way around when she wanted to view something, barely able to grab a cup or operate the remote control.

Her head ached, and it wasn't just from the fight, either. Her brother had come by earlier, and they'd gone at it, giving her crap for not being happier with the win, calling her spoiled. They'd gone through all the trouble to help her out, he said. Their father took time off just to support her, he said. She was being a little baby, he said.

He wasn't wrong. That was the worst thing.

Feeling the way she did made no sense. Lorenza might not have been the world champ anymore and there wasn't a title to gain, but even so, there was a long list of fighters who would have loved the privilege of taking her on. The reputation was worth almost as much as any belt. You couldn't buy that sort of chance, and Carmen had been the honor on a silver platter.

But it just didn't sit right. A split decision, and such a thin one, too. If the judges had been different, if one of them had just blinked at the wrong moment, everything could have changed. There were just so many variables, and that nagging feeling from the stadium was getting stronger by the moment. What if she didn't deserve the win?

She sat in her bed, going through the fight on a DVD she'd managed to convince Army into bring. She was going through it from the start, trying to imagine herself as a judge, how she would decide the match if she were being impartial and fair...as if that was even a possible thing. Obsessive, she could admit that. But she needed something to ease her mind and take the edge off, something like...like...

...like a fine nurse walking by her door. Lorenza hadn't been kidding about the staff here. The nurses she'd encountered so far were quite easy on the eyes, and while she couldn't be 100% sure, more than a few them had given her interesting looks. Not exactly professional, but after all that violence she could use something to take the edge off. This nurse in particular was a stunning figure - slim, but curvaceous, with her hair in a neat bobcut.

"Hey." She paused the tape and waved to her as she passed by. "Reika, right? You busy?"

Lorenza hated hospitals. The feeling of being powerless and at the mercy of doctors and nurses she didnâ€t even know had never sat well with the longtime world champion. Before beginning her boxing career, she could have counted the number of times she visited a hospital on one hand. Growing up without very much money on the streets of Tijuana, she had never needed to visit the hospital, even after her most violent fights. She just sucked it up and dealt with it.

But, after a fight like the one she and Carmen had just had, she was in no position to refuse when her coach had insisted on driving her to the hospital.

And so, there she was, laying in a strange bed in a sterile white room. Brad and Tara had visited with her for an hour or so, but they had long since returned to their hotel for the night, and now, Lorenza was all alone—save for the nurse who was taking care of her. The woman was very welcome company. Lorenza might have been teasing Carmen about the nurses here at the beginning of their match, but she herself was not immune to falling victim to their charms. She was clumsy and inelegant with her words when she tried to flirt—she was eternally rusty when it came to such things—but this nurse, Reika, didnâ€t seem to mind.

“You are so nice, mi enfermera hermosa,” Lorenza groaned, peering up at Reika with bleary eyes as she took a carton of juice from the nurseâ€s hand. Her eyes were still almost swollen shut, despite the nurseâ€s best efforts to reduce the swelling. Lorenza also had a temporary bandage wrapped around her forehead, a cast on her right hand, and extensive bandaging around her stomach and chest to help her broken ribs heal. She was a mess. But Reika still smiled and giggled when she looked at her.

It could have been out of pity. But Lorenza liked to think that it was more than just that. “Thank you,” Lorenza said, grabbing Reikaâ€s hand and squeezing it gently. “Thank you.”

“Youâ€re welcome!” Reika chirped in reply. “Iâ€ll be right back—if you need anything, please call me, Miss Saldano! Iâ€m happy to take care of you!” Lorenza would let go of her hand, and Reika would leave the room, heading down the hall. Lorenza wondered if the nurse was helping any other patients tonight. The thought couldnâ€t help but make the boxer a little jealous. She couldnâ€t help but wonder if the nurse was taking care of some other patient right now.

It was kind of weird, in a way. Carmen's father had never accepted her orientation, and it was always a source of fierce argument between them. He was religious, devout, and while she would never quite call him 'homophobic', he was much closer than she would have liked. These days he was at least good enough to avoid the subject and respect her privacy, but there was a time when he was close to shutting down her training because of it.

But for all that, she'd never managed to even get a real girlfriend. She had the occasional fling, but it was never serious and it never lasted. Most girls just couldn't keep up with the pace of her life.

So Carmen was a bit out of her game when it came to courting. But that was one of many things she intended to change in Japan. She had done a good job with Kurohime, even if that didn't last past their glorious two nights. Maybe Reiko would stay around longer.

"Here I come, here I come." She entered the room with some snacks for Carmen - a turkey sandwich, a salad, and some ginger ale to wash it all down. Nice. "Sorry, dealing with another patient, too. Running thin, tonight."

"Another patient?" She scoffed it off as she popped the ginger ale and took a quick swig. "Someone more important than me?" She tapped her chest. "That hurts, Reiko."

Reiko just smirked and started out. "You're not the only boxer here, you know."

Another boxer. Admitted at around the same time, to the same hospital. Gee, who could that be?

"Okay, okay, wait." Carmen stopped and waved her back over, sitting up in the bed as she came. "Okay, got a little message for you. Tell the other boxer that she's a horrible kisser and an even worse dancer."

"That's it?"

"That's it."Carmen smiled and gave Reiko a pat on the back, as she walked back to the other side with a confused look etched into her features.

Lorenza had some difficulty opening her juice carton. She had to hold it with the pit of her right elbow while she used her left hand to try to twist it open. With her right hand broken, simple things like this would be a struggle for several weeks.

She finally opened it, and poured a long, satisfying gulp of the apple-flavored liquid down her aching throat. She sighed contentedly as she brought the carton away from her lips.

Reika walked back into her room then, a bemused smile on her face. “I have a message for you!” she said.

Lorenza raised an eyebrow—or she would have, had her face not been deformed. As it was, she slightly shifted the big lump above her right eye. “A message?” Lorenza repeated. For a second she was completely ignorant as to who it could be from. Who else would be in the hospital at this ungodly hour of the evening?

…oh.

“From another patient. A friend of yours, I think,” Reika explained with a smile, though by that time Lorenza had already figured it out for herself. She smirked and nodded to the nurse, who continued, her voice a little slower as she remembered the exact phrase she had been asked to repeat: “According to our other patient, you are a horrible kisser and an even worse dancer.”

Lorenza snorted and slapped her good hand against the bed. “Oh, hermana, mi hermana,” she sighed, shaking her head as a grin slowly spread across her face. “Could you give her a message from me?”

“Of course,” Reika replied.

“Tell her that she must have spent so much time kissing my leather that she forgot what a kiss from a real woman feels like,” Lorenza said. She puckered her lips and kissed the air passionately, earning a little giggle from the Japanese nurse. Lorenzaâ€s lips would slowly spread back into a smile, and she winked at Reika as the nurse turned to return to Carmenâ€s room.

Carmen went back to watching the tape after Reiko stepped out, focusing on the latter half of the fight. Specifically, the part where she started Dempsey rolling. It had been a risky little gambit, since that was her first time even employing the movement ins a real fight. She practiced it with Army, but he was bigger, slower that Lorenza by a wide margin, and that's what she had initially learned it for, to take on the bigger, slower male opponents she would be encountering in Tension, tanks like John Mitchell.

Still, it seemed to work well enough, even though the part where she hurt her wrist made Carmen wince. She would have to touch that up in the future. If she hurt herself hitting someone around her own weight and size, it would only be worse when her fist didn't have the glove and she laying into a giant.

She reached for the ginger ale and nearly knocked it over with her cast, forgetting that she wasn't up to the task of grasping things at the moment. Fortunately, Reiko picked that moment to walk back, and she rushed over to grab the can before it could slide of. "Gotcha!"

"Ooo, nice save." Carmen smirked and stole a quick peek as Reiko bent over, before straightening up as the can was handed her way. She put a straw in and started slurping. "Good reflexes. You might have a little boxer in you, ever think about training?"

"Tch, me?" She scoffed it off with a wave of the hand. "Not me, never. I can't take a punch for anything."

"That comes with time. Best way to learn how to take a punch is to take punches, and you've already got good feet - just have to show them how to move." She nodded towards Reiko's rather lovely pair, finely accented by the nursing uniform.

"Oh, stop." She let out a devastatingly cute schoolgirl giggle. "Your little friend has a message for you."

"Of course she does." Carmen rolled her eye. "Hit me."

"She says, and I quote," She put up some finger quotes for emphasis. "'You must have spent so much time kissing my leather, that you forgot what a kiss from a real woman feels like'. Emphasis on 'real'."

"Yeah. Right." Carmen licked her lips as she thought up a response, then looked back up to Reiko. "Okay, okay. Tell her she should stick to kissing with her lips, next time - it was much less predictable than her punches."

"I will!" She chirped back and went on her way, giving Carmen a little show as she left.

It was like they were back in the ring. Carmen threw a jab, and then Lorenza retaliated. Now she was waiting for the next blow from her rival to fall.

It had hardly been a minute when Reiko walked back into the room. Lorenza smiled and sat up a little in bed, grimacing as she felt a sharp pang in her midsection when she moved. She shouldnâ€t have tried to move so soon, with her ribs shattered and her liver perforated, even if she did have them all bandaged up.

“Oh, please, donâ€t try to move just yet!” the nurse said, putting one hand on Lorenzaâ€s shoulder and one hand on the boxerâ€s abdomen. Gently, she moved Lorenza back down to a more comfortable position on the bed. Lorenza looked up at her caregiver and smiled again. Reiko smiled back down at her.

“So, what did she say?” Lorenza asked.

“She said,” Reiko replied, “that you should stick to kissing with your lips—because itâ€s much less predictable than your punches.”

Lorenza snorted. She had been expecting Carmen to say something of that sort. “She wasnâ€t saying that when my predictable punches put her flat on her back on the canvas. Three times.” She hesitated only a second further thinking of her response. “Tell her that Iâ€m flattered by her interest in my kisses, but that I donâ€t go around kissing mi hermana. Sheâ€s not my type.”

Reiko nodded as she memorized the message. “And what is your type, Miss Saldano?”

Lorenza smiled a disarming smile, or the closest approximation of one she could muster with her face deformed the way it was. “Cute nurses.”

Reiko giggled like a schoolgirl, waving a hand at Lorenza as she turned to leave the room and return to Carmen with Lorenzaâ€s message. “You stop, now. Youâ€re going to make me blush,” she said, before heading out the door. Lorenza watched the nurseâ€s backside as she left, smiling like an idiot as she waited for the nurse to return with Carmenâ€s reply.

There it was, that moment in the third when Lorenza started dominating. One of Lorenza's better rounds, but now Carmen was wondering how the judges had called it. Maybe they saw something she didn't see, awarded too many points, missed a crucial moment...she was nitpicking, she knew it. But, looking back over the fight, she honestly couldn't say she won. This didn't look like a winning fight. She didn't feel like she'd been in a fight she won. Everything was just so off. So wrong.

She fast-forwarded it to the part where she got her second knockdown on Lorenza and nearly clenched the fight, then and there. Why couldn't she stay down? Just give some closure, something real...

Her thought train was derailed once again when Reiko sauntered on in, looking bright as ever. Carmen just clicked the video off this time, figuring there was no sense in dwelling at the moment. This little game was more entertaining, anyway, and the distraction would keep her from going stir-crazy. "Back so soon?"

She rolled her eyes and walked over, leaning on the beside as Carmen put the remote control away and sat up. Face front, full attention. "Okay." She bit her lip to hold back a snicker, before starting up. "The great and illustrious Lorenza Saldano wishes to inform you that she appreciates your interest, but you're not her type."

That one got a full laugh out of Carmen, which immediately turned into a groan. Her ribs weren't quite ready for full jolliness, just yet. Reiko's face turned serious, but Carmen waved it off. "I'm fine, I'm fine." She reached over and finished off the ginger ale, letting it cool her insides. "Check this out, I'm psychic. You asked what her type was, right?"

Reiko nodded.

"And then she said her type was, like...gorgeous nurses? Or something like that."

"She said 'cute nurses', but otherwise..."

"Yeah, I'm sure she did." Carmen laid back, running a hand over her face while she sighed. "See, that's why I'm better. I treat my ladies to a more refined vocabulary." She mulled over what to send as a return volley. "Let me see, let me see...ah. Tell Lorenza her pickup lines are more played out than her right hook and just as easy to see coming."

Now, their battle was being rekindled in earnest. This time, they were fighting over more than just honor. While it was a friendly competition, Lorenza had no intention of letting Carmen win. She waited patiently, kicking her feet, waiting for Reiko to return with Carmenâ€s next retort. Unlike her opponent, she wasnâ€t thinking very much about their match. It was in the past, now. And while something just didnâ€t sit right with her—something she would need to take up with Carmen, sooner or later—for the most part Lorenza had accepted the result.

It didnâ€t take Reiko long. As the nurse entered the room, Lorenza looked up at her expectantly. “What did she say?” the boxer asked.

“She said,” the nurse began, “that your pickup lines are more played out than your right hook, and just as easy to see coming.”

Lorenza snorted. “Ouch, that hurts. Do you think my pickup lines are bad, Reiko?”

Reiko smiled and shook her head. “Oh, no. I think theyâ€re charming.” She might have just been patronizing Lorenza, but right now, that was enough to satisfy the boxer, and she laid back in her bed with a big, satisfied smile.

“Tell her that her comebacks are as weak as her uppercuts,” Lorenza said, and Reiko nodded. “Oh, and ask her how that left eye is feeling. I donâ€t think it will be seeing many of my right hooks coming any time soon, eh?”

“Okay, Lorenza,” Reiko said, smiling and waving to the Mexican boxer before turning to once again carry that message over to Carmenâ€s room.

As fun as this was, Carmen had to concede that Lorenza might have the advantage. She didn't know the first thing about her lovelife, but she wagered that Lorenza had far more experience in the area. It would be a safe bet, too, since just about everyone had more experience that her.

Carmen had a few flings through her life, but they never lasted. Training was a grueling, week long thing, and her partners always had to work around it. Sure, they'd talk about in the beginning, and the other girl would promise to be understanding. But then came the missed dates. And the schedule conflicts. And the nights were Carmen was drained and just not in the mood. And, sure enough, she would get that phone call, and it was all over.

Or, in one case, she would get a text message. Still pretty pissed about that one.

So even if she 'won' this little duel, it would be a temporary victory at best...but she didn't quite object to that. The idea of taking Lorenza down a peg always appealed, and unlike last time, there was some tangible to gain. Tangible and with nice legs. Speaking of which...

"Back!" Reiko popped her pretty head in with a wave, like she'd been gone for longer than a minute.

"Glad to see you." Carmen folded her arms, donning a light smirk. "All your patients get this sort of treatment, or am I just special?"

"You're special." Reiko stuck the fork into Carmen's salad and plucked out a tomato slice. "Eat. Good for you. Besides, my shift is almost over and it's a slow night."

Carmen bit off the tomato and spoke with her mouthful. "Appreciate it." She gulped it down. "What'd Queen Saldano say?"

"Oh, right!" She perked back up. "Ah, she said your uppercut is weak, as are your comeback, and she asks how your left eye is doing - which reminds me, take your meds."She nodded towards some medication in a cup by the bedside. "Also, she asks if you'll be able to see her 'predictable right hooks'."

"They're so predictable, I don't need to see them. Could dodge them in the dark." She took out her phone and went through a replay of the fight, one of many she had saved. "Tell her my eye's better than her liver, that's for sure. And show her my new ring tone."

Carmen handed her the phone, which was set to a clip from the final round, where Carmen landed a liver blow and Lorenza made an audible 'Guh!' noise. The clip was set to repeat, going 'Guh! Guh! Guh! Guh!' over and over.

Lorenza pressed her lips together tightly, the two of them forming a thin line. She couldnâ€t help but feel like she was losing this battle over the cute, leggy nurse. And unlike the match that had preceded it, this was not a battle without consequences. Lorenza had something to gain. A real prize to fight for, rather than just honor and peace of mind…

Well, then, she just had to be sure not to lose this battle. Even if Carmen got the better of her in their war of words—and she hadnâ€t; not yet—Lorenza had other weapons that she could bring to bear on her Puerto Rican rival.

“Back!” Reiko sang out as she waltzed back into the room, bearing the next message from Carmen. The thin expression that Lorenza wore was gone, replaced now by another smile as she looked up at the Japanese caregiver.

“What did my lovely rival say?” Lorenza asked.

“She said that she doesnâ€t need her left eye to see your right hooks coming,” Reiko explained. Lorenza smirked, but said nothing in response to that. Reiko continued: “And she said that her eye is better than your liver.”

Lorenza sighed and fidgeted. “What do you think, Reiko? Youâ€re the medical one. Which injury is more serious? Her eye or my liver?”

“Well…” Reiko began, putting a finger to her chin as she pondered the question for a moment, crossing her other arm beneath the downturned elbow. “If Iâ€m being honest, a perforated liver is more dangerous than a damaged eyeball. You can live with sight in only one eye. Itâ€s harder to do if you have a non-functioning liver.”

“But which one is injured more? Which one took more damage? Do you know what I mean?”

“I think so,” Reiko said with a nod. “Youâ€re asking which one is further away from its optimal condition. And my answer…is that they are probably about equal in that regard.”

Lorenza sighed. “Okay.” She noticed the phone that Reiko had in her hand. “Whatâ€s that?”

“Oh, Carmen asked me to show you something. Her new ringtone.” Reiko touched the screen with one thumb and then held it up to Lorenza. It was her, in the final round, being hit in her liver by Carmen. The brown-haired boxer had set it to repeat, and Lorenza heard her own loud, pained groan repeated over and over and over again. She scoffed.

“Oh, no. She is not going to get the better of me like that,” Lorenza said. She quickly whipped out her own cell phone. “Do you know where she got that replay of the match? Oh, wait, never mind.” Her coach had sent her a copy of it. Something for her to review. For the first time, she had lost, and if she was going to box again, she now had real incentive to study and improve before her next match.

It only took Lorenza a minute before she found a new ringtone of her own. “Okay, here, show her my new ringtone, then,” Lorenza said. She thrust her phone up at Reiko. She had found a clip—one that happened just a few seconds in the replay before Carmenâ€s new ringtone, actually—of Carmen screaming as Lorenza threw blow after blow into the sides of her head. That should show her. Reiko nodded and trotted out of the room.