Iona started going to the gym everyday. Usually early in the morning before anyone woke up. She’d lift her weights and before anyone else came to the gym she left. Finals approached and she needed to study. No new cards appeared in her deck. She constantly checked. No “2 of Studying” or “2 of Stress” or “2 of Staying Awake All Night” although she thought she might be close to that one.

For two weeks, she didn’t get a new card from the gym. Her mom had gone on a business trip so nothing broke the mundanity of her schedule. She didn’t do anything else in her life with similar intensity so she thought that it was the best way to get a card. She tried to replicate feeling such intense emotions to get another Desire but it didn’t work. Maybe she needed to actually feel it. But even the gym stopped rewarding her. Her body got stronger, she could see an ab try and break free from its fat restraints. But for a week she couldn’t figure out why she couldn’t get another Training card. She needed to change things up. Nothing great was created in boredom.

It happened at the gym. Of course, it happened there. Where else would it have happened? But it didn’t happen where she used weights. That section of the gym she’d already learned it seemed.

After a long workout, she sat on her bench (third nearest to the wall). Her mind churned. Aches echoed from her body. She couldn’t squat it hurt too bad. She couldn’t bench it hurt too bad. Weights seemed, scary, she needed to rest. But she couldn’t rest, she needed another card or at least to figure out how to get cards themselves. She needed it. The punching bags in the opposite corner of the gym called to her. They shone white and brand new. Someone had put them there three days ago.

She walked over to the punching bags. She could smell the musk of men lingering on them. A mix of sweat and Old Spice deodorant, it whispered to her. There were a couple of pairs of worn-out white boxing gloves strewn about near the bags. They squelched when she put her hand inside. She had to tighten the left glove so that it fit over her stump. Boxing was the only thing left that she could do there. One punch after another, it felt good. The bags made satisfying whop sounds like someone losing all of the air in their body. Sweat poured down her face. It smeared over her thick lips, it covered her eyes. It hurt a bit. Her wrists hurt.

She flopped down onto one of the benches, sweat pouring down onto it’s black fake leather. A queer idea came onto her and she pulled out her deck of cards. In it she saw two new cards. One of the cards suits was punching fists. The fists moved around the card and fought with each other. A 2 of Punching. The other was another 2 of Training. She pulled both the cards out and inspected them. A match made in heaven. She took a deep breath and shoved the 2 of Training into the 2 of Punching. The card started to squelch and rattle and groan. It grew larger and then shrunk and in her vision the new card appeared. Instead of fists or a dumbbell a whole entire person appeared on the new card.

She, because the person could only be Iona’s misshapen face, punched a bag but the mini-Iona didn’t stop there. She started doing push-ups on the card. It was a 2 of Punching Workout. Where would this card best be used? Iona looked at herself in the gym mirror. She smelled the card, and even the card smelled like sweat, did all the cards have unique scents? She slapped the card onto her chest. She didn’t even think twice.

Her spine tingled, her arms tingled, her legs tingled. They started to warm up as if her body had been dunked into hot water. But the water wasn’t just hot it was boiling. It was searing. It fucking hurt. Everywhere hurt. She felt like she was being boiled alive. She was being cooked. Steam billowed from her body like she was a living smokestack. What would someone say if they saw her? Here’s steam girl, her superpower is steam, isn’t that so cool? Was she becoming a Physical? Would her muscles start forming up? Would her brain start Focusing?

The pain vanished and she took a deep gulp of air. She gasped and gasped. Her body lurched forward as if she was going to throw up but nothing came out. What the fuck. She took another breath of air and went over to the gym mirror. Did she become some sort of punching monstrosity?

She looked at herself in the mirror. Her face was the same. But her body looked, her body looked like she lost ten pounds and gained some muscle. She looked athletic. Her arms had definition. Her abs, her abs oh my god. She had abs. Oh glorious abs. Hard rocks of infinite time. The objects of ultimate affection, abs, abs, abs.

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She touched them. They were hard. She had abs. Her mind exuded an unexplainable joy. To see one’s body change before your eyes is a sight that few have ever seen. She left her house this morning with flab and returned with ab.

Her muscles didn’t hurt, nothing hurt, she felt like she could punch something so fucking hard. As if she could just obliterate a bag, and turn it into dust. She looked at the punching bag. She found a perfect target. She started to punch and her punches felt harder. They felt stronger. Ten minutes went by, twenty minutes went by, and thirty minutes went by, she felt amazing as if her body was releasing ten million endorphins. She felt high.

She’d just snorted pure Colombian cocaine but instead of cocaine, she’d just worked out. This was such an amazing discovery it almost made her want to spend all of her cards on her body. But that probably wasn’t a great idea, but not like it mattered. She was muscular and she had superpowers.

She went back to punching the bag and an hour went by. Exhaustion eluded her. Punching was her crack and she wanted to do it forever. But it was already seven-thirty in the morning. P.E. started in thirty minutes, and she had to leave.

School felt slow. So slow. So inexorably slow. She walked into her last class, Spanish. The stuffiness of the room enveloped her. Her eyes drooped, and the cocaine of working out disappeared. Someone drew the blinds but warm afternoon light filtered in. She hated Spanish class. If there was one thing public schools couldn’t do it was Spanish. Half of the kids spoke in the most Americanized Spanish accent she’d ever heard and the other half of the kids spoke fluent Spanish. It was the worst combination.

If you tried to speak Spanish correctly the Americanized Spanish kids would make fun of you and the Spanish kids would think you were dumb. Better to keep your mouth shut. But there was one kid she absolutely couldn’t stand, Matthew Santanas. Despite his Spanish last name, he was whiter than white. He spoke in the most American accent imaginable. His hablos were more like ha-blows. It seemed like he did it on purpose. But worse than his accent was his incessant talking.

Yammer, yammer, yammer, yammer, he talked more than the teacher and he would say the worst things.

“Hey, teacher are you skittles?” And he would giggle.

“Hey, teacher you been on Grindr before?” The teacher would try to ignore him but Matthew knew his weakness. Martin Van Buren high school wasn’t a pleasant place to be gay. But nobody was more brazen and assholic about it than Matthew.

The class went by without a hitch at the beginning. Matthew didn’t talk, just looked at his phone and doodled in his notebook. The teacher put on a movie, something about how Mayan goldsmiths actually created a Wonderland in Guatemala. Some totally gold city that would turn things into gold. Teachers stopped caring to teach near finals. Iona buried her face in her hands and tried to fall asleep.

It started like this:

“Dude, dude, have you been to the gym here before?” It was one of Matthew’s friends. They were whispering but louder than someone talking. Iona listened. She loved hearing about other people’s lives.

“Nah, nah, Coach doesn’t want us using the gym in season.”

“That’s stupid.” His friend said.

“Yeah well, can’t disobey his orders. I gotta start.” Matthew would start no matter what.

“Also like half of the people, there are like tiny fucking cross-country girls and shit. I just workout at the gym near my house.”

When he said tiny fucking cross-country girls his eyes flicked around the room. The eyes of a predator. But who was the prey? Who did he have in mind to harass? He wouldn’t do it so obviously. He’d whisper but the person in question would feel the talking in the back of their mind, they’d leave class knowing they were the butt of some joke.

She buried her face in her arms. She didn’t want to hear anything else. Better to hear nothing than to have to hear that. She could feel the conversation building to her.

The bell rang. School was over. She got up from her seat and walked to the door. Right on the side of the door Matthew stood. He didn’t even look at her. Just made a slight bowing gesture.

“All you, dude. Looking good big man.” Iona walked out and didn’t look behind herself. The halls chattered louder as she walked. Blaring sounds in and out of her ear. She hated the sounds of these talking kids. It was such lame harassment. Just a minor league joke.

She didn’t look up from the walk home.

Her face in the mirror, did it look manly? Were people thinking she was a dude? She looked so skinny and she didn’t have much in the way for boobs and she never dressed in a way to eccentuate anything. She grabbed her body and squeezed. She looked so different and nobody probably knew. Were her shoulders to broad? Is that how he noticed? Did he see her at the gym? Was he just a douche?

He didn’t see her as anything. His eyes glossed over her face, her feet, her shoulders. All he saw was skinny and muscular. She needed to think and to get this feeling off.

The shower filled with steam. Wet air surrounded her. She sat and sat and let her body droop to the floor. She sat and water flowed. Only the sounds of crashing tumultuous water filled her vision. If only her face could wash away.

She got out of the shower and dried off and there in her deck of cards, she saw a new bright blue card, instead of any suit only a drawn pond sat on the card. A 2 of Water.