There’s
something important you have to remember about fighting for money. That
is fighting illegally for money, I don’t know a damn thing about the
federal boxing commission. You always have to be aware of your
competition, there are all kinds here. You have poor men with a talent
earning a paycheck just like any other job....but with a hell of a glass
ceiling and no retirement plan. Then there’s your guys with something
to prove, hot tempered and ready to take on anybody regardless of the
purse. They don’t last long though. Them fires burn hot, and burn
fast. Some are just ex-boxers with a revoked license for giving in to
gambling, excessive violence in the ring, a shit record or a distinct
lack of marketability. Damn shame too.
These
men are to be respected, they are professional fighting’s great,
educated underclass. They pad your records, they throw fights for you,
they teach you your craft. Respect them. They’ve earned it. They’ll
never leave with a million dollar purse but they’d hand you your ass
out here were it’s all equalized. Where there’s no technical
knockout, where there’s no ref and you gotta watch your
own ass. Come correct or don’t come down here at all.
*
* *
You
know sometimes I think that guy was right. life is just like a box of
chocolates, then I remember. That guy was a fucking retard and watching
that movie was like wiping your ass with a hallmark card. Not as much
fun as you’d think.
I
had a lot of thoughts like that driving west from New York. There’s
not a whole lot to do when all you have to stare at is the never-ending expanse that is Pennsylvania. Every once in a while the horizon line is
broken by a Chili’s or an Appleby’s where, I swear, every steak is
the exact same size and shape. That shit isn’t natural.
I
can’t remember if I had a reason for leaving the east coast. I just
know that nothing was happening for me there, and as a result, I
didn’t have anything holding me there. No parents. No friends,
no warmth in anybody, no connection. People keep saying that New Yorkers
are actually a really friendly bunch, but I think that might be just
something said to avoid looking like complete pricks. So I left. Quit
the job, grabbed the saved money, which wasn’t much, and got in my
car. A beat up old mercury, the one cool thing I own. I bought it in
Maryland, a few years ago after I had finally learned to drive. They
have these auto trader papers down there. The old Mercury was in there
and I paid cash for this lovely piece of shit. She’s never let me down
since.
*
* *
Remember
the fight doesn’t end when your opponent hits the floor, when the only
thing moving on him is the blood running down his face. Remember it’s
not over, you still need to dodge the spectators, the angry promoters
and gamblers. You need to get away to enjoy your winnings so make sure
you have an exit plan.
*
* *
I
think it must have been the heat and the fact that’d I’d been
driving non-stop and fast for most of the last day and a half. Try this
sometime, stop at every rest area for a large coffee, and keep stopping
because, Hell, you don’t know when the next one will appear (thirty
miles down the road as it happens). By the fifth one I was so wired I
was seeing how long I could keep my jaw clenched. The car went tits up
right outside this little town, whose name I didn’t catch on the way
in seeing as how I was alternately cursing the car, begging it not to
die on me and then outright punching the dashboard. So I was a little
distracted. She responding by coughing and drifting just enough to upend
us in the ditch by the side of the road.
So
I got out and hitched a ride in to the town, the nearest mechanic was a
Mexican guy and I spoke just enough Spanish for him to call his cousin
who spoke just enough English to get my car out of the ditch, into
town and then screw me out of most of my ready cash. When all was said
in done I was without a car for a week, down to a hundred bucks in the
split lining of my boot, and in need of some sleep.
Flip
to several weeks later and I’m still here. Got a job in a local bar,
cleaning the place and bar-backing when the Mexican kid they normally
employed was off for the night. I guess the locals thought it was kinda
funny, I was probably the only Anglo in town who was gonna take a job
from a Mexican.
*
* *
So
it’s been a little more than a month now. It’s gotten so the locals
are a tad more comfortable around me. I got another bar I go to
regularly, every now and then for a Sol and a shot of house
tequila. I got a room in this little house about a few blocks from
the bar. An old Irish lady lives beneath me, seems even with living here
she’s not lost the lilt, don’t you know? So this one Sunday night,
I find myself on the street traveling around drunk. Wandering feet carry
me to a place in the town I’ve never been to before.
In
the still of the night air an odd sound is carried to me, if I had been
a little more sober, I would have been able to tell you that it was the
sound of a crowd. A frenzied crown, a last call spill out onto a New
York City street corner, random violence crowd. I followed the sound,
buoyed along to a pair of old warehouses. In the space between them was
the crowd in a loose circle poorly lit by a pair of orange construction
lights tossed up around the rain gutters. I couldn’t see into the
crowd’s center yet, but I was now close enough to make out the
shrapnel of individual speech. Calls of five to one odds on the black
pants. Get in there and swing you fucking lump, what the fuck you pussy
get those hands up, a little bitch. That’s it kiddo swing them hands,
chop at the body, shuddup, don’t waste you time there, drive to the
head. Knock him the fuck out! Oye pendejo, matalo este maricon! Cabron!
Matalo, matalo rapido, holmes, faster.
By
now I was close enough to stand on tip toe and see over the heads of the
white and Chicano crowd. All of whom could probably not get along in any
other circumstance. Here Mexican hands held the money and all bet on a
pair of white men in the center, muscles doing the bunch and stretch.
Fists
driving into flesh, each spinning around the circle, locked in a dance.
Each time they came close enough to clasp there was the off-rhythm bass
line of flesh hitting flesh. Either the soft flesh of a midsection, the
glance off the top of the skull as a fighter gets his head just low
enough for the crown of his head to take the fist mean to crack his
orbital bone. A fist slips between a carefully constructed guard,
impervious but for fatigue. A fist that slams into the jaw and a white
piece of plastic sails through the air on a wake of spittle to land in
the dust. Having lost his mouth guard, and hearing his vulnerability calling for a desperate measure the fighter leans back and forces the
next swing from his opponent to reach. He drops low and in, slamming an
elbow into his opponents thigh, his downward angle carrying the other
man to the ground. A charliehorse seizes the offended limb locks it up
and the fighter sits astride the chest of his opponent and raises both
hands in alternating raisings and lowering. A man playing Satan's piano, not with two fisted glee, but as a man doing a job.
It
is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen, ever, then or since. The
man sitting atop the other is still raising both pistons. Each time his
right hand is raised it falls fully into the light of the 100 watt
within it’s orange plastic cage. Each time it is illuminated it is
redder, the tape covering it tattered and ripped. A piece of rag escaped
near the wrist, where the tape ends and the flesh begins. Where a weapon
reverts to its humanity.
The
crowd cannot be contained. They see the end. The screams are
inarticulate. The energy is a fever pitch of rage and joy. Money changes
hands. The top fighter collapses across his opponent’s felled trunk
like a spent lover, finally dragged to his feet by a friend and walked
from the dirt ring, the other fighter is dragged by the ankles. In the
center lies the mouth guard, gilded with dirt and blood. Forgotten.
That’s when a voice yells.
“POLICE!
“
The
crown scatters, casting one another aside. Those without the mass or the
wherewithal to dodge or shove back are scattered. I am slammed into by
one man, who turns to confront me rather than keep going. Two of his
friends pull up short, to watch and to revel in the fact that the blood sport
is not over for the night. The guy who bumped into me swings
at my head and some force beyond me pulls me under the punch and throws
up a hand of my own. My fist hits his throat and he drops, but my small
victory is smothered under the fists of his friends. I am stomped under
and loose myself. It’s a mercy that I am unconscious for the beating
that follows.
*
* *
I
wake up in what must be jail. I never personally seen one before but the
bars look a lot like what I’ve seen on television. I've got to say,
that portrayal leaves a lot to be desired. But I suppose until they’re
learned a way of communicating smell as well as visuals across your TV
that’s going to stay that way. Like most of everything if you want the
experience you’re gonna have to go to the source.
Jail
sucks.
A
fat cop with a sour look on his face and a coffee stain in his shirt
lets me go in the morning I guess I was just brought in to the drunk
tank, no charges filed, I pass a car and finally notice the bandages.
Looks like my head was put back together with a Fisher Price, My First
Aid Kit. When I hear somebody calling out, and I look up to see a guy
across the street sitting on the hood of what may have once been a nice,
low slung caddy convertible. I figure he’s talking to somebody else,
so I keep walking.
*
* *
When
I finally drag myself to work it’s tomorrow. After about two hours of
“I hope the other guy looks worse” and “what the fuck happened to
you,” not to mention “no means no, dumbass,” I was washing
some glasses when a guy sits down in front of me. Now, I mean this is a
bar and people have been know to sit at it. But I’m barbacking. It’s
not like he’s looking for me to pour him a drink. I was gonna just
ignore him when he starts talking. So I look up.
“Yo,
man, I saw you the other night, at that fight, I saw you get your ass
handed to you by those cat’s. That was some foul shit.”
‘Thanks
man.” Not the most sensitive way to sympathize with somebody.
“Thanks
for what, puto. You went down like a bitch.”
Then
I really look up at him, and I try for hard. I really did. I tried to
put every ounce of menace I could into my look, but when you aren’t
really going to fuck somebody up, when you know you won’t. That’s
when this shit doesn’t work. The guy just stares at me smiling. So I
optioned to smile like a damn goofball and own up to it.
“Yeah I
guess I did sorta get beat down. I did get the one guy in the throat
though, I bet he’s hurtin’ for real.” Yeah, I’m
proud of hitting a guy in the throat. So what?
“Shit,
puto. Accidents ain’t shit to be proud of, and the cat’s probably
dead. Oh and another thing. Quit talkin’ like a hard-on you sound like
a puto.”
“Yeah,
well what the fuck do you want anyway?”
He’s
sorta Chicano looking but he’s taller than most of the one’s around
here. One parent or grandparent could be Anglo. He’s also seems to be
going out of his way to fuck with me. Since I can be honest with myself,
here in my head, it’s kind of pointless to fuck with me. I ain’t
exactly a threat.
“So
what do you want?”
He
pulls at his beer and grins at me, a really crazy looking grin. His eyes
gleam like dirty flood lights and his lips pull back at a rictus, almost
like he’s purposely smiling like that. Each tooth, the ones he still
has, looks like a crooked picket fence.
“yo,
man, I’m sorry for fuckin’ witchyou, truth be told man. I think you
got potential.”
“Potential
for what? Idiot Savant punching bag?”
He
laughs hard at this.
“Nah,
man for real. I think you could actually fight, most people would have
just ran, or either covered up and dropped to the ground hoping for
mercy. You took a swing, and truly, I think that guy’s never gonna
eat, speak or breathe right again. You did good, a little excessive
maybe, but good.”
“But
that was a lucky shot, I just swung blind.” I’m getting a little
worried. I hadn’t thought much about anybody else from me since
getting out of jail. I can see the peace that I had here start to shake
at the base.
“Don’t
matter, you think it’s only accident that you connected in a fight
stopper.”
“A
fight stopper?” I mean it’s kind of self-explanatory, but
still it’s not something you hear in everyday conversation.
“Let
me train you, you’ll find out, puto.”
“What
the hell are you, some kind of hit man or something. A martial arts guy.
Do you know kung fu?” I say using my best Keanu Reeves impression.
“No,
I don’t know any of that shit, but I learned to fight the best way
possible. By doing it. I can teach you too, you want to learn.”
“Why
would you want to do that?”
“I
hate seeing good talent go to waste.” And he smiles again with that whack job
glint in his eye, like he knows an absolute ton you don’t.
*
* *
I
finish work that night and go home, having dreams about throats crushing
with a sound like breaking celery and people grinning at me while I do
it, scares the living shit out of me.
*
* *
Then,
it’s like this guy drops off the face of the earth. I go about my
business, but every once in a while I get the urge. Well, it’s more
like I get curious. Curious about him, and those fights. Because I tell
you, going by people’s reactions when I ask them about bare-knuckle
fights I either get blank looks, ones of disgust, or some half-wit who
wants to tell me about the latest bum fight he downloaded off the
internet. Nobody seems to have any idea what I am talking about. On the
off chance that I had so much to drink that night that I hallucinated the
whole thing, I stop mentioning it. Maybe I turned an ordinary brawl into
poetry. Into epiphany. Which is fancy talk for a big fuckin’ deal.
That’s
how things pass and let them slide. Enough where I mostly forget about
it. Then I come home one night and this prick is sitting on my steps,
and next thing I know I’m extending my hand to shake while trying to
swallow my guts back down. From here on in, my training began.
*
* *
I
poured him a beer and he starts talking to me about fighting for money.
He says that you’re only alive while you’re in that ring. Then he
gets up and tells me to follow him, he heads out to his car and I get
into the shotgun seat. He says his name is Jonni.
*
* *
The
first time I step into a ring, it’s been seven months of learning to
punch, learning to kick, learning to use my knees and elbows like sledge
and ball-peen hammers. I learn the “Laws” as he calls them. He
teaches me two sets, a set for the ring and a set for all the other
times. He teaches me both so that I can survive inside the circle and
then walk away with my money afterwards. He says he’s making me his
heir. He still scares the shit out of me. Heir of what?
My
first fight was with this anonymous guy, he introduces as a friend of
his. Says he’s gonna pop my cherry. The next thing I now this guy
swings and hits me hard, right in the breast bone. I end up on my ass,
and the guy is coming in for the kill when I manage to roll to the side
and get back on my feet and get my hands up. The guy backs off and nods
to Jonni and leaves. What just happened?
*
* *
I
learn there is no on and off switch. You are either always “on, ”
the way a select few are, or you’re always off. Most people are
permanently in the off position. Even the dangerous ones. Cops,
soldiers, martial artists. There will always be most that are just off.
If you allow yourself to be unready for even a second then you are
officially and permanently off. I decide to be on. Jonni says it’s the
right choice.
*
* *
I
train in the garage that is adjacent to Jonni’s house. Or at least
this is where he says he lives. I don’t take anything for granted
anymore.
I
enjoy every minute I spend training, like I enjoy breathing after being
underwater. I feel like this is who I was supposed to be my whole life.
I am intensely grateful to Jonni.
Hours
spend on the heavy bag, it hangs from the cross beam. It weights one
hundred and twenty pounds. My fists slam into it’s duct-taped sides.
For the first month my knuckles split and bleed. The first delicate
layer of skin is shredded every time. The first time this happens I
stop. I ask him if I should be wearing gloves, he just stares at me, and
mutters ‘puto,’ under his breath. I don’t mention it again.
Eventually
I learn that if you just keep hitting and concentrate on that then the
pain will fade. It will come back, but of the moment it will fade and
allow me to work. After the bag we work with special leather bags that
my teacher slides his hands into. We circle each other, I learn to
breath steady so that I don’t get dizzy. I run to the corner to throw
up, and keep going. I learn to take punches on elbows. On fore-arms. I
learn to take them to the face and head. I learn to take kicks on my
shins. I learn to go through pain. I learn that I have never been this
able before. The joy is orgasmic. I still have not had my first fight.
*
* *
Jonni
let’s a out a thunderous burp, grins at me and tells me he has lined
up a fight for me while we’re sitting in his kitchen drinking beer
after a work-out. Well, he’s drinking, I’ve got a glass of water. He
says I have two weeks to prepare. He says he got me some special time on
account of this is my first fight. I think, christ, how long is it
supposed to be. He says he promised the other guy’s manager a mud dog
to pad his record. I ask his if that’s true..... he just shrugs and
grins at me. We’ll see, he says.
For
the next two weeks he drills me the same way he’s been doing and he
teaches me other things. Things specific to being in the ring itself.
Professionally people fight for money but it’s still sport fighting.
Out here he says, with a encompassing gesture, out here it’s all
money. He talks to me about dragging a fight on. This is contrary to
everything he has taught me so far. When I ask why, he says there are
two kinds of prize fights. The first is a purse fight. The second is a
bet fight.
In
a prize fight, there is a purse and both fighters are going after it. He
says here people will still wager on the outcome but that it matters
less for the fighters because their prize is already decided on. So for
the fighter it’s best to end the fight quickly as possible. In a bet
fight, you have to give them as much drama as possible because you are
either getting a cut of the betting, or your manager’s are wagering on
your behalf.
If
it ends too soon, then nobody gets as much money. So there has to be
some drama. You’re going to take more of beating. A real artist can
take the beating all the way until everybody thinks they’ve won their
money. A clever manager can then bet big, trusting his fighter to come
back and take the other guy apart. It’s a beautiful thing. But takes
time to be good at. Then he teaches me fight enders. The moves that will
take somebody out regardless of their size or strength. Tight, sneaking
hits that will disable another fighter if they are applied right. He
warns me to practice them and keep them for when you know you’re gonna
lose and you need to pull back from the edge, but tells me its not
magic. I’d better be ready no matter what. I learn them with the same
hunger as everything else. We have two weeks until the fight. Jonni
drinks more, and acts stranger the closer we get to the fight itself.
*
* *
I’m
sitting on a bucket in a trampled over field. There is a small circle of
people around us. Orange safety cones that somebody has stolen from road
construction make an uneven imperfect circle. Jonni is wrapping my
hands. The first layer he puts around my hand is of thin cord,
nylon webbing. The next layer is white sports tape. He makes me look
only at him, instead of the guy mad-dogging me from the opposite end of
the circle. He’s talking at me in a low murmur, his voice as soothing
as a kitten’s purring. It insulates me. He tells me, that he made sure
there is a purse for the fight. So I all I have to do is go out there
and win, fuck this guy up he says. I’m ready. I don’t feel it but he
says so. I have to believe him, he’s my teacher, he’s taught me the
only things I value.
*
* *
It’s
not until I am spattered with the other man’s blood and he is still
and I am not that I begin to believe him. I am rushed to the car, the
money has exchanged hands after some very heated arguing. Jonni is
behind the wheel and brooding, I ask him what’s wrong and he tells me
to shut the fuck up. This is winning.
*
* *
The
next day there is no sign of Jonni’s sullenness, he greets me
with a rebel yell and a bear hug. I’m just happy he’s not pissed off
at me anymore.
*
* *
Over
the next few fights, I am getting a reputation for being a tough fighter
but a slow starter, I don’t remember what happed during the first
fight I had. Some have been more organized. One even had a bell, well to
be fair, it was just some asshole blowing the horn on his lowrider and
whoever kept time must have not had a watch. I realize that I can get
hit, a lot before I feel the urgency to finish things. I can end it
quick too, when a ring hurt from the last fight, you can bet the next
guy to step with me ? He get’s ended quick. Nobody beats me. After the
third time I fight that slow-starter way, taking that punishment only to
turn it into a win. Jonni yells at me after the fight, “What the fuck
are you doing?” he screams. “It’s like you’re paying for that
win in blood you fucking moron. It’s not blood it’s money”
I
wonder what he’s mad for, he got more money for those fights, he
doesn’t know it but I saw him out of the corner of my eye laying bets
of his own. I don’t begrudge him that, but he also never gave me a cut
from his winnings. Either he didn’t bet on me, or he’s keeping it to
himself. Either way, I don’t mind much.
He
had to admit, though, I made a shitload of money that way. I always got
half of the money he was up front about. That half went into a hidden
place. A little voice made me tell nobody about it. I listened.
One
night drinking at his home with Jonni, he tells me about some of his
fights. In the bars, and a couple of nerve-wracking times on the Rez.
Not sure if he was going to be allowed to leave with his life much less
his money for that one. He’s not Chicano, he’s half-Navajo and he didn't’ grow up on the rez. Dad was white.
After
a while, and a case of beer which he has been at heavily, he turns to me
and with utter seriousness tells me that one day I will be better than
him. After this utterance, he falls into a black mood. His moods are
swinging more often into the black the more I fight and win. If I was a
wise man I would have been able to recognize jealousy. I learn over time
that he is crazy, not all the time, but enough to convince me it’s
real.
*
* *
It
all came to a head after three more months. At this point I was getting
a reputation. I have people coming into town to see me fight, and people
coming to fight me. No names, no traces or things like that. In this
business everybody values anonymity.
Then
a guy died in the ring with me.
That’s
the way I have learned to look at it in my head. He died in the ring
with me. I didn’t kill him. Besides, if he was afraid of losing his
life what the hell was he doing in there to begin with.
When
I’m drunk, and I’m honest with myself, I know that I killed
him. I took his life. I ran like a coward in the resulting commotion.
Jonni packed me into his car and I sat in the back with the bloody hand wraps
still encasing my fists. All I can do is stare down at the
bloodied ripped material. Just stare. I rubbed my jaw with the
knuckles of my right hand, I felt something sharp and looked down afraid
that I had broken my hand and that one of the bones was sticking out.
It
turned out to be one of the guys front teeth. I remember sitting on his
chest. My knees on his biceps, I remember pinning him there and going to
work like John Henry, a sledge in each hand. I never saw that he stopped
moving, I mean, that’s the point of pinning somebody like that. To
keep them from moving, how was I supposed to know when to stop. I picked
the tooth out of the bandage and put it in the change pocket of my
jeans. I licked my lips absently and tasted blood that I had put there
when I rubbed my face. His blood. Dead man’s blood.
Why
hadn’t Jonni ever told me when to stop? How to stop?
I
stopped fighting after that. All the beauty that I thought was there
wasn’t anymore. Experience vs. dream. Dream always goes down in the
first round.
I
stopped going to Jonni’s house after that. I never went back. I went
to work. I went home. I drank. I slept. I was allowed the sum total of
that for a week, maybe two. I don’t remember so well, I was tired all
the time. I should have been worried about police coming to find me, but
logic told me it wouldn’t happen. The town had a ton of this shit
going on, they must have been getting a cut to stay away.
He
came to see me at work. To find out where I’d been.
“Haven’t
seen you in a while?” He said. “How you holding up, man?”
“I
been alright.”
“Yeah,
well, it’s time to get back in the saddle. I got you a fight.”
“Jonni....”
“Don’t
Jonni me, puto, we got bills to pay.”
He
grins.
“I’m
done.” I can’t explain the fear that gripped me when I said that.
It’s like your standing at the edge of something working up the
courage to step off, and then you do in mid-thought.
He
didn’t stop grinning, it just got wider. But his eyes gleamed a little
flatter and a little dimmer.
“When
could you be ready?”
I
look at him and the way he’s staring me down makes me think real hard
about the answer and all he’s done for me. Teaching me everything I
know about fighting. I should be grateful but I’m not. I’m just
scared.
“Give
me a month. I’ll think about it.”
“You’ve
got a week, puto. Okay, two. You’ve got a rep now. It’s time to
capitalize on that, you’re a killer. People will be lining up to fight
you. Big money. Get your shit together and your head in the game.”
He
looks at me, his eyes driving his unspoken point home like crucifixion nails. He turned and walked out. I went back to cleaning glasses. It was
nine at night, and the bar was slowing down to speed up later. I had
time to think, which is never good. I got more afraid the longer I stood
there slinging beers and cleaning the bar-top. He’s not gonna let me
go, he’s not gonna let me leave. I’m gonna have to fight again.
*
* *
You
don’t owe anybody a thing. The only bonds that can be placed upon you
are self-inflicted. That’s kind of bullshit, but I’m not talking
about jail or taxes. Sure those things are binding. But gratitude,
imagined or otherwise. Not these. People do what they do for their own
reasons. There are no altruists.
*
* *
Two
days went by and I thought of another thing, he’d taught me everything
I know. But this time that thought wasn’t a matter of gratitude it was
one of edge, and he had it. The really scary thing about learning from
somebody you don’t trust is that they teach you all you know.
Everything. It’s an intimate relationship, somebody learns the
workings of your mind and you heart. They see how you deal with pain,
pleasure, pressure, violence. This is all beneath the surface. On the
outside what they know is how you throw punches, how you counter.
Exactly how hard you can hit, where and for how long before you get
tired. They know your strengths, but that’s easy, they also know your
limitations. Which is the greater vulnerability.
For
the next day and a half I plotted my teacher’s death between shots of
vodka in my room alone. I even went to a local hardware store and bought
a hunting knife. I big thing with a hairsplitter edge. I worked in my
room sharpening the false edge on top running over the ways I could
maybe sneak up on him and cut his throat. I could hide the knife and
when he turned to get me a beer I could stab him in the back and cut his
throat. I could bleed him out right in his garage. I could let him knock
me down and while he was punching me I could hamstring him. I could gut
stab him and run. I could.......
I
could stop this line of thinking that would land my ass in jail, or a
ditch by the side of the road. Most likely he’d just take the thing
away from me and leave me dying and humiliated. Eventually I did the
most sensible thing I could think of....I sank the last of my money into
the Mexicans who fixed my car and got the fuck out of dodge. I drove.
North and west until my body threatened to pass me out and run me off
the road. I fought that urge for six more miles and parked the car and
slept right there in the front seat. I woke up stiff as a board and
shook my sleeping right leg enough to work a pedal and drove on. I
stopped for gas and Red Bull and nothing else until I reached Los
Angeles. I hid there. I never raised my hand to another human being.
*
* *
Trauma
is a lot like learning to ride a bike. You never forget those lessons.
*
* *
There
in LA I kept my head low, got another menial bartender job. I went back
to spinning my wheels. I took up smoking and destroyed my lung capacity
earned on the road and the heavy bag. I drank constantly. I did
everything I could to dull my edges. I didn’t know if I was “on”
anymore. I don’t think I really cared I wanted to make sure nobody
thought it would be a challenge to fight me anymore, I didn’t even
want to look like a fighter. But I kept the knife.
Until
I got the phone call. Yeah, I know doesn’t make any fucking sense does
it? I bought the phone as a concession to my new life. Along with the alcohol
and smokes it felt like yet another way to get as normal as
possible. But it ended up not being enough.
Ring.
It’s
two o’clock in the morning, it’s a Monday. I’m walking home from
the bar and I answer the thing.
“Hey
killer, how you doin’?”
Instantly
it’s all back, I spin put my back to a wall and look everywhere, the
edge comes back up like an unwanted hug.
“How’d
you get this number?”
He
ignores the question.
“When
could you be ready?”
“Ready
for what?”
“To
fight me. It’s time to find out who’s the best.”
What
the fuck is he talking about? Who’s the best? He is.
“
Look man, I’m a fucking mess okay? I don’t train or fight anymore. I
haven’t even thrown a punch in the air it months. You’re better, you
always have been what the hell are you talking about?”
“That’s
not enough, tell me when?”
I
sigh and pretend resignation.
“Give
me two months okay? I’ll be ready.”
He
hangs up. I don’t even bother to ask if he know where I am. He got the
phone number. He can find me. I walk along the avenue, light a smoke,
cough on the smoke and decide to quit. I put it out on the screen of the
phone and dump both into a nearby trashcan. Then I go home.
There’s
no way I’m gonna to fight this guy.
So
it’s another month of me stumbling around the city, half-drunk and
plotting somebody’s death. Which is just as absurd the second time
around. I’m good at beating the shit out of people, but I’m not a
ninja.
I
do my best never to think about the guy who died in the ring with me,
but it does come up when I question my ability to kill Jonni. But I
really didn’t count on him never getting back up. Ever. Like Jonni
said, accidents ain’t shit to be proud of.
Life
tries to tell you things sometimes, and she’s a subtle bitch most of
the time. But, like most women, eventually she gets bored with you not
getting it and get’s all pissed off.....and starts a fight. That’s
how I like to think of it when I run into Jonni outside an L.A. bar one
night, I’m walking past and he comes out. Unfortunately, not drunk off
his ass. He sees me right off the bat.
“Yo,
puto!”
“Jonni,”
I reply cautiously, looking for a likely exit. This is gonna get ugly.
“Why
you running? I didn’t think I raised a pussy.” He laughs, but his
eyes are shit nuts like always and I can feel him edging forward. It’s
not a physical thing, but you can still feel it when a fighter is
thinking about coming at you. Weighing the odds, checks and balances of
pain and risk. If I don’t want this to end in blood right here I
better head this off.
“Jonni,
I’ve been meaning to get back to you, lost the cell phone, you
know.”
“Oh
yeah, bullshit, son. Alright, when we gonna do this?”
“Give
me three weeks, to finish up training. I’ll meet you at the alleyway
behind the warehouses downtown. You know the place?” It’s a spot
anybody in our profession would’ve noticed, a perfect spot to
hold a fight. Nobody to hear or see for miles.
“Gimme
your driver’s license, puto.”
“What?”
I’m just stalling though, I know why he wants it. Fuck.
“So
your bitch ass can’t run and hide on me no more. We gonna have this
shit out.”
I
hand it over, I figure it doesn’t matter anymore, I can’t run, and I
can’t hide either. Fate, or god or the devil, some body feels the need
to see this through besides Jonni. I certainly don’t give a crap. But
I should amend that in my head, I have to start giving a crap soon.
I
hand over the license and nod to him, risking walking past him, so when
he feigns a lunge at me, I flinch accommodatingly, and slink away to his
laughter.
*
* *
I
spend the next two weeks training my ass off, working hard right up
until the end. The park is my gym and the streets are my track. I
haven’t invested in any equipment here. I never intended to fight
again. I run interval sprints until I feel like I’m gonna throw up
every meal ever eaten by anybody ever. Since I don’t train on a full
stomach, all that comes up is acid and saliva. I’ve taken some old
towels and blankets from the thrift store and duct tape and found an old
dead tree in the park, I wrap it in old cloth and duct tape. That’s my
heavy bag. My knuckles bleed every time. I stop after a week to give
them a chance to heal. I do push-ups till I can’t get up of the
ground. Pull-ups the same. Sit ups by the hundred set. It’s all part
of it, but truthfully, this close to the fight, I’m only preparing my
mind for what I have to do, the body won’t change enough this quick.
Luckily for me, it wasn’t dead, just sleeping. Wake up, we got shit to
do.
The
rest of the time, I eat like crazy, I sleep. In truth I have never felt
better than I do right now, and I am terrified that Jonni is going to
kill me. But there is such joy. I had forgotten what it was like to have
focus and drive. I am almost grateful for Jonni for giving this back to
me. Then I remember the guy wants to beat my ass to death. It’s fucked
up, but I’m still grateful.
*
* *
There’s
one final thing to remember about fighting. Cheat like a motherfucker.
*
* *
Tonight's
the night. I don’t remember jogging over here, I don’t remember
getting ready to go, I just remember being here, standing in some rare
moonlight, and looking at Jonni across the way from me. Looking quick
and mean as hell.
“You
ready, Puto?”
I
nod.
We
circle.
We
shift, shuck, jive and slip.
We
are one thing, And it’s trying to kill itself.
Jonni
throws the first punch and I take it on a forearm, taking a step back
and one behind so that we haven’t gotten any closer together or
further apart. I’m gonna let him set the pace for now. Let him make
the decisions. React.
But,
ultimately, fighting defensively is a losing proposition. So I throw a
couple punches here and there. So does he. Now we’re both bleeding. I
take a kick on the outside of my leg, a sharp one, that slides in on the
shin, grinding the muscle. That always hurts, and my leg buckles a
little. I go to one knee and his other knee slams into my chest, I fall
back but roll to the side immediately, slamming into one of his legs
with first my elbow, and then pushing forward and fast driving a
shoulder into his knees. Down he goes, but I let myself get too grateful
with having survived the first real clash, so I let him go, I don’t
finish it. He gets to his feet staring at me, incredulous. Then he
screws up his face and spits at mine.
“Fuckin’,
puto. What the fuck are you doing, pussy? This shit ain’t playtime.
Get your shit together. I ain’t gonna win cause you fuck it up
again.”
I
don’t know what he’s talking about but I sigh to myself and step
forward, thinking ‘let’s bang then.’
We
bang, trading punches, he’s hitting me a lot more than I am hitting
him. I managed to keep my head turning, the harder punches slide off,
one palm slams into my forehead dead center and stumble back, he uses
the advantage to press forward swinging with both hands, and I drop.
Blood drops onto the hands I hold over my face as I turn away from him,
I can feel the blows rain down on my shoulders and I know I don’t have
to worry about feeling anything for know. Then I get hit in the
corner of the skull, and then the same shoulder. I use both strikes to
easy my spin, my right elbow covering my face and held high. I
grab the back of his neck with my left, my right drops down and behind
me. I spin blood in his eyes, and draw my knife from the small of my
back, it clears the leather sheath with a scrape you can feel. I slam it
into his groin, he lifts up, the body’s instinct to get away, I pull it
out and cut deep into the inner thigh, and the femoral artery ruptures.
He bleeds out in seconds. He doesn’t even make a sound, dies quiet.
I hold him to me and feel his body relax, my torso and legs warmed by
his blood. I get up and g through his pockets and get my driver’s
license.
I
paid the cost. Took the beating until I could finish it. He wasn’t
paying attention.
I
walk over to where I dropped my backpack. I pick it up and jog a few
blocks to another warehouse. Look around and go into an alley. I unzip
my bag and take out a bottle of lighter fluid and matches. I strip off
my running suit, underneath I am wearing jeans and t-shirt, unsoiled but
for sweat. I take off the sneakers and replace them with the clean boots
in the bag, I take out a bunch of baby wipes. I clean up my face and
hands, adding everything to the pile with the sneakers, running suit.
Finally I add the back-pack as well, I add the hat I was wearing. It all
goes to the pile, which I squirt with the fluid until it’s empty,
I toss that on the pile as well. I step back a few feet, spark the
whole book of matches, toss them onto the pile and walk away. I parked
my car a few feet away. I get in, shift my knife to a more comfortable
position and start her up, lighting a cigarette. I’m gonna go see what
Portland is like this time of year.
Copyright 2006 by
Justin Porter
Justin Porter
lives and works in New York City. He's a writer and a martial artist.
He's been published in the NEW YORK TIMES and THUG LIT.
