Redemption

by Shey Stahl

  FIGHT NIGHT

  7 P.M.

  As the undercards fought, Adam stood in front of me, watching me carefully, taping up my hands with the commissioner to his left with ten others in the room. I wasn’t watching any of them. I was listening to my trainer. Everyone else had disappeared around me, when in reality, they hadn’t. To my right, a doctor examined my hands. To my left, a boxing commissioner critiqued, making sure nothing illegal was done in the process of wrapping my fists.

  In front of me, Adam was my motivator. “Forget about everyone and anything else except this fight. Don’t think about last night, or this week. Think about now.”

  It was his job to pump me up, give me the confidence I needed. It was what he was here for. Keep me calm and poised. Though nothing had gone as planned this week, I knew I couldn’t, wouldn’t think about that any longer.

  “His reach is longer, he’s got you on size but you’re younger and faster. His straight right and uppercut could knock you out, but he gets spooked easily. He’s never tasted the salt of your left hook. It’s your weapon. He also doesn’t know you have just as much power in your right. Show him. Make him fight the fight you want. Work his body and don’t back off. His weakness is an inside fighter. You saw that fight with Yurli. Use that to your advantage. Protect your chin. He can’t fight an inside fighter, you know that. Get in there.”

  The more he spoke, the more I saw the fight playing out, round after round in my head. I would fight the way I felt. Obsessively as if it controlled me. Because it had. Incessantly. Never letting up, never giving him the advantage. I’d fight him with the anger and hunger inside of me, the maddening disposition that controlled me and my fears.

  Nodding to the rhythm in my head, the heavy bass thumping wildly in my ear, Adam finished taping my hands and gloved me. I was left alone for a few minutes.

  I knew, or at least, I hoped my dad would give me some last words of encouragement, or hell, give me some pointers on a fighter like Ray Lucas. His style was very similar to Jules Shearer, the one and only boxer who’d ever knocked out my dad back in ’96. I remember that fight distinctively and would never forget the obsessive way Dad watched that fight for years, searching for anything he could on what went wrong.

  Bringing my dad along wasn’t about me. I knew he’d enjoy the atmosphere around us, and he had this week. With the unrelenting press, I wasn’t able spend a lot of time around him, until today. He’d been with me nearly all day.

  He said very little, until now. Stepping forward, he rested against the large metal table in the corner of my dressing room, now covered with gauze and tape. He was dressed nice as always, in all black with a suit jacket on. “You ready, boy?”

  Our eyes met, blue on blue, father and son, a man I revered with such respect I knew words would never even come close to letting him know how I truly felt about him.

  Remember me. Just blink and remember. I begged internally.

  No matter how much I desperately wanted that, it wasn’t going to happen. How could he not realize it or understand? Everyone around me was calling me Destry. Had he really not seen that? The robe draped on the chair beside him said Southpaw, my nickname since I started boxing.

  Did he not see that either?

  When my mother left, he had too much pride to ever officially acknowledge it. Maybe it was like that now. Maybe he was too damn stubborn to admit anything, or reveal his memory was gone for good.

  “I am ready,” I finally said, dropping my eyes to my gloves. My voice cracked around the words, but not from emotion, from the fact that I had said very little today.

  “When my son contended for his first title bout, I gave him a piece of advice.” Maybe I was lying to myself, maybe he did have too much pride, but regarding me right then, something told me he remembered more than I gave him credit for. Maybe not me in particular, but emotions. “I told him to remember one thing above all else. ‘Your body tells you you’ve given all you can give. Your mind will carry you the rest of the way.’”

  TALLAN WAS THE last to come into the dressing room as I was shadow boxing. She approached me, dressed in a skin-tight black dress that matched my shorts. Around her neck was the necklace I bought her on the way home from the winery a few weeks back. I couldn’t help where my stare went first, her cleavage, and then her hips and the curve of her waist.

  Fuck, she is beautiful.

  Groaning, my head fell forward, against her shoulder. “Of course, you have to look like that tonight.” Unable to stop myself, I drew her closer so her body was pressed to mine, our chests touching. “When I win, I’m taking you straight to bed.”

  Tallan smiled at my words, as if they were exactly what she wanted to hear from me. “When you win, I’ll probably jump on you in the ring and maybe repeat our first time.”

  Licking my lips slowly, I drew in a whistled breath. “Damn…did Jared bring his gun? He’ll probably need it to keep the men off you tonight.”

  “Everyone knows I’m your girl, Destry. I’ve been by your side since I got here. And it’s not going to change during the fight. I’ll be watching you and only you.”

  I knew what she meant by those words and I appreciated them more than I could tell her right then.

  “Hmmm.” I smiled. “Well, prepare yourself. There’s going to be lots of sex tonight.” Our lips met gently, but there was an underlining hunger burning. “Lots of dirty sex.”

  Reaching up, she angled my face toward her to whisper in my ear. “I can’t wait.”

  And then she was gone, and I was back to my thoughts—a place I didn’t care to be in that moment as none of them made any sense to me.

  CAESARS PALACE WORLD BOXING ORGANIZATIONS TITLE FIGHT

  LUCAS VS. STONE

  8 P.M.

  PRIOR TO leaving for the pavilion, I took one last look in the mirror. The man I saw now was nothing but alive, angry and hungry for the win. I couldn’t wait to teach this son of a bitch a lesson.

  At eight pm, we made the procession down the aisle. I walked slowly, savoring this feeling it gave me, knowing my father was here, and Tallan.

  “Finally, the bout you’ve been waiting for. The World Boxing Organizations World Championship fight! Ladies and Gentleman, your feature event here at Caesars Palace, twelve rounds of boxing for the World Boxing Organizations Heavyweight Title of the World.”

  I don’t remember anything else after that about the introductions. It was like last night at the bar, and the weigh in, my mind went blank and focused completely on one thing. Winning.

  We met in the middle, awaiting the referee to give us his instructions. The two of us were only feet apart, him as the defending champion, me daring to take back what was mine all along.

  I jumped up and down as the ref gave his instructions.

  Keep calm. Your fight. Your win. You.

  “I expect a good clean fight. Protect yourself at all times. Any questions from the challenger?” Auzzie, the ref, looked to me and I glared.

  Challenger? Tonight that ended.

  I shook my head and he glanced at Lucas, whose head remained down. “Any questions from the champ?”

  Champ… no more.

  Lucas’s head shook as well. “All right, shake hands.”

  I didn’t want to shake his hand. I didn’t even want to look at him. We bumped gloves and I trained my eyes on the canvas, completely in my zone and not wanting to see his penetrating gaze trying to sway me out of it.

  Retreating to my corner, Adam gave me some words of wisdom in the final seconds before the fight. “This is your fight. Never forget that.”

  He was right. I had done everything I could to prepare for this fight and it was time to show him how prepared I was.

  Taking one last look at Tallan, and my father seated next to her, I knew I was finally ready.

  They both watched me, waiting to see what my reaction would be. I gave them a wink.

  And then the bell rang.

  Bareknuckle boxing is the original form
of boxing dating back to Ancient Greece. It’s the more savage precursor to the Marguess of Queensberry rules, which mandated the use of gloves.

  Shaking out my arms, my eyes trained on my opponent. I came out of my corner with everything to prove, and lose. During the opening moments of the fight, neither one of us made a hit. It was like a standoff, feeling out the tension.

  Thirty seconds into the first round, we hadn’t made a hit yet when Lucas tapped the side of my head with his glove and smiled, winking at me, assessing my reaction.

  Keep calm. Don’t get worked up yet. Breathe.

  I responded with a left hook straight to his temple. I wouldn’t tolerate his taunting one bit. Not after last night.

  He felt the hit as his head snapped to the side, and then he jumped back bouncing on the balls of his feet and shaking his head. “Okay,” he smiled. “You came prepared this time, eh.”

  I’d like to shove that Canadian accent down your motherfucking throat.

  With that hit, the thousands of fans inside Caesars Palace knew I wasn’t the same fighter I was at the Garden. I wasn’t going to go down without a fight and this son of a bitch knew it.

  With seconds to go in that round, Lucas popped me with a jab that caught my attention but I only laughed, earning me a cheer from the crowd.

  That’s it, get in his head. Embarrass him.

  The round ended as uneventfully as it began.

  Round two, I thought I was in control but I wasn’t sure. You could never be completely sure until the bell rang. In my corner between rounds one and two, Adam was reassuring, but letting me know where my weakness was.

  “Get him tired.” Throughout the rounds, I knew his words would be there, as they should, giving me drive when I felt my own thoughts slipping. “Make him work and get in there. You give him a fucking jab, and then you back up. Get in there.”

  “I am,” I replied, wondering if he was watching the same fight. I was doing that. What the fuck was he talking about? And then it dawned on me.

  No, you’re not. You were dancing around him.

  All right, maybe I wasn’t. I was trying to get in there but I knew Lucas had a right hook I didn’t want to witness. If I was close enough and he had the right angle, he’d surely use it.

  Locked in a clinch, Lucas whispered in my ear, “Your girl’s looking nice in that dress. I bet she likes to get fucked in the ass, doesn’t she?”

  He was obviously trying to get me riled up and it worked. Shoving him away from me, I landed a jab to his nose and left hook to his head. After that, before he could recover, I battered in with another combination, hit after hit intent on inflicting as much damage as I could.

  He nailed me hard with a right hook to my cheek and a left jab. My face absorbed blow after blow, but no way was I giving up.

  That’s okay, you’re still in it.

  He’d learned a thing or two since December and I knew how much power was behind his punches. In my entire career, no one had ever hit me that hard.

  When the bell rang, I retreated to my corner where they applied pressure to my eye, gauze soaked with adrenaline to stop the bleeding and then smeared Vaseline over it and my face. Vaseline wasn’t to make the punches less of an impact, it was to keep my skin from tearing so easily.

  During the third round, the atmosphere in Caesars Palace took on a gladiatorial style, the audience expecting the two bloodied fighters in the ring to ramp it up a notch. Well, they got that when Lucas kept up his remarks about Tallan. He knew from the bar he had some advantage there with his words.

  I didn’t want to fight angry. When a fighter was angry, he didn’t think clearly. He fought sloppy. And I was no exception to that rule. I was a prime fucking example of what not to be.

  Lucas knew that and did everything in his power to get under my skin. He taunted me, made obscene gestures toward Tallan, who ultimately remained clueless because it wasn’t like she could hear him with the noise around her.

  Either way, she showed no reaction to his antics.

  Lucas knew what to say to get me to fight with venom and lose my cool, and he said it.

  “How long do you think I was fucking Stella before that fight?” he taunted, waiting for me to react.

  I said nothing in reply. It didn’t matter if she had been fucking him all along.

  “Ay, okay.” He nodded his head, smiling. “What if I said I saw Tallan before the fight?” With his shoulders hunched, he was poised, hands up in defense waiting for my retribution to his words.

  He’s lying. She was with you. He’ll do anything. Ignore him.

  I said nothing and took a jab, and then two more to the side of his head. He blocked them, dancing around.

  “That’s okay, you know my mouth will be on her cunt before the nights out,” he spat, rocking on his feet. “Even if I have to take it, she’ll beg for it like Stella did. I bet she lets me fuck her ass too.”

  My guard was down with those words and he hit me then, solid, right on the corner of my temple. It pissed me off. I saw white instantly, my ears ringing with the hit. Stumbling back, I caught myself against the ropes, the crowd screaming in response. Squaring up, I stalked toward him. “You better shut your fucking mouth,” I growled, laying into him. I abandoned my style and control, and started hitting him as hard and fast as I could. He asked for this. This was what he wanted, and he was about to see how violent I could be. “You wanted me, here I am, motherfucker!”

  Stop! Don’t react this way.

  My mind wouldn’t listen. I couldn’t see straight, the anger had fed me to the point the adrenaline consumed my mind and I saw red. Every bone in my body vibrated, the beating of my heart loud and suffocating.

  I’d let my guard down and he trapped me in a clench, momentarily controlling me when the ref pushed us apart and the bell rang signaling the end of the third round.

  Swallowing rapidly, I twisted around, moving my footing and wiping my forehead with my right forearm as I stalked back to my corner. I didn’t want to fight mad, but when I did, I fought with an urgency I didn’t always have. Didn’t want to have.

  Nothing prepared me for what I would be like when I heard that. I practically threw myself into the stool.

  “What the fuck was that?” Adam scolded. “Knock that shit off. Drown him out. Don’t even hear that bullshit. You know he’s full of lies.”

  I wanted to argue with Adam but I knew there was truth in his words. I glanced over to Tallan, my breathing heavy and constricted, emotions pulling me in so many directions. Confusion garbled her features for a moment, and then she searched my face, looking to understand what had taken place moments ago.

  I had nothing to offer her.

  Don’t do this. Don’t give up so easily.

  During the one-minute rest period, I heard one person over the intensity of the crowd ringside.

  Jared.

  “Come on, man!” He grinned, pumping his fists in the air. “Give us a goddamn show!”

  For some reason, and maybe that was his plan, but his words made me chuckle. What the fuck did he think was happening out here?

  WHEN I SETTLED down, when I saw the fight the way I needed to, I fought my fight. I didn’t give into his ways.

  Now covered in a layer of sweat, I was vicious and unrelenting in my punches, never giving up and making solid scoring hits where he wasn’t landing them.

  “Get in there! Get closer.” His trainer would yell from his corner, slamming his hands against the canvas. The thing was, Lucas knew what going toe-to-toe with me meant. He was within reach of my deadly left hook, a hit he didn’t want to taste. And hadn’t yet. I never offered it that first fight, and when I did tonight, he’d know it.

  During the seventh round, I snuck in some combinations when I had him against the ropes and out of his rhythm. One left cross connected with his right eye below his eyebrow and split it open immediately, blood gushing in a red streak down his cheek and neck.

  Auzzie waved to me, motioning for me to retrea
t to my corner while the commissioner evaluated Lucas’s eye. I sat down on my chair, as did Lucas across from me, three doctors blocking my view of him. The crowd cheered thinking I’d won the fight, but I didn’t want that. Not like this.

  Adam kneeled in front of me. “They might call it. He’s bleedin’ pretty bad, bro.”

  Fuck. No. Not like this.

  I knew if it went to the scorecards, we were evenly matched and I may not win. I panicked. God, did I fucking panic. “No! I don’t want to win like that. No.”

  Though there was no saying at this point it would if it went to the cards.

  “I know.” Adam turned his head, watching the doctor’s fuss over the blood and try to close the wound by applying adrenaline. “But you might.”

  “No. Fuck that.” In a rush of emotions, as I’d trained for too long, too hard to win like this, I stood up knocking over my stool and pushing against Adam to yell across the ring at them. “He’s fine! Tell him he’s fucking fine.” I motioned up in the air with my left hand. “Let’s go.” I couldn’t catch my breath, gasping out the words.

  Auzzie waved me back when I tapped the commissioner on the shoulder. “He’s fine.”

  Lucas caught my sight then, the hunger and grit to continue as evident in his stare. No way did he want this to end like that either.

  I saw the way Lucas observed my temper tantrum there. He knew I didn’t want to end on a technicality. “I’m fine,” he mumbled, shaking them off.

  Five minutes later, we were back at it, evenly matched and both attempting to win the rounds, biding our time for the final round. Normally, one might want to go for the knock out, get it over with. Not us. Not with the buildup of the fight and this night. It seemed, and I would have never expected it from him, but Lucas had trained for the same fight. A fight he’d earn, not take.

  If I ever questioned whether or not Lucas would be ferocious enough to go round after round with me, I had my answer now. The thought made me smile.

  In the eighth round, Lucas came out of his corner a different fighter, recharged and focused. He’d regained his footing and was stalking me, trapping me in the corner and giving me a beating.