Redemption

by Shey Stahl

  I was slipping fast and I knew it.

  Fight, ya fuckin’ pussy. FIGHT HIM!

  Lucas’s right cross wasn’t pretty. He didn’t have a lot of style when he had me in the corner, but his hits rocked me. He popped me a number of times in the side of the head and my left eye, to which it swelled up immediately. Having already been swelling from round five when he caught me, it was now nearly closed and bleeding to the point where it was starting to constrict my vision.

  Forced together and clinching, Auzzie once again pushed us apart to check the bleeding, worried I wouldn’t be able to see. I knew I wouldn’t be able to see his hits coming clearly but there was no way I was letting this fight end on account of my eye, like when his was bleeding.

  My problem internally wasn’t my eye at that point. I feared the fight was slipping out of my hands. His punches weren’t fading. If anything, they had as much power as they did in round one.

  As they fussed over my eye, I looked to Tallan then, knowing she probably saw a lot of blood when the towels began to fall away and on the ground. Her hand was clasped over her mouth, the other one locked around my dad’s arm, holding onto him, Jared on her other side. She looked sick, probably from the blood, but there was a glimpse of frightened there too, as if she was fearing the worst. This ending with Lucas winning. I wasn’t going to let that happen.

  Don’t be afraid, honey.

  Winking at her, I then tipped my head back, focusing on the doctor. Though it was bleary, I could still see. “I’m good. It’s fine.”

  They managed to stop the bleeding and let us go at it again.

  The ninth round showed my resilience and my ability as I nailed him with lefts and rights, uppercuts, jabs, hooks, and one powerful right cross that had him rocking back into the ropes. His head snapped back, staggering with quick steps and off balance. I knew he was hurt, but not bad enough to go down.

  I waited, sweat beading on my brow, my body completely drenched in sweat and blood now.

  Don’t go down. Don’t. Fight me. Give me everything you have.

  Some might have thought it was crazy I didn’t want him to go down yet. But I didn’t. Yeah, I wanted to hit him and knock him out, see him crumble like I had in that first fight, but I wanted the glory of that twelfth round knockout.

  Lucas retaliated with his own, some rocking me just as hard. And if anything, they made me counter with more fury and pissed me off, my style fading into pure hatred.

  Focus, man. Don’t fight like that. Use your control. Control is the key here. Take a breath, move, make him come to you for a while.

  Stepping back, I attempted to calm myself down, knowing I was heading down a path I didn’t want to take.

  “Stick and jab,” Adam repeated from my corner. “Stick and jab.”

  With minutes remaining in the round, Lucas began to drop his hands, and I knew fatigue was setting in for him too. Still, he was all over the ring, keeping up the tempo and dancing around flickering jabs at me.

  With seconds to go, I too could feel my arms going weary, but I kept hitting him. I had to.

  You could see it on our faces as we sat across from one another. Legs burning, bleeding, lungs on the verge of exploding, but we weren’t giving up. I was spent, arms fatigued. My stomach rolled from the adrenaline and the pounding of my head. If it hadn’t been for needing to continue, I would have probably thrown up.

  With the power behind his hits, the blows were felt like a shot gun any time he landed that disastrous right on me. Because of that, my head hurt so badly that any time he hit me, I saw stars.

  Gasping in breaths, I was dehydrated, my body pushed beyond its limits. I was completely done, but I took satisfaction in knowing he was too. No matter how hard you trained, and despite everyone’s theory on an athlete’s body, we’re no different. Our bodies could only go for so long.

  During the tenth round, I also knew my eye wasn’t going to take much more of his hits. I was already seeing three of him. When the bell rang for the end of the round, I walked back to my corner, or rather I stumbled, and sat down. My body was giving up. Stay with him. I prayed.

  Your body tells you you’ve given all you can give. Your mind will carry you the rest of the way.

  The boys went to work on my eye once again, applying pressure, adrenaline and then coating it with Vaseline.

  “You got this. Keep working him. He’s done. Look at him,” Adam urged. “Stick with him. Two more. Give me two more rounds.”

  I did look at Lucas right then. I saw a man who knew he was in trouble.

  Halfway into round eleven, I kept going after his body, punching his ribs with hooks anytime he’d get close. It took its toll after a while and I knew it’d done some damage, maybe fractured a rib when he kept favoring his right side.

  I caught him with a vicious uppercut to the jaw, his head flinging back dramatically and earning a roar from the crowd. He wasn’t going down though and I began to wonder if I could knock him out. It seemed impossible at that point.

  As the round came to an end, I finally threw a left hook that I knew did some damage. Lucas flinched back, his balance off but he didn’t go down.

  It wasn’t my most powerful hit of the night, but it gave him a stun.

  To irritate him, I hit low on his side, near his groin. His body lurched forward as the referee pushed me back and waved to the judges on the side. “No point.”

  “Fight like a man, not your bitch.” Lucas groaned, retreating to his corner.

  Go head, asshole. Call her a bitch and watch my reaction.

  Turning my back, I smiled, as did Adam. “Stick with him, man, you’re wearing him down now. This is your fight.”

  I glanced at the judges, my gut twisting at the thought Lucas had scored more frequently than me. If it went to the cards, would I win?

  Don’t think like that.

  Sitting on my stool, I turned right then, and I wasn’t sure why, but my eyes snapped to Tallan, as if she said something to me. She didn’t though. At least not verbally. Seeing my head snapping back with the blows, I knew her concern was growing.

  Her eyes were wide with panic and fear, underneath that was the adoration she had for me that I was even doing this in the first place. To fight, to push yourself, to let someone beat the shit out of you like this, as if it was fun.

  One more round. That’s all you have left. Three minutes. You can do it.

  Though I was already mentally telling myself everything I needed to hear, Adam was my voice of reason, the final push I needed for this last round.

  “Look at me, D. Only me.” I did immediately, though he was a little hard to see with one eye. It was worse than I let on, but I wasn’t going to have them call it for my lack of vision. I only needed one to see him. “Don’t look at her like she’s the reason you’re fighting. Or your dad. This fight is for you. The same guy who I saw completely beat down when he tried to win for someone else. Count on yourself and no one else. Show that motherfucker why you’re called Southpaw. Give him the full force of that left hook.”

  Three minutes left and I was counting down the seconds, knowing I either needed to knock him out, or give them a show in order to win on the cards. I had to do this, find the strength internally and give myself the edge I needed. Hundreds of images rushed through my head, the darker ones I never wanted to remember and my fight. The reason I fought so hard in life, in the ring. I saw my mother, the door closing behind her. The bottle in my dad’s hand, the way he hopelessly turned to it.

  Fight. Don’t give up.

  I saw Stella as a girl, worn and needing someone. I also saw her leaving and then days later, the moments when I didn’t think I could stand the pain.

  I saw myself face down on the canvas.

  Give more. Be more. Take more.

  With about a minute remaining in the round with my dad’s words in my head, I came up strong with a quick combination and I could see Lucas struggling. His head snapped back and I knew he was hurt. I wasn’t sure
where the strength had come from, but I couldn’t help but think it was from the memories, the will to survive and never see myself that low again.

  Firing three or four right jabs, I landed a left hook right on his jaw and then another to his rib cage as fast as I could. Not only did I want the fight over, I had to act when he stumbled or I’d miss my chance.

  Lucas dropped to the canvas, on his knees but then stood up again as if he was some kind of fucking terminator. I knew it wouldn’t be easy. Not with how tired we both were.

  He got up and took the mandatory standing eight count, his body hunched forward. His eyes were both nearly swollen shut now, his face, neck and chest caked in blood where the cut above his eye had opened up like a faucet. I could tell by the look on his face, eyes wide and dilated, and I knew he was dazed.

  My legs shook from the exertion, barely able to keep me standing.

  Don’t give up on me now. Push. Give. Take.

  I wasn’t going to hold back any longer when I sensed he was in trouble. I knew enough that any fight could turn in seconds and it could have been me in trouble and him capitalizing on it. I had to take advantage.

  When the ref gave the nod, I went for him, swinging with the style I knew, back alley and aggressive and merciless speed.

  Now’s your chance. Take it. Don’t let up.

  The thud of each hit and the snap of his head, the breaking of his skin as the leather slid on flesh, echoed in my ears. I heard the crack of his nose and cheek bone when I landed another hook and followed with a jab to the side of his head.

  Hit after hit, I treated him like my punching bag when my legs started to give out, burning so badly I wasn’t sure I could keep standing. But failure wasn’t an option. I also knew that was precisely when I needed to give more. It was that moment that it needed to happen. This was the moment when fights were won.

  When I felt like I couldn’t, when my body wouldn’t, I did.

  I did because doing it was what made good fighters, great fighters.

  Made them champions.

  “You need to step into that ring for you, Destry Stone, and no one else. You’re not proving anything to anyone but you.”

  When Lucas stumbled back and didn’t go down, a knot formed in my stomach. I needed to win this by knockout. It was the only way.

  He stood back up and I went in for the kill, doing everything and anything I could to bring him down, hitting him with lefts and rights, uppercuts, anything. Lucas knew where this was going and from the look in my eyes, I was sure he knew how it was ending. He left me one good opening when he covered up and left his chin unprotected. I landed a right uppercut with so much force it vibrated through my shoulder.

  His head flew back along with his mouth guard and right to the canvas. He was out, his body draped over the lower strand of ropes. Part of me wanted to laugh that it wasn’t my left hook that took him down. An upper cut. And not even my hardest hit of the night.

  Auzzie began the count, second after second more excruciating than the last.

  One.

  I didn’t look at anyone.

  Two.

  My stomach burned, clenching in fear and anticipation.

  Three.

  He’s out. He has to be. You got him.

  Four.

  Lucas lifted his arms and rolled over, trying to gain some strength.

  Five.

  Eyes widened, he drew himself to his knees, on all fours, breathing in gasping breaths. I watched with anxiety gnawing through me, afraid of what was to come.

  Fuck, he’s getting up. Give him more. You got it in you. Show him your left hook and he won’t be getting up again.

  Six.

  I paced my corner, stare intent on my prey. If he got up, I’d do the same. Give him what I’d intended on giving. I’d show him what this southpaw was capable of. I’d show him what me, Destry Stone could do when tested. Win.

  Seven.

  Lucas tried to stand and stumbled, shaking his head again and then our eyes met. He was gone completely, nobody home.

  Eight.

  Auzzie threw his hands up, waving him off. The fight was over.

  No one could say that Lucas hadn’t given everything he had in that fight. The same could be said for me. Back in my corner, I collapsed to the canvas, practically in tears. I’d given everything and more that I had left to those last hits.

  The crowd roared to life and Adam lunged through the ropes to hug me. He lifted me in the air, flashes of lights from the cameras, but I only looked for one person. Tallan. Our eyes locked on one another when they announced the winner.

  “Destry Stone has done it!” the announcer wailed from beside the ring, attempting to make his way to the ring. “He’s the new Heavyweight Champion of the World!”

  Nothing prepared me for hearing those words again. Emotions swelled in my head, ones I couldn’t even begin to decipher.

  Tallan clasped her hand over her mouth, crying out in excitement. I winked at her, or at least I tried to. My eyes were both so swollen it didn’t work. So I mouthed the words ‘I love you’ and then swept my stare to my dad beside her.

  He was smiling.

  I dropped to my knees in my corner and I prayed. I wasn’t even sure what I was praying for, just that I was for the first time in my life. Maybe it was my way of trying to grasp the meaning behind winning. I might never know.

  I prayed to understand it.

  I prayed to feel it.

  To throw in the towel also, to throw in the sponge at the end of the fight, to give up, acknowledge defeat. When a boxer’s second feels his boxer is taking a beating and doesn’t think he can or should continue, he throws a towel or sponge into the ring to stop the fight and end by TKO.

  I won.

  I did it.

  Me.

  Destry Stone.

  Immediately after staring at Tallan, I looked to my dad, wondering, praying he might have remembered something, anything, maybe one memory?

  Though he was standing and cheering, the vacant look in his eyes told me he didn’t know me, the boy, was his son. For once, for now, I was okay with that.

  With blood pouring from my eye, I raised both my gloves in the air and the fans roared to life for their new world champion. I wasn’t sure how to feel at that point. I had been so focused on one goal and trained for so long, and now it was over. It was all so hard to absorb and understand.

  I did this.

  I won the fight of my life, my redemption. I came back from the streets of hell and shoved it down their fucking throats.

  A smile tugged at my lips, the cameras surrounding me catching it perfectly, the moment, the feeling, all of it. As it sank in, there was one person I desperately wanted to hold right then and it was Tallan. I wanted to wrap my arms around her so tight, only I couldn’t even begin to get to her when the ring filled with press and commissioners.

  Commotion was everywhere, cameras, people congratulating me, all at once. It was hard to grasp the meaning behind it when I could barely move. On my knees in my corner, I faced the ropes and my emotions took over. Nearing tears, I stared at my father once more, the sense of pride and love radiating from him. He was proud of the boy.

  And then Tallan, her hand clasped over her mouth, crying that over months of working this hard, I’d proven no one could keep me down.

  I accomplished something much more valuable than simply gaining my title back. I’d redeemed myself.

  Tallan finally made her way over to me, pushing past people and into the ring. “I knew you could do it,” she whispered in my ear as I held her to my chest. “I’m so fucking proud of you.”

  I nodded, holding her so tightly I was probably crushing her but I didn’t care. This moment, her in my arms, was what I needed. “I love you so much.” Once my hands were free, I touched the side of her face. My stance widened and Adam wiped my face once more and then my forehead, smearing the blood around. Tallan’s face was white as she took in my appearance. I tipped her head back, h
er bloodshot eyes finding mine, tears streaming down her cheeks. Blinking, the drops of water looked like diamonds under the lights.

  So was so fucking beautiful. I wanted to take her back to the room right now as I showered her face and lips with kisses. I was suddenly overwhelmed with my need for her that made itself known and I had to pull back, knowing it wasn’t the place for this. My desire, raw and real, would have to wait, for now.

  Over her shoulder, I saw Stella with Lucas, holding him the same for an entirely different reason. Stella and I exchanged a look, one of resentment and I looked away, drawing back to focus on Tallan. “Thank you, T. For staying with me through all this.”

  “Do you need anything?” she asked, her voice hoarse.

  My lips came coaxingly down on hers and I gave her a sweaty kiss knowing it left her weak. “I want to go back to our room.”

  “Soon, baby.” She kissed me back, lingering, savoring every moment despite the crowd around us.

  NORMALLY I DIDN’T look in the mirror after the fight, but this time I did. I wanted to see if I looked any different. My face was swelling, my eyes blurry. I was nauseous, dehydrated, and my head pounded and my hands throbbed. I was a fucking mess for sure.

  Smiling, it hurt, but I couldn’t help myself.

  I was the champion again.

  Stepping inside the shower, I sat alone in my thoughts, the warm spray of the shower beating down on my sore and strained muscles. It was then, in the sanctuary of the shower that I felt alone for the first time in weeks. Not lonely, like I felt after the first fight, this time I knew I was alone in my victory.

  I did this.

  I won that fight.

  I pushed myself because no one else was going to.

  My head hung, my chin touching my chest as I washed away the sweat of the victory, blood pooling at my feet.

  When I finished with the shower, I was half naked with a towel around my waist when the door opened. I thought it’d be Tallan because she said she was going to get my dad after the press conference.