by P. S. Power
His mother mock hit as his arm.
“Is that any way to talk? Dump me on them?” It didn’t sound tense or anything, but she was actually fairly easy going most of the time. That was one of the best things about her. It always had been.
He nodded, then tried again.
“Right. Sorry. Um, Jen, can you and Rick take on the terrible and terrifying burden of watching my mother while I’m briefly out of the room? You know where the fire extinguishers are, right?”
Deirdre laughed at him then.
“Better. I can sit here at the table? I’d help, but I don’t want to be in the way.”
Jen smiled then, hopefully getting that Deirdre wasn’t going to be that big of a problem. Not in public anyway. They started chatting while Anthony got out of the room, to the back locker room. It was the smaller one, used by the male employees. The female employee room was just down the hall from there, but no one was likely in either at that time of day. The fighters and customers had larger spaces, since there were a lot more of them.
Tony has some of his old clothing with him, having not bothered to get anything new since he’d gotten there. Some socks and two pairs of new shoes, because he ran enough to keep wearing them out, but not much else. They were clean though, seeming trendy enough that no one had complained about his retro style yet. When he came out several others were there.
Steve, Denny, Ash and Dani, who had a fight coming up soon, Tony thought. Really he needed to start tapering her on her runs. When he sat he waved at her.
“Hey. How are your runs going?”
Everyone laughed a bit, except for Deirdre, who just seemed curious. Out of the loop as well.
Dani just answered.
“Not bad. I have four days before my fight, so I’m cutting way back. Do you have time to go over Sela’s tapes with me? It’s my second pro fight, but I’m still worried.”
Everyone would be. It was part of the whole thing, he was willing to bet.
“Sure? We can do that Friday night? You’re on a day trip for this one, right?” The next big fight was on Saturday and would have like a quarter of the people leaving. A fact which wasn’t lost on the others, who were actually fighting in them.
Steve smiled and shook his head.
“You’ll be gone then. You’re on the training team for three of the fighters, so you have to be there. It’s a rule.”
Rick looked around and shrugged.
“Thursday night?” He glanced at Tony then, as if he had other things to do. That wasn’t the real issue. Even he could see that. Instead of having a big problem, he just nodded.
“Sounds good. Hey, mom, you like Las Vegas, right? Shows, bright lights? Your paycheck being flushed away on the hope that you’ll be the one out of fifty-two people walking away with more?” It was a good point, but she gave him a funny look, instead of grabbing the free trip offer.
Jen looked hopeful.
“That’s a good idea, if you can come along? Tony has worked with almost everyone here, on cardio, but he’s been one of the main sparring partners for Steve and Denny.”
Denny smiled, clearly checking out Deirdre. Locking eyes with her and smiling in a way that everyone there probably got.
Then he ruined his chance, by talking about her son.
“It was inspired. He learned to fight southpaw to help me train. Infighting, too. I’ve watched the tapes, he matches Donaldson almost perfectly. That’s really rare, being able to do that. We should get together and talk about it? If you have time.”
Tony spread his hands.
“Dude… That’s my mother…”
Denny snorted then. He was only about twenty-five or so, maybe a bit older than that. Deirdre was thirty-three. That wasn’t too big a leap that way, but still…
Laughing the guy just shrugged.
“Exactly. Well, anyway, Tony is part of the team. For real. Not just the mascot or anything like that. We should look at the video. It’s freaking impressive.”
Ignoring the inappropriate flirting, Steve just nodded.
“It’s true. We’ve already had people coming in to try and scout him for their own clubs. Dan Sweet call me up, to ask if there was a way to pry him away from here. After the whole thing with Simpson. Didn’t Yikata offer to have him go and train there, in Japan?” That was directed toward Rick, who smiled and nodded.
“Yep. And of course, Adam invited him to go and live with him. You set up a visit for next summer, didn’t you Tony?” It was bland sounding, but clearly the man being mean to his little sister.
Her face was worried, but it was kind of clear that she didn’t get it yet.
Sighing, he rolled his eyes.
“Um, Adam Forsythe? He thought he might be my father, so we got a DNA test. He is, by the way. You never mentioned that part.” He could have been upset about it, but really didn’t care.
She still teared up a bit. It was her phony crying though, so he wasn’t worried. The other people around the table were all concerned that something bad was about to happen. No tears fell. They wouldn’t be doing that.
She tried to look sad and sound small. Like a kid.
“I know. I should have told you, but it was never the right time. I didn’t want to ruin his life.”
Anthony could see that. So, instead, she’d made good strides toward ruining his. Maybe that was just what he would have been anyway. Now it was kind of working out for him, but he felt like everything was about to be stripped away from him at every turn. Even things that he knew weren’t important left him shaking inside. Deep down, where he didn’t admit it.
If he lost his fights, or couldn’t help with sparring, or just possibly if he got poor grades from Janine. He expected almost anything he did to be the wrong one. The straw that was the one too much for the poor camel. It wasn’t real, but inside he didn’t really believe that was true.
Worse, his mother coming suddenly, which she had said she was planning to do six months before, made him feel incredibly insecure. She could rip the little bit of a world he’d managed to find for himself right apart and there was nothing he could do about it. No one could. She was his mother, which meant she had the state behind her if she wanted to ruin his life. No one had stopped her during the first fifteen years at any rate.
There was no reason to think that anyone would now.
Still, he was Tony, not the kid that she’d sort of kept around, while she went off to play, barely holding a job, for all those years. So he shrugged.
“No big thing. He seemed nice. I hear he’s a horrible cheat in fights?” That got Denny and Rick to both nod. Even Adam had agreed that it happened. Though he swore that he never recalled doing it. No one else believed him, but Anthony kind of did. More than once he’d fought and not been aware of everything later. Even in sparring it happened. Thankfully it was almost always him doing what he’d been practicing in his head when that happened. It had started with Sumner, who he suspected did something similar when he boxed. It didn’t make him unbeatable, but it really could work.
His uncle grinned.
“That’s Adam for you. Not a bad guy otherwise. I mean, except for the part where he’ll sleep with your sister. Your underage sister…”
That just about started a fight. No one else saw it happening, but Tony got that both Deirdre and Rick had similar looks on their faces. Getting ready to battle things out, right then and there.
“Let’s not bother? Nothing we say now will affect the past. Things happened. Now we go on. That’s all. So, what’s for lunch?”
Jen was cooking beef strips, which smelled really good. Spicier than normal. It was due to the fact that she was no longer in training directly. The woman had seemed a little down, if happy after the fight. It was a thing that all the fighters had going on in one way or the other. They built everything up for one moment and when it was done, win or lose, there was a cost to pay for having done it. That was something for him to keep in mind, since as far as he’d seen, they all had som
e version of it going on.
Still, she popped her head around the corner, so everyone could see her. Her face held a forced smile, that was big, though not all that strained. She was, after everything else was accounted for, a pretty nice person.
“Beef and rice? Salad, like always. Everyone is on a diet, more or less. Is that all right Deirdre? I can make something else?”
Anthony smiled as his mother was a bit taken aback at that idea. Not just the offer, but the idea that anyone would go out of their way to make her feel like part of things like that.
So he smiled at her and made a slightly silly face.
“Which would be chicken or fish instead of beef. The diet is pretty clean here. I haven’t even seen a piece of candy in months. Not since I saw Denny sneaking a protein bar, back before he started on the new cycle for the next fight. It looked delicious.”
That got a smile and a laugh from Ash.
“Hmmm. That does sound good. Remember cake? Does that still exist?”
Anthony didn’t know. It seemed likely, but he hadn’t seen anything like that for a long time. Too long. Even before he’d come there, by at least a year or two.
“So, Dani… Watching video tomorrow? We can meet here, or at Rick and Jen’s?”
She smiled at him, seeming grateful.
“At six? At their place. The sofa is nicer than the chairs here.”
Deirdre looked over at the slightly square jawed woman and seemed skeptical suddenly. She didn’t say anything, but looked over at Rick, then Tony. No one else thought it was a big deal, since going over fight vids was just part of what the good fighters did when they could. Not all of them had a head for it, but just trying to do that sort of thing helped a lot, if people could be bothered to attempt it.
His mother didn’t know that however and would be thinking at the female fighter would have something else in mind. Not that she said anything about it. That ship had kind of sailed years before. If she was worried about what her son was getting up to, she needed to have tried harder a long time in the past. Like a decade or more back.
The meal involved a lot of small talk, most of which covered life working on a cruise ship. It sounded pretty hard. It was from Deirdre, which meant that she might be a little sensitive to things like that, but it was also kind of difficult seeming. Especially since there were a lot of rules that she’d had to keep to the entire time. Like not drinking or doing drugs. She flat out spoke about that part, though out of everyone only Ashley seemed to think it was a big deal.
His mother was just open about things.
“Before I left… Well, I knew. I understood that I had to change something, or I was going to die. I couldn’t afford rehab. A friend of mine had done this, on the ships, it had worked. The first months were really hard. I was in withdrawal, more or less. I’d always done a lot of different things, so… I guess that actually helped. I wasn’t addicted to one thing, just… Had a lot of bad habits. I still do, of course. Taking the drugs away for a few months won’t fix me. It’s a way to start.” She actually looked humble then, which was a move that he hadn’t been certain his mother was capable of.
She ate for a bit and no one spoke. Finally, she set her fork on her plate, chewed a bite of salad then looked down.
“I’ve been the world’s worst mother for a long time. I still am…” She didn’t apologize for being who and what she was. There was a feeling to it though, that was different than Anthony had seen from her before.
She was trying.
That poured off of her. That was a thing she really could do, though and always had been able to. When she wanted to manipulate people she could go from whatever she’d just been doing to seeming like whoever, or whatever, she needed to in order to get people on her side. Anthony was used to it, so wasn’t about to simply trust in what she was saying. Not yet.
After the meal, everyone else had things to do. He did as well, having Janine in the other room, waiting for him to go and learn things. That left him floundering a bit, not knowing what to do.
Deirdre just sat there, talking to him as everyone else left.
“So… Dani? She seems nice. Are you close?” She was trying to be sly about it, asking if they were dating. Which was silly. If that was the case, then they wouldn’t have been planning to get together as carefully as they were. They would have already known the plan.
“Not really. I’ve worked with her a bit on sparring, but her coming fight isn’t that big of a deal for her. She started out in decent shape. Mainly we’ve been running together. I do that with most of the serious people working here. Well, the ones I think of as being that way.” That got him to grin, shrugging since he got her basic idea.
His mom smirked a little bit.
“Oh? So who are you seeing?”
He rolled his eyes then, smiling.
“No one. There aren’t a lot of women my own age here and that kind of thing is important to Rick and Jen. Not that they’ve said I couldn’t date, but everyone I know right now is older. On top of that I’ve been busy. Training and classes.” He glanced up and then stood. “I need to go and see about that, I guess. Or… I don’t know. Let me go see?”
He got a nod and jogged into the other room, to find Janine sitting there, wearing her gold rimmed glasses that had a string on them and a mustard colored, button up the front sweater.
“Hey! Um, my mother is here? She’s been gone for six months…”
The woman looked at him for a while, then smiled.
“Ah. You should spend a little time with her then. I have a new reading assignment. It’s longer. Also some math and science worksheets for you. We can go over this all now, then meet up in a few days? Monday next week?”
Tony was a bit surprised that would be allowed, but it did make sense to him. He was about to become pretty busy, in a way. He was also going to be on a bus for hours, where having things to read and do would be a good idea. You could only talk to the same people for so long, after all.
“Thanks. I’ll have that all ready. Do I need to have a report written?”
His tutor shook her head.
“Just the work sheets and reading done. Good. I still get paid, as long as you’re learning. I should go to a spa.” She winked at him and stood up patting him on the arm, gently. Then she started packing her things up, setting out what Anthony was going to need to get all the work done.
That meant, about five minutes later, that he was back sitting with his mother, at the dining room table. She seemed pleased, seeing his book and papers.
“Do you like it here? I know that it’s really different. The fighting…” She was worried about that part, it was clear.
Part of him wanted to spin a story for her, making it seem safe all the time, but that wasn’t the truth. It was a dangerous world. Just being around these people had its moments. Like the thing with Simpson. That was part of life. Everyplace had its problems.
Before, when they lived together, there had still been fights. Most of them hadn’t involved him, but it had happened about once a month. That was part of the whole drug culture thing. People did things that impaired their judgment, got involved in emotional drama and had problems to start with. It was an inspired combination, Anthony knew. So fights would break out, often enough that it was just part of his world. No one did it well and normally there wasn’t more than a few bruises or a bloody nose, but it was still there.
The fight world was like that too. Then, there were all the same issues, combined with the fact that everyone more or less liked to fight. Even he did. That part had surprised him, since Anthony never wanted to hurt anyone. He wasn’t an angry person all the time either. It was nice to be good at things. It was the first time, in his entire life, where other people seemed to respect something he could do. It was a great feeling.
Even given that, it wasn’t his dream.
That part was a bit of a problem actually. Anthony didn’t really know if he had any of those. Plans. Sure, that was a part
of his world. Things to hope for however, he didn’t know.
So he shrugged.
“It’s different here. Better, in most ways. Even the running, learning to fight and improve… That isn’t a horrible thing. I miss real food. Fake food, I guess.” Smiling he shrugged and glanced at the kitchen.
Deirdre seemed to get it.
“That… I should have figured out how to do better. I pretty much ruined your life.”
That part was interesting.
Tony, the act of the good boy that he played, wanted him to say something different than he would have figured might happen. It wasn’t about being nice at the moment, just honest. So he was. Even if it was probably the most dangerous plan.
“That… Look, we both know that there’s some truth to that. You did some damage. I mean, telling me that you wanted to abort me… That’s messed up, you have to know that, right? Even if it was true at the time… I never really felt loved or anything. Going away like you did… Leaving me with strangers… I don’t mean Rick and Jen either. At least they’re decent people. I had to live off of trash sometimes… That…”
She looked down, seeming ashamed. That wasn’t his point. Doing that wasn’t going to make him feel better. More to the point, it wouldn’t fix things now.
Deirdre teared up a little. Anthony couldn’t tell if it was real or not. She spoke softly.
“I know. I… I can’t even ask you to forgive me. It was me though, you know? I knew I was punishing you, ignoring you… Because I was sad and bitter. It… It wasn’t like I was going to be a movie star, except for you or something dumb like that. I had nothing going on and used my own child as an excuse to never get control of my life. That… It was insane. I know that now. I knew it then, really. I used you. As a burden. A reason why I couldn’t get ahead, instead of a person to try and be there for.”
Tony nodded then, not being done.
“The thing is… You didn’t ruin my life. All of that is true. Heck, you should even feel bad about it. But my life isn’t done yet. Yours either. We have a chance to do better. Every single day. I didn’t get that before, but here… They gave me a chance. I’ve worked to keep it. Like you said? If you get a chance, you have to take it. Grab it and make it work for you.” Then he blew a raspberry with his tongue. “Which, don’t think I didn’t get that you were justifying abandoning me at the time. That didn’t make the words wrong.”
