Bad Dad

by Sloane Howell

  Cora, Janet, and Logan sat there. All three had tears in their eyes. All of them stared at me. Their pity was like a semi-truck crashing into my already frail body. All at once. Everywhere. The pain drilled into me and I took it all.

  I turned away. Refused to look. I’d said my goodbyes in the room. That was how it was supposed to be. They weren’t allowed to see me like this. Offered up like a sacrifice. I was a lion to them, not a lamb.

  “That’s his weakness.” Joe shook me.

  “What?”

  “He doesn’t have that.” He nodded toward my family. “Stop fighting to win this and fight for your family. The battle isn’t in there.” He nodded at the octagon.

  I shook my head at him. “I’m not running away.”

  Cheers rang out all over the arena. The men by the table scrambled around. One of them walked to our corner. “Can he go on?”

  “No.” Joe glared.

  “I’m fine.”

  The man glanced back and forth between us. “I have to go off what he says.” He nodded at me.

  The referee came back out. Sid stood up.

  I looked back at my family. Gave them a thumbs up and rose from my stool.

  Joe stomped toward the gate.

  I glared at him and spoke through gritted teeth. Grabbed him by the arm as hard as I could. “We are lions. Warriors. We do not fucking run from danger.”

  He shook his head at me and stared back at our family. Then he looked at me and nodded slowly. “Okay, lion. If you’re going to fight. Hit his ass. At least once, asshole.” He stepped through the gate and hopped down.

  Sid cracked his neck sideways with one of his giant fists and came toward me.

  My mind raced. I searched for anything. Ran through his body mechanics, sequence of punches, everything down to the slightest muscle twitches. Thought about all the hits I’d taken. Tried to process how each had felt, the amount of force behind them.

  Then it came to me. It illuminated itself amongst a long string of irrelevant data.

  There was a pattern. It was all so simple, and Joe and I had been overthinking everything.

  If he threw a right at my head and it landed, he countered with a left to my ribs. Every single time. If the right hit my jaw, he came up high with the left instead of a rib shot. The combinations were predictable any time he led with a punch at my head.

  The tough part was that he alternated those back and forth. Right head, left ribs. Right jaw, high left. He did the same thing in reverse if he led with a left. We’d never picked up on the pattern watching his old fights because he’d knocked everyone else out with one punch.

  The only problem was, he’d blasted me into a dream at the end of the last round and I didn’t know how many times he’d hit me. Which one was he on? It’d be a guessing game.

  The sound in the arena all faded away. Everything went into slow motion. His jaw was tight, but his arms and legs loose. He lurched toward me from the corner. Knowing he had a pattern was just the boost I needed, though. All six-five, two hundred and sixty pounds of him charged like a rhino. It was nothing but thick rough sinew and bulging veins, hauling straight at me. Soulless eyes, locked on mine like a radar. His lips pressed into a thin line.

  Left or right?

  I felt the answer in my gut. Some cosmic force, telling me what it was, even though the idea of a cosmic force was completely illogical. I’d have one chance to stun him. Let him know he was fallible and human. Shock the crowd back into this thing. The universe spoke to me. Right.

  It was all or nothing. My entire life banked on a fifty-fifty chance, but somehow, I just knew.

  His right leg gave it away before he took the swing. It planted firmly on the mat. Every bit of his technique was perfect and efficient from years of scientific research and training. All two hundred and sixty pounds shifted to his right foot. Then his right hand balled into a fist and moved into position. Cocked back slightly and up, like he was lifting an invisible lantern up to his ear. Amateur fighters would rear all the way back, telegraph their punches. Not him. He knew how to exert the maximum amount of power in the fewest movements.

  His jaw naturally clenched, and his eyes stayed focused like laser sights aimed right at the side of my head. Right. Right. Right.

  All of it happened within a fraction of a second. It was like watching a bolt of lightning inching its way down to the ground, hellbent on dispersing the energy from the storm. His right knee bent slightly to absorb some of the force from his body, and just as quickly he exploded off his foot.

  His right hand traveled through the air, perfectly aligned with its destination.

  Even with the advance knowledge of what was coming, I still didn’t dodge it completely. But that was the plan. I needed him to make slight contact. Trick his brain to stay on course with his pattern. I swayed to my right with a left guard up to absorb a tiny amount of the blow. Just enough so that he’d think for a nanosecond that he’d landed it. It also slowed him down a fraction. Fractions were a story of life. Fractions could be the difference between victory and defeat. Fractions and millimeters were life and death in the world we lived in.

  The moment his right made impact with my left forearm, I rolled far out to the side with everything my battered body was capable of. His huge left came across and caught nothing but air. It twisted his whole body around to the point I was staring straight at his back.

  He was right there, twisted up, facing the other direction and fully exposed. He’d have to spin all the way back around to hit me. It’s what I’d planned on. Something in my brain clicked when the tides turned in my favor. It could be felt in the energy of the arena too. The crowd leaped to their feet. He wasn’t the invincible machine that’d rearranged my jaw on the island when we were kids, nor was he the indestructible specimen that’d torn apart every fighter he’d faced. He was just another human being with strengths and weaknesses. A man who could make a mistake. He was no longer perfect.

  I came with the hardest right hook of my life. A hundred percent. Even with me barely on my legs, with a shattered jaw and dislocated rib. It’d have obliterated a normal man. My fist crashed into Sid’s head. A perfect transfer of power and energy from my body that traversed through my arm, down through my glove, and directly into his face. The best punch I’d ever thrown. It was perfect. His skull absorbed one hundred percent. I imagined his brain jarring back and forth as the force ripped through his head.

  He staggered around in a daze. Nearly went to the mat, but somehow still held himself upright hunched over at the waist.

  Many fighters would’ve immediately started to gloat after landing a knockout blow like that. Not me, though. I was trained better than that. My life depended on it. My family’s lives banked on me and me alone. It was destroy, or be destroyed. One lion and one lamb. The roles—if even for a brief moment in time—had reversed, and I shed the wool for a long, flowing mane.

  I charged after him. He’d never be that vulnerable again.

  Sid staggered slightly on his feet. He had to be shocked. Nobody had ever touched him before. Not even close. I was sure of that. Edmon wouldn’t risk damaging his most prized possession, nor would the investors who inevitably pumped millions, if not billions of dollars into the creation of the man in front of me.

  I bounded toward him as if running downhill and hammered his ribs with a jab and then rocked my elbows in and shot an uppercut from hell into his chin. He absorbed both of them. They were horrendous blows, but I couldn’t keep up this pace. Hopefully, they’d done enough damage to buy me some time and more importantly a psychological edge.

  The arena came alive. People jumped up and down. You could feel the air sucked out of the place, and then new life breathed back once the gasps had subsided. A deafening roar came, and the place shook on its foundation like an earthquake had just shifted the crust miles below the earth’s surface.

  The worst mistake a fighter can make is run themselves out of gas in the middle of a round. It turns you int
o a sitting duck, ripe for the slaughter.

  I got inside of Sid’s reach and went to work on his ribs at about seventy-five percent. Short quick jabs that took little energy but delivered maximum damage. Kidneys, liver, heart—all organs sitting on the other side of hard bone and tough muscle. Every punch thrown was an attempt to shut them down, kill as many cells as possible to keep him from functioning.

  Sid shook his head like he’d come out of a fog and blasted me out of nowhere with an uppercut to my chin. It lifted my feet off the ground and I came down flat on my back with a thundering thud.

  My mouth was closed when he hit me, or it would’ve shattered all my teeth when they slammed together.

  He came down on me with a knee in my chest and all the oxygen zapped out of my lungs. I watched his eyes. Saw him glance over at Edmon. My own gaze rolled over the same direction and Edmon shook his head at him.

  Sid walked over to his corner and just left me in the center on my back, gasping for air.

  What the hell?

  The arena fell silent. I climbed to my feet and he stood there, waiting for me. His and Edmon’s body language told me it was going to go to the end before he killed me. They wanted me humiliated and tortured in front of the world for as long as possible.

  Maybe the WMMA had cut a deal with them. It needs to go until the end to keep the ad money rolling in.

  I glanced to my family. Glanced to Joe. He didn’t look as hopeful as they did, but his glasses were off, and his eyes were wide, like he couldn’t believe I got one punch in, let alone several. He pumped a fist at me and the crowd sprang back to their feet.

  Joe turned around and looked at all of them, then slid his glasses back on. He fed off the crowd the same way I did, and his arms shot up. My blood roared with adrenaline, and so did the arena when Joe’s arms went up in the air. He screamed and threw his arms up higher, over and over, until the building rocked, and the MGM shook on its foundation once more.

  Joe turned back to me and smiled, and then it happened. All at once.

  Two huge middle fingers shot up on both hands. He turned slowly back and forth, and then in a full circle. He nodded his head and mouthed “thank you” at them until every fan was on their feet, screaming at the top of their lungs. Half of them were giving him the bird right back with both hands.

  I glanced down to see Logan pumping his fists and shadow boxing the air. Cora and Janet both screamed and jumped up and down in place, arms draped around one another, with their other fists punching up at the air.

  The raw electricity funneled up from the ground and into my legs. A surge hit my chest and coursed through my limbs like I’d been shocked back to life.

  I turned back and waved Sid on with my hand. The roof nearly exploded off the building.

  Sid’s jaw clenched. He charged out and threw a left with the first blow. It took me by surprise. I’d expected another right and carried my momentum straight into the punch. He’d recognized his pattern and learned quickly. My whole body twisted itself up like a corkscrew and I tumbled to the ground. My face pounded into the mat just inches from the cage. The crowd fell and slumped in their seats. As quickly as the place had been electrified to life, it’d fallen dead and somber. He’d sucked the energy from the arena again with one punch. Sid jumped on top of me and put me in a choke hold, but it wasn’t tight enough to make me tap out. He held my head in place and then shoved my face against the fencing material so hard the wire mesh seared into my skin.

  He threw tiny jabs into my ribs every few seconds, just hard enough to keep me still.

  I glanced up, and Edmon’s face was less than a foot away from mine. His pale eyes and wizened forehead glared right at me. His fedora was cocked on top of his head.

  The edges of his mouth curled up like two commas, nothing but pure evil and victory in his expression.

  “You’ll never learn. Will you, Son?”

  “I’m not your fucking son.” I choked from the stranglehold on my neck and my words slurred, but they were clear enough.

  He nodded slowly with a devilish grin on his face. “Oh, yes you are.”

  What in the hell is he talking about?

  I glared at him. “What?”

  I bucked against Sid, and his knee drove into the small of my back.

  “Oh, your brother over there didn’t tell you? He likes to keep things from you, doesn’t he?”

  I couldn’t see Joe. Couldn’t move at all. “Liar! Stop fucking with my mind. Won’t work.” I barely got my words out.

  “Deny it all you want.” He made a tsk tsk sound with his tongue. “That’s why you and him feel emotions. You can’t escape the truth.” His grin curled up even farther. “You’re both made from me.”

  I whipped my head back and forth against Sid’s hold. Denial etched itself across my face. It couldn’t be true. There was no way. I was nothing like him. Nothing.

  His lips pressed into a thin line, and his brows narrowed. He shook his head and glared. “And you still disappoint me.”

  “Fuck you!” I spit blood through the cage. It landed on the lapels of his overcoat. I thrashed against Sid, but he dug his knee even harder into my spine.

  Edmon grinned and made a show of wiping my blood from his suit, as if his job fucking with my head was complete. He turned and looked in the direction of my family.

  I couldn’t see them, but I knew exactly where he was staring. My heart constricted.

  Edmon’s devilish grin returned to his face. “Don’t worry. When you’re gone I’ll take care of my grandson and your girlfriend over there.” He winked at me. “That, my son, is a promise.”

  I beat a fist on the mat. “Fuck you!”

  Edmon walked away.

  I shoved with everything I had against Sid, but he brought down all his weight on my back. I was pinned down and helpless. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe. The waves pounded the shore. The mat heated up from below. I tasted the saltwater spray in my nostrils. The crowd boxed me in and seemed so close I couldn’t breathe. They smothered me. Sid twisted my neck sideways so that I could see my family. All of them covered their mouths. Logan’s face was bright pink, and tears sluiced down his cheeks.

  I reached out for him, for Cora—but they were too far away. I needed my chair. My chair outside his door. I had to protect him. I screamed but no sound came from my throat. I had to guard him, keep him safe, and I couldn’t. He’d be all alone in the cruel world without me and there was nothing I could do to escape it. I was a sacrifice on an altar in front of thousands of people and the only few that I loved. A lamb that couldn’t even bleat, waiting to be slaughtered before my family and a live audience—millions of people around the world. My vision blurred as salty tears stung the back of my eyelids.

  Sid roared in my ear. The blows rained down like thunder from above and I took every one of them until I could barely see or think. My hand remained outstretched toward Logan, but fuzzy dots had filled my vision as he and Cora faded away into the background.

  Sid hammered away at my face, nothing but a barrage of grunts and my head jarring into the ground. Then the punches ceased, and he locked me back up in the same choke hold. He intertwined his fingers under my chin and wrenched my head up and angled me back toward my family. I blinked away the tears. Logan and Cora came into focus. I reached out with my hands, fingers spread wide, grasping at them, but Sid had my neck locked up and a knee in my back, ratcheting me up to face them, fully exposed and helpless. Both of them stared back with pale faces and bloodshot eyes. Logan’s bottom lip quivered, and his whole body trembled.

  Sid leaned down into my ear. I felt him smile against the side of my head. “You’re not them. You are me.” His voice was a deep bass and rattled through my bones. The only six words I’d ever heard him speak.

  He leaned back, and I thought my neck might explode into a million tiny pieces. Searing heat ripped up my spine. Then his knee crashed down into the middle of my lungs and crushed my air supply. All the blood drained from my
face, and all the air shot out of my body.

  He and Edmon were trying to own my mind. Break me. Humiliate me. Own me.

  It was working. Had I fooled myself the whole time into thinking I could live a normal life? Be a normal person? Did Edmon sit back like a thief in the night, and wait for me to be comfortable and happy, before he took it all away? Like he always knew he would?

  I kicked and reached out for Logan. Reached out for Cora. The clock read :25. I went limp in his hold. Waiting it out and enduring the pain was the only option. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to walk again. They wanted me to waste energy fighting against it. I stared at Logan and Cora and took every microsecond of pain. It was like nothing I’d ever felt. My bones were on the brink of snapping, my whole body pushed beyond the edge of what it could handle. I tried to block out the pain, stop the signals from my brain. The clock read :11 and my efforts failed. It was like Sid had a huge knife plunged into my back and was twisting and severing every nerve ending in my body.

  When the clock hit :10 he hauled himself up and then came down on me with more fists than I could count. I covered my head the best I could. The blows crashed into my skull like a sledgehammer. I couldn’t move, everything turned to static. Blood oozed out of my mouth, and I drooled a pool of crimson onto the ground. The room was fading to black and white, then fuzzy stars. My skull beat against the mat over and over. Ten seconds worth. More than twenty blows when I lost count.

  Either the whole arena had gone silent or I’d lost my hearing. It could’ve been either. Some of his strikes had crashed into my ears and possibly shattered my eardrums.

  When the bell rang, Sid rose up off me and stalked to his corner.

  The ref scrambled over. I coughed a stream of blood all over the mat. I tried to push up and collapsed right back into the ground. I couldn’t see or feel anything. My soul was outside of my body, probably halfway to its final destination. The ref’s mouth moved, but I couldn’t make out the words. Everything was a ringing sensation and blood beating in my head.

  My vision slowly came into focus, and all I could make out were his lips moving in front of my face. He mouthed, “I’m calling it.”