by Unknown
Holding his pants with one hand, the old man shuffled away. Marvin watched him go for a moment, and then fled. It was his plan to make it through the week, when school would turn out for the summer, and then he’d just stay in the apartment and never leave until school started up in the fall. By then, maybe he could formulate a new plan.
He hoped that in that time the boys would have lost interest in punching him, or perhaps been killed in some dreadful manner, or moved off themselves. Started a career, though he had a pretty good idea they had already started one—professional thugs.
He told his mother he fell down. She believed him. She was too preoccupied with trying to keep food on the table to think otherwise, and he didn’t want her to know anyway. Didn’t want her to know he couldn’t take care of himself, and that he was a walking punching bag. Thing was, she wasn’t too alert to his problems. She had the job, and now she had a boyfriend, a housepainter. The painter was a tall, gangly guy that came over and watched TV and drank beer, then went to bed with his mother. Sometimes, when he was sleeping on the couch, he could hear them back there. He didn’t remember ever hearing that kind of thing when his dad was alive, and he didn’t know what to think about it. When it got really loud, he’d wrap his pillow around his ears and try to sleep.
During the summer he saw some ads online about how you could build your body, and he sent off for a DVD. He started doing push-ups and sit-ups and a number of other exercises. He didn’t have money for the weights the DVD suggested. The DVD cost him what little money he had saved, mostly a nickel here, a quarter there. Change his mother gave him. But he figured if his savings kept him from an ass whipping, it was worth every penny.
Marvin was consistent in his workouts. He gave them everything he had, and pretty soon his mother mentioned that he seemed to be looking stronger. Marvin thought so too. In fact, he actually had muscles. His arms were knotted and his stomach was pretty flat, and his thighs and calves had grown. He could throw a jab and a cross now. He found a guide online for how to do it. He was planning on working on the uppercut next, maybe the hook, but right now he had the jab and the cross down.
“All right,” he said to the mirror. “Let them come. I’m ready.”
After the first day of school in the fall, Marvin went home the same way he had that fateful day he had taken a beating. He didn’t know exactly how he felt about what he was doing. He hoped he would never see them again on one hand, and on the other, he felt strong now, felt he could handle himself.
Marvin stuck his hand in his pocket and felt for the money he had there. Not much. A dollar or so in change. More money saved up from what his mother gave him. And he had his pack on his back. They might want that. He had to remember to come out of it, put it aside if he had to fight. No hindrances.
When he was where it happened before, there was no one. He went home feeling a bit disappointed. He would have enjoyed banging their heads together.
On his third day after school, he got his chance.
There were only two of them this time: Hard Belly, and one of the weasels that had been with him before. When they spotted him, Hard Belly smiled and moved toward Marvin quickly, the weasel trailing behind as if looking for scraps.
“Well, now,” Hard Belly said as he got closer. “You remember me?”
“Yes,” Marvin said.
“You ain’t too smart, are you, kid? Thought you had done moved off. Thought I’d never get a chance to hit you again. That old man, I want you to know, he caught me by surprise. I could have kicked his ass from Monday to next Sunday.”
“You can’t whip me, let alone him.”
“Oh, so, during the summer, you grew a pair of balls.”
“Big pair.”
“Big pair, huh. I bet you I can take that pack away from you and make you kiss my shoes. I can make you kiss my ass.”
“I’m going to whip your ass,” Marvin said.
The bully’s expression changed, and Marvin didn’t remember much after that.
He didn’t come awake until Hard Belly was bent over, saying, “Now kiss it. And pucker good. A little tongue would be nice. You don’t, Pogo here, he’s gonna take out his knife and cut your dick off. You hear?”
Marvin looked at Hard Belly. Hard Belly dropped his pants and bent over with his hands on his knees, his asshole winking at Marvin. The weasel was riffling through Marvin’s backpack, strewing things left and right.
“Lick or get cut,” Hard Belly said.
Marvin coughed out some blood and started to try and crawl away.
“Lick it,” Hard Belly said. “Lick it till I feel good. Come on, boy. Taste some shit.”
A foot flew out and went between Hard Belly’s legs, caught his nuts with a sound like a beaver’s tail slapping on water. Hard Belly screamed, went forward on his head, as if he were trying to do a headstand.
“Don’t never do it, kid,” a voice said. “It’s better to get your throat cut.”
It was the old man. He was standing close by. He wasn’t holding his pants this time. He had on a belt.
Pogo came at the old man and swung a wild right at him. The old man didn’t seem to move much but somehow he went under the punch, and when he came up, the uppercut that Marvin had not practiced was on exhibition. It hit Pogo under the chin and there was a snapping sound, and Pogo, the weasel, seemed to lose his head for a moment. It stretched his neck like it was made of rubber. Spittle flew out of Pogo’s mouth and Pogo collapsed on the cement in a wad.
The old man wobbled over to Hard Belly, who was on his hands and knees, trying to get up, his pants around his ankles. The old man kicked him between the legs a couple of times. The kicks weren’t pretty, but they were solid. Hard Belly spewed a turd and fell on his face.
“You need to wipe up,” the old man said. But Hard Belly wasn’t listening. He was lying on the cement, making a sound like a truck trying to start.
The old man turned and looked at Marvin.
“I thought I was ready,” Marvin said.
“You ain’t even close, kid. If you can walk, come with me.”
Marvin could walk, barely.
“You got some confidence somewhere,” the old man said. “I seen that right off. But you didn’t have no reason for it.”
“I did some training.”
“Yeah, well, swimming on dry land ain’t the same as getting into it. There’s things you can do that’s just in the air, or with a partner that can make a real difference, but you don’t get no feel for nothing. I hadn’t come along, you’d have been licking some ass crack and calling it a snow cone. Let me tell you, son. Don’t never do that. Not unless it’s a lady’s ass and you’ve been invited. Someone wants to make you do something like that, you die first. You do that kind of thing once, you’ll have the taste of shit in your mouth for the rest of your life.”
“I guess it’s better than being dead,” Marvin said.
“Naw, it ain’t neither. Let me tell you. Once I had me a little dog. He wasn’t no bigger than a minute, but he had heart big as all the outdoors. Me and him took walks. One day we was walking along—not far from here, actually—and there was this German shepherd out nosing in some garbage cans. Rough-looking old dog, and it took in after my little dog. Mike was his name. And it was a hell of a fight. Mike wouldn’t give. He fought to the death.”
“He got killed?”
“Naw. The shepherd got killed.”
“Mike killed the shepherd?”
“Naw. ’Course not. I’m jerking you. I hit the shepherd with a board I picked up. But the lesson here is you got to do your best, and sometimes you got to hope there’s someone around on your side with a board.”
“You saying I’m Mike and you’re the guy with the board?”
“I’m saying you can’t fight for shit. That’s what I’m saying.”
“What happened to Mike?”
“Got hit by a truck he was chasing. He was tough and willing, but he didn’t have no sense. Kind of like you. Ex
cept you ain’t tough. And another drawback you got is you ain’t a dog. Another thing, that’s twice I saved you, so you owe me something.”
“What’s that?”
“Well, you want to learn to fight, right?”
Marvin nodded.
“And I need a workout partner.”
The old man’s place wasn’t far from the fight scene. It was a big, two-story concrete building. The windows were boarded over. When they got to the front door, the old man pulled out a series of keys and went to work on several locks.
While he did that, he said, “You keep a lookout. I got to really be careful when I do this, ’cause there’s always some asshole wanting to break in. I’ve had to hurt some jackasses more than once. Why I keep that two-by-four there in the can.”
Marvin looked. There was indeed a two-by-four stuffed down inside a big trash can. The two-by-four was all that was in it.
The old man unlocked the door and they went inside. The old man flicked some lights and everything went bright. He then went to work on the locks, clicked them into place. They went along a narrow hall into a wide space—a very wide space.
What was there was a bed and a toilet out in the open on the far wall, and on the other wall was a long plank table and some chairs. There was a hot plate on the table, and above and behind it were some shelves stuffed with canned goods. There was an old refrigerator, one of those bullet-shaped things. It hummed loudly, like a child with a head injury. Next to the table was a sink, and not far from that was a shower, with a once-green curtain pulled around a metal scaffold. There was a TV under some posters on the wall and a few thick chairs with the stuffing leaking out.
There was a boxing ring in the middle of the room. In the ring was a thick mat, taped all over with duct tape. The sun-faded posters were of men in tights, crouched in boxing or wrestling positions. One of them said, “Danny Bacca, X-Man.”
Marvin studied the poster. It was a little wrinkled at the corners, badly framed, and the glass was specked with dust.
“That’s me,” the old man said.
Marvin turned and looked at the old man, looked back at the poster.
“It’s me before wrinkles and bad knees.”
“You were a professional wrestler?” Marvin said.
“Naw, I was selling shoes. You’re slow on the upbeat, kid. Good thing I was out taking my walk again or flies would be having you for lunch.”
“Why were you called X-Man?”
“’Cause you got in the ring with me, they could cross you off the list. Put an X through your name. Shit, I think that was it. It’s been so long ago, I ain’t sure no more. What’s your name, by the way?”
“Marvin.”
“All right, Marvin, let’s you and me go over to the ring.”
The old man dodged through the ropes easily. Marvin found the ropes were pulled taut, and he had more trouble sliding between them than he thought. Once in the ring, the old man said, “Here’s the thing. What I’m gonna do is I’m gonna give you a first lesson, and you’re gonna listen to me.”
“Okay.”
“What I want—and I ain’t fucking with you here—is I want you to come at me hard as you can. Try and hit me, take me down, bite my ear off. Whatever.”
“I can’t hurt you.”
“I know that.”
“I’m not saying I’m not willing,” Marvin said. “I’m saying I know I can’t. You’ve beat a guy twice I’ve had trouble with, and his friends, and I couldn’t do nothing, so I know I can’t hurt you.”
“You got a point, kid. But I’m wantin’ you to try. It’s a lesson.”
“You’ll teach me how to defend myself?”
“Sure.”
Marvin charged, ducking low, planning to try and take the old man’s feet. The old man squatted, almost sitting on his ass, and threw a quick uppercut.
Marvin dreamed he was flying. Then falling. The lights in the place were spotted suddenly. Then the spots went away and there was only brightness. Marvin rolled over on the mat and tried to get up. His eye hurt something awful.
“You hit me,” he said when he made a sitting position.
The old man was in a corner of the ring, leaning on the ropes.
“Don’t listen to shit like someone saying ‘Come and get me.’ That’s foolish. That’s leading you into something you might not like. Play your game.”
“You told me to.”
“That’s right, kid, I did. That’s your first lesson. Think for yourself, and don’t listen to some fool giving you advice, and like I said, play your own game.”
“I don’t have a game,” Marvin said.
“We both know that, kid. But we can fix it.”
Marvin gingerly touched his eye. “So, you’re going to teach me?”
“Yeah, but the second lesson is this. Now, you got to listen to every goddamn word I say.”
“But you said …”
“I know what I said, but part of lesson two is this: Life is full of all kinds of contradictions.”
It was easy to get loose to go to practice, but it wasn’t easy getting there. Marvin still had the bullies to worry about. He got up early and went, telling his mother he was exercising at the school track.
The old man’s home turned out to be what was left of an old TB hospital, which was why the old man bought it cheap, sometime at the far end of the Jurassic, Marvin figured.
The old man taught him how to move, how to punch, how to wrestle, how to throw. When Marvin threw the X-Man, the old guy would land lightly and get up quickly and complain about how it was done. When the workout was done, Marvin showered in the big room behind the faded curtain and went home the long way, watching for bullies.
After a while, he began to feel safe, having figured out that whatever time schedule the delinquents kept, it wasn’t early morning, and it didn’t seem to be early evening.
When summer ended and school started up, Marvin went before and after school to train, told his mother he was studying boxing with some kids at the Y. She was all right with that. She had work and the housepainter on her mind. The guy would be sitting there when Marvin came home evenings. Sitting there looking at the TV, not even nodding when Marvin came in, sometimes sitting in the padded TV chair with Marvin’s mother on his knee, his arm around her waist, her giggling like a schoolgirl. It was enough to gag a maggot.
It got so home was not a place Marvin wanted to be. He liked the old man’s place. He liked the training. He threw lefts and rights, hooks and uppercuts, into a bag the old man hung up. He sparred with the old man, who, once he got tired—and considering his age, it seemed a long time—would just knock him down and go lean on the ropes and breathe heavily for a while.
One day, after they had finished, sitting in chairs near the ring, Marvin said, “So, how am I helping you train?”
“You’re a warm body, for one thing. And I got this fight coming up.”
“A fight?”
“What are you, an echo? Yeah. I got a fight coming up. Every five years me and Jesus the Bomb go at it. On Christmas Eve.”
Marvin just looked at him. The old man looked back, said, “Think I’m too old? How old are you?”
“Seventeen.”
“Can I whip your ass, kid?”
“Everyone can whip my ass.”
“All right, that’s a point you got there,” the old man said.
“Why every five years?” Marvin asked. “Why this Jesus guy?”
“Maybe I’ll tell you later,” the old man said.
Things got bad at home.
Marvin hated the painter and the painter hated him. His mother loved the painter and stood by him. Everything Marvin tried to do was tainted by the painter. He couldn’t take the trash out fast enough. He wasn’t doing good enough in school for the painter, like the painter had ever graduated so much as kindergarten. Nothing satisfied the painter, and when Marvin complained to his mother, it was the painter she stood behind.
The painter was
nothing like his dad, nothing, and he hated him. One day he told his mother he’d had enough. It was him or the painter.
She chose the painter.
“Well, I hope the crooked painting son of a bitch makes you happy,” he said.
“Where did you learn such language?” she asked.
He had learned a lot of it from the old man, but he said, “The painter.”
“Did not,” his mother said.
“Did too.”
Marvin put his stuff in a suitcase that belonged to the painter and left. He waited for his mother to come chasing after him, but she didn’t. She called out as he went up the street, “You’re old enough. You’ll be all right.”
He found himself at the old man’s place.
Inside the doorway, suitcase in hand, the old man looked at him, nodded at the suitcase, said, “What you doing with that shit?”
“I got thrown out,” Marvin said. Not quite the truth, but he felt it was close enough.
“You mean to stay here? That what you’re after?”
“Just till I get on my feet.”
“On your feet?” the X-Man said. “You ain’t got no job. You ain’t got dick. You’re like a fucking vagabond.”
“Yeah,” Marvin said. “Well, all right.”
Marvin turned around, thinking maybe he could go home and kiss some ass, maybe tell the painter he was a good guy or something. He got to the door and the old man said, “Where the fuck you going?”
“Leaving. You wanted me to, didn’t you?”
“Did I say that? Did I say anything like that? I said you were a vagabond. I didn’t say something about leaving. Here. Give me the goddamn suitcase.”
Before Marvin could do anything, X-Man took it and started down the hall toward the great room. Marvin watched him go: a wiry, balding, white-haired old man with a slight bowlegged limp to his walk.
One night, watching wrestling on TV, the old man, having sucked down a six-pack, said, “This is shit. Bunch a fucking tough acrobats. This ain’t wrestling. It ain’t boxing, and it sure ain’t fighting. It’s like a movie show or something. When we wrestled in fairs, we really wrestled. These big-ass fuckers wouldn’t know a wrist lock from a dick jerk. Look at that shit. Guy waits for the fucker to climb on the ropes and jump on him. And what kind of hit is that? That was a real hit, motherfucker would be dead, hitting him in the throat like that. He’s slapping the guy’s chest high up, that’s all. Cocksuckers.”
