by Paul O'Brien
September 30th 1972. New York.
The ice was helping. Kind of. The ring was mostly ripped up and pissed on. A few stadium employees swept their way through the considerable amounts of wreckage and rubbish that lined the aisles. The main lights were still on and this was the deep quiet after the explosion of madness.
At the end of Row A stood an officious beige figure. Melvin Pritchard knocked the center rail with his car key to get Danno's attention.
Danno raised his weary head, ready to unload on whoever was trying to further annoy him. He thought better of it when he saw who was standing there waiting for him.
“One week, Mr. Garland. And unfortunately you can't fix the end of this matchup.” Melvin put on his hat and walked away.
September 30th 1972. New York.
Babu looked around the cell for something, anything. His arm was in bad shape, and the pain was radiating in his elbow, shoulder and down his rib cage.
“What is it?” Lenny anxiously asked.
Babu grunted at the sheer inconvenience of Lenny being alive. He sized up the bench that they were sitting on and stomped down onto it with his giant foot.
Lenny rushed to the bars and tried to look down the hallway to see what was agitating Babu so much. A slam, again. Lenny could see shapes and figures from behind the frosted glass. It looked like the booking room was filling up fast.
On the third attempt, Babu drove his 18 5 E foot through the six-inch-thick timber bench. He dropped to his knees and tried to pull a usable sliver of wood from the broken options available.
Lenny noticed the handle begin to turn on the door at the end of the hallway.
“Someone's coming,” Lenny informed Babu.
Babu worked faster to split the wood with his one working arm. “Help me.”
His tenseness made Lenny move faster. Babu shoved a partially split piece of bench into Lenny's hand. “We're going to wishbone this. Hold it as tight as you can.”
“Are you not from South Africa then?”
Lenny's knuckles whitened. Babu abruptly yanked the wood, and as a consequence, sent Lenny flying across to the other side of the cell.
Lenny could feel a difference in his shoulder. Babu knelt down beside him and lifted him to the sitting position.
“Thanks, Babu.”
“Move it, asshole. You're sitting on the wood.” Babu reached down between Lenny's legs and retrieved it, folding Lenny in half.
The noise and shouting was now mounting and moving toward them. Nine or ten, Babu thought. Lenny sheepishly made his way toward his cellmate. “I think my shoulder is out.”
Tyler, the aggressive officer from the crash scene, appeared with a huge spread of yellow bruising on most of his face. Lenny had never seen anything like it before. It was as if he had been hit in the face with a typewriter. He was lucky that Babu couldn't use his right arm.
The cop removed a huge bunch of keys and warily unlocked the cell door. “They let me bring some friends of yours here.”
A sense of dread and then relief hit Lenny, until he saw Babu's eyes turn to business mode. Dread flared up, then.
Several other officers dressed in riot gear marched the aggressive mob into the cell. Individuals were getting clubbed and punched, and the door was slammed shut when everyone was beaten into place.
“Enjoy,” Tyler shouted to Babu above the rising madness.
Babu sat down and grabbed Lenny by the arm to sit, too. He made himself as small as he could, pulled off his cap, and turned away.
“Who are these people?” Lenny asked.
All the cops left and the cell was filled with belligerence and drunk people. “This is bullshit, man. Let us out of here.”
In the huddle, Babu checked his arm. He could see the bone.
The cell door was rattled by several pairs of drunken hands.
“We got ripped off. Do you hear me? Let us fucking out of here.”
More and more protesting roars made their way down the hall, but they soon realized that it was for nothing.
Lenny turned more to Babu. His heart was galloping in his chest. He had never felt anything like this before. This was fear. The real kind. The meeting a black bear in your bathroom kind. He could feel a shortness of breath.
What about my kids?
The attention slowly became focused back into the cage. Instinct kicked in. Sometimes you don't have to look to know that someone is staring at you.
“What the fuck?” Some of the new visitors stopped their incoherent protest and turned to Babu and Lenny.
“Is that Babu?” one of the people in the group wondered loudly. “That's fucking him.”
Babu rose up and stood before the crowd. For years he had been provoking hatred in these very same people. Cowardly attacks. Bloodying their heroes. Burning their local team jersey. Humping the American Flag. Babu was so good at his job that when he went to Boston, they had to erect Plexiglas around the ring. He was the most hated man along the East Coast who made a lot of money on the premise that no one could beat him.
But tonight was the night he was going to get it. Finally, after years of dominance, in Shea Stadium, Babu, the South African Savage, was going to be whooped. The people could feel it. They all paid to witness it. They were promised.
Except he never showed up.
“Man, you're the biggest fucking pussy I've ever laid eyes on,” said one of the horde as he stepped forward. “What happened, did you wet your big giant panties on the way to the show?”
The mob roared their approval and the self-assigned leader was clearly enjoying the verbal battle with a mute. “Well, one way or the other, we're going to see you get bloody tonight, Babu. You fucking white nigger.”
Everyone agreed with a series of 'woohooos' and 'yeahs.' Lenny involuntarily stepped out between the crowd and the champ.
“We were in a crash...”
Babu grabbed Lenny around the face and tossed him back behind him.
The leader continued, “I ain't no Florida kid, but I bet I could break you up.”
Babu began a visceral bellow. The self-appointed leader tried to backpedal back into the collective, but he was met by a wall of anxious flesh. They all knew that when the Savage began his 'weird shit', the end was near for his opponent. The bellowing continued through the short 'tribal' dance. The bravado was gone and replaced with a vacuum. The South African Savage had arrived. He pounded his chest with his good hand and his noises became louder, his movements more confrontational. And then he abruptly stopped.
This was the part where all the bad stuff usually happened. And they all knew it.
The swarm was halfway between spectator and prey. They knew what was going to happen next, but their fandom slowed down their alarm.
Babu snapped forward and dropped two of them instantly with the same huge elbow hook. He produced his split of timber and cracked another over the head with it.
The remaining upright automatically rushed him to try and stem the momentum of hurt that was plainly coming their way. They threw everything they had: kicks, punches, biting, and nut shots, but it was like throwing snowballs at a tree.
Lenny wanted to do something. This was what he was waiting for. It was his opportunity to become one of the Boys once and for all.
He saw the giant trying, in vain, to protect his seriously injured arm while fending off a mass of out of shape attackers. Bodies were flying in all directions. Babu was kicking ass, and more importantly to him, staying in character.
This was Lenny's chance.
When he was young, Lenny jumped from the dilapidated Villa Rosa mansion into the Long Island sound. He couldn't swim. To this moment, it was the bravest/stupidest thing he had ever done. He was about to get wet again.
Lenny closed his eyes and jumped in again. He was immediately knocked out and trampled.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
October 1st 1972. New York.
It was that unusually calm time between daybreak and work time. The noise wa
sn't at its peak, or the traffic at its busiest yet. It was a nice time – if you weren't Lenny Long.
His head was hinged back as far as his neck could go. Both nostrils were blocked tight with tissue, and he was having a hard time breathing without pain. There was a dried lump of blood at the back of his head, and his stained and tattered clothes were barely staying with him.
The night before, when things quieted down inside, Babu pulled his arm back into place. Lenny thanked him, but Babu ignored him.
Worse still was his lack of contact with his family. He couldn't remember how many times they'd spoken in the last two months. Maybe three times. He'd been home less in the last six months.
All the physical pain, the emotional torment, and, yet, he knew there was a real good chance that something even worse was coming his way.
Both men were on the steps of the police department while Danno's lawyer, Troy Bartlett haggled inside the station.
“You tell me why I had to ring around every fucking jailhouse in the city to find my clients, officer,” Troy said across the counter.
“Just tell your friends out there not to run off anywhere now,” the police officer answered before taking a call.
Bartlett scraped his briefcase off the counter and headed for the door. It was probably going to cost Danno a pretty penny to make the charge of assaulting an officer go away, but no doubt he'd pay it for his champ.
Troy cracked the doors open and approached both men who were sitting on the steps of the police department. Danno had only asked him to deal with one of them. The one who got them into all this. The small one.
Troy handed Lenny a piece of paper. “Danno wants to see you at seven-thirty here,” and walked off.
Babu was beginning to shake with the effects of his injured and possibly infected arm.
“We're going to have to get you to a hospital,” Lenny said.
“We need to pick up someone on the way.”
“Have you got change for a five? I just need to make a call.”
“Now.”
Babu began to walk. Lenny tried to follow him.
“We need a car,” Babu said as he turned the corner with purpose.
“You saw what happened to my wheels last night.”
Babu stopped. “You get a car.”
“Why?”
“'Cause we have to collect Gilbert King,” Babu said as he walked on.
Oct 1st 1972. New York.
Lenny knocked on the peeling white door. He took a look around the yard and noticed the wire fence was gone. He had promised he would get rid of it when he came back off the road. Looked like he was too late.
He hadn't been home in eight or nine weeks. The boss rang late one night and he was gone. This type of occurrence, or worse, was the norm for the last few years.
The only contact he had with his wife for the last couple of months was a short argument in a car lot near Queens. Based on that, Lenny figured that things might get awkward.
Babu waited in the yard while Lenny waited for the door to open.
Bree answered. She was taken aback by Lenny's appearance, but was too angry to ask him if he was okay. Lenny missed her immediately. She was beautiful, and he loved her. He just couldn't tell her what trouble he was in.
“Hey honey. I lost my key,” he said as he tried to enter the house. Bree stood firmly in her doorway.
“Tell me Lenny, do you think I'm the kind of wife that's going to sit around here and wait for you to make me happy? Do you think I think that's my job?”
“I...”
“Do you think that I sit in here every night changing the wallpaper in my head or baking cakes just in case you happen to grace me with your presence some night? Is that how you've decided my life is to be?”
Lenny tried desperately to direct Bree's eyes to the Technicolor giant behind him.
“Him? Fuck him, Lenny.” Bree stepped onto her porch and looked over her husband's shoulder to Babu. “Do you understand me, mister? This one likes to stay away from his family. You can keep him.”
Bree tried to close the door, but she wanted to have another go at Babu, who seemed to symbolize the business for her. “I fucking hate what you do and I hate what it does to my family.”
“I just need the keys to the car, Peaches.”
Bree stopped her struggle. “You want what?”
“The keys.”
“You're not even going to argue with me or push me over to see your kids? You just want the car? Where's that fucking van that you just had to have?”
“What van?” Lenny pleaded innocently.
“Are you going to tell me you didn't get the van, Lenny? ‘Cause I will scream right here if you're going to come home and lie to me.”
“I'm coming back later. We can talk then.”
“Yeah, what time? Gimme some time to put on a nice dress and warm up the foot massager for you.”
Lenny couldn't answer. Bree took the car keys from a homely little hook plaque with their keys hanging on it.
“Get the fuck out of here.”
Lenny took the keys and walked back down the steps. Bree closed the door. Lenny jumped in the driver’s side and Babu stuffed himself into the passenger side.
Babu took the receiver off the dash. “What's this?”
“CB radio.”
Lenny turned the key and prayed that one of his blinds would move even just an inch. That he'd get a sign that someone was watching him leave.
His prayer went unanswered.
“She never asked me what happened to me, or where the van was, or nothing,” Lenny said, looking to Babu who looked like he had slipped back into character.
“Where's Gilbert King? Where am I driving to?” Lenny asked.
“Back to where we crashed.”
October 1st 1972. New York.
The bridge was unmoved. Not a scratch. Lenny tried desperately to squeeze out a memory of what happened the night before. Did he really ruin the biggest match in professional wrestling history because he was tired?
If he couldn't come up with something else, he was going to get hurt. And probably by several different groups of people.
Babu was sweating profusely in the seat next to him. “We're going to have to get you to hospital, man.”
“Turn here and pull over by that gate,” Babu muttered.
Lenny drove along Roosevelt and stopped at a black gate that hung crookedly between two graffiti-covered buildings.
Babu struggled to release himself from the car. Lenny leaned over to help, but Babu warned him off without saying a word.
The giant opened his own door and fell out onto the road. He made his way to the gate as people stopped and watched.
“Fuck you, Babu, you pussy,” a voice shouted from the other side of the road.
Lenny followed his injured passenger as he opened the gate. They both could see a heavily bloodstained dumpster sandwiched into a small and filthy alleyway.
“Where the fuck is he?” Babu muttered to himself as he walked to the soiled dead end.
“Gilbert King?” Lenny asked.
Babu struggled to stay standing. Lenny tried to hold his arm in support. Babu suddenly turned and grabbed him by the neck. “This is all your fault. You hear me? You couldn't keep your fucking eyes where they were supposed to be, and now we're all fucked.”
Babu released Lenny just in time. He slid down the wall and fought for breath. Lenny never felt so helpless against harm in all his life.“ I don't know what happened last night.”
“You started something that's going to cost us all big fucking money.”
Babu kicked open the gate and marched to the driver's side of the car. A small pool of onlookers had gathered across the road. “Babu, your Momma sucks dicks. Fuck you, man.”
Babu started the car and took off on his own before Lenny found his feet.
October 1st 1972. New York.
The bouquet of flowers was half hidden by Lenny's side as he walked down the busy hospit
al hallway. He was ready to present them or drop them. Truth was, he didn't know which he was going to have to do.
He approached the desk and looked over his shoulder. The hallway was chaotic and loud.
“Sorry, miss. Is there a really big guy who just signed himself in here?”
Down the hall, Gilbert was in the bed and sleeping. His face was unrecognizable from the bruising, cuts and swelling. The tubes ran in a pack from the machines to his nose and hand. His mother reached out her shaky arm to lightly touch his face. “Why would they do this to him?”
Proctor stood at the foot of the bed, seething with rage. Gilbert moaned toward his father. “Sorry.”
Proctor wasn't sure if he heard Gilbert correctly. “What?” he said as he moved closer to his son’s lips.
“I tried to get Lenny to stop driving, but he was drunk.”
“It's okay, son.”
Gilbert ran his dry tongue across his drier lips. “He tried to get me to drink, Pop. And the giant held me down when I tried to stop the van and pull over.”
Proctor's knuckles whitened as he strangled the thin blanket on the bed. “It's going to be okay.”
Out in the hallway, Proctor's fingers refused to pinch the coin from his hand. “Fucking...” He tried again, but suddenly became aware of the patients in the hallway staring at him. “What are you looking at?” he scowled.
He found it hard to breathe in the right rhythm. Gilbert whispered that Lenny crashed them into a wall, even though Gilbert shouted a warning to him several times.
Proctor finally deposited the money and rang the number. “Put me through to Danno,” he demanded. Danno's secretary knew the voice well and connected the call.
“Hello?” Danno answered.
“You fucking cunt. I swear to God I'm going to kill them, Danno.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You've conned me out of the belt and don't think I don't know that you tried to kill my fucking son too, you son of a bitch.”
Proctor removed the phone from his ear and just screamed down the line.
