by Cara Nelson
“I get the idea. But really you’ve been nice to me and I appreciate it. I’m not here to make you feel self-conscious. I’m here as a sort of anthropological experiment to see what I can learn about the stressors of traditional masculinity on white working-class men.”
“You’re here like the rest of us…easy job to pay the rent.” Donny piped up. They all laughed, Zoe included.
She went to Neil’s office and waited until he was done with Aaron. The fighter came storming out the office door, nearly plowing her down. She had to jump aside to get out of his way in the dust-up. Neil summoned her inside.
“How’s it going?”
“Fine. They were really forthcoming and good about being interviewed. I still need a chance to talk to Aaron.”
“You might want to skip it. If you’ve got enough footage from the others—he’s not going to be the most articulate, friendly subject. Get some shots of his fighting—he’s a hell of a boxer, but he has an attitude. He’s cocky, even for a fighter. You can work on editing what you have. I’ll see you back here tomorrow before the fight so you can get set up.”
“Thanks, I’ll be here.”
“You might want to dress—”
“I know. More professionally. I want to blend in. I will,” she said. “Thanks.”
She left Swagger and called Shea to meet her at their favorite thrift store.
“I need some work clothes that won’t get me hit on. A couple of the fighters were checking me out, and the bartender basically told me I was asking for it.”
“In jeans and a jersey? That’s one of the most stupid things I have ever heard. Let’s dress you up like a prison matron, then. Too bad your hair isn’t long enough for a bun.”
She met up with Shea at the store, and they got to work. Together, they fished through tables of consignment clothes. Zoe emerged with a pile of black pants and khakis and a shapeless navy sweater. Shea emerged with a cocktail dress, the palest shell pink, with silver beads all over it.
“Thanks, but if the jersey got me hit on, how will Stu and the boys react to that flapper costume?”
“I was thinking for your date. Or did you forget?”
“No, I didn’t forget!” Zoe lied. “I’m going out with Tony tonight.”
“Yes, Tony the new accounts manager at the hospital, the one I went to the trouble to set you up with. He’s cute if you like blonds.”
“So why aren’t you dating him?”
“He’s skinny. Also he wears a suit to work. I prefer the hands-on type…the doctors, the surgeons—”
“The orderlies, the cafeteria workers…” Zoe teased.
“Look, no one else in the universe is short enough to wear this dress as anything but a tank top, so try it on. It’s perfect. He’s taking you someplace nice.”
Zoe rolled her eyes, but complied. Shea gasped approvingly and wouldn’t let her put the dress down. Grumbling, Zoe kept it, and got her revenge with a few more shapeless, comfy sweaters.
“Enough!” Shea admonished. “Check out! We gotta get you home!”
Zoe paid and they left—she knew better than to argue.
She got dressed for her date with extra care, even braving Shea’s scary eyelash curler and an array of weaponized makeup brushes. She had a pair of strappy silver sandals from her college formal that went pretty well with the cocktail dress.
“Text me and let me know how it goes,” she said. “I put a little something in your purse for later,”
“If it’s a condom, you can keep it. This is our first date,” Zoe snapped.
“Get your mind out of the gutter, chica, it’s a box of Tic Tacs. For the good night kiss.” Shea winked at her.
Zoe headed out, trying not to hold her breath. She arrived at the restaurant, a trendy French place in Back Bay, and found Tony waiting at the table. He was sandy-haired and suave. He looked like a grown-up, as Zoe put it to herself, not like a guy her age. At twenty-two, she wasn’t quite sure about dating a man past thirty, but Shea had promised he was cute. He was, in a bookish sort of way. He had wire-rimmed glasses and wore a bow tie, possibly without irony. He rose from his chair when she approached the table, but he let the waiter pull out her chair.
“Shea said you were lovely, and I’m happy to note that she didn’t exaggerate. It’s good to meet you, Miss Zoe,” he said.
“Thank you, Tony,” she demurred, sitting down opposite him.
“I ordered for us already. I have been here several times, and the coquilles St. Jacques is not to be missed.”
Zoe tried not to make a face. She didn’t mind seafood, but she wasn’t keen on having her decisions made for her. Or being called Miss Zoe—the same thing her mother used to call her when she was in trouble as a kid. She decided to be a good sport, at least for the moment, and nodded.
“I’ve ordered us wine as well. I’m something of a dilettante oenophile, though I’ve been told I have a professional-grade nose. Try this Pouilly-Fume. It complements the creaminess of the sauce with its astringency. Most people will pair a chardonnay with a buttery sauce, but it is overwhelming to the senses and does no favors for the entrée itself. I teach a course about wine pairings and the provenance of certain elite vintages on Tuesday nights. You should come sometime.”
He paused to take a sip, sniffing the glass ostentatiously and swishing the wine around in his mouth. Zoe drank her water, looking away to keep from laughing.
“I like merlot,” she said conversationally.
“A medium-bodied red is not suited to scallops at all,” he said scornfully. “Perhaps it might be well enough with a hamburger. Personally, with red meat I favor a California Zinfandel, something fruity and whimsical.”
“With a burger, I like a Diet Coke. It’s not really whimsical…it has more of a sarcastic sense of humor.”
Tony just looked at her, eyes narrowed as if trying to decide if he’d just been insulted. Then he barreled on talking about the merlot grapes eclipsing the cabernet grapes in France. She glazed over, wishing for a piece of bread. When the meal itself arrived, she started scarfing down scallops almost before the waiter had withdrawn his hand from the plate.
“What are you having?” she asked.
“They’re tripe parcels. Very savory. Do you care to try one?” he offered.
“No. Absolutely not,” she said, shuddering and taking a long drink of her Pouilly-Fume.
Tony was blessedly quiet while he ate. She looked around at the lovely décor, all white tablecloths with pale wood and delicate ferns. It would almost have been pleasant, had she been alone and gotten to order her own meal. It crossed her mind, as he sniffed his wine before every sip, that this was not a man who would have lifted a finger for her if she were being mugged in an alley. In fact, if he knew she filmed bareknuckle fights for a living, he probably wouldn’t deign to share a table with her.
“So, do tell me about your costume. Shea didn’t mention that you were a thespian.”
“It’s a dress. I bought it to wear tonight,” she said, her voice tinged with disappointment.
“Surely you’re joking,” he said affably.
Her eyes prickled absurdly with tears.
“What is with everyone and my wardrobe today? I’m not an actor. I also do not like scallops, smoky wine, or you. Have a nice evening.” She stood up, dropped her linen napkin on the table, and walked out.
That was the absolute last time she’d ever let Shea fix her up. Nothing like wasting a new dress and ending up in tears. Zoe was in her pajamas with a pint of ice cream in her lap by ten o’clock. She flicked on the TV looking for a comforting romantic comedy but found herself strangely wrapped up in one of the Rocky movies instead.
CHAPTER 5: AARON
“May the Lord hold you in the palm of his hand, brother, and never squeeze too tight,” Aaron said, an old joke of their father’s. Kyle nodded his appreciation.
Aaron settled into his seat with his nine-dollar pint. Kyle ducked the ropes and strode to the center of the ri
ng with every bit of swagger that the club’s name professed. He was lean and hard, and an old man in a sport peopled by men nearly a decade younger. The others who started the year Kyle began fighting had all gone on to regular day jobs after landing in the ER a few times too often.
Aaron was still a bit in awe of Kyle. Once the foul-mouthed big brother who beat the hell out of him for sneaking a Playboy out from under their shared mattress, he’d also kicked the ass of any street toughs who disrespected the brothers Dolan. It was Kyle who’d told him that fighting was how you took the measure of a man, how you proved your own worth. And it was, for better or worse, Kyle’s approval he looked for every time he stepped in the ring himself. He was basing his entire life on the wisdom of a then-fourteen year old boy’s image of manhood.
Five rounds into the fight, Kyle was winning steadily, almost too effortlessly. Aaron was thirsty in the crowded heat of the room and wanted a refill on his pint. The fight was dull, with Kyle landing a barrage of body blows. His opponent, a wiry kid from Cambridge, feinted and retreated, looping hopelessly around the ring. Aaron rose to take his glass to the bar.
He heard the crack as the blow fell, and the unnatural sound of it skated up his spine. He dropped the glass in his hand as he wheeled around, toward the ring. He had been in enough street fights to know the distinctive noise of a punch landed with knucks. Knuckle-dusters were the punch enhancers of cowardly little shits who weren’t decent boxers. They did maximum damage with minimum effort. He felt the red spike of fury in his blood as he leapt the ropes. That snotty little Cambridge brat had hit Kyle with brass knuckles: illegal, unsportsmanlike and in dire need of an ass kicking.
Kyle was on the mat, gurgling. The ref used a towel to stanch the river of blood. Aaron heard nothing but an indistinct roaring of blood in his ears, unable even to see for the searing, white-hot desire to kill this kid who had hurt his brother in such a cruel, dishonorable way. He stepped over a streak of his brother’s blood on the mat and seized the opponent by the shoulders. Aaron punched him. He felt the snap of the fighter’s collarbone under his fist as he tried to wriggle away like the worm he was. This was how you took the measure of a man, he thought grimly as the man sank to his knees on the mat.
Rough hands dragged him off the fighter with the knucks, holding him back. He heard voices all around him flooding in, paramedics rushing in with a backboard, one kneeling beside the man he’d just beaten while the others attended to Kyle. The words were indistinct. His heart pounded more adrenaline through his body until he shook.
Of all people, the little redhead from the alley, the camera girl was trying to get him to do something. Her voice started to slice through the roaring in his ears. He shook his head as if to clear his vision and her eyes held his gaze. She has freckles, was his first coherent thought, followed closely by, I wonder why she’s crying.
“Listen to me, Aaron, listen!” She hissed, only inches from his face. “Kyle’s going to be fine. He’s sitting up and talking. He just told an EMT to fuck himself. Your brother is okay. Come with me right now. We’ll meet him at the ER. Come on!”
Her soft voice seemed to pull him forward. He stood, absently shaking off the hands that still tried to restrain him, and trailed after her. She had hold of his sleeve and propelled him toward the locker room, the back alley where they’d first met.
The icy air struck him with a palpable force and cleared his head. His eyes opened wide. He gaped at her for a moment, raking his hand through his hair as he tried to shake off the murkiness of his rage.
“What’s wrong?” he said carefully.
The girl was crying, and he had a tendency to make that sort of thing worse, so he thought it best to proceed with caution. Maybe she’d just tell him what was bothering her. Like maybe he slept with her and never called or something. She looked familiar.
“What’s wrong? You almost killed that guy. I thought you were going to kill him, like beat him to death right in front of everyone.”
“I wasn’t going to kill him, exactly. I was mad. He used knucks on my brother. It’s cowardly. Disrespectful. So I was teaching him a little respect.”
“That is by far and away the most fucked up thing I have ever heard, and I did a thesis on Allen Ginsberg.” She sniffed. “Now I will take you to the hospital to see that Kyle is okay if you promise not to beat the hell out of me or anyone else in the time it takes to get to get there.”
“I’m not going to beat you up,” he said disgustedly.
“I was pretty sure you wouldn’t, but then when I was filming, I didn’t exactly expect you to fly out of your chair, vault over the ropes and start breaking bones either. I thought I’d ask to be sure.”
“I don’t hit women. My dad, he hit women. My mom mostly.”
“Did he hit you?”
“Yeah,” he said, wondering why he admitted that when he never even talked about it with Kyle.
Zoe bit her lip, seeming to hesitate. Then she threw her arms around him and squeezed him tightly, fiercely. Aaron could feel her compassion, her sorrow, her anger in the surprising strength of her arms, in the ferocious way she had grabbed him and held him as if she could protect him. After a minute, he put his arms around her tentatively, hugging her back. She took a big breath and he did, too, feeling his shoulders go slack as he relaxed into her.
“I’m so, so sorry,” She said into his coat. “No little kid should ever be hit. But hurting people, fighting people won’t heal that.” She shook her head. “I wish I knew what would heal that.”
He shrugged away from her, turning away diffidently as she wiped tears off her face.
“I’m Zoe, by the way. I’m not sure we ever really met. I mean, you saved my life the other night, and then before I could thank you yesterday, Neil carted you off. So, thank you.”
“I knew you looked familiar, I just couldn’t place you.”
“Well here I am, back at the scene of the crime, as they say. If it wasn’t for what you did for me Wednesday, getting those guys off me, I wouldn’t be listening to you at all, wouldn’t be standing anywhere near you. Thing is, I’m trying to reconcile the guy who saved me with the one who just beat a man nearly to death. Help me out here, on the walk.”
“It comes from the same place, I guess. Stopping someone, punishing someone who wasn’t fighting fair, who hurt someone I care about.”
“So you’ve got some superhero complex? Because you don’t care about me; you didn’t even know me.”
“I knew you were a girl getting hit and I have a problem with that.”
“And you solve problems by hitting other people,” she finished for him.
“It’s how you take the measure of a man, in a fair fight, hand to hand,” he said.
“Okay, Obi-Wan, but what do you do as a grown-up? Because breaking the collarbone is not a pro-social assessment method.”
They came out of the alley onto the street and turned down the block.
“Switch with me,” he said.
“What?”
“You can tell me what a brainless thug I am from the street side. Shit goes on in these alleys you don’t need to be near.”
Without another word, Aaron moved her over and got between her and the row of buildings broken up by dark alleys.
“See, it’s shit like that—you confuse me. First you save me. Then you beat up some guy. When I have you figured out for some violent guy who gets off on hurting people, and then you’re all ‘switch with me’ so my innocent eyes don’t glimpse a drug deal or a hooker. What is with that?”
“A real man doesn’t hurt women. Or let them see drug deals,” Aaron said, trying to sound lighter.
“I believe you despite all evidence to the contrary, which may mean that I’m incontrovertibly stupid or got my head turned by that green scarf.”
“Hey, take it easy on the scarf. My mom made that.”
“You wear a scarf your mom made you. See, that’s another point for ‘sweet’.” She shook her head in puzzlement.
“Sweet as opposed to? Salty? Sour?”
“Psychotic. Still alliterative and more accurate.”
“Cute.”
“I thought it was pretty good myself. Anyway, everyone in that joint saw that guy use the knuckle dusters on Kyle so his career’s over. It’s prison time for that, I’m sure.”
“Seriously? You’re new.”
“What do you mean? Assault with intent to inflict grievous injury…”
“Based on the testimony of a bunch of fighters and the people who hang out at bars watching fights? Right.”
“Are you saying that bareknuckle prizefighters are a disenfranchised minority group?” she challenged.
“I’m saying we have no credibility. As far as the cops are concerned, if we want to kill each other, it’s our lookout. We’re all thugs, gangsters. My testimony would be discredited so fast…”
“So it’s like the gladiators.”
“What?”
“In Ancient Rome, gladiators were enslaved, forced to perform for the entertainment of the populace, and had no rights to citizenship or even liberty.”
“I became a fighter on my own. No one forced me.”
“Right. Someone force-fed you that cowboy crap about what a man is and what a man does and how you measure a man. It’s like you come from some John Wayne cult.”
“Not a cult. Irish Catholic all the way,” he said.
Zoe gave him a sidelong look and he smiled in spite of himself. He saw her shiver a little…she’d run out without a coat. Aaron unwound the green scarf from his neck and draped it around hers. She stopped walking and faced him. He wrapped it around her and looped it to secure it so the ends wouldn’t drag the ground.
“Why aren’t you breathing?” he said. Zoe let her breath out with a whoosh.
“I’m breathing. Why wouldn’t I be breathing?” she countered.
“Because I loaned you my scarf and I’m so devastatingly charming.”
“Neil was right.”
“He said I’m devastatingly charming? I’m flattered. I had no idea I was his type.”
