Shadowboxing

by Tony Birch

  I had heard similar speeches to this one before, although not delivered with such urgency. He walked over to the second pair of gloves and picked them up from the overturned fruit box. I wondered if he was going to put them on himself. As he walked towards me carrying the gloves in his hands he lifted one to my face.

  ‘Don’t think of this as a glove. It’s part of you now. It’s not a glove. It’s your fist. And you have to work it from here,’ he pointed to my shoulder, ‘along your arm and into your fist. And you have to work all of that, left and right, your footwork, your balance, and your defence, all from here.’ He pointed to the side of his head. ‘If you don’t have a boxing brain then what you do have up there will end up getting battered to pulp.’

  He put the second pair of gloves at his feet. ‘You don’t use the glove properly and you’ll do nothing more than protect your opponent, feeding him love taps. But, if you use it properly, good technique, well, it’s like hitting someone over the head with a fucken sledgehammer. You don’t punch at him, you punch through him, that’s the secret of a good punch.’

  He threw a gentle left hook, feigning it just enough so that it stopped at the point of my chin. ‘You, Michael, you don’t stop at the chin. You don’t stop at the side of the head, or at the gut. You don’t stop at all. You punch through the body. Put your weight behind the punch and move in through the body, move through the body.’

  He feigned a left–right combination. He was still quick. He picked up his pair of gloves and put them back on top of the fruit box. He looked down at my gloved hands as I held them together in front of my waist.

  ‘Now, how do they feel?’

  I didn’t know what to say. I wasn’t sure how they should feel. He did not wait for a reply. He knew exactly how they felt. ‘They’re light, aren’t they? Light and soft. But just wait until you’ve been holding them up under your chin for a few rounds, throwing punches, getting your arms battered. You’ll be sure that you’ve been carrying around a pair of fucken house bricks. You’ll want to drop them around your waist. Once that happens you’re gone. No defence. No fight. You’ll get knocked out.’

  He moved in closer to me. We almost touched. I could feel his breath on the side of my face. He looked into my eyes. His intensity worried me.

  ‘They feel good, don’t they?’

  ‘Yeah, they’re good, dad, real good.’ I was unsure what else to say.

  He smiled at me with satisfaction. He was ready to go. He took a step from the mat.

  ‘Right. Come on. Let’s get on with it. I want you to start just like we’ve been doing on the bag. Start with some combinations. Move around just like we’ve been doing on the bag. Don’t forget your footwork, keep moving, just get the feel of them.’

  He slapped his hands together a couple of times and then held out his heavily calloused palms towards me. ‘Come on, let’s go.’ He slapped them together one more time. ‘Come on.’

  We began to circle each other. I started with a series of straight jabs and the occasional combination. Each time that a glove hit his hand I heard a sharp whack. I enjoyed the feel of the glove as it bounced off his hand with a crisp rhythm. We danced around each other. I continued throwing punches. Each of them landed cleanly in the middle of one of his large hands. It excited him.

  ‘That’s it. Move around. Move around. Now, change direction, double back. That’s it. That’s it. Right. Good, good. Stop. That’s it. Stop now.’

  He was already breathing heavily.

  ‘You’re moving well, son. You move beautifully. And the punches, coming straight from the shoulder, nice action, and no round-arm stuff. Good, good. But remember,’ he walked into me again and looked at me closely, ever watchful for any lack of concentration on my part, ‘looking good is not worth fuck-all on its own. I’ve seen the biggest piss-weak stagers down at Foley’s, prancing around like they own the place. “Punching-bag kings, queens of the ring”, that’s what they say about them. And when it comes to put-up time, well, they get knocked out of the ring quicker than they climbed into it.’

  He sat his hand lightly on my shoulder. ‘You want to become a rated fighter, you’ve got to have speed. I reckon you’ve got that. And a good punch. And heart. Jesus, I hope you’ve got that. Only time in the ring will tell. When you’re getting your head knocked off, that’s when you’ll find out how big the heart is. But most of all,’ he put a hand on my other shoulder and manoeuvred me towards him, ‘you got to have that instinct, a killer instinct. If you don’t have that, it doesn’t mean nothing: how fast you are, how hard you can punch. You’ll get killed in the end, fucken killed. You got to hate the other bloke. Really hate him. Because if he’s any good, when he gets in that ring with you, all he’ll be thinking is how he’s going to punch the shit out of you. Just one sniff from him that you haven’t got it and well, it’s over, all over. He’ll fucken eat you.’ He began poking me in the chest. ‘You got it. You got it.’

  I rubbed the spot on my chest where he had just dug his finger.

  ‘Yeah, I got it, dad. I got it.’

  He looked at me with increasing scepticism.

  ‘Well, Michael, I don’t know if you do understand what I’m trying to teach you, or that you have got it. You’re a beautiful mover, really are. Lovely balance, and your timing, it’s always been good, since you threw your first punch. But I don’t know. I really don’t know. You don’t need respect in the ring, Michael. That talk, all that talk about respect, that’s all bullshit. You need fear. That’s it. You need to put the fear of God into your opponent. That’s the secret. When everything else is equal — strength, technique, speed — it’s fear that will get him. Your opponent, more than anything else, you want him to fear you, Michael, that’s what you want.’

  He stopped looking at me and lifted his head into the air and began talking more to himself, or possibly an old adversary, but certainly not to me.

  ‘I’ve got it. Everyone around here, if they don’t respect me, at least they’re wary of me. Even when I lost a fight, I won it. I hurt them so much they never came back. So in the end it was me that won anyway.’ He began to shadowbox while continuing to talk to himself. ‘I’ve got it. I’ve got it. Punched a hole in this fucken place for myself.’

  He stopped talking for a moment and searched the sky again before looking back at me, remembering where he was and what it was we were supposed to be doing. He slapped his hands together.

  ‘Come on, let’s get going. And I want to see a bit more speed now, and a bit more power in them punches. Come on, let’s go.’

  We began to circle each other. I hit his open hand as cleanly as before and now just a little bit harder with each punch.

  ‘Come on, that’s it, Michael. Stick it here! Stick it, Michael!’ He pointed to his reddening open palm as I hit it. ‘Stick it! Go on, stick it!’

  We began to move away from the mat. The dust from the dry earth of the backyard lifted into the air. I could taste it in my mouth. I caught sight of George Carter out of the corner of my eye. He was hanging over our side fence, watching the action. My father spotted him too. He kept one eye on George as we continued to move around the mat.

  ‘Stick it here, Michael! Stick it!’

  George lived directly across the street from our house. We were the same age and year level, but attended different schools. He went to state and I went to Catholic. But we hung out together on weekends, at the baths in summer or playing football in the street. We walked down to the Brunswick Street ground during the football season to watch Fitzroy play.

  My father called an end to the round. ‘Okay, okay. Time. Time.’

  Sweat was pouring off him and he had completely lost his breath. He crouched forward while trying to suck air into his lungs. He stood up.

  ‘Okay, okay, Michael. Into the laundry and get yourself a drink of water. Leave the gloves on.’
>
  I stood in the laundry battling to turn the tap while wearing the boxing gloves. I could hear my father talking to George. When I came out he was holding the second pair of boxing gloves in his hands, tapping one against the other while George hung from the fence admiring them.

  ‘Yeah, well, George, it would be good if you trained down at Foley’s. But who can afford it, hey? And are you ready for it, George? You wouldn’t want to walk into that gym without some basic moves behind you, would you?’

  George appeared spellbound as he followed the arc of the leather gloves.

  ‘But I’ve been doing some training, Mr Byrne, just like Michael. I shadowbox in front of the mirror every night.’

  ‘That’s good, George. A good start, anyway.’

  My father looked over his shoulder at me before turning back towards George, who had still not taken his eyes off the gloves.

  ‘Listen, George, why don’t I open the side gate and let you in? You can try these on, and if you want I’ll go through some combinations with you, some moves that you can try in the mirror when you get home tonight. What do you reckon? You want to have a go?’

  George had climbed down from the fence and was standing at the side gate before my father had completed the invitation. He greeted George with the boxing gloves outstretched in his arms.

  ‘Here you go, son. Try these on for size.’

  George was a little taller than me, and heavier as well. He did not quite look like the athlete that he thought himself to be. My father laced the gloves while giving George every encouragement to spar with him.

  ‘Come on, let’s see you do a bit of the stuff that you seen me doing with Michael. Let’s move around and get some punches out there.’ He winked at George. ‘Come on, let’s see what you’ve got there, son.’

  They began moving around on the square of lino. George wasn’t fast — with either his fists or his feet. He stood flat-footed, with no boxing stance to speak of. He threw his punches wildly in the general direction of my father’s open hands. Most of the punches missed their mark completely. George’s lack of any genuine skill did not stop my father from giving him every encouragement.

  ‘That’s it, George. Good. That’s it. Keep moving around, son, throw them out, throw them out there. That’s good. That’s it, mate. Time. Take a rest. That’s it. Time.’

  George stopped throwing punches and rested his gloves on his hips as he attempted to gather his breath. My father patted his head.

  ‘That’s real good, George, real good. Take a breather.’

  My father disappeared into the laundry to get a quick drink of water for himself. When he came out he looked over at me before again turning his attention to George, who was by now mimicking the prizefighter, knocking his gloves together repeatedly, while shuffling from toe to toe as if he were a world champion. My father passed George a milk bottle half-filled with water.

  ‘Here, take a drink, son. You look good there, George. Got a nice punch too.’ He looked over at me while continuing to talk to George. ‘What about a spar, George? What about you have a spar with Michael?’

  I interrupted him, while trying to remove one of my gloves by wedging it between my thighs and attempting to slip it off.

  ‘I’ve had enough, dad. I’ve got homework, and I think I better give mum a hand in the kitchen, help her with …’

  He turned on me, hissing at me through clenched teeth. ‘Don’t worry about the fucken kitchen. That’s your mother’s job. Anyway, Katie can help her. And what are you doing, trying to get them gloves off. Don’t touch them! Leave them on!’

  He walked over to George, speaking to him in a much calmer voice than he had just used to abuse me.

  ‘What about it, George? How’d you like to go three rounds with Michael? You’re a bit bigger than he is, so I don’t want you going too hard on him.’ He winked at him again.

  George was keen to have a go at me. ‘Yeah, why not, hey Michael?’ He danced up on his toes and threw several punches in my direction.

  My father was satisfied. He had just organised my first fight.

  ‘Okay then, okay boys. I’ll be timekeeper and referee.’

  He pulled the two of us into the centre of the mat and placed a hand on each of our shoulders.

  ‘Okay boys, I want to see you moving around the ring, show me those combinations. And boys,’ he looked at each of us, ‘not too rough with each other, okay?’

  He winked at me this time before giving us our final instructions.

  ‘Now back in your corners and I’ll call you out for the start of the round.’

  We went to our respective corners. My father walked over to me and put his mouth against my ear.

  ‘All right, son. This is it. I want you to show me all of those things we’ve been talking about. All that training that we’ve done, I want to see it here, all come together, here. Move around. Keep up on your toes. Work the combinations. And don’t go headhunting too early. Work him around the body. Wear the body down first and then punish him upstairs.’

  He winked again and walked back to the centre of the mat and slapped his hands together. ‘Let’s box!’

  George sprang out of his corner and ran straight at me, throwing wild haymaker punches as he advanced across the mat. I easily avoided him. I skipped lightly to one side and threw a combination to put him off balance. He fell forward, almost onto his knees before spinning around and charging towards me again. I flicked out two sharp left jabs that caught him on the end of his nose, halting his attack.

  My father was bouncing up and down on the balls of his toes, as if he were the one doing the fighting. ‘That’s it, Michael. That’s it. That’s it.’

  I was able to pick George off at will, hitting him in the face and the body. But there was little power in my punches. I did not want to hurt him. I did not even want to be fighting him. But George didn’t seem to get it. He was determined to knock me out, putting all he had into throwing punches that would have knocked my head off, had any of them landed. My father called an end to the round.

  ‘Time. Come on boys, back to your corners. End of round one. Time. Time.’

  George went back to his corner, took a long drink of water and hunched down on his hands and knees. My father moved over to my corner. He looked angry.

  ‘What’s with the love taps? What are you doing? He’s not your fucken boyfriend! You’re fighting him, not taking him out to a dance. Start throwing some real stuff. You pull this shit in the ring and you’ll end up getting knocked through the ropes. Now give him some! Like I said, attack the body!’

  He went back to the centre of the ring. George was now sitting on the fruit box. He already looked beaten. He just did not know it yet. My father did not wait for him to get to his feet.

  ‘Let’s go! Round two!’

  George did not charge out as he had done in the previous round. He walked slowly towards me this time, but still managed to swing his windmill punches as he advanced. Again, I was able to easily pick him off. I put a little more power behind my punches in an attempt to pacify my father. It only incited him to demand more from me.

  ‘That’s it. Stick him! Stick him!’ he screamed as he danced around us.

  George was flushed in the face. In his desperation he swung a roundhouse right. As I took a step back and attempted to duck under the punch his glove clipped the end of my nose. It began to bleed almost immediately.

  ‘Time! Time!’ My father attempted to move in between us at the same moment that George sensed his opportunity, having seen the blood pouring from my nose. He continued throwing punches at me as my father tried separating us.

  ‘Whoa! Whoa there, George. Back to your corner, killer, back to the corner.’

  George stood in his corner, impatiently punching his gloves together as I attempted to wipe the blood from u
nder my nose with the thumb of my glove. My father came over to me. He hit me across the side of the head, screaming through his teeth at me.

  ‘What are you fucken doing? You fucken idiot!’ He hit me again. ‘Look at your fucken nose! It’s bleeding everywhere. Everywhere! Don’t shit on me here, Michael. Don’t make me look like a fucken idiot. Not here. I didn’t train you up for this to happen to us, not here. I didn’t spend all my time on you so that you could make a fucken fool out of the two of us.’

  I would not look at him. I watched the drops of blood as they fell from my nose and onto the worn pattern of the lino. The blood mixed with the dust of the yard and the dirt of the surrounding streets. He put a fist under my chin and forced my head upward until we were looking directly at each other. I could see my reflection in his eyes.

  ‘You give it to him now or it’s you and me. We’re going to go at it right here on this mat. And I won’t be pulling any punches. Now give it to him. Fucken do it!’

  He slapped me in the face a third time. It hurt. My eyes were full of dust and tears and I could not see him beyond a blur.

  ‘Round three!’

  I could not see all that much of George as he moved in to me but I managed to hit him with a left to the side of the head. I followed with a straight right that landed across the bridge of his nose. I had thrown both punches as hard as possible, disposing of any finesse or style. George was suddenly very frightened. He tried covering himself with both arms, in an attempt at self-protection, but I continued to punch him viciously around the head and body.

  I could hear my father baying. ‘That’s it. Yeah, Michael, yeah. Stick him! Stick him!’ He was hysterical, hovering over the two of us as I moved in on George. ‘Take him! Take the head, Michael! Take that head! The fucken head!’

  I hit George with everything that my father had trained me to produce: lefts, rights, a cross, a hook, uppercuts, combinations.

  ‘That’s it, Michael. Put him down! Put him fucken down!’

  George was calling out to my father to stop the fight. But George had no idea what this was really about. It was my father that George was fighting, not me. He could not save George, not now.