Always

by Nicola Griffith

“Painful.” She made a careful face and everyone smiled in sympathy.

  “Do you feel more vulnerable?”

  “I guess. More jumpy anyhow.”

  “More scared, deep down, or less?”

  “I don’t know.” She thought about it. “Both, maybe. I mean, I sure wouldn’t want anyone to hit my nose again anytime soon. But the notion of being hit somewhere else is less scary than it was. Kind of. I mean, it hurt, but it, like you said, it gets better. It’s just a . . . a . . . It’s not the end of the world.”

  “Or your good looks,” Nina said.

  The smiles were rueful, and I understood that Nina’s remark wasn’t entirely a joke. For them looks mattered as much as permanent disability.

  “But what’s it like?” Jennifer said. “To get whomped like that?”

  “And, Katherine,” I said, “what was it like to do the, ah, whomping, even though it was accidental?”

  “Awful,” she said. “I felt sick.”

  “So did I,” Tonya said.

  I let them sit with it. It was an inescapable fact: getting hurt hurts. Several of them stared desperately at the floor. Perhaps I would donate a large sum to Crystal Gaze so that future classes could at least stare at a nicer carpet.

  “Omelets,” I said.

  “Oh, no,” Pauletta said. “Please tell me you’re not going to give us that crap about breaking eggs.”

  “Crap. I see.” Cliché, possibly—but I didn’t know how else to describe it. Which annoyed me. “Tell me, then, how you make an omelet.”

  Silence. Nina cleared her throat. “Egg beaters?”

  Despite my irritation I almost smiled. “Someone broke those eggs.”

  “Yes, but not me.”

  “Those eggs get broken. Yes or no?” I looked around the group. “Yes or no?”

  Reluctant nods.

  “To learn to walk, you have to fall down. To make an omelet you break eggs. To defend yourself from physical attack, someone gets hurt. Yes or no?”

  More nods, one or two Yeses.

  “Nothing is free. Nothing is magic. You get out what you put in. Risk and reward. Suze, help me move the mattress to the other wall.” We lifted it away and there lay ten gourd-sized piñatas. I picked up the nearest, crimson painted with gold donkeys and stars, and shook it in their direction. “That rattle is a single poker chip. On it is a number that corresponds to an item on this list.” I pulled a piece of paper from my pocket. “On this list are ten items. A day at Gleam, the day spa. Dinner for two at the Horseradish Grill. Hundred-and-fifty-dollar gift certificates from places like Saks and Tiffany’s and Teuscher. Mostly luxuries, but not all.” I’d included certificates from Chevron and Kroger. “You give me the chip, I give you the corresponding gift certificate. The only rule is that you have to use a naked body weapon to break the piñata open.”

  “Won’t that hurt?”

  “It might,” I said. “You won’t know until you try.”

  “And they’re just piñatas, right?” Pauletta said.

  “Plain old papier-mâché. I broke one myself yesterday.” And that had been so satisfying I’d broken another two and had to buy more.

  “Did it hurt?” Jennifer asked again.

  “Only one way to find out. Would you like to go first?” I tossed her the piñata ball. She dropped it. It didn’t break.

  She picked it up tentatively and shook it. “Don’t people usually break these things with sticks?”

  “Usually. There again, they’re usually blindfolded, too.”

  “It should hang from something.”

  “If you like.” I pulled a piece of string from my other pocket, glad I’d spent the time combing the city for the kind of piñata with two little holes at the top for string instead of the cheap kind with the hook.

  “Well, how else do I hit it?”

  “Entirely up to you.”

  She cradled it in her arm and patted it as though it were a puppy that might have rabies. “It’s hard.”

  I nodded.

  “It will hurt if I hit it.”

  In reply I pinned the list to the door with the thumbtack already pushed into the wood. “Take a look and see if you think it’s worth it.”

  Nina was already looking at the list, with Christie standing by her shoulder. “Jimmy Choo!” she said. “If you don’t break that ball, I will.”

  But Jennifer was hugging it possessively.

  “Think of all your body weapons,” I said.

  “Give me that,” Nina said.

  “No,” Jennifer said. “But you could hold it for me, so I can hit it.” She gave it to Nina.

  “If you hold mine for me next.”

  “Think of—”

  “Not like that,” Jennifer said, completely ignoring me. “In front of you.”

  “—the room. Think of—”

  “Like this?” Nina said, holding it against her stomach.

  “Okay.”

  They weren’t listening. I shrugged. They couldn’t do themselves too much damage. There were no corners, no rough edges, no dangerous metal hooks to tear skin.

  They’d formed a circle with Nina and Jennifer at the center, just like children at a birthday party. Nina snugged the piñata more firmly against her belly and set her back foot to prepare for the punch. Ready to take one for Jimmy Choo. Jennifer began to breathe and bounce around on her toes like a boxer.

  “Hurt it,” Suze said.

  “Kill it.” Kim.

  I wished I’d thought of bribery weeks ago.

  And with a thin, gull-like cry, Jennifer hit the piñata with her fist. Nothing happened.

  “Love tap,” Pauletta said. “Get closer. Kill it.”

  Jennifer set her chin and hit again, harder. “Ow!” She shook her hand. “Think Jimmy,” said Nina.

  “Ow,” Jennifer said again, but absently, and stepped in close and hit it again, and it buckled. “Ha!” Whack. “Ow!” This time she scowled.

  “Oooh, now she’s pissed,” said Pauletta, and Jennifer was.

  “Ow!” This time it was more accusation than complaint, and she threw a series of unscientific, uncoordinated, but totally committed punches, and she screeched like a herring gull fighting with a crow. The piñata crumpled and she seized it from Nina and shook it until the chip fell out. She snatched up the glittery disk. “Four!”

  “Number four,” Christie said from the list on the door. “That’s wine .com.”

  “Champagne!” Jennifer said, then looked at her reddened knuckles.

  “Worth it?” I asked.

  “Totally!”

  Nina picked up a green-and-blue piñata and tossed it to Jennifer. “My turn.”

  The rest of the class closed around them, like punters at a cockfight. Three minutes and scraped knuckles later she had the caviar. “I’ll trade with whoever gets the shoes,” she said with a satisfied smile.

  “No way,” said Kim, “those shoes are mine. Me next.”

  “What about your nails?” Tonya said.

  “Shoot.” Kim stared at them a minute. “Anyone got any clippers?”

  “Wait,” I said. “Think. What other body weapons do you have?”

  “Elbow,” said Christie.

  For the inexperienced, elbows were difficult to use accurately, and even a beginner could generate enough power to break a nose or a cheekbone.

  “We’ll hang this one,” I said, and produced the string again. Soon the piñata was hanging from the bag frame, swinging gently.

  “Kick it,” Suze said suddenly.

  “Knee-high or lower,” I said.

  “No, seriously. Give me one of those.”

  “Which?” Christie said.

  Christie tossed her the orange piñata. Suze caught it, and without pause threw it in the air, and on the way down, just before it hit the floor, she kicked it as though going for a forty-yard goal. It burst in a spectacular shower and a yellow chip tumbled slowly, inevitably to lie faceup on the carpet. Number six. Jimmy Choo.

 
; “Give me one,” Therese said. Christie obliged, and Therese put it against the baseboard, and with one kick, broke it to smithereens. “Number one,” she called to Christie, who said, “Chevron,” and Therese shook her head, and Kim yanked her ball from the string, put it against the wall, and kicked it to pieces. Number eight: Barnes and Noble.

  Katherine grabbed a blue-and-yellow ball and put it on the floor. “Hey, Fred,” she said. “Die, you son of a bitch.” In the startled silence she said, “Axe kick to the head,” with the air of a pool shark naming her pocket, and delivered an executioner’s blow.

  Sandra named someone called George and knelt by it and destroyed it with successive hammer blows with the meaty parts of her fists. Tonya called it Ma’am Yes Ma’am, and had Christie hold it against the wall at chest height, where she burst its spleen with her elbow. Pauletta yelled, “Watch this,” and put hers on the carpet in the middle of the circle. When everyone was watching, she sat on it violently, crushing it. She jumped up, face dark and eyes flashing. “How’s that?” she said. “Who’s sitting on whose face now, you fuck?”

  I decided not to reinforce the “naked” part of the body weapon rule.

  They started to bargain over the chips.

  “Anger,” I said, and waited. Gradually they turned to look at me. “What is it? Why is it?” Blank, though this time no one looked at the carpet. “How does it feel?”

  “Good,” Pauletta said. “Man, it feels good. Kind of clean.”

  Nina nodded. “Naughty but nice.”

  Lots of nods, some smiles. “But in the real world it feels wrong,” Therese said. “Losing my temper feels childish, like a two-year-old screaming in the supermarket until it gets what it wants.”

  “Is feeling angry the same as losing your temper?”

  “Hmmn,” she said.

  “Anger, like fear, is an emotion, not an action. It’s a particularly strong emotion and, again, like fear, releases adrenaline. It won’t just go away because we want it to. What makes you angry?”

  “Idiots,” said Suze.

  “Oh, yep,” Nina said. “And when my husband leaves the cap off the toothpaste. Nearly thirty years he’s been doing it.”

  “When people cut in line,” Tonya said. “I really hate that.”

  “Little things and big things, then. And they can vary from day to day. What makes a person angry today might just make us shake our heads tomorrow. But if you do get angry you can’t ‘rise above it’ because it’s a hormonal thing. It has to be acknowledged, even if just to ourselves. It’s best, if possible, to alter the situation so that we’re not being made angry anymore, and it’s good to do something with the adrenaline charge if you can, to use it in some way, because it makes you feel better.”

  “You mean like telling the person you’re mad at that you’re mad?” Christie said.

  “Maybe. It depends. Would you find that hard?”

  She nodded.

  “Anyone else?” Many nods. Suze shook her head. Sandra didn’t commit one way or the other. “In every culture I’ve come across, from Oslo to Yorkshire to Istanbul to New York, women are disapproved of for showing anger; it’s not feminine, not desirable. And women have been trained for so many years to never, ever get angry that they think if they let themselves slip just a little, just once, it will be a crack in the dam, that the dam will break and unleash a torrent of inappropriate, uncontrolled rage. In specific situations, a lot of people think that if they get angry, they’ll provoke a violent response. Women, in short, have been trained to believe that they’re not allowed to be angry.”

  “Trained,” Katherine said loudly. “You’re always talking about training, like we’re dogs or something.”

  “It’s not polite to raise your voice,” I said, and she immediately hunched and blushed. Suze frowned. “Don’t frown,” I said to her, “you’ll get wrinkles.”

  Silence.

  “Basically, much of what we women hear about anger implies that showing anger means we’re not ‘real women.’ Or, conversely, because we’re women, our anger isn’t real, it’s not to be taken seriously. Our anger, we’re told from day one, is either laughable or disgusting. Effectively, we’re trained to fear and resent our own anger.”

  They looked at each other.

  “All of you,” I said. “All trained. Women are not innately good and kind and wise. We’re trained to be that way. It can be a serious obstacle to getting what we want and need. We’re conditioned. An attacker sometimes has to merely invoke that conditioning and it’s as effective as a leash and muzzle.”

  “Damn,” Nina said.

  “It’s a little like escaping a bad cult. You have to be active in your deprogramming. The first part of what I’d like you to do between now and next week is listen to your body. Learn what makes you angry. Big or small. Don’t judge, for now, whether your anger is reasonable or rational. Anger, for the simple fact that it’s an emotion, is never rational or reasonable. Understandable, yes, but not a rational process. Don’t worry about it. Just learn how you work inside. And then, when you get angry, admit it to yourself, and do something about it.”

  “Like what?”

  “Depends. The first thing must be to find a way to use the adrenaline created by anger. What do you usually do when you get angry? For example, I like to hit things—such as the punch bag. I also like to break wood for kindling.”

  “I kick the soccer ball extra hard,” Suze said. “Or throw the softball.”

  “Slam doors.” Christie.

  “I walk extra fast.” Tonya. And then they were off: kneading bread, stabbing the dirt with a trowel extra hard, singing “real loud,” strangling a towel, punching a pillow, peeling a lot of vegetables, and, Kim’s, my favorite, “hitting the wall in the garage with an old tennis racket.”

  “And how does that make you feel?”

  “Better.” “Cleaner and calmer.” “More in control.”

  I nodded. “Control comes from having choice, bleeding off the pressure on a regular basis, so you’re not seething all the time. Then, when something makes you angry, you can choose whether or not—and how—to respond. ”

  Physically venting also meant they would get used to it, and be able to produce a response more quickly in an emergency. It was all a matter of use.

  “It’s good for your breathing and coordination, too. And the next time you’re strangling a towel”—a nod for Sandra—“or punching that pillow”— Pauletta—“I want you to really feel the emotions, the physical sensations— the speeded-up heart, the breathing, the rising strength.”

  Some nods.

  “I want you to feel it, and remember it. Remember it so clearly that you can recall it in the middle of the night, if necessary, or while you’re brushing your teeth in the morning—and while you’re brushing your teeth one morning, recall very specifically three strikes or joint locks or throws that you think you do well.”

  I held up three fingers.

  “Three things. That’s all. A kick, a knuckle strike, and a pinkie wrench. Or an elbow strike and two kicks. Or two throws and a punch. It doesn’t matter. Three.”

  I motioned Christie over to hold the bag.

  “So I might pick a back fist”—I lunged and unfurled a whipping right fist into the right temple of my imaginary opponent—“then an elbow strike”—the back fist had brought me close enough for a flat, hard drive into the solar plexus—“and then a kick to the knee.”

  Christie staggered at the last blow. I could feel the energy boiling in my bones.

  “Rehearse the anger feelings, the adrenaline, and rehearse the strikes in your head. Rehearse them as you’re driving, as you’re preparing dinner, as you get dressed. Enjoy the sensation. Just three things. Over and over.”

  I scanned the faces around me.

  “Anger isn’t a bad thing. It’s just a feeling. Learn it. Understand it. Feel it—and then start matching that feeling to your three strikes—your punch, your kick, your hold release, whatever. Then
start matching the strikes with possible attacks. Imagine someone pinning you to the wall, or jumping you from behind, or touching you on MARTA. Tie the imagination to the anger to the adrenaline to the strength to the strike. Over and over.”

  More nods. Some of them, I could see—a shifting of the feet, an increased pulse at the neck—were imagining as I spoke.

  “Yes. That trowel in the dirt is a sword-hand to the neck. The towel is your attacker’s throat. The soccer ball is a knee. The tennis racket is a sword-arm to the groin. Imagine the combination blows—the fist, the kick, the strangle. Or the throw, the kick, the knee. Imagine what you will shout as you strike out or throw. One word is best: no, or blam, or die, or fuck. It doesn’t matter. Pick one, practice it. If you can, practice it as loudly as you can. If you can’t, run through it in your heads. Play with it. Play with the scary thing. But play hard, play clearly, and play a lot. I want you ready by this time next week, because I have a treat for you.”

  “Why does the word treat from you make me nervous?” Nina said. “What do we get next week?

  I smiled. “A real live boy.”

  FOURTEEN

  WHILE THE EARLY-MORNING GYM PATRONS EBBED AND FLOWED AROUND ME, I focused on the blue punch bag. Feet first: snap kick and roundhouse, back kick and crescent kick; heel, instep, side and ball of the foot. Then knees, both with the bag hanging free and pulling it to me as I thrust. Elbows next. Ram the nose into the brain, crush the top of the spine where it joins the skull, burst the kidneys, crush the larynx, break the ribs. Forwards, backwards, uppercut and side strike. Left and right. With elbows you have to be close, close enough to kiss.

  I stripped off my outer shirt and wiped my face and hands.

  Hands gave you a little more distance. Fists first. The whipping, snake strike of the back fist, the driving gyaku zuki, the snapping oy zuki. The palm strike. Sword-hand and knife-hand. Fingertips like sharpened pistons.

  Then mixing it up. Heel, move in, elbow, knee, move out, back fist, in again for punch. Combinations and repetitions, whirling and standing, changing up and changing down, until I ran with sweat and the late-rising patrons exchanged sidelong looks.

  I finished with a right back-fist, left punch, right elbow combination, and stepped back. Now I could eat breakfast.