Tom Schreck - Out Cold

The bell rang. Smitty stood on the ring apron, which was a bit unusual for him. He called out instructions to both of us at different times. Sometimes he'd bark one word 'guard', which meant get your hands up. Other times, 'recoil', which meant bring your hands back after throwing. 'Work and get out' when we tied up and 'Hook off that jab' were his standards. Tashaun was a pro, with six fights and a four and two record. He had won the state amateur championship, but he got sloppy with his training habits and had kind of under performed. He caught me with a hook that landed a bit high on my headgear. I felt it, and it had some steam on it, but it didn't land flush and it didn't do any damage.

Honestly, I felt a little relieved to take one and not have it do anything weird to my head. I feinted Tay to the body, jabbed to the head, and caught him with the cross that followed it. My timing felt good. The bell rang. Mostly uneventful give and take sparring round, but it left me loose and a little excited. The second went the same, and Tay tired. I feinted, coming in with a stutter step, and he went slightly back on his heels. I caught him with a combination. A nice move and it showed the differences in our experience. The whole thing probably occurred in less than two seconds, but it had about five components to it. I maneuvered Tay into the center of the ring, I jabbed, I stutter stepped like I was going to jab again, then I stepped in with three punches. It wasn't an accident; it was the game within a game that goes on all the time in boxing. Tay landed a thudding right and I partially blocked it, but part of it caught me in the face straight on. I felt the throb, but it wasn't bad and something I probably wouldn't even have noticed if I wasn't looking for it. That round ended and the next one went pretty much the same, only with less action. The rule of thumb in the boxing jungle is in a sparring session like this one where there's no important fight coming up, you don't take it to your partner when they're tired. You can step it up a bit and give enough action so the guy knows he needs to work on his stamina, but you don't punish him with it. Again, not said, probably not even in some guys' consciousness, but it's one of those rules of the gym.

"Time" Smitty called. "All right boys, that's enough. Tay you probably ought to get in here more often and get out on the road if you want to fight." Tay breathed heavy and he nodded knowingly without saying much. He knew he was a little out of shape.

"Not bad, Duff," Smitty looked at me. "Still, not turning over the hook," a criticism Smitty had said to me every time I sparred here for a decade and a half. "How'd you feel tonight?" Smitty's way of checking in about my head.

"Good… Good, Smit." I still breathed heavy. "I wanted to get off with the jab more, but Tay's movement kept me from it." That was the answer that my head felt fine. Smitty held his eyes on me a little longer, evaluating me. After a second, he nodded and helped us both off with our gloves. He headed over to Angel with the mitts and I headed to the medical center to give Karl a lift home.

I felt satisfied with how things went and more tired than I usually am after three rounds of work and my head throbbed a bit, but it wasn't a big deal. It was well worth the feeling I had from getting in the ring. It's hard to explain to someone who has never done it. It feels like a cleansing-like you just did something important. I'm sure it has something to do with exertion, which you get from all exercise. It also probably has something to do with the relief you feel from not getting hurt and having it over. Although those two together don't add up to the entirety of it. I think it has something to do with facing your demons. Facing what scares you the most and keeping on even when you don't have to. I know a very small percentage of the population is willing to do what we fighters do in the ring. To me anyway, that gives a person some rank. It's not the only way an individual gets rank, but it sure is one way. People who face what they're afraid of, I believe, are people of the strongest character.

Speaking of characters, it headed toward seven o'clock and time to give Karl a ride. I swung by the hospital and wound the El Dorado through the serpentine path to the parking garage. Parking garages weren't made for Cadillacs built in the middle of the seventies, so negotiating some of the turns wasn't much of a party. I got the $6.00 ticket for the privilege of picking up my friend recovering from an assault, and felt like another assault had just taken place, though this one was to my bank account. Inside the medical center I followed the arrows around to the area known as 'discharges.' In the room were about twenty people, most in wheel chairs, and most with one or two family members. Most of the non-patients had kind of a relieved look on their face as their loved one was deemed well enough to go home. Karl got wheeled into a corner by himself. He didn't look relieved at all. He nervously twitched and looked around like something bad was about to happen.

"Hey, Karl, how are you? Must be good to be going home."

"Duffy, what are you doing here?" He looked up at me.

"I came to give you a lift."

"Why?"

"I don't know. I heard you were being discharged and I figured you could use a ride."

"They just called the Mission."

"Huh? The Mission? I thought you had your own place?"

"Nope."

"But I had an address for you in the Westview Apartments."

"That was a lie."

"You didn't want to admit to being in the mission?"

"Yeah, but not because I was embarrassed like you think. I'm too vulnerable in there."

"The Mission can be a bit of nightmare but you got benefits. Why not let DSS get you an apartment?"

"Sure, get me on another government tracking system. That's just what they'd want."

"So are you going to the Mission?"

"To get out of here and then I'll go out for a walk and split."

"And wind up in the park and get your ass kicked again?"

"It's not the park that's getting my ass kicked. It's what I know." He looked out the window and then around the room.

"Shit, they could be right here. I'm such a fool!" Karl dropped his head into his hands and started crying. He cried so hard he shook. It was pathetic.

"You want to stay with me and Al?" I heard come out of my mouth.

Karl sniffled away some tears and looked up at me with a squint.

"What?"

"Stay at my place. It's not the Trump tower, it's a trailer, but if you can stand basset hound flatulence, it ain't half bad." Karl looked down, back up at me, and then down again.

"Why do you want me at your place?" He said it without the paranoid tone. It was more of a tone of disbelief.

"I don't know. You wanna come or not?" He snickered and smiled on one side of his face. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand.

"The dog lives right inside with you?"

"Yeah."

"I'm in," Karl said.

I had no idea what had gotten in to me.

Karl signed a bunch of papers and I signed some more. I'm sure I had just released me and my heirs from every possible right under the sun and agreed to reimburse everyone in North America for all their expenses for the next fifty years. I had gotten over worrying about such things.

I wheeled Karl out to the curb and told him I'd pull the car around for him. He didn't object, mentioned something about still being a little weak in the legs. The problem was working my way around the labyrinth of a parking lot and finding where I had been. I walked up to the second level and couldn't find the El Dorado. Although I swore I'd parked it on the second level, the place was confusing enough that I thought I just might've been on the third level.

I headed to the stairwell and saw a soda machine. I went to get a diet Pepsi, but there was some sort of Army guy standing in front of the thing, apparently unable to decide between a Pepsi and a Mountain Dew. I guess after a few years of leaving the thinking up to someone else that sort of thing can happen.