Andrew Klavan - The last thing I remember

While I was setting the blocks up, the applause died down. Now there was just a nerve-racking silence in the auditorium and the sound of me adjusting the blocks on the floor. When I was done, I had to go backstage again to get the third block. By the time I came out, I could hear the audience fidgeting in their seats and murmuring to one another. They were already bored.

I felt a line of sweat run down my back-and I hadn’t even started my kata yet.

Then someone-Josh Lerner, probably-shouted out, “Go get ’em, Harley-Charlie!” and everyone laughed and I laughed with them, but I felt my cheeks get hot.

I forced myself not to look at Beth to see if she was laughing too. As coolly as I could, I laid the third cinder block across the top of the other two. Then I walked to the podium where Mr. Woodman had been. I had to clear my throat before I spoke, and the sound went into the microphone and came out sounding like a roll of thunder. There was more laughter and more heat in my cheeks and another line of sweat rolling down my back.

When I finally got some words out, I could hear the quaver of nervousness in my voice. I could only hope no one else could hear it.

“I’m gonna do a kata,” I said. “It’s kind of like a make-believe fight where you imagine different people attacking you and you do defense techniques on them. That way you get to practice your techniques in motion so your muscles will learn how to do them. Then, if you ever have to use the technique in real life, your body will just know how to do it. You won’t have to think about it or anything. Anyway, I’m gonna do one now called the Tiger Kata because it uses really powerful striking techniques, which, in my karate school, we call tiger techniques.”

Then, for good measure, I cleared my throat into the microphone again, making another thundery noise and getting a few more giggles.

I forced myself to move away from the protection of the podium and walked to the center of the stage. About a thousand cringe-making scenarios were flashing through my mind, a thousand different and excruciating ways in which I might embarrass myself forever. Maybe I would fall off the stage. Maybe I would sprain my ankle and have to hop around like a cartoon rabbit. Maybe my pants would just fall down. Maybe they’d fall down while I was hopping around…

I forced the thoughts away. I arranged myself into what’s called the front position: feet together, arms lifted in front of me, hands together just in front of my chin. My right hand was in a fist to represent the power of the yang, or masculine principle; the left hand was open and covered the fist to represent the restraint of the yin, or feminine principle. Power through self-discipline: that’s what karate is all about.

I stood like that for a long second. The auditorium had grown really quiet. There was no more shifting around, no more murmuring, no more cracks from Josh Lerner. They were interested, I could tell.

I took one more long breath, and then I went into my salutation.

Right away, a wonderful thing happened, an amazing thing. A salutation begins every kata. It starts with a bow and then a series of motions performed with the muscles very tense and the breath coming through the open mouth with a long, loud hiss. The breath is called Dragon-Breathes-Fire. It’s meant to focus your attention and push all your unnecessary thoughts out of you and bring all your energy to bear on the form. And the wonderful, amazing thing that happened is: it did exactly what it was supposed to do. The minute I tensed my abdominal muscles and pushed the dragon breath out of me, all the nervousness flowed out of me too. Suddenly, I had no extra thoughts to spare on anything at all-not even on Beth Summers. Suddenly, there was only the kata-the form-which I knew so well I could do it without thinking- without thinking but not without concentration. And that’s the way it was: suddenly, every thought was gone and all my mind was concentrated on performing the kata’s movements exactly right.

Which I did. I practically flew across the stage in long animal leaps, ending with mighty strikes in the air where my imaginary opponents were supposed to be. My fists corkscrewed out and back almost too fast for the eye to follow. My openhanded strikes slashed back and forth in lightning-speed combinations. I kicked and spun and kicked again, then leapt into the air with my body nearly horizontal to drive a devastating flying kick into an imaginary opponent’s head. I fell to the earth with a downward finishing strike-a punch spiraling straight to the floor as my body dropped down behind it to give it extra force. I let out a deafening roar- “keeyai!”-expelling every ounce of tension in my body, letting the tension explode into the punch as my knuckles scraped the surface of the polished wood.

Then I was upright again, spinning again, lashing out with a hook kick that brought my foot snapping around behind me and the rest of my body snapping around after it. Under the sound of my movements, I could hear the silence of the audience, I could feel their attention on me, feel them caught up in the violent grace of the form. Now I dove forward and went into a rolling somersault. Then I snapped to my feet with a combination of knife-hand strikes and a spinning back kick that brought me around 180 degrees. Someone in the audience-a guy, I’m not sure who-let out a whoop of appreciation, and the rest of the audience applauded. But even then-even as I began to realize that I was doing the best form I’d ever done-even as I began to understand that every eye in the auditorium was locked onto me in fascination-even then, I didn’t let it break through my unthinking concentration. I was deep inside myself, deep inside the form. I had no thoughts-just movement, just concentration. Striking, spinning, kicking as fast as I could but keeping every strike forceful, every position absolutely precise.

Now I was ready to perform the final move of the kata-and the most dangerous. I had come to rest on the far left side of the stage, as far from where Beth was sitting as I could get. I was in a crane position, absolutely still with one leg lifted, the knee up to my waist, the foot pointing down, the edge of one open hand hovering above the thigh, the other hand up to block my face. In one more second, I was going to explode out of the crane and drive across the stage behind a flurry of kicks and blows. At the last second, I would leap into the air above the place where the concrete cinder blocks stood, the two standing upright and the third lying across the top. As I came down, I would unleash a driving downward strike-right into the top of that third concrete block. If I did it just right, with all my focus and all my force-if I concentrated my mind on driving not into the concrete but straight through it-I would break the cinder block in two with my bare fist. That was the plan anyway. My fists were well conditioned and I’d broken blocks before- it’s not really as hard as it looks.

Still, as I stood there on one leg, poised to begin that final movement, a terrible thought broke through my concentration. I had an image of myself driving downward toward the concrete block-driving downward and then, just at the final second, losing my focus. Too late to pull back, I would continue the driving downward strike into the block-but without the full force of my mind and will behind it, it was not the concrete that would shatter, but every bone in my hand. That was it, I realized suddenly. That was how I was going to make a fool of myself in front of Beth. I was going to drive down into the block and break my hand in a million pieces so that my powerful, roaring keeyai would be transformed on the spot into a high-pitched howl of agony. I would go hopping across the stage, gripping my jellylike hand, screaming and screaming while everyone stared in horror and secret amusement. Maybe my pants would even fall off for good measure.