Michael Seidlinger - The Laughter of Strangers

I need to train.

EVERYTHING YOU READ IS TRUE

That might be true but I can’t let this brand of laughter languish. It’s laughter that is at my expense. It is laughter that should motivate me. I should focus and keep to the search within.

I realize that it sounds stupid but there has to be a reason why I want to be the best, right?

I want your attention, their attention.

I want you to realize that I can beat you.

YOU WON’T BEAT ME

I will beat you.

IF YOU BEAT ME, YOU END UP LOSING

TO YOURSELF

Don’t start with that. It has no effect on me.

I have long since lost interest in the subject. How we even exist is a matter of subjectivity. Looks like anyone that isn’t in the spotlight is cast in a brand of doubt. In fact, if there’s no brand there’s no brain, nobody there.

It makes sense that Willem Floures is a popular brand.

Everyone wants to be me.

I have to keep fighting if I don’t want things to change.

THEY CHANGE

EVERY MOMENT THEY CHANGE

LOOK WHERE YOU ARE NOW

VERSUS WHERE YOU WERE

LOOK HOW IN TWO DAYS YOU WILL BE

BEDRIDDEN AND FORCIBLY RETIRED

I choose not to read the last text message. I suddenly feel overwhelmed. I get in the ring, I take off my shirt and shoes, I look down at the design so permanent; I trace the ridge of one scar, a circular border around a purple and green dragon tattoo. I consciously tune out what I hear as well as the impossibilities that are now, somehow, in progress.

I tell them all, noticing that they are all watching me, “Life doesn’t make sense. If it does, maybe you’re dead.”

I consciously keep things simple.

I don’t read into any more of it. No not at all. I start shuffling around the ring, warming up my legs, practicing footwork.

I begin shadowboxing.

Clear-headed, phone set aside, Black Mamba is of no issue. The only issue is figuring out what training routines to stress in the next forty-eight hours.

What is most effective?

What will have any real effect?

Really though, how long can my mind remain clear before the inconsistencies you see and read so clearly resurface as yet another washed-out wave of apprehension? Am I getting too old for this?

Please, don’t read into : The fact that my mind is misaligned, getting cloudy with confusion and self-conflict…how long did I last?

A dozen punches, a series of jabs.

Two minutes before the latest chapter collapses and your identity is further fraught with internal conflict, fright, worry, loathing, contradiction, hypocritical undertones, worry again, repeat, repeat, bad memory, problems, life is meaningless, alone, fight in two days, worry, anxiety, need to train, Spencer where are you, Sarah too, existential questions and — end this train of thought now .

But my train of thought continues —with laughter, laughter, worry that ____ is a result of ____ and a history of fighting results in a broken mind, laughter at me, a joke, I’m a joke, laughter at fact that I think any of this training is going to help, laughter at fact that I made a fool of myself to remain in the spotlight, laughter at fact that I can’t remember any of it, laughter at fact that I am still somehow proud of it, laughter at the enjoyment I get from being a “relevant subject,” laughter I hear whenever thinking about legacy, will I be remembered, will Willem Floures be as good of a boxing commodity when I’m done, laughter heard when I think about all that I’ve done to be noteworthy, laughter and then debase myself, laughter upon laughter when dealing with all aspects of this, what? laughter, what? laughter abounds when, yet again, everything is confused and I don’t know what the hell I’m doing much less what I was thinking about right before it all faded, lost train of thought. End train of thought.

Continue training, despite myself.

I DON’T KNOW WHO I AM ANYMORE

Okay, duly noted. But there’s a fight tomorrow.

I must do something, must focus on something productive, something that helps buffer the incoming events, the events that haven’t already transpired and been lost to a poor memory.

DID YOU HEAR SOMETHING?

I’d ask them but they know as much as I do. Their mouths are taped shut. Their minds are broken apart. Their routines shattered; all they can do is watch. All they have left is their sight and what they see is their future.

Maybe they think they can do better, become a much better fighter, and that might be true but I will tell them that no matter what happens, we are viewed to be the same person more often than we are viewed as ourselves.

THE FIGHT

I know, I know.

The fight is tomorrow.

THE FIGHT IS TONIGHT

It is not tonight.

Wait a minute…

Black Mamba leaves another voicemail. I don’t have to listen to it to know that he sent me a sample of the press conference where he said something that I capitalized upon much to the appreciation (and delight) of everyone but myself.

I turn to them and say, “I came out of the press conference on the up. Black Mamba really walked into that one huh?”

No replies.

But they know.

I’m the last to realize what happened.

WHAT HAPPENED, ‘SUGAR?’

I want to text back, “Don’t patronize me,” but that’ll just open up another avenue of communication. I refuse to let Black Mamba continue sabotaging my state of mind. If the fight is really tonight, I need to focus.

Shit, I need to train…

I ask the latest kidnapping, ‘Hatchet,’ if there’s anything I can possibly do in the next four hours before I need to be on the way to the arena.

WHY ARE YOU ASKING HIM?

Black Mamba, get out of my mind! Focus on the fight. Let me go about this the only way I know: an introspective and interpretive, but ultimately long-winded, exploration of who, what, when, where, and how.

The five questions.

The five senses.

Number of rounds covered to a twelve round fight where I come up two rounds short. The last two are the toughest and I often leave nothing left for those twilight hours, those miserable last gasps.

I never think about the future.

I’m consistently stuck in the present.

DID YOU HEAR SOMETHING?

Easy enough to ignore the threats, the mind play, when I have such a great and receptive audience!

“How many of you are there, hmm?”

I count sixteen but what happens if I look away?

Will I see Spencer dragging another one in?

How many people really desire to be someone preexisting?

“I am Willem Floures!” I shout at the lineup.

Turning around, I meet the seventeenth, “And let me guess, you are…”

Willem Floures.

‘Lights Out’ Willem Floures.

“Hey Lights Out, what’s your fight record,” I untie all tethers but the ones binding his wrists together. He doesn’t need to say anything; he’s going to be my sparring opponent. We are going to have one last bit of training before I face Black Mamba. And about his fight record, I can only assume that he’s undefeated; I am undefeated at such a young age. It’s basically a prerequisite.

Everything is easy, anxious, and hopeful when you are young.

It’s only when you’ve climbed every rung of the ladder that you see that they’ve all been following you too, every damn version.

So what do you do?

You confuse them; you confuse yourself.

Confusion, contradiction, complete chaos seems to be the only means of keeping me in the spotlight.

I set up a twelve round sparring session.

We’ll take it slow. I only need someone to evade.

DID YOU HEAR SOMETHING?

I hear the TV and I hear my phone but I don’t hear you.