On the Ropes (Down for the Count) (8 page)

“Saint? Can we race today?” Jayden asks.

We race, we play “Eye Spy,” and occasionally, I quiz them on American History; which had been my favorite subject back when I was in school. To this day, whenever I find some down time, I watch the History Channel. I especially love the Revolutionary War. Being from Massachusetts, our state is rich in history dating back before the Pilgrims and Plymouth Rock, so it’s always been interesting to me. But, of course, the kids’ favorite thing to do is race.

“Oh, you wanna race, do ya? I’m thinking we should talk about The Battle of Bunker Hill today.”

“Awww…” they all groan in disappointment.

I look back at them, smiling. “What? The Battle of Bunker Hill is fascinating.”

“About as fascinating as watchin’ paint dry,” Tyler says quietly.

The other kids laugh at his comment.

“What’d you say?” I grab Tyler in a head lock. “You like watchin’ paint dry?”

All the kids begin to laugh and cheer me on, “Choke him out, Saint!”

Tyler taps my arm, meaning to break the hold I have on him.

“You’re giving up, punk,” I laugh, letting him go.

Tyler looks up at me with a huge smile on his face.

“Okay… where were we? Oh… that’s right, The Battle of Bunker Hill. When did the war start?” I ask, directing my question at Tyler.

“Ummm… hmmm… 1492?”

Some of the kids snicker.

“That was Christopher Columbus, dumbass!” Antonio blurts out.

“Shut up, asshole!” Tyler sneers at Antonio.

“Who you calling an asshole?” Antonio says loudly and shoves Tyler down onto the ground.

“Hey! Cool it,” I step in-between the two of them. “You okay, Tyler?”

“Get up, you pussy!” Antonio shouts. “I’m gonna kick your ass.”

“Antonio, that’s enough!” I raise my voice to him. Antonio’s face drops at my tone. I’ve never raised my voice to any of the kids in the program. Knowing what it’s like to live in an abusive home, I try my best to keep my composure around them. Throughout the years, I’ve learned to take my anger out in the ring and not on others. That’s one of the key components to Frankie’s program and another one of his rules: Fighting only occurs in the ring. If you get caught fighting outside of the ring, you’re thrown out of the program.

I hold my hand out to Tyler to help him off the ground, “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he pushes my hand away; embarrassed.

I pull Antonio to the side, “You know if Frankie hears about this you’re gone, right?”

He nods his head, his chest heaving and his face still flushed with anger.

“I’m not gonna tell him about this, but if it happens again, I’ll have no choice. Do you understand?”

Antonio just stands there glaring at me.

“Do you understand?” I say, forcefully.

“Yes,” he mutters under his breath as he nervously shuffles his feet back and forth.

“I want you to apologize to Tyler, you were totally out of line.”

“You gotta be kidding me,” Antonio groans.

Ignoring him, I call out, “Tyler, can you come here for a second?” as I wave him towards us.

Once Tyler joins us, we take a few steps away from the rest of the kids so we’re out of earshot.

“Tyler, Antonio has something he wants to say to you. Don’t you, Antonio?”

“No, not really,” he mumbles.

“Are you sure about that? Because I’d hate to have Frankie find out about this,” my tone is condescending.

“Tyler… I’m sorry,” he blurts out.

“Sorry for what?” I’m losing my patience.

“I’m sorry I pushed you,” Antonio grumbles.

“It’s alright,” Tyler replies.

Tyler, Antonio, and I rejoin the group. “Okay, none of this happened. Do you understand?” my voice is loud enough for everyone to hear.

They all shake their heads in acknowledgement.

“Good, now let’s get you guys to school,” and I lead them towards the school.

Once they’re all safely at school, I usually go back to the gym to get Frankie, then we head over to the local YMCA to resume my training.

“Everyone made it to school okay?” Frankie asks, as soon as I walk through the gym doors. It’s like he has a sixth sense about stuff.

“Yeah, they all made it there in one piece,” I reassure him.

“Good. Before we start your workout, I wanna talk to you about Blaine Davis,” Frankie leans up against the boxing ring.

“What ‘bout him?”

“Have you given any thought to him sponsoring you?”

“No, not really.”

“Kid, you do realize what a sponsor can mean for you, don’t you? Your entrance fees into the fight would be paid for, he’d probably spring for some top of the line gear for you, and there is the potential of you making some extra cash. So you don’t have to live paycheck to paycheck and drive around on that death trap of yours.”

The death trap he’s referring to is the motorcycle I bought off Craigslist. It’s a used, Blue and White Yamaha R6, and it’s in fairly good condition; considering its age. A few months ago, I’d secretly gotten my motorcycle license and I’d been saving up my money to buy a bike. Frankie was mad as hell when I showed up one Sunday afternoon with it. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he’d yelled. “You’re gonna kill yourself on that death trap!”

I sigh heavily, “Set the meeting up.”

A smile appears across Frankie’s wrinkled old face.

“This means nothing! I’ll hear him out, that’s all,” I point at Frankie, smiling back at him as I walk towards the locker room.

“I’m gonna call him and set it up!” Frankie yells to me.

Opening my locker, I pull out my wraps and gloves then sit on the bench. I begin to pack my gym bag for the Y and think about Blaine Davis.
Maybe a sponsor will be good for me?
Money is always a serious stress factor for me before a fight. I’m barely making ends meet as it is, so to have my fight entrance fees paid for would certainly come in handy.

“All set,” Frankie says, as he comes up to stand behind me. “Blaine is meeting us here tonight at seven.”

“Okay,” I sigh.

“I’ll be with you the entire time, kid. Don’t worry, I won’t lead you astray.”

“I know, Frankie. It’s just…” I pause, trying to find the right words for what I want to say.

“Spit it out, kid.”

“I don’t want this guy thinking he owns me, and I still want you to train me.”

“Then we’ll make sure of it,” Frankie’s voice is confident. “This is a first for me too, you know. Most of the fighters I’ve trained leave me before they’ve made it to this level.”

“You’re not getting rid of me,” I say matter-of-factly.

“That’s good, because I hadn’t planned on letting you leave,” he pats me on the shoulder. “Now, stop wastin’ time and let’s get to the Y.”

A typical day of training before a fight begins with conditioning. Conditioning consists of seven three-minute intervals of shadow-boxing, stair runs, heavy bag, and the speed bag; with three seconds of rest between each interval. Some days, once I’m done with conditioning, the real challenge begins. When preparing for a fight, Frankie always has me train for extra rounds. So, if I’m fighting a five round match, then I train for seven. I need to be prepared both physically and mentally for this fight.

Frankie has it set up so that I’ll go seven rounds of sparring with seven different fighters. Not only am I tired from nearly ninety minutes of conditioning, but now I have to face seven different fighters who are here to fight me with everything they’ve got. Frankie always pulls in the toughest fighters for this type of sparring. He goes out of his way to contact fighters I’ve never sparred with because he wants this to be a challenge. But, of course, Jimmy is always here for this too.

After a quick break, we’re back at Frankie’s gym. I see Rex ‘
The Rogue
’ Dawson, Hunter ‘
The Master
’ Hughes, Ramsey ‘
Ice Cold
’ Reynolds, Seth ‘
The Savage
’ Ritter, Derek ‘
The Rocket
’ Carter, Bobby ‘
Blackout
’ West, and Steve ‘
The Violator
’ Johnson sitting around the gym waiting for us to arrive. Each and every one of these fighters has a phenomenal fight card. It’s an honor for me to be in the same room as them, let alone get the chance to spar with them. I only wish we could’ve met under different circumstances and could maybe actually go out and have a beer or two afterwards. But I know Frankie’s watching me like a hawk. I wouldn’t be surprised if he follows me home and sits outside my apartment’s window all night; making sure I stay in.

I jump up onto the ring, ducking through the ropes. “You ready for this?” Jimmy asks, as he applies Vaseline onto my cheeks, forehead, and chin.

I shrug my shoulders. “As ready as I’ll ever be,” I say, huffing and still recovering from the conditioning.

“You’ve got your work cut out for you,” Jimmy looks over his shoulder at all the fighters waiting to get in the ring with me.

“Thanks for the encouragement,” I laugh.

“Stop wasting time in there!” Frankie
hollers
.

“Let’s do this,” I nod, hitting my gloves on Jimmy’s hands.

“You know I’m in your corner.”

I signal to him with a simple gesture, acknowledging his words, then I make my way over to my corner. Sitting down on the tiny stool Jimmy’s put there for me, I look straight across the ring to see which guy is my opponent.

The first fighter I’m sparring against is Hunter ‘
The Master
’ Hughes, who’s known for his speed and ability to land punches.

Jimmy kneels down in front of me as he slips the headgear onto my head.

“You got this, Saint,” he’s confident as he looks into my eyes. He raises the mouth guard to my mouth and pushes it in for me.

I stand up slowly and begin walking to the middle of the ring where ‘
The Master
’ is waiting for me. We touch gloves, then step back to our corners and wait for the sound of the bell.
Ding!

Both ‘
The Master
’ and I come out eager to fight, though I need to hold back to conserve my energy. I’ll be doing this for another six rounds, while he’s done after this one. Frankie and Jimmy are both in my corner yelling. The first round of sparring is where I’m always critiqued on my form. “Arms up! Protect your face!” Frankie yells to me.

“Don’t let him back you into the corner!” I hear Jimmy shout.

‘
The Master
’ manages to land a few jabs. He’s fast, but I counter with a few jabs to his ribs. I know he feels them by how his face cringes.

“Keep it up, Saint! You’re doing great!” Jimmy says, loud enough for me to hear. “Keep the pressure on him. He felt those punches.”

Before I know it, the bell rings; ending this match.

“Great round,” ‘
The Master
’ says to me as he leaves the ring.

Frankie pulls out the stool for me to sit down.

“You owned that round, kid, but you let him land some jabs. You gotta keep your hands up to protect your face,” he advises gruffly, as he lays a wet towel across my shoulders.

The next four rounds go by like a blur. Though I’m exhausted, I manage to dominate all of them. I keep reminding myself that next week I’ll be fighting ‘
The Gladiator
’ and he won’t be walking away after three minutes. We’ll be fighting, round after round, either until one of us is knocked out or a decision is made.

I watch my second to last opponent, Bobby ‘
Blackout
’ West, slip through the ropes. He jumps in place and pounds his gloves together, his dark charcoal eyes glaring at me from across the ring. He has a good three inches on me and easily outweighs me by at least ten pounds.

“What’s his problem?” I ask Jimmy.

Jimmy looks over his shoulder to the other side of the ring.

“How the hell should I know?” he replies as he squirts water into my mouth.

I slosh the water around in my mouth then spit it into the bucket at my feet. “He looks like he wants to knock my fuckin’ head off.”

Jimmy turns to look at him again and begins to laugh, “Yeah, he does. Did you fuck his girlfriend or something?”

“Beats me,” I shrug my shoulders, “but it’s a good possibility.”

Jimmy rolls his eyes at me as the bell rings again.

“You got this,” Jimmy calls after me.

‘
Blackout
’ and I dance around the ring. He’s clearly toying with me.

“Show me what you got,” he antagonizes me.

“Are you gonna dance with him, Gabriel? Or are you gonna fight?!” Frankie shouts at me from the corner of the ring.

For the next two and a half minutes, I listen to Frankie screaming at me; telling me how terrible I’m fighting. He actually tells me that I don’t deserve to be fighting ‘
The Gladiator
’ next week. “If you fight like this against him, he’ll knock you out in the first round!”

Finally, the bell rings and the match is over. My arms are feeling heavy and the exhaustion is setting in. With only one more round left, I drop onto the stool in the corner, and I feel a cold towel hit my shoulders.

“You feelin’ okay?” Jimmy asks me, as he gives my shoulders a gentle rub.

“Yeah, I’m good.” I’m gasping for air as I try to suck in a decent breath.

“You held your own out there. He was a tough one.”

I nod my head at Jimmy as the sweat drips down my brow and into my eyes. I squeeze my eyes closed as they begin to sting.

“You alright?” Jimmy asks.

“Yeah, my eyes are burning a little,” I say, trying to wipe my brow with my head gear on. “It’s nothin’.”

“Here, have some more water,” Jimmy insists.

With my eyes remaining closed, I open my mouth so he can squirt some in. I feel the towel lift from shoulders and land in my hands.

“Wash your eyes out,” Frankie instructs me. “This is it, you got one more round. You gotta dig deep for this one. I know you’re tired. Three minutes left,” he says into my ear.

My last opponent is making his way up to the ring. Steve ‘
The Violator
’ Johnson easily outweighs me by fifteen pounds.

“You gotta be fuckin’ kidding me!” I look back at Frankie, who is now on the outside of the ring.

“What?”

“He’s gonna fuckin’ kill me.”

“You need to have faith in yourself, kid.”