The Boxer and the Spy (14 page)

T
ank came into the café and said to Terry, “Kip Carter is outside with about four other guys. He wants to see you.”

“No,” Abby said.

Terry didn’t say anything.

“We’ll back you,” Tank said. “Me and Carly, and I bet Steve would jump in.”

“No,” Abby said again.

Terry nodded slowly.

“Yes,” he said.

“It’s about me,” Abby said. “Isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Terry said, “but it’s about me too.”

“I know who he has with him without looking,” Abby said. “Tookie, Ray ...”

“Yeah,” Tank said.

“They are big mean guys, Terry,” she said. “You don’t need to do this. You don’t need to defend my honor or whatever it is.”

“It’s my honor too,” Terry said.

She felt desperate.

“Think, what would George say?”

“I think George would understand,” Terry said.

He stood up. She stood with him. He patted her on the upper arm for a moment, then he turned and went out the front door of the café. Tank followed him. Abby stood frozen for a minute. Then she went after them, out the front door of the café, and, on the dead run, past them, and across Main Street toward the building where George had his gym.

Abby was right, Kip Carter’s side was all football team. The kids had formed a big circle. Terry’s side of the circle was more diversified. In the center of the circle was Kip Carter in a tank top and jeans. To Terry he looked like something out of
WWE SmackDown!
Terry walked into the middle of the circle and stood facing Kip Carter.

“I told you what would happen, you kept causing trouble,” Kip Carter said.

Terry nodded.

“I want to know what you think you’re doing bothering Mrs. Trent.”

Terry shook his head.

“You better tell me now, Novak,” Kip Carter said.

“Or what?” Terry said. “You try to beat up on Abby? Last fight you had with her, I heard she won.”

Kip Carter seemed to freeze up for a moment. His face got red. He didn’t speak.

He’ll probably rush me,
Terry thought. He could almost hear George’s voice.
Keep him off with the jab. Cover up.
Move. Carter couldn’t last long if he were swinging wild and off balance.
Nobody that strong,
George said. Even in boxing shape you can’t be flailing with both hands and no feet under you and keep it up.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw George strolling across the street with Abby. George was talking, but Terry couldn’t hear what he was saying. But George looked calm. It made Terry feel steadier.

“How’s your lip,” Terry said to Kip Carter.

And Carter rushed him. Terry went into his stance. Covered up. Crouched to make himself a smaller target. He moved right and stuck a jab out at Carter. Carter swarmed him, punching with both hands. Terry took most of them on his arms and moved back and jabbed again. He could hear George’s voice.
Stick and move,
the voice was saying.
Stick and move.
He wondered if it was really George’s voice. Kip Carter connected on a half-blocked roundhouse that staggered Terry. But Carter was off balance when he threw it, and all his weight wasn’t in it.
Street fight, you don’t want to break your hand on his head. Want to use the side of your fist if you can. Or your forearm. Elbow. Use your fists on his body.
Carter swung another big roundhouse left. Terry was able to lean back and check the punch past him with his right, block it hard with his left. He dropped a little lower and hit Carter hard with a right hook in his rib cage. He heard Carter grunt. He backpedaled and shuffled left while his head cleared. He could hear Carter’s breath starting to rasp.

“Stand still and fight, you little freak,” Carter gasped.

Terry kept circling left. His hands high, in a low crouch. It was odd how everything had come down to the fight. He didn’t feel much. He didn’t see much beyond Carter’s movement before him. Carter was hitting him mostly on the arms and shoulders and he didn’t really feel it. He was not aware of anyone around him. Of the kids standing in a circle. Of George standing with Abby. Of Paxton Bullard driving up behind the circle and easing himself out of his too-small car. All he saw was Carter, and only in a kind of faceless movement that he tracked and responded to without thought.

Carter tried to grab him with his right hand, but Terry stepped into him, which Carter didn’t expect, and turned and blocked the right hand hard with both of his forearms. Then he drove his right elbow up and across, catching Carter on the cheekbone. Carter staggered. He followed with his left forearm, turning with the natural torque of the movements, and Carter staggered backward. His arms dropped and Terry, his feet still under him, holding his stance, hit him in the middle of the face with a straight right. And Carter went down. A kind of sigh went up softly from the circle of kids.

Carter stayed down for a moment, sitting on the ground. Then he struggled to his feet.

“I’ll kill you,” he gasped, and with his head down rushed at Terry.

Terry stepped aside. He heard George’s voice through the murk of his intensity.

“Finish,” George’s voice said. “Finish it.”

Carter came at him again, bull-rushing with his head down. Terry hit him with a left hook and then straightened him with the big uppercut George had taught him. It stopped Carter. He stood motionless for a moment, then slowly dropped to his hands and knees and stayed there, head hanging. There was no sound except for Carter’s breath heaving painfully in and out.

Terry was still. As the fog of his intensity began to dissipate, he became aware that he was breathing hard. His hands would probably hurt in a while. He felt kind of bad for Kip Carter. He looked at Abby. He couldn’t read her face. But there was no pleasure in it. He wasn’t sure what it was. He looked at George. George nodded slightly. Terry understood that. He knew it was approval. George and Abby walked into the center of the circle. George squatted on his heels beside Kip Carter. He put a hand under Carter’s chin and raised his head a little and looked at his eyes.

“How you feel?” George said.

Carter shook his head.

“Got a headache?” George asked.

Carter shook his head again.

“Follow my finger,” George said, and moved his raised forefinger back and forth in front of Kip Carter’s eyes.

“You dizzy?” George said.

“I ... don’t ... think ... so.”

George nodded and stood up.

“He be all right,” George said. “He more wore out than hurt.”

Terry nodded slowly. Abby stood next to him without speaking.

“Lemme see your hands,” George said.

Terry held them out.

“Nothing broken,” George said.

Mr. Bullard pushed through the circle of kids. He stopped next to Carter and looked down at him, and shook his head slowly and made a sound as if he were spitting. Then he looked around the circle.

“Okay,” he said. “What’s going on here?”

“Come on to my place,” George said to Terry. “We need to get some ice on your hands.”

Terry nodded again and, with Abby, he followed George through the quiet circle of kids and across the street toward George’s gym.

“Hey,” Bullard shouted. “Don’t you just walk away from me.”

“Ice’ll ease the swelling,” George said. “Maybe won’t hurt so much tomorrow.”

They walked on. Bullard stared after them for a moment, then he turned toward the circle of kids, which had already started to thin.

“You all get out of here,” he said. “Move!”

The remaining kids began to move. Kip Carter was on one knee now, leaning on the other one. Bullard stood over him with his arms folded.

“Stand up,” Bullard said scornfully, “and get in my car now. ”

Carter rose slowly and, still unsteady, moved carefully toward Bullard’s car. Bullard stood for a moment staring after Terry, Abby, and George as they went into George’s building. Then he turned on his heel and walked angrily toward his little car.

T
erry soaked his hands in ice water, taking them out periodically when the cold got too much. Abby watched him quietly.

“So,” Terry said. “Whaddya think?”

“I didn’t like it,” Abby said.

George was stowing things: boxing gloves, trainer’s tape, jump ropes.

“Would you have liked it better if Carter won?”

“No. I’d have hated it more,” Abby said.

Terry was thrilled with his success, and the fact that Abby wasn’t treating him like a hero was bothersome.

“He started it,” Terry said.

“I know,” Abby said.

“Well, you don’t think he deserved it?” Terry said.

“I’m not thinking about Kip Carter,” Abby said.

George picked up a couple of towels and tossed them in the hamper.

“I don’t get it,” Terry said. “I won the damn fight against the high school hero and you seem mad.”

“I’m not mad,” Abby said. “And I’m glad you won. I guess it just scared me a little.”

“Hell,” Terry said. “It scared me a little too. But it’s over now. What’s your problem?”

“If it had happened when he ... bothered me in the woods,” Abby said, “I would have been thrilled. I was so scared ... and so mad ... and you would have saved me from him.”

“And this isn’t saving you,” Terry said.

“No,” Abby said. “This is like revenge.”

Terry stared at her.

“Well,” George said. “Might be more than just revenge, might prevent him from bothering you again.”

Abby nodded.

“I suppose,” she said.

“Not a bad thing,” George said.

“No.”

“But that ain’t what really bothering you, stuff about revenge.”

“It’s not?” Abby said.

George shook his head and grinned at her.

“You don’t like the Terry Novak you saw in the fight. You never seen him before.”

“He was so angry,” she said. “He was, like, cruel.”

“For god’s sake,” Terry said.

“Ain’t gonna argue none about whether fighting’s good or bad,” George said. “My own guess is that it be good and bad, like most things. Hitting somebody is cruel, even if you have to do it. But say that you do have to do it, then being angry and cruel probably a good thing. Long as you control it.”

“You think he had to fight?” Abby said.

“I think there are some things worth fighting ‘bout,” George said.

He grinned at her.

“I was Terry,” George said. “You might be one.”

Abby looked at Terry.

“But I don’t know if I could spend my life with someone cruel and angry like that,” she said.

Terry felt the familiar electric thrill when she mentioned spending her life with him and the equally charged flicker of fear when she suggested there could be a reason not to.

George nodded.

“There it is,” George said. “Isn’t it?”

Terry and Abby both looked at him.

“You known him nearly your whole life,” George said to Abby “And you never seen him angry and cruel before.”

“No.”

“That the control thing,” George said. “The good ones, like Terry ...”
Wow!
Terry thought. “They can control it and use it only when they fight.”

“And the bad ones?” Abby said.

“Kip Carter,” George said.

“They don’t control it,” Abby said. “They let it out all the time.”

George nodded.

“You think everybody has cruelty and anger in them?” Abby said.

“I hear you punched Kip Carter on the lip when he grabbed you in the woods,” George said.

I
n his office, in the now-empty school, Bullard loomed in front of Kip Carter.

“Nice going,” Bullard said. “You’ve fixed it so now I’m going to have to do something about him. Her too, probably.”

“I was trying to help,” Kip Carter said.

“He beat you like a drum,” Bullard said.

Kip Carter looked at the floor.

“A ninth grader ...” Bullard said.

Kip Carter couldn’t think of anything to say. He looked at the floor some more.

“You’re yellow,” Bullard said.

“Mr. Bullard,” Kip said. “I’m not.”

The veins in Bullard’s neck were bulging. His face was red. His breathing was heavy and fast. His voice was hoarse.

“I told you not to touch him unless I said so,” Bullard said. “Didn’t I?”

Kip Carter nodded.

“But no, you jerk,” Bullard said, “you had to be a hero. You thought you could beat him up easy, everybody thought you could beat him up easy. You even fooled me, but no more.”

The color in Bullard’s face deepened.

“You know why he beat you?” Bullard said. His voice was shaking.

“Because you quit,” Bullard rasped. “Because he landed a couple of lucky punches and you folded like an accordion. I thought you were going to cry.”

“I didn’t quit, Mr. Bullard,” Kip Carter said. “He beat me, but I didn’t quit.”

“You quit,” Bullard said. “You think you can play in the Big Ten? You think a quitter like you can make the team? When I get through talking to the coaching staff out there, they won’t give you a scholarship for cheerleading.”