Total Knockout (23 page)

At the front door, she asked, “You still boxing with Cooper?”

“Yeah.”

“I didn't mean to take it away from you when I tried it with him. It's just that, I've never known anyone, let
alone a girl, who boxed. It's one of the coolest things about you.”

“You can still try it, you know,” I said. “I didn't mean, during all that, that you couldn't box if you wanted to.”

“Just not with your gear, right?” She smiled, and I knew she was playing around.

“Hey, a girl's gear is a sacred thing. Like wearing someone else's magic hat.”

“Right.” Things seemed like they might go back to normal for us, but we were taking it slow. I couldn't believe I had ever thought, even for a brief moment, that she might vote for my impeachment. Sometimes I really was dumb, especially when it came to my friends.

Then suddenly, Melanie snapped her fingers and her face lit up—more so since she wasn't hidden by a hat. “I got it!” When I asked her what, she said, “A way to raise the extra money. The only thing is, you have to do it yourself.”

Instead of being suspicious or rolling my eyes and asking why I had to do everything alone, I stepped back inside her house and listened to her plan.

“Keep your hands on either side of your face. Remember, you have to protect yourself! Jared, turn your hand flat when you hit. Rotate it. There! That's good!”

I walked around the school's gym and watched my fellow classmates learn the basics of boxing, all for the admission price of five bucks a person. Melanie convinced me to hold a one-hour boxing clinic. I'd had a similar idea months ago but was too chicken to go through with it. “Everyone's heard that you box, but people either don't believe it or want to know more,” she'd told me.

“Why hasn't anyone ever asked?”

“Guess they were afraid to.”

The idea for the workshop was totally different, unlike anything we'd ever done. We had advanced signup sheets so we could determine how much money we
were going to make (no surprises, thank you very much). Ms. Jenkins noted that it was a great way to get the kids exercising in a new, fun way (although Mrs. Peoria grumbled something about violence begetting violence). And, most important, it was something everyone was excited about. They wanted to participate, and not just because they felt obligated to donate to the fundraiser. For once, everyone thought this sounded like a lot of fun. And I had Melanie to thank for that.

We had about fifty students sign up, so we brought in the coaches to help us out. But it wasn't the coaches who made it so special and worth the price of admission. One of the selling points of the workshop was having a trained professional there. I just had to convince said professional to do it.

I had gone to Dad one night after Melanie and I had agreed that we needed an expert there to help us, not just me showing what I knew about jabs and uppercuts.

I explained our idea to Dad and why we needed him. I knew about having good people on your team, helping you out and making you stronger. That shows real strength of character. “You taught me a lot about boxing,” I told him. “But this can't possibly work without you.”

“It's been a long time,” Dad said.

“I know. That's why you should do it.” He seemed to be thinking about it. “Dad, I'm asking for your help.”

He looked at me, finally understanding. “Tell me when and where,” he said.

After he agreed, I asked him if he could go to the old gym and see if they'd loan us some gloves and extra practice mitts. “I bet they'd be glad to see you,” I said.

“Light on your feet, girl!” Dad called to April DeHart in the school gym. “Get on the balls of your feet. No, not like you're going to tiptoe! It's more subtle than that.”

Dad demonstrated to the group he was working with. He told everyone to put their hands on the sides of their faces, then showed them how to shuffle back and forth. “It's the boxer shuffle,” he said as his group—which also included Lily Schmidt, Cooper, and Melanie—bounced back and forth. “Good! Keep those hands up!”

Everyone had pulled through on the event—the whole student council, the coaches, and even some of the teachers. Nicole was there to cover it as a reporter, but it looked like she was having a great time, throwing punches into the mitts of Coach Ryan. Lori Anne took a bunch of photos but couldn't resist joining in, so she'd set her camera aside for some lessons too.

Dad circulated through the gym, checking everyone's form and making sure that the coaches were showing proper technique too. He looked more awake than I'd seen him in months.

The smacking of gloves on mitts filled the gym. “I want to hear that thunder!” Dad yelled.

BLUE JAYS . . .
THE VIEW FROM ABOVE

O'Hare's Secret Weapon
BY NICOLE JEFFRIES

Student council president Melanie O'Hare ends the calendar year on a high note with her presentation of the football team's much-needed warm-up suits. Approximately 75 students showed up before school, when Ms. O'Hare, along with Mrs. Peoria, built a fire in a trash can to help keep students warm, and mark the significance of the event.

“Even if hell freezes over and this team goes to state,” Coach Fleck began, referring to one local news station's
opinion of our fighting Blue Jays going all the way this year, “at least our boys will be warm enough to fight the devil!”

One person who was noticeably absent from the proceedings? Ousted president Lucia Latham, whose resignation marked the first time in Angus's history that such a scandal has ever happened.

Many wondered how Ms. O'Hare, more known for her hats than her work ethic, could have raised this money on her own.

“Of course I had help,” Ms. O'Hare stated, her fuzzy cream-colored winter cap looking thirsty for a snowflake or two. “A good president always keeps herself surrounded with smart, hardworking people. I'm no different.”

But this reporter learned, in fact, that it was Ms. Latham herself who worked in tandem with Ms. O'Hare to realize the success of the fund-raiser. The former foes were
spotted traipsing in and out of local businesses in a joint effort to raise money for the football team.

In fact, it is believed that, without the help of the former president, the football team would still be left in the cold. It is no secret that William Latham, the former Golden Gloves junior middleweight champion who led the boxing clinic, is father to Ms. Latham. This clinic helped the eighth-grade class raise the money for the football team and pay back the difference lost in Ms. O'Hare's ill-fated Pie Toss.

Here's to Ms. O'Hare, who took a hard hit but kept on fighting. She's a true Blue Jay through and through.

I didn't go to the big check- and plaque-presenting ceremony. It was held outside near the coaches' temporary offices in the cold before school. Mrs. Peoria had made exactly one decision so far this year with the student council, and that was it.

You'd be surprised at how okay people were with getting to school an hour early and standing in the freezing cold. The ceremony was tradition, and the fact that the student council raised money for the football team made it even huger, because who doesn't want to support their football team? The very best part, though, was that this year's student council raised more money than any other council, ever.

But like I said, I didn't go.

I didn't
not
go on purpose. Well, okay, maybe I did a little bit. But also I didn't know I was going to get
woken up by Dad at six o'clock that morning.

“Come on, girl,” he whispered in the dark. “Get your gear and meet me in the kitchen.”

It all felt so covert—the dark early morning, the whispering and tiptoeing—that I was out of bed before Dad had even left my room. Plus, I smelled bacon frying.

In the kitchen, Dad flipped what I instantly recognized as his classic whole-wheat pancakes. In another pan, the bacon fried.

“What is all this?” I asked, but quietly. Despite the noise of the bacon, the house was so still that I didn't want to break any spells.

“You'll need your energy,” Dad said as he stacked my plate with two pancakes and slices of bacon. He set a glass of orange juice beside my plate.

I looked at the carton. “The real stuff?”

“Mom couldn't stand the cheap stuff anymore.” He winked at me as I poured syrup on my pancakes, making sure to drizzle a bit on the bacon as well.

After we ate, I was so excited to realize that Dad was driving us to his old gym. When we walked inside, it was as if we had entered a different time zone. The gym was completely alive and awake with stomping, pounding, buzzing energy. Guys, and a couple of girls, were
jumping rope, hitting bags, and sparring in each of the two rings. I let myself get filled up with the energy.

Dad walked easily across the gym, a couple of guys calling out his name as he went.

“Back again? You gonna make this regular?” a slim, cute guy asked Dad.

When we got to the side of the gym, Dad told me to get my wraps on. Being in the gym was exhilarating but intimidating. The people there were serious—it was no hobby for them.

Once my hands were wrapped, I said to Dad, “Don't you dare ask me to get in that ring. No way am I ready for that.”

“Your momma would have my head if I tried that,” he said. “I'm going to teach you what I should have taught you last summer. The speedbag.”

There was a special bag that was lower than the others so I could just reach it. As Dad showed me how to hit the bag (“Count, shift your feet slightly, and don't forget—it's not really about speed”), I realized that this was in my dad's blood, which meant that it was in mine as well.

I was glad I was at the gym instead of the ceremony. Melanie deserved to have the spotlight all to herself.
She'd implemented the whole thing—I'd just brought Dad in. She and I had both learned an important lesson: The key to success is about surrounding yourself with people who complement you, who make your best even better. And we were both surprised to find out we were a pretty good team. I had learned that everyone works differently, and I don't have all the answers or the best work ethic, necessarily.

By the time I got to school, the ceremony was over. Ms. Jenkins actually let the football guys wear their warm-up suits to school that day, so the halls were extra festive, as if it were a game day.

“Hey, Coop!” I called when I saw him walking down the halls. “So how'd it go this morning?”

“It was great!” Cooper said. “You should have come. I missed you. Where were you?”

“With my dad, boxing.”

“What, I'm not good enough for you anymore?” He lightly punched my arm.

“Please. You're my best sparring partner ever,” I said, punching him back.

“Are you upset about not getting your name on that plaque?”

Mike Tyson once said that everybody has a plan
until they get punched in the mouth. I was finally starting to realize that. Planning was good—expecting the unexpected and knowing your opponent backward and forward was important. You had to approach things the smart way. Just like Ray Arcel, a legendary boxing trainer, once said, “Boxing is brain over brawn,” and that's how I wanted to live my life. Even though you can't control how things will turn out, when you're hit with a dilemma, you have a choice in how you handle it. I hadn't made all the right choices this year—like not telling what I knew to be the truth about the research period and scheduled voting—and I'd lost a lot of trust and respect from my peers because of that. But I'd work hard to earn it all back. Boxing was about respect, and so was life.

“Not at all,” I told Cooper. “In fact, I'm glad everything happened the way it did.”

“Seriously?” When I told him I was, he said, “Well, I hope so. Because the school year is only half over.”

I moaned when I realized that. But you know what? It was still a great year. I fought hard, and I learned that I could take a hit and keep going. And I'd
never
let myself get knocked down again.