by Sarah Deming
“What time is it?” she said, looking around for her coat.
“Time to take off your panties.”
“No, I gotta get home. I want to…jump rope or something.”
Lefty laughed and pulled his T-shirt over his head, revealing his smooth, fragrant chest. “That rope’ll be there tomorrow.”
His handsome face looked squinty and sleepy with weed. Despite everything, he still had a hold on her, and she wished she could convey to him the urgency she felt. The rope would be there tomorrow, but her will might not. She had already wasted so much time. He reached out a hand for her, but she slipped it like Sugar Ray.
“I’m sorry, Lefty. I gotta go.”
The most famous boxing gym in New York City occupied an airy old printing house near the Hudson River. Sunlight poured through the huge windows and drenched the four rings, in which professional champions shadowboxed side by side with bankers training for adventure races and movie stars practicing for action roles. Everything about Smiley’s was the opposite of Cops ’n Kids. It cost a lot of money. It had showers, a weight room, and a favorable human-to-cockroach ratio.
A small man in a rumpled business suit sat behind the front desk, reading an old magazine with naked ladies on the cover. He had an eye patch and a miserable expression on his face.
“Hi, Smiley,” Gravity said.
The man set down the naked ladies and glared at her through his single eye. “Who’s that?”
“I’m Gravity Delgado,” she said, holding out her hand.
He stared at it for a while as though unfamiliar with this odd custom. Finally he gave her a limp, clammy handshake. She was positive he knew who she was. Smiley’s Gym often hosted the Metropolitan Championships, which she had won three times. He had personally given her trophies.
“I was hoping to sign up here. I used to train at Cops ’n Kids.”
“Hmph,” Smiley said. “One of Rizzo’s charity cases. I suppose that means you can’t pay dues.”
Gravity fingered the sixty dollars in her pocket. Ms. Laventhol had insisted on giving it to her when Gravity told her about breaking up with Coach. Gravity smiled, remembering how concerned Ms. Laventhol had been. It was nice to have a teacher on her side.
Gravity was hoping not to have to waste the sixty dollars on dues. That way, she could save it for trainers’ fees, if the coaches wanted to charge her, or—even better—for food. She still had not received any money from those assholes at USA Boxing. Mom had actually gone food shopping that week, but Tyler was growing fast and consumed alarming amounts of cold cuts.
She said to Smiley, “I just got back from Spokane, where I won Trials at a hundred and thirty-two pounds, and the American Continentals, where I took gold. Lightweight is an Olympic class for women, so if I qualify, I could go to Rio.”
“Mazel tov,” he said dryly.
“I was hoping…”
There was an unspoken rule in boxing that really good amateurs didn’t have to pay to train. Somebody like Gravity was good for business. Then again, maybe he didn’t need more good publicity. She looked behind him at all the banners hanging on the walls of the palatial gym, advertising past and current champions. She had begun to pull out her cash when somebody called her name.
“Gravity! How are you, champ?”
It was Tiffany Clarke, one of the few three-star AIBA coaches in New York. She was a tiny, tough Jamaican lady who held the record for being the oldest woman to ever win a world title. She glanced at the cash in Gravity’s hand, then at Smiley, pursing her lips.
“Don’t tell me you’re charging her?”
Smiley glared at Tiffany with his one good eye. She stared back, folding her arms across her chest.
Smiley returned to his dirty magazine, grumbling, “You’re gonna put me out of business.”
“Thank you,” Gravity said, following Tiffany onto the sunny gym floor.
Tiffany patted her on the back. “Don’t mention it. I watched the livestream of Canada. You hung tough! I won’t lie, I thought that Brazilian edged it. But you’re coming along.”
Gravity hid her irritation. Why was Tiffany telling her that? She didn’t need negativity right now.
They paused beside the nearest ring, where Tiffany had a group of little girls doing a bob-and-weave drill underneath clotheslines stretched across the ropes. Truth and Honor worked next to the ring, hitting the human-shaped punching bag called BOB. The twins paused, panting, and gave Gravity sweaty hugs.
“You look big,” Truth said.
“Yeah,” said Honor, prodding Gravity’s belly with one glove.
“Look who’s talking,” Tiffany said, laughing. “Back to work now. Gimme that double jab, right hand, left uppercut, right hand, left hook.” She glanced up into the ring. “Ella, don’t cross your feet! Violet, bend your knees more! Come on, Ariana! Don’t stop working when I stop looking!”
Gravity set her bag down on the ring apron and fished out her jump rope.
“You sparring?” Tiffany asked. “The twins are done, but my one twenty-five could use the work. Is Coach Thomas coming?”
“He…” Gravity hesitated. Boxing was a small world, and soon it would be all over the gyms that she had left Coach. “He’s not the right trainer for me anymore.”
Tiffany raised her eyebrows. “Don’t you have Worlds soon?”
“Yeah.”
China was in thirty-one days. Gravity scanned the gym, noting the half dozen trainers spread throughout. There was the old Panamanian who had gotten famous from Million Dollar Baby, but Gravity hated that movie. The cranky Irish guy who always told the press that women shouldn’t box. That nice man who had started Boo Boo off, but he was one of Coach’s old fighters and would not want to step on his toes. A muay thai trainer, a pro wrestling teacher, a group of men in tracksuits that said “Kazakhstan,” and a few new faces she did not recognize.
Boxing gyms were like school lunchrooms: every clique had their own table, with hidden alliances and hostilities between groups. She hadn’t realized until now how worried she had been about finding her place here.
She turned back to Tiffany, who was studying her with a frown, and blurted out, “Would you coach me?”
Tiffany sucked her teeth. “Jefferson Thomas had you since you were knee-high to a grasshopper. You best go back and talk it out.”
Gravity shouldered her bag, cheeks burning. If Tiffany didn’t want her, somebody else would. She headed to a quiet corner by the locker rooms, where mirrors stretched across the wall and a few boxers were jumping rope.
Her phone rang with a call from Tyler. Melsy and Rosa had gotten Ty a cell phone for his eight and a halfth birthday, which Gravity had been opposed to at first, because it would give him more of an excuse to spend all his time playing games. But it came in handy for moments like this, because it meant he could reach her without having to go through Mom.
“Hey,” she said, blocking off her other ear from the bell.
“Hi, Gra Gra.” He sounded unhappy. Gravity thought she heard sex noises in the background.
“What’s going on?” she asked. “Is that a movie?”
“Mom is watching it with a man.”
“Listen, Ty Ty. Go in your bedroom and lock the door and watch Naruto until I get home and make us dinner.”
“But that’s not fair. He’s about to fight Konohamaru. You won’t know who wins!”
Gravity smiled. “Let’s make an exception just this once. I leave in a month for China, so we have a lot of episodes to get through. I want you to watch it and find out who wins and tell me why, okay?”
He sniffed. “Okay.”
“I’ll be there soon. Lock the door and watch.”
When she hung up, she saw with surprise the familiar hulking form of Monster, climbing into the nearest ring with one of the men from Kazakhstan. M
onster wore an “Autism Awareness” T-shirt and sleek new sparring gear that said “PLASMAFuel XXXtreme.” Boca and Andre were leaning up against the ring ropes. Gravity felt a flush of embarrassment as Boca’s eyes met hers, but he just smiled and kissed her cheek, like it was totally normal to meet her there.
He said, “Coach Thomas is too controlling. You’re not a little girl. How’s he gonna tell you what to do on your own time?”
“Yeah,” she said, his words cheering her up. “It wasn’t like me and Lefty were bringing it in the gym.”
“You work harder than any of the boys,” Boca said. “I see you.”
“Thanks.” Gravity blushed. Boca had never said anything like that to her before.
Then Andre ruined it by saying, “You left that old man in the wheelchair? Good for you! He’s a dinosaur.”
She gave Andre a dirty look and began jumping rope. She didn’t like hearing anybody insult Coach, especially not that sleazebag. Coach had forgotten more about boxing than Andre would ever know. And dinosaurs used to rule the earth.
She channeled her irritation into double jumps and banged out forty before tripping, then slowed to a basic jump as she watched Monster try to handle his stocky opponent. Normally, she jumped at least four rounds straight through, but today she allowed herself to rest on the breaks. The twins were right; she was big. She could feel the extra weight with every jump.
After three rounds, Gravity was gassed. So was Monster. The Kazakhstani fighter’s class revealed itself slowly, like that little Polaroid that Monster had taken of her outside the gym last week, which, she realized with a pang, Coach had never given back. Gravity had never given him that Boxing Canada hoodie, either. The thought made her sad. She draped the jump rope over her shoulders and went to stand beside Boca.
“Who is that Kazakhstan guy?” she asked.
“World cruiserweight champion,” Boca said. “Niyazimbetov or something. He defends his title next week at the Garden.”
“Wow.”
Cruiserweights were under two hundred, which meant Monster outweighed the guy by forty-some pounds, but Niyazimbetov or whatever was controlling everything. He was neutralizing Monster’s right by keeping his own left high and jabbing relentlessly at Monster’s shoulder.
After the fifth round, Boca yelled, “That’s it for us.”
Gravity and Monster worked the heavy bags side by side. He was barely even throwing his right hand, so she knew all those shoulder punches had hurt him. She was having an equally hard time. By a silent agreement, they both quit after four rounds and slumped down on the apron, where he clutched his shoulder, grimacing. Gravity pulled out some arnica balm and rubbed a thin layer over his stony deltoid.
“How’s my champ?” said Andre. He patted Monster hard on the injured shoulder.
Monster shuddered and said, “Great.”
“Glad to hear it! The other kid’s team was real impressed.”
“Yeah?” Monster looked over at the Kazakhstani coaches. “They said I was good?”
“They said I had a future world champion on my hands,” Andre said proudly.
It suddenly came back to her, what Coach had said that night they all watched Boo Boo kayo the Nigerian: that Boca and Andre would build Monster up until the crossroads and then cash him in. She had meant to ask Coach more about that but she hadn’t. Now she wouldn’t get the chance.
She hoped Monster would be okay and that he could retire from boxing early with his faculties intact. It was a jungle out there. There were always sleazy people waiting to take advantage of trusting boxers.
Andre said, “All right, champ, I’ll see you next week!”
“Okay, Andre! Thanks for the new gear!”
Andre smiled. “Like we say at PLASMAFuel: label first.”
“What does that mean?” Gravity asked.
Andre looked at her with surprise and annoyance, as though one of the spit buckets had piped up with a question. He said, “The label tells people what to think. It’s more important than what’s in the bottle. If we want Monster to be a champion, we have to package him as one.”
Gravity thought that sounded wrong. She said, “I thought you weren’t supposed to judge a book by its cover.”
Andre laughed. “Nobody reads books anymore.”
As soon as he was gone, Monster moaned in pain.
“Do you want some Advil?” Gravity asked.
“Thanks. My head is killing me. That guy hits hard.”
She slipped two Advil into his enormous palm. She couldn’t imagine the size of the headaches he must get. She got headaches sometimes. After the fight with Ariana, she’d had trouble sleeping. Every boxer she knew got headaches, but they rarely spoke about them. If your coaches found out, they were supposed to keep you out of the ring.
She glanced at the old journeyman hitting the heavy bag near the locker room. Jimmy had a record of ten wins and thirty-seven losses, but he still loved boxing. The slushy way he said his s’s was like how Tyler had said them before he had speech therapy, and sometimes he paused a long time before he found the right word.
That was the other reason you didn’t talk about headaches: you didn’t want to turn into Jimmy. You might joke about it, like if you forgot the combination to your locker, you might say, “I’m getting punchy.” But you couldn’t think too hard about it, because if you thought about that, you wouldn’t be able to keep going.
“Can I show you something?” Monster said shyly.
“Sure.”
“It’s a new series I’m doing on ring card girls. Some are of your cousin.”
Gravity looked at his phone reluctantly, expecting boobs and asses, but what she saw surprised her. The gym went away as she lost herself in the images.
A French-manicured hand gripping a card that read “Round Seven,” the cords of the wrist popping, as though the hand’s owner was terrified to let go.
A stiletto heel precariously balanced on the metal grating of the ring stairs.
Another immaculately manicured hand, draped in an unenthusiastic manner over the shoulder of a man in a business suit.
Two pairs of feet, crossed at the ankles, one dark-skinned, the other pale, in identical stilettos.
The pale feet again, red where the straps dug into the flesh and bowed at the ankles as though about to topple from exhaustion.
Hands holding a Hello Kitty cell phone.
Hands adjusting a bikini strap.
Hands lighting cigarettes.
Hands counting money.
She gave him back his phone. “These are amazing, Kimani.”
“You really think so?”
“Yeah! When you look at their hands and their feet, you see how tiring it is to keep looking beautiful.” She struggled to put it into words. “It made me feel kind of sad but also kind of…like I was inside their world.”
“Empathy,” he said. “That’s called empathy. Those girls fight their own fight, just like you and me.” He looked at her searchingly. “You really left Coach?”
“Yeah.”
“You two seemed so good together. He was like a father to you.”
She sighed. Why was everybody trying to make her feel guilty about moving on?
“I had to. He disrespected me. Besides, I’d have to break up with Lefty, and I could never do that to him.”
She had been thinking a lot about Lefty, and the more she thought about him, the more she regretted having gotten so angry. She should have had empathy. It must have been incredibly hard for him to go through that with Tray. He had to be feeling pulled in two directions now, between his own family and D’s. She had been wrong to judge him so harshly. They had not spoken all weekend, although she had sent him a few texts checking in.
When she looked back up at Monster, he was studying her with those big solemn eyes of
his.
“I hope Lefty appreciates you enough.”
“Thanks, Kimani.”
Boca came striding across the gym floor, yelling, “All right, Monster. We out.”
Monster hugged her, and Boca gave her a kiss on the cheek. She watched them go wistfully and finished her workout alone.
She got the email on the subway ride home:
April 18, 4:57 PM
From: [email protected]
Re: Stipend Checks
To: [email protected]
Dear Gravity,
I just received a call from your team manager, Bonnie Rosario, who brought to my attention the matter of your missing stipend checks. I am sincerely sorry nobody from the office replied to your earlier queries. It’s been extremely busy here and emails to our general information mailbox sometimes got lost in the shuffle. Please feel free to call or email me directly in the future.
According to our records, we mailed your March stipend of $2,000 on 2/29/16 and your April stipend of $2,000 on 3/31/16. Both checks were cashed at a Western Union on Coney Island Avenue in Brooklyn. I have attached a scanned image of the backs of the canceled checks so you can follow up on your end.
I’m sorry to say that we cannot reissue the monies. Going forward, I suggest we set up a direct deposit that could go right into a checking or savings account. I have attached the forms to this email. If you need help filling them out or setting up a checking account, please let me know.
Very best of luck in China, and congratulations on your Continental gold!
All best,
Gautham
Gautham Nagesh
Athlete Liaison
USA Boxing
One Olympic Plaza
Colorado Springs, CO 80909
Gravity did not need to click on the canceled checks to understand what had happened. The only mystery was how she could have been so stupid and why she and Ty had not packed up their things and left for good long ago. Her mother had already stolen her Golden Gloves necklace and gift certificates. Why wouldn’t she take the stipends, too?