Monster Man (Fight Card)

by Jack Tunney

  The scuffed wood door made it a room. Bars would have made the space a cell with no further alteration.

  Ben dragged himself back up on his feet, pulled the key from the door and slipped it into his pocket. He then slipped out of his pants and shirt and eased back onto the bed, matching the bed frame’s moan with one of his own.

  A little, square ray of red sunlight crept up Ben’s chest. He was snoring long before it reached the peak.

  ROUND 4

  It was ten o’clock at night when Ben opened his eyes. The dark room and amplified water sounds from the harbor through the open window confused him. He wondered how he got there for longer than he’d care to ever admit. He stretched, reached for the dirty bedside lamp. Something crunched in his shoulder. There was no pain, but the movement of his shoulder bones made him queasy. He twisted the lamp on and swung his feet to the floor.

  The lamp gave off a dim light. Ben staggered to his bag in the lamp’s orangey glow and pulled fresh clothes from his little case.

  Still in his undershirt, shorts and socks, Ben moved into the hallway, locked his room and held the key in his fist. He shuffled to the bathroom at the end of the hall with his fresh clothes under his arm. He found the door locked, grunts and farts greeted him from the other side. He shuffled back to his room and unlocked the door.

  ***

  Clean clothes on an unwashed body can only do so much, but Ben didn’t have much else going for him as he tromped down the last few steps to the rooming house lobby. The clerk who’d checked him in, a handsome blond guy with a pointed chin and stiff, styled hair, had been replaced by what Ben thought was a rather piggish slob.

  The night guy.

  Ben put his fists knuckles down on the front desk and leaned on them. The right one spiked with pain. He yanked it back up. “Hey, uh…”

  The night manager looked up from his stiff copy of Foto-Rama. “Need a room?”

  “No, I, have a room.” Ben flashed his key to prove it. “I just wondered…” He glanced around the lobby for no reason whatsoever. “Who do I talk to about getting some work in the morning?”

  The night guy returned his attention to the stag mag, but extended one wide pointer finger to the doorway across the lobby from the stairs. “In there.”

  Ben squinted at the doorway guarded by an old west style swinging double door. A tall, muscular guy in sweaty work clothes held a pay phone receiver to his ear. He stood to the left of the door as the sounds of drinkers drifted through it into the lobby.

  Ben turned back to the night guy. “The bar?”

  “Yep.” The night guy turned a page, realized it was two pages stuck together and tried to use his big-toe-sized thumbs to pry them apart. Failing, he closed the magazine and rolled his eyes up at Ben. “The shippers and receivers can be found in there most nights.”

  Ben stared at the swinging doors.

  Two young guys in t-shirts and jeans came down the steps and passed behind Ben’s back and through the doors.

  “And if you’re looking to move boats around, the harbor master is sometimes in there, too.” The night guy dropped the magazine to the floor and folded his hands over his broad gut. He squinted up at Ben. “Sure you’re not looking for…handier work.”

  “No.” Ben patted the air between them with his right hand, still sore from his last fight. “I don’t think so.”

  “Too bad.” The night manager snorted. “That’s the best work a guy can get round here, if he’s handy enough.” He closed his eyes and the air squished out of his chair cushion.

  Ben mumbled his thanks and made his way toward the swinging doors.

  The sweaty guy on the phone twisted away from Ben as he passed. “No, I ain’t seen Joe all night, so I don’t know.”

  ***

  The bar was bigger than Ben thought, but as filled with immense-shouldered men, slight, sleazy women, and murky smoke as he’d envisioned. Two stairs took him down to the main floor, where the bar itself extended from the far wall on his right. A three-sided square with the back-bar stood against the wall.

  It only took the two steps down and four lumbering steps to the bar for people to notice him.

  “Jeez, you look like you been through it already, ace.” The bartender sported a wide waist, thick shoulders and arms. He cleaned a dirty glass with a dirty towel as Ben assumed a barstool. “What’ll you have?”

  “Beer. Whatever’s on tap.”

  “You got it.”

  The stool to his left was empty. On his right, Ben could feel the stare of a well-liquored longshoreman. The man’s eyes explored Ben’s ears, his jaw, his brow, his whole head. Ben turned his shoulders to the left.

  “Heh, hey, hey,” the drunk said. “You some kinda…you okay, buddy?”

  Ben allowed the guy a brief nod, mostly with his chin. “Yeah. Just tired is all.”

  “Jeepers, I don’t know.” The guy squeezed Ben’s right shoulder with imprecise strength. Ben gripped the edge of the bar to keep from popping the drunk. “To me you look like…” He dropped his hand from Ben’s shoulder and elbowed the olive-skinned guy on his right, who was conversing with a scrawny blonde. “Eh, Ramon. Is this guy okay? He looks like…what was the name… that picture…the one with…”

  “Shove off, Wyatt,” a female voice said. “Go get soaked somewhere else.”

  Ben’s entire body unclenched. He released his double grip on the far edge of the bar.

  The voice was rich and husky.

  Ben watched the drunk longshoreman, Wyatt, pull his focus in the direction of the voice, which had come from behind Ben. Wyatt sort of smiled, sort of didn’t. “Hey, Vicky.” He waved a finger at Ben. “You ever seen that picture with…”

  “I said shove off.” The voice moved to Ben’s right shoulder. He moved his chin that way. “Go bother someone else, will ya? I’m bothering this one.”

  Wyatt stumbled from his stool and moved away, palms up. “All right, Vicky. All right…” His sentence drifted off with his body. He settled between two homely brunettes on a bench along the far wall like a dead leaf carried by a stiff breeze.

  Ben’s beer arrived. He turned to his right.

  The voice came from behind again. “I’m over here.”

  Rather than simply turning back to the stool to his left, Ben twisted to his right, toward the voice, and ended up on his feet.

  She stood more than a foot shorter than him, even in her peep-toe pumps. She was about fifteen pounds overqualified for her vine-patterned dress, but it hosted all of her curves with grace and offered her bosom with flair. Her bare arms and shoulders were pale and lightly freckled. Auburn hair crested over one side of her face, casting it in shadow. The other side featured one dazzling emerald green eye. It locked onto both of his.

  She looked like Veronica Lake, only real.

  “So, can I sit?”

  Ben nodded and they both sat.

  Neither of them noticed the bartender, so the man leaned in. “One of you owes me six bits.”

  “Tab it,” The woman said. “Okay, Roy?”

  The bartender moved on to someone else. Neither looked his way.

  The woman’s legs wound into a twist like courting pythons. She peered up at Ben with her one sparkling green eye, a smile in it. “So, are you a mute? We’ve had those here.”

  Ben’s hand wandered along the bar in search of his beer. His eyes had yet to divert from her eye’s shining emerald depths. “Can I get you a drink?”

  She smiled and tilted her head in such a way he could see the whole thing. It made him swallow. “My money’s no good here, but I appreciate the gesture,” she said.

  “Sure.” Ben folded his hands on the bar, then unfolded them and laid them flat. The refolded them. His beer remained untouched.

  She offered him her right hand. “I’m Vicky.”

  He took her hand in both of his as if it was a newborn duckling. “That’s not good enough.”

  “What?” The brow over her one green eye furrowed.

>   “Sorry.” The sharpness of her word brought Ben back. He released her hand, straightened on his stool and snatched up his beer. “I meant…You just seem like more than a Vicky.” He shook his head. Two gulps took care of most of the beer. “I’m just a Ben.”

  She cocked her head at him. The shadow lifted from the side of her face, but not enough to really see her. “You’re adorable, Ben. I was Victoria to my mother. How’s that?”

  Ben nodded, a lopsided grin on his deformed face he felt powerless to change. “More like it.”

  She smiled. “Sorry about Wyatt.” She motioned to the empty stool behind Ben. “He knows the new ones are my territory.” She leaned back and looked him over. “And you’re definitely new.”

  She leaned in under the yellowed bar lights, which gave Ben a look at her belly. It was not big and round so much as present and soft. The tight, vine-patterned dress bisected it at what Ben guessed was Vicky’s navel.

  Victoria’s navel.

  Ben looked anywhere else. “I guess I stand out.” He glanced at the other bodies lounging around the room at various stages of sobriety. “Even in this crowd.”

  “I’ll say.” She leaned an elbow on the bar, cocked her head at him again. The hair curtain fell over her face. “That’s a head made for knocking down castle doors.”

  Ben straightened. “Geez, thanks.” He signaled the bartender.

  “Don’t be mad.” She grinned up at him. “I’m sitting here, aren’t I?”

  “Yeah.” He folded his hands.

  “Besides,” she leaned in a bit more. “I thought you might have gotten that head from working.”

  He glanced at her. She had her little fists balled near her waist in a vague guard. He stared at the back bar. “Some of it’s from that. Rest is God. Or whoever.”

  Roy the bartender arrived and took Ben’s mug.

  “Stop.” Vicky slapped Ben’s arm. “It’s not so bad. I like unusual things. And I like guys who work.”

  Ben hugged his elbows on the bar. “You got your pick here, from what I hear.”

  She surveyed the bar. “Yeah, I do.” She leaned in a bit. “But I like new, unusual things.”

  The bartender slid a fresh beer in front of Ben. Vicky nodded at him and pointed at herself. Roy nodded and moved on.

  Ben watched the exchange and completed the trio of nods with one at Vicky. “Thanks.”

  “My pleasure.” She smiled. “What’s yours? I mean, I assume you’re here to work somewhere other than the dock.”

  He shrugged. “I dunno. Might be time to make an honest living.”

  She dismissed that notion with a hand on his shoulder. She squeezed it just a bit. “You must be something else when you fight.”

  “Yeah, that’s me.” Ben gulped his suds. “Something else.”

  The hum in the bar swelled over Ben’s right shoulder. He looked over at Vicky and found the shimmering, green eye wide, but looking past him.

  Vicky looked back at him and smiled. “I want to see you work, but a girl’s got her engagements, you know?” She unwound her legs and slid from the stool. “Ask around, you’ll find your way to some work. I’ll be watching when you do.”

  The bar’s hum grew louder, and closer. Vicky kissed her fingers and pressed them to Ben’s bare bicep. The surge under Ben’s skin went from there to his fingers and shot to his shoulder.

  His hand went immediately to the spot for the chance at retuning the touch, but her fingers were gone. Then so was she. Ben laid a hand over his bicep and looked up in time to see auburn hair and a tight, vine-patterned dress slip through a door at the end of the bar.

  He thought about going after her. He thought about another beer. He thought about never removing his hand from his bicep for fear of allowing the feel of her touch to float away into the smoke and yellowy light where he’d have no hope of ever recapturing it.

  He thought about hitting someone. Hard. He thought about hitting someone hard where Vicky could see him do it.

  Ben thought all of those things at once as he glanced around the room searching for a face, any face, which looked like it might lead him to the ring.

  A hand clapped his shoulder.

  “Hi there.”

  Ben turned and found a clean-cut, blond man in a decent suit smiling at him. “I’m Joe,” the man said. “Heard you might be looking for some work.”

  ROUND 5

  Ben and Pete were to meet to compare notes at noon on Ben’s third day in town. At least that was the plan.

  In order to do that, there needed to be a set location for the meeting to take place – a place universal to any town, regardless of size, in which they ran the scam. If all went well, Ben and Pete would have little to no contact, and certainly no public contact, while arrangements were made for Ben’s first fight.

  They couldn’t risk being seen together in a place as small as Mamaroneck.

  Ben didn’t know where Pete was staying, so the meeting spot had to be something every town would have, yet a location in which it was unlikely for anyone involved in underground boxing to have an interest.

  Ben slipped into the Mamaroneck Public Library with only a few glances over each shoulder. He nodded at the woman behind the front desk, who just stared at him, and proceeded through the thick silence to non-fiction section 158, applied psychology.

  No Pete.

  He traced a fingertip, which was wider than many of the books, along the plastic-covered spines until he found the precise designated meeting spot – Dewey decimal number 158.1.

  How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

  Ben slid the book from its spot and flipped to the third section. He found his place and read.

  “Hey.”

  Ben snapped the book closed. “Hey.”

  Pete gave Ben a warm smile, clapped him on the shoulder and pointed at the book. “Our book, huh? Didn’t know you actually read the thing.”

  “Only when you’re late.” Ben slid the book back in place. “You didn’t give me much of a chance this time.”

  “That’s because I wasn’t late.” Pete delivered a left hook tap to Ben’s arm, and flipped a thumb over his shoulder. “I was over there readin’ the paper when you came in. You didn’t see me.”

  “Guess not.” Ben placed a hand on the edge of a shelf and put a little muscle behind it. The stacks didn’t shift, so he risked leaning against them with his back and crossed his arms over his chest. “So, what do you got?”

  “Well.” Pete mirrored Ben’s posture against the opposite stack without testing it first. “Big player in this racket is a guy called Joe Barney, the harbor master. You met him?”

  Ben nodded. “I didn’t know he was the harbor master, but I met him, yeah, two nights ago. My first night here. He approached me in the bar attached to that flophouse down by the docks where I’m staying.”

  “I been there.” Pete smirked. “My first night and again last night. So, that timing worked out, huh? I missed you.”

  “Yeah.” Ben smiled. A vine-patterned dress and auburn colored hair danced through his mind. He shook his head a little. “Where’re you staying?”

  Pete leaned back against the stacks. “Nice little place above the main drag. Widow runs it. I think I might have a shot.”

  “I must have passed you on my way from the train station.” Ben turned up a palm. “I’d wish you luck with that widow, but…”

  “Yeah, you know me.” They shared a chuckle, then Pete put out a hand. “So, wait. You got a fight already?”

  Ben smiled.

  “All right.” Pete clapped his hands and they both had a look around in silence to see if there would be a reaction. There wasn’t and Pete spoke at a lower volume, but with no less exuberance. “This is great. Ahead of schedule. Nice going, man.”

  Ben nodded his thanks. “Wasn’t much effort at all. Seems like everyone here had me made as, or wanted me to be, a fighter since the second I got here.”

  “Yeah.” Pete’s lower lip j
utted. “Seems like a pretty open secret around here. I think Joe Barney’s got things worked out with the cops. Plus, they got that ratty gym full of stiffs and drunks there on the main drag right before the harbor. I’m sure you seen it.”

  Ben nodded.

  “Anyway, I guess you didn’t tell anyone you’re a fighter, right?”

  “Nope.” Ben shook his head. He also moved his fingers over a certain spot on his bicep. “Everyone just thinks I’m here looking for dock work. That’s where I come from how. I’m on a lunch break.”

  “Great, great.” Pete said. “I hear the champ here is a longshoreman name of Jackson.” His eyes wandered the shelves. “Larry, or Lance, or Lou, but definitely Jackson. That I remember.” He rounded his shoulders and showed Ben the backs of his fists. “Big negro, y’know. Hits a ton, I hear.” He smiled and crossed his arms, gave Ben a nod. “So, who’re you fighting?”

  “Dunno.” Ben shrugged. “Barney wouldn’t say. Just told me if I can fight, I’ll like this fight.” He shrugged again. “What do you make of that?”

  Pete stroked his chin with thumb and forefinger. “Could be a few things. Maybe the guy’s a real fighter’s fighter – technician. Maybe he just likes to brawl and he thinks that’s what you’d want?” He scratched his forearms. “Maybe it’s just some tomato can, huh? I mean, guys can hope.”

  “Yeah.” Ben smiled. “That’d make my job easier.”

  “Amen.” Pete rubbed his hands together. “Okay. From what I hear, these guys fight in the warehouse along the docks every Friday midnight and sometimes Saturday, if they got enough fighters and action, but definitely Friday.”

  Ben nodded. “That’s what Barney told me, yeah.”

  “I guess that means you’re on this Friday?” Pete’s smile filled out his cheeks.

  Ben’s smile was more lopsided. “I guess so.”

  “OK, good.” Pete’s face hardened. “What I’ll do is, I’ll wait ’til I can actually see you in the place before I make my bet. This way it looks like I never even seen you before. I’ll try to wait as long as I can before I lay it down. Sound good?”