by H. T. Night
He bounced off my trunk and then did a backflip in the middle of the street. Cool, I thought. I have an athlete on my hands. This will be fun kicking his ass. Luckily, there was no traffic at 3 o’clock in the morning.
Eddie made a hand motion to his friend, basically telling them to back off and that he would take care of me. Little did he know what a bad-ass he’d just run into. Eddie charged me, and tried to kick me in the nuts. It’s the most predictable technique move in the street-fighting handbook. It’s a bitch move—you kick your opponent as hard as you can in his package, and just unload punches on him. But I was far too savvy to let a twerp like this get one over on me. I easily blocked his kick, using the karate kid wax-off technique. It actually does work. I smacked his leg down and that relentless little turd tried to kick me again. I caught his leg and lifted it straight up, forcing him to fall on the ground. I knew grappling and wrestling this guy was a risky move because his friends could jump on me in seconds. I figured I would choke him out fast until he saw stars.
On his back, Eddie came up at me. I took my left arm and wrapped around his head in a reverse headlock. I just cranked that baby down against his windpipe and it was lights out for Eddie. I let go of him and he slumped against the asphalt.
Suddenly, I felt an elbow crack into the back of my head. It was one of Eddie’s friends. Then I felt a sensation I had never felt in my life. The motherfucker bit my right shoulder. But not a minor bite; he bit it like he was biting into a rack of lamb. I never felt that sensation before. What the hell just happened? This crazy asshole just bit a giant gash in my shoulder. I literally heard him spit out my flesh.
Motherfucker! That fucking hurt! I did the only thing I could; I threw my head back so hard that the back of my skull cracked the guy’s nose. I heard his nose break as I connected with it like a bowling ball hitting a walnut.
I turned around and the guy who bit me fell straight back onto the asphalt. The third guy came at me and I grabbed his head and knee-kicked him in his scrawny little chin, then I slammed his head on the back of my car.
All three guys were semi-conscious and crawling their way to the sidewalk. I could have stuck around and finished them off, old-school, but I was better than these street thugs. I climbed back into my car where Sasha was still sitting in the passenger seat, looking on with exhilaration in her eyes. I obviously just made her wetter than a Slip ’n Slide. I was the ultra-bad boy in her eyes and had just proved it by kicking some serious ass and wiping up the street with three guys. A girl like this was probably more turned on than she had ever been in her entire life.
I sat in my driver seat and looked straight ahead at the spider-web crack in my windshield. Luckily, the putz wasn’t that strong, so he didn’t break through the glass. I still had to drive back Ace Ventura-style, with my head sticking out of my window.
I decided to just go down PCH toward Huntington Beach. I looked over at Sasha, whose eyes were still locked onto me like she had just discovered a million-dollar diamond.
“Really?” I said. “Seriously? Are you kidding me? That’s the kind of people you associate with? Grown men jumping on cars?”
Sasha leaned over and touched my bloody shoulder. My shoulder hurt in a way that it never had before. I knew I had just jeopardized my fight tonight and that made me more pissed than she’d ever know. “We are going to the E.R. I need stitches. What the hell did you get me into?”
“I’m so sorry, Tommy. Those guys had no reason to be there. He is just a jealous boyfriend and he was incredibly drunk.”
“Oh, really? That’s supposed to make it better? I have a professional fight in nearly 12 hours. That’s my livelihood. That’s how I make my living! I can’t even raise my arm. Do you know how hard it is to get a shot in my sport? I’m fighting at the Staples Center! Do you understand how huge that is? The Lakers played there.”
“I’ll pay for your windshield.”
“You’re damn right you’re paying for my windshield. But at the moment, I could give a rat’s ass about my windshield. What I give a shit about is the two-inch gash in my right shoulder. I’m right-handed, Sasha. Seventy-five percent of my coordination and strength comes from the right side of my body! How can I fight like this tonight?”
“Can I go with you to the E.R.?” she asked.
I looked at her and she seemed as concerned as anyone could be in a situation like this but my Spidey senses were out and this girl was a world-class con-artist. That was the only explanation, and why she was running around with guys who jumped on cars and fought strangers in the middle of a busy street. “Yeah,” I said. “You’re coming with me because I don’t have time to drop you off.” From a distance, I saw a hospital near Beach Boulevard.
I turned right and made my way around the block to the emergency room. I hobbled into the back and filled out the necessary paperwork and waited almost five hours for them to fix me up. I didn’t say a thing about my fight later on. There was no way I’d be cleared by this guy to participate in my match tonight. I was not going to let anyone else know about my injury.
I had already been checked out by California Commission doctors and cleared to fight yesterday. They would have no idea that some idiot would bite off a chunk of my shoulder the night before my fight and there was no way I was going to say anything. I would fight one-handed if I had to. Southpaw, even.
It was 10 a.m. by the time I was released from the E.R. I was scheduled to fight at 6:00 p.m. that night. I could have gone home to catch another four to five hours of sleep and still have been reasonably refreshed. I purposely didn’t take any of the pain medication that the E.R. doctor had prescribed for me because I didn’t want to be loopy. But damn, my shoulder was killing me. I figured I could use the pain as motivation for my fight.
I started driving down Beach Boulevard. “Okay, where do you live?”
Sasha was quiet.
“Where do you live?” I demanded.
Sasha sighed loudly.
“I’m waiting,” I continued.
“I don’t have a place to stay.”
“Huh? When did your boyfriend break up with you?”
“He didn’t exactly break up with me.”
“Did you break up with him?”
She paused. “No.”
“Well, where is he?”
“I don’t know. He’s kind of missing.”
“You mean he just up and left!”
“That’s what I’m hoping. My boyfriend was married himself and was putting me up at an apartment in Brea. About a week after I met you, he just quit contacting me. I called him several times and even drove by his house. I can’t exactly call his wife or go to the door and ask her where he is.”
“I hate to tell you, Sasha. He wised up and went back to his wife.”
“They usually do.”
“Then maybe it’s time to quit living a hundred miles an hour and find a real job and quit all this shit of living on the edge 24-7.”
“I know. You’re right. He never paid the January rent for my apartment. About a week ago, I was evicted. Then, I was staying with a friend in Balboa, and he became real needy and possessive. He was physical with me tonight, and I didn’t want our friendship to go there, so I waited for him to fall asleep and I took off.”
“Where is your car?”
“A couple of days ago, it was impounded.”
“For what?”
“Unpaid parking tickets.”
I just drove, staring straight ahead. It was a cloudy day, and this was far too much drama for my taste. “Let me get this straight. You have no car and no place to stay. Do you have a job?”
“Well, I’m an actress.”
“That’s not a job unless you earned royalties for a commercial. Let me put this another way, do you have any money for a motel?”
“No.”
“You’re broke?”
“I have about $17.”
“And that is why you called me, you knew I was a good guy and you thought
you could weasel yourself in my life for a couple weeks until your next move.”
“You have it all wrong, Tommy.”
“Do I?”
“You do!” she said emphatically.
“How so?”
“I’m running.”
“From who?”
“I’m running because I’m afraid I might have done something bad.”
I pulled over into a Carl’s Jr. parking lot. “What did you do?”
“I’m not sure.”
“That’s not good enough. How do you not know if you’ve done something bad or not?”
“There is more to me than meets the eye.”
The nerve of this girl! She was talking to me all cryptically after what I just went through for her. “What?” I said. “Are you a special agent or a bounty hunter?”
“Not exactly.”
“What are you?” I was now getting pissed off.
“You’re not going to believe me, so I just shouldn’t tell you.”
“Look, you turned my entire night upside down and you probably fucked up my fight. So, guess what? You are telling me exactly what your deal is!”
Sasha paused and then looked me in the eye. “I’m a werewolf.”
Chapter Six
I hit the brakes, pulled over, threw it in park, and stepped out of my Mustang. I walked to the sidewalk that was parallel to Beach Boulevard, breathing hard. What kind of nut job did I get myself involved with?
Sasha stepped out of my vehicle and walked over to me. Cars were whizzing by and it was pretty chilly. I was still dressed for a pickup basketball game at a local park, but I didn’t care. I had heard enough. I needed to take this woman to a halfway house where they treated mentally-ill patients.
Sasha sat next to me on the curb. I didn’t even feel like arguing with a crazy person. I didn’t feel like talking at all and needed to go home so I could rest.
“Do you believe me?” Sasha stared deep into my eyes. What a con job. She was good. Her eyes were as sincere as I had ever seen in my life.
“Do I believe you?” I repeated.
“Yes, do you believe me?”
I looked at her and gave her a look that said, ‘You can’t be serious.’ I just laughed out loud.
“So, you don’t believe me.”
“Sasha,” I said. “A werewolf? Really? It becomes more ridiculous by the minute with you. You’re not well. You’re either crazy or a pathological liar. Either of those choices isn’t someone I need to be associated with. Listen, I’m going to take you to the Radisson Inn and I’m going to pay for three nights. Stay there and figure out your next move.”
“How secure are their rooms?”
That was a strange response. “They’re secure. It’s a fancy hotel.”
“Can you padlock yourself in from the inside?”
“I don’t know. I would imagine so. Why?”
“Because tomorrow night is the first full moon.”
“Oh, you’re right,” I said condescendingly. “We better make sure we lock down the furniture so you don’t break anything, being that you’re a werewolf and all.”
“We should!” Sasha said, as serious as a heart attack. Wow, she was Looney Tunes.
We went back to my car I drove down a couple of streets and pulled into the Radisson Inn. I jumped out and went to the front office and paid the guy cash. I had to show a credit card and that made me nervous. I didn’t know if one of Sasha’s many wonderful traits was that she was also a kleptomaniac. I walked Sasha up to her room and stopped in front of her door.
“You want to come in?” she asked.
I gave her a look that must have answered the question before I said it. “No, I’ll pass. I’m exhausted. I need to go home and sleep. I’m done, Sasha. Have a good life.”
Sasha looked at me and with a wistful tone in her voice said, “I wish you believed me.”
“So do I,” I said. “It would at least explain your erratic behavior.” I turned around and walked down to my car and didn’t look back. I slid into my Mustang and headed onto the freeway and arrived at my apartment in about 20 minutes. I went straight to my bed and crashed. I looked over at my clock. It read 10:15. Maybe I can get four hours in.
I closed my eyes and I had a bizarre itch come over my body. I scratched all over and each scratch felt a bit euphoric. I was sure satisfying the itch in a way that was almost therapeutic.
I rolled over and protected my shoulder and fell asleep almost instantly. I woke up about one hour later. Someone’s car alarm was going off outside. What an asshole! Turn it off!
I jumped up and went outside to yell at the jerk. I could hear the alarm and it was loud as ever. I began walking down the street, trying to find the car alarm. The closer I was to where the sound was coming from the more my ears felt like they were bleeding.
I must have walked a half mile down the street. How fucking loud was the asshole’s alarm? Finally, I walked into the mini mall parking lot and there was a little yellow Volkswagen bug with its alarm just screeching away.
There were people outside and I was shocked they weren’t floored by the noise like I was. This was the loudest alarm I had ever heard. It sounded like ten sirens going off at the same time. There was a guy walking toward me and he seemed pretty unaffected by the noisy alarm.
“WHY ISN’T ANYONE TELLING THAT GUY TO TURN OFF HIS ALARM!” I screamed at the top of my lungs.
The guy mouthed, “Why are you screaming? It’s just a car alarm. It’s no big deal.”
“JUST A CAR ALARM?!!” I screamed even louder. “IT COULD WAKE THE DEAD!”
“No, asshole, your voice can wake the dead. Get a grip, will you?” The guy walked past me and climbed into his car.
Huh? I looked over at another man calmly walking out of a bagel shop, pressing his keys that stopped the blaring obnoxious alarm. His alarm stopped and I could finally hear again. My ears were literally stinging. Damn, that was loud!
The guy slid into his little yellow bug and left. I looked around; there must have been a dozen people outside and not one of them cared. That alarm was so loud it woke me from a mile away. A mile?
I turned around and went home. Well, so much for sleep. I had a fight tonight, and Mo wanted me there by 4:00 p.m. Los Angeles was about an hour away on a Saturday, so I thought that I better just get ready. I could sleep when I was dead. Which, at this rate, wouldn’t be much longer.
I put my fight bag together and then took a long shower. I thought about my opponent and how Mo trained and prepared me for my fight. I needed to quit worrying about one-night stands and car alarms.
I wrapped my shoulder good and tight, so that no one would know that I was butchered the night before. I would need to let them know I was wearing the bandage as a precautionary measure. A lie. I hated lies.
I arrived at the arena and I met with Mo in the training room. We were the first one up, so I needed to get my head on straight. I told Mo I slept on my shoulder wrong and that’s why I bandaged it up. He wanted to look at it, but I told him it wasn’t a big deal. Little did he know how bad my shoulder ached and that I had 45 stitches in it.
My opponent was exactly my size, but I was younger and quicker. My ground game was one of the best in the business. Mo and I went over a few key points and soon it was time for my second professional fight.
Chapter Seven
I stepped out into the ring for a professional fight with a veteran fighter and could only use the left side of my upper body. The only strategy I had, considering the condition I was in, was to break him down and get him to the mat so that I could do a submission move. I was in for a painful night.
After the opening announcements, I went back to my corner and Mo was outside the cage yelling instructions. “Just like we ran it in practice, Tommy. You got this.” Little did Mo know what I was truly dealing with.
Round one. I rushed out and Vasquez circled me. He knew he didn’t want me to shoot into his legs and have our fight on the ground.
“Use your right arm!” Mo yelled at me.
I was waiting for just the right moment where his neck would be left open so I could sink my arm in for a choke submission.
He was guarding it beautifully, and it was impossible for me to get my arm through. So, I continued to hammer down my left arm on the back of his head and neck.
I went into complete spastic mode. I unloaded 10 to 12 consecutive punches and elbows and I could see Vasquez weakening.
Just give me an opening, I thought. I’ll choke you out and then we can all go home. Then it happened—he used his arm to try to get in position by placing them on the mat. And for a brief second, his neck was exposed and that was all I needed. I shoved my left arm underneath his Adam’s apple in a blink of an eye. I yanked up and tightened it with my right arm, which gave me an immense amount of pain.
He shifted his body, trying to get out. He was a veteran and he wouldn’t tap out lightly. He fought me off for a good 20 seconds, and then I saw the most beautiful thing in sports: my opponent tapped out. That only meant one thing. He gave up and threw in the white flag. I had my second first-round knockout.
I jumped up and I looked at my shoulder and I was bleeding through my shoulder wrap. I had torn out a number of my stitches. But it was worth it, I was still undefeated. Granted, I was only 2 and 0, but I’d take it.