A Fighting Chance

by Sand, A. J.

  I threw a rapid series of blows and disorienting knocks to his body. My finale was a hit to the gut, a hook to the chin, and a jab square in the face. Lights out, bitch. Dazed, Kerr stumbled to the left and landed mouth on the canvas floor. Well, he got his taste of Glory.

  He was only still for a few seconds before he took a weak roll onto his back. Blood was snaking from his nostrils and one of his eyes was already swelling. I had expected much more from him. I knew they were still hungry out there, so I leaned down, lifted his head, and pummeled his face. He struggled a bit, but rage over my mom’s illness and the crowd’s encouragement suddenly consumed me. My punches became so forceful Kerr couldn’t resist anymore. He flailed then went limp, but the cheers around me grew with each hit until they reached a deafening roar.

  So, I didn’t stop.

  “Jesse! Jesse! He’s down! Jess! He’s down!” My gaze swiveled to Drew—somehow hers was the single voice that pierced the overbearing noise. She was screaming, fists clenched, chest heaving. “Jesus! What the hell is wrong with you?”

  Guilt ballooned in my gut as her disgusted look sawed through me, and I turned away from her. My heart was pounding at a bullet train’s pace, but I lowered my bloody glove instead of hitting Kerr again. I stood by Bucky’s side and raised my own arm before he got a chance to.

  “Winner! Jesse Chance is your winner!” he shouted into the bullhorn. The victory itself was never enough for me, though. I wanted my moment. My Glory. And the attention was addictive. I stomped around the ring, desperate to take the whole scene in. This was the best part. This was the worst part. Soon the applause would end, and the admiration would fade. By Friday it will be like it never happened. Drew didn’t get it. She didn’t get how much I needed this. She didn’t get that they always snatched away everything they gave, so I had to hold on to it for as long as I could, for as long as they allowed me to.

  I took another stroll and locked eyes with Henry, who was clapping for me. I smiled and told myself that he was proud, but a nagging internal voice reminded me that he was just happy he hadn’t bet his beer money for nothing. As he pointed to me, he whispered to two men I had never seen before and whom I was quite certain were not from Glory. They were both Hispanic and wearing suits, too, but theirs were of far better quality and fit than Henry’s cheap three-piece.

  Bucky slung his arm around my neck and put the bullhorn to his mouth. “There you have it, folks. We’ll see you next week! Please exit our fine facility in an orderly fashion,” he said with amusement as the audience stampeded for the doors. “That’s orderly, Jim Bellum…as in…oh, fuck it.”

  “What’s my take tonight, you think?” I asked him.

  “Your win plus the door…low-end…close to two grand, at least. It’ll be more, though, ‘cause I got Dad to do a pay-per-view stream on the Internet the past few fights.”

  “More than two grand. That’s awesome.” I shook his hand. “Uh, but is that live-streaming thing smart? This isn’t exactly legal…and doesn’t that defeat the purpose of the whole underground thing?”

  “Yeah, but it’s not defeating my desire to not be broke, so it’s worth the risk. After this fight, I bet more people will sign up to watch. I’ll drop that money off to you sometime this week, okay? Fifteen percent of the Internet ticket sales for this one and the others. Hey, if you’re free tonight, me and the other Webber boys are gonna race the back roads.”

  “I thought y’all quit doing that after the crash?”

  He shrugged. “Live hard and die young, brother.”

  “Damn straight. See ya, dude.” People were congratulating me from all sides when I ducked out of the ring to greet waiting female fans. They were out-of-towners, but they attended all the matches and usually ended up in the beds of winners. I hadn’t slept with one since before Drew, but they were still anxious…and grabby.

  “Drew!” I pushed through them when I saw her in the long line of impatient people bottlenecked near the doorway. “Drew! Are you—”

  “Don’t say a goddamn thing to me,” she said, cutting me off. Her gaze fell to my bare chest for a moment, and anger blazed into her stare when her eyes returned to mine. I looked down and saw the specks of dried blood on my skin.

  Shit. I cringed inside but kept my expression neutral. “C’mon, you know they like it when I put on a good show.”

  “No, Jess, you like it. You.” Drew jabbed my collarbone with her finger. “You want attention from people who just tolerate you most of the time, and look at what they make you do for it. You’ve let them turn you into someone I can’t stand almost any of the time. I’m tired of it. I’m getting out of here, and I will never come back to this place.” Drew spun away from me and started clicking away on her cell phone like I wasn’t still standing there.

  “Wait,” I said, grabbing her arm, “are you breaking up with me?”

  She turned back to me and her face was stoic. “I’m going to see your mom. I will sit in my car for exactly ten minutes before I go. Then, I’m leaving.” She pushed past several people and I lost sight of her. We always argued after my fights but tonight seemed different. I hoped she wasn’t at that breaking point she had been threatening me with for as long as I could remember.

  I decided not to go after her and walked toward Perry’s small office at the far end of the barn to collect my winnings. A jealous Drew was hot but a pissed-off Drew was dangerous to my well-being. I went a little overboard in the ring. That was stupid, but she’ll get over it. Right? Fear crashed down on me when I reflected on how she’d looked at me minutes ago, as if I were someone she was giving up on. The thought of Drew hating me was frightening because she was all I had in this place…other than mom. Mom. My heart sank into my stomach, weighed down by guilt.

  Henry stepped into my path right then with the men he had just watched the fight with. “Here he is, my, uh…” His hand vised my shoulder. “Number one fighter.” Son. A three-letter word that he could’ve said in one breath was too much for him to speak aloud to people who probably knew nothing of our lives here. I meant so little to him. I knew this but still resisted accepting it. I was the stupidest self-aware person ever. “You won me quite a bit of money tonight, Jesse. You did great out there. Man, the things you could do if you considered fighting as a career. You have a future in it, you know.”

  “Thank you.” I was smiling before I could control myself, and only the shame I felt for caring about his compliment finally made me stop.

  “Congratulations. Your reputation precedes you,” the elder of the two men said. He had long black hair that hung almost to his shoulders and carefully groomed facial hair. He reminded me of a diplomat—a diplomat who enjoyed seeing teenage boys punching the shit out of each other. He spoke with a thick Spanish accent but his English was perfect. “Every fight I go to in the South, your name comes up. Jesse Chance. Jesse Chance. Who knew you were just a boy. How old are you?”

  “Seventeen.” He circled me after I responded, inspecting me like I was on a used car lot.

  “They’re looking to sponsor you,” Henry explained. “There are bigger fights on their side of the border. More organized. Lots more money. I told Mr. Acevedo that you would be perfect. Look how well you did tonight!”

  “Sponsor me?”

  “Yes.” Mr. Acevedo finally extended his hand, and his silent buddy did, too. As the younger man’s sleeve shifted I saw the edge of a tattoo on his wrist. I looked him over and spotted two more poking up from under his collar, on either side of his neck—one with the name Elena and the other was a Spanish word I didn’t know.

  “My name is Francisco Acevedo and this is my business partner, Ramón Vega. As Henry said, our fights in Mexico are much bigger. They are spectacular events. The fighters are treated like kings. Celebrities! There’s more money and women than you could ever dream of. We sponsor three fighters who live on one of my properties. I provide them with food, transportation, fight attire…nightly entertainment…everything you would need to keep you
r…head in the game, as they say.”

  “I can take you down there, once you graduate, of course,” Henry told me, squeezing my shoulder tighter as he smiled. “We can take some time to get to know each other on the way. That’s long overdue. Then I’d represent you as your manager—all the fighters have managers—for a small cut of your earnings, and look out for you. Ramón has opened his home up to us while you train and fight.”

  “How much are we talkin’?” I asked. “How much would I make as a fighter?”

  “Someone as good as you, the possibilities are endless,” Ramón replied with a tight smile. He had no accent at all. “I’ve seen great fighters become millionaires in six months’ time.” Shit. Replaying the words in my head brought on a flood of excitement and imagination. I could leave Glory for good. I could take Mom on a vacation. She and I would never have to worry about money again.

  “Millionaires?” Henry nearly choked on his spit.

  “Mexico, huh? I’ve never been,” I said, rubbing my chin in thought, trying to play it cool. “But I know of that fighter…uh…the crocodile guy…”

  “Carlos Garcia, the Cocodrilo,” Francisco said with a wide, proud smile. “He is one of ours…and he is very, very good. And very, very rich. Do you want to meet him? I can arrange a sit-down. In fact, what are your plans for tonight? I’m having a small get-together. Carlos is a few hours away but he will be there, too.”

  “Not a damn thing.”

  “Good. And what will you be drinking?”

  “Rum, right?” Henry said. Sometimes after fights we all drive to Lake Bishop to bonfire and drink, and he always shows up to join in the revelry, Captain Morgan in hand.

  “Tequila, actually…”

  Henry patted my back hard. “Even better.” This apple might not have known the tree well, but it still hadn’t fallen too far from it.

  “Jesse, your ten minutes are up. Let’s go!” Drew suddenly grabbed my arm and jerked me away from Francisco, Ramón and Henry, and I wondered how long she had been standing there, and if she’d heard everything Francisco had offered.

  Ramón’s stare went straight to Drew and stayed on her. It bothered me for some reason, even though I couldn’t tell what the hell he was thinking. He and Francisco didn’t look like the kind of people who were used to others interrupting them or speaking out of turn. Henry’s eyes narrowed with apprehension as he whispered what sounded like an apology to the men. Then he stepped in between us. “Miss Hallisay, this is a private meeting. Just for me and my son.”

  “Your son?” Drew and Ramón both said.

  “Ah…I made the connection with the last names but did not realize the relationship was so close,” Ramón added.

  “I think you mean extremely convenient,” Drew corrected with an exaggerated laugh. Ramón’s mouth curved up into a smile, and for just a blink I thought I saw what looked like approval.

  My father glowered in embarrassment and probably spite. “Okay, young lady, I understand that getting into my son’s bed is your way of rebelling against your parents, but—”

  “With all due respect, Mr. Chance, fuck you,” Drew spat. That got a chuckle out of Ramón. Okay, so my girl’s a bit of a badass. With no type of filter.

  “You little—”

  “Everybody, just calm down, okay?” I said, trying to mediate.

  “I suspect now is not a great time to talk, Jesse. If you’d like to contact me, your father knows how. Goodnight, everyone,” Francisco said, and Ramón looked to Drew one more time, with the same expression from before, as he shook Henry’s hand, but my father still followed the men to the exit.

  A WISH

  “Let me guess, they want you to punch someone?” Drew asked with frustration lacing her words, after I picked up my prize money. “Those guys have cartel written all over them.”

  “Just ‘cause they’re Mexican? They sponsor fighters. And what do you know about cartels?” I asked.

  “No one with neck tattoos is working a nine-to-five.” She rolled her eyes with her arms crossed over her chest. “What did they promise you?”

  “Francisco said there are better fights in Mexico.” There was no sense in lying to her; she’d already figured out why they were there. Outside, her car was still running, with her door wide open. Serious crime was nonexistent here.

  “Better fights? Are you fucking serious? And when would you do those? During Christmas break from college?” Drew said, her face twisted with scalding fury as she slid in behind the wheel. When she zoomed off, she forced a car with the right of way to swerve. “Were you really gonna go with them tonight? To some place to drink yourself into oblivion and have gross skanks trying to blow you?”

  “We were just gonna talk, babe.” She was annoying me but I kept my voice calm.

  “What about your mom? What would I say to her? How could I tell her you chose Henry over her?” The words hit like ice water to the face. “Mexico! Henry by your side, finally giving a crap—but not really—because there’s money involved…”

  “Drew…” I said with clenched teeth. My own anger was gaining momentum, like a tidal wave ready to sweep me up.

  “For fuck’s sake, your mom is dying of cancer!”

  “You don’t think I know that?” I couldn’t help screaming. I always felt like screaming when I had to talk about my mom, like all my tangled emotions were just sitting at the base of my throat. “I’m staying in our house alone! I hear her voice in my head all day, and I wonder if I’ll forget what she sounds like when she’s gone. I’m working out a schedule of how and when I’m gonna pack up her stuff, and who might want it…” I pressed my nails into my knees. “And maybe I don’t want to see her anymore because I don’t want her to see me, Drew! She has to die with me as a son. I don’t want her last memories to be this!”

  She looked over once without saying another word, but she held my hand the entire rest of the drive. After Mom stopped responding to treatment, she refused hospice care, so she had been staying at an old friend’s house in Kenzie, a town about an hour outside of Glory. Other people might have thought it was odd for a dying mother to be so far away from her son, but I think Mom wanted me to get used to not having her around. Growing up, she never called the work she made me do around the house “chores” because she said it came with a negative connotation. Instead, they were tasks for a functional life and adult survival. Maybe she always knew I would be without her earlier than she really wanted.

  Drew parked at the curb in front of Miss Madison Shaw’s house, and she answered as soon as we knocked. She was a registered nurse and she and Mom had gone to college together, so her home was really the best place for Mom to finish out her life. Mom didn’t get many regular visitors out here, except for Drew and me. She had extended family in California that she wasn’t close with, and she really didn’t have many friends in Glory. Everyone knew Henry slept around, but my mom was the only one who had gotten pregnant. She had worn a scarlet letter for seventeen years now, but somehow Henry Chance managed to walk around as just a weak man lured into temptation by a home-wrecker.

  Drew handed me a clean shirt from her car, and I went into Miss Madison’s downstairs bathroom. Now I felt sick about what I had done to Kerr tonight as I scrubbed my face, neck, and chest with soap. And I couldn’t believe how wrapped up in Henry’s shit I had almost gotten myself. In hindsight, I knew I was just a walking dollar sign to him, nothing more than a way to line his pockets. The man gambled on anything with a winner, no matter how small, just for the chance to get a little richer.

  “I’m sorry about what my dad said to you,” I told Drew when I joined her at the bottom of the staircase. She pulled me into a tight, comforting hug. “You deserve better than me.” I told her this all the time but tonight it came with the pain of a million thorns, because I always meant it, but for the first time I realized I was right.

  “You deserve better than you,” she said.

  “And earlier in the ring I was—”

 
“I know, Jess.” My life was an ugly mess, at times of my own making and at other times because of whom I was in Glory; yet, even at my most unlovable, Drew only loved me harder. “Can I go see Miss Carla now, please?”

  Mom had chosen Miss Madison’s biggest guestroom, so that she could have space to move around, back when the pain wasn’t so much.

  “Miss Carla, I’m so glad you’re awake!” Drew raced to my mom’s side and hopped onto the bed to hug her. Mom’s nightstand was covered in pain pills and anti-nausea medications, crackers, and a gallon of water—just the stuff she could keep down these days. Every time I came here I noticed how much she was wasting away, especially now that Drew was taking up more space on the bed than she was. Her skin was ashen, there were deep, dark circles under her eyes, and she was so thin that the shape of her bones was prominent through her skin. The sight of her pinched my stomach and it hurt to breathe; I couldn’t move past the doorway.

  I used to stand on her feet and she would dance all around the house with me. During the Glory holiday parade, she would sit me up on her shoulders to see, the only mom doing that. One time the whole school heard her yelling at Principal Stern in his office when I was in elementary school because he hadn’t done anything when another kid called me the son of a whore during recess. She had always been my hero, and I couldn’t think of anything more devastating than her death.

  “I stayed up for you. Did you bring my boy?” There was so much excitement in her voice; it finally cracked through my sadness.

  “Hey, Ma.”

  “Why are you all the way over there?” She waved for me to come closer and she couldn’t stop smiling. “How are you? Drew gave me the big news! You finally got around to filling out those college applications. I’m so proud of you. College was always what I wanted for you.” As Mom talked, Drew gave me a look that dared me to contradict her.

  “Yeah, I did,” I said as Drew moved so I could sit. “I’ll buy you a t-shirt of the school I end up at.”