Hard City

by Clark Howard

  Sometimes Linda made an unexpected comment about her home life. “My mom and dad have been fighting a lot lately,” she said one day. To Richie that did not sound too terrible; they had to be there to fight. “I think it’s over me, but I’m not sure,” she added.

  “Why would they fight over you?” Richie asked.

  “Dad says Mom’s jealous because she thinks he likes me more than he does her,” Linda explained.

  “Does he?”

  Blushing, she glanced away and replied, “I think so.”

  Other times, Linda seemed to forget her own life in lieu of curiosity about his. “What’s it like,” she asked, “living in a bowling alley?”

  “It’s not so bad,” Richie shrugged. “Not as bad as it was at first. I’m kind of used to it now. I’ve got three bowling-ball lockers, see? The lockers are big enough for a ball, a pair of bowling shoes, talcum powder, and whatever else a bowler wants to keep there. Okay, in one locker I keep my blanket and a small pillow. In another locker I keep my extra clothes; I fold everything real nice so it stays neat. An’ in the third locker I keep my other stuff—books to read, the school notebook I carry around during the day, extra stuff to eat at night—cheese, crackers, Vienna sausages, pork-and-beans, Twinkies. I keep wooden Dixie Cup spoons to eat with, my toothbrush and toothpaste, a box of Rinso to wash my underwear and socks with—”

  “How do you wash yourself?” Linda wanted to know.

  “I spread paper towels on the floor, fill one of the sinks with hot water, and use soap from the dispenser.”

  “You mean you just stand there naked? In the ladies’ room?”

  “It’s one o’clock in the morning,” Richie said. “There’s nobody there but me.”

  “Still and all, don’t you feel funny?”

  Richie shrugged. “Not any more.” He went into his John Garfield: “After Red, the manager, locks the place up, that bowling alley is mine, see? I do whatever I want.”

  “Yeah, well you just better hope you don’t ever get caught in there, Mr. Tough Guy.”

  “I don’t get caught.”

  “Sure, I know.” Suddenly she grinned. “Know what?” she asked, leaning over to kiss his cheek.

  “What?”

  “I think it’s cute that you fold your clothes so nicely.”

  Richie turned red. “Cut it out.”

  As the weather became increasingly warmer, they met in the park first without coats, later without sweaters, and the first time Richie saw Linda in just a cotton blouse that spring he noticed a slight swelling in front and found himself surprised to realize that her breasts were developing. Why he was surprised, he did not know; he was certainly aware of breasts in general and some even in particular. Noticing Linda’s made him think of Helen, the girl that his mother used to leave him with; the one who had slapped his face a lot; her breasts had been about the same size that Linda’s now seemed to be.

  “What are you looking at?” she asked once when she caught his eyes on her. Richie had blushed and turned away.

  “I wasn’t looking at nothing.”

  Linda took his arm and leaned her head on his shoulder. “It’s okay, silly. I guess we must be growing up faster than we know.” Squeezing his arm, she then commented, “You’re not as skinny as you used to be, I don’t think.”

  “Myron, my friend at the gym, wrote me out a diet,” Richie told her. “It’s got stuff on it to build me up. I try to go to Thompson’s Cafeteria once a day and pick out the stuff Myron wants me to eat. I been drinking malteds with an egg in them too. Costs a nickel extra.”

  “When you pay the check, you mean.”

  Smiling, Richie said, “I always pay the check now. Mainly ’cause I always eat at the same couple of places. In the fry joint across from Cascade, the counter guy don’t even make me pay ahead of time anymore. One day he just stopped asking. I guess he’s seen me in there so often he must trust me now.”

  When it was time for them to part on Sundays, they tried to find a place in the park where no one was close by so they could hold each other and kiss. Their kisses had progressed from those first quick touchings of pursed lips into longer, flatter, twisting meshes that sometimes they broke only when they needed more breath. Because she liked to kiss, Linda never resisted overtures to do so, which he now made instead of her. All she did, when they were embracing and she felt his hand moving up under her arm, was gently push it back to her waist. Neither of them ever spoke of his attempt or her restraint; it was simply something that he had to try and she had to check.

  Richie realized that Linda was right about one thing that spring: they were growing up faster than they realized.

  One Saturday night three months after Richie started going to the gym, at the Calumet Athletic Club on the South Side, Myron hung up the receiver of a pay phone in the locker room and looked thoughtfully at Richie, who was helping three of the four Midwest fighters put away their street clothes as they got into their trunks and ring shoes.

  “Richie, come here a sec,” Myron said after a moment. Richie hurried over. “All this time you been watching the guys train, doing what they been doing, listening to me like they did, right? So tell me, do you think you learned anything?”

  “Sure,” Richie said enthusiastically. “I guarantee you I did!” Inside, Richie knew exactly what was up. Myron’s next words confirmed it.

  “Dutro ain’t coming,” the trainer said. “He’s sick.” Sammy Dutro was the club’s one-hundred-two-pounder. Myron’s eyes flicked up and down Richie. “What do you weigh now?”

  “Hunnerd, hunnerd and one,” Richie said. His blood was racing.

  “You wanna go in as a sub for Dutro?” Myron finally asked.

  “Yeah! You bet!”

  “Ordinarily I wouldn’t consider doing this without having you spar with somebody so’s I could see how you handle yourself, but unfortunately we ain’t got time for that. I’ll just have to take your word that you’ve been learning these past weeks. I know you got the moxie for it. Main reason I’m doing it is that this kid you’d be fighting, this is only his second fight an’ he lost the first one, so it ain’t like I’m putting you in with no Golden Gloves champeen. So, are you game to try it?”

  “I’m game,” Richie emphasized. “Yeah, I’m game!”

  “Okay.” Myron bobbed his chin toward the gear bag. “Get out Dutro’s shoes and see how they fit.”

  The shoes were a little too big, but not enough to bother him; Richie had been wearing stolen galoshes two sizes too large for him all winter. He was still a year under the minimum club fighting age of fourteen, but now that he had gained some weight and built himself up he could easily pass muster. Myron gave him a new jockstrap and protector cup, and Richie put on Dutro’s blue boxing trunks, which were also slightly big in the waist and which Myron took in with a safety pin. They were barely ready when they heard from the door, “Okay, let’s go, opening bout, hunnerd-and-two pounds!”

  “I’m first?” Richie said, as much a realization as a question. He stared at Myron with wide eyes.

  “Somebody’s gotta be,” Myron said matter-of-factly. To one of the other boys he said, “Georgie, grab the water bucket for this fight. Let’s go.”

  “Bust him up, Richie,” one of the remaining Midwest fighters encouraged. “Tear into him, Richie,” the other said.

  Richie nodded, smiling weakly. Across the locker room he saw his opponent from the Calumet Athletic Club being sent out with a loud team cheer of some kind. Richie swallowed drily as Georgie Miller, one of the other club fighters who was carrying the water bucket, nudged him to follow Myron.

  The aisle leading to the ring was at least five miles long, and Richie was sure there were ten thousand unfriendly faces glaring at him as he walked it. Each of the three steps leading up to the ring apron was as high as a wall, and the ring itself, when he finally, miraculously, got into it, was a vast prairie of canvas with a seemingly endless expanse of space in which to run, but not a single place to hi
de. Richie felt the old sickness that always came when he walked into a new schoolyard.

  Sitting on the stool in the corner, a towel instead of a club jacket around his shoulders, Richie heard Myron ask, “What’s your last name anyways? I don’t even know.”

  “Huh? Oh, Clark,” Richie said, using his mother’s maiden name. No one was looking for him under the name of Clark.

  Myron walked out to give the information on his substitute fighter to the announcer who would introduce him. While the trainer was away from the corner, Georgie Miller, in language none of the boys was allowed to use around Myron, said, “Kick the shit outta this fucking punk, Richie.”

  “Sure, sure,” Richie said, trying for John Garfield but not even coming close.

  He was only vaguely aware of Myron returning to the corner and bending over him; off in the distance he heard occasional disconnected words: “. . . what you learned in the gym . . . proper stance . . . correct delivery of the jab . . . .”

  From the loudspeaker above the ring he heard, “. . . club fight debut . . . a hunnerd-and-two pounds . . . from the West Side . . . .”

  Then, with shocking suddenness, all the preliminaries, the parts Myron called the priming and the rites, were over, and with a resounding noise that sounded as if it were directly next to his ear, the bell rang. Staring out from the corner where he now stood, Richie was surprised to see that the vast canvas prairie had shrunk to the approximate size of a door mat and moving quickly across it toward him was the Calumet A.C. fighter.

  Richie’s instincts took over: he moved out of the corner and brought his arms up defensively, just as he always did in the schoolyard. Backing up in a tight circle, he allowed the Calumet fighter to hit him at will, keeping his head and face—ears, nose, lips—as well hidden behind his raised arms as he could. Most of the blows he took on the forearms, elbows, upper arms; there had been times, after his first day at a new school, when his arms looked like he was in the early stages of leprosy, and he could barely move them to get dressed, eat, or use a pencil. In the ring now, being hit with gloves instead of bare knuckles, Richie found that the punishment was less intense. For the full two minutes he protected himself like that without once retaliating.

  Back in the corner after the round, Myron said, “That’s an unusual defensive tactic, but it’ll never win you any points.”

  The referee came over and said to Richie, “Start t’rowing some punches or I’ll disqualify yez.”

  “He will, he will,” Myron assured. To Richie he said, “Remember the jab. Everything starts with the jab. Pop, pop, pop, right in your opponent’s face. Break his rhythm, get him off balance. Pop, pop, pop. I know you can do it.”

  The break between rounds could not, Richie thought, have lasted more than ten seconds, and then he was being pushed out of the corner again. Arms automatically going up, he went into his shell again. There was some scattered booing from the spectators. The Calumet fighter was pasting him again and the referee said, “I’m warning you, Midwest, I’m gonna disqualify yez.”

  Richie came out of his shell at that, went fluidly into a southpaw stance, and let go with a right jab. It snapped the Calumet fighter’s head back. Richie heard Myron yell, “Good! Good!” He went back into his shell. The Calumet fighter moved in and battered him some more. After another thirty seconds the referee said, “Come on, Midwest, fight!”

  Richie let loose the right jab again. It landed solidly, stopping the Calumet fighter in his tracks. While he stood there, Richie fired it again. I can hit this guy! he thought, exhilarated. I can fight back! When the Calumet fighter came forward again, Richie met him with the jab. Then he went into his shell and backed up, but this time it was not defense, it was strategy: when the Calumet fighter started after him, thinking he would pound on him as usual, Richie unfolded and shot the jab three times in rapid succession. The Calumet fighter stopped dead again; this time, instead of ducking back into his shell, Richie took one step to the right and peppered him in the face with the jab. By the time the Calumet fighter regained his composure and moved back out of range, Richie saw that his face, around the nose, had turned fiery red. As the Calumet fighter retreated, Richie, inspired, lunged in and hit him four more times. Confused by Richie’s unusual style, he flailed out with several wild punches but all of them missed. Richie had begun to stick the jab in his face again when the bell rang.

  “Congratulations, you just won your first round,” Myron told him in the corner, “and you done it with only one hand. Next round I want you to start using the other hand too. Left-handed fighters have their best power in the left hand—”

  “I ain’t left-handed,” Richie said, heaving breaths, “I’m right-handed.”

  “Whaaat?” Myron looked incredulously at him. “Then how come you box out of a left-handed stance?”

  “That’s how I learned in the gym, watching the other guys in the mirror.”

  “The mirror. . . ?” Myron’s mouth hung open as he shook his head. “Well, I’ll be a dirty name,” he said, mainly to himself. Then to Richie, “Are you comfortable fighting that way?”

  “I guess,” Richie said, his bare shoulders raising and lowering with his answer. “I can hit the guy fighting that way,” he added.

  “You can do that, all right,” Myron agreed. “Okay then, fight like that.”

  In the third round, Richie stayed out of his defensive shell more than he stayed in it. When he was in the shell, he continued to take most of the Calumet fighter’s punches on his arms and shoulders; when he was out, he pop-pop-popped his right jab into his confused opponent’s face with relentless regularity, precision and accuracy. Only now and again was the Calumet fighter able to hit Richie in the face or stomach, and then not with any punishing power. Richie was amazed at how much easier it was to take a punch with boxing gloves than without. And also amazed at what a constant jab could do to an opponent. By the final bell, the Calumet fighter’s nose was bleeding steadily.

  Winning the third round by a comfortable margin, Richie was also given round two and declared a decision winner.

  “I won!” he said over and over as they all walked back to the locker room. “I won, Myron!”

  “You did indeed,” the trainer said, with a rare, if weak, smile.

  “I won, Georgie!”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know.”

  “I won! I can’t believe it—I actually won a fight!” Richie kept up the announcement all the way up the aisle as Myron shook his head resignedly and Georgie tried not to be embarrassed. Once in the locker room, Richie continued to marvel aloud at his success, even after Myron had returned to the ring with Nick Bolly, Midwest A.C.’s 120-pounder. The others in the locker room ignored him; they had all been through first wins and knew Richie would get over it easily enough. What was hard to handle was the first loss.

  To Richie, however, who had lost so many times in so many ways, no such fate awaited him. He was a winner now.

  Later, on the streetcar going back to the West Side, Myron handed out their “prizes”: seven dollars and fifty cents for winners of the three-rounders, ten dollars for the boy who won the four-round co-main event, three bucks for the one boy who lost a three-rounder. The prizes were not official; on record, the boys were amateurs and did not get paid.

  When they got back to the Midwest, the three regular fighters went their separate ways home and Richie, as usual, helped Myron carry their equipment bags up to the deserted gym. Then Myron, as usual, took Richie down the block to a café and bought him a cheeseburger and a malted, with an egg in it, while he himself had a bowl of soup and a glass of milk.

  “Tell you what,” the trainer said as they ate, “I’m gonna talk to the president of the club on Monday and ask him to let me put you on the regular roster—”

  “Jeez! You mean it?” Richie was ecstatic.

  “It’ll mean showing two fighters at the same weight—you and Dutro are bot’ hunnerd and two—but there won’t be no problem getting matches ’cause nearly al
l the meets involve three clubs. I think I can get ’em to go for the extra dough, ’specially after I tell how you won tonight. You wanna ’nother cheeseburger?”

  Richie shook his head. “I’m full, thanks anyhow, Myron. If they approve me, will I get a jacket and everything?”

  “You bet. First-class all the way. I’ll have to get some forms signed by your folks.”

  “Can I take them home to be signed?”

  Myron glanced curiously at him. “I suppose,” he said after a moment. “Say, what kinda work does your dad do, anyway?”

  “Delivers beer.”

  “Oh. Route man, huh. Your mother work?”

  “Yeah, she works in a drugstore.”

  “I notice you been gaining weight. Your mother using the diet I made out for you?”

  “Yeah.”

  Myron looked at him as if contemplating further questions, but finally gave up on it. The kid apparently had an answer for everything, but was not about to volunteer any information.

  When they finished eating and left the café, the somber trainer and the boy said goodnight. Myron started walking toward the streetcar line on Pulaski Road. Richie went in the opposite direction; half a block down, he ducked into a doorway and waited until Myron was out of sight, then cut back toward Cascade.

  Feeling good, feeling confident, feeling for a change like something besides a running, hiding, scurrying little rodent of some kind, Richie walked with a new bounce to his step, a new balance in his legs, a new swing to his arms. He had won tonight! He had faced another kid and for the first time in his life had not been humiliated, pushed around, or beaten up. And now Myron was going to try to get him on the club team, to be a real fighter just like the other guys: train with them, have a jacket, a locker in the gym, everything. First-class, Myron had said. Richie could not help grinning. He was going to be like John Garfield!

  As he approached Cascade, Richie saw Pete sitting on the curb, his gaunt frame folded like a puppet. Richie’s face darkened. Pete better not mess with me tonight, he thought, squaring his shoulders. I don’t care if he is a grown man; I’ll let him have one right in the mouth, then run like hell. He won’t expect it, he’ll be off guard; maybe I can get in a right and a left. . .