I hopped up and down in my corner and stared directly ahead at the defending amateur middleweight champion Steel Toe Tommy. Tommy worked on the East Boston union construction site as a mason. Rumor had it Tommy’s steel toe boots were so rusted through that you could see his real toes through the holes in his socks. Rumor also had it he never wore a dust mask even when he used the bull saw to cut through brick creating clouds of red dust. I never understood why people don’t care more about their health. I still missed cigarettes and heroin but not enough to go back to poisoning my body. I snarled at Steel Toe Tommy and licked my lips as if thirsty for blood.
Steel Toe Tommy dropped to the canvas and did twenty pushups with perfect form. The muscles on his biceps popped and then there was a muscle by his temple that popped out, too. My muscles always popped like that back in my heroine days—I was a vein connoisseur back when I used to shoot junk. Man, I was missing heroine—I always missed it before the fight. Fighting was a certain kind of high but it always reminded me of the old ways of getting high. I dropped to the canvas and breezed through thirty pushups to mock Steel Toe Tommy.
The referee gripped our wrists and brought us to the center of the ring where Steel Toe Tommy was jumping up and down as if trying to touch his chin to one of the steel beams across the ceiling. My memory was shit at this point but it could have been me who installed that beam. I hated being a steelworker. I wanted a cush life as a mason like Tommy.
At center ring Tommy smelled like alcohol and weed and I noticed his eyes were bloodshot and practically squinting shut. I used to shoot junk with my girlfriends after bouts, but I never got high even in training camp. I used the heroine as something to work towards—not something to celebrate with during the process. I guess you could call me “goal oriented.” I was jealous of Tommy’s alcohol breath and weed aroma. I was jealous that he probably felt better than I felt. I feinted a jab to his face and winked and dapped up his hanging gloves.
The time keeper tugged on a rope and clanged the loud bell and I rushed forward to the ring like I was late for work. Steel Toe was wobbly from the weed and liquor but his head kept moving and I couldn’t quite line him up for a clean shot. I always fought fighters with good head movement. That’s why I never hit the heavy bag too much—always the double end bag. It wasn’t good for me to always practice hitting a stationary target. I was agitated by his wobbly head movements. I felt like I knew how Steel Toe Tommy fought. But I didn’t know how he fought drunk and high. I was angry at this disadvantage. I swung a wild right hand and he caught me between the eyes with a stiff jab and I backpedaled until I felt the stretchy ropes across my back.
He swung a wild left and I ducked but on the way back up he caught me with another stiff jab and then followed with a body shot to my spleen. My spleen had bruises and all sorts of scar tissue my doctor told me. The whole thing was barely functional. I never knew what a spleen did—or a kidney or a liver. I just liked the idea of punching someone in an organ. I liked the idea of knowing where a man’s organs were and targeting them. It felt barbaric to me. I covered up my organs with my elbows and then snuck in a dirty head butt when he grabbed me and I opened a small cut above his eye.
He waved his arms at the ref so I threw a one two combo and my jab grazed his temple but my right cross landed right on his mouth. His mouthpiece flew and looked wet and dirty on the canvas and his teeth were stained red from the blood dripping from his eye. I always fought dirty if I felt a disadvantage. I liked the other guy to know off the bat that I would go to extremes that he wouldn’t. It was part of my psychological advantage. I wasn’t proud of this but I wasn’t exactly ashamed either. He growled and bared his red teeth but I connected with a stiff double jab.
Tommy rushed towards me and this time in the clinch he kneed me right in the stones and I fell to the canvas and curled into the fetal position howling. The ref looked calm when he deducted a point. Refs were always happy to even the score after they missed a dirty head butt. Refs weren’t all that bad—it wasn’t easy standing between two barbarians. I thought about being a ref but I saw rules as a challenge of how far you could bend them until they break rather than something to enforce. I stood up and rushed in for a clench and kneed Tommy right back in the nuts.
Steel Toe didn’t drop and the ref didn’t yell to stop the fight. I looked down and saw a hole in his boxing shoe and those deformed yellow toe nails on his nasty mason’s feet. I always tried to beat a guy based on his nickname. If his name was Iron Jaw I’d try to knock him out with a shot to the chin. If his name was speedy I’d chase him around the ring. If his name was—you get the picture.I felt like I was having an epiphany when I saw those nasty curled toes and I almost felt bad for him that he couldn’t afford better shoes. I brought my heel high and slammed it down with a crunch on his toes and he crumpled to the canvas. He didn’t even bother getting up for the ten count and the next day I drove to Steel Toe Tommy’s construction site and asked the foreman if he needed a new mason.