Battling Boxing Stories. C. J. Henderson
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BORGO PRESS BOOKS BY GARY LOVISI
Battle Boxing Stories: Thrilling Tales of Pugilistic Puissance (Editor)
Driving Hell’s Highway: A Crime Novel
Gargoyle Nights: A Collection of Horror
Mars Needs Books!: A Science Fiction Novel
Murder of a Bookman: A Bentley Hollow Collectibles Mystery Novel
Violence Is the Only Solution: 3 Vic Powers Crime Tales
COPYRIGHT INFORMATOIN
Editing Copyright © 2012 by Gary Lovisi
Individual stories Copyright © 2012 by Wayne D. Dundee, Stan Trybulski, Ron Fortier, Robert S. P. Lee, G. D. McFetridge, Arlette Lees, Terence Butler, Marc Spitzer, C. J. Henderson, Gary Lovisi, Garnett Elliott, Penelope Stanhope, Michael A. Black, Lonni Lees, and William Boyle (see the Acknowledgments Page on p. 253)
Published by Wildside Press LLC
www.wildsidebooks.com
DEDICATION
To all the authors whose fine stories have made this book possible
INTRODUCTION
BATTLING BOXERS
Do you know the name of the heavyweight champion? There was a time not so long ago when every one of us knew his name. The great boxing champions were in all the newspapers and on TV, their names indelibly burned into our collective memory as true giants, powerful men who were larger than life itself—John L. Sullivan, Jack Johnson, Jim Tully, Jack Dempsey, Joe Louis, Rocky Graziano, Muhammad Ali, Joe Frazier, George Foreman, even Iron Mike Tyson. These men—and many others I have not named here—are the ones we remember today; men who lived and fought in a tough and often dirty, corrupt sport. Many of them we admired—some more than others. We wanted them to triumph, and while some failed, each one gave it their all to thrill us in the boxing ring and we were there cheering them on.
Today, I doubt many of us can name the champions of any weight division. There seems to be little meaning or magic today in modern boxing, at least to the general public. These days traditional boxing has been somewhat eclipsed by other more violent aspects of sport, such as mixed martial arts (MMA), kick boxing, and cage matches. It is sad. The idea of boxing has been truly noble. It offered many young men who came from nowhere the opportunity to be someone, you didn’t need a degree or an uncle in the business. You just had to be able to keep standing, while your opponent fell. There are many boxing stories and legends, and they are as individual as is each man who put on gloves and stepped into the ring.
In the old days—in those far away traditional times—the game seemed to possess elements that were virtually magical, and that is what the stories in this book are all about and what they seek to capture. Boxing is a magical sport. The stories can be as heroic and as full of triumph and tragedy as anything Homer ever wrote. The sport pits two men mano a mano. One man against another man—but also today with women boxers—it pits one person against another with nothing to interfere with their battle royale. Nothing except that which is deep within themselves, their inner secrets and fears, or the plans of those around them—to stop them.
Boxing can be art, heroic majesty, and dark magic all wrapped up in a bloody maelstrom of passion and sheer violence. It has been captured well in classic films like Somebody Up There Likes Me, Requiem for a Heavyweight, Raging Bull, even Rocky, and so many other fine boxing flicks. However, most of that is mere fantasy, they are not like the real game. Books fare better, especially non-fiction books. However, the actual boxing game is far tougher and meaner than any film, darker and grimmer than anything written in books. Short stories, however, can tell these tales extremely well because they capture that short-burst intensity and hyper-emotion and turmoil very effectively—few feature-length films or long novels can ever sustain that. I believe the short stories in this book do that extremely well, each one offering its own sharp, powerful vision of a particular aspect of the game—and an individual boxer in a specific time or place.
As good as a film can be, no mere film can ever capture the real action and excitement of some of the classic boxing bouts that make up the exciting history of this sport. The old newsreels and videos of classic bouts are the best, staggering in their raw intensity and passion—but too often grainy, shot poorly, or sometimes missing key action. However, fiction in a short story can also hit the mark, putting the reader right there in the ring with the champ—or the chump—making him or her feel the impact of every blow; the pain, the hurt, and the crying bitter rage of anger or betrayal. It’s all there and more in the stories in this book by a host of fine writers who tell their particular tale with passion, violence, action, anger—and the most important ingredient of all—sheer brutal truth. However the stories in this book also show the other side of that coin. They give us noble men and women winning against the odds, men who fight the good fight in the ring and in their life, people who celebrate a passion for the sport and a passion for life and...even love. These are heroes who rise up against tragedy to do what is right, to protect those they love, to care for someone other than themselves, or to fight the toughest fight there can ever be—battling their own inner demons. Sometimes they win, sometimes they lose, but they always give it their all. That too, is all part of the game.
I am proud that the traditional boxing stories in this book chronicle all manner of battles, both inside the ring and out. Some of them offer unabashed pulp action with real heart, others raw reality and truth. There is certainly magic in each one of these tales and maybe even just a touch of fantasy, but no outright magic or fantasy. Here you will find no bouts with human boxers duking it out with aliens; no men fighting wizards, monsters, zombies, vampires, or even superhuman robots—none of that nonsense. So have no fear on that score here. Perhaps that might be fodder for some other book—but not this one!
The fifteen stories in this book also do not offer a how-to manual on the boxing arts, they’re not instructional tales devoted to process. These are stories created solely to entertain you, to grab the reader, to offer some measure of that magic and truth found in the boxing ring. They do that quite well. These stories are as real as their authors could make them, they’re stories with heart and soul, depicting pain and triumph by fascinating and unforgettable characters entangled in the eternal warfare of the boxing arena. These are stories with impact, and they’ll hit you like a cold smack to the face. They may shock you with their intense violence, sheer brutality, and bitter rage; but they will also lighten your soul with their heartfelt emotion, humor, and even outright depictions of love; where sometimes sweet, sometimes rough, and sometimes decent characters struggle to triumph, battling for their very dignity and humanity—their own special story of boxing magic!
Gary Lovisi
Brooklyn, New York
January 5, 2012
QUICK HANDS
by Wayne D. Dundee
Usually they just put some brute up against him—the strongest, toughest miner from whatever camp they happened to be visiting. Powerful men with massive shoulders and thick arms, men who could load more ore and out-arm wrestle any other man in the camp. Experienced brawlers at best...but possessed of little or nothing in the way of punching basics or actual boxing skills.
This kid tonight, however, was something of an exception. He was smaller, though not by much, and considerably faster. He’d already proven he could move and dodge, rather than wade in right away like so many of them did and try to finish everything with a thrashing windmill of uppercuts and roundhouses. McMahon actually appreciated this. Those other types too often punched themselves out before the end of the first round. And then it was up to McMahon, in order to make sure the crowd got its money’s worth, to carry his opponent (sometimes almost literally since the dumb clods were practically too exhausted to stand) until it reached a point where it was okay to put them down.
As they went into the second round now, McMahon could see his opponent still had quite a bit left. He was showing some wear, sure, breathing hard and sweating—just as McMahon himself was—but the lad was far from being played out. In the corner, between rounds, Professor