On November 4th, Hot
and Bumps were set to fight again in Bumps' gym. Hot wasn't stupid about it--he
planned to have some friends along to back him up, and he said so in a post on
this site. Both Bumps and Hot asked me to watch, write it up and post it here,
but I refused both invitations. I did tell them they could tell me how it went
down, and I'd post that for them. They agreed. Neither knew the other had the
same arrangement with me. So November 4th comes, and I wait for a call. I wait
until 2 am. I fall asleep waiting.
When I go out to my car the next morning, there's a note under the windshield
wiper. It says, "Mercy General" and gives a room number. Since this is Bumps'
way of communicating with me, I figure he beat Hot again, probably pretty bad if
the hospital's involved. I go to visiting hours. I have trouble convincing the
nurses that I'm family. Then Spider shows up, Bumps' friend with the pale skin
and the long arms and the spider web tatt on his left shoulder and pec. He
smoothes things over, then takes me to the room.
Bumps is in the bed. Unconscious. Hooked up to machines.
Part of me is relieved. Hey, I've been playing revenge scenarios in my head ever
since Bumps beat me into a short coma a couple years ago. But I don't have the
skills to do this much damage. His ribs are wrapped tight, but I can see
bruising around the edges of the wraps. His jaw looks broken--lots of swelling
there, plus a hint of it being wired shut. His nose is smashed up--there's one
of those metal splint things covering it. His head's immobilized like they do
for fighters who don't come to in the ring. As I'm taking all of this in, I
realize something's wrong. Then I see what's missing.
"The bumps. What happened to the scar over the right eyebrow?"
Spider nods towards the rolling table they'll use for meals when Bumps comes out
of it. There's a rubber scar in a baggie. Since that's fake, I wonder just how
far this guy went to transform himself into a character I created for my
stories. I pull the hospital gown open to check for the boxing glove tattoo on
his left pec. That's gone, too. Without thinking, I start to reach for his eyes,
to check if those bright, mesmerizing blue eyes of his were just contact lenses.
"No," Spider says. "The eyes are real."
So I ask Spider if he knows what went down, how the fight went.
He shrugs. "Wasn't there." He settles into a chair next to the bed. I don't ask
anything more of him. He's never been much of a talker anyway, but he never lied
to me that I know of. If he doesn't know, then that's what he says.
There's no reason for me to stay. Before I'm out of the door, though, I hear
Spider's voice one more time.
"I'll be in touch," he says.
I nod and leave. I go home. No messages on my voice mail, e-mail, nothing. I
wait for Hot to make contact and tell me how the hell he did it.
I wait a week. November 12th. Hot calls me.
"I didn't want to say anything until I knew he came out of it," Hot tells me. "I
got a buddy on staff at Mercy General. Bumps came to today. Cops were there
asking him what happened, but he didn't tell them a thing."
Of course not. That could get complicated. I don't say this to Hot, though.
"Anyway, I'll just tell you, and you write it up if you want." Hot pauses a
little too long, just long enough that I'm ready to ask him to go on. Then he
starts.
"I don't know how you remember fights, Doc. Not when you're in them. If you
think too much you get clocked. So you go on instinct, by training. Yeah, I
learned a little boxing since I fought Bumps the first time. I got a buddy in
the amateurs, and he showed me a thing or two. Basic stuff, but stuff I didn't
know before. I got a jab now. That helps. Bumps wasn't expecting anything new
out of me, not after he jumped me last month, so surprise was on my side this
time. Anyway, I show up at the gym with six friends, big guys like me, including
the guy who fights amateur. He says he'll ref, but I can see the tape again, so
no ref can really help much 'cause we're just gonna launch the bombs until
somebody goes down and out. So we start off circling each other. I'm waiting to
test my jab, he's waiting to counter when I do something stupid. We go a long
time like that, long enough for my friends to stop calling out encouragement to
me. It gets quiet. Then he moves in a step, I pop out my jab. He counters with
his right. That's the last thing I remember clearly until it's almost over. I'm
on instinct."
Hot goes quiet. I wait. Again, I'm about to ask a question when resumes his
tale.
"We trade pretty even, I guess. But then my left--a straight left--shoots out
like I'm not connected to it. My fist to his nose. I feel it land perfect, see
the blow force his head down and in. He's bleeding and woozy. And I just lost
it. I see the punches, hook after hook to the jaw, boom boom boom. His
mouthpiece goes flying. Finally, he gets his gloves up to protect his face, so I
go to the body hard as I can. I get lost in it, Doc. I target his left side
until I can see the bruises going dark. One of my friends said he heard the ribs
breaking, but I didn't. I just waited until Bumps leaned to his left. Then I go
for the right side just as hard. The thumping, the grunts, that light smacking
sound when the gloves land--you know how hypnotic it can be, Doc. The last body
shot hits the liver, and Bumps collapses, flat on his face. He rolls over on his
back and grabs his sides."
Again the silence. I wait.
"You know what he did to me that first time. You were there. You wrote it up."
"Yeah," I say. "I remember."
"So I figure I'll do the same. I didn't really think about it, I just did it. I
jumped on top of him, sat on him so he couldn't move his arms, and started
punching his face. Over and over, and I could tell when he was out cold, but I
just kept going until my friends pulled me off him. They got him to Mercy
General, not me. I haven't been in to check on him or anything. My buddy kept me
posted. Then the cops came and went. I got a buddy who works down at the police
station, he's an intern there for his Criminal Justice major."
Hot has a lot of buddies.
"Anyway, he says they don't have anything on me. Just if Bumps points me out. So
that's it. Write it up and post it if you want. Nobody's gonna believe it's true
anyway. I always thought your stuff was fiction. The guys who read it will
probably think this is just a story. But it's like I gotta tell somebody, like
confess it or something. It's enough that I tell you. I don't care what they
think."
We end the call. I write it up. But it doesn't seem right to me. Bumps trained
everyday for years before I ever met him, so how does an inexperienced kid like
Hot get skilled enough to beat him that fast? Hot's not claiming a lucky
punch--he's claiming a perfect punch. If he has that in his arsenal, why didn't
he use it last month when Bumps jumped him? Then there's all the conveniently
well-connected friends. Besides, when it comes to Bumps, nothing has ever been
exactly what it seemed to be.
So I show Hot's story to Bumps. Only what Hot told me--not my own doubts and
definitely not what I'd seen..or hadn't seen...when I'd been in the hospital
room before.
Turns out he already knew what I'd seen. The rubber scar was still in the
baggie, and the boxing glove tatt hadn't been reapplied. Actually, I kinda
missed them. I guess I prefer fantasy after all. Anyway, I don't ask about any
of that. Bumps would tell me if he wanted to. Those intense blue eyes of his
burn brighter and brighter with fury as he reads Hot's version.
"He's a fuckin liar," Bumps finally says in that husky whisper of a voice.
"So what did happen?"
"You gonna post what I tell you?" Those eyes turn on me now, and my legs weaken.
God, how I wish I had a spine when I'm around this guy.
I nod.
He tosses Hot's story back to me. "Like he says, he brought his friends with
him. Don't remember six, but that don't matter. I didn't care. I didn't have
nobody here. Fly had a fight in Virginia on the 8th, so I sent him and Spider up
to train. Spider was s'posed to be here and back me up, but he called and told
me they shut down 95 for some shit and he can't get to an exit. He's the one
found me after and got me to Mercy. Not Hot. Not Hot's friends either."
Spider isn't in the room now, but there's no point in checking Bumps' story
against Spider's response. I can't read Spider's face, and he'd give me the same
story he gave Bumps. I could check the papers to see if they covered whatever
shut traffic down, but that'll come later.
Bumps goes on. "I ain't gonna back out and have that punkass tell people about
it. I stay. I put the tape down, and I stay. He gets his friend in the ring with
us, says the guy's gonna ref. Fuck that shit. I shoulda known right then. We
start the fight, but there's no circlin to it. I attack, he attacks. No
surprises, no dirty punches from me, I swear. But this ref guy stays on my
right, just inside my line of sight. I get distracted, ok? And Hot takes
advantage. He puts his forearm against my chest and pushes like we're playin
football or some shit. Pushes me into a corner. Then the other guys grab my
arms, my legs. Some guy's got his arms around my hips, crosses 'em right over my
balls. It's a trap from the get-go."
"And Hot stands there, smilin at me. So I'm all 'get on with it, mother fucker'
and he yaps about I shouldn't of done this shit and that shit. Then he throws a
straight right. I move my head one side, and the punch slides past me. He hits
one of his friends instead, drops him--I hear him hit the floor behind me.
Doesn't help, 'cause somebody else grabs my arm before I can get a shot off. So
Hot works my body."
Bumps slides his hand along his sides. He's still wrapped tight, but his face
isn't swollen as much. The immobilizing stuff is gone, and any signs of his jaw
being wired shut are gone, too. But he's still in pain. His talking comes in
spurts because he has to stop to get his breath from time to time. Breathing
deep provokes the pain. He's got a long road back to one hundred percent.
"Fucker kept going at me, hard as he could. Probably trained some, 'cause he
knows how to punch now. Didn't wing arm punches. Good leverage behind 'em. I
felt the ribs go, and I swore at him, called him every name I know twice. He
just kept going, even after he knew I was havin trouble breathing. The asshole
wanted to kill me, I swear to God. So, yeah, he hits my liver, and I slump down
like anybody would. But his friends don't let go. He props my head up with his
left and bangs away at my nose with his right, three, four times. I'm not out,
though, not by a long shot. He starts with the hooks. I remember four of those.
Then I'm out cold. Next thing I know I'm here, Fly's fight is history, and I'm
busted up worse than I've ever been. Fly comes in to tell me about his fight, he
gets all emotional like a girl, bawls his eyes out."
"How did his fight go?" I ask.
This brightens Bumps' face. "Took the guy in one. This wasn't no set-up fight
neither. I don't get my boys nothin but solid fights. Fly says he almost took
the guy's head off. You ask him about that. He likes the story, maybe he'll let
you tell it. That's his call." Bumps is smiling, calmer now, but he looks tired
now. No surprise there, all things considered.
I decide to take a risk. "So did Hot fuck you?"
Immediately, the fire comes back to Bumps' eyes. "Why the fuck you wanna ask
that, Doc?"
"Seems logical to me. Hot wanted revenge. I just assumed he'd do to you what you
did to me. I don't know if you did it to him, you never said. Like I told you, I
just assumed."
"He fucked me up, but he didn't fuck me. He got scared and ran, and so did his
friends." Bumps holds me with a stare for a few moments--which feels eternal.
"This the kinda balls you got now, Doc? Askin me this when I can't get outta bed
to kick your ass?" The psych is one hundred percent. I feel chills.
"No. Sorry."
"You know better, Doc. Give me time, and I'll make you my punchin bag again if I
want."
I decide not to ask about the fake scar, the absent tatt, the whole game he's
been playing for years now. Instead, I move closer. I place a fingertip on the
end of his nose. He winces a bit with the contact. I trace a line from his nose
to his lips, down his chest, along the center line of his abs, all the way down
to his cock.
And there's less there than I expected. I don't ask about that. I hold his balls
gently. I move in tight. I dart my tongue out to lick his lips, then I kiss him
lightly on the mouth. "I'll worry about you later, Bumps. For now, I'll be your
friend."
I fake with my shoulder like I'm going to squeeze his balls--hey, he did it to
me the first time we fought. He gasps in a breath and winces at the pain in his
ribs. I pull my hand back. I lick his neck the way he's done to me. Then I take
Hot's story with me when I leave.
So I'm posting this. All of it, both versions. I'm not sure I believe either of
them, but the result's the same: Bumps in the hospital (still is as of the day
I'm posting this--I checked, so that part is real) and Hot nervous as hell,
ready for the cops to bring him in for questioning. And I'm still in the middle
of it.
You know it's not over yet, right?