CHAPTER ELEVEN | RORY
“What the hell happened out there, McAlister?!” the promoter screamed. “I had five G’s on this fight, and you stood there taking punches like a fucking blow-up doll!”
I tried to pull my head up, but my brain was doing somersaults inside my skull. The entire room was spinning. My stomach heaved and I spit a mouthful of blood and bile into the bucket between my knees.
“Jesus,” the promoter grunted in disgust. “Look at yourself, McAlister. You can’t go back out there like this.”
“I’m fine,” I said. The words sounded slurred; my lips and tongue were swollen, and I was hanging onto consciousness by a thread.
I was far from “fine,” but I knew that I needed to get back into the ring. I didn’t have a choice… I needed to finish this fight.
“You’re fucking insane!” the promoter cackled, gnawing on the toothpick that was wedged beneath his gold-plated canine. “He knocked you out. Game over…”
“It’s not over yet,” I snarled, spitting another mouthful of blood into the bucket.
I forced myself to sit up on the stool, then I dumped a water bottle over my head to wash away the sweat and blood that stained my skin. I felt a stinging sensation ignite everywhere that my opponent’s fist had left its mark, but I ignored the pain… just like I ignored the second wave of nausea that was battling its way up my esophagus.
The skin on my knuckles was cracked and raw. The fissures had been sealed shut with super glue, but fresh blood seeped out as I re-wrapped my hands in gauze.
“You’re a crazy motherfucker, you know that?” the promoter said, shaking his head. Then he grinned and rubbed his palms together greedily, “Alright, fine. Let’s get you back in that ring, eh? Let’s see if you can win back those five G’s…”
That’s what this was all about, the money.
I couldn’t pry my eyes open without seeing double. My lungs were throbbing, the blood in my veins was ice-cold, and my skin was bruised and stretched tight over my swollen muscles.
After that last fight, I was fucked up… maybe even concussed. Getting back into the ring now was like feeding myself into a meat grinder… but I needed that fucking money.
I had just gotten accepted into the Massachusetts Firefighting Academy. Training to become a Boston firefighter wasn’t some sort of life goal or dream come true for me... it was an escape route. It was a steady paycheck with benefits and health insurance… all things I needed, now that I had a baby on the way.
I was going to be a dad, and that meant it was time to clean up my act. No more underground cage fights; no more going home with a broken nose and a bloody wad of cash.
The Firefighting Academy was my ticket out of this life, but that ticket wasn’t free… tuition was going to set me back a couple grand, and that was before equipment and test fees.
I needed cash, and going back into the ring was the only way I knew how to get it.
One last fight, I told myself. That’s all I need… just one last fight.
I forced myself up onto my feet and blinked through the cloud of blood that stained my eyes. I balled my hands into fists and ignored the pain as I cracked my knuckles.
My opponent was waiting for me in the ring, drenched in sweat and undefeated. The crowd was jeering and rock music was blaring through the speakers.
I stumbled forward and felt my stomach twist. I wanted to give up… but then I thought about my daughter. She was just a peanut-shaped blob floating in the middle of a black and white sonogram, but already she deserved so much more than I could give her.
I was doing this for her.
One last fight… I told myself. And then I’ll never have to fight again…
I ducked my head under the ropes as I entered the ring, then I raised my fists in front of my chest and slowly strode towards my opponent...
***
“UGH!” I grunted as I slammed the full force of my right fist into the leather punching bag. A dull, burning pain shot through my knuckles, but I ignored it as I twisted my shoulders and drove my left fist into the bag.
Over and over, I pummeled the bag with my fists.
Right, left, right, left…
I was in the Firehouse 56 weight room, waging a one-sided war on the 300-pound punching bag that was chained to the ceiling.
The chain rattled with from the impact and my knuckles screamed as they cracked against leather, each punch harder than the last. I was hoping that if I hit the bag hard enough, I could drown out the sound of Desiree Leduc’s words echoing in my head.
‘Ancient history…’
‘We’re practically strangers…’
The words got louder, and I punched harder; right, left, right, left...
I was so focused on the bag that I didn’t hear the weight room door creak open, or the sound of footsteps trampling into the room.
“UGH!” I grunted loudly, driving all of my weight into the bag.
Right, left, right, left--
“Holy shit!” a voice suddenly whistled out of nowhere.
That’s when I froze.
My boiling hot blood went cold and my muscles immediately stiffened. My knuckles grazed the bag on their way down, and I spun around to see a handful of crewmembers gaping at me from the opposite side of the weight room in stunned silence.
Troy Hart was the first to speak up,
“Who the hell pissed you off, McAlister?” he quipped as he strode into the room, then edged around me to the get to the weight rack.
“No kidding,” another crewmember whistled through his teeth. “The way you’re throwing your fists around, you’d think you just caught the punching bag in bed with your mother.”
We hadn’t been formally introduced yet, but I recognized him as the month of August. Between his cheesy spread in the calendar and his lame attempt at a ‘yo mama’ joke, I had a hunch we weren’t going to hit it off.
“Seriously though… you feeling ok, McAlister?” Duke Williams asked. “You sure you don’t need a Snickers bar or something?”
“I’m fine,” I muttered under my breath.
“You’re tense,” Troy countered, eyeing me from the weight rack. “Those deltoids don’t lie, brother.”
“And look at those veins bulging out of your neck!” Duke corroborated. “You could pluck those things like banjo strings!”
“Shit,” Troy cackled. “Hey Walker, do you think you could play us the theme song from ‘Deliverance’ on McAlister’s neck?”
“Fuck off, Troy,” Walker Wright rolled his eyes. “I’m from Texas, not Bumfuck, West Virginia.”
“Same thing,” Troy shrugged.
I realized how tightly I was clenching my upper body -- from my jaw, to my neck, to my shoulders -- but I couldn’t force myself to relax. The taunting words of my new coworkers definitely didn’t help...
“Come on, McAlister,” Troy grinned encouragingly. “It’s obvious that there’s something you’re just dying to get off your chest. Spit it out.”
“Yeah,” a voice echoed from across the room. “You can talk to us…”
“Hey,” Troy’s head cocked to the side and his eyes narrowed. “This wouldn’t happen to have anything to do with that damsel in distress you saved the other day, would it?”
My pulse thumped through my veins and a bead of ice-cold sweat rolled off my brow.
“Wait… huh?” Mr. August asked, flicking his eyes between Troy and I in confusion. “What did I miss?”
“McAlister rescued this chick the other day, at the Hartford High cafeteria fire,” Duke explained. “I think she was a teacher?”
“A smokin’ hot teacher,” Troy added. Then, realizing his unintended pun, he chuckled proudly.
“Anyways,” Duke continued, “She was unconscious when Rory found her inside the building. He had to carry her out, and--”
“He was doing his job,” Walker interrupted firmly. “A woman was trapped inside the building and needed assistance, and McAlister carried her to safety. Standard procedure.”
“Sure,” Duke shrugged. “But I don’t remember it being ‘standard procedure’ to camp out in front of the ambulance for thirty minutes while you wait for said woman to regain consciousness.”
“Definitely not standard procedure,” Mr. August agreed. “That’s what I call going above and beyond the line of duty.”
“That’s what I call having a crush,” Troy smirked. “Sounds like someone was feeling… ‘hot for teacher.’”
Right on cue, Mr. August dropped to his knees and strummed at an air guitar as he belted out the chorus to Van Halen’s ‘Hot for Teacher.’ Troy just grinned proudly, then glanced towards me.
“Come on, McAlister,” he said. “Am I right, or am I right?”
You’re a fucking asshole, I wanted to shoot back. Instead, I clenched my jaw and glared down at the soft, spongy weight room floor as my hands balled into fists.
“Careful,” Mr. August warned Troy playfully. “You don’t wanna piss this guy off… you saw what he did to the punching bag.”
“Leave him alone, guys,” Josh Hudson snapped. His eyes flicked towards me as he strode across the room, and he flashed me a small smile before he hunched over the weight rack next to Troy.
“We’re just trying to help,” Troy shrugged innocently. “Firehouse 56 is a family. That means looking out for one another--”
“Being a ‘family’ also means knowing when to keep your mouth shut and mind your own damn business,” Josh snapped back. “I learned that the hard way…” he added under his breath as he shoved a heavy weight plate onto his barbell.
“Alright, alright…” Troy murmured, shaking his head in defeat as he stood up slowly from the weight rack. “I’ll drop it… for now. But the offer still stands, McAlister, if you need any brotherly advice on how to talk to women…”
“Dude, shut up!” Duke rolled his eyes dramatically. “You’re the last person that should be dishing out dating advice…”
“I don’t know about that,” he grinned back. “At the rate you losers are getting wifed up and locked down, I might be one of the last bachelors left standing at Firehouse 56!”
“You say that like settling down is a bad thing,” Josh challenged him with a scowl.
“Hey, man… if you want to give up your freedom to change dirty diapers and have boring sex once a month with the same woman for the rest of your life, then more power to you,” Troy shrugged. “I just hope it’s not contagious! The last thing I need is a kid…”
I knew that he was just talking out of his ass, but that was the last straw. I chucked off my boxing gloves and stormed out of the weight room.
“What the hell is his problem?” were the last words that I heard before the heavy metal door slammed shut behind me.
I was halfway down the hallway when I heard the weight room door thrust open and a pair of footsteps sprint after me.
“Hey man, wait up!”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw a member of the crew jogging towards me. He was wearing Adidas track pants and a Firehouse 56 sweatshirt with the sleeves rolled up, revealing two forearms covered in tattoos.
“I don’t think we’ve met,” he said, rolling to a stop a few paces away from me. He stuck out his hand, closing the distance between us. “Bryce McKinley.”
“Rory McAlister,” I said, slapping my palm against his and giving his hand a firm shake. His eyes scanned the tattoos that covered my own arms, and his gaze landed on three digits inscribed above my right wrist.
“860?” he asked, reading off the numbers. “That’s the Hartford area code.”
“Yeah,” I shrugged, shoving my hand into my pocket to hide the tattoo. “Just a reminder of where I came from.”
As if I could ever forget…
“I got the same tat,” he grinned as he pushed up the sleeve of his sweatshirt to reveal a gothic-style ‘860’ inscribed on the inside of his elbow.
My initial instinct was to make a snide or sarcastic remark, but I stopped myself. Bryce hadn’t been one of the guys mocking me back in the gym… he didn’t deserve my bitterness.
“Listen,” he said, rolling his sleeve back down. “I just wanted to say that you shouldn’t let those guys get to you--
“I’m not,” I snarled, sounding a bit too defensive.
“Ok,” he held up his hands in surrender. “Look, I know they seem like a bunch of pricks now, but I swear they’re good guys once you get to know ‘em. Even Troy.”
“I bet,” I remarked dryly.
Bryce cocked his head and studied me through narrowed eyes.
“You’re a dad, aren’t you?” he asked finally.
“Huh?”
“You’re a father,” he repeated. “That’s why you stormed out when Troy started talking shit about kids. That’s your soft spot.”
“Look, I just want--”
“Hey man, it’s cool. I know that feeling,” he cut me off, raising his hands again -- this time to silence me. “I’ve got that soft spot, too. Those guys can run their mouths all day long, but the second they mention kids… it flicks a switch inside of me. It’s been that way ever since my daughter was born.”
I rubbed the back of my neck and glanced up at Bryce. He was silent, obviously waiting for me to fill in my own blank.
“I’ve got a daughter, too,” I said finally.
“How old?”
“Seven.”
“I bet that’s a fun age,” Bryce grinned. “My daughter, Ava, just turned five. She started kindergarten a few weeks ago, and I swear one of these days I’m gonna blink my eyes and she’ll be heading off to prom or her high school graduation.”
“They grow up fast,” I agreed, feeling myself grin as I thought about Charlie. “It seems like just yesterday I was teaching her how to tie her shoelaces, and now she’s lecturing me…”
“God, we sound like a couple of soccer moms,” Bryce chuckled. Then he sighed and glanced back up at me, “Look, I know it’s tough joining a new crew and figuring out where you fit in, but you can’t let those guys get to you. You just gotta remember that they’re talking out of their asses. They don’t mean any harm.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, staring at the ground. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it,” Bryce slapped his palm against my back, then added, “And hey, if you ever want to double up on dad duty…”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” I nodded appreciatively.
Bryce gave me another slap on the back, then he turned and walked back towards the weight room. I let out a heavy sigh, and I realized that some of the tension had melted away from my shoulders.
I walked through the station towards the rear exit door that opened onto the gravel parking lot at the back of the firehouse. It was raining outside, and the sky was heavy and grey. Rain pelted the earth in thousands of needle-sharp shards.
The thin metal awning over the door provided eight square feet of shelter from the storm, and I pressed my back against the brick wall of the firehouse as I plucked a pack of menthol cigarettes from my pocket.
I was about to prop one of the cancer sticks between my lips when I noticed the car idling at the back of the lot.
A Kia Soul. In a parking lot full of muscle cars and pickup trucks, it stood out right away.
The headlights were on, shooting two beams of yellow light through the rain. The windshield wipers were slashing back and forth furiously, but in between passes I could make out the outline of a face behind the glass.
I rolled my back off the wall and stepped forward, squinting my eyes to get a better look. The windshield wipers flicked aside a curtain of raindrops, and I saw her face.
Holy shit…
The unlit cigarette dropped from between my fingers and fell towards the wet gravel.
Des?
The car headlights blinked off, then back on; a single strobe to beckon me forwards.
‘Ancient history,’ her voice echoed in my head.
Well if we’re just ancient history, then what are you doing here, Des?
I stepped out from under the awning and immediately felt the rain eat through my t-shirt, mixing with the sweat that had prickled on the back of my neck from my workout.
She watched as I crossed the parking lot. When I got close, she leaned over the center console and popped open the passenger side door.
“Quick!” she yelled out. “Get in the car!”
I pulled the door open the rest of the way and ducked inside. And then, once I had blinked the raindrops out of my eyes, I found myself staring face to face with Desiree Leduc.