The Laughter of Strangers (9 page)

“I killed a man,” and it sounds like something said at face value. I killed a man and tomorrow everyone will know about it.

SILENCE

I get to talking about something else, about the house.

“You should think about repairing the roof.”

Spencer shrugs, “Who’s got time for that?”

Upstairs we hear a loud crashing.

Alarmed, I sit up.

“Relax,” Spencer rolls his eyes, “it’s James.”

“Wait a minute, are you for real?”

A grin. Spencer says, “What do you think?”

“I thought it was just some imaginary friend of Sarah’s.”

He laughs, “Guess.”

“I haven’t a clue.”

“I could be lying,” Spencer narrows his eyes, “but it could also be true.”

He says it again as if this is all one big lesson:

YOU CAN LIE ABOUT THAT

“If you can’t tell the difference, maybe it doesn’t matter.”

These are a trainer’s words. He is trying to build me back up, trying to beat down all of the doubt that’s boiled to the surface. And I’d thank him for it, but somehow I am still not certain that this will result in something we won’t regret later. However, at the same time, I don’t see how we can stop now.

It’s already too late.

This is round two in a fight that probably never ends.

We fight until winded, and then we fight some more.

He’s wrong about one thing.

You can’t lie about that.

Can’t say it’s a fight you win because I’m not so sure anyone can win this particular fight. The opponent is time and its punches change you until they send you to the ground, six feet down and dead, the last brand of light isn’t limelight, it’s the bright light of the bare bulb hanging from above, the mortician tending to your body.

Somewhere in there, I feel like I’d still remain.

Unable to understand if I had died or not.

Win or lose?

SILENCE

Neither of us says anything.

I keep my eyes closed. I listen to the house in pain, mimicking my own groans, the ache of each joint, the cuts and bruises that still need a lot of time to heal. I inhale, hold, and exhale before asking:

“Do you think I can go spar for a few rounds?”

Spencer looks up from the laptop, expression as if saying:

WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK?

It’s a no-go.

And probably better that I just rest.

What about the painkillers?

I want to ask but all of a sudden it feels like an impossible question to pose; the silence of the house lulls me into a self-conscious cocoon.

I want to keep, and obey, the silence.

For awhile, it feels like I’ve escaped the world.

SILENCE

PERFECT

SILENCE

But it ends around the same time Spencer starts typing again, and I can only imagine what else he is planning.

Whatever it is, you’ll hear about it in the morning.

THE SILENCE I REACH

As part of the plan, I keep my silence. I keep my silence despite having been more or less silent throughout most media events that have involved any part of me. Media events of silent intrigue and steady enigma. But silent especially now as I reach a new plateau of distance, carrying along a grimace, maybe a frown if it calls for it, favoring facial gestures that fit the design of the headlines around the time word got out.

And word certainly got out.

Stuff like:

‘SUGAR’ WILLEM FLOURES MURDERS HIS PAST

And:

BAR FIGHT GONE AWRY FAMOUS BOXER SUSPECTED OF MURDER

I maintain my silence.

Spencer keeps me updated on all media requests.

We remain at the house, laptop against laptop, kitchen table our office, as I ease off the painkillers and frequently hide from the steady current of suspicion with a few rounds in the ring Spencer installed in the basement.

My own private gym.

When your name is Willem Floures, you really can’t afford to be seen in public gyms. Not because I’m smug (I’d never claim to have much of an ego; I’m too self-conscious to be egotistical) but because of the fact that the others like the same kind of gyms, same sort of equipment, same towns, cities, everything. For example, ‘Buster’ Willem Floures lives next door.

He is Spencer’s neighbor. Neither party planned for it.

It just happens.

Seems ‘Buster’ liked the quiet, slightly rundown little suburb too.

I mean having my own private gym means everyone has their own private gym and only the media really suffers.

No media day workouts.

No public sparring sessions.

No open calls for opponents.

No surprise challenges.

Everything is under wraps. A shroud.

But they will do what we say if they want to be partners in news-stories and spectacle of the likes of SUSPECTED MURDER.

I can’t say that I want it to fall into their hands, but then again who really has control over the media? Many claim they do and have the dollar signs to prove it; however, just so often a paid-for event hits public awareness. Something unexpected, like some nugget of information from a dark past resurfacing. In this case, I have killed a man that does not exist.

The media hears from the original source, Spencer posting under one of his longtime message board handles on boxing forums (boxing aficionados are some of the most vocal people around; they’ll debate for dozens of pages about fight patterns, the dynamics of the power punch, and famous boxer career choices), mentioned this particular dark nugget from my “past.”

It didn’t take long for it to spread.

Spencer did more, of course. He had photos, doctored documented proof (medical records?)—

He had something.

I know he did. Kept me in the dark for obvious reasons.

1)
I didn’t want to know about it.

And—

2)
I am supposed to plead ignorance/innocence.

I CAN LAST THREE ROUNDS

Before I am gassed. This isn’t even an actual fight. I’m merely working in some shadowboxing exercises while Sarah watches and pretends to be her father, shouting commands at me.

Think: Cliché of boxer trainer, “LEAD WITH THE JAB!”

Of course I lead.

It all comes from the jab.

I used to like doing this. Fighting.

Right?

Yeah.

Ask any of them and they’ll all say yes.

DO YOU LOVE BOXING?

NOTE: And all its variations such as “Do you like to fight?” and “Did you want to be a boxer?” and “Do you enjoy taking a punch?”

EXECUTIONER: Absolutely.

ICE: Wouldn’t want to do anything else.

BUSTER: I guess so. I am a fighter aren’t I?

ONE-TWO: That’s a stupid question given that you’re asking a professional boxer…

Yeah so I guess my answer would be an absolute, one hundred percent confident:

SUGAR: Yes!

Maybe drop the exclamation point…

YES

Yeah that’s better.

I can agree to disagree with myself. By the looks of it, I’m a bit of a hypocrite. You turn the page you see a different side of me. Maybe more of the same, but the subtleties (if I can be considered subtle) take on poor, imprecise shifts like someone that is constantly aching to be in the limelight…

But doesn’t know why.

I’m afraid of the dark.

I am drawn to the brightest lights. Nothing is brighter than the lights shining on the ring on fight night.

Imagine the warmth of everyone’s gaze.

Imagine that you are standing facing the only person that matters:

Yourself.

And you are prepared…

Prepared to go twelve rounds if need be. You will defeat that part of you that fights back. You will fight yourself, JAB JAB POWER SHOT if it takes all the blood and guts spilled to the canvas to get you to stay down.

Imagine that and you might begin to understand why fighting is all I can do. It’s all I’m made to do. I understand the fight. Everything else, well that’s sort of the issue here. I started fighting in hopes of finding myself; big surprise fighting only created more of a rift between each emotion, each resurrected feeling, I might have.

There are no easy identities, only more interesting proximities.

CAN I GO ANOTHER ROUND?

Sarah seems to think so.

From upstairs I can hear Spencer laughing.

Things must be going well. But that’s not my fight. Well, it is, but at this very moment, I want to be as far removed from the version of me they are sculpting. I will see myself imposed upon every possible mode-of-delivery.

A good rumor makes for great spikes in site-hits, subscription purchases, and so forth. I don’t blame the media. They are the blood.

They carved out the veins.

No one exists without blood flowing.

The media makes sure the people that want to, need to, desire to be alive are still there, being viewed.

Read: Alive.

YOU ARE ALIVE

Right now, I am because they say that ‘Sugar’ Willem Floures is a murderer. Right now, I am because I am lead subject on over a dozen media outlets’ front pages. Right now…

I AM ALIVE because I lied.

Therefore, I am living a lie.

And not just one.

As many as needed.

Sarah asks me, “Do you want to win this?”

Words right from her father’s mouth. Spencer always barked the question in raspy, throaty calls during my training sessions.

Motivation mostly, but you know what…

I have been so busy thinking about my chances of winning that I have failed to think about whether or not I want to win.

What is in it for me if I win except a rematch, another one that fights on their toes, quick to strike, ready to replace me?

I WANT TO WIN

I know that I do but these days I worry that I don’t have any other motivation, nothing else to claim as purpose, besides the victory. I want to win because I want to win.

“Yes,” I shout back.

Sarah giggles, “JAB!”

Just like her father, she does her best to pretend that we have it all under control. But really, I’m in the basement, gassed, tired, achy, only a few days away from the rematch, and I haven’t even begun to train.

I have become someone people can’t stop talking about, not because I am still in their minds a great fighter but rather because I might be convicted. I might be
that person that killed some person
. When it involves murder, everyone gets at least moderately interested.

I lean back against the turnbuckle, corner of the ring my place to calm down, check my heartrate, and most importantly, listen for Spencer.

What is happening?

I tell Sarah, “Go get your father. Tell him we need an update.”

She salutes me like a soldier, “Yessir!”

Carefree and not at all concerned with identity and placement in this society, Sarah might end up disappearing on her eighteenth birthday like so many others. Without a visible and brand-worthy identity (and unless you fix yourself to one) you disappear from society. You become brandless. You are just another person, faceless and making do.

I have always feared that sort of scenario.

However, when I see the anonymous so quick, so carefree, I often wonder if it was their choice. Their decision to be private. Their identity solely theirs, no one else’s.

There might only ever be one Sarah Mullen.

Maybe she wants it to be that way.

That’s a lot of pressure, being in full control of yourself.

How anyone can do that…I can’t even begin to fathom.

Spencer has his own past. There are other Spencer Mullens out there. I know that a few of them have a Spencer as their trainer. They just don’t let Spencer treat them the way he treats me.

I never got over my social anxiety.

I never got over the fact that people are watching me and they care and yet I still need to say something interesting, something poignant.

I settle for silence.

SILENCE

It beats saying something you regret, something people won’t forget.

Spencer with daughter descends the stairs.

“My, my,” Spencer sounds chipper.

“You wouldn’t believe…” he starts but then stops when he notices that I have boxing gloves on and I am noticeably sweaty.

“I didn’t say you could start training.”

“I needed something to keep my mind off the hysteria.”

Spencer rolls his eyes, “This is the sort of spectacle that increases your brand.” Sarah wanders over to the left corner of the ring and hangs on the ropes.

“Sarah quit that!”

I add, “Yeah you don’t want to sprain your ankle.”

Out of breath. This is bad.

“Look at you, you wasted all that energy.”

“I have to train, Spencer.”

“What did I say? Huh?”

I know what he said.

I know, I know. But a fighter trains before a big fight.

“It’s hopeless. Every punch you throw is one less you can throw in the ring on fight night. Your training days are over. Now it’s about fight psychology, staying attuned to your fighter instincts, and most of all: Eat healthy.”

I throw a few jabs.

“Three down the shitter, right there.”

“Only jabs, Spencer. This is helping me. It helps center me.”

He sighs, “Wait until you hear about what they’ve done to you. You’ll be brimming with confidence!”

I BECOME THE PERSON VIEWED

IN THE HEADLINES

Happy I have the boxing gloves and hands taped up otherwise I’d be compelled to scratch at my face. The media took the rumor and took on the remainder of Spencer’s plan. It has reached the authorities and media consultant experts have been quoted saying things like “inconclusive” and “it is quite possible” while the story as a whole is shrouded in mystery.