Caged Warrior (9781423186595) Read online

  I squinted, the twisted look on my face answering the question for me. Like why would I be coming to the auditorium tonight?

  “It’s the charter school lottery,” he explained. “Nine neighborhood schools, 1,673 balls, just four slots. They pull ’em bingo style.”

  “I’m not much for bingo,” I said.

  “Those bingo balls, they represent an opportunity, son.” Mr. Freedman put his hand on my shoulder in a caring, fatherly way. “You know, not much officially counts for college in terms of academic records until you get to your sophomore year, but if you post solid grades in eleventh and do it again in twelfth, especially at one of these charter schools, you’re looking at a way out.”

  “I already got plans for my way out.”

  “What’s that, skateboarding?” he asked, as if he knew something more than he was letting on. Very few folks, students or teachers, hadn’t heard about the growing reputation of the cage-fighting kid from Fenkell High who was born with a gift for breaking holds, breaking bones, and then breaking other fighters’ wills.

  “Somethin’ like that,” I said in a low-key manner.

  Truth is, I had to give Mr. Freedman his props. The man really did care about the kids at our school. A student can always tell when a teacher is faking it. He wasn’t. Mr. Freedman was one of those guys who went way beyond the paycheck to try to be a role model, to try to be a sort of good citizen in a place gone insane. Despite the fact that so many of his so-called students often acted more like they were in a zoo instead of in a classroom, Mr. Freedman always did his best to teach them and reach them.

  Even when they didn’t give a flying flip about being taught.

  But I guess he saw something in me. Like some sorta potential. That’s why, I imagine, he was always asking me if I “had a sec.” Can’t really fault a man for that. Plus, I’m the kind of person who prides myself on being polite and prepared for class with my homework and stuff, anyway. Way I see it, discipline in the cage can only be obtained by having discipline outside of it as well, and though this may sound weird, I’m one of those students who never once got into a fight at school.

  Not once.

  Of course, having a rep like I do doesn’t hurt. People up and down the halls know, Don’t mess with Bam Bam, a nickname I picked up somewhere along the way. But the thing is, I like rules. I like respecting them, too. I guess I just prefer it when things are orderly and go the way they’re supposed to. Me, I like neat. I like clean. I like it when A + B = C. Chaos, mess, it bothers me. Come to my kitchen and every pot has its place. Every pan, every fork, every plate, too. No, we don’t got much, but what we do have is in its proper spot. If I get homework, I do homework, simple as that. Of course, I also know that this doesn’t give Gem any excuses for slacking off, either. I mean, if I’m gonna cross all my t’s and dot all my i’s, then damn straight she’s gonna do the same; but the reality is I just can’t sleep good unless I know I have properly handled all of my business each and every day.

  That’s just who I am.

  I glanced at the clock on the wall above Mr. Freedman’s desk. It was broken, stuck on 8:18. I didn’t know if that was a.m. or p.m., but it didn’t matter. After science class every day I had to be somewhere.

  “Can I go now?” I asked.

  “You should come tonight,” Mr. Freedman said, as if he was actually dropping a hint. “I got a feeling you could get lucky.”

  Lucky? I ain’t never been that. Besides, my dad hadn’t even filled out any of the forms. Far as I knew, I wasn’t even eligible for the stupid charter school lottery.

  “Sure,” I said as I flipped my hoodie over my head. “See you there.”

  I made my way toward the dark-green classroom door that led out into the hallway, knowing that there wasn’t no chance I’d be watching bingo being played later that night.

  And I felt pretty sure Mr. Freedman knew this, too.

  What I would be doing by twelve thirty that afternoon, however, was mashing down at Loco’z Mixed Martial Arts Center, a place where the mats smelled, the bathrooms did, too, and the fighters were hard, scarred, take-no-prisoners cage warriors.

  “I’m gonna snap that sucker’s bones like a fat girl snaps a chocolate-covered pretzel!”

  BOOM! Officer Klowner pounded the heavy bag.

  “Dude’s so soft, people blow their nose into his armpit fat!”

  BOOM! BOOM! Klowner struck again.

  “Boy wanna get in the cage with me, he’s either blind, stupid, or can’t afford cable TV!”

  Klowner spun with a roundhouse kick, and KA-BOOM! It sounded like a mortar round had just been detonated inside the gym.

  At six feet four, two hundred forty pounds, David “Officer” Klowner was a former U.S. Marine who’d gone past the black belt level in Tsien Tao Chinese Kempo to earn a red belt. Leg strikes were his specialty, the kind that could knock down a house. His motto: All business in the cage, all smiles outside of it.

  “Remember when I KO’d that dude in Philly and the ref asked him where he was and the boy said, ‘Uh…Vegas?’ Man, I done knocked that fool clear across three time zones.” Klowner machine-gunned the heavy bag, sweat flying off his body like bullets. “Ain’t nobody want a taste of this honey bear.”

  “Hey, K-K-K-Klowner, when’s your m-m-m-manager think you’re g-g-g-gonna get a title fight?” Nate-Neck asked with a stutter.

  Nate-Neck was called Nate-Neck because, well…he didn’t have one; his shoulders went straight to his ears and his head sat directly on top of his traps—no neck. Once upon a time he’d been a championship wrestler at the University of Iowa. Now, at twenty-seven years old, his world was all MMA, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

  Not exactly what anyone would call a pretty man to start with, Nate-Neck had a nose that zigzagged like a bad country road and a case of cauliflower ear that would scare off young children. Of course, cauliflower ear is a warrior’s badge of honor, especially to a wrestler. A person can only get it from spending so much time with their head being rubbed into the surface of the mat that their earlobe becomes permanently disfigured. Nate-Neck’s left ear looked like a chew toy for a pit bull—swollen, deformed, inflamed, a permanent rash—and while no, cauliflower ear won’t do much to attract the ladies, to an opposing MMA warrior, it shows a kind of toughness that can’t be bought with a mere tattoo. Ink you can pay for; cauliflower ear has to be earned with blood, pain, and years of hurt.

  Standing five-foot-eight and two hundred and five pounds, with a chin made of cement, Nate-Neck was as tough to dent as a bank vault. Kids used to tease him for the way he “s-s-s-stuttered” when he was in elementary school. No one teases him these days unless they have a very good health insurance plan and a high threshold for bodily pain.

  “Got three weeks till my next undercard,” Klowner answered. “And once I obliterate Jersey ‘J.J.’ Jenkins, it’s only a matter of time before I get a shot at the belt.” Every fighter in the gym basically had one reason for living: win the belt. And when it came to talk about belts, not even Klowner clowned around.

  “Yo, M.D., w-w-w-what’s up, kid?”

  “Hey, Nate,” I said as I approached the lion’s den.

  “Up for s-s-s-some crucifix work today?” he asked.

  “If you have time,” I said as I set down my gym bag.

  “And I got you lined up for hip sweeps later, right?” Klowner added. “Plus clinches.”

  “Yes, please, if that’s okay.”

  Klowner repeated my words in a squeaky high, girlish sounding voice. “Yes, please, if that’s okay.” He smiled ear-to-ear. “Kid, you gotta be the most polite badass I’ve ever met.”

  I grinned. “Lemme just sweep up the locker room before we get rolling, okay?”

  “And make sure my towels are fluffed!” Klowner called out. BOOM! He smashed the heavy bag with a high roundhouse that lan
ded like thunder. “My foot is like a sleeping pill with toes. Who wants some?”

  Lord help the man who took one of Klowner’s kicks to the head.

  I’d started coming to Loco’z when I was nothing but a squirt, so young that lifting a bag of wet towels used to push me to my limits. That’s when a few of the fighters started taking me under their wings, showing me some moves, that kind of thing. Being that my dad, Demon, used to box with Loco under the same trainer, a semifamous guy named Palm Tree Taylor from way back in the day, I became the young’un who got to hang around when Loco opened his own place, sort of the pet puppy of the gym, who never had to pay dues or anything to use the facilities.

  But puppies grow up. Nowadays, after I make myself useful by helping to clean the place (even though Loco never asks, but it’s only right) I mash with the big boys.

  And they don’t spare me one bit from the hurt of training. At least once a week I walk out of Loco’z with less blood in my body than I walked into the place with. Most MMA fighters who are serious about their craft know exactly what I’m talking about, too. In this sport even the winners get hurt.

  Hurt bad.

  “M-m-m-mouthpiece?” Nate-Neck asked, making sure I had my safety gear.

  “Check,” I said flashing my teeth.

  “Cup?”

  I banged my balls with my knuckles. Nate listened for the click sound of the hard plastic. Once or twice I’d been known to try to sneak through without all my gear. It’s not that I don’t believe in being safe, it’s just that, well…I can’t always afford everything.

  “Go s-s-s-start your circuit,” Nate said, noticing that my dad, the guy who is supposed to be my manager, my cornerman, and my trainer, wasn’t—as usual—anywhere to be found. “S-s-s-see you in thirty.”

  “Yep,” I said and I headed off.

  Since knowing how to break submission holds is so crucial in the cage, after I’d skipped rope, done some suicide squats, and box jumped till it felt like my quads were burning streams of hot lava, I went to the mat for some specialized instruction in ground fighting.

  “Two words,” Nate-Neck said as the sweat poured from my body. “L-l-l-leg locks.”

  Nate-Neck gobbled me up in a one-legged X guard to show me the finer points of how to reverse out of it into a position of dominance by using my forearm for leverage. Fact is, once a fighter owns this kind of submission hold on a foe, he can take an opponent’s ankle home with him to serve for dinner with soup, salad, and buttered bread if he wants.

  Joint locks’ll take down a Navy SEAL.

  After a solid high-energy session on the mat with Nate-Neck, Klowner stepped in.

  “How ’bout some love-tap time with a few Thai clinches?”

  “Sure thing,” I said.

  Klowner began by showing me the proper way to snare an opponent. He always emphasized good technique because of how incredibly important it is in the cage. Sloppy street fighters, to a real pro, were easy to spot and even easier to beat.

  “Forearms on the collarbone, arms around their neck, a tight, thumbless grip—wrist on wrist—around the back of the head, and keep your own elbows tight. You see how inside position rules and gives you the ability to turn your enemy’s head like a steering wheel? You’re in my Lexus right now.”

  Klowner snared my head like a black widow seizing its prey and whipped me side-to-side to give me a feel for how much control he actually held over me at the moment. He then began feeding me knee after knee to the body. It was as if my mid-section was a bass drum and he was being paid to bang away in a marching band.

  “There’s a little feather that’ll tickle your pillow.” Klowner drilled me in the ribs. “So, how’s a fighter break this hold?”

  “Forearm shiver to the face,” I replied attempting to strike him in the temple.

  “That’s one way,” Klowner said as he blocked my counterattack, his arms still wrapped like a python around my neck. He spun me left and delivered a thump to my body. “What else?”

  “Drive my arm up through yours to gain control of the inside position and smash an uppercut to your nose,” I answered, attempting to execute the move.

  “Correct,” Klowner replied. “But you know I ain’t gonna let that happen.” Klowner spun me right and kneed me in the midsection again to show me that he was still in firm control of the action. “What else ya got?”

  “Use a lever move,” I replied. “Step out, palm up under opponent’s elbow, push up, and explode in the other direction.”

  “Great answer,” Klowner said. “But when a fighter as big as me gets you in a Thai clinch, it ain’t gonna be that easy.”

  Outweighing me by at least seventy pounds, towering over me six inches in height, Klowner wrapped his arms like a spider around my neck, and blow after blow blitzed my ribs as I struggled for a way out.

  “Keep your head up while seeking a solution,” he warned. “A knee smash to your nose will feel like I hit your brain with a fire hydrant.”

  “Got it.”

  “Any other ideas, M.D.?”

  “I’m searching,” I said, struggling from my position of disadvantage.

  “Well, take your time,” Klowner teased as he bombed me again with another knee. “I’ve got all day.”

  Even though I was the youngest in the gym and weighed the least, I never backed down from taking whatever hurt cards my training partners dealt out to me. Getting hit teaches a fighter to lose the fear of being hit; and the more times you’re really smashed, the less fazed you are by the shock of it when the lights are on and you’re center stage.

  Plus, no one avoids getting clipped in this game. Not the heavyweights, not the veterans, not the ground game specialists or the fighters who view an impenetrable defense as a best choice for offense. Even the best take big shots. How a fighter handles these big shots is where victories are won.

  “Say the word when you’ve had enough,” Klowner offered.

  I struggled without much luck to free myself from the hold. “You, too,” I responded.

  Klowner laughed. “All right, if you wanna be hardheaded about it.” He whaled away some more. “Cootchey-cootchey-coo!”

  As my midsection was being shelled by artillery, I grappled on, refusing to back down from the beating. Why? Because quitting becomes a habit. Give up once, you’ll give up twice; and before you know it, you’ll end up turning into a quitter who gives up entirely.

  Me, I’ll die before I’ll quit. Surrender, to me, isn’t an option.

  “More scoops on your sundae?” Klowner asked. “Got some chocolate fudge sauce for ya, too.”

  Being that I was approaching the end of a long, grueling, strong-effort session, I was weakening. After all, there’s only so much gas in any fighter’s tank. However, that only made it more important for me to war on. Absorbing Klowner’s knees had changed this workout from a physical one to a mental one. All good training sessions always exist at both levels anyway because the will to win is a muscle that needs exercise just like a bicep.

  And if I ever needed any extra motivation to battle on, any added incentive to fight when it felt like all the fight had been drained from me, I simply visualized the one image that was never far from my thoughts.

  Gemma. Her smiling face lit up my darkest days.

  Klowner faked left, then drove his right knee into the center of my breastbone. There was a violent, thundering BOOM! It sounded as if someone had just dropped a two-hundred pound sandbag into the center of an empty room. The blow was so loud Nate-Neck set down his medicine ball and turned to see what had just happened.

  There’s a code among fighters who train in the same gym, an unspoken rule: they push one another, but nobody gets broken. Klowner relaxed the grip he’d held around my head, and I knew why. With his last shot, he knew he’d pushed it too close to the edge of what was acceptable.

 
I spun around and hammered him with a left hook to the liver. It caught Klowner flush.

  “Urgh,” he groaned.

  I backed away and raised my fists, ready to go some more. Every brawler knows you never drop your guard in the cage. It was a clean shot I’d nailed him with, and Klowner knew it.

  He rubbed his side, then smiled. “I swear, this kid’s got more heart than a Marine infantry,” he said to Nate-Neck. “And I think his stomach muscles bruised my damn kneecap.”

  Nate-Neck grinned as Klowner turned and extended a glove. “Good work today, M.D.”

  We slapped hands. “Thanks.”

  “Yo, schoolboy, yo’ punk-ass ready for a taste of me?”

  Klowner and Nate-Neck spun around to see where the voice had come from, then dropped their eyes at the sight of the approaching fighter who was barking at me.

  “Bam Bam wanna boogie?”

  “G-g-g-give it a break, h-h-h-huh, Seize.”

  “Wut?” Seizure responded with a wicked smirk. “I just wanna work with the schoolboy on a few li’l choke holds.”

  Silverio “Seizure” DeSilva was a Brazilian jiu-jitsu expert in the Gracie line of fighters with the quickest hands in the gym. And the nastiest attitude. As an underground cage warrior who’d fought in Florida, Philly, and St. Louis, he had a sketchy, dark history of inducing seizures in his opponents through his signature rear naked choke hold. By cutting off the blood supply to other fighter’s brains until they did a little epileptic dance in the center of the cage—which he’d then post on YouTube—he’d earned his nickname. These days, however, Seizure was a ranked professional who had given up the unsanctioned war circuit a few years ago and settled in Detroit, where he’d risen to number three in the middleweight division. Like so many others trying to scratch their way into the top tiers of MMA fighting, he’d stop at nothing to one day be a world champ.

  Yet Seizure didn’t take me seriously. He still viewed me from a big brother/little brother perspective.

  At least he used to, until I knocked him into next Tuesday. That was a few months ago. Ever since then he’s been extra chippy with me because word had leaked out around town that Bam Bam was actually gonna be the true prince of D-town cage fighting one day, and not Seizure.