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I see myself in a place where I don’t know anyone, but everyone knows me for being the most ruthless fighter they’re ever seen. They’ll look at this 115-pound tiny girl who barely makes it into Flyweight, and they’ll drop their jaws to the floor when they see me win.
There will be no drugs, no pressure, no lack of money. There will be no Kings crew trying to hurt me. Caden will never make it out of here, and I will be far away from him and his gang before he can harm me beyond repair. I know it. I feel it with the way the music and uproar make the floor of the cage vibrate.
The ref takes both my hand and my opponent’s as the presenter speaks. He’s not actually a presenter, more a guy who loves putting on a show for a few bucks.
“Tonight’s win goes to the tiny fighter we’ve started callingunbeatable,” he shouts into the mic. He’s done many of my other fights, and everyone is starting to know my reputation in Silver Falls, South Bank and North Shore alike. “This is her fourth win this year and herthirdT.K.O., ladies and gentlemen.”
My heart is beating so hard that I struggle not to tremble with excitement. My whole body is burning, emotions flooding my chest, and I almost want to cry. There is no better feeling than what comes next.
“The winner of this fight by T.K.O. is…Billiethe unbeatableScott!”
The cheers and screams make my knees weak. Apart from my family, I know none of these people. Dickie wraps me in his arms before lifting me on his shoulders. I raise my fists to the sky as he does another round of the cage. My huge bear-like coach has the personality of a marshmallow when we’re outside the gym, and as I look down, I see him wipe a tear of happiness.
Dickie is a war veteran. When he returned from Iraq, his wife left him and took his two daughters with her. He had nothing left except fighting. She would only let him see his daughters when she needed money from him.
He was not a good man back then, though no one on the North Shore judges anyone on their past, especially me. He took his anger out on poor guys who looked at him the wrong way in bars. He lost his money and visited jail more than a few times. One day he got a call saying his ex-wife and kids had been in a car accident and were all dead. Two little girls, four and seven years old, gone, because his ex-wife had started dating a maniac who couldn’t control his anger. He never got to say goodbye. All he could do for closure was kill the fucker. No one ever found out. He didn’t get convicted or do time, and I think that was fate telling him it was his chance at a new life. He had nothing and no one. So, he became a boxing coach.
I met him in L.A. The year the Bianco family was backing up our crew, I was sent to fight illegal fights for three months. A way for us to show our loyalty. That, among many other things. If big organizations keep us as low-class criminals, they always have something to hold over our heads.
Dickie saw the potential in me right away. He was working for Bianco too back then. When I went back to North Shore, he followed me. And when Bianco got put away, he took the rundown gym that’s on North Shore Crew turf and told me to drop all illegal shit I was involved in.
I have no doubt he sees his little girls in me. With every win, I see the pride in his eyes and the tears shining. Every time I get into fights outside the gym and kick some Kings Crew bitch’s ass, he looks at me with that disappointed expression that silently tells me to do better.
He knows I want to get out of this shithole. He knows I want not only my UFC fame but a nice life far away from here. Make good money from fighting as long as possible, and when I’m done, move to some nice small town where people gossip about who took two parking spots at the grocery store. About whose kids are bad because they once saw them smoke weed. A humble marriage, possibly some kids. Some white picket fence and a small house. Waving at my neighbors when I leave for the boxing gym. I’d discuss how I used to be part of UFC over a glass of wine with them and shock them with YouTube videos of my best fights.
I simply want to be somewhere else. Anywhere that isn’t here.
Dickie knows that, and he’s trying so hard to get me out of this life. I dread disappointing him. But on nights like this? When I see him wipe a tear at how proud he is of me, I feel light as a feather. I feel like I can fly so far away from here North Shore of The Falls would just be a small dot on a map and bad memories.
Grabbing me by the waist, Dickie lifts me off his shoulders and sets me down. He hugs me so firmly that I feel a ball of emotion gather in my throat as my face hides against his belly. He truly is a gigantic man.
Some random local journalist takes a picture of both of us. I’m going to make the local news. Probably on that last half page, the one they dedicate to sports. I don’t care. My stomach flips with excitement, and I raise one winning fist to the sky. My face is probably bruised from the few punches the other girl got in. They call her Feisty Cathy. She didn’t stand a chance against me, although I do feel blood trickling down my eyebrow from when she punched me hard in the first round. That was before I annihilated her. She lasted three rounds. The third was obviously cut short by the T.K.O.
“Come on. Let’s get you showered and changed. I need to check that eyebrow again,” Dickie says as he nudges me.
Before I make it off the ring, the presenter, who loves to put on a show, comes to me with the mic and asks the same questions UFC fighters are usually asked. Instead of having a cameraman with him as most professionals would, he’s just got his phone, filming himself. “Billie, Billie! This is for my YouTube channelFollowTheFight. My subscribers saw you live tonight, and they love you! You only have one more fight to win before facing the current local Flyweight champion. We have no doubt you’ll get there, but she’s never lost a fight. They call you ‘Unbeatable Billie’, but they call her ‘Killer Clover’. How do you feel about that?”
I laugh at how serious he is about this. He points his phone camera at me, and I love it, so I play the game. “I’m coming for you, Clover.” I stop at that, not wanting to say something I’ll regret.
I follow Dickie to the changing rooms, and he gets his first aid kit out as I go to the showers. I untie the tight French braids I have on when I fight and relish in the warm water trickling down from my skull to my toes. Once I’m out and dressed back in tight jeans and a tank top, I find a bottle of water and some Advil next to my gym bag. I keep the towel on my shoulders as my long, light brown hair dries.
“It’s stopped bleeding,” I tell Dickie as I pop an Advil in my mouth and down half the bottle.
He still comes to observe me, leaning down with a penlight as he checks for severe injuries.
“That’s what I like to hear,” he says in his low grumbly voice. "Your cheek is a bit swollen. Let’s put some ice on it.” He cracks an icepack taken from his kit and gives it to me so I can apply it against my cheek.
“Alright,” he says. “There’s someone who’s been waiting outside to meet you.”
He walks to the door and opens it to a man in a suit. He looks rich. The kind of rich that either means he’s up to no good or he has opportunities for small people like me. Maybe both.
He walks into the room with a confidence I could never have and extends his hand to me. I look at it for far too long, wondering who he is, noticing the stark difference between him and us. I’m wearing the same clothes I always do and Dickie the joggers and hoodie he can’t live without. The man’s wearing the kind of suit that costs the amount of money I could only ever dream of.
Shit, I bet it’s tailored.
“Hi, Billie. I’m Taylor Davis.”
Taylor in the tailored suit.
