Day 200:  Sunday, June 20, 2010:  You have a very big heart.  It’s just proportionate.

To celebrate Father’s Day, here’s a short story I’m working on:

He sat in the small room with another hangover and looked out one of two windows, hearing Narragansett Bay as a backdrop to other thoughts, with early morning surf breaking on rocks just out of sight.

The night went well down in the bars and there was only one small fight he had to contend with, but there were no punches and rugby players hired from the university pushed two drunks out separate doors to maybe settle things elsewhere. 

They pulled in a lot of bucks so the bar owner set them up after hours, Ryan sitting down quiet as always until booze loosened tongues, Smitty wanting to know more about the D’ Dario fight until Ryan relented, telling them how the cut wouldn’t close and Lonnie argued with the ref not to stop it but they stopped it anyway, Ryan way ahead on points but there was too much blood.  A promising welter weight had died weeks before, so the media was up-in-arms and refs pulled the plug when bleeding started. 

 “And you quit the ring,” said Smitty.  “Walked away just like that.”

Ryan nodded because why waste words when a nod will do?  Why open your mouth about things they should know, when a deft motion will put it all away and to rest?  It was a lousy head butt and nothing to talk about.  D’ Dario had been hurt and desperate. Now it was all gone and he didn’t want to talk about it.  Just ancient history.

“Your hands were fast,” Smitty said, watching his head bouncer like a prize bull.  “Lightening fast.”

Ryan shot his drink while Cheri lined-up another round, and she saw him quiet and too serious there, getting a nod from Smitty to just hand over a fresh bottle.  Hand him a brand new bottle to take upstairs and medicate, as Ryan called it.  Medicate with soundless sleep until the quiet day, tomorrow being Sunday.

Ryan ambled off as their small bar manager told Smitty he was giving away the good stuff, Smitty coming back with, “Ryan brings more customers in here than your goddamn dollar drink night,“ driving home the man’s popularity and draw from fight crowds in Providence and even New York, who would come on vacation and see the great undefeated boxer who walked away without a word, first time he was cheated on a major bout.

“That stuff is killing him,” Cheri said.  “Worse than all those stupid punches.” 

Smitty was not a cruel man and considered her words carefully, roiling surf out back talking for them now through big wall windows, the distant Point Judith lighthouse blinking in time to mark interior silence.

“See the Cambodian tonight?” he asked.

Cheri shrugged.  “Half the time you wouldn’t see him anyway, buried in the crowd.”

“Next time you catch his ear, send him up the steps,” meaning Smitty’s office, which shared the same hall as Ryan’s room. 

Cheri kind of smiled because she knew how Smitty really cared, not wanting to use Ryan up like some kind of circus draw, knowing the brooding fighter would listen to that little Cambodian, who was the only person their head bouncer liked.

Ryan respected Smitty as his boss and landlord, but honored the Cambodian as some kind of close friend.  Smitty would use it to help get through that thick Irish skull.  The drinking had to stop and other things, like some kind of job other than living off old winnings.  The winnings would only deplete, and the booze would finish him in a classic, tragic sense that everyone knew about fighters.

But that was all last night as the weekend stumbled slowly into Sunday and now everything was quiet again.  Ryan sat before the window and thought maybe he should run a few miles but the booze had taken him down hard and his other thoughts were of a toasted egg sandwich at the Captain’s Nest, to watch tourists and meet Sam (Samgang) for a run at the bluefish, if they were biting.

Was Sam in the bar last night?  He tried to think but his mind wouldn’t work that way anymore and he focused on the short squabble from last night, no punches there and the rugby players did their job.  No court to be coached by Smitty on what to say when questioned.  No problems to go over.

Was Sam in the bar last night?  He tried to remember but couldn’t.

Was there a squabble?

Yes.  No problem though.  Way over capacity like every weekend, but no unwanted attention.

The surf sounded good, and he prepared to take a shower down the hall, but somehow got confused by a small television.

DAY 119: Thursday, February 4, 2010:  You don’t shop for cars; you shop for land movers.

Severance Pay: continued from Day 118 . . .

And how did Manager Rick react to this?

By using it all against them come review time, which was usually three months late anyway.  The last one was just like the one before:

“I could really use a raise,” Fiddles stammered, seated in Rick’s office.  “My car is on the fritz again, and those classes cut into my overtime.”

“You failed those classes,” Rick said, tap-tap-tapping a pencil.  “And I’d would really like to address those so-called twelve hours of overtime claimed in June, when you and Randy worked up in Greenfield?”

Fiddles shrugged.  “That was Randy’s job.  He was the crew chief.”

“And that would be the bus rolling right over him, huh?

“Well . . .”

“You get to take the van home at night, Fids, because your car is always on the fritz, remember?  That van is like a huge bonus, so we’ll leave it at that.  A review is mandatory; a raise is not.  Your job is secure for another year.”

“But Fergus . . .”

“Ferg is vulnerable because he starts pushing buttons when review time rolls past.  Last time he called Boston, and they came down on us pretty hard.  Now he’s overpaid for the work he does, and has officially jumped to environmental, run by a flaky idealist who doesn’t have any real solid backlog.  He’s very vulnerable, and you’re not.”

Fiddles smiled, unconsciously feeling his hooked nose.

Rick leaned closer.  “Are you shaving your eyebrows now?”

Fiddles shrugged.  “I shave my head, so . . .”

“And certain white guys should never, ever do that.”

Tap-tap-tap . . .

“You included, Fids.”

Tap-tap-tap . . .

“Your job’s secure.  Get the hell out.”

Tap-tap-tap  . . .

The biscuit was officially his, and Fiddles looked down in despair.  “So . . . are we getting rid of Fergus?”

“It’s not ethical for me to say,” Rick explained, nodding “yes” like a desperate bidder at the auction, throwing in winks for good measure.

Fiddles smiled.  “That’s what you get for jumping to the fucking tree huggers.”

“Maybe you should think about that career move,” Rick said, taunting.  “I heard you’re quite a mover out in the woods.”

Fiddles flushed.  “I better get back to those plans and make sure some angles add up.”

“Yuh.”

And so it went as rumors spread into eventual reality, Fiddles talking during lunch, Rick meeting with Rourke over Boston’s request for someone’s release, and Frenchy preparing special wine, trying to get payback for lectures about beating his boy, and passing out during lunch.

So Ferg was gone for real now, and Uncle Fiddles parked in back of that wonderful little packy store, watching the ballet class stretch and bounce eagerly on flexing toes, the hawkish pervert slamming nips and drinking beer, listening to a CD of Stern calling Gary the Retard; Gary nearly bawling in misery as Arty Lang jabbed his arm with another needle to bring his witty mind up . . . or down.

You can’t even buy this kind of multi tasking thrill Fiddles thought, swatting angrily at his lap.  You only dream of such things in fairy tales.

“So Gary,” Howard was saying.  “Is your thumb really up your ass right about now . . ?”

Ahhhhhhh, Fiddles thought, just now aware of a homeless drunk guy climbing out of that rusted blue dumpster to find himself a place to piss, exciting the hawkish pedophile into even higher levels of self-satisfying ecstasy.

To be continued . . .