Sure, he gave me the opportunity to get rich. I’ve got several million in the bank, sitting there doing nothing.
But to rub shoulders with a man like that… I’m glad I always kept a distance between us, a gap. I wasn’t up to playing some fucking role, being his fucking surrogate son.
I got in it for the fights, for the chance to make something of a life that would have gone quickly nowhere. I’m not stupid, I knew what my chances were. I couldn’t even fucking spell ‘Deidre’.
No education, but I was no idiot.
I stayed in it because of Dee. There were times I thought about striking out on my own. I didn’t need some motherfucker calling the shots for me. It was useful, but I could have become a straight mercenary, work for the highest bidder.
Five percent of the pot? I could have commanded ten, maybe fifteen. Unheard of for an underground fighter. It would force a change to the whole betting structure.
I was that good. Could have gone pro at a moment’s notice and dominated.
But I couldn’t leave Dee. There was no way I was going to. She… she was what I was fighting for. Those millions… all that money… what the fuck does a guy like me have to spend it on? I eat, I train, I fight; it’s not expensive.
No, that was for us.
Perhaps I wasn’t conscious of it at the time, perhaps I didn’t understand it. But I was saving all of that for us. For our future. A future that only came to me in fuzzy outlines. A future that I couldn’t peer into, because I wasn’t sure how it was going to play out.
If only I’d planned it better. If only I’d talked to Dee, been honest with her about what I thought. But I wanted to wait until it was all there, ready for the taking. I wanted her to know she could leave, but not have to wait in order to do so.
Maybe I was stupid. How many times has she told me I didn’t need to protect her?
God damn it, maybe I was stupid! Maybe I got it wrong! Did I drive her away? Did she leave because I never committed as fully as I meant to?
Fuck.
That future evaporated, my last palm-full of water in a desert, when she took my baby and ran.
I put the beer down not even having taken a sip… I’m in no mood. I go back inside, stare at my map. I’ve sat on seventeen schools so far, each for several days at a time in case she’s just working part-time. I never saw her at any of them.
There are plenty more to go, especially out in the suburbs, nearby places like Geelong. The schools, that she wants to teach, it’s all I have to go on.
I’m full to bursting with frustration, recognize the need to burn it off before it robs me of another night of sleep.
I can’t keep going on like this, sleeping for barely two or three hours a day. It’s going to wear me out, burn me out, fuck with my mind. I don’t have the body fat percentage to keep my energy levels up forever, and I’m not eating like I need to be. I’ve already dropped weight, most of it lean mass. Throw me in a cage now against the last guy I fought, and I lose easily.
Fuck. I’m coming apart at the seams.
I change, leave the apartment, jog toward the beach then turn left toward Brighton. I take an aggressive pace, force my heart to race, force my lungs to burn. I’ve sweated through my t-shirt, and I push harder, faster.
Maybe it’s some stupid attempt to tire myself out so much that I forget about Dee tonight. But I know that’s impossible. I’ll look at that fuzzy ATM picture again. I’ll stare at it until my eyes blur out and I fall asleep on the couch.
I race by the marina, hear the metal clangs of sail strings slapping masts. I pass a hidden beach, tucked away in an alcove of stone beneath a cliff face, and there I see nesting miniature penguins, no taller than a bowling pin. I heave past the mansions that belong to celebrities and the rich, with their swimming pools and servants and rare pure-breed accessory dogs.
And then I’m spent, panting, gasping. I double over, grip onto my knees. My white t-shirt has gone transparent, clings to my skin. I go toward a bench overlooking Brighton beach. Lining the beach are multicolored boat huts. They’re painted in a variety of ways. One has a kangaroo on it, the other the colors of the local Aussie-rules team. One is painted in the colors of the union Jack. I spy another one… the American flag.
My mind goes back to Dee. She’s a foreigner all alone in this country. She’s a woman carrying a baby who’ll have to hold down a job to make enough money to live.
I see somebody walking along the beach in the distance. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust as I’m pulled from my thoughts. Behind the person are two dogs, casually following.
Dee liked cats. That was one of the first things I ever learned about her. I grin at the memory, that cat t-shirt in Thailand. It was black, soaked up all the heat, and in that sub-tropical climate, no wonder she looked uncomfortable.