“Let me down.”
“All right.”
“Let me down right now.”
“Take my hand. And the other one. Sit down slowly.” She sank to her haunches. Sat. Pushed her feet out in front of her. Eased off the desk. Sat in her chair.
“Now imagine you did all that, you jumped, you fell forward, face-first. A hundred feet. Falling for about four seconds.” I nodded at the big clock on the far wall. We watched four seconds pass. “It feels like a long time, but there’s just time to close your eyes and breathe a prayer. And then you hit. And then you realize you’re alive. You did it. You broke the record, and you’re alive. And everyone’s clapping you on the back. And fifteen million people in darkened movie theaters will watch you take that fall and feel their hearts slam under their ribs, then grin with relief when you walk away. And you’re going to get a big check for it. And then imagine one day you can’t do that anymore, but you love the movies so much you start from the beginning in some other field, and you work—day in, day out— clawing your way back into people’s good graces, doing your best to ignore the fact that they pity you, that you could do their jobs six times better than they could, if only you didn’t have a hip held together with a dozen steel pins, ignoring the fact that it hardly pays, and that cutting tomatoes is just not the same as falling through the air like a stooping eagle. And then imagine that some fool takes even that away.”
She started writing. After a minute, she slowed and looked up. I could see the cynicism reasserting itself. “Human interest isn’t enough. Before I start in on the work, the hours of backbreaking, mind-numbing work, asking people questions, searching archives, combing the Web, bring me something.”
“If I bring you proof you’ll write about Kick?”
“Bring me proof of government corruption and I’ll write about anything you want.”
MY MOTHER and I turned to face the elevator door. I pressed the button for the lobby. I’m having dinner with him tomorrow. Today, now. Tonight.
She raised her eyebrows, nodded at my thumb, which had turned white against the steel button. I let go. “The newspaper woman I saw today was less than cooperative,” I said.
“Ah.”
The bell dinged. My mother got out first. We headed for the hotel’s oyster bar.
“Journalists,” she said. “Very annoying. Particularly photographers.”
“Yes.”
“One understands how they get punched so often.”
We found a seat at the bar. The bartender brought us menus. My mother ordered a glass of cabernet. I chose champagne.
“I have never punched a person,” she said as our drinks arrived. “I don’t believe I’ve ever punched anything.”
I shook pictures of Kick and Dornan from my mind, kept my place in the menu with my finger, and looked up. “Never?”
“No.”
“But…” If my mother said Never, she meant not even a cushion when she was a child. I sipped my champagne. My mouth bubbled, as it had last night. “Would you like to?”
“Now?”
I pushed my champagne away. “There’s probably a bag in the gym.”
She slugged back her wine and stood, prepared for battle in her cream silk sweater, taupe linen pants, and delicate evening sandals.
In the gym, a woman with hair pulled back and ears sticking out was yanking at the handles of a lat machine as though trying to pull the legs off her boss; a young, slightly overweight man knelt on all fours on a blue yoga mat, morphing from cat to cow and back again. His back was very flexible. In the best hotel gym tradition, everyone ignored everyone else.
The bag was a heavy boxing bag, and my stomach squeezed: it was the same brand as the one I’d used for my class. This was my mother, I told myself. I was just teaching her to punch. It would not end in blood and death and the feeling that I’d done more harm than good.
The bag looked brand-new. I checked the hook and chain, nonetheless, ran my hands over the casing. Smooth and soft. Acceptable for her beginner’s hands.
I had a sudden flash of Kick’s small hands. I like her very much.
“If you’re going to hit with both hands, you’d better take off your wedding ring.” She touched it, then twisted it off and put it in her pocket. No tan line. Maybe you’ll find out tonight. “And your shoes.” Her sandals were low-heeled, but I didn’t know enough about her balance to be sure. She slipped them off. She seemed more comfortable in bare feet than most of my class had. I held my hands up, curled my fists. She copied me inexpertly. “Imagine the pads at the base of your fingers are an iron bar. Don’t clench too hard. All tension should be in the wrist. Okay?”
“Okay.” The whiteness around her knuckles eased.
“There are seven basics to learn about striking. One, strike from a firm base. Two, most of your power comes from the torque generated by—” She was shaking her head. “What?”
“Show me.”
“All right.” Different rules for my mother. “Hold the bag for me like this.” I showed her how to get behind it and brace it against her shoulder. “Ready?” She nodded seriously. I hit it, hard. I like her. She moved back half a step. I hit it with the other hand. I like her. She set her feet and her face. I let fly with a right-left-right combination. I like her very much.
My mother’s serious expression smoothed, replaced by a bland mask. I didn’t have to turn around to know that Yoga Boy and Bat Ears were watching.
“Show me again,” she said. And I obliged with a left-right-left. “Do I have to make that noise?”
“What noise?”
“That ‘ush’ sound. Sometimes a ‘hut.’ ”
Ush. Hut. Well. “Make whatever sound you like. Anything. Just as long as it pumps air from the deep part of your lungs.”
“Does it hurt?”
I looked at my fists, the pinking knuckles. As we swapped places I started worrying about her spraining a wrist, breaking a finger, crushing a knuckle. Not being able to get her wedding ring back on. “Start gently.”
She assumed the same position I had, took a moment, then punched. Coordinated, but too careful to be graceful.
“Again. Try the other hand.”
She stepped into it, and connected squarely, but the bag didn’t move.
“Stop being careful now.”
She hit the bag. She was only two inches shorter than me, and despite having gained ten pounds or so in recent years, she was strong. I had seen her wallop a tennis ball hard enough to smash an opponent’s teeth out. She should have made me stagger.
“Again,” I said. “Remember to breathe.”
She hit the bag, and huffed as though trying to blow out the candles on a birthday cake. Tidy, controlled, self-contained.
“Don’t think about those people watching you.” I said it loud enough for the man and the woman to hear. The woman’s ears turned beet red. She looked like Mickey Mouse after a gallon of Thunderbird.
“Comics,” I said. It was faintly embarrassing talking about this to my mother. It felt more personal than talking about sex.