Sneak Preview of Squared Circle Blues

Sneak Preview of Squared Circle Blues
by Matt Posner
coming September 2015 (I hope)


Becky had to pound on the door of Billy’s room for a long time before he opened it. He leaned against the wall just inside the door as she came in. He was wearing his boxers and not much else. His hair was tousled. His chest was covered with broken blood vessels. He stank. Becky pushed him into the shower, turned on the water, and left him to bathe. She opened his luggage and pulled out clean underwear, clean socks, jeans and a t-shirt. She opened the hotel window the crack it would open, lit one of his cigarettes, smoked out the window. Billy came out naked and dressed in the clothes she had laid out for him.

“Let’s go to the diner,” she said when he was dressed. “You’re paying.”

Hestia’s Olympic Diner was a block from the hotel. After the shower, Billy was able to walk there. He staggered a little. He hadn’t shaken off the previous night’s hurts. Billy was a well-trained, skilled wrestler who could take a beating, but Fighting Eagle was both clumsy and stiff.

While they were having their eggs, toast, and coffee, Dora Gutierrez arrived and slid in next to Becky. Her heavy features and broad shoulders belied her tall, thin frame. She wore a linen blouse and dark skirt and a hair ribbon whose girliness didn’t match her mannish face.

“I got to get me my own car,” Billy said.

“You’d just wreck it,” said Dora. “The usual,” she called to a waitress. Dora’s voice was a low croak. She didn’t smoke anymore, but had acquired a permanent huskiness from her smoking days.

“I ain’t never wrecked a car,” said Billy.

“Why don’t you start paying me for gas money?” Becky suggested.
“Since I got to drive you everywhere. Instead of all this bullshit about saving for a car you ain’t safe to drive.”

The waitress brought Dora oatmeal with raisins.

“You should eat more,” said Becky.

“Aah, what’s it matter?” said Dora.

“You’re getting skinny.”

“I give a fuck?” asked Dora.

“You get any skinnier, your tits’ll be hanging off your back.”

“Aah.” Dora took a tiny bite of oatmeal. “I got no appetite.”
She turned her attention to Billy. “Gash ain’t gonna say it, so I will. If you’re getting hurt as bad as last night, just get out of the ring. Roll on the floor, get counted out. Morgenheim’s too stupid to put you back in the ring if you don’t help.”

“I can take it,” Billy said. “Got to have a good match for the crowd, right?”

“Got to make your next shot,” Dora countered. “If you can’t get out of bed the next day, or your ass is in the hospital, then what?"