The kickboxing gym is noisy, it stinks, and it’s full of people beating up blue and red punching bags as fast and as hard as they can. The sound of speedballs is like machine-gun fire.
‘I like it.’ Trav looks around admiringly. ‘Let’s get into it. There’s Mikey over by the drinking thing.’
We make our way through the gym to catch up with Mikey, me and Trav dressed in the seriously traditional kickboxing uniform of runners, boardshorts, and cut-off footy jumpers. Mikey, in long white shorts and a black singlet, laughs when he sees us. He has his hair tied back and up; not a look I’ll be trying any time soon.
‘Hey, boys. Don’t you guys look the real deal.’ Mikey points with a drink bottle towards a small glassed-in office. ‘Just wait here a minute while I go and get Rocco. He’s the boss. Kind of like to check you in.’
Trav and I wait, watching guys and a few girls with flying ponytails smashing anything that moves. I can tell Trav’s itching to let loose, as he’s always trying to hit something or someone, often me. Plus he has an extremely high pain threshold, in that he doesn’t care who he hurts, or how much.
‘We need some of those handwrap things.’ Trav waggles his fists. ‘We’ll look like pussies without ’em.’
Good point. Everyone has their hands wrapped like professional fighters, even some big weird jellyfish guy wearing a green cardigan.
‘I’m down for the black ones.’ Trav nods seriously. ‘The yellow ones are gay.’ He laughs then punches me in the ribs. ‘Uncool, I mean.’
We wait, listening to the ticking of skipping ropes, and the hard smacking of gloves as everyone trains as if they want to kill somebody, even those shadow-boxing themselves in the mirrors. I see Mikey coming back over with a guy in a black windcheater, who’s built like a concrete mixer – a concrete mixer that doesn’t shave a lot.
‘Travis and Marc,’ Mikey says, arriving. ‘This is Rocco Galtieri. The boss. He’ll get you started.’
We shake hands with Rocco. He’s like a planet with his own onion-scented atmosphere. His eyes are black, he has arms like logs.
‘Now, boyss. Lissen.’
We listen.
Rocco holds up two massive fingers. ‘We drain for doo minutes. Then we rest for one minud, and lissen to da music while we seddle da mind and da breethin’. But no dancin’, please. And rememmer dis.’ He lifts a fist, wrapped in black. ‘Da baddle never ends. Neffer effer. Da baddle neffer ends!’
‘Right on, Mister Rocco,’ says Trav, with feeling. ‘Let’s get started!’
Rocco watches as Trav and I work on opposite sides of a heavy punching bag. Basically we’re okay with the old left jab, straight right, left cross routine, which Trav’s dad taught us years ago. Then Rocco has us ripping with elbows, knees, and back fists – all good stuff that is going straight into Trav and Marc’s Personal Encyclopaedia: Fight Technology For Use On The Street And Perhaps On The Sporting Field If Things Get Out Of Hand.
‘Keep your breethin’!’ Rocco shouts. ‘Hanz up! Elpows in! Prodect your rips!’ He holds up fists as large as pineapples. ‘Now addack!’
I’m doing my best, no longer worried that I have yellow handwraps, because Trav got the last of the black ones, and that the girl next to me has bigger biceps than mine. What worries me now is lack of oxygen, and the possibility of a teenage heart attack that might get me onto A Current Affair.
‘Nice work, boyss!’ Rocco shouts. ‘Han zup! Han zup!’
I’m fading.
‘Marc!’ Rocco roars at me like a Kodiak bear. ‘Dat bag gunna kill you! No sleepy time yet! Ponch him! Kneep him! Elpow him!’
I try, but my elpows sag, my kneeps are exhausted, and my ponchs sock. The world title’s slipping away. The bag’s killing me. I’m in the red zone. I’m goin’ down… then, in the distance, through a wall of pain, I hear something. Is it the bell?
No! It’s YMCA, the extended dance mix.
I’ve been saved by the Village People!
For a while Trav and I practise a basic front kick that Rocco taught us, then we wander over to watch Mikey spar with some guy with red dreadlocks. Unlike us, they have bare feet, shin guards, mouth guards, and head gear. And they mean business.
It’s cool to watch. The red-headed guy is light and fast, flicking out jabs and kicks, sometimes leaning back on the ropes, weaving and swaying like a cobra, waiting for Mikey who slides in, watchful, almost still, before unleashing kicks and fists, forcing the other guy into the corner. Then it’s all on, gloves, knees and feet flying.
‘Go, Mikey!’ Trav leans on the ropes. ‘Punches in bunches!’
Mikey punches fast and kicks hard, only stopping when the bell rings. Then he and the other guy touch gloves, the music starts, and everyone rests.
Man, if only real fights were like that, the world would be a better place.
While we’re waiting for Mikey, Trav and I find a corner as far away from Rocco as we can get, and punch these pumped-up leather balls on big rubber bands. The idea is that as soon as you hit them they bounce back, meaning the whole exercise can go on indefinitely if you have the energy. Fortunately, a girl with black handwraps, cropped white hair, and a panther tattoo on her arm, interrupts us.
‘Do either of you guys want to spar?’ She holds up a fist that looks like a little black hand grenade. ‘Just for a couple of rounds?’
Of course we don’t. Why would we? Talk about lose-lose. You fight with a chick and she beats you up. Is that good? No. Or, you fight with a chick and you beat her up. Is that good? No, none of it’s good. Wrestling might be okay, but that’s a different story.
‘No thanks,’ says Trav. ‘We’re just beginners. We really only came to watch our mate, Mikey. And to listen to the music.’
‘In the Navy’ is on.
The girl, who’s small and stocky, studies Travis. I actually think she’s pretty cute. Firstly, because she doesn’t push the sparring issue. Secondly, because she’s very pretty in a chubby sort of a way. And thirdly, because she smells like dried apricots, which I like.
She glances at Mikey, who is talking to the red-headed guy he’s been punching up. How civilised. They’re even using a bucket to spit in.
‘Yeah, he’s a lovely guy, Michael.’ The girl wipes her mouth guard on her singlet. ‘So, are you guys … um, pardon me for asking, gay friends of Michael’s?’
I laugh, but Trav is so shocked he looks as if he’s hit an electric fence.
‘Us? Shit, no!’ Trav elbows me. ‘No way. Mikey’s a mate of Marc’s from work. I’ve only met him today. We’re straight-as.’ Trav laughs at something I think he’s about to say. ‘Well, maybe Marc’s a little dodgy, but no. Really. We’re straight.’
‘Cool.’ The girl smiles. ‘I’m not. Anyway, so are you comin’ along to help him paint the gallery on Sunday? Me and my girlfriend, Jodie, are.’
I struggle to pretend I’m not a little shocked, as this girl is the first self-confessed lesbian I’ve ever met. I mean, there’s a lady in our street who plays in a brass band and wears marching pants, but that could mean anything.
‘We didn’t know that he was,’ I say. ‘Painting, I mean. But yeah, we could get along, couldn’t we, Trav? Sunday’d be okay. No problem.’
‘My name’s Imogen.’ The girl puts out her black-wrapped hand and I put out my yellow one. We shake bro-style. ‘Call me Immy.’
I introduce myself and Trav, who is unusually quiet now, probably because we don’t meet that many lesbians at an all boys’ school.
‘We might see you Sunday then,’ I say. ‘We’ll try and get there, for sure.’
‘Great. Lovely. See you.’ And Immy heads off, leaving us to raise our eyebrows like actors in a soap opera when someone’s just got up off a life support machine to unload the dishwasher.
‘Now, Marc. Listen.’ Trav drops a hand onto my shoulder. ‘I know you’re never gunna be the kind of guy who’ll make school captain or house captain. Or even be an arsehole prefect. But I reckon there’s a good chance you could become one of the real superstars of the gay community.’ And with that, he goes back to the floor-to-ceiling ball, laughing so hard he can hardly hit.
We stand at the station in the rain, me minus a spray jacket that I left somewhere, which is a pity because I’d just found it again a week ago. While we wait, I check out the computer studies nerds, all carrying laptops, wearing glasses and strange shoes, although I must say that some of the girls look okay. I could catalogue quite a few of them, no worries. Even Tandy Electronic ads need babes. In fact, they probably need them more than anyone.
‘We met a very nice lesbian at the gym,’ Trav tells Mikey. ‘Imogen. I believe she’s a house painter.’
‘What he means,’ I say, ‘is that we’re coming around to help you paint on Sunday. I’ll bring my dad’s stepladder, if you want. And some brushes.’
For a moment Mikey says nothing, and I listen to the rain pattering on the tin roof, and try to pick which girl I can see that I’d most like to go out with. In the end I select an Indian chick with a nose stud in tight white jeans who’s eating chips with sauce.
‘Well, that’d be great.’ Mikey nods thoughtfully. ‘I’d appreciate that. A lot. Anyway, I might walk home from here. See you, guys.’ He nods some more. ‘And thanks again. Again.’ And then he’s gone, leaving me and Trav with the nerds.
‘Do you always have that effect on people?’ Trav says.
Often it seems that I do.