The Fun Parts

the WORM in PHILLY

Classic American story: I was out of money and people I could ask for money. Then I got what the Greeks call a eureka moment. I could write a book for children about the great middleweight Marvelous Marvin Hagler. My father had been a sportswriter before he started forgetting things, such as the fact that he had been a sportswriter or the name of his only son, so my idea did not seem crazy. Probably it’s like when your father is president. You think, If that fuck could do it …

Why Marvelous Marvin Hagler? Why not? He was one of the best of his time, my time, really, meaning the time I was a boy and the world still seemed like something that could save me from the hurt, not be it. Why for children? Children were people you could reach. You could really reach out and reach them. Plus, low word count. That meant I’d get the money faster. I was experimenting with unemployment, needed to make rent quickly. I was no longer experimenting with drugs. I knew exactly what to do with them.

Thing was, I remembered certain facts about Hagler from my father’s boxing magazines, the ones my stepmother always groused about, stacks of them littering our house in New Brunswick. Hagler was tough and bald, for instance, perhaps the toughest, baldest fighter ever. I could begin with that piece of the story and just build out. Maybe my friends could help, though I’d never heard them talk about boxing, and most of them were hopeless drug addicts, good for only a couple of hours. I was hopeless, but prided myself on being good for more than a couple of hours. I still had what my father called get-up-and-go. Also, I was in possession of a positive outlook, which is just a trick whereby you convince yourself that the desolation of your world is a phase in your personal growth.

The weird thing is it works.

* * *

One evening a few of us got together in the apartment Gary and I shared. John and John’s cousin were there. John’s cousin went to divinity school. He told us about his fellow students, the gay guys in the closet battling their mothers and God, the brainiacs who approached faith as a physics equation, the bruisers groomed for ghetto heroics, the quivery social needs types. I stood, paced around the steamer trunk, which was cluttered with bleach and alcohol and glasses of water, bent spoons, cotton balls. I had a social need. I waited until John’s cousin nodded off, the dope overtaking his narrative imperative.

I wanted everybody to witness the fire in my eyes. I wheeled on them, announced my goal to write a children’s book about Marvelous Marvin Hagler.

Mostly when one of us spoke like this, by which I mean shared a dream or ambition or plan with the others, nobody would pursue the topic or even offer comment. The group would regard such an utterance with stricken silence. Then somebody would start in on something else entirely. It felt cruel at times, but served, I believe, to slightly check our plummet. Even as we sat around and measured, cooked, tied off, we would not indulge one another’s delusions.

But tonight when I mentioned the Marvelous Marvin Hagler children’s book, somebody spoke up. It was John’s cousin, the guy in divinity school. He was new, I guess, ignorant of our code.

“Hagler was bald, right?” he asked, rising out of his nod.

“Yes,” I said. “He was the first bald guy.”

“The first?”

“In the modern era.”

“Nobody was ever bald before?” said Gary.

“You know what I mean,” I said.

“I remember him,” said John’s cousin. “Dude was relentless.”

“Nobody would fight him,” I said. “That’s why it took him so long to be champ.”

“Like me,” said Gary, tapped the barrel of his syringe.

“But why Marvin Hagler?” said John’s cousin.

“He was relentless,” I said.

“Did he ever lose?”

“Just a few times.”

“I was robbed!” said Gary.

“Huh?” said John.

“I’m being Hagler.”

“He was, actually, robbed,” I said. “In a fight with Boogaloo Watts. But then they became good friends. That’s partly what the book is about.”

Nobody said anything, and I figured this would be the moment a new topic got introduced. I could see Gary doing the things he sometimes did when he was about to launch a rant, maybe about the cunning rhetoric of the soft left (he was the hard), or the immense number of people he believed had pancreatic cancer but didn’t know it, or how the smartest pop songs were by definition the dumbest, namely letting his head drop so that it was nearly in his crotch and doing some painful-looking thing with his shoulder blades and breathing super quickly, but then he didn’t lift his head or say anything at all, and it was John’s cousin who spoke, looked into my eyes, and said the oddest thing: “I can help.”

It turned out that the divinity student had an older sister in publishing. Children’s books, in fact. She kept an eye out for fresh talent, John’s cousin said. He’d be happy to write down her number.

“Oh, he’s fresh talent,” said Gary, his head still buried in his corduroys. “This motherfucker is fresh and juicy.”

* * *

The next afternoon, I called the sister.

“Yes, Leo said you’d be in touch,” Cassandra said. “He thinks the world of you.”

“Who’s Leo?” I said.

“Excuse me?”

“Oh, right,” I said. “Sorry. We have a different name for old Leo. A nickname.”

“What is it?”

“John’s Cousin,” I said.

“How endearing.”

“I’m a big fan,” I said. “But anyway, the reason I called you—”

“You want to write a biography of that boxer.”

“He battled racism,” I said.

“I’m intrigued. We need books for boys. With real stories about gritty people who struggled and triumphed.”

“I could do that for you,” I said. “No sweat.”

“No sweat?”

“Look,” I said. “I’ve never written anything like this before, but I feel a passion welling up in me. Before he forgot everything, my father was what he liked to call a ‘wordslinger.’ Also, I was accepted into a name college, though I was unable to attend.”

“That’s wonderful,” said Cassandra. “And sad. The last part is sad. The last two parts, I think.”

“No matter,” I said. “I mean, here we are now. You guys pay money up front, right?”

“Sometimes,” said Cassandra. “Listen, I don’t usually do this, but since you’re a friend of Leo, why don’t we meet for a drink tomorrow evening and you can tell me about this project.”

“Better bring your checkbook,” I said.

“Oh, you’re a riot,” laughed Cassandra.

* * *

Ever since Gary’s band, the Annihilation of the Soft Left, had broken up, I’d been eyeing his beautiful twelve-string Rickenbacker guitar. He didn’t seem to play it much, and I thought maybe I could sell the thing for a decent amount of cash. The way Cassandra had talked, the book contract looked like a done deal. I’d buy Gary’s guitar back once I got the advance the next night. I just needed something to tide me over.

A twelve-string Rickenbacker in a hard-shell case is a vexingly heavy object to ferry about the city in summer heat. I knew my feverish mien and the jones stink rising out of the holes in my T-shirt might aversely affect the guitar shop’s initial offer, but the guy at the counter seemed impressed with the make and year of the instrument.

“Sweet,” he said. “Great condition. People are playing these again. That guy from the Annihilation of the Soft Left plays one.”

“Never heard of them,” I said. “But I don’t know much about today’s scene. How much can you give me?”

The guy named a figure. I had to steady myself on the counter.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I accept. Let’s do it.”

“Great,” said the guy. “Just give me the papers, and we can take it from there.”

“Papers?”

“Ownership. You have to prove ownership. A receipt is fine.”

“Tell me,” I said. “Is that the policy in all the guitar stores around here?”

“Bet your ass.”

“Think I have to go,” I said, closed the case and slid it off the counter.

“Think you fucking better,” said the guitar store guy.

The Rickenbacker was even heavier on the walk home, but life is funny, because as I shoved the guitar back into Gary’s closet, I kicked over a rotted duck boot and a wad of bills rolled out. It was as though Gary secretly wanted me to hijack his property and try to pawn it or else just steal money from him outright. I went up the street to the doorway where the huge man stood in his leather vest and leather half gloves and two leather fanny packs under his enormous belly. One fanny pack had the boy, the D, the dope. The other had the stuff we agreed to call the girl, the coke, though sometimes it was just powder for helping babies poop.

This guy had stabbed a customer several weeks ago, but he was always pleasant with me. I liked this spot. It was safe and convenient. It beat Cups. Cups was a few blocks away. Bad things happened at Cups. I preferred Fanny Packs.

“Thanks,” I said.

Gary was still not home, so I sat on the futon and tried to focus on some basic facts about Marvelous Marvin Hagler. I remembered a lot, but I needed to remember more. I wondered if my stepmother had ever delivered on her threat, thrown out those boxing magazines. I needed to do some research, and I didn’t even know the location of the nearest library. The only books I read were the ones I found near trash bins. Right now I was muscling through an anthology of Korean poetry and a tract on management theory from the early 1970s.

I called my father, and my stepmother answered.

“Hey,” I said. “Remember those boxing magazines we used to have? Like crates of them?”

“Why, you want to shoot them in your arm?”

“Please,” I said. “You’re not being fair.”

“I’m not being fair?”

“I’ve made some mistakes. I’ve changed. I’m doing research for a book project, believe it or not.”

“Not.”

“It’s about Marvelous Marvin Hagler.”

“Who’s that?”

“You should know. You’re married to a sportswriter.”

“I’m married to a carrot.”

“A what?”

“A zucchini.”

“You’re drunk.”

“A vegetable medley. That’s your father. Your mother was lucky to get out.”

“Put him on,” I said.

“Your father?”

“Yes, put him on.”

I heard some fumbling, some hard breathing.

“Dad?” I said. “Is that you? Can you hear me? It’s me. Your son.”

The breathing softened, a distant surf.

“Dad,” I said, “Marvelous Marvin Hagler. Any thoughts? Didn’t you cover a few of his fights?”

“Yeah. I fucked her after the fight,” said my father. “It was the road. That’s how we did it.”

“No,” I said. “Hagler.”

“Name your price, Chief.”

There was more fumbling, and I heard my father say, “Sales call.”

My stepmother came back on the line. “How’s the research going?”

“Well,” I said, “if you find any magazines…”

“Don’t worry,” said my stepmother, “I won’t.”

* * *

Maybe I could meditate, trek deep within myself. Perhaps some truths about Marvelous Marvin Hagler lay entombed there, along with memories of my mother before she got sick and my father before he left her and got married and then got married again and then started to forget everything, such as his son and his wives and the rare fury of Marvelous Marvin Hagler. For instance, here was an indelible fact: Hagler’s mother never called him Marvelous. He added that, legally, later.

Then again, maybe the point of this book wasn’t facts at all. Children didn’t need facts. Children needed books for boys about gritty people who struggled and triumphed over steep odds. Maybe my next book would tell the story of me. I had been struggling, but now my hour of triumph had arrived. Triumph was about to caress my shoulders, coo into my ear. I didn’t even know if triumph was a man or a woman, or if this was my way of battling God in my mind.

I went out to the street and found somebody who knew the location of the nearest library.

* * *

We met for drinks at an outdoor café on a gritty, struggling side street in midtown. They had umbrellas over the tables so you could squint and maybe pretend you were somewhere pretty. I took a seat and ordered an Irish coffee, the closest thing to a speedball on the menu. Some mounted cops sauntered by, eyed me as their roans pinched off hot loads near the curb.

Those bright, mulchy mounds, they looked so full of life, the excess of life.

Cassandra had described herself with the usual telephonic vagueness, blondish this, bluish that. I had a corner table, a good view of the café, so I jumped when I felt a hand on my neck.

“It’s me. Cassandra.”

She was a less delicate version of her brother. A much older man in a charcoal suit stood beside her.

“Hi,” I said, half stood. “Please, have a seat. How did you recognize me?”

“Wasn’t hard.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“I’m sure you will,” said Cassandra. “This is Timothy. He’s our editor in chief. When I told him about your idea, he really wanted to come along.”

“The more the merrier!” I said.

“Hello,” said Timothy. He spoke tightly. I sensed awkwardness between them, perhaps a dispute about who would bask longer in the reflected glory of my publication.

Cassandra ordered iced teas.

“So,” she said. “About this book thing.”

I knew this was my moment. This was the way of the world, the opposite of the way of our apartment. You had to speak your dream. It wasn’t enough to do a thing. You had to sell the notion of doing it. This was what they meant by the marketplace of ideas.

“The book,” I said. “The book. It is for children, as you know, for all children, but with an emphasis on the boy. Because there are no stories for the boy. Stories for the girl are too sweet and sticky. Everything’s a colossal lie about bunnies and rainbows and butterflies. But the boy needs the truth of us as meat, to bathe in the blood of our meat war.”

Timothy squinted in his ice-cream chair.

“I think I know what you mean,” said Cassandra, “but I’m not sure I would put it that way.”

“You’re the expert,” I said, drank down the rest of my Irish coffee. It really didn’t compare.

“Yes,” said Cassandra. “I am.”

“I’m just the lowly writer,” I said. “The humble scribe. But I do know one thing. Marvelous Marvin Hagler is somebody the boy would do well to remember. As an exemplar. Hagler grew up poor in Newark, New Jersey, where he witnessed the ’68 riots firsthand. A social worker helped move his family to Brockton, Massachusetts. Do you know who that social worker was? The mother of the revolutionary poet and playwright Amiri Baraka. How is that for doozy-grade historical confluence.”

“Amiri Baraka?” said Cassandra.

Timothy looked rather ashen.

“These are the facts. That’s all. I went to the library. They’ve got something called microfiche. One night in Brockton young Marvin is beaten up by a local tough named Dornell Wigfall. The next day, Marvin goes to the gym. The rest is legend. He shaves his head and becomes the fighter nobody wants to fight. Finally he gets his title shot, from a Brit called Minter. Minter says no black man will ever take his belt. So Hagler flies to Albion’s shores and gives that limey a New England beat down. The crowd throws bottles into the ring. Hagler flees for his life. It’s victory, but a tricky kind of victory. He has many more celebrated bouts. Sugar Ray Leonard. Roberto Duran. His third-round KO of Thomas ‘the Hitman’ Hearns, the Kronk Gym prodigy, is considered by many to be—”

“Stop!” cried Timothy. “What are you doing?”

“Daddy, please,” said Cassandra.

“I can’t fucking listen to this anymore. Have you seen Leo today?”

“Leo?” I said.

“John’s cousin,” said Cassandra.

“Yeah, I saw him. Not today. Wait, I don’t understand.”

“What are you kids doing to yourselves?” said Timothy, his gray eyes greased with tears.

“Daddy,” said Cassandra.

“That’s great,” I said. “Father and daughter working at the same publishing house.”

“I’m a lawyer,” said Timothy.

“Sorry?” I said.

“We’re planning an intervention,” said Cassandra. “For Leo. We’re gathering information for it.”

“How much is he doing?” Timothy said.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I don’t really know the guy.”

“He talked like you were close,” said Cassandra.

“I’m not sure what to tell you,” I said. “I’ll help any way I can.”

“Help yourself!” said Timothy. “Save yourself, young man. Dear God, go to your family. You are about to die. Don’t you see this?”

“Sometimes,” I said.

The man shook and crossed his arms.

“Daddy,” said Cassandra. “Daddy, we can go now.”

“What about the book?” I said.

“The book.”

“The advance?”

“The advance,” said Cassandra. “Here’s your advance.”

She pulled bills from her bag, tossed them onto the table.

“Pay for the drinks. Whatever is left is your advance. But don’t ever contact me again. And stay away from Leo. Seriously. You are never to be in his presence again. My husband works for the district attorney. Don’t cross me, or people will put you in the river. Let’s go, Daddy.”

My editor led her sobbing father away.

“One more thing,” she called over her shoulder. “Boxing is barbaric, and you are a sick little parasite. What do you know about sweat and blood? Bet you’ve never even been punched in your life. I’m serious about Leo. Stay away!”

* * *

I scored down at Fanny Packs and headed back to the apartment. Gary and John and John’s cousin had gathered on the futons.

“I saw your sister,” I said to John’s cousin.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“You gave me her number.”

“Right. For your book.”

“I was robbed!” said Gary, giggling.

“He did lose one bout,” I said to Gary. “Early in his career. Lost it fair and square. To Willie ‘the Worm’ Monroe. The Worm took him in Philly.”

“The Worm!” cried Gary.

“The defeat was soon avenged,” I said. “And here’s one more thing, and then I’ll shut up. They did an MRI on Hagler’s skull. It was abnormally thick. It was basically a helmet.”

“Cool,” said John.

“My sister likes your idea?” said John’s cousin.

“I don’t think so. She’s got some other things on her mind.”

“Like what?”

“Like you.”

“Me?”

“She’s going to intervene. Your dad, too. They’re planning the big ambush. They’ve got the maps out. They’re watching you through scopes. Somebody will give the signal.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You’re Leo, right?”

“Of course I’m Leo.”

“The van will pull up. Men will pour out. Or maybe your sister will just take you out for a nice meal. All the people you’ve ever felt judged by will be there.”

“What?”

“You’re going to rehab, Reverend.”

“I was rehabbed!” said Gary.

“Shit,” said John’s cousin. “Not again.”

“What about me?” said John.

“They didn’t mention you,” I said. “I think you’re on your own.”

* * *

Supplies ran low, and I went back to Fanny Packs. The big guy was gone. There was police tape across the doorway, a dark, wet splash on the wall. I hit other spots, blocks and blocks away, but they were closed. The Laundrymat: closed. Pillbox: closed. Rumpelstiltskin: closed. Scooter Rat was nowhere. Ditto the Old Lady of the Sealed Works. That left Cups.

Cups was near the river in a crumbly walk-up. The light was on in the hallway and I could see people huddled near the banister. I started up the stoop when a hand shot out and grabbed me.

“Hey.”

He was a big kid, lumpy in the folds of his sweatshirt. He rubbed his stubble-covered head.

“I’m stuck here, bro,” he said. “I’m on lookout. I need a bag, you know? Just buy me a bag while you’re in there.”

He pressed a ten-dollar bill into my hand.

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Yeah, you know. Just get me a bag.”

“Boy?”

“What? Get me a bag of dope.”

“Okay,” I said, shrugged, went inside.

I waited behind a man who stank of subway station elevators and a soulful-looking woman in fishnet sleeves. The thing about Cups was you never saw the guys with the cups. They stayed upstairs, invisible puppeteers. The Styrofoam containers bobbed down on strings. The lookouts on the stoop and the rooftops called their codes, for the cops, for the all clear.

“Gato!” they’d shout, and I pictured jaguars with badges in their fur.

Maybe I pictured that now as the cups came down. I put the lookout’s money in with mine in the cup marked D, watched it go up. The cup started down once more, but there was something wrong. The lookouts shouted, the cup swung hard, bounced off the stair rails, tilted, tipped. The lights went out.

I groped the scummed tiles for my bags. Broken bottles pricked my palms. I heard a burst of siren, then more shouting, then nothing at all. My hand brushed something, one of the tiny glassine envelopes. I scooped it into my fist. The lights came on. The lookout stood in the doorway.

“Got my bags?” he said.

“Bag,” I said. “One bag. You only gave me ten dollars.”

“I gave you twenty, motherfucker. You trying to rip me off?”

“No, man.”

“You little fucking junkie, trying to rip me off. Just give me what you’ve got.”

I walked toward him, opened my palm. We both sort of gasped when we saw the flattened cigarette butt.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m really sorry. I’m sure it’s over there near the stairs. Come on, let’s look.”

I wanted the lookout to follow me the way a father would, reserve judgment until it was clear a misdeed had occurred, maybe the way my father used to follow me when I was a boy, for he was a reporter and his job was to seek the facts, even if it was just the fact of who won a ball game or who’d ripped the sofa or stained the rug. My father always wanted to know what was truly happening.

Except maybe once.

There had been a big snowfall, and we stood in the driveway we’d just cleared, leaned on our shovels, sucked icy air.

“I remember,” my father said then. “I remember when you were a little boy. You had some words here and there, but you hadn’t really spoken a sentence yet. We were all waiting for your big first sentence. We were eating dinner and I was having my wine. I get up for some bread and knock over the glass. Wine spills everywhere. Stains the tablecloth. You know how your mother was about stains. We’re all sitting there afraid to speak, and you know what you said?”

“No.”

“‘I’m sorry.’ That’s what you said. ‘I’m sorry.’ Hah. You were always like that.”

“Like what?” I said.

“Listen,” said my father. “I need to tell you something. I don’t love your mother anymore. I’m seeing somebody else. Somebody I love. I care about you, but I can’t live with your mother right now.”

“She’s really sick.”

“I know. Believe me. That’s what makes it so hard.”

“You fucking bastard,” I said.

“Okay,” said my father. “I’m not going to let you speak to me like that too much. But right now is warranted. Give me what you got.”

I stood there, stared at him.

“That was it?” said my father. “Come on, take a shot. Sock it to me. Haymaker express.”

I cocked my fist, studied the salt bristles in his chin.

“Lay me out, baby,” said my father. “Onetime offer. Put the old fuck on the deck. Don’t be a damn pansy! I’m leaving your dying hag of a mother!”

I turned hard, took a few steps, and threw a huge hook at the garage door. We both heard my hand bones crack. I slid to the pavement, squealed.

“Oh, Christ,” said my father. “No good deed.”

He clutched me up and rolled me into the car, drove us to the hospital.

* * *

It was true about no good deed, or even bad deed, same as it was true about fathers and how they forget to love you, but it’s more that they’ve forgotten everything.

Maybe it’s just a classic American condition.

None of it mattered now. The lookout’s eyes filled with this silvery hate and he gathered up the collar of my shirt and commenced what people who have never been punched, people like me, call fisticuffs. He threw hard, perfect crosses, and my legs fell away and the blows did not cease. I could feel them, not feel them, their smash and wreck, the splintering of bone, feel my blood, this warm, barbaric blood, so rich and parasitical, pour out my nose and sluice out my mouth and down my throat and choke me with the shock of something terrible and unendingly foreseen.

When he was done, the kid leered down at me.

“Had enough?” he said.

“Yes,” I lied.