GRACE UNDER PRESSURE
“Stop throwing your elbow!” In the flag version of American football, it’s permitted to use hands and arms in a blocking set, but it’s against the rules to grab or punch. So, when Cesar kept throwing his elbow into Gumbo’s neck, Gumbo got angry and said, “Stop throwing your elbow! It’s against the rules.” Cesar, who was six inches taller than Gumbo and outweighed him by forty pounds, just laughed and did it again. Gumbo was faster and could move around Cesar if Cesar didn’t do something to slow him down, and the coach was watching another game – four of which were going on simultaneously in their physical education class – so Cesar kept throwing his elbow.
Gumbo didn’t care about winning the game, but he always tried to play as well as he could, and he always tried to play fair. Since the coach wasn’t around to settle the foul play, he decided he’d have to do something himself. The next play when Cesar threw an elbow, Gumbo stepped back, balled up his fist and plunged it into Cesar’s midsection. Cesar gasped and stumbled. Gumbo said, “Two can play that game,” ran past the stunned opponent and grabbed the flag of the quarterback before he could pass the ball. “You’re down!” shouted the players on Gumbo’s side.
Cesar stopped throwing his elbow, but now he couldn’t stop Gumbo and became angry. He tried to push Gumbo down but Gumbo slithered by and pressured the quarterback, whose pass fell short of the intended receiver. The next play, Gumbo pretended to push back, but then slid right, so Cesar, shoving hard, lost his balance and fell down. Again the quarterback had to scramble away from the persistent pest and ran out of bounds. The quarterback glared at Cesar and said, “Damn it! Can’t you stop that little runt!” Then the quarterback pointed at Gumbo and said, “Next time, you’re on my team.”
Gumbo had no specialties, but Gumbo was a survivor. His high school friends all conceded he was very bright; he got good grades, but he didn’t belong to any scholastic societies. They thought he was clever and creative, but he never entered contests; he amused himself with his drawing and his strumming. He was fairly athletic and loved to play sports, but he never went out for teams; he was content to play sandlot pickup games. He was friendly, but he didn’t belong to any cliques. He moved easily between groups, so that’s why Theodosius Umbar was called “Gumbo”: the sobriquet rimed internally with his last name, which was hard to pronounce, and it meant a mixture of foods stewed together with a base of okra, a vegetable that few of his friends liked and some wouldn’t have recognized if they saw it even though they all liked gumbo if they ate it. Okra was prickly; to pick the spiky green spires, workers wore gloves and cut the tough stems with knives, but gumbo was tasty. Besides, no one liked his first name, not even he.
Word that he had stood up to Cesar whooshed around the class. His two best friends, Donnie and David, with whom he often played pickup sports, approached him.
Donnie, a better athlete than Gumbo could ever be, grinned and said, “Did you really punch him in the gut?”
“Yeah, did.”
“Man, he’s a lot bigger than you and built.”
“Yeah, guess so.”
David, who could run like a gazelle even though he smoked cigarettes at the drugstore across the street from the school every morning, said, “You better watch your back, boy. Don’t you know he’s got a gang? Those dudes carry switchblades, chains and brass knuckles.”
“Yeah? Thanks for telling me. That makes me feel a lot better.”
They grinned and playfully punched him on the arm as they strolled to the lockers.
At the end of physical education class, he was in the showers when the Vizal brothers, skinny and squirmy like ferrets, ran up to him and said, “Would you have fought Cesar if it came to that?”
Gumbo said, “Yeah, I guess so.”
Then the two squiggled away.
While Gumbo was putting his clothes on, Cesar loomed over him and said, “I hear you want to fight me.”
Gumbo said, “No, I never said that.”
“It don’t matter. Everybody thinks you want to fight, so I got to fight you.” He said it softly like it was something he didn’t really want to do, but honor and culture had forced him.
“Ok, I guess, if you got to, you got to.”
“Meet me at the drugstore tomorrow morning. We’ll do it there.”
However, Gumbo knew the gangs hung out at the drugstore and that if he fought Cesar there, he couldn’t win because even if he somehow got the upper hand over Cesar, his gang would jump in and Gumbo would be pummeled senseless.
“No.”
“No? Where then?”
“In class.”
“Class?’
“Yeah, when two guys have a problem, coach let’s ‘em put on gloves and box. That way it’ll be fair and square, just you and me and a referee.”
Cesar knew he didn’t need any help to beat such a runt, so he agreed. “All right.”
They went to the coach’s office, knocked on the open door and went in. Their teacher Coach Bruner, a big, broad bear of a man, was also the football coach. His office was plastered with team pictures from all the years Bruner had coached, and the shelves behind him held trophies that his teams had won. He sat at his desk and had looked up at them and smiled. He said, “What is it, boys?”
Gumbo said, “We want to fight.”
Cesar said, “We have to fight.”
Coach, no longer smiling, said, “What’s this about?”
Gumbo said, “He kept throwing elbows in today’s game, so I socked him in the stomach. That’s what started it.”
Cesar said, “So we have to fight.”
Gumbo said, “Cesar wanted to fight at the drugstore tomorrow, but I said we could fight in class. That’d be fairer.”
Coach said, “Right. Besides, fighting at the drugstore could get you expelled.” He looked from one to the other, taking in with a practiced eye their disparity in size and weight. He said to Gumbo, “Umbar, you sure you want to do this?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Colon?”
“Yes, sir.”
“All right, then. I’ll set it up. We’ll mark off a ring in the field. When you get here tomorrow, come in here to get a pair of gloves. Mosco and I will referee.” Augie Mosco was one of his football players who acted as assistant in physical education.
Gumbo’s next class was history, one of his best subjects. He had no trouble remembering dates and places and events and connecting causes and effects. He understood that in warfare, the best trained and most disciplined armies often won over larger armies. He had read about the Greeks against the Persians at Marathon, Alexander’s victory against the hordes of Darius, the Romans against the Gallic tribes, the British against the French at Agincourt, Robert E. Lee’s victory at Chancellorsville, Napoleon’s, at Austerlitz. He also understood that a stubborn resistance, a bloody standoff, was a kind of victory: the Spartans at Thermopylae, the Seminoles against the United States Army, the Texans at the Alamo, the RAF against the Luftwaffe, the 101st Airborne against the Panzers at Bastogne, the American destroyers at Leyte Gulf against Japanese battleships and cruisers.
His history teacher, a Humpty-Dumpty shaped man with a balding head, announced that since Gumbo had all his work in and had achieved the only hundred on the last test, he had a free day to do anything he wanted. Gumbo asked to go to the library.
In the library he found a thin book that he hoped would help: The Basics of Boxing. He checked it out, slid it between his textbooks.
While he stood in line waiting for the bus, other boys came up to him and said, “You really gonna fight Cesar Colon? He’s real strong, you know.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“He’s fought lots a guys.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“You gonna get your ass whipped.”
“Maybe.”
“Whoo, you crazy, dude.”
On the bus, Donnie and David asked, “You’re going to fight Cesar, huh?”
“Yeah, I have to. He won’t let me alone if I don’t fight him.”
“Why’d you want to fight him?”
“I didn’t. The Vizal brothers told him I did. Now, he figures he has to fight me or he’ll look bad.”
Donnie said, “Too bad you aren’t fighting one of the Vizals. Sounds like they’re the ones that deserve a beating.”
David said, “He smokes a lot, so you probably have more stamina . . . if you can avoid getting punched out.”
Donnie said, “Stay away from his right hand. Move around a lot. Make him chase you.”
“In a way,” David said, “You can’t really lose. Nobody expects you to win. So even if he beats the crap out of you, nobody will think bad of you.”
“Thanks, dudes; you really know how to make a guy feel better.”
After dinner that evening, Gumbo secluded himself in his room and read the illustrated book about boxing: He learned several techniques. The first was to hold the wrist straight when punching; otherwise, the puncher could break his wrist. Second, plant the foot below the punching arm and drive through, using the leg to steady and power the punch. Four, keep gloves in front to block blows from the opponent; the best block deflected the opponent’s punch in a glancing manner, so the boxer received less of the force of the blow. Five, move counterclockwise around a right-handed opponent to nullify his best punch. Six, when ducking, duck into the swing, so the other boxer can’t immediately counter with his other hand: corollary, if the opponent is taller and has a longer reach, move inside his swing and give him body punches.
After he read, he practiced those techniques. He held his wrists straight, planted his feet and drove through with his punches, all the while moving counterclockwise and blocking imaginary blows from his opponent, who was taller and stronger. When an imaginary swing came, he ducked inside and punched the imaginary body.
His curious younger sister turned his doorknob and pulled, but he had locked the door, so she went to complain to their mother. The mother, who had heard huffing and shuffling sounds, came to the door, knocked and said, “Theo, what are you doing?”
“Just practicing a new dance.”
“Well, unlock your door.”
“I don’t want Gracie coming in.”
“Gracie, did you hear that? Leave your brother alone. He’s trying to learn a new dance.”
Gumbo unlocked the door because he knew Gracie wouldn’t come in for at least an hour now that their mother had warned her.
The next morning he ate a large breakfast: two eggs, bacon, hash browns, biscuits, orange juice and milk. His mother said, “My, you’re hungry today.”
As he stepped off the bus, he heard hoots and catcalls directed at him from across the street at the drugstore, but he pretended not to hear them.
The first thing he did when he got to school was return the book to the library.
He found concentrating on his studies in his first few classes to be difficult. In algebra he took a quiz and made some errors in methodology, although his answers were correct. In English, his essay was well-structured and insightful, but he failed to proofread, so had some spelling and punctuation errors. In chemistry, he was content to serve as assistant to his lab partner while she selected ingredients to make an inert compound. His mind was set on the coming fight, and he couldn’t turn the dial completely to other channels.
At lunch, he sat by himself in a corner and ate quickly shepherds pie, French fries, English peas, and peach cobbler, with iced tea. Then he went to the library and skimmed magazines and newspapers, but nothing he read registered. His main goal was just to be alone, so no one else could hassle him about the upcoming fight.
When physical education class came, he went to his locker and began undressing. He reviewed mentally the basics that he had learned the night before. When he was in his shorts, T-shirt and tennis shoes, he went to the coach’s office. The other boys were already filtering out to the fields to get ready for another round of flag football.
The coach was at his desk and tall Mosco was folded into a chair beside the desk. On the desk were two pairs of boxing gloves. The coach saw Gumbo and said, “Well, Mosco, here’s one of them now. So, Umbar, you still want to do this?”
“I have to, sir.”
“Mosco, put the gloves on him.”
The gloves fit tightly as Mosco laced them and made sure they were secure. Then Cesar came in. The coach said, “Colon, these are yours,” and tossed the remaining pair of gloves to him. Mosco helped Cesar put the gloves on.
Mosco said, “Follow me. We’ve got a ring marked off.”
The two boys followed the older boy outside all the way to the back of the field, far away from the other students who had begun scrimmaging. He stopped at some clipped grass where a white ten-foot-by-ten-foot square had been painted.
The coach walked up behind them. “Listen up. You’ll be fighting standard three minute rounds and will fight at least three rounds. Mosco will be the ref. If you step outside the white lines, that’s a point for the other guy. If you clench, Mosco will tell you to let go and you have to let go. No punching below the belt. No gouging eyes. No biting. No kicking. If Mosco calls the fight, it’s over. If one of you says he wants to quit, it’s over. When I blow the whistle, the fight starts. When I blow it again, the round is over. Any questions?”
“No, sir.”
“Ok, touch gloves and get in the ring.”
They stepped in. Gumbo looked at his opponent, who looked back with a hard gaze as if he meant to knock Gumbo out quickly. Gumbo took a deep breath and raised his gloved fists. The whistle blew.
Immediately Cesar stepped in and threw a roundhouse right, but Gumbo had already started moving counterclockwise, so the punch didn’t come close to hitting him. Then Cesar threw a left hook, but Gumbo ducked into and under it and continued counterclockwise. He also pushed Cesar away, and because he was off balance, Cesar stumbled and almost stepped out of the ring, his toes crossing over onto grass. Gumbo thought that Cesar’s arms were so long that he would have trouble getting close, but he kept moving. When Cesar recovered from his stumble and turned around, the look in his eyes had changed. His new look said that he knew he’d have to work harder to put the “little runt” down. Cesar came in punching straight with his left hand, but Gumbo pushed each shot away from his face so they went either left or right. He heard someone breathing hard and realized that it was Cesar, who was expending a lot more energy than he was. Then came a swing that almost caught Gumbo; he had only time enough to throw his head back, so the glove just brushed the tip of his nose and passed by, and Gumbo heard the swish of the air as it passed. Gumbo knew that if the punch had landed he would probably be on the ground with a broken bloody nose. Instead he stepped inside and saw that Cesar’s midsection was open, so he planted his foot and drove his fist into the midsection just as he had learned in the book. Cesar grunted and moved away. The whistle blew.
Gumbo went to his corner and thought that he hadn’t realized that three minutes could be so long. He tried to breath silently, but he was breathing in deep gulps of air. Across the way, he could see Cesar’s chest heaving and his stomach quivering. He seemed to be breathing more heavily than Gumbo.
Just as his breath was coming more easily, the whistle blew again. They stepped back into the ring. Again Cesar attacked immediately, swinging and chasing Gumbo as he bobbed and back-peddled counterclockwise. One punch nicked Gumbo on the top of the head and stung, but to Gumbo the swings seemed wilder, less controlled, and he had less fear of them. Once Cesar came in so hard and wild that Gumbo had no choice but to hug his shoulders and hold on. As he held on, he could feel Cesar’s chest heaving against his and hear the heavy breathing. Mosco grabbed them and pulled them apart. The look in Cesar’s eyes had changed again; now he seemed to be looking at Gumbo with confusion. Gumbo on his part began to notice how heavy the gloves were becoming, but then he noticed that Cesar’s gloves must be getting heavy, too. Cesar held his gloves lower and wider apart than at the start of the fight. Gumbo moved and Cesar turned, but not enough to protect his open flank, so Gumbo drove a left and a right into his side. He expected Cesar to come after him again, but Cesar just stood in the middle of the ring, bobbing a little bit, but mostly trying to get his breath. Gumbo danced around, not knowing what to do. Should he attack? The whistle blew.
This time neither boy tried to disguise his heavy breathing. They both gulped in air as fast as they could. Sweat was running in streams down their backs and chests.
The whistle blew again. They stepped in, but Cesar didn’t rush in. He stood in the center of the ring, waiting. He continued to breathe heavily. Gumbo moved counterclockwise. Cesar threw a left, but it was slow and when Gumbo caught it on his glove and shoved it away, its force was more like a push than a punch. Gumbo realized that Cesar was more exhausted than he was. He moved toward Cesar, and when Cesar did nothing in response, Gumbo rapidly hit him in the midsection – one – two – three – four times and backed away. Cesar did throw a right but it struck Gumbo’s shoulder and just pushed him back. Cesar’s look had changed to resignation as if he no longer thought he could win the fight. Gumbo knew that his punches couldn’t really hurt the bigger boy, but they did send a signal that Gumbo was still willing and able to fight. Gumbo danced around, and although his arms seemed to be turning into slabs of concrete, he once more dipped in and gave a couple shots to Cesar’s midsection. Cesar was now huffing and wheezing a little and seemed to be lifting his arms by drawing his shoulders back. The whistle blew.
The coach stepped between them. “Ok, that’s three rounds. Right now, I’d call it a draw; you both got in some good licks. You boys want to continue or have you had enough?”
Gumbo looked at Cesar with his arms hanging down like broken inverted flagpoles and the gloves not fisted but unfurled, and Gumbo knew that Cesar wanted to quit but could never be the first to say so. Gumbo said, “I’m ready to quit.”
Cesar said, “Me too.”
“Good. Mosco, take their gloves off. Now listen. For fighting in class you both get three demerits. Now shake hands, go back to your teams and play fair.”
The word rushed around that the fight had been a draw. When Donnie and David questioned him, Gumbo said, “I was lucky. He could’ve killed me.”
End of "Grace under Pressure"
"Grace under Pressure" was first published in the short story collection A Collection of Nickel-plated Angels, 2008. This story is based on a real incident during my high school years in Brevard County.
The person I fought subsequently worked out and became even heavier and more muscular. A year or two later while I was home from college, I ran into him one day at a movie theater. He saw me first and walked over. When I saw his new buffed physique, my first thought was "Uh oh, what now?"
However, he reached out a hand to me and said, "Jerry, how you doing?"
I shook his hand and replied, "Fine, how 'bout you?"
"Good. I wasn't sure you'd remember me."
"I remember."
We chatted a few moments. He was married and working as a mechanic. Then we wished each other well and walked away. I never saw him again.
By the way, the title of the story comes from Hemingway's definition of courage.
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