Chapter 15
Like I’ve said earlier, there are four weeks now until I fight my brother. Fighting Ruben Wolfe. I wonder how it will be, and how it will feel. What will it be like to fight — not in our backyard, but in the ring, under all the lights, and with the crowd watching and cheering and waiting for the blood? Time will tell, I suppose, or at least, these pages will.
Dad’s at the kitchen table, alone, but now, my father doesn’t look so beaten down. He looks like he’s back in it. He’s been to the brink ame back. I guess when you lose your pride, even for just a moment, you realize how much it means to you. His eyes have some strength back in them. His curly hair is spiraling at his eyebrows.
Rube’s quiet lately.
He spends a fair bit of time down in the basement, which, as you know, has been vacated by Steve. In the end, Mum offered it to everyone for their bedroom, but none of us wanted it. We said it’s because it gets so cold down there, but really, I reckon the remaining wolves in our house feel like now’s a time to stick together. I’ve felt it ever since Steve left. Not that I would say it out loud. I would never admit to Rube that I didn’t take the basement because I’d get too lonely without him. Or that I’d miss our conversations and the way he always annoys me. Or, as disgraceful as it sounds, that I’d even miss the smell of his socks and the sound of his snoring.
Just last night, I tried waking him, because that snoring of his was dead-set detrimental to my health. Sleep deprivation, I’m telling you. That is, until it gets like a pendulum again, coaxing me into sleep. Huh. Hypnosis under the influence of Ruben Wolfe’s snoring. It’s hopeless, I know, but you get used to things. You feel weird without them, like you’re not yourself anymore.
In any case, it’s Mrs. Wolfe herself who has taken hold of the basement. She has a bit of an office down there and does the tax.
On Saturday night, though, I find Rube there instead, sitting on the desk, his feet resting on the chair. It’s the night before his fight with Hitman Harry Jones. I pull the chair from his feet and sit on it.
“Y’ right there?” He glares at me.
“I am, yeah. It’s a pretty nice chair.”
“Don’t worry about my feet,” he goes on. “They’re danglin’ now ‘cause of you.”
“Ah y’ poor bloke.”
“Got that right.”
I swear it.
Brothers.
We’re strange.
In here, he won’t give me an inch, but out in the world, he’ll defend me to the death. The frightening thing is that I’m the same. We all seem to be.
A pause yawns through the air, before Rube and I start speaking without looking at each other. Personally, I look at a blotch on the wall, wondering, What is that? What the hell is it? As for Rube, I can sense that he has lifted his feet to the desk and rests his chin on his knees. His eyes, I imagine, are fixed straight ahead, on the old cement stairs.
“Hitman Harry,” I begin.
“Yeah.”
“You reckon he’s any good?” “May
Then, right in the middle of it all, Rube says, “I’m gonna tell ‘em.” His statement brings with it no extra attention, no movement. No prospect of believing that he’s thought out what he has said just now. It’s been decided long ago.
The only problem is, I have no idea what he’s talking about.
“Tell who what?” I inquire.
“Can you really be that thick?” He turns to me now, a savage look on his face. “Mum and Dad, y’ yobbo.” “I’m not a yobbo.”
I hate it when he calls me that. Yobbo. I think I hate it worse than faggot. It makes me feel like I’m eating a pie and drinking Carlton Cold and like I’ve got a beer gut the size of Everest.
“Anyway,” he goes on impatiently, “I’m tellin’ Mum and Dad about the boxing. I’m sick of the sneakin’ round.”
I stop.
Think it over in my mind. “When y’ gonna tell ‘em?” “Just before you and me fight.” “Are you crazy?” “What’s wrong with that?”
“They’ll keep us from fighting and Perry’ll kill us.”
“No, they won’t.” He has a plan. “We’ll just promise that it’s the last time we’ll ever fight each other.” Is this part of Rube wanting a real fight? Telling Mum and Dad? Telling them the truth? “They can’t stop us, anyway. They might as well see us for what we are.”
What we are.
I repeat it, in my head.
What we are…
Then I ask it.
“What are we?”
And there’s silence.
What are we?
What are we?
The weird thing about the question is that not long ago we knew exactly what we were. It was who we were that was the problem. We were vandals, backyard fighters, just boys. We knew what words like that meant, but the words Ruben and Cameron Wolfe were a mystery. We had no idea where we were going.
Or maybe that’s wrong.
Maybe who you are is what you are.
I don’t know.
I just know that right now, we want to be proud. For once. We want to take the struggle and rise above it. We want to frame it, live it, survive it. We want to put it in our mouths and taste it and never forget it, because it makes us strong.
Then Rube cuts me open.
He slits my doubt from throat to hip.
He repeats it and answers it. “What are we?” A brief laugh. “Who knows what they will see, but if they come and watch us fight, they’ll know that we’re brothers.”
That’s it!
That’s what we are — maybe the only thing I can be sure of.
Brothers.
All the good things that involves. All the bad things. I nod.
“So we’ll tell ‘em?” He’s looking at me now. I see him. “Yeah.”
It’s agreed, and I must confess that I myself get obsessed with the idea. I want to run up immediately and tell everyone. Just to let it out of me. Instead, I concentrate on what lies ahead before it. I have three fights of my own to survive, and I must watch Rube fight and the way his opponents fight him. I can’t make the same mistakes they make. I’ve gotta go the distance, and for his sake, I have to give him a fight, not just another win.
To my own surprise, I win my next fight — a points decision.
Right after me, Rube puts the Hitman to bed midway through the fourth round.
The week after, I lose in the fifth, and the last fight before my meeting with Rube is a good one. It’s at Maroubra, and compared with my first ever bout there, this time, I walk in and throw punches without hesitating. I’m not scared of being hit anymore. Maybe I’ve grown used to it. Or perhaps I know that the end is near for me. The guy I’m fighting doesn’t come out for the last round. He’s too wobbly, and I feel for him. I know how it feels to not want the last round. I know how it feels to concentrate hard on just standing, let alone even thinking about throwing punches. I know how it is for the fear to outweigh the physical pain.
Watching Rube fight later, I see something.
I find out why no one beats him, or why they don’t even come close. It’s because they don’t think they can win. They don’t believe they can do it, and they don’t want it badly enough.
To survive him, I have to believe I can beat him.
It’s easier said than done.
“Hey Cam?”
“It’s about time.”
“About time for what?”
“About time you started the talkin’.”
“I’ve got somethin’ important to say.“Yeah?”
“We’ll tell ‘em tomorrow.”
“Y’ sure?”
“Yes. I’m sure.”
“When?”
“After dinner.”
“Where?”
“Kitchen.”
“Okay.”
“Good. Now shut up. I wanna get some sleep.”
Later, when he starts snoring, I tell him.
“I’m gonna beat you.” But personally, I’m not really too convinced.