The audience outside the cage applauded and cheered. Not long after, Quarry emerged and came toward us, as if knowing in advance that I’d be coming to see him tonight.
Quarry was taller than me, but thin, with cheekbones that protruded from his face like rocks from a mountainside. He had a thin beard and penetrating eyes that said he would just as soon kill you as put up with any bullshit or weakness. “I thought I recognized a new face,” he said, walking over. He smiled but it didn’t touch his eyes.
“Justin Brown, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m not sir, Justin. This isn’t your daddy’s gym. Everyone here calls me Quarry.”
“Got it.” I smiled, feeling silly.
“To what do I owe the pleasure?”
He seemed like a man who didn’t appreciate any bullshit, so I got right to the point. “I parted ways with Coach Jansen and thought maybe I could come train with your team.”
Quarry didn’t change his expression. “Parted ways? What does that mean?”
“It means that he told me he doesn’t think I’m ready to go pro. Drew Ellis told me the other day that he was going to sign me if I won my next fight. But my coach said he didn’t think I was emotionally ready, so I decided to move on.”
Quarry smiled a little. “Emotionally ready?” He looked at Z. “You hear that shit?”
“I heard it.” Z laughed softly.
“Well, I don’t even know what the fuck that means. I train fighters here, not therapists.”
“That’s what I heard, and that’s why I came.”
“So, can you start right away?” Quarry demanded.
Relieved, I nodded. “Absolutely. I could start tomorrow.” Then I remembered my cut. “I do have to wait a few more days to let these stitches heal,” I said, gesturing to my eye. “But then I can go full contact, no problem.”
Quarry’s expression transformed to one of annoyance. “I thought you said you were ready to go.” He sighed. “Look, Justin. Why don’t you go back to your coach, or…I don’t know. Do whatever you need to do. I’m not interested in any special cases.”
His dismissive attitude pissed me off. “I said I’m ready to go.”
He looked at me again, his eyes focused in on mine. “You want in with my team, that means you’ve got to pass a fitness challenge. Tonight.”
I shrugged. “Let’s do it. I’m ready for anything.”
Quarry got a huge, excited smile on his face as he clapped me on the shoulder and squeezed. He turned me to face the room. There were about fifteen people there who were now looking at us.
“We’ve got a live one, boys!” he shouted.
Everyone must have known what that meant, because people began cheering and whooping and hollering, even more excitedly than they’d been for the fight in the cage a couple of minutes ago.
That got my adrenaline flowing.
Z bent down and whispered softly to me in his deep voice. “Just stay composed and keep your mind strong,” he said. “You got this, I know it.”
“Thanks,” I said to him.
“Okay, my man,” Quarry said, shepherding me forward. “Our friend Justin Brown, also known as JB—”
“Does that stand for Jail Bait?” A short guy with a goatee shouted.
“Maybe so,” Quarry replied. “Maybe so. In any case, JB, you have to get down and give us as many pushups as you can in five minutes. When you’re done, you do as many sit-ups as you can do in five minutes. After that, you go over to the heavy bag and work that over with kicks and punches for five. Got it?”
“Got it.” It didn’t sound that bad—but I knew it couldn’t be that simple.
“Then go!” Quarry shouted in my face.
A moment later, the group of people in the gym had swarmed around me in a rough circle, yelling and screaming insults, as I got down and started to do my five minutes of pushups.
I remembered what Z had told me and just focused on keeping my cool and pacing myself. I knew I could do pushups for a long time. I’d been busting out a few hundred a day with ease when I wrestled in high school and I’d only gotten in better shape over the last few years.
Still, five minutes of anything without a break is very difficult, and at about four minutes in, my arms were shaking.
“We got noodle arms, I repeat we got noodle arms!” Someone laughed.
I kept going. Finally, Quarry called time. “Five minutes are up, JB, now you have five minutes of sit-ups.”
I breathed deeply for a few seconds, but the yelling grew positively deafening.
“He’s stalling!”
“Come on, you fucking *!”
“Do it! Get going!”
I was getting angry. These guys were a bunch of idiots. What the hell was I doing here, when I could have been back at my old gym with my normal training partners instead of undergoing hazing with the MMA team from hell?
But then I thought about Coach Jansen telling me I was stupid, telling me I wasn’t
“emotionally ready” to fight professionally. Taking my dream away from me just because he could. I’d make him regret that decision.
My motivation came back in a burst of rage, and I started on my sit-ups with a fury. The five minutes passed by in a flash, and the crowd around me was quieting a little bit. I’d shut them up by doing what I needed to do.