Her face was mottled with embarrassment. She smiled inanely. He wondered if she was just slightly retarded—speaking at a pitch that was audible seemed to require an effort from her, a measure of audacity. As if she had been made to believe that no words uttered by her, no expression possible from her, could be of the slightest interest to another person; yet, she had the audacity to imagine that she could become a professional boxer . . .
And how much effort had it required for her to enter the gym, step inside this place almost entirely male, and smelling of bodies, funky sweat-smell, and everybody in sight male, at the machines, at the heavy bags, speed bags, in the badly stained ring (two lanky-limbed young guys in their twenties, black-Hispanic, eight-ounce gloves, headgear, sparring with quick sharp fists), loud voices entirely male, and on the walls posters and photos of male boxers. She had nerve, at least.
Feeling impatient with the stolid plain-faced girl but protective too thinking Keep your money. I don’t want your money. Just turn around and get out of here if you know what’s good for you.
“So—is it OK?”
“‘OK’—what?”
“You can give me lessons? Like to be a b-boxer?”
Her voice was so pleading, and the way she was breathing through her mouth like her life depended upon the next words a stranger might utter quick and glib like dealing out cards in a game in which he had nothing at stake and she had everything, how in hell could he say anything except—“Tell you what: come back tomorrow. There’s nobody got time for you tonight.”
Relief in her face, and a sudden smile that made her appear even younger, childlike with hope.
Muttering Thanks! and turning quick to leave before the stranger changed his mind.
“Wait. What’s your name?”
Mumbled what sounded like D.D. Dun-fie.
“‘D.D.’—? That’s a name?”
She laughed, blushing but pleased. “Yah. It is.”
HAMMER OF JESUS. That was her.
With Jesus’s help, that would be her.
She knew she was crude, clumsy. She knew she had much to learn. Her legs didn’t move her fast enough (yet) and her arms were short for a boxer so she’d be at a disadvantage with a longer-armed opponent. She would have to learn to take punches if she wanted to throw punches. (Which she was willing to do.) There are fights won when the stronger boxer has punched himself out on the body of his opponent like young George Foreman on the body of not-young Muhammad Ali (she’d seen on ESPN TV) and if that is a way of winning, D.D. Dunphy was eager for it.
Though she was strong she became winded quickly in the gym which was surprising to her—at work, at the Target unloading dock, D.D. Dunphy had the most stamina of anyone including the young guys.
D.D. was the one who didn’t bellyache. Didn’t complain even on freezing-cold days. Did her job and kept her mouth shut. Thinking her private thoughts while her co-workers kept up a steady stream of stupid chatter and nasty jokes of which some (she knew) were addressed to her—Just means I have to work hard at the gym. I will work hard.
She would make the name proud: Dunphy.
She would not call attention to herself for that reason, that she wished to honor her father Luther Amos Dunphy.
But, if she was questioned, if she was interviewed, on TV for instance, then she would say quietly—I am dedicating my boxing to my father Luther Amos Dunphy and to Jesus who is my Savior.
Many of the boxers she and Luke had seen on TV thanked Jesus for their victories. Many knelt in the ring to bow their heads in a quick prayer or to cross themselves if they were Catholic. The great heavyweight Evander Holyfield (who’d beat Mike Tyson in two fights for the heavyweight title) wore a baseball cap with the stitching JESUS IS LORD. George Foreman became a Christian minister. The female boxer D.D. admired most was the junior lightweight WBA champion Tanya Koznick (“The Wildcat”) who could not have been taller than five feet two inches and who fought like a wildcat in fact in defiance of safety and caution, overwhelming and intimidating her opponents with fierce flurries of blows. On the biceps of both arms Tanya Koznick brandished tattoos of the cross and she wore a small gold cross on a thin gold chain around her neck even in the boxing ring. She began TV interviews saying in a throaty broken voice she owed everything to Jesus and most of all she owed her life—Before Jesus my life was trash. Jesus lifted me up out of that trash.
Hearing these words D.D. Dunphy shuddered and felt faint as if Jesus had touched her on the forehead—lightly, with just His fingertips.