#598 Life in the Flesh- Craig Davidson

#598 Life in the Flesh- Craig Davidson

There has always been drama in boxing. Pure aggression mixed with elegant precision; years of work put in to a three minute round; facing a brutal opponent but the real battle is inside the fighter’s head. The stories almost write themselves. 

“A prizefighter is a freak. He’s got maybe ten years in the roughest business in the world, a business ruled by a strict hierarchy: winners and losers. He’s not a paperhanger, a lawyer, a beancounter. He doesn’t put on galoshes, grab his briefcase, catch the trolley, the same daily grind for thirty, forty years. He gives it all now, or never.”

Of course, they don’t write themselves, and Davidson takes his story to an interesting place. This story is about a boxer, Roberto. He killed a man in the ring. It was a legal fight and a fair contest, but a man died, and everyone saw him do it. It immediately ruined Roberto. He stopped training, started drinking and eventually moved to Thailand running away from his demons.

Once a fighter always a fighter. In Thailand, Roberto found the world of Muay Thai. Now twenty five years later he is a trainer still living in Thailand: “You can’t outrun this life. Sounds weak, I know, but it’s the truth. Whether it was bred into me or whether I’ve always harbored the best has long ceased to matter.”

His old manager now sends him hard-cases to train with the Muay Thai fighters to toughen them up. The most recent is a bruiser named The Kid. When his ego and body take a beating in his first fight, Roberto gets a fight he wasn’t expecting. 

Rating: 8-8-8-8 Total= 31

#563 Friction- Craig Davidson

#563 Friction- Craig Davidson

This is a story about Sam, he’s a sex addict, and because his addiction lead to the loss of his “real” job, he is now a porn star. He has an ex-wife, and a daughter who he has partial custody of.

We hear some of his testimonials at various Sex Addict group meetings, he goes to several a week. Him and his sponsor often call each other when they are in weaker moments, and instead of talking each other down, they usually “give this one a pass.” When he sees a girl he knows at a meeting—a recent fluffer from a porn shoot—he thinks she could be a match. So, I guess this is a love story.

You get what you get when the topic is sex addiction, so expect most of this to be NSFW, but its not really all that different from any other good short story, minus the explicit nature. Imagine Chuck Palahniuk writing about addiction groups in Fight Club but this one doesn’t go over the edge or take wild dark turns like a Palahniuk story (not saying that’s good or bad).

Rating: 8-7-7-7 Total= 29

#535 On Sleepless Roads- Craig Davidson

#535 On Sleepless Roads- Craig Davidson

Graham is a repo-man. He gets up in the pre-dawn hours to repossess vehicles from those missing payments. 95 % of the time, he manages to complete his job without incident; other times, things can get violent. He has been doing this work, on sleepless roads, for twenty-five years.

His wife, Nell is suffering from a degenerative disease called Bradykinesia. It has caused her to lose control over the movement of her body. She shakes uncontrollably and her walk, once a thing of amazement and beauty to Graham, is no longer what it once was.

We see graham go through a few repo stops, and we see some of the tactics people use to beg for their stuff back. In a rare scene, we actually see graham take pity on a man and lets his temporarily keep his trailer.

Rating: 7-7-6-7 Total= 27

#500 Rocket Ride- Craig Davidson

#500 Rocket Ride- Craig Davidson

Wow, I’ve reached 500 stories! This will probably mark the half way point. I’m having so much fun with this, I’ll definitely try for 1,000 short stories in as many days. Thanks everyone for following along—or at least for checking in every once in a while.

This is a story about a killer whale nearly killing a trainer at a water park. Ben was about to perform the show’s big climactic jump when the whale decided to exact revenge for the brutality of captivity. His leg was bitten off and he nearly died.

“I was the one who fed her. Taught her. Kept her alive. I came to belive she belonged to me, the way land or a car can belong to a person. I forgot that every time I entered the water I belonged to her, and the moment I remembered was the moment it ceased to matter.”

He is having a hard time dealing with his trauma and his new leg-less reality. He lashes out at those wanting to help, he seeks comfort in the wrong places. And he wonders if he deserves the pain he has:

“I think of these things. Casual brutalities, unthinking and profane. Think of them often.”

He retunes to the scene of the crime, and asks his attacker/victim for one last ride, some closure, and perhaps some karmic balance.

Notable Passage: “There is only acceptance, and hope that, in those slender moments separating what is from what may be, there might be understanding.”

Rating: 9-8-9-8 Total= 34

#479 A Mean Utility- Craig Davidson

#479 A Mean Utility- Craig Davidson

If you’re an animal lover, this one could be hard to get through. James and Allsion breed and fight Pit Bulls. We see in graphic and terrible detail the scene of one of their animals winning a dog fight, but then being put down because of injuries sustained during the fight.

They are also trying unsuccessfully to have a child. Impotence and powerlessness are themes running through this one. That and over compensation for said impotence. I don’t care what kinds of lessons these two learn from their dog fighting world, their lack of judgment and compassion would make them lousy parents. If that makes me judgmental…so be it.

Rating: 7-7-7-6 Total= 27

#458 The Rifleman- Craig Davidson

#458 The Rifleman- Craig Davidson

There’s a certain type of father that gets banned from attending his son’s little league athletics. Usually it’s one of two things: an over-bearing loud attitude that puts too much pressure on the kid, or public intoxication. Hank Mikan was guilty of both. He wanted his son Jason to be the next great basketball shooter, a rifleman. He would drill him until late at night when the neighbors began complaining about the noise.

Now as Jason is about to get college offers, Hank is barely a part of his life, and not by choice. He is one step away from being a homeless drunk. He is an embarrassment for Jason who wants nothing to do with him. He has made him hate the thing he is best at. The only thing his son has in common with him is basketball. When you get rid of that, what happens?

Rating: 7-7-8-7 Total= 29

#411 Rust and Bone- Craig Davidson

#411 Rust and Bone- Craig Davidson

This is the title story of Davidson’s award winning short story collection. Eddie is a fighter, a boxer. This is who he is.

“Fighting becomes a job, stepping into the ring punching a clock. It’s a pragmatic pursuit, opponent’s equations to be solved using the chimerical physics of reach, height, spacing, leverage, heart. You’d no more fight outside the ropes than a factory lineman would work a shift for no pay.”

However, he does fight outside the ring, just not with his fists. The story starts with an explanation about the 28 bones in each hand, the intricacies of them and their fragility. You can teach a boxer footwork, build his abs to take body blows, but if you break the bones in your hand, that is a weakness that will stay with you for your whole career.

“You fight, you lose, you fight, you win, you fight.”

Rating: 8-8-8-8 Total= 32