The Chief Read Free

cut.
    â€œTake him out, now,” Alfred is screaming, and Sonny surges forward, he’s got Viera on the ropes, pounding him with his left, ignoring the blood and white stuff oozing over his eye and down his face. He’s going to win, he’s going to win!
    But suddenly, an instant before Iron Pete gets smelted, the referee plunges between them and waves off the fight. He points to Sonny’s bloody eyebrow. He holds up Viera’s arm. If he didn’t, Viera would fall down.
    And that’s it. A technical knockout for Viera. TKO. I’d score it a TRO, a technical ripoff.
    Jake is screaming and Alfred is screaming, and a voice that sounds a lot like mine is screaming, but Sonny just shrugs and walks back to his corner, his shoulders slumped.
    It’s over.
    Maybe it’s all over. Seventeen fights in two years, win thirteen, lose four, every loss a hometown heist. That’s no record for a future champion of the world. It’s the record of an “opponent,” a nobody who’s good enough to put up a decent fight but not good enough to win the big ones.
    The crowd is chanting, “I-un PETE, I-un PETE,” as Viera dances around the ring flexing the eagle’s wings. Sonny vaults the ropes and rushes off to the dressing room. We scramble to get Alfred back into the chair. Usually we have to clear a path for Sonny through thecrowd. But this time no one bothers him. Sonny’s invisible.
    Maybe that’s the last bad sign.
    Hang it up.

3
    T HERE’S A CAR WRECK and a stabbing ahead of us, so we sit in the emergency room for an hour before a nurse takes a close look at Sonny’s eyebrow. She shrugs, makes a mark on her clipboard and walks away.
    â€œSo this is where it ends, in an all-night blood hole in a dead-end town.” I don’t realize I’m saying it out loud while I tap it into the laptop.
    â€œWrite it down if you have to,” says Alfred, “but shut up.”
    â€œLeave him alone,” says Sonny.
    Alfred wheels around. “Now you want to fight?”
    â€œHe did the best he could,” I say.
    â€œI hope not,” says Alfred.
    â€œDon’t matter now,” says Sonny.
    â€œHi there. You okay?” The TV producer marches in and leans over to peer at Sonny’s eye. “You were jobbed out there. I hope weweren’t part of the problem.”
    â€œâ€™S okay,” says Jake. “He’s a professional.”
    â€œWas,” says Sonny.
    She gets it right away. “You’re not going to quit?”
    â€œAnnounce my retirement on your show.”
    â€œThe way you were fighting tonight, you might as well quit,” she says. “You started too slow. You didn’t bring the fight to him until it was too late.”
    â€œWhat makes you think you know so much?” I ask, trying to get some sneer into my voice to hide the tremble.
    â€œI’m a producer. I know everything.” Her smile makes my liver quiver. “The deck was stacked. You had to knock Pete out to win. Ever since the fishing rights case around here, the locals’ve had it in for Native Americans. Think they had something to do with closing down their factory.”
    â€œAlways be something,” says Jake. “Got to overcome it. Learn from it.”
    â€œSonny learned how to fight one-handed tonight,” she said. “What happened to the right? Broken?”
    â€œDon’t want that in your movie,” says Alfred.
    â€œHey, I’m easy.” She smiles. “I might like to shoot your next fight.” As the desk nurse passes us again she calls out, “You know, we have a hurt person here.”
    â€œEverybody in here’s hurt, honey,” says the nurse, popping out her words as if she’s snapping gum.
    â€œBut not everybody comes in with the media.” She flips open her wallet and shows the nurse a card. “Would you call your supervisor please, before I call my camera