Barbra’s First Fight
The car came for Barbra at six thirty sharp just like it was promised. Barbra was worried it would be some gypsy hack, but they had sprung for a professional limo service. She’d be riding to the warehouse in Hunts Point in a comfortable town car, and Barbra valued the fact the driver knew she didn’t want to talk about what she was about to do. He figured she was a sex worker, and she was in a way, but the main commodity Barbra was selling was violence. She certainly didn’t look the part when she stepped into the car. She was a sweet faced college girl, the closest thing to a manic pixie dream girl this side of Zooey Deschanel with her long bangs and thick curly auburn hair that went to her mid back. While it normally was free to run wild, or held in a ponytail to one side, Barbra had put the finishing touches on her milkmaid braid. She had incorporated a black bandana on each of the two pigtail braids and now was wrapping them around her head till it formed a crown of reddish hair and black fabric. She had been told that the customers liked to see hair fly, that a bounce from a ponytail when she took a hit was good for business. Barbra didn’t care about what was good for business, all she cared about was getting out of in one piece and didn‘t see the need to give her opponent something to grab.
Barbra was the first person in her family to go to college, and as such she really thought there was a difference between the degree you get at a state school and one you get a fancy private university on the East coast. So Barbra studied hard, got good grades, and managed to land a scholarship that took her from the soy bean fields of Indiana to the hallowed halls of academia of the North East. Let’s just say Barbra went to one of the seven sisters for her degree in social working and leave it at that.
She struggled at from the very beginning, even with her scholarship, to find the school work balance that would allow her to both pass her classes and allow her to eat on a regular basis. Jobs that paid well-tended not to allow much study time, ones that didn’t have a lot of hours meant little money. Barbra had been given a stipend to pay for room and board, and foolishly decided Barbra would be fun to spend a couple months in New York City. Her monthly allowance for room and board didn’t even cover room. Barbra had to bus tables to make rent, she lived on shift meals. It was funny because while Barbra worked as an extern trying to help families with single mothers get the help they desperately need she was leading a hand to mouth existence herself. Barbra considered getting pregnant at one point so she could qualify for some of the programs she helped other women sign up for. Barbra was too smart to fall for that sort of trap, she told herself, and she prided herself on that.
She was hanging on by a thread just as it was, when a snow storm cut the string that was holding her up. Business was down, which meant her hours were cut, which meant she didn’t eat. The sous chef knew as much and let her eat family meal one night when she showed up because “she misread the schedule.” One of the girls she was supposed to be helping caught her stealing from the food pantry one day at the Mission she externed at. Barbra told her about her money situation, and Cindy told her how she could make some money.
“Some of the fellas’ from the neighborhood pay bitches to fight in front of them,” she said, “They pay more if you’re a stacked, but shit you’re a white girl, that’s got to be worth something.”
Barbra didn’t like idea of trading on her skin color. Hell she wasn’t crazy about the idea of fighting for money in some back ally. At the end of the day, she hated the idea of asking for a handout even worse. Barbra made the call, an Eastern European guy picked up. He wanted a picture of Barbra. He seemed impressed enough to hire her with just one pic, Cindy was right, they didn’t get many white chicks at least not from America. They were having a fight in three days,
“We send car for you. It important you make fight, no girls no fights.” he said.
“That won‘t be necessary,” Barbra protested.
“Is no trouble, really we own taxi service. After fight we take you home or to hospital, you choose.” The Russian said this as if this was like choosing between two flavors or ice cream.
“I can take the train.”
“Is not a good idea, little gurl. The neighborhood is not safe for pretty gurls like you. And we are concerned you may get scared of building and run away. We need gurls for the fights.”
Barbra could see why someone might want to run away from here, the fights were taking place in a vacant warehouse, the sort of location that would make for a great movie backdrop for a slasher film. Inside the warehouse it was just a foreboding. Space heaters had been brought in, but it was still cold enough to see everyone’s breath.
That means it is going to sting when you get hit, Barbra thought, like you thought it would feel good getting hit before you knew it was cold, she chided herself.
There were maybe a half dozen other girls scattered about the room, and gathered around them were groups of men. Some were the Eastern European guys in track suits with gold chains, who were either mobbed up or trying to look like it. There were several black men, ranging in ages from 18 to their 70’s; one group seemed to be making the underground fights a multigenerational bonding adventure. There were run of the mill Guidos and Brosikis, who the track suit guys had to remind “No touching girls, bro.”
The room stopped dead in its tracks when Barbra entered. Barbra thought she was good looking, but she never commanded a room’s attention like this before. Everyone stared at her like she was as out of place here as a live rabbit would be in the middle of dinner party. Her style ran towards hipster chic, but her vintage coat and handbag were chosen as much for the fact they were priced right at the thrift shop as they were for style. Still the nervous grin she wore wasn’t helping. A couple of the guys cat called, not a good sign as she was still wearing her winter coat. Now every girl here hated her. Not that she imagined getting into a knockdown drag out brawl would endear her to which ever lady she was fighting. All Barbra wanted to do was fade into a corner and get warmed up for her fight, but that wasn’t possible now.
Barbra started to head to some of the track suit mafia when she heard a voice that stopped her dead in her tracks.
“Oh hell no! Hell no, little Miss Sunshine from the mission didn’t drag her ass to Hunts Point to try and talk me out of fightin’” proclaimed Aaliyah, in her normal voice, which was 40 decibel louder than it needs to be. Aaliyah was a young mother, just 18, with two kids. She had her hair in twists that came down to the middle of her back, honey brown eyes, and decent figure, more impressive if you consider she had two children. “You are just wasting yo’ time. I ain’t going back wit you, al’ight. I need this money, and nothing you can say will change that so don’t try and talk me outta’ this.”
“I’m not here to talk you out of this, Aaliyah.” Barbra said.
“You ain’t?” Aaliyah was puzzled. “Why you here then?”
“I’m here to fight.”
Aaliyah let out a boisterous laugh, like Barbra said something funnier than Kevin Hart, Richard Pryor, and Eddie Murphy put together. The other girls joined in. Barbra was furious, for the first time since she agreed to do this she was looking forward to hitting another girl.
“Why you really here, girl, is it for someone else?” Aaliyah demanded to know. “You are tellin’ me you care about someone else here but don’t give two shit what I do. I thought you said you wanted to help me and my babies.”
“Not today. I just want to get paid.”
Aaliyah extend her fist to get some dap on that. “You got that right… Ha, ha, so who are you fighting?”
“I don’t care.”
“You don’t care?” Aaliyah was excited now “Hey Gregor, I’m fighting this bitch here, OK?”
“Why you want to fight white gurl. You know her? She steals your man with her white cooze?”
“As if, I just want an easy win, Gregor”
“Is too bad, you hellcats really tear into each other when man is involved. You twos fight second.”
Barbra was shaking with furry as she walked away from Aaliyah, she didn’t like that they thought she was a pushover. On the other hand she’d never fought here before. Barbra found a crate to sit on and took off her coat. Like the other fighters she was down to a wife beater and shorts, but while they favored denim she wore her workout gear a black pair of running shorts. The man she spoke with only really required the wife beater, and remaindered her to make sure it was a white one, “It shows the blood better, bro.”
A couple of spectators in a cloud of smoke came over to inspect her, they seemed to approve her decision to tie a knot in her tank top and expose her toned belly.
“Shortie got abs yo’,” they said to themselves like she wasn’t there. “No titties, no ass, but she got abs.”
Barbra felt a little less than human, like a piece of meat. She’d endured catcalls before, what woman hadn’t, but now men were actively critiquing her chance in a fight and if they should bet on her. The general trend of the line was she didn’t stand much of a chance, and the gamblers didn‘t mind saying it in front of her. She was a non-entity to them. Barbra reminded herself she needed to stay focus, to channel the anger for her fight. She took a roll of medical tape and began to wrap her hands with practiced precision.
“Yo, can this bitch do that?” one of the bros asked the Track Suit mafia pointing to the half taped hand. The hirsute bald man looked at Barbra for a moment and gave a little shrug of his shoulders as if to say “What difference will it make?” or maybe “I don’t really care.” Rules were light here; Gregor explained them as “You bitches fight till there is winner. How you do it we really don’t care.”
The gamblers had finally left her alone, the first fight had started and shouts of a couple different languages filled the air, all of them seemed to be expressing the same sentiment “Kill the bitch.” Barbra tried to stretch out a little, she was tense, it was hard not to be. She knew she was about to fight, and even with the constant smoking of cheap cigars and expensive weed, the smell of blood was still strong in this place. She switched to doing a little invisible jump rope to try and get the blood flowing in this cold, but it wasn’t happening. The primal screams of the fight called to her. She wanted to look and she what was going on, like you wanted to see a gruesome auto wreck. Finally Barbra gave up, threw her coat on her shoulders and head to the crowd to try and get a glimpse of the action.
A corpulent man in his 50’s noticed the shivering girl standing behind trying to get a peek at the fight. He was the first guy to treat her as something worthy of more than his passing attention since she arrived. He put an arm around her and whispered yelled in her ear, “You’re scared because you’ve never fought before. Come here and get a good look, just remember it is too late to back out now, sweet cheeks.” The fat man pushed her to through the crowd to the front cupping her ass the whole time. Barbra was taken aback by what she saw when she got to the front, she wanted to throw up. There was no ring or cage for the girls to fight in, it was an honest to god pit dug into the warehouse floor through a busted up section of the concrete. All the girls had been called referred to as bitches since she started talking to the guys who organized these fights. Now it made sense, when it wasn’t catfights it was dog fights with these scumbags. Two women were covered in scratches and claw marks rolling around in the dirt as men screamed bloody murder fighting in the same conditions as animals.
Barbra pushed her way out of the crowd with tears in her eyes. She wasn‘t sure what upset her more, the fact she was letting herself and the other women get treated, no abused like animals, or the fact she was supporting guys who abused animals. She broke out of the crowd and moved a few yards from them to vent a little, in seconds a big track suit wearing man was standing over her, “Scared little gurl, you still are having to fight.”
Hands one her knees, Barbra fought to hold back the tears as she looked up at the mobster. “You’ll get your damn fight. I‘m just a little nervous, OK.”
“I am knowing fear, little gurl, everyone fears me. I am making sure you no run away.”
There was screaming from the pit now, Barbra could hear a woman over the grunts of the gamblers. Now the gamblers shouted louder than the woman. The fight was over, there was a winner. Barbra fought to get control of herself. She really wasn’t scared. She wanted to hit every single person in this place. The girls who hated her, the men who dismissed her chances, the sick bastards who organized this. Barbra even wanted to hit herself at this point; she was giving these men the spectacle they wanted. She was supporting the criminal empire as much as the customers by fighting. She was too proud to call home for money, not like they had it, too proud to admit she couldn’t afford this damn externship, and so she felt she deserved to be here. Here in a shitty warehouse watching a limp body covered in blood get dragged out of a pit, the so called winner hardly looking any better.
The burly man in the track suit tugged Barbra towards the pit, “It’s time.” Faced with the reality of the situation Barbra snapped to it. She forced herself to get ahead of mobster; it wouldn’t do to be seen getting dragged to the fight. She held her head up high as she walked past the parted crowd and pretended she couldn’t see the trail of blood that the lead from the pit. She hopped into the pit without a second thought and took up a fighting position with her back to the wall. The pit itself might have been the warmest place in the whole shithole, the earth really was warmer if you dug down, in this case four feet to make a fighting arena, and hot lights illuminated her and everything else in the hole. There was rough edges of concrete all around the hole and Barbra reminded herself to avoid them at all costs. That said that didn’t allow much room to move around, the pit was maybe 15 feet in diameter.
Aaliyah was helped down into the pit, she wore faded blue Daisy Dukes what one featured a rhinestone embellishment of some sort but had fell away save for the odd sparkle here or there. Her warm chocolate skin stood out brightly against the white top she wore. Her twisted locks were tied back now exposing her long neck. Aaliyah was trying to mean mug when she got into the pit, scare the white girl worse than she was, but she couldn’t. Seeing Barbra with her taped fists up and her boxer’s shuffle, it just made Aaliyah laugh, “Check out Fighting Irish over here, we ain’t here to box bitch. This the streets, we here to fight buck wild!”
The brothers in the crowd cheered her on. For what it was worth Barbra thought she had the support of the tracksuit mafia and the bros, something about fights causes people to divide along racial lines. Aaliyah paced back and forth like a tiger ready to be let loose, the two of them were about the same size. Aaliyah might have been two inches taller, and weighed a little more, but they were within ten pounds of each other.
Gregor yelled out “Fight, bitches!” and the battle was on. Aaliyah couldn’t resist playing to the crowd a bit more, she took up an exaggerated boxing stance of the Notre Dame mascot as she skirted the edge of the pit. Barbra circled with Aaliyah but toward the center of the battleground hands up by her head. It was funny to the brothers for maybe five seconds, at ten seconds they were ready for the girls to start tearing into each other. Aaliyah made her move she charged forward with clawing strikes but got nothing, Barbra side stepped her and landed a glancing jab. Aaliyah was pissed, the white girl hit hard, she tightened up her stance. The black girl threw a crispy combination, jab, cross, jab that Barbra slapped away before countering with a right cross of her own. It was right on the money, she drove her first right into Aaliyah’s nose and sending her crashing onto her ass. While she sat in the dirt a torrent of blood started to flow from her nose, drenching her chin and top. Aaliyah couldn’t believe it, the crowd couldn’t believe it, someone yelled out, “Dammmmn, shortie got hands.” The only person who didn’t seemed surprised was Barbra, who was shaking out her right hand. She just wished she bought more tape at this point.
Aaliyah wasn’t going to wait for her opponent to get her head into the fight. “Thai-bo won’t save you now, bitch,” she roared as she shot in for a takedown of the white girl. Aaliyah got a hold of one of the smooth pale legs of her opponent, but couldn’t get the other one. Barbra had catlike reflexes and moved to widen her stance to stabilize herself. While Aaliyah worked to pull Barbra down from her knees the white girl rained down hammer fists to the back of Aaliyah’s head. After five strikes Aaliyah let go and fell to the ground, Barbra landed a soccer kick to the black girl’s ribs that sent her rolling to the walls of the pit.
“What the hell,” Aaliyah stammered as she clutched at her sides. She’d been in plenty of fights on the streets of New York, how could a hick from French Lick, Indiana whup her.
“Country strong, bitch.” Barbra said, almost as if she could read her opponent’s mind. The white girl charged at Aaliyah and drove a knee into her face then started pounding her with hammer fists. Country strong was only part of the story. When she wasn’t helping on the farm she was rolling with her brothers, both of them amateur wrestlers in high school. Barbra was state champ for girls three years in a row, not that she considered beating the same four girls nearly as impressive as when she placed 3rd in state wrestling freshmen and sophomore boys her senior year. As for her hands, her grandfather was an old sergeant who used to love when his granddaughter beat the boys with the gloves in the backyard boxing matches during the summer.
Aaliyah was hurt, but had enough base fighting instincts to try and fight back, she sunk her claws into Barbra‘s tits and face while she took shots to her kidneys. A sharp roaring scream from Barbra at least gave Aaliyah the knowledge that Barbra didn‘t like her face getting scratched. The white girl stopped punching for a second to return the favor, sinking her nails into Aaliyah‘s pretty face. Seeing her opening Aaliyah drove forward and put Barbra on her back. Now that she was on top Aaliyah started her comeback, chocking the white girl with one hand, clawing her tits with the other. All the while she dripped blood into Barbra’s face. The comeback was short lived. Reversing a pin was easy for a wrestler like, Barbra; she was back on top in seconds.
Strattling Aaliyah’s hips Barbra paint brushed Aaliyah with slaps. Her eye was already blackened from the knee, her nose was broken from the first punch, and Barbra was very concerned the fight might be over before it started. If she was going to be a hellhole like this for a few buck, somebody had to suffer.
“Come on and fight back, you stupid bitch,” mocked Barbra as Aaliyah struggled to claw at the redhead’s face and bucked her hips. Every time it looked like she would break free, Barbra took control. She pressed down one knee into Aaliyah’s guts, right on her liver, the pain of which was debilitating. Then Barbra grabbed hold of the black girl’s tank top, “If you won’t give them a show then I will.”
Barbra ripped the bloody garment off her opponent and then tore into rival’s chest. She was trying to maul Aaliyah’s breasts and tear her bra open in equal measure. The gamblers loved the vicious streak the white girl had, and roared as the young mother’s breasts made an appearance. Some guys laughed most just screamed encouragement as Barbra squeezed Aalihay’s tits for all she was worth. Barbra wanted blood, but what she got was white not red. “It’s been a while since this farm girl had to milk a fat cow like you.”
Aaliyah had never been so hurt, so humiliated, in all her life. She wanted to quit, to give up, but she needed that money. The shear helplessness of her situation gave her strength she shoved Barbra off her and somehow staggered to her feet. Aaliyah wasted no time in getting back to the fight, she had to strike now or it was all over. The young mother managed to get her claws into the white girl when they were both standing up, one hand ripped at the braids wrapped around Barbra’s head. The other hand tore down Barbra’s wife beater exciting the crowd some more. Most of the time fighter just tried to hurt one another, and in truth Aaliyah was hoping to sink her claws into Barbra’s tits, but the girl was that slippery. She was almost impossible to hold onto, were it not for her handful of hair, Aaliyah was sure that Barbra would have created separation. With retreat out of the equation, the country girl embraced pain. She did feel the need for her to suffer for this spectacle was justified, but she planning on winning never the less. When Aaliyah tugged at her hair Barbra went with the momentum and pile drove an uppercut into the black girl’s ribs. Barbra’s sore right had gone numb at this point in the fight and she felt more free to use it. It found home in the soft scared belly of the Aaliyah. The black girl landed a good punch to Barbra’s chin, but she took it in style. She yanked at Aaliyah’s twists in retaliation exposing her chin as the young mother screamed in pain and then Barbra clocked her in the chin twice in rapid succession.
Aaliyah fell back but took Barbra with her. In the dirt Barbra still had the advantage, she had the black girl in side control, her legs pinned on arm, her chest pinned Aaliyah’s chest to the ground. Barbra choked Aaliyah with her forearm while she began to pry Aaliyah’s hand from her hair one finger at a time. Finally free of the death grip on hair Barbra took over, she spun her body so she had Aaliyah pinned with a reverse schoolgirl pin. Barbra pinned down Aaliyah’s arms with her legs and smothered her face with her ass. Aaliyah was trying to bridge out of the hold but Barbra had other idea. A solid potato to the gut took the rise out of Aaliyah’s bridge. Now Barbra could get to her brutal work. She pounded on the black girl’s belly for all she was worth with unreal speed and power. Here was a fist for the creepy fat guy, here was one for the stupid bros in their baseball caps, here was one for bastards who staged these godforsaken fights. Aaliyah had enough at this point, but Barbra pretended not to notice Aaliyah had stopped clawing her thighs and now was tapping out on one. Barbra kept hitting the soft belly under her, here was a fist for disrespecting her, here was one for underestimating her, here was a fist for each of the other bitches here who thought they were better than her. Barbra could feel Aaliyah stop moving under her, she had passed out from the pain, maybe the smother, Barbra didn’t care, she still had people she wanted to hit. Here was for the system that failed her, and one for the creeps on the subway and at her job. Barbra saw a tracksuit guy coming to pull her off. Here was one last shot for Barbra herself for agreeing to this in the first place. She’d become a monster.
It was a struggle to keep Barbra off Aaliyah; she was still full of battle lust for minutes after the fight. She honestly asked to fight another girl, but at this point every other girl was scared of her, most of the bros were too. Finally she calmed down enough to clean herself up with the towel they gave her. Barbra took minimal damage; a few scratches to the face could be covered with makeup, her tits were sore, but for all her boasting Aaliyah couldn’t punch worth a damn. Well minimal damage if you didn’t count what she had done to her soul. She’d beaten a woman to a pulp, a woman she was assigned to help for her class credits this semester, and she literally beat her. Barbra took the envelope of money she was given without looking into it. She was too disgusted with herself. It was fat with bills, most likely a percentage of what the asshole here paid to watch the fights.
“You did good little girl, want to stay and watch last fight, we give you vodka.”
“Could I get that car ride?”
“Home or to the hospital? I kid, kid, that black bitch barely touch you, you fight like Russian womans.”
On the car ride home her own desperation got the better of her and she opened her purse to count the money. It wasn’t the grubby singles she expected, it was hundreds. Barbra no long felt guilty for hurting Aaliyah and her family, or taking the money of mobsters. Now she had a list running through her head of what she could do with this type of cash. Then it occurred her maybe she got the wrong envelope. She called Gregor, to see if it was mistake, “Little kitten, what is it, you are making me miss good fight, not like yours very even.”
“Did you give me the wrong envelope? This is a lot of money.”
“It is a lot of money for here, but you should not be fighting in dog pit, no? When you want real money you call me, my boss pays well for pretty girl who can fight. We see if you can beat more than scared young girl. If you can beat real womans.”
Barbra didn’t know what to do with herself; she felt disgust and shame, for what she’d done in that pit, but also pride and lust maybe… No that wasn’t the right word. And Gregor’s offer, there was greed, and fear, but also curiosity. How would she fair against what Gregor thought was a real woman?
