The bout between Lefty Louie and Brainbasher Gordo was a week off. Brainbasher was a vicious fighter, with a brutal right cross, a devastating left hook, a chin of granite, and a 15-0 record, all by KOs within the first two rounds. Louie’s record was less distinguished. He did win his last fight, although his opponent collapsed in the fourth round, the victim of a sudden, violent stomach virus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the practice gym, his manager, Mel, called Louie over from working out on the heavy bag. As far as Mel could tell, the heavy bag was ahead on points.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHow do you feel, Louie?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI’m a little tired, Mel\u2026 But I think I can make it another round with that damn bag.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cGood, Louie\u2026 But I wondered how you felt about Brainbasher?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWho?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mel sat next to Stan, the corner man. Stan removed a cigar butt from his mouth, shaking the ash onto the cement floor.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cGordo, Louie?\u2026 Mel and I want to know how you feel about Gordo?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI’ve been practicing positive thinking, Stan, just like you explained. I’m going to bust Gordo’s chin in.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat’s what I call positive, Louie. I’m glad to hear it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhy’d you ask, Stan?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The corner man shoved the cigar back into its place, the way a sheriff in the Old West might reholster a smoking gun, except the gun would smell a lot better. He could talk, smoke, and spit tobacco juice pretty much simultaneously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWell\u2026 Mel didn’t think you’d make it past the first round, Louie. But I bet him you wouldn’t be knocked out until the middle of the second.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The bout between Lefty Louie and Brainbasher Gordo was a week off. Brainbasher was a vicious fighter, with a brutal right cross, a devastating left hook, a chin of granite, and a 15-0 record, all by KOs within the first two rounds. Louie’s record was less distinguished. He did win his last fight, although his … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa867U-11V","jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3964,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3963\/revisions\/3964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/underwoodpress.com\/ruescribe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
David Sydney is a physician who writes fiction in and out of the EHR (Electronic Health Record).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"