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"I did not have an easy childhood. I never met my father and I never exactly got to know my mother. For most of my childhood I wasn't even home. She didn't want any of her boyfriends to know that she was a single mother so I was at my neighbors' apartments a lot. When they got sick of it my mother just shipped me off to military school. As you can imagine it's no surprise that I'm an angry person.
"Well enough about that stuff. That's not what I want to talk to you about. Let's fast forward to college. As you may recall from earlier my mother wasn't around so it was up to me to figure out how I was going to foot the bill. I guess it didn't matter that with her credit history my odds of getting a school loan would have gotten worse with her as a co-signer.
"So there I was, angry since the early days and military school didn't exactly give me any real marketable skills. Nobody wanted to hire what looked like a time bomb waiting to go off on a customer. Hell I can't imagine what our esteemed principle goes through whenever she hears about the frequent episodes I have in class. One day I was just out for a walk when all the sudden I get jumped by some guy with a friend and a crowbar.
"Now let me start with saying that I didn't get my eye problem from that night. I used to get beat up a lot at the academy by kids who would grow up and become real army material, so these guys weren't really a big deal. Heck at the time I was glad to have two punks to beat down and make up for a long list of pummeling. The guy with the crowbar winds up to take a swing at me so I pop him right in the face while he's winding back. While he's stunned from the jab I start wailing on the second guy. He goes down as the first one recovers and he tries to swing the crowbar at me again. I drop down into a half crouch and the crowbar hits the second guy in the jaw as he's getting his footing back. I come up with an uppercut and that's when they decide to cut their losses and go.
"Now there was this other guy who saw the whole thing. Turns out he knows a couple of 'unregulated' pugilism spots. In other words he had an 'in' with the growing underground boxing world. He gives me this song and dance about how he never saw anyone fight like that and so on. All I heard was 'college money'.
"I went ahead and started boxing for money. I got better and better and started really working out a lot. I used my fight money to pay my way through my first year of school. One of the heads of the school caught wind of where I was getting the cash from and gave me a deal: He gets me a full scholarship if I join the college's boxing team. I took the deal and got out of the underground fighting.
"Now I was hardened by the old military academy and was throwing down with street toughs with little regard for rules and whatnot; so I was unstoppable in the regulated ring. I became the campus jock overnight. Parties, girls, I had it all. Trust me Kevin, the college scene is a lot better than high school.
"What was really important to me were the two best things that ever happened to me though: My best friend Neil who was really into martial arts as a form of meditation and physical training; and my number one gal Jackie who was the love of my life. I've never met better people and I probably never will again. They both wanted to be educators and to be honest I wouldn't be surprised if they hooked up after I was gone.
"Now there was this one match which I guess is the whole point of the story. The guy I was up against was something else. It was like he was a faster me. He also did not believe in giving me room to breathe. He was the best fight of my life. Imagine you're on the field and the other QB is a better version of you. The rush of acknowledging a true rival in what you're good at isn't even close to the satisfaction of winning.
"Anyway we're going at it and eight rounds in all I do is just take it. I can't keep up with him. He sends me down and I'm saved by the bell at the count of nine. Seriously, that one second made the difference. Before he sent me down though, he gave me some rapid shots to the side of my head and one just above my eye. Yeah the messed up one.
"Neil wants the towel thrown in, Jackie wants the towel thrown in but I want to get this guy. I've always been angry but this time something didn't feel right. Looking back I know that it was just the first time I really hated someone. He just hit the right thing in the worst way he could. I wanted to break this punk into a thousand pieces and then break the pieces into a thousand more in front of his mother.
"The bell rings and we get back into it and this time he doesn't get one hit on me. I just hammer at him with everything I got. I was running on pure hatred.
"I knocked him out fifty two seconds into the ninth round.
"He died about an hour later. I just went too far and hit the right thing in the worst possible way. Neil stops talking to me because I killed a guy and Jackie…well…you get the idea. 'Angry Anthony' suddenly had a new meaning."
"I ended up joining the army and fighting in Vietnam. I guess I wanted to get shot out there. I had my life together for the first time and in the span of fifty two seconds I smash it all to hell. The war ended and I somehow lived through it all. When I came back I had no idea what to do.
"Well I got lucky. An uncle I never knew I had tracked me down. My mom's life insurance was put into an account in my name. She died while I was in Nam and I had no idea. I ended up using the money to go back to school. I guess I was really missing Jackie and Neil since now I'm a teacher; which was their dream.
"Look Kevin, the point is that being an athlete is a big dream and there's nothing wrong with dreaming big. What I'm saying is that One hit can be all it takes to end everything. The thing with the motorcycle? You were lucky and still have lucky near misses during football games. I thought I was invincible and I wasn't. I ended up killing a guy in the ring. In your case it's more likely that someone's going to put you in a wheelchair.
"I guess you remind me of who I was in my glory days.
"Anyway Kevin... For your sake at least make an effort with your studies and have a backup plan in case your football career ends before it starts. This is going to be your fifth year in high school and a lot of colleges just closed their doors because of that one thing. You're only young once. I built myself up high and fell hard. Don't turn out like me wanting to strangle people at random and wondering how you're going to find the motivation to get out of bed in the morning.
"Now get going. Detention's over. I just gave you the short version of why I'm so damn hard on you and now I'm thinking about old friends.