A good night's sleep had a way of putting all problems into perspective.

At least, that's what his mother had told him.

Turning onto his side and away from Doc, Mac had spent half the night staring at the wall through sore, half-lidded eyes, waiting for sleep to creep up on him. He had wanted to believe that his troubles wouldn't seem so bad in the morning, that maybe he and Doc would be able to talk comfortably again, sooner, and that they could even go out for lunch instead of holing up in their room to find some peace and ordering room service as they had last night.

But, Mac had woken up to the reality that a splotch of dirt on a reputation like his couldn't wash off overnight.


The kid sat up on the bedside, leaning forward and mopping his face with a towel. He had just come back from a brisk jog out in the street, although one much briefer than expected. The paparazzi had ambushed him, quickly working to block off his path as soon as he had stepped out of the lobby.

Stumbling to a halt - his breath catching in his throat - he had pivoted and taken off in the opposite direction, struggling to feign indifference while being pursued on foot and by car. All too aware of where a lack of self-restraint had gotten him, he had heeded Doc's advice and clamped his jaw shut as they hounded him, tearing into him with their callous questions. He fought to push on and doggedly fixed his gaze straight ahead, panting harder, chest squeezing up, his legs feeling like they were dragging heavy chains.

It had been one of the hardest jogs of his life.

Mac flung the towel over his shoulder, ruffling his damp hair half-absently, awkwardly. His trainer was watching TV, his silence feeling like a condemnation. The kid was infinitely grateful, though, that Doc hadn't lectured him last night when he had been more rattled and vulnerable and drained. Instead, he had tiredly asked him if he were alright, how his head was feeling, discussed matters relating to food and later encouraged him to rest up. The hardest part of it all was in not knowing whether Doc was angry with him or not and just keeping it tucked away inside, trying to remain composed and compassionate and understanding in the midst of trouble with less than half a day left before the fight.

He shut his eyes, remembering.

Gone.

The bag of jacks was gone.

The fact worked up a cold throb of panic in the pit of his stomach, sweat breaking out along his backbone. The blanket was tossed, the pillow flung aside. Perhaps he had carelessly misplaced it, that had to be it- -

"Where did y'get this?"

The kid bristled inwardly at the voice that came from behind, his heart racing as he wheeled around. "Listen… pa…" He tried.

"Answer the question!" The man gave the small bag of jacks in his hand a pointed shake before slamming them onto the dresser. "Where d'you get these?" He demanded almost desperately, moving in from the doorway.

Mac shifted his weight from one foot to another. "Please… can't we… can't we talk about this later? I really ain't in the mood."

"You ain't in the mood?"

A hand shot out, lightning-fast, and cracked across Mac's face, the other firmly seizing him by the shoulder and jostling him to attention.

"Now you listen to me when I talk t'you! Do you think this is a joke?"

Silence.

"Look at me! Is this a joke to you?"

"...No, sir." Standing rigidly with his arm in a vice-grip, Mac looked back at him with the wide, wary eyes of a small creature ready to bolt.

Chest heaving, his father half-lead-half-hauled him stumblingly to the bed, forcing him to sit down. Then, gradually, he loosened his hold. "Tell me what's goin' on," He pressed after a long moment, his voice barely dropping to a conversational volume.

The dizzying shock of the blow was still echoing in his skull when Mac fought to swallow past the knot in his throat to answer, his heart tumbling around like a rock in his chest. "I stole 'em." He croaked. "It's... jus' a bag a' jacks..."

"Jesus!" His father sharply threw up his arms and let them slap down at his sides, twisting around as if intending to storm out of the room. "I've… I've got a thief for a son!" But with a fierce, disbelieving shake of his head, he turned back, red-faced, a vein pulsing in his temple. "...How long were you gonna keep hidin' this?"

The question hung in the air with the weight of a threat. Head bowed, Mac weakly shrugged a shoulder and rubbed at his nose.

"What was goin' through your mind, son?" The man gave a strange, mirthless sort of chuckle, folding his arms accusatorily. "Anything? Anything at all?"

Lips pinched into a thin line, the kid shook his head in defeat, feeling drained at the prospect of having to explain himself. It was hard enough just lifting his heavy gaze from the floor. But his father wasn't have any of his silence.

"I'm jus'…" Mac begun, a weary, helpless desperation flickering in his eyes, "I'm jus' tired a' havin' nothin' nice!" As soon as he had blurted it out he realized how pathetic it must have sounded. "I'm tired a' these old clothes and wearin' shoes 'til they get holes n' 'em and' seein' some other people at school have nicer things… They laugh at me!"

He sucked in a ragged breath, his voice raw. "You don' know what's like…" Swallowing, he shook his head again, anger coiling hot inside him, grasping for a voice. "If they ain't raggin' on me and callin' me a bum, they're always findin' somethin' else. I can't take it no more, pa. I jus'… I can't."

"Nothing?" His father shot back, jabbing a finger at the room itself. "You have a bed to sleep in, food, a roof over your head, a room of your own in this house, and that's nothin'?" Struggling to collect his thoughts, he seemed to be on the verge of tears himself, for an instant, before a stern, hard look entered his eyes. "Now you listen here, son: your mother and I work hard so you don't live out in the streets. Nobody's gonna give a damn about you out there. You want your nice, little useless things? You want these jacks? Go then, go and get a job n' save that money, and see how hard it is, livin' on your own. Then you can talk about havin' nothing!"

Mac stared frozenly, slack-jawed. "'M'sorry…" He managed chokingly. He wiped at his face in a brisk, angry motion, looking to his feet again as if he didn't have the right to face his father. "I'll return it… I'll return the stuff tomorrow. I swear! I ain't ever gonna do it again!"

Massaging his forehead, his father walked out of the room in a daze.

"Oh, Mac… baby." His mother was waiting at the door, the back of her hand pressed tremblingly to her mouth. "Oh, Mac." For a long time, it was all she could say.

He expected her to approach him, to try and soothe him as she always would by stroking his hair or wrapping her arms around him and pressing a kiss to the top of his head, telling him it'd be alright. But she didn't move as if afraid, as if he were a stranger in their house. With an anguished look of betrayal and confusion that made his stomach twist sharply, she looked straight at him. From that day forward, he had never quite been her little baby anymore.

"We never raised you to be like this," She spoke haltingly, her voice thin. "We all want nice things, but not like this, baby. Not like this. …Where did we go wrong?"

"Ma…" He pleaded, weakly, feeling as if he had been punched in the gut.

"…Is it my fault? Did I coddle you too much?"

"Ma… you ain't done nothin' wrong." Mac's throat ached thickly. "I-It's me, okay? It's me." He rose to his feet, tentatively taking a step towards her. "I was stupid. Please don't cry, ma…"

Mac started slightly when he felt something touch his shoulder and looked up to see Doc, wide-eyed and uncomprehending.

"Hey, son." The man ventured, carefully lifting his hand away and sitting himself down beside the kid, the air in the room thick with things left unsaid.

Mac pursed his lips and shook his head in a moment of frustrated inarticulacy, his Adam's Apple working restlessly in his throat. And then, drawing a quiet, shaky breath, he broke the silence. "That guy in the street - the guy I punched... he said awful things. It was sick; it was real sick." The words came slowly and reluctantly, strangled. "I got so mad, I could barely see straight. All I 'member… was wantin' to hurt 'im real bad, and make 'im feel sorry."

Glancing off to one side, he huffed a mirthless, self-deprecating laugh, his expression flat. "Guess that don't make me all that different than those bullies at school."

"D'you really believe that?" Doc leaned forward slightly.

The kid looked down at his calloused knuckles, studying the rippling of tendons in his hands with the infinitesimal movements of his fingers. "...I don' want to."

The answer hung in the air for a moment.

And then he spoke again, his voice rawer than before; but quieter. "I was scared, Doc." He swallowed as if it hurt, as if every word stuck in and scraped his throat like fish bones. It was easier to keep his head down than in Doc's direction. "The guys in the street were really into the fight. They, they were gonna break my arms. Then at the station, I was- -"

Hesitating, Mac blinked, ashamed of how easily his eyes could sting with the threat of tears.

"- -I was afraid I'd… I'd be locked up an' we'd miss the fight. Waitin' in that room, I really… was hopin' t'see you…" He said, choking up on vowels the more he struggled not to, "But I didn't want t'see the look on your face."

The boxer suddenly felt the light pressure of Doc's hand on his trembling back, reassuring. "Don't cry, son. It's alright now; it's alright."

Mac didn't say anything for a while, not trusting his voice to come out evenly. He rubbed his eyes hard with the back of one hand. "I m-messed up bad." He said, after clearing his throat. "'m sorry. It's 'cause a' me that you're stuck in this room and people're givin' you trouble."

"I know you're sorry, son. Trust me." Louis answered mildly, trying to inject a bit of levity into the conversation. "And I'm sick of bein' stuck in this room, too. But I don't need you to tell me you're sorry. I just need you t'promise me you won't ever do this again. And I know you can do that, son." He shifted his position to face his protégé, the bed dipping creakily under his weight. "Listen. I know it ain't easy, but you gotta try and keep it together for the match tonight. Remember why we're here, Mac baby; remember that courage an' heart that got you this far."

He looked into Mac's face for any hint of a smile. "You'll drive yourself crazy if you keep beatin' yourself over the head. You're a good kid."

Despite refusing to answer to the paparazzi while on his jog, the damage had already been done. Mac had come across newsstands filled with freshly printed tabloids, the same papers and magazines that presented him as a nice boy with teen-heartthrob potential now feeding to the Californian public the image of a temperamental New Yorker. He had seen the words, "Little Mac Attacks!" plastered on the cover of one of the magazines in bolded, bright font and below had been a shot of him taken from the midst of one of his bouts. His eyes fierce, teeth gritted.

It had made his gut churn to see it.

"That ain't what people here been sayin'."

"They don't know you, Mac," Doc insisted, "These tabloid writers, they'd make a monster of their own mothers if it'd make their magazines fly off the racks. You can't fight 'em. All you can do is not let 'em get to you."

Bad news had the tendency to spread like an infectious disease. Mac winced inwardly. He could only wonder what his landlady or Mr. Johnson and the others he knew back home would think of him now.

'But he was always such a good kid…'

'I knew there was something about him…'

He let out a breath heavy with helpless indignation, with resignation, his lids drooping. "…This ain't fair."

"Hey... life ain't fair, son – life ain't fair. You know that."

The fact sat heavily inside Mac. A long, deep silence followed.

"Now I don't mean that in a mean way. It's just how it is."

"...I know, Doc."

Doc rested his hands over his thighs, gazing thoughtfully into empty space. Then, after a moment, he said, "Did I ever tell you how I lost my belt? I can't remember if I did."

Mac turned to look at him, forgetting his present discomfort at meeting Doc's eyes when he shook his head, frowning.

"Well, let's see. It was back in 1956…" Louis began. "I'd been defending my title for two years, by then. Hadn't had much trouble. Then came that heavy-hitter, Mosley. Peter Mosley. We were fightin' in his home city that night. It was a close fight, a real close fight. I 'member it like it was yesterday."

The kid had heard of Doc and Mosley's bout, but never in any great detail. Sucking absently on his lip, he waited for the man to continue, listening with rapt attention.

"I lost by split-decision." A wry half-smile played the man's lips as he lingered on the thought. "They don't got that in the WVBA, as you know. I wouldn't have been half as upset if the judges came to that decision fairly. Turns out they had a little incentive, just in case."

The kid straightened, eyes rounding in surprise. "They were bribed?"

"The association did some investigating – they thought it smelled a little fishy – and that's what they found out." Doc explained. "Mosley's manager had wined and dined the three of them and left a little extra in their pockets as a nice reminder. One of the judges didn't want anything t'do with it, at least, and didn't play along. But it didn't matter what the world found out. I never got that belt back."

"Man…" The thought of people, of hardworking people's careers and hopes and dreams being toyed with and crushed as the result of shady, back-alley deals worked Mac's blood into a boil. "That ain't right…"

"You should have seen me! Woweee! I was pissed like you would not believe. Bet if you ran into me back then, kid, you'd never know it was me. 'Course, I was not as fully-rounded a fighter then as I am now, hahaha."

As Doc's laughter faded into silence and a look of weary acceptance settled over his features.

"How'd you get over somethin' like that?" Mac asked.

"There's no quick-fix. You just do, son. You just do. I let it go... 'cause it'd have really destroyed me if I hadn't."

The man paused, contemplating the raw power in those words, contemplating in what ways his life would have been different had the belt remained in his possession for another year or two.

Mac looked back at his hands, running his fingertips absently over his knuckles.

"What I'm trying to say here, son… is that you're a kid with a bright future ahead of you. It ain't easy, dealing with something like this when you're as young as you are. I get that, Mac. But you keep carrying this bitterness and anger with you and it'll eat you alive. …Like one of those alien things from that movie we were watchin' a few weeks ago. Y'know what I mean." He watched the boy meaningfully. "...D'you know who helped you out of jail?"

"You?"

"I only picked you up, son."

"Then...?"

"Strangers." Doc said, after a beat. "Enough of them came forward and made a case that you were provoked. And that officer? He coulda taken your prints and your photo - he coulda had you charged and locked up if he wanted to. No matter how bad or unfair a situation is, it ain't the end of the world. Just 'cause you're hearin' a lot of bad things right now, don't mean that there aren't some people out there who still believe you're an alright kid and who still give a damn. It ain't just you, or you n' me against the world, either, Mac – it never is."

Mac blinked and raised his head.

"I want you to think about that, son, when you walk down to that ring tonight." Knitting his brows, he tried to decipher the slow, thoughtful shifting of Mac's eyes from side to side. "...Can you do that for me?"

At last, the beginnings of the little smile Doc had been hoping for appeared. But it didn't reach the kid's eyes.