A Matter of Life and Death

was a bench on either side of the van’s interior, but no windows. When the door slammed shut, the interior was almost completely dark and Joe had a hard time making out the other riders. He took a seat next to a grossly overweight woman with narrow-set eyes and an odor that made it hard to breathe. Across from Joe was a lanky six-footer whose foot tapped incessantly and whose knee jerked from nerves. He glanced at Joe, then looked away quickly. Seated beside the nervous passenger was a muscular African American who weighed a tight two hundred pounds.
Joe smiled at him and asked, “Any idea where we’re headed, bro?”
“I ain’t your brother, motherfucker.”
Joe knew you never showed fear, so he glared at the man to show that he wasn’t intimidated, but there was a knot in his stomach, and he hoped that this wasn’t the person he would have to fight.
The trip started on pavement. After three-quarters of an hour, the van began bouncing, and Joe guessed that they were somewhere in the country on an unpaved road. After twenty-five more minutes, the van stopped, and the giant opened the door. Joe hopped out and found that he was staring at the side of a barn. He looked around and saw cars parked in a field and a gravel lot. Suddenly, a roar went up inside the barn.
The giant opened the barn door, and Joe stepped into an open area surrounded on two sides by stalls and hay bales. Screaming men and women were crowding around a cleared space where a blond woman and an Asian woman were fighting. The Asian had her hands up to fend off a furious assault. One eye was swollen shut, and she was bleeding from her nose and mouth. The other woman landed a ferocious kick to the stomach, and her opponent collapsed on the dirt floor. As soon as the bleeding woman hit the ground, the blonde dropped on her, pinned her shoulders to the ground, and began raining punches on her unprotected head as the crowd cheered.
Joe recognized the referee as Sal, the man with the fifties retro look who had recruited him. He thought that the fight should have been stopped, but Sal let the carnage continue for a while before stepping in and pulling the blonde off her unconscious opponent. Two men with bouncers’ builds dragged the defeated woman away and dumped her at the side of the barn. Joe felt sick. He’d bled and watched opponents bleed in fights, but the referees and the fighters’ corners stepped in whenever a fighter was in real danger. Sal had let the fight continue well past the point of serious injury.
A well-dressed man in tan slacks, a white silk shirt, and a navy blazer walked over to the new recruits. He was Joe’s size, and bulging muscles strained the seams of his jacket and pushed out his shirt front. The man smiled, revealing pearly-white teeth.
“Welcome to fight night, boys and girls. As you’ve just witnessed, we don’t expect mercy and our attendees love to see blood, so do your best. There are no rules here. Gouging, kicks to the nuts, and every other form of mayhem is allowed. Winners get money, losers go home broke. And that’s all you need to know.”
The man handed out a clipboard and told the new arrivals to print their first names.
“I’ll be pairing you up soon, so do whatever you need to do to get ready. Best of luck.”
Joe was wearing a T-shirt, sweatshirt, and pants over shorts. He stripped off the tee, sweatshirt, and pants and stuffed them in a duffel bag. He would fight shirtless so his opponent would have nothing to grab.
Joe started to work up a sweat to loosen his muscles and make it even harder for his opponent to get a hold on his slippery skin. As he warmed up, Joe scanned the crowd. Some of the women wore jewels and designer clothes and were with men who would have been at home in a country club. Others in the crowd looked like they would never have been allowed on the country club grounds. There were bikers, sharp-dressed men with wads of cash, and men and women who looked like they belonged in a movie about drug cartels.
While he was surveying the crowd, Joe saw the Asian woman get to her feet and stagger out of the barn. She was in bad shape, and Joe wondered if there was a doctor present. He stopped thinking about her when the referee stepped into the cleared space and called the names of the muscle-bound black man from the van and the lanky, nervous man who’d sat beside him. The black man laughed as he walked through the crowd. His opponent looked frightened.
“Next up,” the referee said into his handheld microphone, “we have Mustafa and Alan. Place your bets, and we’ll get started.”
There was a flurry of activity as the fighters warmed up. Mustafa flexed his muscles and smiled at his opponent, who didn’t make eye contact. When the bets had been placed, the man in the blazer nodded.
“Okay, fellas,” Sal said. “Let’s get it on.”
Mustafa charged. Alan slipped to one side and slammed a foot into Mustafa’s knee. A look of shock crossed Mustafa’s face as the knee buckled. Alan torqued his hips and followed the kick with a vicious elbow strike to Mustafa’s temple. The big man sagged to the ground. Alan leaped on his back and threw on a choke hold. Mustafa lurched backward, but his tormenter rolled with him. Mustafa threw a wild punch, but Alan buried his head behind his victim and ground his teeth into Mustafa’s ear. The black man screamed, and Alan tightened the choke hold. Mustafa grabbed Alan’s arm and tried to loosen the hold, but he was weakening, and moments later, he was unconscious.
While Sal was raising Alan’s hand, the man in the blazer walked over to Joe.
“You’re up. Good luck.”
Joe walked into the