The Red Hunter(26)

Mike Lopez was the man who taught me how to fight. I came to him a kitten, scared and skittish, hiding behind my uncle. He turned me into a dragon.

“Learn to fight and you’ll never be afraid again,” he told me that first night while my uncle watched. “Learn to fight and you’ll know yourself and understand your own power.”

I was skinny and fourteen, newly orphaned, and in the throes of trauma. Maybe without my uncle and sifu (teacher), as I have come to think of Mike, I would have turned to drugs, or become a lifelong victim, broadcasting a signal of fear and weakness, drawing predators to me like an injured bird. Instead, he turned me into a warrior. I have never left fear behind me, nor should we, but I have conquered it.

We started small back then with stances (make it strong or always be off balance), basic punches (fast, loose, as if your fist is a rock on a chain), and blocks (twist your arm to deflect with the flesh not the bone), and we built from there into sequences of moves called Tao Lu. My uncle took me three days a week to the studio on Twenty-Seventh Street from six-thirty until eight-thirty in the morning, after which I went on to school. I hated it until I realized that when I left the temple after two hours of intense exercise and learning, I had no energy for misery. As my body grew stronger, so did I. More than therapy, of which there was plenty, kung fu healed me. Sort of.

Mike Lopez was a big man, so he always came in hard like a freight train. That’s his advantage: size, strength, and a surprising speed for someone the approximate girth of a semi. But I am a cat, slipping away and behind, or coming in close, delivering blows to the kidneys or the abdomen. The trick, when you’re a small fighter with a big opponent, is to get away fast, to dance, to never let it be a match of strength, never let the big hand close around your wrist, never take the full brunt of the blow.

We wrangled around for a while; he threw me, and I landed (that wood floor bounced for a reason) in a roll, hopping quickly back to my feet. I caught his slow but devastatingly heavy roundhouse kick and forced him to the ground. Side kick, forearm block, duck below his leg again, pull my upper cut to his chin, just touch him there. He tapped my temple, to indicate that he could have struck me there—a fight ender, possibly worse.

I am not better than he is; I won’t ever be. But I can hold my own. He has admitted as much. At that point, we trained together mostly; sparring was play. But I will always consider him my teacher. That is the condition of even the most advanced martial artist—student. There is always something to learn, even though now I was a teacher myself. I taught the Sunday morning girls’ class, the ten-to twelve-year-olds. Most of them are just coming to terms with their own bodies, finding their confidence and power. How I have loved watching them turn from kittens into dragons. I think that’s what I’ll miss the most.

When we were done, we sat on the floor, leaning against the mirrors, and drank from big jugs of water, scarfed down protein bars.

“What’s eating you?” he asked.

He had put on his glasses, gold-rimmed circular specs that made him look like a scholar, even with his bald head, tattoos, and giant muscles. He was as old as Paul, maybe older, but he seemed much younger. His body pulsed with health, and his energy was strong. There is an intimacy with people you fight regularly; they know your body better than lovers do.

“Nothing,” I lie.

“Paul,” he said. “He called. He’s worried about you.”

“There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Let me ask you a question.”

“Is it a real question?” I ask. “Or is it a question to which you already think you have the answer? Because that’s annoying.”

Mike has a belly laugh, a kind of funny shake he does, covering his mouth like a girl as he issues a sound that’s more like a cough. When it passed, he grew serious again. The laughing Buddha.

“What is the difference between justice and revenge?” he asked.

It was a good question, one I’ve asked myself a number of times. Probably most victims of violent crime have reason to ask themselves this question. As a society, we have reason to ask when we try to convict criminals, send them away for life without parole, or, in the extreme, sentence them to death. Who has the right to judge? Who says what is the appropriate punishment for wrong? Juries and judges make the call most often. But what if the people who do wrong are not caught? What if there is no arrest, no trial, no sentence, no judgment day? What if the men who murdered your parents while you watched went free?

“Must there be a difference?” I asked.

He took a swig of water, ran a big hand over his crown. It sounded like sandpaper.

“There should be,” he said. “What’s the first rule of kung fu, as I have taught it to you.”

“Walk away unless they won’t let you. Then, stand your ground to defend yourself, no more.”

He gave an assenting nod. “Better said: never do more harm than is necessary to walk away.”

I stood up, stretched my hands high, catching sight of myself in the mirror, then quickly turned away. It’s an uncomfortable position, to have parted company with your mentors. Mike always tells this story about the Buddhist monks who prayed for their killers while they were being slaughtered. It might be a myth, because I looked it up on the internet and couldn’t find any articles about it. He speaks of them with awe and admiration; but the story always angered me. How could you pray for someone who hated you and wanted to kill you? I don’t know if I have Mike’s pacifist heart. What is the difference between pacifism and weakness?