The Making of Big Sandy
by Michael Carter
The toughest kids I ever knew were at Big Sandy’s house. They say opposites attract, but in our neck of the woods, it was the other way around. Big Sandy’s house seemed to draw the rough-and-tumble kids, the ones that didn’t have a place to go or maybe didn’t want to go. But Sandy had a home, and, if you were good with him and he was good with you, you had a home as well.
Sandy was a smaller guy, but everyone called him “Big” because he packed a big punch. Growing up like Sandy did, with a dad who fought his way out of many smoke-filled bars and probably hit the boys too hard a few times, it was no surprise Sandy learned to punch.
But it wasn’t his heavy hitting and pugilistic skills he developed through the years that led him to the ring. It was his skills as a wrestler.
#
Sandy’s house was in the “wrong” part of town. The obligatory broken-down truck with mismatched primered hood, old camper on cinder blocks, or retired dinghy decorated most yards. Rusted oil cans nestled with purple-and-gold Crown Royal bags in the alleys, while quarts of wood lined garages. Most folks didn’t work. It was a rugged neighborhood, but most of our hometown was that way, so we never thought much about it.
When I would arrive, I’d say hello to Sandy’s dad and head downstairs. Sandy didn’t have a mom, and I never knew for sure what happened to her. From what I heard, she was a deadbeat and jammed when the boys were little.
I’d step down the creaky stairs and hear laughter in the back corner of the unfinished basement. Sandy, his older brother Troy, and younger brother Corey, set up a hang-out spot with some ripped couches and a table in an area framed off by two-by-fours. Circular stains from pop and beer cans coated the surface of the table. Playing cards and chew cans were strewn about. The centerpiece was that familiar Coke can with small holes poked in the indentation on the side.
I was an outsider, for the most part, coming from the slightly better part of town, if there was such a place. A few of the older guys, Troy’s friends I didn’t know well, would give me hard looks when I sat down. Would he narc? their eyes always seemed to say.
Eventually, they’d get bored playing cards and reliving the glory days, and hit the Coke can, passing it around the table. It wasn’t my thing, so I never took part, and that made me even more of an outsider. I told them I had asthma and that my grandmother was fighting her fifth battle with lung cancer from cigarettes. They let me slide with the latter excuse.
On this particular day—the day Sandy figured out who he wanted to be—I didn’t need an excuse, however. I was summoned by a sheer metallic noise that rang through our skulls.
Clank, clank, clank, echoed down the stairway from the backyard.
“Mikey, go see what’s going on,” Sandy instructed. Being the outsider and someone who didn’t take hits meant it was my job to investigate. I respected Sandy, and for that reason, I did what he asked.
#
On the back patio, by the Lil’ Chief Sandy’s dad used to smoke rainbows he caught out at Loon Lake, I found Troy and a kid from up the street, Garret. Troy stood behind Garret with an ax. Garret sat with his hands behind his back, and his back against the tree stump where Sandy’s dad chopped wood. Garret was posed execution style, and Troy was rearing to swing.
“What the hell?” I yelled while running up to them. As I approached, I could see why Garrett’s hands were behind his back. “Why are you in cuffs?” I asked.
“Headbutted a cop,” Garret said.
“You headbutted a cop, so he put you in cuffs? How’d you get here?”
“No, I was already in cuffs. The pig put them on me last night. I asked ‘im if he’d turn me around so I could ask somethin’. When he did, I knocked ‘im out with a headbutt. I ran here. Troy’s gonna cut off the cuffs.”
“Aren’t you worried he’s going to whack off your hands?”
They both shrugged. Troy heaved up the ax and took another swing. The blade sparked against the handcuff chains, but the chains, and Garret’s hands, remained intact.
#
I heard commotion in the front, so I headed to investigate. The early-summer breeze wafted the smell of fresh-cut grass and charcoal briquettes. A giant Weeping Willow shaded most of Sandy’s yard, making it a great place to hang out when we weren’t downstairs.
Sandy’s dad stood in the middle of the yard with Corey. A group of guys and girls surrounded them in an irregular circle. Sandy’s dad squared off against his son like they were going to fight.
I knew Sandy’s dad had a mean streak, but fighting his own son in the middle of the day, in the front yard?
As I approached, I heard Sandy’s dad explaining what was happening.
“You see, son, when you hit them in the face like this,” he said as he demonstrated a slow-motion jab, “you turn your fist at the last second to get traction on their face.”
“Ahhh,” the crowd said, almost in unison.
“Do that, and the punch will have more meaning.”
#
Sandy’s dad headed off to work at the aluminum plant, but the group remained in the front yard. Some uninvited guests arrived with 40s of Old E just as Sandy made it up from the basement.
One of them called out Corey, said he was a “pussy daddy’s boy.” The meddler sat down the brown paper bag cloaking his 40. It tipped over, but nothing came out. All forty ounces of charcoal-filtered liquid courage was in his belly, making its way to his head.
Big Sandy wouldn’t let a slight like that go unanswered in his own yard, let alone against his brother. He approached the meddler and gave him a soft tap on the face, like you might administer both to get one’s attention and degrade them at the same time.
“You should watch your mouth around here,” Big Sandy said.
The meddler raised his fists and stepped forward. Big Sandy, not usually confrontational, backed up.
“We don’t want no problems here, but you’re gonna to have to leave after what you said about my brother,” Sandy said.
The meddler continued to move forward, stalking as Sandy tried to give the guy an out.
Finally, he took a swing at Sandy. Sandy ducked, grabbed behind his opponent’s knee with both hands, and raised the knee to his chest. Sandy swept the other leg so that so that they fell to the ground with Sandy on top.
Sandy then cinched his opponent’s arms together in a double chicken wing. Sandy dug his chin through his opponent’s mullet, grinding it into his back.
“I’m gonna let you up in a sec,” Sandy said, “but you gotta jam, understand?”
No answer. Sandy released one arm, held his opponent in a single arm-bar, and placed his elbow on the nape of his opponent’s neck. He leaned into his elbow with all his weight and rubbed it back and forth.
“Okay, okay, okay, man, I’m outta here,” the guy said, as sweaty beads of pain accumulated on his forehead.
Big Sandy let him up, and the uninvited guests all fled.
#
Garrett and Troy finally made their way out front to witness part of the show.
“Where’d you learn to take down like that?” Garret said.
“Ah you know, I played a lot of Pro Wrestling on the NES, mostly as King Slender,” Sandy said.
“He wrestled in high school for a while,” Troy said. “But yeah, he’s got skills.”
“You outta get yourself a job,” Garret said.
“I have one at Heights Pizza Parlor,” Sandy said.
“No, I mean wrestling. Lots of money in it. You even got a name already: ‘Big Sandy.’ They have matches right downtown at the arena. You could be a jobber to the stars when they come to town.”
The corners of Sandy’s mouth turned up, almost in a full smile, revealing the chipped incisor he had since a kid. He blinked, and I swear I saw a sparkle in his eyes.
“‘Big Sandy.’ Yeah, I like that,” Sandy said.
Garret smiled back. “Now help me get these cuffs off, man.”
END
Michael Carter is a short fiction and creative nonfiction writer from the Western United States. He grew up in Eastern Washington and comes from an extended family of farmers and orchardists who homesteaded in Montana. When he’s not writing, he enjoys cast-iron cooking, fly fishing, and wandering remote areas of the Rocky Mountains. He’s online at michaelcarter.ink and @mcmichaelcarter
by Michael Carter
The toughest kids I ever knew were at Big Sandy’s house. They say opposites attract, but in our neck of the woods, it was the other way around. Big Sandy’s house seemed to draw the rough-and-tumble kids, the ones that didn’t have a place to go or maybe didn’t want to go. But Sandy had a home, and, if you were good with him and he was good with you, you had a home as well.
Sandy was a smaller guy, but everyone called him “Big” because he packed a big punch. Growing up like Sandy did, with a dad who fought his way out of many smoke-filled bars and probably hit the boys too hard a few times, it was no surprise Sandy learned to punch.
But it wasn’t his heavy hitting and pugilistic skills he developed through the years that led him to the ring. It was his skills as a wrestler.
#
Sandy’s house was in the “wrong” part of town. The obligatory broken-down truck with mismatched primered hood, old camper on cinder blocks, or retired dinghy decorated most yards. Rusted oil cans nestled with purple-and-gold Crown Royal bags in the alleys, while quarts of wood lined garages. Most folks didn’t work. It was a rugged neighborhood, but most of our hometown was that way, so we never thought much about it.
When I would arrive, I’d say hello to Sandy’s dad and head downstairs. Sandy didn’t have a mom, and I never knew for sure what happened to her. From what I heard, she was a deadbeat and jammed when the boys were little.
I’d step down the creaky stairs and hear laughter in the back corner of the unfinished basement. Sandy, his older brother Troy, and younger brother Corey, set up a hang-out spot with some ripped couches and a table in an area framed off by two-by-fours. Circular stains from pop and beer cans coated the surface of the table. Playing cards and chew cans were strewn about. The centerpiece was that familiar Coke can with small holes poked in the indentation on the side.
I was an outsider, for the most part, coming from the slightly better part of town, if there was such a place. A few of the older guys, Troy’s friends I didn’t know well, would give me hard looks when I sat down. Would he narc? their eyes always seemed to say.
Eventually, they’d get bored playing cards and reliving the glory days, and hit the Coke can, passing it around the table. It wasn’t my thing, so I never took part, and that made me even more of an outsider. I told them I had asthma and that my grandmother was fighting her fifth battle with lung cancer from cigarettes. They let me slide with the latter excuse.
On this particular day—the day Sandy figured out who he wanted to be—I didn’t need an excuse, however. I was summoned by a sheer metallic noise that rang through our skulls.
Clank, clank, clank, echoed down the stairway from the backyard.
“Mikey, go see what’s going on,” Sandy instructed. Being the outsider and someone who didn’t take hits meant it was my job to investigate. I respected Sandy, and for that reason, I did what he asked.
#
On the back patio, by the Lil’ Chief Sandy’s dad used to smoke rainbows he caught out at Loon Lake, I found Troy and a kid from up the street, Garret. Troy stood behind Garret with an ax. Garret sat with his hands behind his back, and his back against the tree stump where Sandy’s dad chopped wood. Garret was posed execution style, and Troy was rearing to swing.
“What the hell?” I yelled while running up to them. As I approached, I could see why Garrett’s hands were behind his back. “Why are you in cuffs?” I asked.
“Headbutted a cop,” Garret said.
“You headbutted a cop, so he put you in cuffs? How’d you get here?”
“No, I was already in cuffs. The pig put them on me last night. I asked ‘im if he’d turn me around so I could ask somethin’. When he did, I knocked ‘im out with a headbutt. I ran here. Troy’s gonna cut off the cuffs.”
“Aren’t you worried he’s going to whack off your hands?”
They both shrugged. Troy heaved up the ax and took another swing. The blade sparked against the handcuff chains, but the chains, and Garret’s hands, remained intact.
#
I heard commotion in the front, so I headed to investigate. The early-summer breeze wafted the smell of fresh-cut grass and charcoal briquettes. A giant Weeping Willow shaded most of Sandy’s yard, making it a great place to hang out when we weren’t downstairs.
Sandy’s dad stood in the middle of the yard with Corey. A group of guys and girls surrounded them in an irregular circle. Sandy’s dad squared off against his son like they were going to fight.
I knew Sandy’s dad had a mean streak, but fighting his own son in the middle of the day, in the front yard?
As I approached, I heard Sandy’s dad explaining what was happening.
“You see, son, when you hit them in the face like this,” he said as he demonstrated a slow-motion jab, “you turn your fist at the last second to get traction on their face.”
“Ahhh,” the crowd said, almost in unison.
“Do that, and the punch will have more meaning.”
#
Sandy’s dad headed off to work at the aluminum plant, but the group remained in the front yard. Some uninvited guests arrived with 40s of Old E just as Sandy made it up from the basement.
One of them called out Corey, said he was a “pussy daddy’s boy.” The meddler sat down the brown paper bag cloaking his 40. It tipped over, but nothing came out. All forty ounces of charcoal-filtered liquid courage was in his belly, making its way to his head.
Big Sandy wouldn’t let a slight like that go unanswered in his own yard, let alone against his brother. He approached the meddler and gave him a soft tap on the face, like you might administer both to get one’s attention and degrade them at the same time.
“You should watch your mouth around here,” Big Sandy said.
The meddler raised his fists and stepped forward. Big Sandy, not usually confrontational, backed up.
“We don’t want no problems here, but you’re gonna to have to leave after what you said about my brother,” Sandy said.
The meddler continued to move forward, stalking as Sandy tried to give the guy an out.
Finally, he took a swing at Sandy. Sandy ducked, grabbed behind his opponent’s knee with both hands, and raised the knee to his chest. Sandy swept the other leg so that so that they fell to the ground with Sandy on top.
Sandy then cinched his opponent’s arms together in a double chicken wing. Sandy dug his chin through his opponent’s mullet, grinding it into his back.
“I’m gonna let you up in a sec,” Sandy said, “but you gotta jam, understand?”
No answer. Sandy released one arm, held his opponent in a single arm-bar, and placed his elbow on the nape of his opponent’s neck. He leaned into his elbow with all his weight and rubbed it back and forth.
“Okay, okay, okay, man, I’m outta here,” the guy said, as sweaty beads of pain accumulated on his forehead.
Big Sandy let him up, and the uninvited guests all fled.
#
Garrett and Troy finally made their way out front to witness part of the show.
“Where’d you learn to take down like that?” Garret said.
“Ah you know, I played a lot of Pro Wrestling on the NES, mostly as King Slender,” Sandy said.
“He wrestled in high school for a while,” Troy said. “But yeah, he’s got skills.”
“You outta get yourself a job,” Garret said.
“I have one at Heights Pizza Parlor,” Sandy said.
“No, I mean wrestling. Lots of money in it. You even got a name already: ‘Big Sandy.’ They have matches right downtown at the arena. You could be a jobber to the stars when they come to town.”
The corners of Sandy’s mouth turned up, almost in a full smile, revealing the chipped incisor he had since a kid. He blinked, and I swear I saw a sparkle in his eyes.
“‘Big Sandy.’ Yeah, I like that,” Sandy said.
Garret smiled back. “Now help me get these cuffs off, man.”
END
Michael Carter is a short fiction and creative nonfiction writer from the Western United States. He grew up in Eastern Washington and comes from an extended family of farmers and orchardists who homesteaded in Montana. When he’s not writing, he enjoys cast-iron cooking, fly fishing, and wandering remote areas of the Rocky Mountains. He’s online at michaelcarter.ink and @mcmichaelcarter