"Training Partner"
(excerpted from Behind the Mask)
By A. A. Rubin
I was devastated when I discovered that Professional Wrestling was fake. It was almost like finding out that Santa Claus wasn’t real, but worse, because at least Santa didn’t make you save up your allowance for a month in order to split the cost of a Pay-Per-View event with your parents. Santa brought you presents for free, and, even after you knew he wasn’t real, your parents still bought you presents and put them under the tree on Christmas Eve. Once you found out about wrestling, you had nothing. You couldn’t even buy baseball cards, because you were still in debt to your parents from the last Wrestlemania.
After I found out that wrestling was fake, I became interested in real sports like baseball, football, and especially boxing. The boxing champions were larger than life superheroes like the professional wrestlers, but, unlike the wrestlers, the fighting they did was real. After a few years of following the sport, I decided that I wanted to be a professional boxer. I joined a gym the day I turned eighteen. I would have joined sooner, but my mom wouldn’t let me while she still had legal control over me, and began training with the goal of eventually becoming the Heavyweight Champion of the World. It would be a long time before I got into wrestling again.
“It’s a show,” my instructors told me, “not a real fight. If you kill all your opponents, we go out of business. The way you’re beating guys up, we’ll have to create a character called the mummy to account for all of the bandages on the wounds that you give people.”
I went home from training and told my wife, Linda, about the problem. She suggested that I should practice the moves on her.
“After all,” she said smiling. “You wouldn’t hurt me, would you?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said. “I gave some guy a concussion last week.”
“I have a tough head,” she said as she knocked on it with her knuckle. “Besides, I’m lighter than those guys, so you don’t have to throw me so hard.”
“I still don’t think that’s such a good idea,” I said. “If I really hurt you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“You’re just afraid that I’ll beat you up,” she said, and punched me, playfully, in the stomach.
I practiced my moves on Linda for a couple of weeks. She was light enough that I could do the moves slowly, and concentrate on form. Doing the moves slowly allowed me to see how the move worked, and I learned to do them correctly. Linda ended up with a few black and blue marks, but she survived our “training sessions” without any broken bones.
One night Linda asked me to show her some of the submission moves. I put her into one she said, “Oh, that’s easy to get out of, you just have to slip down like this.”
I glared at her as she lifted her arms in the air and dropped to one knee to escape the hold.
“Please don’t remind me that it’s not real."
A. A. Rubin lurks in the shadows. His work has appeared in Kyanite Press, Serious Flash Fiction, Pif Magazine, and Constellate Literary Journal. His story "The Substance in The Shadow" has been named a Fiction War finalist, and his story, "White Collar Blues" was nominated for the Carve Magazine/Mild Horse Press online short fiction award. His debut graphic novel, "Night Prowler: In The Cross Hairs" will be published by Golden Bell Studios. Mr. Rubin holds a BA in Writing/Literature from Columbia University, and an MA in Teaching of English from Teachers College Columbia University. A mild mannered public school teacher by day, he roams the street at night as a vigilante crime fighter. He does not believe in secret identities. He wants the criminals to know his true face. He can be reached on twitter and facebook as @thesurrealari .
(excerpted from Behind the Mask)
By A. A. Rubin
I was devastated when I discovered that Professional Wrestling was fake. It was almost like finding out that Santa Claus wasn’t real, but worse, because at least Santa didn’t make you save up your allowance for a month in order to split the cost of a Pay-Per-View event with your parents. Santa brought you presents for free, and, even after you knew he wasn’t real, your parents still bought you presents and put them under the tree on Christmas Eve. Once you found out about wrestling, you had nothing. You couldn’t even buy baseball cards, because you were still in debt to your parents from the last Wrestlemania.
After I found out that wrestling was fake, I became interested in real sports like baseball, football, and especially boxing. The boxing champions were larger than life superheroes like the professional wrestlers, but, unlike the wrestlers, the fighting they did was real. After a few years of following the sport, I decided that I wanted to be a professional boxer. I joined a gym the day I turned eighteen. I would have joined sooner, but my mom wouldn’t let me while she still had legal control over me, and began training with the goal of eventually becoming the Heavyweight Champion of the World. It would be a long time before I got into wrestling again.
“It’s a show,” my instructors told me, “not a real fight. If you kill all your opponents, we go out of business. The way you’re beating guys up, we’ll have to create a character called the mummy to account for all of the bandages on the wounds that you give people.”
I went home from training and told my wife, Linda, about the problem. She suggested that I should practice the moves on her.
“After all,” she said smiling. “You wouldn’t hurt me, would you?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I said. “I gave some guy a concussion last week.”
“I have a tough head,” she said as she knocked on it with her knuckle. “Besides, I’m lighter than those guys, so you don’t have to throw me so hard.”
“I still don’t think that’s such a good idea,” I said. “If I really hurt you, I’d never forgive myself.”
“You’re just afraid that I’ll beat you up,” she said, and punched me, playfully, in the stomach.
I practiced my moves on Linda for a couple of weeks. She was light enough that I could do the moves slowly, and concentrate on form. Doing the moves slowly allowed me to see how the move worked, and I learned to do them correctly. Linda ended up with a few black and blue marks, but she survived our “training sessions” without any broken bones.
One night Linda asked me to show her some of the submission moves. I put her into one she said, “Oh, that’s easy to get out of, you just have to slip down like this.”
I glared at her as she lifted her arms in the air and dropped to one knee to escape the hold.
“Please don’t remind me that it’s not real."
A. A. Rubin lurks in the shadows. His work has appeared in Kyanite Press, Serious Flash Fiction, Pif Magazine, and Constellate Literary Journal. His story "The Substance in The Shadow" has been named a Fiction War finalist, and his story, "White Collar Blues" was nominated for the Carve Magazine/Mild Horse Press online short fiction award. His debut graphic novel, "Night Prowler: In The Cross Hairs" will be published by Golden Bell Studios. Mr. Rubin holds a BA in Writing/Literature from Columbia University, and an MA in Teaching of English from Teachers College Columbia University. A mild mannered public school teacher by day, he roams the street at night as a vigilante crime fighter. He does not believe in secret identities. He wants the criminals to know his true face. He can be reached on twitter and facebook as @thesurrealari .