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Double Life

By B. Michael Moro

AuthorHouse

Copyright © 2010 B. Michael Moro
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4520-0468-6

Chapter One

In the fall of 1970, I turned fifteen. I have never felt that my life was all that easy. I was born into a World War Two family and had a sister of eight years older. My father was a truck driver and an Auxiliary Police Officer in the town of Lanesboro Massachusetts, and he felt that manual labor was the only way to get something done. My mother worked as a clerk for various times in department stores. My sister had left home at eighteen, to go live in California with some relatives, because of a bad relationship she had here with a fiance. He was a drunkard and was very abusive when intoxicated. She and I were close while we were growing up, but had slowly drifted apart as time went on. She had gotten married to a nice guy, but he was not a devoted husband, and I remember hearing my parents discussing her and her marriage at night after all had gone to bed. They kept tabs on her through relatives out there in California, because of her departure from here in 1965 had left bad feelings between her and our parents.

I had been raised not quite as strict as she, but still to a degree. At fourteen I was allowed to occasionally, when my parents went out dancing and drinking, to spend a weekend with a school buddy at his grandparents little farm in Cheshire. There we had complete freedom to basically do what we pleased. Most of the time we would acquire enough money to buy some beer from a nearby neighbor of his grandparents.

The neighbors were known as "Hippies" and to some of the local folk they did seem strange. My friend and I thought they seemed all right, considering we could obtain from them access to beer. Their little group contained a couple in their early to mid twenties, Tom and Terry, that weren't married, but were content to just live together. A young woman of nineteen who was married to an Army Soldier also lived with them. Her name was Bev and commuted with Terry to the University of Massachusetts in Amherst where they were both students.

When Bev's husband, John, and her brother, JoJo, were on leave, they stayed at Tom and Terry's house as well. I liked hanging out with them, especially with John and JoJo. They were in the same unit of the Special Forces branch of the Army and had just come back from their first tour in Vietnam. They didn't talk too much about Vietnam, unless they were very drunk, but they were willing to teach me some martial arts moves and some other stunts that youths like me really shouldn't know.

All of this came about on the first time I met them, when John threw a play around punch at my face and I instinctively ducked, blocked, and slapped John back lightly in the face. In which case, John, just a little shitfaced, proceeded to spare with me. He was too much for me to handle, but after a couple of minutes John wrapped his arms around me and called it a draw.

Afterwards, I told them that my father was a boxer when he was in the Army and I found out that John was an Amateur boxer before he joined the Army. That is where he met JoJo and consequentially, he met Bev and they got married before he went to Vietnam.

In the two weeks to follow, John and JoJo had talked me into going into a training routine and introduced me to a man in his mid thirties named Alex Constintine, who was an ex-fighter they knew for a long time and had been living in Springfield Massachusetts, for over a year. Alex was talked into taking me under his wing and three months after I turned fifteen I fought my first amateur bout in Springfield.

These amateur fights were basically not sanctioned by any league, and therefore, were considered an outlaw league, but they still went by the same rules. Bouts consisted of two rounds of two minutes each. Though I had gotten my upper lip fattened and my nose tweaked a bit, I had beaten my first four opponents on points by consistently pounding them with short, quick punches during most of the second round.

After the fourth bout, as Alex was giving me a ride back home, he asked me why I elected to continue using only short punches after I had my opponent's legs starting to wobble. I exclaimed that I wasn't really angry with the other kid and I didn't want to hurt him too badly. Alex took a long look at me and told me next time, to hit my opponent as hard as I could whenever I had the chance. The quicker I ended the fight the less chance there was for me to get beaten. I listened to him and when I chose to end my career as a boxer I had gone Seventeen and 0, with nine clean knockouts, four technical knockouts, and four decisions.

After my sixteenth bout in Providence Rhode Island, while changing into my street clothes in the locker room, I was approached by two well dressed gentlemen escorted by several bodyguards. They were interested in buying my contract and have me fight in their camp. They talked about me having a great future in boxing and about all the fame I would receive, but first, all I had to do was fight this certain fighter in my next bout. The fighter had already turned pro, but needed a couple more wins under his belt to start getting recognition. If I did everything that was asked of me they would have my birth certificate falsified to show that I was older and, thus, get me into the Pros before I was actually old enough. They tried convincing me that I was almost ready for the Pros and all I had to do was let this next fighter knock me out in the first round.

Alex interrupted and said that we needed some time to think about it and discuss it with my parents. They agreed to give us up to the night of the fight, which was in two weeks, to make our decision. Alex knew that my parents knew nothing of me being involved in any form of organized boxing. I simply explained the bruises and minor cuts as being received in horseplay with my friends.

The three hour ride from Providence Rhode Island seemed longer than usual that night. I was remembering some of the things my father had said in conversations with other people when they were visiting us. My father had fought in World War Two and was in the second wave at Normandy during "D Day". He didn't really talk very much about the horrifying aspects he experienced, but he always mentioned the humorous side. When my father enlisted in the Army he wasn't allowed to go into battle over in Europe right away, mostly because of his Italian heritage and because his address book was full of names of relatives and friends in Italy he had intentions of visiting.

He had gotten involved in boxing shortly after boot camp and always told a couple of stories from that part of his life. One of them involved a childhood friend who went in the Army with him and, like my father, was involved in the Army's boxing program. His friend, Ed, had done well in the boxing program and when the war was over Ed had gone into Pro Boxing and was owned by some small time promoters. They made him throw fights once in awhile. Essentially, his career was ruined and he finally retired. I thought about this and before I had gotten home I had decided to fight this last fight and retire.

When we had arrived at my drop off point, about a quarter mile from my home, Alex asked me if I had made up my mind. I told him my decision and he said he was glad I had decided to go that path. He mumbled something about the boxing world being corrupt and full of filthy crooks and I got out of his car and said good bye. I didn't change my mind during the next two weeks and when the fight started it only lasted one...