“I had to know if I could do it,” Nate repeated over and over. “Cory, how am I doing?”

It was a lot different being up close and personal to the action. I was in his corner and right there at the side of the ring. The lights and the crowd noise were so distracting that I had trouble focusing on the action at hand. From what I could tell, Nate was doing fine. He had lasted three rounds with the Horse.

Pops yelled out, “You’re doing fine.” He reminded me of Mickey in Rocky. The whole scene had my head spinning. Hand me this, hand me that, give me the sponge, more water. It was demanding work in the corner.

At the start of the fourth round, Pops said to me, “Son, for some reason he’s looking to you for encouragement. You gotta pump him up. Pay attention, and if he ask you something, tell him,” then he smacked me on the side of my head as if I was stepping into the ring.

As Nate move away from the corner, I yelled, “Whoop his ass.”

Pops smiled at me and turned his attention back to the fight. The fighters gave the crowd reason to cheer as they had a violent exchange of punches in the middle of the ring. It was the first clean punch of the night for the Horse. Unfortunately for Nate it gave him confidence. After the exchange the Horse began asserting himself. It became obvious that it was his time on top as he began hitting Nate with a barrage of punches. Although he was never in danger of going down, the punishment was evident on Nate’s face. His left eye showed some swelling when he came back to the corner after the round.

I didn’t hesitate when he asked how he was doing this time. “Nate, he’s bigger and stronger, but you’re quicker than he is. Don’t stand there and trade punches with him.” In my mind I was thinking that it could prove fatal if he did, but I said, “Use your speed. Come on. This is what you wanted, right? I know you don’t need the money. So, if you’re fighting for pride or ego, then show it, man.”

With that he turned and looked at me and nodded his head. Pops shouted a few curse words about his performance but I knew that he was hanging on my words.

The next two rounds Nate was barely hit while throwing twice as many punches as his opponent. The seventh round both fighters seemed to tire and looked as if they were resting up for the finale. The crowd didn’t like it and everyone from the cheap seats down to the celebrities began to boo. I looked over at Faith, whom I had given my seat to, to make sure that she wasn’t joining in. When I looked over at her, she was already staring in my direction. Our eyes met and she smiled.

Nate surprised everyone by not just surviving the next few rounds. It was possible that he was ahead on a couple of the judge’s scorecards. In the corner we were all yelling at him, trying to keep him pumped up. “You’re doing it,” I yelled.

“Pops, I told you I could do this, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, you did.”

“Damn right I did.”

“Okay, stay loose and be careful. You only have two rounds left to go. It’s yours. Listen to the crowd.” They were chanting for Nate. The whole place had turned, not so much against the Horse, because he was a great champion. It was more of a swelling up for the underdog.

Nate stood, anxious for the bell. Across from him the Horse was a confused and frustrated fighter. He couldn’t understand how he had underestimated Nate so badly. He had cursed his cornermen so much by this point that they were silent in between rounds. The bell rang and the two met in the middle of the ring.

As they danced around, Nate’s mind began to drift. He began to think about the ESPN special. He began to think about the history he was on the verge of making. No boxer had ever come out of retirement to defeat such a formidable opponent. This was bigger than Leonard versus Hagler.

Nate was no longer focused on the punches. He was focused on the end result. The crowd was chanting his name as they had for the past two rounds, but suddenly he could hear them. He began to wonder how it would feel to wake up as the champ again.

The first punch came and Nate ducked it, the second he backed out of the way. Nate had lost track of where he was in the ring. His back was against the ropes and there was no escape. The third was not to be denied. Nate felt the impact and his knees buckled. A fourth and fifth punch to the head sent him reeling to the canvas two feet in front of me.

I could see his eyes rolling up in his head and, for a minute, I wasn’t sure if he was okay. When I saw him trying to shake the cobwebs out of his head at the count of five I was encouraged. At seven he had his hands on the ropes. At nine he was standing straight up. The referee asked him if he could continue. “Hell, yeah,” he replied.

I was quiet. I was hoping he would quit. I wondered if Brendan was watching somewhere. I looked over at Dee. His face showed concern. As I looked in his eyes, I tried to see if he could make it. For the first time he was slow to rise. “Be ready to stop it, Pops,” I yelled.

He ignored me. I repeated myself, “Son, shut your mouth. You don’t know boxing. He’s okay.”

“You’re worried about a paycheck. I’m worried about his life. If he looks shaky, I will stop it.” Pops gave me a mean look but I didn’t give a damn.

The crowd was on its feet. Nate pulled himself together enough to make it through the next minute. After the knockdown it was obvious that the Horse was trying to fight safe. He wasn’t throwing many punches and allowed Nate to regain his energy. As the clocked ticked down to the final minute the Horse did something extremely stupid. He responded to the chants of the crowd. “Knock him out” they screamed, and he tried.

He threw four hard punches that all landed to Nate’s body and head, but they had obviously lost steam. The Horse had backed Nate into the corner but the Horse seemed too winded to do anything. The champ threw a lazy punch that Nate easily moved out of the way of.

The next thing the crowd saw sent them into a frenzy. A right hand to the champion’s temple stunned him and caused him to stumble backward. From that point Nate threw no less than fifteen punches. The Horse reached out in an effort to grab Nate but only took more blows to the face. Cameras were flashing, hundreds by the second as Nate threw punches like a man possessed. The last punch from Nate landed flush on the Horse’s chin and sent him stumbling to the canvas.

The crowd went off as Nate threw his hands up in victory. We watched from the corner on pins and needles as the referee counted to ten. The Horse couldn’t make it to his feet and just like that it was over.

Nate was the champ once again.

Anita came down to the ring. When I saw the way Nate’s eyes lit up when he saw her I knew that they would be all right. I was next to him keeping the crowd back. I heard him say to her “I love you” over and over.

She was in tears. “I love you too. I told you you’d do it.”

“You did. You told me.” He was crying.

“I love you,” was all I heard. Then I saw the Horse come over to congratulate Nate.

“Great fight, man,” the Horse said.

“Thank you, man. Thank you for the opportunity.”

“Rematch?” the Horse asked with a smile on his face.

“We’ll talk, baby,” Nate said and winked.

A few moments later and Larry came over with the microphone. After Larry’s opening statements and questions, Nate started, “Larry, I know we all say this, but honest out there people, listen up. To God Be the Glory. Anything else I can say is pointless. I didn’t do a damned thing in this ring but show up. God kept me alive.”

“He sure did, Nate,” Larry said and went on, “So what will you do now? Is there anyone you’d like to fight or are you willing to give him a rematch?”

“At this point, I honestly don’t know yet. I have to go and talk it over with my fiancée. We’re getting married as soon as this swelling goes down.” Nate laughed.

“Congratulations. So with all the speculation about health concerns, were you at all scared for your health?”

“Never,” he lied.

“Did you ever imagine that you would be here back on top of the sports world and did that fuel your return?”

“I wondered almost every day for the past six or seven years what this would be like. But I listened to everyone else’s reasons why I had to give it up. But I got one word of advice for everyone out there. Dreams don’t come easy, ya’ know. Life is short, you have to live your dreams. If you sit around wondering when the time will come that life will make it easy for you to live them, you may wait a lifetime. Don’t ever wonder, baby. Don’t ever wonder.”

The End…almost