The Fight Of His Life

"Probably."

"You want him back?"

"Maybe."

"Why?"

Why? He could hardly find words for why. It wasn't thought—it was feeling. Only his dad knew what it was to find yourself standing in a locker room three minutes before a fight with your bladder full and your crotch in a cup and your hands tied up inside a pair of eight-ounce gloves. Only his dad could reach down without hesitating and take care of it, the way he had done for Buster before another bout in '85. Only his dad could tell him what to do when he was tired and hurt and some two-fisted fiend was throwing four-punch combinations at his head. Only his dad had lived these things.

"Hit him, honey!" Bill would shout to his son during fights. There was a sweetness in that. "Take him out, little baby!"

But no, this is the last straw—sidling up to King, consorting with the enemy—something has to be done. Buster closes the magazine. He looks at his image on the TV screen.

"He's asking questions of Tyson that Tyson hasn't been asked!"

He opens the magazine again.

"See how easily Douglas is dominating the action!"