Retirement Plans and a Fond Farewell

The lingering scent of cheap beer and desperation clung to me like a second skin. It was a perfume I’d grown accustomed to, a pungent reminder of my brief, bewildering career as the ‘Rent Money Champion’. My pockets, for the first time in what felt like an eternity, were comfortably full. The eviction notice, once a menacing harbinger of doom, was now a crumpled souvenir in my sock drawer, a testament to the sheer, unadulterated absurdity of my recent life. I’d punched my way out of poverty. Well, more accurately, I’d stumbled, flailed, and occasionally tripped my way out of it, all while my opponents seemed to be politely obliging me with their jawbones.

Sal ‘The Fixer’ Moretti, a man whose smile could charm a viper out of its skin, had been beside himself with glee after the Boris debacle. He’d slapped me on the back with the force of a small meteor, his eyes gleaming with the avarice of a man who’d just discovered gold in a sandpit. “Artie, my boy! You’re a phenomenon! A legend in the making! We’ll have you on pay-per-view, merchandise, the works!”

I’d just blinked at him, the ringing in my ears slowly subsiding. Pay-per-view? Merchandise? I’d been more concerned with the fact that my left shoulder felt like it had been introduced to a particularly aggressive badger. The sheer terror of facing Boris, a man built like a brick outhouse with a perpetual scowl, had been a more potent motivator than any prize money. And then… then there was the tumble. The glorious, accidental, life-saving tumble. Boris, in his magnificent rage, had charged, I’d instinctively dodged, and the next thing I knew, I was on the canvas, staring up at the flickering fluorescent lights, while he was performing an impromptu, and rather painful, impression of a felled oak.