Chapter 40

On Tuesday at five-ten in the evening, Eric rang the bell marked ‘Kitani’ at 2440 Broadway. He heard no answering ring, so he tried the door. It was unlocked, and he climbed the stairs two at a time, up one flight. At Kitani’s dojo, he pushed the door open and walked inside. The place seemed to be an ordinary, utilitarian, workout arena, with an office in the front and a large barren space in back for classes. Eric took off his shoes and placed them in the rack intended for that purpose. He had been in martial arts schools before and knew that shoes were removed so that no one could scuff up the wood floor where the workout was performed.

As Eric was heading toward the back to find the changing room and get into his sweats, Hiroshi came out from a doorway in the rear with a broom. Kitani’s ‘son’ gave his usual shy acknowledgement and began sweeping the dojo floor. He was good at it, too. In the Japanese culture, Eric knew, a task such as this was not considered mere menial labor. It was the basis of a practice, such as martial arts practice, which required commitment to excellence.

By the time Eric had dressed, Hiroshi was nowhere to be seen, so Eric began stretching against the barre installed along one wall for that purpose. At the same time, students started coming in to change and begin their pre-class warm-up. The students weren’t all Japanese, either. In fact, the majority was a mixed bag of Westerners—white, black, and Hispanic. And not all were men, either. Several women were in the group—although no Kita.

A tall blond, muscular—naturally—guy greeted Eric. “Hi. I’m Danny. We start at six. I’ll lead the warm-up, then Hiro-san will probably take over to drill us in techniques. Then we’ll do our katas and then we’ll spar.” He looked at Eric expectantly, so Eric introduced himself, but in a somewhat laconic fashion.

Most of the students wore a gi—a cotton, two-piece martial arts ‘uniform’—in this case black—with a belt. The color of the martial arts belt was supposed to indicate ranking in terms of ability, although Eric had never found that to be the case. A black belt in one school might be completely outdone by a brown belt in another. Here, most of the students wore black belts, so Eric took that to be indicative either of rank or of an indifference to rank, probably both, considering Kitani’s personality.

Eric was greatly relieved to find the workout easy—well, a challenge, but not impossibly hard. These guys were good, but they weren’t in a class with Kitani’s mountain crew. They were more at Eric’s own level, experienced fighters, but still in the category of human—and, therefore, defeatable.

Kitani didn’t enter the workout space until the students began performing their katas—choreographed arrangements of martial arts movements practiced to drill the body in sequences of moves used in actual combat. Kitani came onto the floor after each student’s ‘performance’ and demonstrated some corrections of form and encouraged an increase in precision and power. The katas weren’t always practiced for speed, however. Sometimes they were done to a deliberately slow tempo, so that the movements couldn’t be glossed over; later, speed and power were added.

Eric sat with the main body of students, on the floor, but away from the wall so they would have to keep their backs straight with their own musculature. He took this opportunity to rest and recover from the first part of the evening which had been a more-than-vigorous prelude to the sparring still to come. Although he had left his watch in his pants pocket in the men’s dressing room, he figured it was already about eight, so he didn’t imagine much time would be left for the sparring. This being the United States, people would want to get home, eat, and relax a little before going to bed. Even black belts.

When the fighting started, Eric was surprised to see that it was done full contact. That was unusual. Most of the martial arts gyms he had been in didn’t indulge in contact matches because the gym was trying to at least pay its own way—and probably earn a living for the Sensei. People get hurt when fighters don’t pull their punches—and then they stop coming to class. Also, the gym could potentially be liable if someone was seriously injured.

Kitani didn’t call on Eric until after the first several bouts, then he faced him off against a somewhat older Japanese guy. The man, remarkably tall and slender for his ethnicity, had an intellectual look about him and seemed hesitant to bash Eric properly when landing a punch. Kitani exhorted him in Japanese every time he hit Eric, presumably to connect a bit more solidly. The Japanese won the match easily, but Kitani held on to Eric and beckoned to Danny to fight his fellow American.

The two bowed to one another, their eyes on each other’s faces. This was a don’t-watch-his-feet, watch-his-eyes school. Eric left his hands limp and open and moved forward immediately with a kick to the jaw—a favorite move of his. Danny blocked and followed through by landing a punch to Eric’s chest. Eric stepped back. He felt as if he had just been kicked by a mule.

He was used to losing in a lot of arenas, but fighting wasn’t one of them. He almost always won a fight, and his temper flared up at what had happened so far in this round. He feinted toward Danny with a roundhouse kick to the gut, pulling the kick, and moving in instead with a stomping motion toward Danny’s forward leg. He touched his opponent lightly on the shin. Danny moved back quickly, but Eric hadn’t intended that one to connect full force. He could have broken Danny’s leg.

They moved around in a circular pattern, staring at one another, evaluating, trying to detect a weakness, a tiring, an opportunity to strike. Eric was fatigued, but more than that, he was stubborn. No, this wasn’t life or death, but it was his ego on the line.

He faked a kick, then another at Danny, but didn’t manage to stampede him. Danny then threw a punch toward Eric’s face, but Eric blocked and took a step back. The moment after Eric moved back, he took two quick steps forward. Danny’s hand had gone down after his punch, leaving a fraction of a second of vulnerability. Eric struck his opponent lightly in the nose. Danny’s hand came up too late to block, but the high block then left his midsection unprotected. Eric followed the punch to the nose with a kick to the gut, indulging in some degree of force with this one.

Danny fell gracefully to the floor, rolled and was up, back on his feet, all in one movement, without even breathing hard. Eric was pretty sure that he himself couldn’t do the same with so little effort. Kitani pointed a thumb at Eric, indicating he could sit down again, then called up a new partner for Danny. Eric sat and, although he watched the next couple of bouts, he didn’t really pay attention. He felt relieved and vindicated by his success and went over the moves again a few times in his mind. Maybe loosing wouldn’t have been so terribly shameful, but winning was a far, far better thing.

The next big challenge came in the dressing room. All those sweating bodies and only cold water running in the shower. Eric was glad to see that not everyone was willing to jump into the frigid water. That meant they weren’t total mechanical monsters in this school. Eric had to live up to his Ranger background, however, and jumped in for five seconds, just to get the sweat off.

He started to dry himself with his sweatshirt, but someone handed him a towel. It was Danny. “Not bad,” Danny said. The guy smiled. Nothing impressed Eric so much as a gracious loser. Some could win graciously, but most found it hard to accept defeat with a similar ease. “We’ll do it again sometime,” Danny added.

“I don’t live in the city,” explained Eric vaguely.

“Come up Saturday morning then. We start at nine.” Danny appeared to think that nine was a terribly late hour for a workout. Nine would allow Eric a leisurely Saturday rising time of six a.m. Eric finished dressing and headed toward the front to get his shoes. Danny caught up with him.

“Come have a bite to eat with us,” Danny offered.

“I think I’m joining Kitani,” Eric said.

“Good,” said Danny. “Then we’re all going.”

Damn! Kitani had done it again. Eric had been given the impression that the two of them were supposed to have a private talk about matters of mutual interest—like what a scoundrel Kitani was.

Kitani came out of his office, smiling, ever the affable host. He shook hands with Eric and looked him probingly in the eyes. “That was a little bit fun, wasn’t it?” he asked.

Eric didn’t admit it, but said instead, “Thanks for inviting me.” His mother had taught him to say that at parties and he thought it just dry enough a phrase to demonstrate a bit of hostility to Kitani.

“We’ll eat at Sekizaki’s nearby,” said Kitani, busying himself with straightening a notice on the bulletin board. “A few of my students will join us.”

Kitani turned again to face Eric. “Don’t eat too much though. I have some strenuous exercise in mind for us later.” He seemed at first serious, but then amused, so that it flashed through Eric’s mind that Kitani wanted to take him to some sort of whorehouse. Eric was repelled at the notion that such a blatant and crude approach should be part of Kitani’s seduction of him. But then it occurred to Eric that he was being ridiculous. No, Kitani intended some other type of torment for him, some form of initiation he put each of his own students through. …Like what?