In the middle of the standoff, I heard the front doors to the Green Room burst open behind me, and my friends came in like reinforcements.

“Wassup!” Josh said as he threw off his jacket and put his arms up.

In life, as far as I know, there are two kinds of fighters- The kind who fight for enjoyment, and the kind who fight because they weren’t given a choice. Josh was the first kind. He didn’t always have to fight, but he wanted to, either to prove something to himself or others. He had “Shrek hands” as he once put it, and he would go to work on people.

I was the second kind of fighter. Ever since first grade until only about eight years ago, I basically had other kids and people coming after me nonstop. I never knew why because usually I was minding my own business. The worst of it was in sixth grade, because I was one of the shortest kids in the school, and people MUCH bigger than me had me in their sights. My choices were to either let these giants pound me into the ground, or fight back. I don’t know why, but I fought back, maybe out of desperation. Surprisingly, some of them even complimented me about my strength after the fights. I guess they weren’t expecting me to put up much of a struggle because of my size.

One guy I called outside for harassing me on a bad day even became one of my best friends in high school. After the fight, neither of us said anything. We automatically and instantly had respect for each other from then on.

Perhaps all of the tests I had been through up until this point gave me the confidence to stand up to Big Ju and his companion. It might’ve been intimidating to the both of them. But this wasn’t my battle to fight anyway.

“This ain’t got nothing to do with you, Josh!” Big Ju said to Josh, as they both must’ve slid past each other at some point in the past.

How interesting that Big Ju was so quick to involve himself in my confrontation, and just as quick to dismiss anybody else from joining.

Josh, Mike, and my friend’s cousin Rick came up to the front line. It was unfortunate that Uncle Rick had already left. Mike gently brushed me aside so he could take the heat. I wasn’t sure exactly why he did that. Stosh hung out in the back because he wasn’t part of the south side crew, and he wasn’t really a fighter anyway. I didn’t expect him to get involved, and I was glad he didn’t.

A shouting match ensued. Big Ju was screaming in Mike’s face, and the others were all shouting at each other. I just watched everything happening because it looked like there wasn’t a need for me to do anything. I preferred action over words anyway.

Cousin Rick said something to Big Ju, and Big Ju walked over to the cue rack nearest him and grabbed a pool cue.

“That’s it. We’re goin’ outside!” he said to Rick.

The owner of the Green Room jumped in front of Big Ju.

“You’re not goin’ anywhere with my pool cue!” he said to Big Ju.

John, the wrestler who worked there that I didn’t like so much, was holding Big Ju back.

“It ain’t worth it, man! It ain’t worth it!” he said a few times.

For the second time tonight, Big Ju had the look on his face like, “Awww, dayum!” He gave up on his quest to break a pool cue over cousin Rick’s head. Everyone in the pool hall was most likely focused on us, but it was like I couldn’t even see them, but I could feel the quiet tension in the air.

“The cops are on their way,” the owner said to both parties.

Kind of him to give us all a warning so we could jet.

We were the first ones out the front door. We all squished into my old white Subaru station wagon that had begun to rust and drove across the parking lot. Just as we got near Odana Road, I heard someone shouting across the parking lot at us from near the entrance to The Green Room. I looked back and saw that it was the drunk guy who started the whole situation.

“THAT”S WHY YOU DIDN”T DO ANYTHING WHEN I WAS UP IN YOUR FACE!” I yelled back at him, and he immediately changed course and started walking straight towards us from behind, rather slowly at a Michael Myers pace.

I was tempted to drive away, but I decided to wait for him, even though the cops were on their way. He came up to my window with anger in his eyes and started babbling to me, and looking like he was thinking about punching me. We went back and forth for a minute and nothing was solved.

“You’re in your car. WHAT?!” he shouted.

“I’m in my car! WHAT?!” I shouted back.

We did that a couple of times until he stopped talking to me, then he called Mike out of the car to fight. Why did he want to fight Mike? Nothing about the events of this night made any sense to me.

We all got out of the car and lined up as Mike and the drunk guy stood opposite each other. Big Ju and another guy stood several yards away from us. We had all forgotten about each other and focused on the fight that was about to take place. The air was thick with anticipation for what would come next. The drunk guy stepped forward and took a swing at Mike. It was like he was in slow-motion. I could’ve counted to at least five from beginning to end.

“HAHAHAHAHAHA!!” I started laughing when I realized he wasn’t much of a threat.

That took some of the tension out of the air quickly.

Mike easily dodged the punch, but hadn’t committed to anything yet. The parking lot was made of black tar, and the two of them shuffled back and forth across it. There were a few lights in the parking lot, and it was mostly a big open area where we were, so far away from the front entrance. Not many cars were near us. The drunk guy charged Mike again, but Mike threw a short combo and hit him once or twice in the face.

“Get the *#$@ off me!” Mike said as he punched, and I could hear the smacks from the hits.

“Aww, man! I don’t even wanna fight you!” Mike said.

It was too late, because he was in the fight. I didn’t even know why they were fighting each other.

I looked over at Big Ju and his other friend and realized that the third member of their group was someone I went to middle school with. I didn’t know him well, but we hung out in the same group at least a couple of times. Without hesitating, I walked over to him.

“Hey! Is your name Tyler?” I asked.

“Yeah…?” he said, slightly warily.

“Do you remember me? We went to Vanhise together,” I said.

Instantly, he put his hand out.

“What’s up, man?” he said very enthusiastically with a glad look on his face.

I shook his hand and started talking to him like our mutual friends weren’t even there in front of us boxing each other. That was just background noise now. We were all carrying on like the police weren’t on their way either. Sometimes I would look back at the fight in the middle of the conversation to see what was happening. The drunk guy grabbed onto Mike, and Mike tried to fling him away but he reversed it and flung Mike right back. After about ten minutes of fighting or less, I guess both Mike and the drunk guy got tired of fighting and decided to end it right there. I didn’t see everything, but I don’t think he landed a single shot on Mike.

As we were all getting back into my car, the drunk guy waved goodbye to me, like I had somehow earned his respect. Maybe it’s because we didn’t act like a bunch of punks and try to jump him, but let him and Mike fight it out instead. He originally accused me of being complicit in some robbery that he was accusing one of my friends of doing, but I still wasn’t sure about what he was talking about.