Metamorphosis

Call me Angry. That's not my Christian name, the one Mother penned on my birth certificate. My own contributions to that document focused on the inked imprints of ten tiny toes in a singular impression.

If only my fingers, my hands had been similarly preserved, so I might now recall their size, their shape. And remember how, until a few days ago, I could move my fingers freely, separately from one another - to sign a letter, make a sandwich, dial a phone. Oh, the things we take for granted.

But I digress...

---

Two days ago, on a Tuesday, I sat at Fossy’s Pub – out on the rear patio, alone among a dozen empty tables. I tossed back a double of scotch, relished the burn on my tongue, the heat scorching inch by inch down my throat, the bomb exploding in my stomach.

Next came a pint of bitters, a drink I’d chosen for a reason. And what perfect weather to manifest my mood. A lowering sky portended violent summer storms. The horizon was a menacing shade of green, and through the haze showed brief, diffuse flickers of light. I looked forward to the monstrous wall of rain bearing down on me.

I was fuming. The breath hissing through my nostrils felt hot.

---

An hour ago, in Don’s office, I'd chucked my business partner, and my job, for good, when he'd rejected my latest work proposal in favor of Cynthia’s. The woman he's been screwing behind my back. The one he'd been telling me “I should try to be more like". I vented my anger - for the affair, but also his chronic disregard and condescension, his treating me as second-rate for the past three years.

As I reclaimed the shattered remnants of my self-regard, the space around me grew in volume. The air itself felt thinner, less stifling, more breathable.

How strange. And how freeing.

I stormed out, left Don standing shocked behind his desk. The whole floor of the Crackenhill building was silent, as if frozen in time. The clack of typewriters had ceased, replaced by the strikes of my soles on linoleum. All eyes followed me through the office and out the door.

---

Thunder rolled in the distance while I gulped the rest of my bitters. The tops of my ears were ablaze, my face flushed with heat. I closed my eyes and awaited the storm, as a deep boom rattled my ribs and buzzed my empty glass across the table.

When I opened my eyes, I had to squint. It seemed suddenly oppressive, this flatly even light that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.

I recoiled in surprise – something rested on the table, inches from my hands.

Boxing gloves. A pair of them. Dark blue leather, lashed together by their laces. They looked old, their surfaces scuffed and stained. The front of each glove felt softened by use, by age. They bore no insignia. Their interiors smelled musty. How many layers of salt and sweat they must have accumulated.

They drew me in, perhaps by their appearance, almost primordial, and seemed to embody some archetypal force. As instruments of pugilism, I couldn’t guess what special power they might possess. And how had they appeared on my table? I’d been alone out here.

The first large, cold drop smacked my forehead. I stuffed the gloves into my bag and stood cautiously, hands braced on the table. My head swam, my gait unsteady as I wove between tables and entered the pub to pay up.

Out in the pouring rain, my suit became heavy, waterlogged. I removed my jacket, left it dripping atop a trash bin. Anything to lighten my load. I felt some strange urge to be nimble, unencumbered, light on my feet.

---

An hour later, I staggered into room 13 at Downe’s Inn, the cheapest flea-pit in town. Only one car sat in the parking lot – the check-in clerk’s, I presumed. Was I the only person staying here tonight?

The thought appealed to me. No one next door. No one to eavesdrop through walls that were probably paper thin.

I stripped down to my boxers, opened the closet, found its shelves covered in the soft gray velvet of neglect.

A light puff of dust wafted out as I dropped to the edge of the mattress, unzipped my case and removed the gloves. They untied readily. As I slipped one on, a surge of excitement ran up my arm, diffused through my chest – a kind of sartorial ecstasy as the glove enfolded, not enclosed, my hand. Then the second glove, with the same intense sensations as the first. And somehow their laces were already tied neatly in a bow on each wrist.

I stood before a wall-mounted vanity mirror. My arms felt restless, my hands craved movement. I took my best crack at a boxer’s stance and began swinging my fists. Slowly at first. Then with increasing speed. My arms itched to move ever more quickly, and soon I was whipping the leathers about in a mesmerizing blur.

A metal support post stood on either side of the door, and I chose the left one as my "punching bag". The first impact sent a shock through my elbow. A sense of frustration, of anger surged through me, and I hit it again, only harder. On and on I swung, connecting solidly with the post each and every time. My arms never tired and were soon a blur of sweating skin and leather.

Another thunderstorm boomed outside. Rain hammered the window, the drapes flashed white, and I roared in concert with the thunder, as sweat flew off me with each fist blow. Then a loud crack of electricity, and the lights failed.

I wasn’t plunged into darkness. No – a hot blue glow suffused the sweat-misted air about me. My boxing gloves were luminous, pulsing in brightness as I struck the post, over and over. The purely physical became purely mental. My body, my exertions faded into oblivion as my mind raced backward in time, to when we founded the company and I already knew something was off.

Then I was moving forward – each insult, each belittlement fueling more resentment and anger, until I came full circle and focused on myself, for not standing up to him, for subjecting myself to humiliation and not leaving sooner. That admission - that I was angriest at myself, sent me into a frenzy.

Self-rage poured through my arms, out my fists. Bits of plaster fell from the ceiling around me. So I moved to the other pole. Fresh metal for my mettle.

I punched, slammed, laughed, wept as each minute, each hour passed. Until time itself dissolved into a seamless haze. Eventually, my mind folded in on itself, and I fell spent, exhausted. Into darkness.

---

My eyes flew open. How uncanny, this instant transition from oblivion to wakefulness. The room spun ‘round me. I sat up. No hangover. I could run ten miles, or swing my fists again at –

Both of the floor-to-ceiling poles were bent two-thirds of the way up – where I’d hammered each of them. Plaster dust lay scattered on the floor. I tried to scratch my nose, but the cool blue leather of a boxing glove bounced off my face. I’d not removed them before passing out last night.

I brought a glove to my mouth, to untie the laces with my teeth. Where were they? The laces, the eyelets were gone. Same with my left hand. Then, as I studied them further, my horror...

The cuff of each glove merged seamlessly with the flesh of my arm. The blueness had bled further up, too, blending smoothly with my own skin tone halfway to my elbows. The gloves were becoming… vascular… Small veins and arteries had grown from my arm and into, beneath the leather.

These hellish things were invading my body, fusing with my flesh, my sensation. Terrified, I tugged with all my strength at each glove. A stinging pain shot through, as if I were trying to tear one part of my body from another.

We were one, these gloves and I...