Mixed boxing, 200 pictures 1920x1080 (FullHD), no nudity, no blood.

“I’m not happy about this Apache Dance scene,” Jean Marshal told her husband, Derek, as they drove to a rehearsal for the ballet company they co-directed.

“It’s too late to alter the programme,” Derek insisted, “and there’s a lot of interest in it. We have been doing a lot of the same old stuff lately. But a low-life scene, depicting Paris back streets of about 1910 –”

“-Where a pimp beats up a prostitute…”

“Well, yes. It’s a genre that isn’t done very much. It can’t all be Swan Lake, or The Sleeping Beauty.”

“Another thing is, I don’t think Naomi and Edgar are suited for it. They don’t like each other as it is, and I think it’s asking for trouble making them mock-fight.

“The audience expects, and pays, to see them. They’re professional dancers, and I don’t believe they’ll let personal feelings get in the way.”

Jean sighed, but said nothing more, because they had arrived at the theatre. On entering, they found Beverley, the choreographer, was already lining the cast up for the scene.

“Now, Naomi, when the music starts, you timidly enter the pub and approach Edgar, who is standing moodily at the bar.”

“No change there, then,” suggested a chorus member, at which Beverley went into a theatrical rage, flinging his papers on the floor. The others persuaded him to calm down, and he continued:

“Now, when the music goes, ‘La la la’, then speeds up with ‘one two three four five’, on the one, you push her away, right?”

They rehearsed it and perfected it. Then they worked on the part where Edgar pulled Naomi off the floor by her hair, before lifting her up and swinging her round. It went well, and Beverley excitedly introduced them to the next idea.

“Ok, when we have a repeat of the La las and one two three, etc., Edgar, you stage-punch Naomi in the face, on the same beat as when you pushed her away. Ok? Right, places please everyone.”

The recorded music started, Naomi and Edgar took up their positions, Edgar then punched – and Naomi’s hands went up to her face.

“Stop the music!” Jean insisted, running up the steps onto the stage. She put her arm round a distraught Naomi’s shoulders, and led her down the steps to a chair. “You clumsy idiot, Edgar!” she shouted.

“It’s not my fault,” he answered sulkily, “She wasn’t standing in the right place. If she had been, I’d have punched upstage of her.”

“I think you might at least apologise, Edgar,” Derek intervened. “Even if Naomi was technically at fault, you could at least show some remorse and concern.”

“Could I make a suggestion?” asked Dave, the stage-manager.

“Please do,” answered Derek, motioning him to continue.

“Edgar and Naomi obviously know all about dancing. But they don’t know about fighting; and as I see it, they can’t do this scene convincingly, or safely, unless they understand the rudiments of boxing. Now, if they were to meet in a ring….”

“Of all the daft ideas!” snapped Jean.

“Hang on,” mused Derek. “It would be great publicity. The two ballet stars who have a dance-fight, meet in a ring beforehand….”

So it was left up to Dave to arrange it. They had a break then and Jean, at the counter to order her coffee, was intrigued to see Naomi and Dave sharing their coffee at a table together. At least she was smiling again, thought Jean, and she went over to join them.

“I still think it’s a daft idea,” she remonstrated.

“Please listen a moment,” Dave urged her. “I belong to a boxing club, and I’ve suggested to Naomi that we book the ring for about 6 weeks’ time. Now, she can come along with me twice a week to the club, and spar with me and the lads. When I tell them what happened today, I know they’d love to teach her all the tricks. I don’t know about you, but I’d love to see her punch Edgar’s lights out.”

The faint smile that appeared on Jean’s face developed into a great grin, before she mastered herself and said, “I can see the attraction, certainly. Now, I suggest we keep this between the three of us, umm?”

*****

“What is he wearing?” asked Derek, staring with distaste at Edgar’s thong, as he climbed into the ring then strutted about, very much the star attraction (as he saw it) of the ballet company. He received dutiful applause.

“Oh, he thinks all the women swoon at him, so he’s giving us a treat. I think it’s…”

But her voice was drowned out in the roar and whistles that greeted Naomi.

“Phwoor,” doesn’t she look great!” Jean demanded. “Go on girl, punch his face in!”

“Jean, please!” insisted Derek. “We have a position to consider.”

It went quiet as Naomi and Edgar exchanged a few words – very hostile ones, by the look of their body language.

“I thought this was supposed to be about learning moves and so on,” stated Derek nervously. But the way everyone’s behaving, it’s as if they’re going to have an out-and-out fight.”

“I know,” Jean answered, grinning. Derek shook his head.

Cheers arose as Naomi struck the first blow, a jab to the chin. Edgar’s head went back, and she followed up with a probing right hook. But he then caught her. A jab with his right actually got her on the right jaw, as she was still following through from the hook. That hurt, the audience could tell. Jean looked nervously about and caught Dave’s eye, a few seats away from her. He looked as worried as she was.

But it seemed all right when Naomi fought back with a similar jab to her first; until Edgar responded with a more powerful one to her chin. Then they both struck at the same time, and it was honours even.

“Got him!” murmured Jean, as Naomi caught Edgar with a firm left uppercut. But again he responded confidently, this time with a left hook. She was in trouble, and when he pressed home his advantage with a right to her stomach, she felt the ropes on her back and shoulders.

“I think we should stop the fight,” Derek told Jean, as a second left hook from Edgar drove Naomi partially through the ropes.

“I don’t see how we can,” she protested. “We have no authority here – oh, thank goodness!”

Naomi had turned away, and now caught Edgar with a beauty of a back-handed right, so that he, in turn, leant beyond the ropes. But he had more resilience than anyone gave him credit for, and a downward left hook had her momentarily struggling to stay on her feet. On the other hand, her slight stumble and subsequent crouch placed her very nicely for a body blow …

The crowd caught the first shout of pain, as the ballerina’s left fist thumped Edgar in the kidney area. But he retaliated again, with a right to her stomach. Worse, a swing with the left caught her badly and forced her into a corner. Jean looked down at the floor, when he had a third success, with a blow to her stomach. By the sound of what happened next, he had scored again, but she wasn’t looking.

She soon looked up when several people jeered “Missed” though, and was relieved to see Naomi safely out of the way of his right fist, while he lurched forward as a result of hitting nothing. The lady stepped round him, and plunged her right fist deep and low into his stomach. But a right cross from Edgar halted her counter attack. She attempted a clinch to buy herself time, but wasn’t quick enough, and he caught her again in the stomach.

Naomi dropped to one knee with the blow, and powered her left fist into the same spot she had hit moments before. But he gained a free target as she got to her feet, and punished her stomach once more. She retreated and Edgar, sensing victory, pursued. He was abruptly halted by her right fist hammering the pit of his stomach for a third time. That was a bad one to endure and he blundered forward trying to clinch, failing as she had earlier.

Yet again, he fought back – but this time she was ready. He fired a right cross, and Naomi warded it off with her raised arms.

“Yes!” whispered Jean to herself.

Edgar had slowed down. He didn’t withdraw his arm quickly enough, and Naomi trapped it against her gorgeous breasts with her right arm, holding him in place. Then all she had to do was measure up his exposed jaw, and let him have it with her left fist. She was gratified to hear Edgar’s second shout of pain. The contrasting sensations between her warm, welcoming, womanly bosom and the ferocity of her punch, gave him a very strange feeling that had nothing to do with his pain.

Still holding his right arm secure, Naomi took advantage of Edgar’s temporary disorientated state following her punch (and partially caused by the allure of her breasts at his arm), and hooked her left leg around his right one, at which she pushed his body forward. It tripped him up and tipped him over, but she worked it so that he landed on his back. She sat on his middle and punched his face. But, showing remarkable resilience, he forced her off with a punch of his own. It was a hefty blow, and had her on her knees.

They both needed time to recover. Naomi got to her feet again, and they eyed each other warily, each one playing for time to get their breath back. All pretence of an honourable match had gone; their mutual loathing - so professionally repressed during rehearsals and performances - at last found an outlet.

Naomi pounced, cracking Edgar on the chin with her elbow. His teeth slammed together, jarring his head. He fired a body blow in response, but she side-stepped adroitly out of the way. Similarly, she blocked a left cross; and when she successfully leant back out of harm’s way from a left hook, Jean and Dave exchanged another look, and Dave made a “thumbs up” sign. (Derek noticed, and was puzzled.)

When Edgar wasted more precious energy in a frustrating miss of a right cross, overreaching badly, Naomi sliced her left fist into the kidney area that she had already injured. He felt sick with pain. He managed to ward off a right cross from her, but realised too late that it was a feint, when her left fist roared into his ear. As he stood dazed, she caught him square on the chin with a right cross, and he staggered.

Sensing her growing momentum, and willing her on, the crowd began calling out encouragement. She obliged them with a left cross, and they shouted their appreciation. “Lovely!” stated Jean, as a right hook, both graceful and destructive, drove Edgar into a corner. He lashed out with his left; Naomi swung out of the way, and buried her left fist in the same ear that she had struck less than two minutes previously.

“Must get out of this corner,” thought Edgar, close to desperation. Naomi disagreed, and rammed him back into it with her right fist. He was beginning to sway, and seemed to be losing the ability to think straight. She had the luxury of being able to take aim anyway, and her left fist stormed into his face. She would have had him on his back after that punch, without question, had the ropes and corner post not prevented his fall. The din from the crowd was deafening.

“Not showing off now, are you, you great pussy!” yelled Jean.

“For God’s sake, what’s got into you?” demanded Derek, shouting for her to hear. “We’ve got most of the cast here, you can’t behave like that!”

“Bah, no one will hear me with all this row!”

Naomi brought the unresisting Edgar into the middle of the ring. She wanted the satisfaction of knocking him down. She placed him where she wanted him, and gave him a firm, straight right. If anything it seemed to bring him to his senses, because he did make an effort to block her next blow. It’s just a shame it didn’t work! Her right uppercut shot his chin upwards, and his teeth clanged together once more.

Naomi swatted away a nondescript nothing of a punch from Edgar, then planted her left fist forcefully on his mouth. It was such a powerful blow that it threatened to put him on the ropes again. She didn’t want that, so she turned him round, and punched him back into the middle, brutally in the stomach.

The crowd had quietened down a little for the past few minutes; but now, sensing a victory for Naomi, its shouting built up to a crescendo. She couldn’t let it down, could she? With Edgar still coughing and gasping after her previous assault, she took aim for the climactic blow. She crouched down slightly and shot a missile of a left cross, upwards, at his jaw. This was the one she wanted! At the woman’s punch, the man’s feet left the canvas, and he sailed in mid-air for a moment, before crashing down near her feet.

The crowd was a frenzy of cheering and waving, and Naomi basked in it. She was, after all, used to playing to an audience, and she got laughs as she bent over him and looked down, as if to check something.

But the laughter abruptly changed to booing. For a moment, Naomi couldn’t understand why, until she was aware of movement behind her. Edgar had come to, and was getting to his feet, intending to catch her unawares. Seconds later, and it would indeed have been too late for her. As it was, when he tried to attack her from behind, she just managed to escape and turn round to face him.

He came at her with a right cross, but she blocked it, responding with one of her own, as if to say, “That’s how you throw a right cross!” It was too, much to the relief of the crowd. She ducked under an attempted left cross from him, and as he laboriously limbered up for another attempt, she decided to interrupt him. She belted his jaw with a right hook, and this time there was no doubt: the woman had knocked the man out.

As the crowd shouted its adoration of its heroine, Jean and Derek stood and “high fived”. Derek nodded to himself, guessing what they had plotted.

*****

The fight had taken place on a Friday evening. This was deliberate, the idea being to give Naomi and Edgar time to recover for Monday morning’s rehearsal, which Jean normally took by herself, aided by Beverley and Dave.

“Good morning everyone,” she announced brightly. “Now, over the weekend, we’ve made some changes to the Apache Dance scene.” (Beverley and Dave nodded.) “For those of you who weren’t with us Friday night, the reception that Naomi received convinced us that it would go down much better if the woman beats up the man in that scene. Naomi, dear, you were wonderful!” (Naomi curtseyed, getting laughs) “And Edgar, dear, thank you for coming here this morning. Poor you! You are a bit black-and-blue! Now, Naomi, do you think you could lift Edgar, and throw him?”

“Yes, I should think so,” she answered.

“I’m not going to ask if you can hit him, because we all know the answer to that! All right, so places please everyone …”

“Sorry, Mrs Marshal?” It was Douglas, one of the stagehands, who had just come in.

“Yes Douglas, what is it?”

“Will you be needing the trap door to open for this scene, because – blimey you’re all at it!”

“What do you mean?” asked Jean, wanting to get started.

“It’s Edgar’s face! Only I’ve just been round your house to get the spare stage door key, and Mr Marshal’s face is in the same state as Edgar’s!”