My business is hurting people.

Host: The gym was empty except for the sound of the speed bag, its rhythmic pulse echoing like a heartbeat in the metallic air. Sweat and old leather filled the room, the lights buzzing overhead with a faint hum, as if tired of watching so many battles fought and forgotten beneath them.

Jack stood in the ring, his hands wrapped, his shirt damp with effort. He breathed hard, chest rising and falling like a machine built for endurance, not grace. Jeeny sat on the bench nearby, her notebook open, pen tapping idly. The rain outside beat against the roof, the smell of dust and iron thick in the air.

Jack: without looking up “You know what Sugar Ray Robinson said once? ‘My business is hurting people.’”

Jeeny: raises her eyes slowly “He said that with pride, didn’t he?”

Jack: “Yeah. Because it was true. That’s what boxing is. Hurting people before they hurt you.”

Host: His voice was flat, but underneath it there was a tremor, something half-buried, like the echo of an old bruise. He shadowboxed while he spoke, his fists cutting through the air with precision, controlled rage, a kind of rhythm that was almost beautiful in its violence.

Jeeny: “You sound like you believe that’s more than boxing.”

Jack: “It is. That’s life, Jeeny. Business, politics, relationships — it’s all just different rings. Everyone’s swinging. Everyone’s trying not to go down.”

Jeeny: leans forward, voice soft but steady “So hurting people is the business of living?”

Jack: “No. It’s the price of surviving.”

Host: The sound of punches hitting the bag filled the room — sharp, clean, like small explosions of truth. The gloves smacked, echoed, and then silence returned, hanging like a judge above them.

Jeeny: “That’s not survival, Jack. That’s surrender — surrender to the idea that cruelty is inevitable.”

Jack: “Tell that to the guy who loses his job because someone else outperformed him. Or the soldier who has to pull the trigger first. Or the CEO who fires two hundred people to save the company. You call it cruelty. I call it arithmetic.”

Jeeny: “Arithmetic without soul is just cold logic dressed as necessity.”

Jack: turns, finally meeting her gaze “You think the world runs on soul?”

Jeeny: “It should. Otherwise, we’re just professionals at destruction.”

Host: The lights buzzed louder, a faint flicker breaking the stillness. The air between them tightened, as if the ring ropes themselves had drawn closer. Jack’s knuckles were white, wrapped tight, his breathing heavy, his eyes dark.

Jack: “You ever seen a man bleed for a living? Not on accident — for a living. He signs the papers, trains, steps in the ring, and gives everything he’s got to do the very thing that tears him apart. That’s the truth of this world — pain is the only honest currency.”

Jeeny: “But what about meaning? What about love? Compassion? You talk like those are luxuries.”

Jack: “They are. You can’t afford compassion when your job depends on not feeling it.”

Jeeny: “Then you’ve already lost more than you’ve won.”

Host: Her voice cut through the room, clean, sharp, like the sound of a bell marking the end of a round. Jack froze, his glove midair, muscles twitching. Rainwater dripped through a small leak in the ceiling, one drop, then another, each impact echoing like a countdown.

Jack: after a pause “You think I like this? You think I wake up wanting to hurt someone? I didn’t choose this world, Jeeny. It chose me. You either fight or you fall.”

Jeeny: “No. You either fight to destroy or fight to protect. There’s a difference.”

Jack: “Protection’s just another word for controlled damage.”

Jeeny: “Not if it’s guided by mercy. Even Robinson, with all his violence, had elegance — he wasn’t fighting to kill, he was fighting to express. There’s art in that. There’s humanity.”

Jack: snorts “Humanity in a knockout punch?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because it’s not the punch that matters — it’s what you rise from after. You think pain defines you, Jack. But it’s what you do with pain that decides who you are.”

Host: The rain roared, drumming harder now, blurring the roof’s rhythm with the beating of Jack’s heart. He leaned on the ropes, his head bowed, sweat dripping like small prayers. The light from the overhead bulb cast his shadow long and broken across the mat.

Jack: “You sound like you believe there’s redemption in everything.”

Jeeny: “There is — even in pain. Even in the business of hurting people. Because hurt can teach. It can wake. It can change.”

Jack: “You can’t make poetry out of blood.”

Jeeny: “Tell that to every soldier who came home and wrote a song, every boxer who turned trainer to keep the next kid from breaking like he did. Pain can destroy, yes. But it can also create.”

Host: Her words hung, heavy and holy, in the humid air. The sound of rain softened, settling into a rhythm like breathing. Jack’s gloves lowered, hands trembling slightly — not from fatigue, but from recognition.

Jack: quietly “So you think the business of hurting people isn’t the problem — it’s what we do with it afterward.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The world breaks everyone, but some people turn their breaks into bridges. Robinson fought for glory, yes, but he also fought for beauty. For mastery. For something pure in the midst of violence.”

Jack: “Beauty in violence. That’s dangerous thinking.”

Jeeny: “No — it’s honest. Because life is violent. Birth is pain. Growth is struggle. Every act of love risks loss. We hurt, and we heal, and we hurt again. Maybe the point isn’t avoiding the hurt — it’s learning to make it mean something.”

Host: The light flickered, then steadied, as if the room itself had exhaled. The bag hung still, silent, swaying gently like a pendulum measuring the distance between violence and mercy.

Jack: removes his gloves slowly “You ever think maybe that’s why people fight? Not to hurt, but to feel alive. To prove they still can.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And that’s what redeems it — not the punch, but the pulse behind it.”

Host: The rain eased, the sound now like faint whispers against metal. Jack stepped down from the ring, sitting beside her on the bench, his hands bare, his breathing calm. Jeeny closed her notebook, the pen resting between her fingers.

Jack: “You ever think maybe Sugar Ray was half right? Maybe the business is hurting people — but maybe the real business is learning how to stop.”

Jeeny: smiles softly “Maybe the real business is learning how to heal the hurt we cause — starting with ourselves.”

Host: A silence fell, deep and unbroken, except for the distant hum of the rain and the sound of their breathing, two souls sitting in the aftermath of a truth too raw to deny.

The lights dimmed, the ring empty, the echoes of the past still hanging in the air like the ghosts of old fights.

Host: And as the night folded over the city, Jack and Jeeny sat, not as a fighter and a believer, but as two witnesses of the same paradox — that in the business of hurting, there lies the fragile, eternal chance to heal.