Will Harris gets going when the gloves are off

And so to the ring, where I am lucky enough to have two comps to ‘Pink Collar Boxing’, an event billed as ‘the UK’s first ever gay boxing show and club night’. A dozen gay men from all walks of life have endured months of training, calorie-controlled diets, and weekly sparring sessions, all to face off against each other in the sticky-floored environs of the Scala. Ding ding!

“OMG!” I say, as the first bout gets under way. “They’re actually punching each other”.

I don’t know why I should be so surprised. After all, we gay men spend so much time battering each other’s self esteem, the transition to physical violence could probably be considered a natural progression. The crowds clearly agree. When one fighter’s nose starts spilling blood down his headguard, they cheer. When a fight is declared a draw, they groan. One grand old gay beside me, silver-haired and resplendent in Alexander McQueen, practically starts frothing at the mouth and screaming: “KILL HIM! Get the bastard on the ropes and kill him!”

“Who knew the brotherhood had this much testosterone,” I remark to Nadia, who is wincing at every blow and attempting to cover her eyes with a Tom Collins.

“You’re so naïve,” she says. “This isn’t testosterone. It’s foreplay. They’re all just waiting for the moment the clothes start coming off.”

“In the red corner,” bellows the announcer, “he’s CEO of an award-winning design agency by day, an unstoppable force of nature by night; please put your hands together for…”

““OMG!” I say, as the first bout gets under way. “They’re actually punching each other””

And then he reads out the name of a man I dated briefly last year. A man with whom I enjoyed a string of disarmingly romantic assignations, until one morning he told me he was going out to get us stall seats for Romeo And Juliet at the Guildhall, and never came back. The same man who, right now, is strutting across the podium, shrugging off his dressing gown, and raising his gloves above the crowd in anticipatory glory.

“OMG!” I say (it is my firm belief that acronyms are the future of interpersonal communications, just FYI). “I’ve totally had that bantamweight.”

“Shut up!” says Nadia, giving him the once over. “Why is it, everywhere we go, we unravel a little bit more of your sexual history? I mean, who are you; Tiger Woods?”

Up to this point I’ve felt largely disconnected from the aggression in the room, but the appearance of this ghost from the past strutting across the ring stokes something in me; an understanding that even the most mild-mannered of us has access to a seething well of primal bloodlust, and all it takes to activate it is the spark from an old flame.

“CRUSH HIM!” I yell, jumping to my feet. “GET HIM BELOW THE BELT! BELOW THE BELT!” Something tells me I’m going to enjoy this.