Post by Lockhart on Apr 7, 2019 21:53:44 GMT -5
He still remembered the last night he and Amber had spent together. She had flown to LA to meet him, where he had been staying at Jared’s place the night after defending The World at #EFFINRAGER. The match had been gruelling, but seeing her rejuvenated him. His feet felt lighter, each step noticeably less painful than when Jaice had nearly snapped him at the knee.
The anchors that rested upon his shoulders, the responsibility of being World Champion, the weight of family legacy carried on by those who had come before him, the expectations of the fans and his faction. All of it dissipated when he spent time with her, and that night had been nothing different.
‘I thought we were done after you became World Champion, you know.’ she said, smiling at him from across the table, her appetizing plate of salt and pepper calamari half-finished as she picked away at some salad. He glanced up from his own plate, eyebrows raised.
‘Really? Why?’ he said, tone raised an octave. She shuffled in her seat, placing an elbow on the table, chin resting upon her cupped hand.
‘You were obsessed with that thing since like… forever. We met in the club but the look you had seemed different from every other guy. I can’t really explain it. Ambition, I guess?’ she said, with a shrug.
‘It was kinda hot, but it was intense. Too intense. That’s why I left for a while. After you got it? I wasn’t sure what would happen to you… or us.’ she said, frowning. It is replaced shortly after with a bright smile, drawing attention to her perfect set of gleaming white teeth.
‘Looks like I didn’t have to worry about that though, right?’
‘Yeah.’ he said, followed by a weak, empty laugh. His stomach dropped, hands subtly pushing his plate further from his body. Behind her smile, he could see the pain he must have brought her.
‘But you’re happy now, yeah? You got everything you wanted. The belt, money, fame. You’re living the dream.’
‘Something like that, yeah.’ he said. Living the dream? He felt sick. He needed an emergency exit. The eyes darted around, attempting to find anything that could turn the conversation elsewhere. But before he could, she spoke once more.
‘I missed you, Ryan. Really. Not spending time with you kinda made me realize it.’ she said, voice lowered, afraid to speak how she truly felt. Her eyes leveled upon him, trying to gauge a reaction.
Then, the question came.
‘Was I just another fling to you, Ryan?’ she said, her mouth giving a subtle twitch, before dropping into a small frown. Ryan tensed, sitting upright in his chair, fists balled. He thought he could see tears in her eyes.
‘I…’ he trailed off, uncertain of himself for the first time in what seemed like months. She waited, hope gleaming in her eyes for a few seconds.
I missed you too.
I have feelings for you.
You weren’t just a fling.
Naturally, none of them came out. He bottled it up, and she slumped in her chair.
‘I guess that tells me everything I need to know then, huh?’ she said, her voice lowered into nothing but a sad whisper. His mouth sprinted ahead of his thoughts, leaving them to Bite The Dust.
‘I’m fuckin’ scared, Amber. I’m not… I’m not a good guy. I haven’t learned how to be a man yet. I’m still a fuckin’ child. Look at me… how I act, the people I’ve hurt, the shit I’ve said. I have learned nothing.
‘I’m not like them, yeah? My Dad and Grandfather… they worked hard to give the people they loved a decent life. Me? I was blessed. I’m a prodigy. In one year I’ve made and achieved more than they did in an entire life of grinding away, day after day after fuckin’ day.
‘But honestly? I’m not even half of what they were. That’s why I’m still doing this shit. That’s why I’m not ready to commit. I’ve still got so much to learn and so much to prove. It’s not just about me, yeah?
‘I’m not about to drag you into that. You need someone that’ll give you the time you deserve. I’m not that guy. It sucks… but this is reality. This isn’t a choice, it’s something I gotta do. I need to keep pushing, keep working. I’ll go insane if I don’t, Amber. I swear to God I will.
‘Maybe I’m going about it the wrong way but… fightin’ is all I really know, love. It’s the only thing I really got. I’ve alienated my friends, I’ve got a whole roster lookin’ to cave my fuckin’ skull in… so that’s where I’m at. I can’t focus on anything else.
‘I’m still obsessed.’ he said. He hadn’t noticed until now, but there were tears streaming down his face, ones that he hurried to wipe away with the cuff of his shirt. When he looked at her, he saw that she too was crying, but a smile was still on her face. Before he could add anything, she grabbed his hands with both of hers, nodding.
‘I thought so.’ she said, pushing herself up to her feet. She stepped around the table, leaned down and gave him a kiss on the cheek, and then turned away toward the exit of the restaurant. He went to say something, anything, but choked on his words. She left.
‘I’ll call you sometime. I really hope you figure everything out, Ryan.’
She disappeared shortly after, leaving him alone at the table, shirt sleeves damp with tears and his eyes reddened.
So do I.
He thought back now, and questioned every word he said, and every word he didn’t say. He examined it all under the most watchful eye of them all; hindsight. Now? She had disappeared, taken by someone who he didn’t know the identity of.
He would find her, no matter the cost.
The fighter in him made it impossible to do otherwise.
A camera switched on, the image blurred and unfocused until it settled on Ryan leaning over a table, the whites of his eyes filled with red cracks, the bags underneath them accentuated by the dim lighting in the room. Even in this condition, Ryan cracks a smile.
‘You’re probably thinking right about now you’ve got me backed into a corner, desperate and with no method of escape. Don’t you, you fuckin’ rats? The locker room died from excitement when Camila came out and laid it all out on the line, forcing me into a handicap match against The Guardians a week before I go out and defend my title twice.
‘I’ll admit, the situation I’m in right now? Not the most desirable. Anyone in my situation would fuckin’ run from this challenge. They’d get themselves counted out, they’d get themselves disqualified. Hell, half of the roster wouldn’t even show up. They’d call it quits before they even get halfway down the ramp.
‘But as I’ve told you all… I’m a different fuckin’ breed. I’m a warrior. I’m not a wrestler. I’m the most skilled and determined fighter in this damn company, and I’d rather chop off my left nut then run away from the same Guardians I have been bitch-slapping since I arrived here.
‘Alex Richards. Claire Hawkins. L Verez. Jaice Wilds. I said it before, I’ll say it again. Put any of them against me one-on-one and I’ll wipe the floor with them. I see you’re thinking a step or two ahead, eh, Camila? Now the tables have turned. The same fuckin’ bitches who cried unfair about #BeachKrew running roughshod over the entire federation are here to give me a taste of my own medicine, right?’
The smile drops, a scowl replacing it.
‘Wrong.
‘For the first time in my career, I step into that ring a clear underdog, yeah? Sammy, Claire, and Jaice… you’re all just fuckin’ brimming full of confidence, aren’t you? You get your revenge on the dude that has wiped his nuts all over the credibility of your faction, the guy who beat your boy twice back-to-back to defend the World Title.
‘Let’s get one thing clear, I have more god-given ability and talent in one hand than all three of you put together. Let’s prove that point by starting with you, Jaice.
For weeks you carried on, drooling like a fuckin’ spastic as you glued together your nonsensical arguments about how I’m such a coward, such an undeserving champion. All of it and more. You cried foul when you thought I got handed a win at #EFFINRAGER because of #beachkrew interfering, but you had no complaints when it was YOUR team that got to spend the entire match at ringside, now did you?
‘I beat you then, and then I put the argument to bed when I crushed you at Battlefield. This is the story of our time in the ring together, Jaice.
‘You wear a mask to the ring? I beat you.
‘You take me on in a tag team match? I beat you.
‘You fight me while our teams are at ringside? I beat you.
‘You fight me one-on-one, no added bullshit? I beat you.
‘Why do you think you keep getting put into these advantageous positions, you fuckin’ pleb? First you’ve got your entire faction surrounding the ring as lumberjacks, and now they’re giving you TWO of them give you a three to one advantage over me. Everyone knows that you never have been and never will get the job done against me in a fair match, so now they’re saying “fuck it” and doing their absolute best to give you at least one “hard-earned” victory over me.’
Ryan shakes his head adamantly.
‘But that’s not how this story goes. I’ll fuckin’ die before I let you get the one-up on me, even in a situation as dire as this. Stay obsessed with me, Wilds. Keep uttering my name everywhere you go. Keep thinking about “what could have been” and how you had me “dead to rights” at #EFFINRAGER. I want you to think of these moments endlessly, I want you to stay up at night, tossing and turning, knowing you were JUST about to beat the unquestioned greatest wrestler on the planet… but fell just short.
‘Because that’s all you did, Jaice - catch me off-guard. And it nearly worked, I’ll give you that. But now? I know what to expect. It doesn’t matter if they throw three of your crew at me, or the whole fuckin’ squad, I’ll put a nail in all your coffins and put this argument to bed once and for all about who is the better man.’
A smile now from the champion.
‘On the topic of being a “better man”... have you made any improvements in that regard, Sammy? No? Still the same fuckin’ depressing, soulless husk of a man you’ve always have been? We’ve seen the mask slip recently, and now we’re finally seeing the real you, huh?
‘Let’s get one thing clear, Sammy ol’ pal… you’re a fuckin’ lousy wrestler and an even worse champion at that. I have zero respect for you or anything you’ve “accomplished” here. The Guardians were quick to bring up the amount of titles they held in this company, but they left out the fact that you were the man holding two of them. That’s an odd argument and bragging point, considering you haven’t even shown your capable of DEFENDING a fuckin’ belt against some half-decent competition.
‘It’s people like you that make me sick. Your pathetic, incessant whining about what life has dealt you and how you’re in a slump. Your inability to look at yourself in the fuckin’ mirror and see your own flaws and improve upon them. You’re arrogant. You believe you’re at a higher standing to everyone else, and you do it all under this persona that you’re a “good guy” trying to inspire everyone around him.
‘If that’s your goal, you’re doing a shit job. I can’t go more than two minutes watching you wallow around in your self-loathing, edgy misery before I want to throw my head into a brick wall… and this is coming from me. You know you done fucked up when I’m the one hitting you with this shit, you twat.
‘Maybe if you had any shred of dignity or honor, you’d pick yourself up and be real with these people. You aren’t in this for them. You aren’t here to accomplish anything for the greater good.
You’re in it for yourself. You’re obsessed with that United States Title and your incompetence at keeping it. You’re here for the fame and glory, and nothing else. How do I figure that? The only time you’re happy is when you have everything you want. You were handed opportunities when you were young, you had a meteoric rise to the top that only the slimmest percentage of The World will ever get to experience… and then you tossed it all away.
‘The moment people saw you on the same level as all the “mediocrity” that surrounded you? Everything crumbled. Your facade, the fake persona, all of it left and out came the ugly, hate-spewing, low-life scum that IS Sam Kidsgrove. Don’t you dare prance around in MY company and try to pretend that you’re someone the people should love, you deserve to die nameless and be put six-feet under, just like everyone else. You aren’t worthy of any “special treatment”, you should have to dig your way back up to the surface and survive flailing in the endless waves just like everyone else, just like I had to.
‘You think you’ve had it rough recently? Good for you. I can guarantee you I’ve had it worse. Unlike you though? I didn’t sit there being a waste of fuckin’ space, moping around and hoping that someone would finally take notice and say “Aww, Ryan. What’s wrong? You can talk to me if you need anything.”
‘Fuck that shit, and fuck you. Come Monday, I will kick a hole through you and if all goes to plan… be the one to pin you. I want YOU to be the one that costs your team the victory, Kidsgrove, and I want it to be YOU that owns up to his mistakes and suffers the consequences.
‘Maybe then you’ll be someone the people actually give a shit about.’
He sighs, letting out a loud exhale.
‘And then there’s you, Claire. Although there would be many people who would say you don’t belong in The Guardians… you seem to be the perfect fit. You’re an entitled brat and you believe yourself superior to everyone that surrounds you, especially those that you’re supposed to be aligned with.
‘You have no concept of teamwork or respect, and that’s why you will be absolutely eviscerated the moment you step one foot into that ring with me. You don’t stand a chance against me one-on-one, but perhaps if you swallowed your pride for just a match and put all your chips in alongside your teammates… maybe you’d be able to get one over on me.
‘Maybe.
‘But you won’t do that, and you won’t even come close to beating me. Do you enjoy being ridiculed in this manner, Claire? Do you enjoy being looked down upon? This is what it must feel like for both your teammates and our peers in the locker room whenever they’re subjected to your diatribes on twitter. It makes sense you would fall back on that format to do all of your shit-talking, considering you fail magnificently every time you step into the ring when it fuckin’ matters.
A cheeky grin from Ryan, who points to the camera with a knowing look.
‘You know exactly what I’m talking about, don’t you Claire? You question everyone around you and their motives, and their abilities… and then you get fuckin’ stomped when it counts. Look at all that shit you claimed about Casey Holliday, about her not wanting the UCI Title… only for her to embarrass you in the ring and retain the belt. If she “didn’t want it” then you must have been actively avoiding going for the win, right? Considering you lost in another high stakes match… again.
‘This is a recurring theme with you, Claire. You dissect an opponent’s psyche, you give off this nonchalant attitude and act as though winning or losing doesn’t matter to you… and then you either win against less than spectacular competition or get beat by people who have a modicum of talent in this industry. Your attitude isn’t impressive, it doesn’t make me respect you. All I see is a loser who doesn’t want to step too far out of her comfort zone.
‘And that’s the main difference between the two of us, I strive for greatness and you settle for being a mediocre wreck with no real distinguishing features besides being a wannabe badass who gets slapped by anyone that isn’t a low-card bum.
‘Me? I never settle. I keep fuckin’ going until there isn’t any doubt left, and right now? I’ve only shared a ring with you once, and that was during the All-In match. That wasn’t a conclusive victory, so now I’m back like the grim fuckin’ reaper and I’m about to finish the damn job.
‘I still remember what you said about me all that time ago, Claire. You claimed that I was moving too fast, that if I kept rising I would eventually flame out and there would be nothing left, or something along those lines, right? Well, look where we fuckin’ are, huh? I dug deeper and kept finding resolve from that never-ending gas tank that is my burning passion and desire to be the greatest… and you? Well, we’ve all witnessed what exactly happened to you, Claire. Nothing but disappointment and failure everywhere you looked, as you got out-classed by just about everyone near your relative skill-level.
He chuckles to himself, almost beside himself.
‘This was meant to be a handicap match in the favor of The Guardians… but you’ve all forgotten who you put at the other end of the table. I’ve fought against the odds my entire career, I’ve come up from nothing and I’ve butchered everyone in my path. You’re all probably watching right now and thinking I’m on my bullshit again, talking a mad game and that I’m being too cocky… that The Guardians will put me in my place, right?
‘When that bell sounds and I step into that ring, you’ll realize that I was never the one at a disadvantage. It was The Guardians on the back foot the entire time, why?
‘Because I’m Ryan Lockhart, and this is my World.’
The smile and relaxed face disappear, pure anger taking their place.
‘They never stood a fuckin’ chance.’
Alexander has hardly moved since he took a position on the balcony overlooking Los Angeles from the apartment we had rented out for the weekend. Lately, something about the VolkSWAGGIN’ felt hollow, like it wasn’t really our home anymore, not after Jana had left her and Alex’s place at Brighton Beach. Since then, the dude has been a shell of himself. Hardly smiling, rarely cracking jokes or even going outside. We’ve only been in this place for a few days, and already the bottles of alcohol are piling up at the kitchen counter, and there are traces of white powder throughout the apartment if you look carefully enough.
When I look at him, I almost feel bad. After all, this was my doing. It all came down to one decision I made, to betray the trust of my friend to be honest and give the harsh reality to his once loving girlfriend. I wonder what hurt worse: me crushing her hopes of Alex not getting back on drugs, or him finding out she had left - maybe for good.
He’s an observant one, I wonder if he’s pieced it altogether yet. Maybe she hasn’t told him why she left yet, she probably won’t even pick up the phone… but I can’t help but feel like eventually, the truth will come out and I’ll be the one getting the shit end of it all.
But why should I? One look at her and I could see that he had put her through a lot, that it had been wearing away at her, scraping her resolve and heart away bit by bit… and it would’ve kept going until there was nothing left at her, and she was just another broken-hearted individual with nothing left to give.
The guilt, the sympathy I’m feeling for him? It’s withering away and transforming into something else entirely. Disgust. Slowly but surely, I can feel the transition happening, even though something tells me it’s wrong to feel that way.
But… how can one sit there and not see the consequences of their own actions? The pain they bring to others? The suffering they cause? Fuck, I’m not the best guy myself, but at least I’m self-aware enough to know what I’m doing and how it can impact other people.
Or do I?
Maybe that’s the reason I feel uneasy around him. Sure, he’s nice enough, and he’s one talented fuckin’ dude. We get along. That’s why we work so well together. But… beneath it all? I sometimes feel like I’m lookin’ into a damn mirror.
Alexander’s voice rings out from the balcony, snapping me from my trance.
‘Should I give her a call? It’s been long enough since the last one, yeah?’
He speaks, but it’s uncertain, lacking of any conviction or bravado I usually associate with him. Instead of the hardened, street smart, savvy fighter I’m used to witnessing… it’s as though I’m witnessing a lost child, unsure of himself and seeking any form of guidance available.
He’s looking for it from the wrong guy, that’s for sure.
‘I don’t know, man. The whole thing just seems like a spur-of-the-moment decision. If it’s true love, she’ll be back, she’ll see what she’s missing out on.’
My words are vile and make me feel sick. Bullshit, bullshit, useless bullshit. All of it. I know the truth, but I don’t speak it. I just sit here and humor him, make him feel better, give him hollow words of encouragement and hope that’s enough, even though in reality I’m sitting here and seething, ready to burst.
It seems he is unconvinced too.
‘Nah, I don’t think that’s it. This is fuckin’ weird even by her standards. Somethin’ must have happened, and I’m gonna figure it out.’
He turns now, looking at me.
‘Any ideas? I need to figure this shit out, fast.’
I say nothing, resorting to taking a sip of water and hoping the moment would pass. It didn’t.
‘I thought I was doin’ okay recently. Phone calls, visits every now and again. The works. Hell, I was even saving up to move us to a better place, even though it would’ve been hard to leave that place behind.’
He’s looking for answers. He wants something, anything. I shrug.
‘Sometimes, there are things other people see we can’t. Perspective, it changes everything.’
This simultaneously stumps his and satisfies him, putting him back into his state of still contemplation. A sigh of relief escapes from my lip. The truth is still secret, and Alex can only sit and wonder where he went wrong.
What a fuckin’ few months this has been.