Post by distortedamber on Nov 20, 2022 12:41:03 GMT -5
“I let my gaze travel out the picture window. Unlike at my old doublewide trailer perched on the fringe of a played out quarry, here I owned a real yard with real grass that screamed for mowing each Monday a.m. I sat at the kitchen table, cooling off from just having finished this week's job. Yes, here in 2005, I was a full-fledged suburbanite, but I'd been called worse.”
― Ed Lynskey, The Zinc Zoo
Walter Pyramid
Long Beach, CA
13.11.2022
8:42pm
Adrenaline.
Amber wasn’t quite sure how long she’d been gripping the edges of the basin by now, only that the ache in her knuckles had long since faded paler than the white she’d last acknowledged. It made her want to be sick and throw herself off a balcony in the same breath it made her feel… real.
Alive?
Ugh. No.
Reactively shaking her head slightly as though trying to dislodge the notion, Amber quickly dismissed the thought- one that felt a step too cliche and false in her repertoire, even by her usually low standards. Water trickled around the drain, pooling briefly before disappearing and taking a little of the pent up nothingness, she’d so carefully stockpiled for the last five months, with it.
Even now she still wasn’t even quite convinced. Loosening her grip slightly so that the flow of blood might reach through her aching fingertips and perhaps dribble down into the indents she’d furiously intended to leave. Watching the water pool then vanish in cycles, perpetual only when allowed by her own hand, was as much a catharsis as it was a hypnotic burden. A constant reminder of how close she’d continually come to losing everything, and how the universe unjustly let her keep scraping by for it.
Perhaps she was supposed to be grateful. Some might have determined this was the point where she should be finding faith, spending the last waking moments of every evening whispering sincere thanks to a God that had stopped listening almost two decades earlier. They’d be telling her that this was a sign, a new opportunity to do something… go somewhere… be someone.
Anyone, but who she was.
Many would be telling her she should be thankful for the gifts she was given- time and time again she’d defied expectation and odds like it was russian roulette and she’d been convinced the chamber was loaded with bubblegum.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Only it had been, almost as often as it had been gifted- and more often than not by her own god forsaken hand. That was the most curious part, like a terribly choreographed groundhog existence, she shouldn’t have been here and had been more than determined to prove it- and yet, here she was time and again being told that she was supposed to be thankful in the same way a collegiate athlete might appreciate a fistful of terminal cancer.
To a degree, perhaps, she was.
After all, she’d just gone out there and told the world in no uncertain terms- she was back.
Daring her gaze to stray up towards the mirror she’d so dutifully ignored, quietly hoping that the movement might not suddenly trigger the wave of adrenaline induced nausea that steadily bubbled just below her ribs, the top half of her visage seemed foreign for the first moment. An acquaintance that time had been allowed to drift apart, a friend of a friend who’d always felt closer than they actually were. A passing set of eyes that lingered a little too long not to be coincidental, yet not so long that the small tlak wouldn’t immediately set her over the edge.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Maybe those words would have meant more if she hadn’t used that same breath to call out the same draconic djinn that she’d seemingly knowingly unleashed, the one that had puppeteered an unstoppable world champion into a derelict husk waiting, wanting, to die and the one that was the very reason she’d spent the last five months relearning how to vocally express her disdain, instead of just using rude hand gestures, and how to pick up a spoon.
She’d been told by many that this was a new beginning, a second chance to live a first real life as though dying between the ropes somehow didn’t count the first 16,000 times. That she should be gratified that she wasn’t wearing a toe tag and horrifying whichever poor medical examiner drew the short straw that day.
Only she wasn’t grateful.
People with little reason and less understanding sat behind desks or in front of television screens trying to convince her that everything she knew and loved, in full knowledge that it would never love her back, was supposed to just gather dust in someones poorly maintained archive of ‘almosts’ and that she should be okay with that.
No, somehow the woman with darkening circles beneath her eyes and the flickers of a indignant scowl on her lips disagreed.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Only it had been.
Until tonight.
Until tonight she’d feigned contentment, she’d turned the other cheek in hopes the world might not see them flushed with a hurt and rage she’d swallowed a little too hard. Until tonight she’d tried to pretend that she could walk away and simply let the sleeping dogs fester with their fleas, infesting the home she’d razed and rebuilt in the space of a year.
Until tonight, Amber Ryan had been accepting of a life that she never really wanted.
Until tonight, Amber Ryan had forgotten what gratitude really was.
Gratitude was the screaming voice of every fan who’d wasted their prayers on her forsaken soul, gratitude was the flicker and fluctuation of lights and the thunder of bass while the Sin City legion questioned whether it was real… whether she was real.
Gratitude was one more chance to right the wrong she’d created.
Five months ago, she’d tried to convince everyone she knew what she was doing- that she was in control. Maybe the stupidest part was that she’d believed it, that was the first lesson of wrestling that you were never taught though- as the furrows of her brow sunk a little deeper in recollection and the phantom metallic taste lingered at the back of her tongue.
Five months later, she knew that she had no fucking clue.
Anyone with two brain cells to rub together knew this was a terrible idea. Maybe some of them might even find their balls for long enough to suggest so before they withered back whence they came, under the glare of a sideways glance.
Even now, with her right hand tracing through her hairline and into the mass of crimson that snaked down her back like a tangled waterfall, there were questions. There was doubt.
Was she making the right decision?
Absolutely fucking not.
Only now, it didn’t really seem to matter.
What she did have though… or perhaps what she really had left, was gratitude.
For the time she had left…
For the way she knew she had to spend it…
For an opportunity to do what she should have done seven fucking years earlier…
For one more chance to make things ‘right’.
Or… maybe a little less wrong.
******
“How can I break your heart in the least amount of words?
How many syllables does it take to reach inside someone's chest and squeeze, to take everything they have and everything they are in your grasp and reduce it to nothing simply because you can. Essence of everything dribbling between your fingers and into a splattered mess on the floor.
It's not that many.
Nor does it need to be.
Don’t ever think though that this is an attempt at being succinct out of sincerity, like I’m trying my damndest to preserve the fragile egos dangling by precious threads. Now granted, my Mom did always tell me not to run with scissors but in this case… and every case… I’m willing to make an exception.
Truth is though, I’ve come to learn over time that most people you come across in this industry simply aren’t worth the effort of coming up with something inherently clever for…
Honestly, in the time it would take me to come up with something borderline original to satisfy the blasphemy thirst traps I could have done something far more productive… like punching myself in the face for half an hour.
At least then I might have something to show for it.
Sticks and stones never rang so true. It's just a shame they never accounted for the blunt force trauma of a carefully aimed truth. That's why we’re here, isn’t it?.
We own our little share of the spotlight like it's somehow owed to us, standing proud and tall before speaking from whatever bullshit we’ve stuffed into the gaping void, in hopes of staying up upright just long enough to be convincing to those who don’t know any fucking better.
We are all carefully crafted charades- veritable idols made of sticks and straw, propped up on pedestals we created, hoping that one good breeze doesn’t render us to rubble. Falsehoods trying to make a truth from a foundational nothing- despite it all, we are still the grain from the chaff - after the thresher hit a stuffed rabbit, or at least you hope it was. We are the cream on top of the milk… when it's been left outside for three days.
It doesn’t matter which way you frame it- it's still an achievement- in the same way it's an achievement when you realise that only half of the field hasn’t stuck their fingers in electrical sockets after learning they were 70% water, wanting to find out which ones that meant.
Kids, it's always the middle one.
Yeah. You know who the fuck you are.
Fact is though, we are here cause we ‘deserve’ it.
Fuck. Sorry, but that word gives me the fucking ick. You want a reckless truth? None of us deserve a fucking thing… It breeds entitlement, it breeds a festering need to be acknowledged and validated as more than you are. Eventually it grows more septic than Vhodka’s skin problem- seriously though, sleeping in open graves has really done you some wonders for that. I mean, it only looks like 78% of your skin looks like it's covered in athletes foot now. Good for you.
Let that entitlement grow untreated and next thing you know, you’re dancing on social media naked for double digits of likes while patiently waiting for best mate Elon to put this blue-tick Titanic into an interwebs iceberg.
Maybe I’m a pessimist, but I started pro-wrestling cause I fucking loved it. It meant something to me, I keep coming back to this abusive relationship cause nothing else will ever love me the same.
Mostly because I won’t let it.
Deserving it is about being willing to sacrifice for it- as far as I can tell, the only sacrifices have been made are to dignity, self-respect and reasonable talent. I could create a combined puddle of talent from the bottom half of the field and I promise it would barely be less shallow than Dionysus’s gene pool.
Granted not all of us can afford to make a living walking around looking like a half sucked mango like Regan Voorhees, or self-deprecating- like Allen Chaney- to the point that dying of botulism becomes more aspirational than following in his footsteps.
No, we’re all here for a reason- after all, someone has to make sure Dane F’N Preston gets his mandatory participation trophy and someone can record Johnathan Cable beasting his way through catering on his way back out the fucking door again.
That's the reality of all of this- someone has to lose, people have to fail for any one of us to succeed.
Problem is, most people aren’t prepared for that.
Too many walked into this being told they were ‘special’, that they were unique… just like everyone else. By now, I’m actually worried my face might start screwing itself up in protest to hearing the absolute fucking nonsense being repeated almost verbatim by every stupid fuck who thinks that theirs is the first original thought presented in the business, in the last 30 years.
Fuck, by the end of the second sentence I’m gonna start looking like the scrunched up ball of paper that once constituted your pathetic looking resumes.
Do I deserve to win more than anyone else here?
Probably not.
I’m sorry. Did you expect me to lie?
To stand here like a fucking hypocrite and try to tell you I’m somehow a better person than someone like Raion Kido- I mean the guy is literally so fucking wholesome it actually makes me want to vomit up my spleen in protest. Guy makes me wanna kick a child's teddy into an eight lane highway, then feel bad enough to go and fucking get it.
Hell, I’ve got no doubt the guy has thanked the towel after showering… more than once.
How the fuck do you compete with that?
How do you rightfully look an audience in the eye and say that you’re somehow a better person than that? I suppose if you’re someone like Shawn Warstein you’d call that a regular Wednesday afternoon. Of course, that being said he’s legitimately the human embodiment of what I imagine a week made of Wednesdays would be like.
Utterly fucking miserable.
Truth is, I’m a charisma heat sink. I take all that is joyful and good, and I put it through a trash compactor until it emerges as a cube of something that had the potential to be far better than it actually is.
Weirdly enough, it reminds me of every Lex Collins promo I’ve ever heard… uncanny how that works, right?
I’m the gift of sunflower seeds in your pocket and the knife in your guts, hoping your continued failures will allow the germination of something more meaningful in your place.
I’m the perpetual queen of the paper bag prom. I’m a monologue shot underwater and an elegy written on the back of a Wal-Mart receipt.
I’m everything and nothing all at once. I’m the alchemical reaction of violence and radioactive disinterest- and my showing up is the reason you’ll fail.
See, I’m not really ‘better’ than anyone.
Truth is, I’ve never needed to be.
Not when I could break your hearts without saying a fucking word.”
******
Oblivion Garage
Las Vegas, ND
18.11.2022
1:27pm
“You have to admit Red, this is a great opportunity.”
Perhaps if she didn’t implicitly love Mac so much, Amber might have been infuriated by his sincerity. Even the warmth of his smile when he knew he was right made her bristle internally- maybe it was because he always seemed to be right. Maybe it was because she knew it too and had no argument against it, well none that would have gained any traction.
“You know what? Fuck you Mac.”
Shielded by the raised hood of a canary yellow 1992 Dodge Viper, she knew he could probably hear the coy smile in her voice but refused to acknowledge it further. Of course, it didn’t stop him being right.
Not only was the chance to be featured on television again, outside of a Sin City Wrestling capacity a blessing given her recent and rather extended hiatus from wrestling- but really, he just liked seeing her uncomfortable in trying to act like a real, semi-likable persona instead of a kamikaze pilot dropping f-bombs like its machine gun fire.
It wasn’t as though she couldn’t act on it. As world champion, she’d done an excellent job in almost being marketable as the face of a company- it was most unfortunate though that the facade was usually shattered the moment she opened her mouth.
“I can be charismatic and likeable.”
“So can a rattlesnake if you decide not to poke it with a stick.”
Mac had come around to the side of the car now, determined to witness the frustrated crinkle in her nose.
“Besides, the car is… well it's sure something.”
Amber paused briefly, giving Mac a raised eyebrow as though questioning his integrity. In response, he simply shrugged, as though his attempt to lighten the mood hadn’t sunk through the grease splattered concrete.
“It's cool and all, but let's be real…”
Wiping the back of her wrist across her forehead thoughtfully- Amber straightened up, trying to work the kinks out of her back as she pretended as though she had done anything except curse how much she really fucking hated working on Dodge’s.
“... We are absolutely donating the vehicle, if won obviously. I mean, it's fucking cool and everything but---”
“But it's not us.”
Mac interjected thoughtfully, placing a hand to steady himself as he leaned. Amber simply nodded before adding her confirmation automatically. Even their thoughts were in-sync to the point that if she thought about it too much, she might have thrown up at the clicheness of it all.
“It’s definitely not us.”
It wasn’t as though she wouldn’t have been appreciative, however Oblivion Garage was already accumulating it's fair share of ‘show vehicles’ and ‘testimonials’. Amber particularly prided herself on practicality and purpose- instinctively, she was minimalistic- a lover of sharp, sleek lines and clean paint jobs. A classic born in the wrong generation perhaps.
“Make-A-Wish or something? I’m sure there's some good that it can do… but here? I mean that thing is more wired than Vhodka’s ‘toy’ collection. I feel like I’d need a PhD in electrical engineering just to qualify to look under the hood.
I dunno Mac, I just imagine some sick kids getting a kick out of it…”
Mac paused for a moment, the silence between them heavy and bated.
“I hope you aren’t still talking about Vhodka’s toys.”
“Come on Mac, I’m serious.”
“So am I!”
More sincerity that made her want to reach between her ribs and squeeze. His chuckle hurt as much as it soothed her aching soul, a quiet reminder of how much she knew she didn’t deserve his love and adoration but how thankful she was to have it nonetheless.
Maybe one day he’d finally realise…
“Look Red, I’m not disagreeing with you. If anything, I think it's pretty noble for you to want to actually see it get appreciated- granted I’m a little disappointed that monster-trucking it wasn’t discussed as an option.”
Amber allowed herself a small chuckle before releasing the sigh sitting in her chest.
“It's not that I wouldn’t appreciate it, I mean it's a hell of a prize- but honestly… I’m not doing any of this to win a prize, I’m doing this to prove that my name is still worth something. I wanna feel like I’ve actually contributed something instead of just a mess for some other poor sucker to clean up after I’ve moved on.
I’m never gonna win awards for being likeable Mac, I’m not gonna go out and be everyone's friend- I’d be far happier if I didn’t have to talk to even half the people I’m required to.”
A half smile crept across the tired redheads' features, as though the battles waged through trying to live a relatively normal life weighed far heavier than any of those contested in a ring.
“I don’t expect anything from this- I just want my legacy to be more than what I’ve already left behind. Who knows, maybe someday there's gonna be a Make-A-Wish kid or something who goes out for a drive in that mechanical abomination and has the goddamn time of his life… I could do that for someone.”
A hopefulness crept into Amber’s tone as she turned on the spot and gently sat lightly against the edge of the Dodge’s front end. Absent-mindedly she swept the errant strands of red that had escaped her plait from her face, trying to envision a world that she wasn’t the monster kids were told would steal them in the night if they left the safety of their beds or the mythos said to be waiting at the edge of the Styx guiding the souls she’d reaped to their inevitable inferno.
“Wouldn’t it be nice, maybe just once, if we got to be the source of happiness instead of the reason for hurt…”
As cautiously as he might, Mac shifted closer so that his hand might have found hers and her head might have rested against his shoulder.
“You know Red, I think you might already be.”
Perhaps if she weren’t so thankful for him, Amber mused as they found themselves once again overcome by the silence, she might have found a way to hate him… and perhaps one day, she even come to believe him.
“God, you are so full of shit.”
Today, however, was never that day.
― Ed Lynskey, The Zinc Zoo
Walter Pyramid
Long Beach, CA
13.11.2022
8:42pm
Adrenaline.
Amber wasn’t quite sure how long she’d been gripping the edges of the basin by now, only that the ache in her knuckles had long since faded paler than the white she’d last acknowledged. It made her want to be sick and throw herself off a balcony in the same breath it made her feel… real.
Alive?
Ugh. No.
Reactively shaking her head slightly as though trying to dislodge the notion, Amber quickly dismissed the thought- one that felt a step too cliche and false in her repertoire, even by her usually low standards. Water trickled around the drain, pooling briefly before disappearing and taking a little of the pent up nothingness, she’d so carefully stockpiled for the last five months, with it.
Even now she still wasn’t even quite convinced. Loosening her grip slightly so that the flow of blood might reach through her aching fingertips and perhaps dribble down into the indents she’d furiously intended to leave. Watching the water pool then vanish in cycles, perpetual only when allowed by her own hand, was as much a catharsis as it was a hypnotic burden. A constant reminder of how close she’d continually come to losing everything, and how the universe unjustly let her keep scraping by for it.
Perhaps she was supposed to be grateful. Some might have determined this was the point where she should be finding faith, spending the last waking moments of every evening whispering sincere thanks to a God that had stopped listening almost two decades earlier. They’d be telling her that this was a sign, a new opportunity to do something… go somewhere… be someone.
Anyone, but who she was.
Many would be telling her she should be thankful for the gifts she was given- time and time again she’d defied expectation and odds like it was russian roulette and she’d been convinced the chamber was loaded with bubblegum.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Only it had been, almost as often as it had been gifted- and more often than not by her own god forsaken hand. That was the most curious part, like a terribly choreographed groundhog existence, she shouldn’t have been here and had been more than determined to prove it- and yet, here she was time and again being told that she was supposed to be thankful in the same way a collegiate athlete might appreciate a fistful of terminal cancer.
To a degree, perhaps, she was.
After all, she’d just gone out there and told the world in no uncertain terms- she was back.
Daring her gaze to stray up towards the mirror she’d so dutifully ignored, quietly hoping that the movement might not suddenly trigger the wave of adrenaline induced nausea that steadily bubbled just below her ribs, the top half of her visage seemed foreign for the first moment. An acquaintance that time had been allowed to drift apart, a friend of a friend who’d always felt closer than they actually were. A passing set of eyes that lingered a little too long not to be coincidental, yet not so long that the small tlak wouldn’t immediately set her over the edge.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Maybe those words would have meant more if she hadn’t used that same breath to call out the same draconic djinn that she’d seemingly knowingly unleashed, the one that had puppeteered an unstoppable world champion into a derelict husk waiting, wanting, to die and the one that was the very reason she’d spent the last five months relearning how to vocally express her disdain, instead of just using rude hand gestures, and how to pick up a spoon.
She’d been told by many that this was a new beginning, a second chance to live a first real life as though dying between the ropes somehow didn’t count the first 16,000 times. That she should be gratified that she wasn’t wearing a toe tag and horrifying whichever poor medical examiner drew the short straw that day.
Only she wasn’t grateful.
People with little reason and less understanding sat behind desks or in front of television screens trying to convince her that everything she knew and loved, in full knowledge that it would never love her back, was supposed to just gather dust in someones poorly maintained archive of ‘almosts’ and that she should be okay with that.
No, somehow the woman with darkening circles beneath her eyes and the flickers of a indignant scowl on her lips disagreed.
‘Be grateful for what you have, else it might be taken away.’
Only it had been.
Until tonight.
Until tonight she’d feigned contentment, she’d turned the other cheek in hopes the world might not see them flushed with a hurt and rage she’d swallowed a little too hard. Until tonight she’d tried to pretend that she could walk away and simply let the sleeping dogs fester with their fleas, infesting the home she’d razed and rebuilt in the space of a year.
Until tonight, Amber Ryan had been accepting of a life that she never really wanted.
Until tonight, Amber Ryan had forgotten what gratitude really was.
Gratitude was the screaming voice of every fan who’d wasted their prayers on her forsaken soul, gratitude was the flicker and fluctuation of lights and the thunder of bass while the Sin City legion questioned whether it was real… whether she was real.
Gratitude was one more chance to right the wrong she’d created.
Five months ago, she’d tried to convince everyone she knew what she was doing- that she was in control. Maybe the stupidest part was that she’d believed it, that was the first lesson of wrestling that you were never taught though- as the furrows of her brow sunk a little deeper in recollection and the phantom metallic taste lingered at the back of her tongue.
Five months later, she knew that she had no fucking clue.
Anyone with two brain cells to rub together knew this was a terrible idea. Maybe some of them might even find their balls for long enough to suggest so before they withered back whence they came, under the glare of a sideways glance.
Even now, with her right hand tracing through her hairline and into the mass of crimson that snaked down her back like a tangled waterfall, there were questions. There was doubt.
Was she making the right decision?
Absolutely fucking not.
Only now, it didn’t really seem to matter.
What she did have though… or perhaps what she really had left, was gratitude.
For the time she had left…
For the way she knew she had to spend it…
For an opportunity to do what she should have done seven fucking years earlier…
For one more chance to make things ‘right’.
Or… maybe a little less wrong.
******
“How can I break your heart in the least amount of words?
How many syllables does it take to reach inside someone's chest and squeeze, to take everything they have and everything they are in your grasp and reduce it to nothing simply because you can. Essence of everything dribbling between your fingers and into a splattered mess on the floor.
It's not that many.
Nor does it need to be.
Don’t ever think though that this is an attempt at being succinct out of sincerity, like I’m trying my damndest to preserve the fragile egos dangling by precious threads. Now granted, my Mom did always tell me not to run with scissors but in this case… and every case… I’m willing to make an exception.
Truth is though, I’ve come to learn over time that most people you come across in this industry simply aren’t worth the effort of coming up with something inherently clever for…
Honestly, in the time it would take me to come up with something borderline original to satisfy the blasphemy thirst traps I could have done something far more productive… like punching myself in the face for half an hour.
At least then I might have something to show for it.
Sticks and stones never rang so true. It's just a shame they never accounted for the blunt force trauma of a carefully aimed truth. That's why we’re here, isn’t it?.
We own our little share of the spotlight like it's somehow owed to us, standing proud and tall before speaking from whatever bullshit we’ve stuffed into the gaping void, in hopes of staying up upright just long enough to be convincing to those who don’t know any fucking better.
We are all carefully crafted charades- veritable idols made of sticks and straw, propped up on pedestals we created, hoping that one good breeze doesn’t render us to rubble. Falsehoods trying to make a truth from a foundational nothing- despite it all, we are still the grain from the chaff - after the thresher hit a stuffed rabbit, or at least you hope it was. We are the cream on top of the milk… when it's been left outside for three days.
It doesn’t matter which way you frame it- it's still an achievement- in the same way it's an achievement when you realise that only half of the field hasn’t stuck their fingers in electrical sockets after learning they were 70% water, wanting to find out which ones that meant.
Kids, it's always the middle one.
Yeah. You know who the fuck you are.
Fact is though, we are here cause we ‘deserve’ it.
Fuck. Sorry, but that word gives me the fucking ick. You want a reckless truth? None of us deserve a fucking thing… It breeds entitlement, it breeds a festering need to be acknowledged and validated as more than you are. Eventually it grows more septic than Vhodka’s skin problem- seriously though, sleeping in open graves has really done you some wonders for that. I mean, it only looks like 78% of your skin looks like it's covered in athletes foot now. Good for you.
Let that entitlement grow untreated and next thing you know, you’re dancing on social media naked for double digits of likes while patiently waiting for best mate Elon to put this blue-tick Titanic into an interwebs iceberg.
Maybe I’m a pessimist, but I started pro-wrestling cause I fucking loved it. It meant something to me, I keep coming back to this abusive relationship cause nothing else will ever love me the same.
Mostly because I won’t let it.
Deserving it is about being willing to sacrifice for it- as far as I can tell, the only sacrifices have been made are to dignity, self-respect and reasonable talent. I could create a combined puddle of talent from the bottom half of the field and I promise it would barely be less shallow than Dionysus’s gene pool.
Granted not all of us can afford to make a living walking around looking like a half sucked mango like Regan Voorhees, or self-deprecating- like Allen Chaney- to the point that dying of botulism becomes more aspirational than following in his footsteps.
No, we’re all here for a reason- after all, someone has to make sure Dane F’N Preston gets his mandatory participation trophy and someone can record Johnathan Cable beasting his way through catering on his way back out the fucking door again.
That's the reality of all of this- someone has to lose, people have to fail for any one of us to succeed.
Problem is, most people aren’t prepared for that.
Too many walked into this being told they were ‘special’, that they were unique… just like everyone else. By now, I’m actually worried my face might start screwing itself up in protest to hearing the absolute fucking nonsense being repeated almost verbatim by every stupid fuck who thinks that theirs is the first original thought presented in the business, in the last 30 years.
Fuck, by the end of the second sentence I’m gonna start looking like the scrunched up ball of paper that once constituted your pathetic looking resumes.
Do I deserve to win more than anyone else here?
Probably not.
I’m sorry. Did you expect me to lie?
To stand here like a fucking hypocrite and try to tell you I’m somehow a better person than someone like Raion Kido- I mean the guy is literally so fucking wholesome it actually makes me want to vomit up my spleen in protest. Guy makes me wanna kick a child's teddy into an eight lane highway, then feel bad enough to go and fucking get it.
Hell, I’ve got no doubt the guy has thanked the towel after showering… more than once.
How the fuck do you compete with that?
How do you rightfully look an audience in the eye and say that you’re somehow a better person than that? I suppose if you’re someone like Shawn Warstein you’d call that a regular Wednesday afternoon. Of course, that being said he’s legitimately the human embodiment of what I imagine a week made of Wednesdays would be like.
Utterly fucking miserable.
Truth is, I’m a charisma heat sink. I take all that is joyful and good, and I put it through a trash compactor until it emerges as a cube of something that had the potential to be far better than it actually is.
Weirdly enough, it reminds me of every Lex Collins promo I’ve ever heard… uncanny how that works, right?
I’m the gift of sunflower seeds in your pocket and the knife in your guts, hoping your continued failures will allow the germination of something more meaningful in your place.
I’m the perpetual queen of the paper bag prom. I’m a monologue shot underwater and an elegy written on the back of a Wal-Mart receipt.
I’m everything and nothing all at once. I’m the alchemical reaction of violence and radioactive disinterest- and my showing up is the reason you’ll fail.
See, I’m not really ‘better’ than anyone.
Truth is, I’ve never needed to be.
Not when I could break your hearts without saying a fucking word.”
******
Oblivion Garage
Las Vegas, ND
18.11.2022
1:27pm
“You have to admit Red, this is a great opportunity.”
Perhaps if she didn’t implicitly love Mac so much, Amber might have been infuriated by his sincerity. Even the warmth of his smile when he knew he was right made her bristle internally- maybe it was because he always seemed to be right. Maybe it was because she knew it too and had no argument against it, well none that would have gained any traction.
“You know what? Fuck you Mac.”
Shielded by the raised hood of a canary yellow 1992 Dodge Viper, she knew he could probably hear the coy smile in her voice but refused to acknowledge it further. Of course, it didn’t stop him being right.
Not only was the chance to be featured on television again, outside of a Sin City Wrestling capacity a blessing given her recent and rather extended hiatus from wrestling- but really, he just liked seeing her uncomfortable in trying to act like a real, semi-likable persona instead of a kamikaze pilot dropping f-bombs like its machine gun fire.
It wasn’t as though she couldn’t act on it. As world champion, she’d done an excellent job in almost being marketable as the face of a company- it was most unfortunate though that the facade was usually shattered the moment she opened her mouth.
“I can be charismatic and likeable.”
“So can a rattlesnake if you decide not to poke it with a stick.”
Mac had come around to the side of the car now, determined to witness the frustrated crinkle in her nose.
“Besides, the car is… well it's sure something.”
Amber paused briefly, giving Mac a raised eyebrow as though questioning his integrity. In response, he simply shrugged, as though his attempt to lighten the mood hadn’t sunk through the grease splattered concrete.
“It's cool and all, but let's be real…”
Wiping the back of her wrist across her forehead thoughtfully- Amber straightened up, trying to work the kinks out of her back as she pretended as though she had done anything except curse how much she really fucking hated working on Dodge’s.
“... We are absolutely donating the vehicle, if won obviously. I mean, it's fucking cool and everything but---”
“But it's not us.”
Mac interjected thoughtfully, placing a hand to steady himself as he leaned. Amber simply nodded before adding her confirmation automatically. Even their thoughts were in-sync to the point that if she thought about it too much, she might have thrown up at the clicheness of it all.
“It’s definitely not us.”
It wasn’t as though she wouldn’t have been appreciative, however Oblivion Garage was already accumulating it's fair share of ‘show vehicles’ and ‘testimonials’. Amber particularly prided herself on practicality and purpose- instinctively, she was minimalistic- a lover of sharp, sleek lines and clean paint jobs. A classic born in the wrong generation perhaps.
“Make-A-Wish or something? I’m sure there's some good that it can do… but here? I mean that thing is more wired than Vhodka’s ‘toy’ collection. I feel like I’d need a PhD in electrical engineering just to qualify to look under the hood.
I dunno Mac, I just imagine some sick kids getting a kick out of it…”
Mac paused for a moment, the silence between them heavy and bated.
“I hope you aren’t still talking about Vhodka’s toys.”
“Come on Mac, I’m serious.”
“So am I!”
More sincerity that made her want to reach between her ribs and squeeze. His chuckle hurt as much as it soothed her aching soul, a quiet reminder of how much she knew she didn’t deserve his love and adoration but how thankful she was to have it nonetheless.
Maybe one day he’d finally realise…
“Look Red, I’m not disagreeing with you. If anything, I think it's pretty noble for you to want to actually see it get appreciated- granted I’m a little disappointed that monster-trucking it wasn’t discussed as an option.”
Amber allowed herself a small chuckle before releasing the sigh sitting in her chest.
“It's not that I wouldn’t appreciate it, I mean it's a hell of a prize- but honestly… I’m not doing any of this to win a prize, I’m doing this to prove that my name is still worth something. I wanna feel like I’ve actually contributed something instead of just a mess for some other poor sucker to clean up after I’ve moved on.
I’m never gonna win awards for being likeable Mac, I’m not gonna go out and be everyone's friend- I’d be far happier if I didn’t have to talk to even half the people I’m required to.”
A half smile crept across the tired redheads' features, as though the battles waged through trying to live a relatively normal life weighed far heavier than any of those contested in a ring.
“I don’t expect anything from this- I just want my legacy to be more than what I’ve already left behind. Who knows, maybe someday there's gonna be a Make-A-Wish kid or something who goes out for a drive in that mechanical abomination and has the goddamn time of his life… I could do that for someone.”
A hopefulness crept into Amber’s tone as she turned on the spot and gently sat lightly against the edge of the Dodge’s front end. Absent-mindedly she swept the errant strands of red that had escaped her plait from her face, trying to envision a world that she wasn’t the monster kids were told would steal them in the night if they left the safety of their beds or the mythos said to be waiting at the edge of the Styx guiding the souls she’d reaped to their inevitable inferno.
“Wouldn’t it be nice, maybe just once, if we got to be the source of happiness instead of the reason for hurt…”
As cautiously as he might, Mac shifted closer so that his hand might have found hers and her head might have rested against his shoulder.
“You know Red, I think you might already be.”
Perhaps if she weren’t so thankful for him, Amber mused as they found themselves once again overcome by the silence, she might have found a way to hate him… and perhaps one day, she even come to believe him.
“God, you are so full of shit.”
Today, however, was never that day.