Post by Alex Kincaid on Dec 18, 2017 11:40:55 GMT -5
My name is Alex Kincaid and I am a professional wrestler.
For over a decade I’ve made my living fighting all over the world. I fought the wars I chose with one goal in mind: To save the sport I love. But I can’t be what I was to do that, I can’t let hate turn me into something I’m not. I need to change.
That change starts in Platinum Coast. They tell me that the place is a tech haven, that it’s one of the fastest growing cities in America. I grew up in Northern Alberta, in the woods and the snow and when I look at this place it can sometimes be too much to handle. It’s bright, shining and towering above me. The place drips with promise. Sometimes a little too much. I feel like I’m overindulging in it, and the sheer sweetness of it all is giving me an ache. But I’ve got a reason to be here. I’ll have to learn to cope.
“You’re going to hate it here.” Alyssa teases me, dropping a box on the couch next to me “It’s too loud. Too bright and too warm. You’re going to boil.”
The heat is a lot to take. The south, Oceanside, it’s a lot. The house is a half a mile from the white sands they named the place after and I know we’re both going to have to spend a healthy amount of time there to keep ourselves sane. But I’m already working, my face on the laptop in front of me clicking through article and after article. Mystery after mystery. Invitation after invitation.
“I’ll be fine.”
She rolls her eyes and picks the box back up to move it to the bedroom. I look up for a second, long enough to realize I missed a hint that was supposed to pull me away from the computer. But that’s Alyssa. She’s got her feet on the ground more than I do. So I push the laptop aside and I move to the bedroom to help her unpack.
“Still nothing from the Battleground?” She asks, and I know bringing it up is more for my benefit than hers “It’s been a few days. They’re just leaving you swinging in the wind?”
“No emails. No calls. Nothing on twitter.”
“I will never get tired of hearing you talk about twitter.”
I shoot her a dirty look and start unpacking. Her things. Art supplies, paints, her tablet, and rolled up canvases that she’ll post on the wall in the room. The second I touch her work I see her stiffen up. I might be a little prickly, a little hard to get close to, but I can read people. I can certainly read her like a book and everything in her body language screams be careful. I set it on the bed and move to something easier. Clothes. Mine. Going in the closet.
“I just want to figure out who invited us. Why they’d want me there and how they know what they know.” I say “Just sucks I’ve got to slog through the Baumer report updates and 4CW drama to do it. At least I get to see how Blaise and the rest are doing.”
I’ve got a few old friends. Not many. Seeing their success doesn’t make the rest of the social media muck worth it though.
“You’re so old.” Alyssa teases, playfully tossing a pillow at my head. Sometimes, I catch myself just stopping and looking at her. Wondering how I made this all work. Wondering how I got so lucky. She understands me, even if she doesn’t always agree with me. She pieces all the bits of life together that I can’t make work. Look, you put me across from someone and you ask me to fight them? I’m golden. I fly like an eagle and I hit like a bus. But if you ask me to plan out a three week road loop with hotels and budget for all of it? Not a chance in hell. But she can. She does all the stuff that makes what I do truly a career, and I do the parts that make the money from it.
We didn’t meet the right way and I haven’t always appreciated her the way I should have. That’s a story for another time. I guess the point I’m trying to make is, sitting there in our new home, it hit me again that she isn’t just a pretty face. Or legs. Or ass. Or-
Ahem.
“Someone wants me to go to Union Battleground. And that someone knew I was coming to Platinum Coast.”
We turn at the same time to where we found the note tacked to the wall of the master bedroom. It was there when we arrived yesterday, stuck into the wall. It made me think of Hook, that Robin Williams Peter Pan movie? You are cordially invited…James T. Hook….
“Oh my god, this place is GORGEOUS!”
Meet Maggie Clark. Fifteen years old. Also carved out of the frozen north, but very much in love with living down near the Gulf already. Before I can stop her, she’s charging into the room dripping saltwater everywhere and running over to grab Alyssa’s hands “You have GOT to see that beach! It’s gigantic, and the water is so clear you can see bottom no matter how far out you go and oh my god the-“
“Breathe, kid, breathe.” I toss her a towel that flops over her head, and I can’t help but be a little self-satisfied at the irritated huff she gives “I’m glad you’re excited.”
“I am PAST excited.” She’s too fast for her own good, which I blame on the teenage part of your brain that hasn’t developed the ability to separate ‘word’ and ‘thought’ “I’m meeting so many people! And everybody is awesome. There’s this girl, with this Twitch channel who’s super into Overwatch and-“
“Overwatch now?” Alyssa’s eyes perk up at about the exact same time mine are glazing over, and the two of them start gushing about whateverthehell an Overwatch is.
You might know who I am. I’ve been around a long time. But the kid? Never heard of the kid right? Don’t ask me why I’ve decided to let you in this much. Into the way I feel, into my head and into what my real priorities are behind the scene. The kid came to us three years ago, with nowhere else to go back up North because one by one her family had been killing themselves with drugs and bad decisions. I don’t hold a grudge. My father used to run Bearing, and when the coal dried up and he left the town there was nothing else to fill that space. That town died around us, but the kid deserved another chance. So we took her in. The way the Llewellyn’s took me in as a kid. And I’m already teaching her to fight, same way they taught me.
But she’s off limits.
Part of taking her in was letting her be normal. We do the best we can with that, and it’s damn hard when you’re in a violent business where some of the crazier types don’t mind following you home. I’ve always kept a low enough profile that I don’t have autograph seekers coming up to me in the mall, and I keep her off camera when they need to send someone to film a promo. That keeps her out of the public eye. No one in wrestling is supposed to know about her. Because, as I sit there unpacking my ring gear and my girls start freaking out about the Infinity War trailer for the third time this week, I remember that it’s good to keep my feet on the ground to watch what’s right in front of me sometimes.
“Oh good, you found the speedos.” Maggie grins and tosses my red trunks to me “You ever think of picking some of your fights in actual pants?”
“I wear trunks.”
Alyssa gives Maggie a self serious nod “Right, right, important distinction. He wears combat speedos. Very serious stuff.”
I can’t help but crack a grin at that one, as I start tucking them into the closet “I’ll remind the two of you that you helped MAKE this ring gear.”
“All that black made you look like you were going through a goth phase.” Alyssa slides the door to the balcony open, and I’m hit with a gust of that sweet, southern air “Time for a change right?”
The three of us step outside, where the sun is gleaming shocking orange down onto the beach below. It’s impressive. A view I’ll probably never get sick of. It’s different, it’s more than a little uncomfortable, but it’s new and it could turn into something amazing.
“So, pizza then?” I volunteer “I’m not cooking. You see anything while you were out there? I’ve got to believe there’s a pizza joint around.”
“Block or two up.”
“Grab my wallet off the fridge and go grab whatever you want. Pizza wise. Don’t forget I read my credit statements.”
Maggie grins and backs into the house “What are you implying?” She snatches the wallet and heads out the other door. Alyssa wraps her arms around my middle, and we watch below as the kid comes out of the house already accompanied by a pair of the locals. She’s a social butterfly, chatty, comfortable, a little weird in the ways that draw people in instead of pushing them away.
“You made a good call coming down here.” Alyssa says, giving me a peck on the cheek “I think this will be good for us.”
She’s an optimist. I admire that. Because I remember what that note said when we found it stuck in that wall. We didn’t tell the kid about the note because we wanted her to have some time to settle in before I went back to work and everything got a little heavy for a few weeks. Even if we did, we wouldn’t want to tell her the specifics of what it said. So I stashed it in my wrestling boots, already sitting inside the closet, but I don’t need to look at it. What it said was burned into my brain: UNION BATTLEGROUND. SAY HI TO MAGGIE FOR ME.
Someone thinks they know me. Thinks they can screw with me. But they don’t know me. Not this me. Because I’m changing, and I’ve got more to fight for than ever.
For over a decade I’ve made my living fighting all over the world. I fought the wars I chose with one goal in mind: To save the sport I love. But I can’t be what I was to do that, I can’t let hate turn me into something I’m not. I need to change.
That change starts in Platinum Coast. They tell me that the place is a tech haven, that it’s one of the fastest growing cities in America. I grew up in Northern Alberta, in the woods and the snow and when I look at this place it can sometimes be too much to handle. It’s bright, shining and towering above me. The place drips with promise. Sometimes a little too much. I feel like I’m overindulging in it, and the sheer sweetness of it all is giving me an ache. But I’ve got a reason to be here. I’ll have to learn to cope.
“You’re going to hate it here.” Alyssa teases me, dropping a box on the couch next to me “It’s too loud. Too bright and too warm. You’re going to boil.”
The heat is a lot to take. The south, Oceanside, it’s a lot. The house is a half a mile from the white sands they named the place after and I know we’re both going to have to spend a healthy amount of time there to keep ourselves sane. But I’m already working, my face on the laptop in front of me clicking through article and after article. Mystery after mystery. Invitation after invitation.
“I’ll be fine.”
She rolls her eyes and picks the box back up to move it to the bedroom. I look up for a second, long enough to realize I missed a hint that was supposed to pull me away from the computer. But that’s Alyssa. She’s got her feet on the ground more than I do. So I push the laptop aside and I move to the bedroom to help her unpack.
“Still nothing from the Battleground?” She asks, and I know bringing it up is more for my benefit than hers “It’s been a few days. They’re just leaving you swinging in the wind?”
“No emails. No calls. Nothing on twitter.”
“I will never get tired of hearing you talk about twitter.”
I shoot her a dirty look and start unpacking. Her things. Art supplies, paints, her tablet, and rolled up canvases that she’ll post on the wall in the room. The second I touch her work I see her stiffen up. I might be a little prickly, a little hard to get close to, but I can read people. I can certainly read her like a book and everything in her body language screams be careful. I set it on the bed and move to something easier. Clothes. Mine. Going in the closet.
“I just want to figure out who invited us. Why they’d want me there and how they know what they know.” I say “Just sucks I’ve got to slog through the Baumer report updates and 4CW drama to do it. At least I get to see how Blaise and the rest are doing.”
I’ve got a few old friends. Not many. Seeing their success doesn’t make the rest of the social media muck worth it though.
“You’re so old.” Alyssa teases, playfully tossing a pillow at my head. Sometimes, I catch myself just stopping and looking at her. Wondering how I made this all work. Wondering how I got so lucky. She understands me, even if she doesn’t always agree with me. She pieces all the bits of life together that I can’t make work. Look, you put me across from someone and you ask me to fight them? I’m golden. I fly like an eagle and I hit like a bus. But if you ask me to plan out a three week road loop with hotels and budget for all of it? Not a chance in hell. But she can. She does all the stuff that makes what I do truly a career, and I do the parts that make the money from it.
We didn’t meet the right way and I haven’t always appreciated her the way I should have. That’s a story for another time. I guess the point I’m trying to make is, sitting there in our new home, it hit me again that she isn’t just a pretty face. Or legs. Or ass. Or-
Ahem.
“Someone wants me to go to Union Battleground. And that someone knew I was coming to Platinum Coast.”
We turn at the same time to where we found the note tacked to the wall of the master bedroom. It was there when we arrived yesterday, stuck into the wall. It made me think of Hook, that Robin Williams Peter Pan movie? You are cordially invited…James T. Hook….
“Oh my god, this place is GORGEOUS!”
Meet Maggie Clark. Fifteen years old. Also carved out of the frozen north, but very much in love with living down near the Gulf already. Before I can stop her, she’s charging into the room dripping saltwater everywhere and running over to grab Alyssa’s hands “You have GOT to see that beach! It’s gigantic, and the water is so clear you can see bottom no matter how far out you go and oh my god the-“
“Breathe, kid, breathe.” I toss her a towel that flops over her head, and I can’t help but be a little self-satisfied at the irritated huff she gives “I’m glad you’re excited.”
“I am PAST excited.” She’s too fast for her own good, which I blame on the teenage part of your brain that hasn’t developed the ability to separate ‘word’ and ‘thought’ “I’m meeting so many people! And everybody is awesome. There’s this girl, with this Twitch channel who’s super into Overwatch and-“
“Overwatch now?” Alyssa’s eyes perk up at about the exact same time mine are glazing over, and the two of them start gushing about whateverthehell an Overwatch is.
You might know who I am. I’ve been around a long time. But the kid? Never heard of the kid right? Don’t ask me why I’ve decided to let you in this much. Into the way I feel, into my head and into what my real priorities are behind the scene. The kid came to us three years ago, with nowhere else to go back up North because one by one her family had been killing themselves with drugs and bad decisions. I don’t hold a grudge. My father used to run Bearing, and when the coal dried up and he left the town there was nothing else to fill that space. That town died around us, but the kid deserved another chance. So we took her in. The way the Llewellyn’s took me in as a kid. And I’m already teaching her to fight, same way they taught me.
But she’s off limits.
Part of taking her in was letting her be normal. We do the best we can with that, and it’s damn hard when you’re in a violent business where some of the crazier types don’t mind following you home. I’ve always kept a low enough profile that I don’t have autograph seekers coming up to me in the mall, and I keep her off camera when they need to send someone to film a promo. That keeps her out of the public eye. No one in wrestling is supposed to know about her. Because, as I sit there unpacking my ring gear and my girls start freaking out about the Infinity War trailer for the third time this week, I remember that it’s good to keep my feet on the ground to watch what’s right in front of me sometimes.
“Oh good, you found the speedos.” Maggie grins and tosses my red trunks to me “You ever think of picking some of your fights in actual pants?”
“I wear trunks.”
Alyssa gives Maggie a self serious nod “Right, right, important distinction. He wears combat speedos. Very serious stuff.”
I can’t help but crack a grin at that one, as I start tucking them into the closet “I’ll remind the two of you that you helped MAKE this ring gear.”
“All that black made you look like you were going through a goth phase.” Alyssa slides the door to the balcony open, and I’m hit with a gust of that sweet, southern air “Time for a change right?”
The three of us step outside, where the sun is gleaming shocking orange down onto the beach below. It’s impressive. A view I’ll probably never get sick of. It’s different, it’s more than a little uncomfortable, but it’s new and it could turn into something amazing.
“So, pizza then?” I volunteer “I’m not cooking. You see anything while you were out there? I’ve got to believe there’s a pizza joint around.”
“Block or two up.”
“Grab my wallet off the fridge and go grab whatever you want. Pizza wise. Don’t forget I read my credit statements.”
Maggie grins and backs into the house “What are you implying?” She snatches the wallet and heads out the other door. Alyssa wraps her arms around my middle, and we watch below as the kid comes out of the house already accompanied by a pair of the locals. She’s a social butterfly, chatty, comfortable, a little weird in the ways that draw people in instead of pushing them away.
“You made a good call coming down here.” Alyssa says, giving me a peck on the cheek “I think this will be good for us.”
She’s an optimist. I admire that. Because I remember what that note said when we found it stuck in that wall. We didn’t tell the kid about the note because we wanted her to have some time to settle in before I went back to work and everything got a little heavy for a few weeks. Even if we did, we wouldn’t want to tell her the specifics of what it said. So I stashed it in my wrestling boots, already sitting inside the closet, but I don’t need to look at it. What it said was burned into my brain: UNION BATTLEGROUND. SAY HI TO MAGGIE FOR ME.
Someone thinks they know me. Thinks they can screw with me. But they don’t know me. Not this me. Because I’m changing, and I’ve got more to fight for than ever.