New Friends, Old Trauma

A WONDERFUL DAY

The bedroom radiates with heat, as if the sun itself has descended upon it, its rays streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows left wide open. Following a night of indulgence that left his liver protesting, Lowell awakens to the dawn weaving through the concrete jungle of downtown Miami. With a languid stretch, he pulls the duvet up to his chin, relishing the luxurious sensation of silk against his bare skin. It’s a rare moment of decadence for him, this opulent suite a world away from the shabby, trash-strewn trailer he previously called home.

His strategy had unfolded perfectly thus far. Initially, he needed to sway STRONK, convincing him that Lee Best was incarcerated for sexual misconduct (to put it very mildly). Supposedly, according to the Shillin’ Villain, it was Lee's dying wish for STRONK to bestow upon Lowell the role and title of STRONK’s new manager and caretaker. And remarkably, the task proved even simpler and easier than anticipated. STRONK, with his unwavering trust and susceptibility to manipulation, lacked discernment and critical-thinking skills: there seemed to be very little going on inside that cinderblock of a head of his. An advantage the dastardly Lowell planned to continue to leverage and exploit moving forward.

In STRONK, Lowell saw all of the riches and fame he’d desired for himself, along with the physical prowess necessary to achieve such lofty goals.

It was a wonderful fucking day.

Rising from bed, he sashays around the bedroom, clad only in a bright blue G-string. He snatches a bottle of Glenfiddich ‘Rare Collection’ 50-Year-Old Single Malt Scotch from the bedside table, twirling and spinning across the room, humming the beat to “Not Like Us,” and breaking into a very poor attempt at C-walking. He tips the bottle back, glugging the remaining quarter of its contents and wiping his mouth with satisfaction.

Grabbing his phone, he opens the Jabber app.

Fucking Fred Dick, he thinks. Limiting MY screen time. What an asshole. I should just post about what a dork he is and how he smells weird and how he (probably) penetrates himself anally with Oscar-Meyers. I should put him fully on BLAST and assert that it is I that is in control, not you, stupid fucking Fred Dick. I should totally roast him and—

Lowell stops, takes a deep breath, centers himself, allowing the effects of the $33,000-a-bottle scotch to wash over him and calm his razor-wire nerves. Sure, he could do all those things; he could blow up their spot right here, right now. He hopes STRONK remembers his Papa's (illegitimate) words to blindly follow Lowell and side with him against the Whoresmen. He is sick and tired of Fred Dick and the rest of the Whoresmen thinking him a suitable target for their bullying. He has been bullied throughout much of his childhood and again when he first started changing in wrestling locker rooms. Truth be told: he is fucking triggered. Big mad. Steaming.

But no, he'll smoke a joint out on the balcony, survey the city that once chewed him up and spat him out, and that one day he'll rule over with his accumulated money, power, and influence. He’ll save his vitriol for a time in the future when the moment is just right.

Tonight, though, he has class.

The Human Brick Shithouse, STRONK Godson, marches into the bedroom, chewing on the end of a frozen 66-ounce tomahawk steak. “THE MEAT HAS BECOME HARD. WHY?”

“Because it’s been in the deep freeze since we bought it a week ago,” Lowell responds, tossing the empty scotch bottle into a wastebasket. “You’ve gotta let it thaw, big man.”

STRONK blinks, then breaks a huge chunk off with a formidable bite. His cheek protrudes cartoonishly from the left side as he tries breaking the hunk of icy meat down in his mouth.

“Whatever you do, don’t fucking choke,” Lowell says, walking past him toward the bathroom. “You’ve got Anna Daniels on the next ReVival and I don’t need you choking and losing any further brain cells. From the limited research I’ve done, she’s too crafty for a brute-force approach.”

The Shillin’ Villain grimaces as STRONK swallows what has to be a baseball-size lump of beef, watching as it slowly and painfully slides down his throat.

“OKAY.”

Sighing, Lowell turns back to STRONK, entering the bathroom. “By the way, I’ve got a business class tonight at the local community college. I’d have you stay here… but Fred Dick knows where we live, and I don’t want him showing up out of the blue and spiriting you off for another one of your strange adventures. So you’ll be coming with me.”

“CLASS?”

“Yes, class.”

“STRONK DOES NOT WANT TO LEARN. STRONK KNOWS WHAT STRONK KNOWS AND STRONK DOES NOT NEED TO KNOW ANY MORE THAN WHAT STRONK KNOWS. SCHOOL IS A BAD PLACE.”

“Preach, brother, but don’t worry, you won't be joining me in class. That would be… a mistake. I only have a few more classes left before I essentially have the equivalent of a Wharton MBA, minus the pretentiousness. You'll stay outside. There are plenty of benches and trash cans to lift to keep you occupied.”

“OKAY.”

Lowell shuts the bathroom door. The shower begins to run.

STRONK looks at the frozen steak in his hand.

Then takes another unnecessarily large bite.

—

OLD MEMORIES

The old Bronco rattles to a stop in front of the school, its rusted frame groaning in protest. Gordon Godson slumps over the wheel, a haze of alcohol clouding his eyes. His face is a roadmap of deep-set lines, each one etched with years of bitterness and hate. He glances sideways at STRONK, who sits silently in the passenger seat, his large, innocent eyes staring out at the unfamiliar world of the schoolyard.

“Get out,” Gordon growls, his voice a gravelly command. He doesn’t bother to look at his son as he speaks, his focus already drifting back to the bottle waiting for him at home. “Go on, boy! What are ya, brain-shitted? I ain’t got all fuckin’ day now! Go learn yer numbers like some kinda big shot.”

STRONK, mute and confused, fumbles with the door handle before finally pushing it open. He stumbles out of the Bronco. He stands there, unsure, a solitary figure against the backdrop of bustling children and the imposing school building.

Gordon doesn’t wait to see if STRONK makes it inside. He revs the engine, the Bronco sputtering before lurching forward. He’s eager to return to his dingy recliner in his shabby rural trailer, the TV blaring nonsense, and the ever-present stench of whiskey. He spares no thought for his son, left behind in a world he neither knows nor understands.

STRONK watches the Bronco disappear down the road, a mix of fear and bewilderment in his eyes. School is an unknown entity to him. His education up until now (the age of nine) had been a farce, consisting of endless days seated at the kitchen table across from his catatonic, drooling mother. A dusty audio cassette, Gordon’s twisted idea of schooling, would drone on with a raspy, southern voice. It spoke of “tilling your fields,” the “threat of immigration (legal and illegal, it didn’t matter),” and, bizarrely, “proper foot care.” To whom the voice belonged, and the origins of the mysterious tape, were both unknown. STRONK never understood much of it, but he listened because there was nothing else to do, and Gordon would beat him black-and-blue if he caught him fiddling with the TV or “muckin’ about in the yard.”

Now, standing unprepared and alone on the threshold of grade five, STRONK faces a new reality. It’s hard to tell whether he’s afraid or simply too naïve to grasp what lies ahead. His innocence is palpable, a stark contrast to the harshness of the life he’s known.

He walks sheepishly up to a group of children standing in a circle, clutching a plain, dented, metal lunch box, unadorned with any superhero or cartoon characters. He was lucky to have it, his father told him. Of course, his packed lunch consists of a slab of raw ground beef and a soggy fish stick.

“HELLO.”

STRONK hadn’t fully matured yet, and thus, he hadn’t yet acquired the BOLDED ALL CAPS bass in his voice.

The other kids turn toward him, looking him up and down judgmentally: his clothes dirty, somehow both too big and too small at the same time, and riddled with holes; his teeth yellow and caked with breakfast beef on account of the fact no one had ever instructed him to brush them; his black hair poorly cropped with a pair of hedge clippers; and his shoes… nonexistent.

“Ew,” a girl says, prompting the other children to point and laugh. “You’re stinky.”

“SORRY.”

“Go away,” a boy commands.

“Nice lunch box, loser!” another boy calls out, eliciting another round of laughter from the group.

“THANK YOU.”

More laughter.

“What a DORK! I wasn’t being serious, idiot! Your lunch box looks like something my grandpa would’ve had, and he’s DEAD.”

“OKAY.”

STRONK doesn’t take the hint and remains standing in awkward silence. The only thing stopping the boys in the group from tackling him and giving him a nasty wedgie is the fact that STRONK looks like he’s already developed man-muscles; their scrawny, undeveloped bodies would be no match for him, even if they had the numbers advantage.

Instead, they collectively turn and walk away, leaving STRONK standing alone.

And then it starts to rain.

—

A TERRIBLE NIGHT (CLASS)

The fluorescent lights flicker, casting an uneven glow over the rows of mismatched desks. The air is heavy with the scent of damp paper and stale coffee. The clock on the wall ticks with a hollow rhythm, each second dragging the night deeper into its grasp.

Students slump in their chairs, shadows under their eyes, their faces a canvas of indifference. The professor, a silhouette against the smudged whiteboard, drones on about concepts that seem to float just beyond reach, words dissolving into the hum of the ancient heating system.

Notebooks lie open, some half-heartedly scribbled with notes, others abandoned in favor of screens glowing with distractions.

“Hey Tiff,” Lowell says, tipping over in his desk-chair combo, riding that bitch on two legs like a six-four rolling down the street, “what’s the answer to number five?”

The young woman seated across the row from him looks revolted. Her nose crinkles, smelling whatever chemical concoction seeps out through his pores. She can feel him leering, scanning her young body with his manic eyes. She grabs a pink sweater off the back of her chair and swiftly puts it on, zipping it all the way up to the neckline and folding her arms across her chest. “The quiz hasn’t even started yet,” she mutters, rolling her eyes, her skin crawling.

“I know, uh-DUH, I was just making one of those, whatchamacallit?” He scratches his temple, tilting his head to the side as if genuinely searching the glacier storage of his memory for the word.

Ah yes, got it!

“Jokes!” He spits. “… Not that your generation would understand. Bunch of liberal-cuck snowflakes!”

“Shut up, BITCH!” shouts a burly football-type seated on the other side of the classroom. “I’m only here because I got kicked out of the day class! Ain’t nobody wanna hear your old ass, boomer!”

“Jeff,” the prof says, stopping the lecture and pointing to the source of the disruption, “that’ll be enough of that.”

“That weird old dude is creepin’,” Jeff responds. He bores a hole through Lowell with his stare. “Ain’t that right? You creepin’!”

“I was having an informative conversation with this young lady,” Lowell says. “We were talking about where the debits and credits go. Now, I know, but do you? Maybe if you paid less attention to me, and more attention to Professor Bronson, you’d know.” The smarm drips from him.

“Debits-what?” Jeff shakes his head, laughing. “This is fuckin’ calculus, you dumb shit. You stupid.”

“Actually,” the young lady finally speaks up, “he was creeping. He keeps… looking at me.”

“Oh, what? Am I supposed to avert my eyes? Stare at the floor? Fuckin’... I dunno… should I sit here blindfolded?” Lowell springs to his feet in defiance. Within seconds, every iPhone and Android in the classroom is out and pointed in his direction, ready to capture whatever comes next. Likely to end up on the PublicFreakout subreddit, or maybe viral on Instagram or TikTok.

“You…” he seethes, turning around slowly, casting an accusatory glare at every single one of his classmates, “You think this is funny? You want something to film? I’ll give you something to film!”

Suddenly, he tips over his own desk, then shoves the young woman’s laptop off to the floor, and finally begins to undo the button fly of his dated trousers.

But before he can fully unveil the horror show that is his genitals, a savior intervenes—no, not Jeff, he’s still all the way across the room, but rather the subject of his untoward desires and lecherous glances. Blindsided by a closed-fist punch to the eye, Lowell pitches back, toppling over a desk and smacking his head on the tile floor below.

Scrambling back to his feet, tears in his eyes, he screeches, “How… DARE… you?” He nurses the mouse forming under his eye, and feels a subtle wetness on the back of his head. He sees small droplets of blood speckling the floor, some staining his canvas shoes. “We haven’t even fucked yet, and you wanna lay hands on me? Do you even KNOW who I am? Do you KNOW who I represent? I am an important man! Do you know who STRONK Godson is? How about Donny Wintz? I run shit in this city!”

Before Lowell can completely come unraveled, several students grab him and drag him towards the door. He fights every step of the way, kicking and screaming, making strange noises by expelling air sharply from his nose, and attempting to grab onto anything in his path. The professor… does nothing; he uses this time to text his wife about dinner plans.

They unceremoniously toss him from the classroom, slamming the door shut behind him.

As he collects himself in the hallway, his face blood-red with anger and embarrassment, he hears laughter through the door. 

—

NEW FRIENDS

STRONK stands at a bar, his short, heavily muscled frame like a boulder among pebbles.

He’d been asked to remain outside the community college while Lowell attended his night class. But several minutes after his manager disappeared inside, STRONK forgot why he was standing there. Restless and aimless, he wandered across the street to a nearby bar in search of something to quench his thirst.

“STRONK WANTS MEAT JUICE IN A GALLON JUG,” he demands, his booming voice drawing the attention of everyone around.

The bartender looks at STRONK with an amused expression. “Beefeater? Sure. Single or double?”

“YES,” STRONK replies, his eyes gleaming with intensity.

“A triple, then!” the bartender says with a chuckle, reaching for a larger glass.

Enter a quartet of “alpha bros,” carbon copies distinguished only by the colors of their hair. They stride in with synchronized swagger, each step a performance, each gesture a calculated move from a shared playbook. Zander Xearo, with his sleek brown mane, leads the charge, his name as artificial as his tan. CarMichael follows, black hair slicked back, a smirk plastered on his face like a permanent fixture. Big Festa, a silver fox, bounces on his heels, radiating an energy that’s almost desperate. George, the blonde, lags slightly behind, the only one whose name lacks flair, perhaps compensating with an extra layer of arrogance.

They surround STRONK like hyenas encircling a lion, their identical postures and gestures almost comically choreographed.

Zander Xearo, clearly the self-appointed spokesman, leans in, his voice teeming with admiration. “Hey, big guy,” he starts, eyes scanning STRONK as if appraising a piece of art. “You’re huge!” The others snicker, not in derision but in giddy agreement.

“Holy shit, those muscles!” CarMichael exclaims. “How do you even get this ripped? I’ve done the whole ‘eat clen, tren hard’ thing for a couple years now, but look atcha!”

Big Festa can’t resist touching STRONK’s oily skin. “Bro, you're like a Greek god or something! And that beard! It’s like a black sea flowin’ right from your face, no cap!"

George is almost trembling with excitement as he circles around to get a better look. “And these glutes and thighs, man! Fuckin’ unreal! This is what peak performance looks like, fellas!”

STRONK blinks, his face an unreadable mask as he endures their relentless admiration. They poke and prod, their hands exploring every inch of his muscles with a mix of awe and envy. Zander, not to be outdone, drops to one knee and grips STRONK’s thigh, his voice hushed in reverence. "These legs are like tree trunks. You must squat, like, a thousand pounds!"

“YES. A THOUSAND POUNDS FOR A THOUSAND REPS.”

“On god, brodaddy, you got alien snakes living under your skin! Look at them shits!” Big Festa says.

“THESE ARE THE MUSCLES STRONK HAS CULTIVATED THROUGH BLOOD AND SWEAT AND URINE AND VOMIT AND PAIN AND POOP.”

“Impressive! Are you compounding or just hacking the ‘bells freestyle?” CarMichael asks, genuinely curious.

“That’s God runnin’ through him—you feel it down in your balls yet, big guy? I thought I did once, but it wasn’t that,” Zander Xearo adds, his tone almost reverent.

“It was ball cancer. Our boy had cancer of the ball. We cried in each other's arms the night we found out,” George says solemnly, the group’s mood momentarily somber.

“Shit was beautiful. I didn’t get hard though,” Big Festa adds, breaking the silence.

“Neither did I, bro,” CarMichael echoes, nodding.

“You did, but I think it was just ‘cuz you felt warm and safe and completely vulnerable for the first time in your life. You let your guard down, my guy,” Zander Xearo reassures him.

“Yeah, I did. You’re right, bro,” CarMichael admits, a touch of sincerity in his voice.

“I got hard as well, but then I went and had sex with a chick on shrooms underneath a boardwalk and felt no kind of way about it. Used the broner I got off our cuddle puddle, too—is that weird?” George confesses, eyes wide with innocence.

“How can that be weird? To not use a broner to bang a hot lady in a place as classy as underneath a boardwalk would be… well… it’d be…”

“Wasteful.”

“Exactly!”

The absurdity of their conversation underscores the bizarre nature of their hero worship.

“Say,” George says, “you wanna… like… get outta here and come and live with us and become best friends and do everything together from right now until the day we die? We could use a fifth. And in fact, we could use… a leader.”

STRONK blinks.

He thinks back to all of the times he’s struggled to make true friends. From his childhood, through to his time in HOW, it’d never been easy. And most of the time, even those that called themselves friends were just manipulating him for their own gain.

Has anyone, at any point, ever truly cared for him?

Maybe the Whoresmen. Maybe Mama Dick. Maybe.

But these guys seem to value the same things he does: muscles, bigness, and muscles again.

Maybe he’s finally found his flock.

“OKAY.”

As they exit the bar en route to a party van parked further down the street, the four alpha bros start yacking about the “man-o-sphere” and how they don’t need women in their lives and they intend to stay unmarried to anyone but Miss Lady Gym.

“JIM SOUNDS LIKE A GOOD HUMAN. YES.”

Before they can get more than a few steps from the bar, an out-of-breath Lowell, looking especially gaunt and vampiric, still bleeding from his head, runs up to them, stopping them in their tracks.

“I thought I told you to wait outside!”

“IT IS OUTSIDE.”

“Don’t get FUCKING cute with me right now, you big fucking retar—” Lowell catches himself, throttling his temper, gritting his gradually disintegrating teeth. “I mean, yes, we are outside… but I meant outside the building across the street.”

“Woah, dude, chill the hell out,” Zander Xearo says.

“And who the HELL are these guys?” Lowell shouts. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. Let’s go!”

He grabs STRONK by the wrist. The King Stallion allows himself to be led away from his newfound friends.

He looks back at Zander Xearo, CarMichael, Big Festa, and George, like a bunch of forlorn puppies being abandoned by their mother. They don’t protest because that’s not how they live their lives. Things come and things go. Everything is in a constant state of flux.

And soon, STRONK forgets about his fleeting encounter with the alpha bros, listening to his manager rant and rave and vow revenge but ultimately understanding none of it.