“Well, love is insanity. The ancient Greeks knew that. It is the taking over of a rational and lucid mind by delusion and self-destruction. You lose yourself, you have no power over yourself, you can't even think straight.” - Marilyn French

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HISTORY AND GOSSIP

Salvete, students!

We had a nice first day of class. You all got to know the roots of the two major figures we're studying, and how they came to be. The interesting thing about this class, particularly in my opinion, is it's something more like modern history – a history that, every day, unfolds further, and each moment that passes by, that collapses from the present into the past, is a potential chapter in this course.

With that being said, what is history? Yes, a tool, of course. Something to learn from, absolutely.

But isn't it gossip, as well?

I mean, yes. It is the study of wars, of people, of the greatest moments in human history and, much if not all of their details are factual, verifiable, et cetera.

But collectively, as a history-knowing American society, we know far more details about Henry the Eighth and his six wives than perhaps any other British monarch prior to Elizabeth. We know as much about Julius Caesar as we do Mark Antony, thanks to his love for Cleopatra. The most famous clip of John F. Kennedy, besides his assassination footage, is of Marilyn Monroe singing him, “Happy Birthday!”

The difference in a history textbook and National Enquirer is, perhaps, not as great as we'd like to believe.

And wow, do I have some juicy history for you.

It occurred over the weekend, immediately following Green Vale Gang's successful debut at PRIME.

Let's open our textbooks.

📖

WEEKEND PLANS

Green Vale Gang had won their debut match. They managed to piss off a couple of hall of famers, and screwed one of them out of a victory without directly interfering in the match itself.

It was, by all measure, a very successful night.

“Gentlemen,” Ned Reform began as they retreated towards separate private jets. “Plutarch once defined rest as the sweet sauce of labor. Take this weekend, rejuvenate, and be prepared for an intense Monday of preparation. My ring in New Haven is ready to become the breeding ground for your hard work. Until then - go forth and heal your minds and body. And please…”

Ned leaned in close, as if telling a big secret.

“Try to minimize distractions. Especially those of the female variety, yes?”

Big chuckle. Such a funny joke. Hugo grinned and rolled his eyes. Daniel winked.

“Anyway… goodbye.”

Handshakes were exchanged, and ways were parted. Within an hour, an invoice would be sent to Hudson Vale. It would be paid the following business day. The work Ned Reform was doing, excellent work on all accounts, did not come free. It was costly, and now, proof of concept had been delivered.

That is to say, this all just became a lot more expensive.

Hugo and Daniel boarded their own jet, and it is what one would expect their jet to look like – after all, it's not really theirs. It's Hudson Vale's. And as such, it's masculine and rich and extremely American, high-end fabrics, leather upholstery, a massive flat screen with surround sound speakers, a rug with a bear's head still attached to it, a bar full of scotch with an embarrassingly high price tag. The lavatory had marble countertops, and a full-sized mirror. There was a steam shower. Heated floors.

Everything about it was Hudson's style. It made Hugo feel… restless, let's say.

As Hugo poured a brandy and clanked a glass against Daniel's, he said, “My father didn't even text me. Is that not fucked to you?”

Daniel hated to have to reveal the news to him. “He texted me,” Daniel said. “He didn't say much.”

“What did he say?” Hugo asked.

“Uhm, ‘Well done, boys.’”

This pissed Hugo off in a way that he could never allow to simply simmer beneath the surface, he had to write it all across his face as well. He couldn't control it, for reasons that as of now, I can only summarize.

It is unfair to you, my students, as there is so much history that occurred between the beginning and now that, even with this summary, you will have many questions. Just please, for now, accept my promise that we will cover it all in this course – eventually.

But, as it were, Hugo's anger derived from two simple facts, which were:

Hugo was the son that Hudson never wanted, and Daniel was the son that Hudson wished he had.

As you can imagine, both Hugo and Daniel were sharp enough to be keenly aware of these facts.

They had been the cause of a few minor disagreements, but remained mostly undiscussed. Keeping things that way had been a lot of work for both boys. For instance, the text Daniel received did not actually say, “Well done boys.” It actually said, “Well done, Daniel.” Hugo knew that Daniel knew that Hugo knew that Daniel lied about what it said. It was preferable to, and more comfortable than, what would have to happen if Daniel actually said the truth. And yet, Hugo couldn't not-know the truth. He was too smart to not-know, and too obsessive to merely ignore it.

Hence, the anger he could not hide from his face. Daniel, for his part, nursed his brandy and left the topic alone.

After a bitter silence, Hugo said, “We're going to Copenhagen.”

“Copenhagen?” Daniel asked. “So you can see that man again?”

Hugo scoffed, “What's wrong with that?”

“You barely know him,” Daniel said.

“I don't care,” Hugo said. And after a moment, he followed up with, “I think I might love him.”

Daniel rolled his eyes. Hugo was, with most things at least, as quiet and sharp as a knife in the expert hands of an experienced killer. But with love – he was clumsy, and fell like a bowling ball from an airplane.

“Copenhagen it is,” Daniel finally replied.

📖

PRIMARY SOURCE - HUGO VALE

The first time I saw Jens was last summer, and my head was already well over my heels when he finally said, “Hej,” which sounds like, “Hi.” No idea how that's possible, but then, I've never been one to study languages that aren't already dead.

Daniel and I had just graduated from the coliseum known colloquially as St. George's School, and I had finally admitted to my father that I wasn't going to college, but pursuing a career in combat sports. It was the first time he'd been proud of me that I can honestly recall. “Being your own man,” he said, “Is the greatest gift a son can give his father.” Access to the jet was a graduation gift. “To make up for… however many birthdays I missed,” he said.

“All of them,” is what I'd have said if I had any guts. “Thank you,” was my true reply.

One of the first places we went was Copenhagen, actually, for a few reasons. It was a place unlike anywhere else, for one. Not to mention it boasts one of the world's oldest monarchies, its origins can be traced all the way back to the Vikings, and it's one of the few cities in the world where the architecture didn't feel so oppressive. The brutalism that influenced much of the world's architecture felt minimal in Copenhagen, where there were Baroque and Rococo buildings, cobblestone streets, and modern architecture – a kind meant to make you feel good.

We'd gotten way too high off a cigarette we bought from a local – the Danish make their joints with a mixture of tobacco and hash, and, apparently, we weren't specific enough in our request. Then, we stumbled into a few bars, landed on a couple of ecstacy pills, and finally hobbled into a flower shop.

That's where I saw him.

Jens.

He was gorgeous. Tall, blonde, classically handsome – in a European way, the kind that gets away with turtlenecks and drives sports cars.

“Hej,” he said, with a smile money simply couldn't buy. Perfectly imperfect, pearly white with a tiny gap between his teeth that, if corrected, would've ruined how adorable it was.

Immediately, I engaged him in conversation, and was elated to discover he spoke English.

With my hand brushing Jens' shoulder and his body language indicating he liked that, Daniel recognized what was happening despite his inebriation and quietly left the shop.

I didn't even notice, such was the depth of my enthralled state. We talked about everything. He was in his mid-twenties, single, had a mom but not a dad, had a houseboat out on the harbor – a nice one, it turned out. After he closed-up shop, he toured me around Copenhagen on the back of his bicycle. He pedalled as though there wasn't another man on the bike. We talked the entire time.

He brought me to his house boat and we drank wine. I stayed the night.

The next morning, he called me sweet. He said, “you're so sweet, you make me bleed cotton candy.”

My heart floated over that harbor.

When I got back to the jet, I told Daniel about it. Daniel scoffed at the idea of it all. He's not a very romantic person, and phrases like that do not activate his poetic heart, but rather, his conspiratorial mind.

But I believed in love.

Upon our return to Copenhagen, I was very, very excited. I popped an Adderall, put on my favorite suit (a Kiton cashmere blend, dark green that accentuated my hair and eyes), lit a cigarette and started to disembark.

"Alright," Daniel said. "You go chase a broken heart, Petey and I are going to go find some ladies to party with."

"Petey?" I asked.

"Petey," Daniel said. "Our pilot? The man your father has been paying to fly you around for nearly a year, now?"

I tossed a flippant hand towards nowhere. Honestly, who cared?

I walked off the plane and quickly found my way towards the flower shop. The cobblestone streets were just as I'd left them, the multicultural city bristled with both Danish and foreign culture, creating a vibrant city that felt as quaint as it was modern, as quiet as it was bustling.

When I arrived, he was just as I’d left him as well. Arranging flowers and speaking softly with an elderly, female customer, he did not initially see me – even when the door jingled a set of bell chimes as I opened it.

Eager, I waited as patiently as I could for him to notice me. But Jens was perfectly focused on his work, and I had to cough to get his attention.

He looked up from the customer and saw me.

I smiled.

But Jens did not. Not at first. I was mortified. Did he not recognize me? Had he not thought of me as I'd thought of him every day since that summer night?

Then, he smiled after all. Yet, in my hasteful desire for his recognition, and my relief at having received it, I failed to notice the hesitation that occurred when he offered that smile.

It would soon become clear enough, anyway.

When the customer departed the store, I smiled at her and then looked up at Jens. His hands were already out, not for an embrace, but to stop me from doing so.

“Do you not remember me?” I asked.

“Of course I do,” he said. “You're Hugo. The sweet one.”

I smiled and brushed his shoulder with my hand. He smiled, but pulled away.

“You should have said something,” he said.

“Apologies for showing up unannounced,” I replied. “But I failed to get your number when we first met.”

“There's a reason for that,” he replied. The first dagger. It plunged into my gut and twisted. The realization that I'd been used – and the embarrassment caused by the irrational anger that spilled forth from my body.

“So this is how you operate?” I asked, shoving him. “You think it's alright to just sweep people off their feet, make them feel wanted, make them feel like somebody, and just discard them?”

He grinned in an annoyed way, “Hugo, please. Don't act like you've never done the same.”

I punched him on the arm. Once, twice. I screamed, and punched his arm a third time.

“You are… ha, ehm... what's the word? …'Insane,'” he said, laughing like I was being some incredulous maniac.

“I'm not insane,” I said. “I am not fucking insane. You told me you loved me. You said I made you 'bleed cotton candy.' Do you use that corny ass line on everyone or something?”

“I never said I loved you,” Jens replied.

My jaw hurt from the way I clenched my teeth. Maybe he didn't say that – but with everything else he said to me that night and the following morning, what was the difference? I stomped the floor. I fought the heat in my eyes that indicated tears. I threw my arms in the air and said, “What is this?”

“I'm married, Hugo,” he replied. “I have a husband – okay? A husband.”

“You said you were single,” I said.

He shrugged, as if to say, “what do you want me to say? I lied.”

Let me make something clear. He was right. I had done the very same thing to people before. Daniel had watched me do it, and drank with me after. But it's different when it happens to you. It hurts. And I was so incredibly hurt. I didn't actually care if he was married. My father is married to my mother and he has slept with at least twenty women that weren't her, and that's just the ones I know about. Marriage is about presentation. I would one day marry a woman as well. But I would never love them. It's just something you have to do. For the purpose of lineage.

It was that he pulled the wool over my eyes so easily. It was that what I thought was one of the most meaningful nights of my short life was actually one of the most meaningless.

“My father always said you can't trust a man with a weak handshake,” I said. “I should've known.”

“Look,” Jens said. “You are a very attractive, and very rich young man. The last thing you need in your life is a florist in Copenhagen.”

“What if it's the first thing I want?” I asked.

“And the last thing I need is a handsome, rich guy destroying my marriage,” he answered.

“There's already a handsome guy ruining your shitty marriage,” I said. “But he's not rich. He knows fuck-all about money. He just wastes away doing stupid shit no one cares about, like cutting flowers for old cunts in some city that handsome, rich men like me fly to for fun.”

“Okay,” he said. As if he was taking it because he deserved it. As if it was his right to disengage, and he was exercising that right.

It just pissed me off and hurt me more.

I ripped some arranged bouquets from the walls and threw them on the shop floor, stomping on them in a pair of loafers that cost more Krones than Jens’ entire inventory.

“I'm sorry I hurt you,” he said on my way out the door.

“I hope you die from a horrible disease,” I replied as I punched the door open.

I walked out into the streets of Copenhagen and realized I'd been wrong about this place the entire time. The architecture was very oppressive. The city felt dead and so did I. It was just like everywhere else.

📖

GIFT BASKETS

Hours after Hugo's altercation with Jens and his subsequent, defeated walk through the city, he finally arrived back on the jet.

There, he found Daniel puffing a cigar in his boxers, and three women, all beautiful, lying around on the leather furniture.

Daniel chuckled, “Shame you don't like women.”

Suddenly the lavatory bathroom opened. A sixty-seven year old man in a pilot's uniform stumbled out with his pants still around his ankles.

“That's Petey,” Daniel said.

“My name's Paul, actually,” Petey said.

“Petey got laid, didn't you Petey?” Daniel said.

“Again, my name's Paul – but yes, I did,” Petey said. “It was awesome.”

Hugo simply blinked, wiped whatever tears fell from his eyelids and walked back towards the private sleeping quarters.

Daniel didn't need to be a sleuth to understand what happened. Hugo had gotten hurt. Was it his fault? Probably. Did he need to do something drastic on Hugo's behalf to avenge him? Probably not.

…but he kinda wanted to.

“Petey,” Daniel said. “Once these sluts are done with their nap, get them a gift basket, yeah? From the back. And if they'd like a shower, let them. But make sure they leave.”

“I can't stress enough that my name is Paul,” Petey said.

“It's not about you right now,” Daniel said, throwing his clothes back on.

“What's it about?” Petey asked, half-joking.

“Revenge, probably,” Daniel said as he disembarked from the jet.

📖

THOUGHT CIRCLES

As Hugo laid in the full-sized bed with Thomas Bespoke sheets and feather pillows, he couldn't help but feel utterly sorry for himself.

The only thing that broke him from his malaise was the text he received from one Dr. Ned Reform. There was no greeting, just a screenshot:

ReVival 66 Card.

Hessian vs Hugo Vale.

Hugo lit himself a cigarette and grabbed a silver ashtray from the African Blackwood end table by the bed. His thoughts carried like the smoke from the end of the cigarette.

His first singles contest would be against a hall of famer.

There was something to that – even if it was that he and Daniel had managed to piss off that hall of famer the night prior. But still, Hugo wondered, if he would get the Hessian that people rave about – the one from years prior who dominated the ranks, or the one now who, some say, doesn’t live up to the ideal of himself he established.

That was a hard judgment for Hugo to make, and frankly, wasn't his concern. But Hugo knew that if the fire had burned out in Hessian… if what was once a fiery inferno of passion that Hessian had for this business had somehow become little more than coal ash and a few, flickering embers, then he was in trouble. Because Hugo wrestled the same way he loved. It was ugly. It was idealistic.

And it was passionate.

If Hessian showed up in the ring without that fire in him? Hugo might just have a shot. And that would surely show a lying, bastard florist in Copenhagen a thing or two, wouldn't it?

Of course it wouldn't. He was a married man, with a life. A life without Hugo, at that.

His thoughts must have circled for hours from Jens to Hessian, the same kinds of thoughts, on repeat, like a loop of film that mixed his fantasies of victory against Hessian, and love, with the reality of love's treacherousness, and Hessian's utter brutality.

The circle always concluded with Hugo hoping he would face the real Hessian – the one that everyone feared, the one that dominated the industry. He was done with half-assed fakes. Then his thoughts would return to Jens, the biggest half-assed fake he knew.

Finally, the door to the private room opened and Daniel walked in. He sat on the bed next to Hugo, grabbed a cigarette out of Hugo's case, and lit it.

“Are the whores gone?” Hugo asked.

“They are,” Daniel said as he exhaled smoke.

Hugo nodded. Good. They could leave.

“I would like it if his entire world burned to ash,” Hugo said. “I would play the lyre, like Nero.”

“I know, buddy,” Daniel said, patting Hugo on the back.

📖

CONTEXTUALIZED

That's just about the end of our class time today, but I'd like to leave you with what the result of this weekend truly ended up being, and how history will come to know them.

When Daniel said, “I know, buddy…”

Daniel did, indeed, know.

That night, while Hugo was thinking circularly and feeling sorry for himself on the jet, a fire had been set to a flower shop.

Some local boys recalled a tall, Black man who spoke talented Danish offering them money and “a lighter worth more than their bicycles” to set the flower shop on fire.

But Jens Clemensen, the owner of the shop, knew of only one person who might commit arson against the shop, but he was white, and only spoke English.

Though no lives were lost, considerable damage had been done to the building, and the shop would need to be closed for repairs.

As of today, the case is considered open and ongoing. “One of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood.” - Seneca