I Am The Wrestler

“Your brother’s a shithead. You sure he’s not lying?”

Nate Colton raised a salient point. If Guido Battaglia’s honesty were an animal, it would be the Squonk - ugly, dissolved into tears at the slightest provocation, and totally imaginary.

“Nah. He didn’t have that weaselly desperation about him. That laugh. That fucking laugh. He only laughs like that at two things - racist jokes and when he knows he’s got a one-up on someone.”

Tom’s expression didn’t change one iota since Nate got back in the car from entertaining three idiot police officers at a precinct in Northeast Philly. The mix of shock and defeat permeated his face. Real sad clown without the makeup hours.

“So what are you gonna do?”

“I…”

He trailed off, partially because some dickhead in a Tesla decided to pull over into the left lane and put his blinkers on, partially because…

“...I don’t know what I’m going to do. But I need to talk to someone.”

“You know, Tom. Dad said you should call him more often, which is to say you should call him once. I think now might be the best time.”

Finally, the expression on Tom’s face changed, like he had a minor epiphany.

-

Jon Rhine. Phil Atken. Ria Lockhart. Kohime Mori. Coral Avalon. Jared Sykes. Don Winters.

The Anglo Luchador.

You guys all have this commonality, assaulted either in the hallways or outside the confines of a match. Some repeatedly. Some gravely. Extracurricular violence in wrestling has become commonplace, but no matter how acceptable it is, there’s still a word for it, from a single punch in a corridor to a motherfucking chocolate fountain baptism.

Assault.

Wrestling is violent, but these motherfuckers, they’re violence perverts.

-

Home. Settled in after a tumultuous day. Uncle Nate settled in the family room playing Mario Kart with Vinny and Zo. Tam, once informed, got so mad she took a walk without a coat, so hot that the raindrops falling from the sky sublimated upon impact on her skin. Tom was alone on his couch. The brainworms started closing in like Shai-Hulud chasing rhythmic thumping in the alien sands. The last thing he needed was a bout of intrusive thoughts.

And then he remembered what Nate told him in the car.

Riiiiiing.

“Hey, is this Jake?”

“Yeah. Who’s this?”

“Uh, it’s Tom. Tom Battaglia?”

“Oh! Hi, Tom. Sorry, I’m used to seeing and hearing ‘Mr. C.’ Didn’t recognize you actually using my name.”

“Yeah, well it’s been a day.”

“Nate told me you guys were…up to something. How’d it go?”

Silence. On the list of things Tom wanted to relive, recounting his brother’s revelation before it was able to scab was between the principal catching him making out with Maria Bellomo in the St. Monica’s boys room and the time Paxton Ray shock-collared him at Ultraviolence.

“Look, I don’t know what you boys did, but…”

“I found out my mom is in on the harassment my brother started.”

Another silence. It was Jake’s turn to fumble for the right words.

“Jesus.”

“Yeah. And it couldn’t have come at a worse time. Like, I’ll never admit it to anyone else, but I can take slipping up against Ivan. I mean, it’ll suck to let him get the last laugh so soon after my dickhead brother did, but…”

Another tense silence.

“...but I’d only be letting me down there.”

“Cut the shit, Tom. The only way you’re gonna let that team down is by not showing up, and I bet my boy will tell you the same thing. I’m gonna put that out front, ‘cause that other thing…man, I don’t even know.”

“Fucked up, ain’t it, Mr. C? This coming off the heels of my dad… Nate told you about that, right?”

“Yeah. Afraid I can’t offer any words of advice on that front.”

“There’s always a but with you Coltons though.”

“You know, sometimes I forget you’re closer to my age than Nate’s. But yeah.”

They both shared a chuckle.

“You worry about letting people down…you worry about it a lot, from what I’ve picked up. But Nate tells me that your two boys, they worship the ground you walk on. Your wife…I mean, I don’t have to tell you, that ain’t gonna be perfect all the time, but I see a lot of me and Mallory in you two. And like I said, the only way you let your team down is if you don’t show up.”

Jake paused to let the moment breathe before continuing.

“But when you head over to Wales, you gotta make sure to leave this stuff at home. I know it’s hard, but it might make the difference between walking out, or being carried.”

“Easier said than done, Mr. C.”

A sigh.

“Is it? If you let this stuff cloud you at a desk job or whatever regular people do, yeah, you’ll mess up a ledger or whatever. But you’re in there with 400 pounds of Ivan Stanislav or 21 other people who wanna knock your head off?”

Silence for a beat. Less tense, more of a thousand lightbulbs illuminating the lucha-brain.

“Look, no one’s life is perfect, either at work or home. I learned pretty quick that when I got stiffed by a booker or got screwed over in a match, I had to make damn sure not to bring that into the house. But that cuts the other way too. Mal and I had our fights, the kids were a pain in the ass sometimes…but that all had to go on ice when I went out on the road. I couldn’t handle a handicap match against my opponent AND those problems.”

“I don’t know if cooler heads will prevail because I don’t even know why she’s doing it. But you’re right. Ivan and Cancer and all those other sadists…”

“Hey. Breathe, Tom. I tell all my students, the only bad loss is one you don’t learn from. I think you’ve learned a lot over the last couple years. Put it to good use.”

Just as Tom said his goodbye and pressed the big red button on the call, the front door swung open.

“Alright, I didn’t feel like going to jail tonight, so I didn’t kill your mother. I did the next best thing.”

Tam threw a package wrapped in wax paper marked “DiBruno Bros.” at her husband. He hurriedly opened it up and his face started beaming.

Guanciale.

“You really do get me.”

Tam smiled as she turned to go upstairs to change out of wet clothes from the rain. Tom yelled downstairs.

“HEY NATE, YOU LIKE CARBONARA?”

-

They dragged you through hotels and gave you stigmata. They cheapened your only title win and expected to be thanked for it. They locked you in a dark room and scarred you while a child was in your care, and then they threw a shock collar on you twice. They drugged you and dragged you around Chicago and then descended upon you like locusts through drywall and from behind.

What’s worst is they dragged you to their level. You shock-collared a man fighting for his daughter to give him a taste of his own medicine. You spent all that time jogging and bleeding and training, and they dissolved your inhibitions, no, your principles just so you could get a modicum of payback.

And it got you nothing.

-

The drive to JFK was uneventful. Tom and Nate spent it talking mostly about the corgi show the former was judging. But overall, the topic landed on just about anything but War Games, because it would consume them for an entire night. There was no use obsessing.

Tom was able to get Nate a first class seat when he rearranged the Next Diamond’s travel schedule on his own dime, but because of how last minute it was, their seats were not adjacent. He prepared with a sleep mask, a neck pillow, and a downloaded podcast series about American mythology. He had his fill of the Aztec stuff anyway. Might as well branch out, y’know? Besides, he was looking forward to the Johnny Appleseed episode, just a guy, planting trees, doing a service for no other reason than it seemed like the right thing to do.

Then he felt a tap on his shoulder.

“Hey bud! Fancy that, seat buddies!!”

Dabney Doubleday, in the enthusiastic flesh. Tom put the earbuds back in his pocket. Johnny Appleseed would have to wait another day.

“Dabs, hey! Wow, first class?”

“Yeah, it’s a credit card perk. I use my card to buy everyday things, and then I pay it off immediately. All rewards, no interest! Dougie’s great with that stuff.”

“That’s…” Tom trailed off for a second before settling on a rote platitude. “That’s pretty cool, actually.”

“So, Looch…” a shorthand picked up from Chandler Tsonda, no doubt, “You think we gave those ne'er-do-wells the what for? Make ‘em shake in their boots?”

“Ixnay on the uchadorlay while I’m unmasked.”

“OH- !” Dabs’ face turned beet red, he adjusts his volume “Oh crud!”

“Oh man, it’s okay, I didn’t mean to scold you it’s just, I’ve already been unmasked once this year.”

“I’m so sorry, chum. Did you make the villain pay, at least?”

Tom smiled weakly, eyes rolling away from making contact with Dabs’.

“It’s complicated.”

“As wrestling so often tends to be, am I right?.”

Dabney grabbed his carry-on and reached his hand in.

“Uh, to answer your question though,” Tom awkwardly continued. “I don’t think it’ll work like that in War Games. Separating them individually, yeah, that’s good for deterrence. But…”

“Yeah, it's going to be mayhem in that cage. But whoever gets in from our team first will just have to stay strong! Once all of us get in there, we’ll give them the what-for.”

Tom nodded and started to reach for his neck pillow when another lightbulb went off in his head.

“Hey, Dabs, mind if I ask you a question?”

“Of course not, teammate. What’s your boggle?”

“It’s your whole…”

Tom waved his arms in front of him.

“...thing. ‘Fair Play.’”

“I, just, am who I am, bud. Nothing mysterious, just like things on the up and up..”

“No, not what it’s about. I mean, you know what this business is.”

Tom threw his head back and sighed before continuing.

“How do you do it? How do you come out every week and strive to play by the rules in a business that burns the code?”

Dabs smiles warmly.

“You think I’m sunny all the time, friend? I wish. I’ve got my crosses to bear, believe you me. When someone really gets my goat, sure, somewhere deep down I’d love to do what you did to Paxton last year. Sneak up on them, put a shock-collar on them, and…”

BZZZT!

His onomatopoeia drew some momentary eyes.

“But the key, dear teammate, is to let the thoughts be thoughts and not action.”

“Yeah… but I actually dipped to their level. I made them action.”

Dabney laughed again.

“So what? Everyone gets mad, everyone makes mistakes. Every day we get a fresh chance to be a little better than we were the day before. You’re a wise old veteran- you should know that.”

Fairplay elbows his seatmate with a grin.

“The only thing wise on me is my ass.”

They both shared a chuckle this time.

“Friend, you have to forgive yourself. You made a mistake, and you’re making amends. I think that’s how good people normally operate.”

Dabs put his hand on Tom’s shoulder.

“Besides, if you can’t forgive yourself, who can you ever expect to? You know?”

Tom smiled but then noticed the seat across the aisle was empty.

“Uh, where’s Dougie?”

“Oh, poor guy has just as weak a stomach as they come. Planes, riding in the backseat of a car, rollercoasters, my dad’s workplace, even! He also has IBS, so traveling can really be a perfect storm.”

“TMI, bud. But uhh… we haven’t even taken off. I’m not sure he’s even allowed in the bathroom yet.”

Dabs rubbed his chin.

“Well where’d that little fella’ scrabble off to, by George...”

-

But still here you are. Physically scarred, mentally exhausted. But here. Few wrestlers in the company have the matches you have on your belt, the mileage. Only eight other wrestlers have been in the fed from ReVival 1 to now, and two of them are your teammates.

Yet there’s a burning yearning deep inside of you. You want something more, something worth holding to the sky as an accomplishment. Half the wrestlers in the fucking company right now would kill for your resume, but your standards are high. Impossibly so.

Not because you’re a wrestler.

You are the wrestler.

But that hasn’t gotten you far enough. Is it because you’re a wrestler in a sea of racketeers? PTC is dead, but the mentality that you can’t just be a wrestler, it lingers like the stink from a hockey bag. Always an ulterior motive. Glory for Mother Russia. Attention from the woman. Sweet, sweet egg profits. A place for tits, coke, and accidentally firing a six-shooter at a new father. Crucifixions. News shows. The spies are disavowed, and the vampires are all staked.

But the unspoken whispers keep telling you you’re not enough.

Or are they just in your own fucking head?

-

Home for the next week, a luxurious hotel in downtown Cardiff, one of the perks of working for the best and most lucrative wrestling company in history. Tom packed a little too lightly; his CPAP remained on the endtable right by his front door in South Philly. He plopped his travel bag and carry-on next to the door and hung the suit bag containing his press conference garb and his finest corgi-judgin’ suit on the frame as he maneuvered to get the keycard out of his pocket. As he looked up, he noticed a familiar face checking into the room next door.

“Oh, hey Champ.”

Jared Sykes serendipitously had his bags splayed on the floor next to his door simultaneously, also fumbling for his keycard.

“Hey Tom. How was your flight?”

“It was good. Having a wife in pharma makes for getting real easy access to first class. One of the few perks. Speaking of wives ‘n stuff, I never got a chance to congratulate you two. The fog of war, that sort of thing. Where is Justine anyway?”

“Oh, she’s here, just checking some things out downstairs for now.”

“Glad she made the trip. I know things got a bit contentious last year, but I’m happy for both of you, for everything.”

Jared nodded. Tom looked down at his keycard, but a question bolted into his mind he needed to ask before the Champion started his cross-ocean decompression.

“Hey, if you don’t mind, I have something to ask, away from the rest of the team.”

Jared furrowed his brow, awaiting what was about to come his way.

“I don’t wanna make you relive all the shit you went through, but I mean, it’s objective you probably had to survive the most extracurricular violence out of everyone here. How did you do it? Persevere that long and get to the top of the mountain?”

Jared furrowed his brow even harder.

“Honestly? Not quite how I look at it. It's only a mountain if you're looking down on everyone else. No doing that around here, y'know?”

“Yeah. I guess. But…”

Tom trailed off, squinting, shaking his head.

“...I know it’s not the case, because I’m not deaf. I hear the conversations, and I know how much this shit sticks with you, but you go out there every fucking night and fight through like people aren’t forklifting you or literally trying death by chocolate on you. How do you do it? How can you just be so…”

Tom looked up, fixing his eyes directly on his captain’s.

“...cool?”

Jared laughed.

“I don’t think ‘cool’s the worth you’re looking for, but I get what you mean. Got a thought experiment. What’s the reason you’re here? All this: the travel, the dipshits, those aches that creep in on Monday morning - why do it?”

Tom stopped dead in his tracks.

“Easy answer is your family, right? Probably the go-to for everyone. You love ‘em, that’s clear enough. It’s right there on your sleeve. But then it’s just a job, because everyone who has one does it to take care of their family. I guess… why are you here?”

It was Tom’s turn to furrow brows now. Jared took a beat and continued.

“Like, the vibe I get from you is kinda chaotic. Maybe that’s not the word. Inconsistent? There are days we get the guy who wants to be a paladin, but then he’s picking fights. There’s the guy who’ll go full campaign mode, but then everything is blood and barbed wire.”

Tom was still struck silent. The truth hurts. A wave of regret washed over Jared’s face momentarily before he composed himself again. A captain must always remain in charge, after all.

“Look, I’m not saying this to give you shit or be a dick, man. Like, you’ve been through it, but the kicker is that you’re still here. Caesar isn’t. Julian isn’t. Hoyt. Atken. Better or worse, you’re just…”

“Too stupid to know when to give up?”

“Not what I was going for.”

Tom nodded. Jared continued.

“Just think about it, the question, I mean. You gotta answer it for yourself. And when you have your answer, you’ll never need to ask it again.”

Tom took a second to absorb what Jared said, then replied with one word.

“Thanks.”

Jared nodded as he opened the door to his suite.

-

What is it you fight for, Luchador? Is it just fighting for the sake of fighting?

You can’t just fight for the purity. For the sanctity.

For wrestling.

Can you?

Why not?

Why can’t you help be the one to bring this shit back to where it needs to be?

Forget silos and cliffs and queens and pawns.

None of that matters.

You know what does? You know who does?

Chandler Tsonda.

Adam Ellis.

Dabney Doubleday.

Brandon Youngblood.

Jared Sykes.

Nate Colton.

And you.

The Anglo Fucking Luchador.

The Wrestler.

-

“Hey Luchadork, guess what I found?”

The text from Pom Shinjoku came in with a video attached. Tom dreaded opening it because he knew it had an equal shot of containing footage of her decapitating a birdman as it did something sentimental. He played the video.

Like a time capsule creaking open in the hands of city officials, the video peered into a simpler time, a brightly-lit dojo. Four wrestlers in a ring with an audience of one, the Shogun of Bloody Japan Grappling Arts himself. There was a slimmer Dragon Matsumoto. A junior heavyweight in baggy pants with a pencil-thin moustache, Nobuo Hasegawa. Pom Shinjoku had both her eyes still. And then there was the Anglo Luchador, not scarred yet, still vibrance in his step, bounce in his jumps.

He watched the video of this final dry run match featuring the Shogun’s four best wrestlers with eyes wide as saucers. Then replayed it. And again. And again. The video was only nine minutes long, but it contained enough layers that one might think Pom sent over all 48-hours of the Wrestling CONDOR show from the early ‘90s, put on by the Joshi World promotion.

Each time he watched, he found something different. The smile on the Shogun’s face as Tom and Pom reversed each other seemingly for an eternity compressed in under a minute. The look of shock on Dragon’s face when Tom slid through his five-hole, taking his arms with him and whipping him into a pin combo. Pom’s glee at hitting Nobuo with the Great Wave off Kanagawa, only to fade into shock as Dragon tossed her out of the ring.

But the thing that struck him most about it all was how much fun it appeared they were having. How much fun, if his memories weren’t scrambled, they all were objectively having. There was no malice behind the strikes. They weren’t trying to concuss or maim each other. They were wrestling because they were wrestlers. Engaging in a sacred sport. No revenge bait or racketeering involved.

It was the last time on that tour Tom remembered feeling happy about who he was professionally.

It may have been the last time he felt happy about the sport, well, ever.

After a playfully curt reply to his best friend in the biz, he tapped the forward button on the video.

Send to: Jared Sykes.

He furiously typed his message, smiling, a tear running from his right eye all the same. Before he hit send, he looked at it one last time and then typed another message.

“Video message - hey, the answer to your question earlier.”

“This is what I’m fighting for.”