Femme Furies (Fade/Selene): Points of View

That Shaboozy song is playing and I’m fucking toasted.

A couple of basic bitches from UNLV are over there at the bar hitting on the bartender, wanting to hear the latest pop song that justifies them being stupid as hell while guys slobber all over for them.  I take another shot.  He sees me, he gets ready to pour me another one.  He pours it, says something about how I’m too pretty to be drinking alone and it’s like, dude, why do you think I wanna hear that tonight?  How generic would it be to bang the bartender, right?

I find myself here a lot of nights, particularly when I get hurt when I train.  Honestly, I’m not good at what I decided to do with my life.  That is to say, I’m not even sure what that is anymore.

He goes to take the bottle away and I grab his shirt sleeve.  I don’t hear him but I brush my hair behind my ear and smile at him.  The charm is limited because I’m not trying to see what happens when I get blacked out right now.  He leaves me the bottle like a good boy.  I’m sure he thinks I’m gonna drop my panties at the first sight of a dude giving me vodka but, seriously, if every girl that was given a drink by a guy screwed the guy we’d all be pregnant pretty much 24/7.

I signed the contract Lindsay had worked on by whoever it was that works PRIME legal.  I don’t know when I start but I know it’s gonna be me getting my ass kicked.  She told me she knew a guy to train me better than the random Youtube videos I saw that showed me a “Best of Snapmares” four hour supercut.  I’m very, very lucky.  I know that.  It doesn’t stop me from thinking I don’t deserve it.  Because I don’t.  Another swig.

He sits down next to me and asks for something to drink from the bartender.  He says something about the vodka to him, but he doesn’t want that.  The bartender pours him something else that’s clear which I’m guessing is water.  Oh, awesome, those girls have asked for “Espresso” to play.  Twenty bucks says they…yep.  They just screamed the line about give a fucks being on vacation.  The guy next to me is laughing at me and talking to me about something.  I don’t know why I’m here, what he wants, or any of that shit.  I feel his hand touch my bare shoulder and I want to deck him but…wait.  I know his face.

“I know you…”

My voice is a lot more slurred than I thought.

He tells me he knows Lindsay Troy and he’s willing to help me learn to wrestle.  He tells me he knows all about my history, who I used to live with, who used to do what with me, and that I was full of potential if I wanted to use it.  I take another swig.  He says something and smiles like he’s nervous.  I smile back at him before I go back to pouring me some more vodka.

“Hey, so listen,” I say as I try to gently sit the bottle down on the bar, “I’m not…in a ring right now.  I don’t know if you’re tryna get in my pants or what, but holy shit let me get a drink or seven in me before I tell you to fuck off.”

I’m so clever.

“No want in sleeping with you,” he chuckles, “Just wanna pay it forward in the industry.  Listen, call me T.  Get drunk, get sleep, wake up, call me as soon as you’re good.”  He slides a card in front of me that I pin down with my shot glass.  I look down through the glass and I see the word “Proper” like it’s this guy’s brand name.  He got up and started telling the bartender he would pay for my drinks.  I wanted to remind him I’m not fucking anybody, but he doesn’t actually listen or stay long enough to let me finish my comment.

He’s gone and left me with a business card and free drinks.

Guess I know what I’m doing tomorrow.

I am uncomfortable taking charity.

When I was growing up, two of the five sets of foster parents I had both told me how all charity ever does is teach the weak they can get by on the inner weaknesses of the strong.  There is an image I have seen on the internet with a cartoon character saying something about having a nickel for every time something happens and having two nickels being strange or something to that effect.

The city is hot.  I tie the bottom of my shirt together and inhale the heat, the dust, and the carbon monoxide-seasoned smoke.  I unzip my backpack and bring out my old cowboy hat.  It was not mine, not always, but I owe it to the men that held this hat before me to honor them in my way.

I think back to what I must do, what I have agreed to do.  I, signed because of who my alleged birth father was and the connections he had made, was only given the luxury of signing to a promotion for professional wrestling as something of a favor.  My uncle laughed at me and told me that if people knew who I was related to and who I used to work for, I would have the nickname of “Nepo Baby” and that it would be best if I won them over on my own.  I did not like going to him with this, but his charity brought me here.  I just have to do what I must do and what I have agreed to do.

I must impress them but not intimidate them, express my confidence yet pay attention to not be cocky, remain respectful to the profession even if the professionals are no longer professional.  My new career would live and die upon “opinions.”  Opinions of my peers, opinions of my audience, and opinions of my administrators and employers.  I could only look at my fledgling career and my decision to take this risk and see it for what it was: the most frightening thing I have ever done.

One wrong decision, one foolish act, one wrong smile, and it can all come crumbling down.  I could lose fans that I worked so hard to gain, I could lose merchandise sales if they ever do come, and then comes the conversation with your manager as they tell you they are not happy with your performance and they will be going a different path.  Being fired, being dismissed, it is never so contenting as a release or calm like parting ways.  No, it is a break up, a dissolution of a relationship that is not built upon love but rather money, which is the hardest and most painful collateral put forth in any transactional relationship.

As bad as that is, it is knowing that I am to debut in a tag team to help build the division for this company and knowing that my performance can directly cause another person to lose their job and the entire career they believed in.  They had their own uncle tell them to go out in the world, they had their own connections, and whoever they are they are struggling to get their own career off of the ground and that is it, I am through with this thinking!  I pull the hat over my head and I walk out into the heat.

I am supposed to meet a Japanese man who has agreed to train me in private as a favor.  To keep up with the checklist, I owe my career to someone else, my hat to someone else, my training to someone else, I owe this new apartment and this new partner to someone else, and my future?  My future does not feel like my own.  But I am a Huntress.  I learned how to survive in the wilderness, how to live and work alone, and how to make it so you will not need another soul alive or dead tell you how to be who you are.  But I have placed myself in the hands of the charity gods, whoever they may be, and I will be forced to accept with grace the hands given to me.

If I can find this dojo.

My hangover trick, I mean how to avoid one, is to chug down a big glass of water and then eat two slices of bread.  See, I don’t know how the hell it works, maybe the water dilutes the alcohol and the bread soaks it all up like a fucking mop or something, I don’t know.  All I know is I’m awake right now and I’m ready fucking go.

Okay, Vic, don’t be a dick.  If I walk in this shitty little address and it’s a porn shoot I’m gonna freak the absolute fuck out.  Fool me once, bar top business card guys, shame on me.  I hear “Like That” bumping from a car driving by me.  They slow down and instantly I’m sitting here thinking I gotta tighten my walk, I gotta keep my head up, and if they on some dumb shit, I can decide right then if I stand on business or I let these types put me down.  The windows don’t go down, I can’t see inside with my peripherals, and they move past.  There’s a fleeting voice in me telling me I wish they would have done some foul shit and then my other voice is like you’re a dumb bitch if you like stepping on every toe tapped in front of you.

I see the place finally.  It’s a gym.  Come the fuck on, I watch enough of these shits to know how this is going to go.  Cut to montage where I get the shit kicked outta me and I get better as the music builds, I climb the mountain and tell the Russian to fuck off for killing my black friend or man I’m not good at these metaphor things.

I walk in and it’s really busy here.  There’s two wrestling rings with three students listening to a big Japanese guy and I think that’s who I am here to talk to.  I’m greeted with another Japanese guy and he is all smiles when I show him the business card.  He points to the other guy and he’s nodding his head to beckon me to go towards the man training those other people.

I start walking towards him and I’m quickly stopped by Vic.  He’s got his hair rustled, in a pair of jogging shorts and tank top.  He reaches his hand out to me and I don’t want to take it because I don’t have a clue what’s going on here.

“You came!” he exclaims, “Give him a second, he’ll be right with you.  I’m very excited you came, that’s awesome!”

He walks away and slaps me on my shoulder before I can respond to his odd chipper demeanor.  Then again it’s early morning and he wasn’t as drunk as I was last night.  I stand there, hands on my hips, and I watch as the Japanese man slugs the woman in the face with an elbow strike and demands each of them take turns striking the others in the face.  The woman wants to protest when he stops and looks at me.

“You!” he bellows, “Get the fuck up here!”

I hear the other Japanese man clear his throat.

“Please,” the larger one sighs.  Please and thank you are probably alien concepts for this guy.  He stops the girl and pushes her to help me get in the ring.  She reaches her hand out and I have to take it, right?  Or should I just get in the ring, fuck anybody trying to help me, what’s this guy’s deal?  Fuck it, she seems nice.  I take her hand and she almost lifts me in the ring by herself.

“Good!” the Japanese man exclaims, “Your first action for your partner was to tag them out of the ring.  You already know this business better than half the shit pieces that pay for us to train them here.”

My partner?

“My partner?” the other girl looks at him very confused, “This is…Fade?”

“Lucia,” I extend to her my hand.  She shakes it and quickly averts her eyes and tells me her name is Selene.  She isn’t a fan of eye contact.  Awesome.  A tag team partner who doesn’t do well with eye contact is just the absolute fucking tops.  Just what I always wanted.  Suck it up, girl.  We're tag team partners.

I am welcomed in by a heroic looking Japanese man who seems to struggle with English.  Which is fine considering I struggle with Japanese so we can struggle together.  He offers me his hand and I take it, it is a hopeful show of trust that I am willing to put myself in his hands, and thus their hands, in order to better myself.

I do not know why I did this.  Perhaps I am hopeful for a future filled with promises kept and dreams realized.  What I do know is that as he walks me past the white man who nods to me and mentions that my partner might be coming by today and I see the students here I am completely out of my element here.  Had I an element to begin with.

He guides me to the ring where two men are on their knees listening to a larger man who is also Japanese tell them everything they had done wrong in their exercises.  His voice is like a belch of fire coming out of a volcano’s caldera, licking at the air and calling for the lightning and thunder from above to meet it in a maelstrom of matrimony that wins lucky photographers all types of awards.

“You!  Girl!” he turns his attention to me, “Why the hell are you standing there like some tourist?  Get your ass in here and kneel.”  It is less a command and more a guide to show me how the process is to be under his tutelage.  I follow his instruction and remove my hat, untie my button down shirt, and kneel next to one of the men as the tendrils of my curls bounce against my back and collar.

I turn to the man next to me and force a smile to hide behind my worries.  “Hello, my name–”

“You shut the fuck up when you’re in this ring!” the Japanese man stomps his foot in my direction to shut me up.  “My house, my rules, and when you are in my house you will obey my rules.  Braddock, what is my first rule?”

The man on the other side of the one next to me speaks up, “No one may speak in the ring but Daiichi.”

Daiichi plants his foot in Braddock’s chest and pushes him down, knocking him back onto his backside.

“You broke the rule!” Daiichi’s laugh bubbles like lava, “Get up, you ballerina.  Now, you, girl.”  He turns his attention to me, “Stand up.”

I do as commanded.

“Take a bump.”

I am confused what that means until he grabs my shoulder, swings his leg behind mine and slams me to the mat.  I would learn later this is called an STO and professional wrestlers seem to really like doing them.  The air rushes from my body as though it never belonged there and I am in agony.

“Gonna take a while for you to get tough, girl,” he grumbles, “Get up and fall back onto the mat.  Need your back to callous up, handle the fall, because you’re gonna fall a lot.”

I scurry back to a standing position and try to fall backwards only to spin around and catch myself.  Before I can push myself back up, Daiichi kicks my arm out from underneath me and I plant my face first into the mat.  I am embarrassed but no one laughs like I had feared.  I get back up again but he puts his hand on my shoulder again, this time much more gentle than before.

“Sit your ass back down, girl,” I feel my legs buckle underneath me.  One move and two falls and already this is awful.  “Now,” he continues, “we practice our elbow strikes.  Do you know what an elbow strike looks like, little bird?”

Am I the little bird?

I look around at the two beside me.  One adjusts his elbow at his side, trying to show me something about how an elbow strike is done.  Daiichi sighs.

“Get up,” he commands.  I oblige.  “I am going to knock you the fuck down again, alright?”

I open my mouth to instinctively ask why or what point this serves or what am I even doing here when all of a sudden I feel his elbow connect with my jaw and neck.  The smack echoes through the gym and I feel everything inside of me shift.  For a second, there was only blackness.  I have never been hit so hard and I have been hit a lot.  I stagger back and though my body begs to buckle and surrender to darkness, I cannot.  Not here.  Not now.  I see what this is now.  This is a test.  He wants to test me.  I must not fail.  I must not fall.  He says he intends on knocking me down.  He will not.

“You!” he bellows, “Get the fuck up here.”

I hear the other Japanese man clear his throat.

“Please,” Daiichi sighs as he reaches for me and helps me steady myself.  There is a moment where the two of us look at one another.  He knows this is going to be when I decide if I want this or not.  I am not sure.  I want to run.  He points to the person he just yelled at.  She is a young woman, maybe around my age, Hispanic I think, with her hair cut in an uneven bob and clearly not dressed for exercise.  She looks angry at him but then her gaze softens when I reach out to her.  She takes my hand and I smile at her, hoping to disarm her defenses with an attempt at kindness.

“Good!” Daiichi is happy, I think.  He is at least satisfied. “Your first action for your partner was to tag them out of the ring.  You already know this business better than half the shit pieces that pay for us to train them here.”

My partner?  I should probably say that out loud.

“My partner?” I look at this girl with new eyes.  Eyes that understand that I am not alone.   “This is…Fade?”

“Lucia,” she tells me as she takes my hand and enters the ring.

"I am Selene," I respond.  She is beautiful, to be sure, but she is also cunning and there is an unhinged violence behind her eyes.  It frightens me.  I turn my eyes from her.  I do not want her to turn that violence towards me.  Not now.  What if she does not like me?  I have heard tales of tag teams falling apart because one partner is unhappy so they plot and scheme until they find the time to betray their partner.  Will that happen to me here?  I should not think of such things.  She seems annoyed.  Should I smile again?  No, I will look foolish.

Awesome.  A tag team partner capable of handling herself and willing to fight but also perhaps willing to trust.  For a moment, I wonder if we will be friends.  Now is not the time for such thoughts.  Now, we train.  We are tag team partners!