The Wrestler's Daughter #2: Power and Control

You walk into Greg Miller’s gym in Dempsy and the first thing that hits you is the smell. It smells like sweat and blood and wet cement. It smells like failure prolonged. 

Jason arrives at 9:30 a.m. on a Tuesday and already the place is full of wrestlers keeping the dream alive long past the time the dream had any hope. Sounds of jump ropes, heavy bags, grunts, iron on iron. Everybody in this room is looking for some missing ingredient, some missing thing that has been holding them back their whole lives, but if they can just find it, the big time awaits. Jason knows few of them–likely none of them–will ever see step foot in a ring worth mentioning. Whatever it is he himself has, or at least had, they don’t have it. And yet, all the same, he’s here to learn from them.

Greg Miller himself stands next to the warehouse’s squat ring, Greg in his usual stainted t-shirt and blue gym shorts, barking instructions at a couple of guys between the ropes who look way too old to be as green as they are. Jason can relate. But then when Greg spots Jason, he stops mid-sentence, waves, and says, “There he is,” already on his way over, his belly bouncing along with him. “There’s the winner!”

Jason drops his gym bag just as Greg surprises him with a celebratory hug. “Told you, didn’t I? What’d I tell you?” After separating, he gets a good look at Jason. “Was startin to worry you might not show back up. Expected to see you here over the weekend.”

Jason nods to himself. “Meant to be,” he said. “It’s been a hell of a week.”

#

It was Thursday when Jason showed up at Emily Manderly’s apartment door. Emily had texted him the address. The door was thick, brown, with the number 319 in gold. The building itself seemed nice enough. He had always known Emily would do fine.

The wait, after he knocked, was excruciating. With every second that past he became more and more sure that she wouldn’t answer, that she would change her mind, and that, not only would he never lay eyes on Emily again, but whatever information she had about his daughter–the real reason for this visit–would be lost. And then Jason would live on knowing that his daughter, Haley, was in some vague sort of danger.

But then Emily answered the door. And when Jason saw her–for the first time in fourteen years–every drop of blood in his body rushed straight to his knees and he nearly fell over. He opened his mouth to speak. Nothing came out. Then he said, “Hey.”

Somehow Emily found it funny. She laughed. Then she hugged him. She came up to about his chest. “I literally never thought I’d see you again,” she said. When she pulled back he could see tears in her eyes.

“Yeah. Me too.”

“You look kind of different and kind of the same.”

“You look pretty much the same.”

“You’re bald now.”

“Thanks for lettin me know.”

“Seriously. I can’t even believe this.” She took a very, very long breath. “Danielle did not want me to see you.”

“Does she know?”

Emily wrinkled her nose. “She doesn’t need to. She doesn’t need to know everything. She’s not the queen. Come on. I made tea.”

It felt like a dream. But so much of his life lately did. Jason was like a man who’d gone to space for fourteen years and then come back to see how different the world he’d known was now. And everything was indeed different. As for Emily, he hadn’t been lying; she looked pretty much the same. A little heavier, a few lines around her eyes.

Her apartment was about what he had imagined. She had been an obsessively clean teenager when she had moved into Jason’s home at fifteen years old. And those habits, at thirty-two, were still alive and well. Her apartment was predictably immaculate. The furniture was spotless and set to carefully calculated angles. The books on her bookshelves were alphabetized. And everywhere there were photographs.

Jason scanned them, the photographs, looking for Haley. But before he found her, he found Danielle’s wedding photo. It caught his eye like a fish hook. He looked at it. And it hurt. She stood, Danielle, in the photograph, dressed in her white gown and the forefront of an endless lawn, and in the background there were the out-of-focus faces of friends and family. The only other face in focus was the face of the man standing next to Danielle, the groom, and he had the kind of face that told you instantly that this was a guy with his life together. Jason stared. He tried to be happy for her. But he couldn’t quite get there. He couldn’t quite get past wishing he could just go back in time and find a way to stop the horrendous momentum of his own life before it blew up and ruined the lives of everyone around him. If he’d been able to do that, it might have been him in this photo. And maybe it would be his face you could look at and tell his life was very “together.”

“That’s Robert,” Emily said when she noticed Jason staring at the photo. “He’s really nice.”

“She kind of hates me now. Danielle.”

“Well. You gave her pretty good reason.”

Jason looked down at her. “I gave you all pretty good reason.

Emily shrugged. “I had my moments. But it was different for me, I guess. You were the father figure. You could pretty much do no wrong in my eyes. So I guess you lucked out by way of some biological urge to make excuses for you. But for Danielle? You know. She had hopes and dreams. All of them were pinned to you. You–You kind of did a lot of damage there, you know?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I do.”

Emily said, “For a long time she wasn’t even the same person. She just completely lost control.”

#

Greg Miller says, “Pulled it kind of close there, didn’t ya?”

The two of them are drifting toward the ring. All around, Jason notices, students are casting him fly fishing glances. Twenty, twenty-five guys in this room, aged nineteenish through fifty-something, all with their dreams in various states of deterioration. They see Jason as someone who figured it out. Jason, he himself knows, is the thing they all come here hoping to be. 

Greg adds, “With Pontiff, I mean. Another split second and that’s a three count and maybe I don’t ever see you again.”

“I knew what I was doin. Had the ref timed.”

Greg squinted at him for a second before letting loose a laugh. “You had the ref timed? Like his count? Well shit, I guess that’s somethin we don’t teach here. Maybe you can teach these guys something about that. Had the ref timed.” He inhaled deeply, nodding. “It was a good win. Sloppy, but good. That’s the startin point. It’ll get better as it comes more naturally. But for this week, I’m thinkin a little specialization. Come here. Come here. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

The squat warehouse ring comes and goes, the pair of them drifting toward the corner of the warehouse where a young bear of a man windmills punches against a heavy bag. He might be twenty-four, twenty-five, already balding. Roughly 6’6, two hundred-sixty pounds.

Jason says, “Who’s this?|

“This,” Greg replies, “is Hessian.”

“Hessian?” Jason can’t help but chuckle. The kid is big, but… “He’s too small to be Hessian.”

“Well hey, this is Dempsy, and he’s the biggest guy we got. So for right now, he’s Hessian. We’re gonna have to use our imaginations a bit.”

#

At Emily’s kitchen table, with steam from their mugs rising in the space between them, Jason couldn’t stop staring at Haley’s graduation photo. He had spotted it on the wall, not so long after Danielle’s wedding photo, and immediately plucked it off, before Emily led him to the kitchen and served them both tea.

“My God,” Jason said at the table, unable to take his eyes off his daughter. It wasn’t like he had expected Haley to stay nine years old all this time. It wasn’t like he thought time had simply stopped for her. But then again, seeing the photo, seeing her at eighteen, an adult–she looked so, so, so much like her mother–maybe he actually did. Maybe he had been expecting to finally see her, and she would still be nine years old.

He said, “I just can’t believe–”

“Her name is Lynn now. But she hates it.”

Jason put the photo down on the table and took a moment with his face in his hands.

Emily filled him in on her own life. She went by the name Sarah these days, except for with Haley, and lately Danielle. She had started college a year late but finished on time. When Jason asked if she’d ever been married, she said, “Are you kidding? The closest thing I ever had to a father figure was a really rich, famous wrestler  who might also have been the toughest man alive, who was also a smidge over-protective of me. What man could possibly live up to that.” After Jason chuckled, she asked him to guess what she did for a living.

Jason removed his hands from his face. “Interior decorator.”

“Close,” she said. And then she seemed to take some pleasure in telling him, “I work for the I.R.S.”

“How is that close?”

“Internal, Interior. You know. I guess I invade people’s personal spaces.” She pointed at him. “You’d better be up-to-date on your taxes. I hear that’s how they took down Al Capone.”

Jason didn’t say anything.

Emily said, “Bad joke? Too soon?”

Jason said, “Let’s talk about Haley.”

Emily sighed. “Okay.”

“You brought me here to talk about her.”

“Well. Get ready for this. Are you ready?”

“I’m not sure.”

“She’s getting married.”

When in your mind your daughter is still nine years old, there are many things you are not ready to hear. Chief among them is that she’s getting married. Jason blinked a few times.

Emily went on, “I mean, probably not. It’s not exactly a stable relationship.” She looked Jason in the eye. “He’s really not a good guy.”

Blinked a few more times. “Not a good guy how?”

Emily seemed to give her answer some thought. Then she said, “I’m just thinking maybe you could talk to her.”

“Does–Does she know I’m back? Alive.”

Emily shrugged. “Danielle sort of let it slip to Oliver.”

“Oliver.”

“That’s the boyfriend. And what a treat he is, let me tell you.”

“What are you sayin here?”

“She’s not even allowed to have a phone. So we have to figure out a way to even get you close to her.”

“Wh–what are you talkin about? Not allowed to have a phone? This guy controls who talks to my daughter? Is that what you’re tellin me?”

“It’s worse than that.”

“How?” Jason leaned in. He wasn’t exactly aware that his tone had changed, but he could see it in Emily’s face. That his tone had changed. “How is it worse?”

“Jason.”

“Emily.”

“I’m afraid you’re going to do something stupid. It’s your first instinct.”

"Emily. Are you--Are you tellin me this guy puts his hands on my daughter?"

#

The kid’s name is Garrett, and he’s about as strong as he looks.

Six or seven minutes into their sparring session, Garrett catches Jason in a bear hug. They've been instructed to ease up on strikes, but when it comes to submissions? Just don't break any bones. But Jason suspects that Garrett is either too stupid to understand that  ribs count as bones, or he's over-estimating the pressure it takes to break one. Because this bear hug is a real son of a bitch.

From the outside, Greg Miller calls, “Good. Squeeze him, squeeze him!” like he might have one of the same two problems. 

Jason swallows the urge to just break this big dumb kid's eye socket with an elbow. Instead, he grabs the kid's forearms and begins to push. Dig the nails in. Push. Push. Push!

Garrett's eyes go wide and he squeezes even harder, sucking a breath—breath, wouldn't that be nice?--down into his belly to take up even more space from Jason’s ribcage.

Jason grits his teeth. And pushes. He looks right into the big stupid bastard's crooked eyes and pushes even harder. Garrett's grip begins to break. And Jason can feel it. He gets a breath. And pushes even harder. 

Garrett can't maintain the hold. 

Jason is free.

Greg Miller calls out, “Stop! Stop!” And when Jason looks, Greg is already awkwardly maneuvering his bulbous belly between the ropes. “The fuck was that? The fuck did you just do?” he says to Jason.

Jason holds his hands out, confused.  “I broke the hold.”

“You broke the hold. Yeah, sure. Whoop-dee-doo. All right, look. Look. I know you're stronger this guy. That don't surprise anyone.”

Garret chimes in, “He's not str—“

“Shut up, Garrett, I'm tryin to make a point.” Back to Jason. “Yeah, you're six feet, six-one, but you're strong like you're six-foot-six. Wonderful. Good for you. But you know who you ain't stronger than?”

Jason looks away.

Greg says, “Hessian. You are not, not, not stronger than Hessian. You know they call him The Murder Show for a reason, right? So you need to get it out of your dipshit brain that if that gargantuan son of a whore decides to grab you, that you're just gonna go ahead and muscle your way out of it. Abra Cadabra! What you need is technique. So come on.” He turns around and twirls his finger overhead. “Let's see it again. Get back in the bearhug. No more out-musclin. This is Hessian we're talkin about here. You ain't got that kind of power.”

#

For a second Jason just sat there stunned. He felt like he had tiny bugs living under his eyelids. He had just asked Emily, “Are you tellin me this man puts his hands on my daughter?”

And Emily didn’t answer. Which was all the answer he needed.

Next came the pacing. He paced back-and-forth across Emily’s kitchen while she watched, arms folded like she was not at all impressed.

She said, “Are you ready to calm down? Are you ready to figure out what we can do about this?”

“I know what I can do about this. I can go there. To where she lives. And I can bury this fucker underneath the house.”

“It’s a trailer.”

“Even fuckin better.”

“Sure. You can do that. Go ahead. Lose her forever. Go be just like the rest of us, tellin her what to do with her life while she’s oh so in love with this greaseball. You want her to dig her heels in and go right ahead and marry him for real? Go put him in the hospital. Then watch how quick they schedule the wedding.”

“I’m not talkin about putin him in a hospital,” Jason hissed.

“Sit. Down. And listen to me.”

Jason picked up his mug of tea and threw it at the cupboard.

Emily said, “Are you even serious right now?”

Jason finally sat back down and dug the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Where is she?” he said.

“Are you finished?”

He took a second to breathe. “I’m sorry about the mug.”

“I don’t care about the mug.”

Jason just shook his head. After a second he said, “You have to understand, Emily, I know she’s a full grown adult. I know it but it’s like in my head, I can’t see it yet. She’s still nine. She’s six, she’s five. She’s still brand new. And you just told me this guy, he’s what? Hitting her? How bad is it?”

“We think she has a drug problem too.”

“Oh my God, oh my God.” Jason felt himself melt. He began to cry.

“That’s why we can’t do things your way. The way you’re used to doing things? It won’t work. Not with a problem like this. She loves this guy. Or thinks she does. And, let’s face it, she’s got some serious daddy issues.”

“Oh my God.”

#

With a twenty minute training session down, Jason, sweating in gym shorts, sits on a chair outside the warehouse's squat ring, sipping water. Somewhere around the ten minute mark of the session, Greg Miller had picked up a notebook and began writing. And now Miller is coming over with that book in hand.

“Basics,” Greg says. It is by far, Jason thinks, the most common word in his vocabulary. “What's the basics on how to beat a giant?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. “Same as a tree. You cut it down from the bottom. Keep the man off his feet and his size advantage goes away.”

Jason has indeed heard this before. “Sounds like a cliché,” he said.

“Once again, that right there is your problem. Just comin out in a different form. You know why a cliché is a cliché?”

Jason wipes his face with a towel and shakes his head.

Greg says, “Because most of the time? They're fuckin true. A cliché ain't nothin but some shit people been sayin over and over because it's. fucking. true.”

Jason looks over at him.

Miller says, “You gotta stop thinkin you're smarter than everybody who's ever done this before. You’re special, that’s for sure, but you gotta stop thinkin you ain't got nothin to learn from nobody because you're Jason fuckin Snow. Yipee, who gives a fuck.” Miller leans back in. “Now go back in there for Round 2. And take his legs. He starts to get up, sweep the legs again. Headlocks. Head scissors. Ride the back. Keep him off his feet.” He points at Garrett on the opposite side of the ring, still sucking in breaths. “Cut that big fucker's legs out from under him and don't let him ever get em back. And then Friday do the same thing to Hessian. You ain’t gotta be seven feet tall. You gotta make him six-one. That's the only power you got. Use that.”

“You can only control what you can control.” Jason has heard this line recently. He’s been trying to understand it. Apply it.

“Right. Control what you can control. Exactly. Control his fuckin legs.”

#

Emily said, “You need to stop thinking your power is all in your fists. Sometimes, sure, I get it. A wrestling ring? Yeah, fine. Whatever else you used to do in your spare time? I don’t even want to know. But this is Haley we’re talking about here. You use that power? On some guy she loves? And that’s just it. Probably none of us ever see her again. At least until she comes to her senses. And God knows how much damage she does before then.”

Jason took this all in with his head in his hands, still at Emily’s kitchen. “So–So what do we do?”

He heard Emily’s chair scrape the floor. Then he felt her warmth as she came close. He felt one of her small hands on his back and another on his shoulder.

“You’re her father,” Emily said. “That’s your power in this situation. Because, believe it or not, she still sees you as this perfect dad. It doesn’t even really process with her, you know, what happened. She still sees you kind of the way you see her. Like you’re exactly what you were before you left.”

“How do I–What does that even look like?”

“Well, first, we need to use one of your other powers.”

“What’s that?”

“You’re making pretty good money now right?”

Jason didn’t respond. Didn’t speak.

Emily said, “That’s probably going to come in handy. Because after Danielle left their trailer, I went out. To see if I could talk some sense into her. I mean, we’ve been trying to talk sense into her for almost two years now, but–”

“This has been goin on for two years?”

She rubbed his back. “It’ll be okay. We’ll find her. But the first thing you need to realize, Jason, what you really need to accept, is the way you used to do things? The way you used to be? It was–It was just really, really flawed. And it was always going to lead to disaster. Which is exactly what happened. You can’t always fight the grain, fight society, fight the norms. Sometimes you just have to do things by the book.”

“What does that even look like?”

“Your daughter’s in trouble? Just go be a dad. You can only control what you can control. Trying to control all the things you can’t will just eventually blow up in your face.”