Boro

The thing about living in warm climates for all of your life is you tend to be highly aware that the sun is always a deadly laser.

Every day.

Without exception.

Some shrug it off and deal with being broiled alive. Others attempt to take precautions and inevitably slack of them because hey, life comes at you fast. But the time always comes where you must adjust to the heat and get on with it. It's seven in the morning. Winter. Sixty degrees in your freedom units.

(Yes, we know you're jealous now. But our summer's hotter than Satan's asshole and the wildlife can eat a whole damned person year round, so we consider it a fair trade in the grand scale of things.)

Jacky's up front because he's always up front. He always starts the Run. Gets himself all pent up with one thing or the next, hypes himself up, and off he goes like a human bullet on a one way ticket to hell. You wouldn’t think a man with that much muscle mass can just do that. But the lessons from a hard earned pedigree of pugilism doesn't fade just because you now mostly throw people from the middle of the ring into row five, section eight.

“Husband, at least slap on some sunscreen.”

We're dangling from the doorway of a bus that is best described as “Mad Max on a budget”. Can't pierce giant spikes on the bastard, but there's enough metal fencing, chains, and pipe to give a sadist ideas. He takes the cream and does…an attempt at covering his otherwise exposed flesh with it. Admittedly, it is difficult to do that and not stumble.

“Worried about me?”

“Always. But don't rub it in or we'll deny it.”

“I'm supposed to rub it in though.” He holds up the tube.

We trade it in for a frosty bottle of water. “Smartass. You're making good time. This might be your best one yet.”

“I don't plan to stop until I'm satisfied, Annie! Gotta get this energy out of my system before I explode! Plus I have to shed away some of this weight from the avocado ice cream. Oh! And I have to Noah about power washing the building. It's looking dreadful! And–”

A noise breaks through. It's from our phone. A notification. We groan at where it comes from. PRIME HQ. We look at it. Jacky looks at it.

Fuck Your Tag Team vs New World Trash.

“Hey! Told ya he didn't forget about ya, Annie!”

“We never said he did!”, we scoff.

Because he didn't. For all of his flaws, Rob Williams is not stupid. And neither are we. We know the difference between being chosen and having a partner forced upon you. The Anna of six months ago would've been pissed off. The Anna of six months ago would insist that this is a test. A taunt from the fucking owl filled heavens. She would rant and rave and seethe. The Anna of six months ago found her peace because she did what nobody else on the roster to this day has the balls to do.

…then why do we still feel this slight irritation at the back of our head?

“You didn't have to, Annie.”, Jacky mumbles.

We barely hear it. We shake it off. We don't have time for reason right now.

“Keep on it. We got to whip the stragglers into shape.”

Meanwhile…

“Ah, fuck.” Rob calls out.

“Air fryer got you by the short and curlies again?” Charlotte quips with a smile.

This is what he missed the most about her. About their life together. Two in the morning brewing a pot of coffee in the kitchen and just… talking.

It’s like nothing has changed.

But the text notification on his phone rips him from his fantasy world where it’s just him and her (and baby).

“Nope. Just got the booking notice for ‘90. Me and Anna versus New World Trash.”

Her big blue eyes squint over her bowl of ice cream.

Well, some things have changed. In reality she wouldn’t be up this late if the baby wasn’t craving some butter pecan ice cream.

On their first date he took her for ice cream. Said he forgot his wallet. There were a lot of scrupulous women with questionable intent on the road.

Charlotte ordered butter pecan ice cream. And she paid.

That’s a story for another day.

“And? You love Anna. She’s a Whoresmen. Which, personally, I think makes no sense but who am I to question what y’all do?”

“Yeah. It’s not that. I don’t know, Anna’s just… not happy. Like ever. And it got kind of weird when ‘Tone and I won the tag titles. Like, for me. Does that make sense?”

He feels the pack of cigarettes in his pocket. If Char wasn’t there - if she wasn’t pregnant, he’d light one up. There was something he loved about smoking a cigarette in the house. Not as a habit, but every now and then.

You know you shouldn’t.

But it’s so good.

“You don’t deny yourself anything, do you, babe?”

Of course Charlotte clocks his tell with the cigarettes.

“I would never. Not while you’re…” Rob nods towards her belly and smiles.

“Didn’t even mean that, babe. I mean you’d rather sit in the comfort of not having a tough conversation with someone you care about than even ask why she’s mad.”

A gut punch. Charlotte knows when to let him have his time and when he needs a little bump and run.

Rob’s first instinct is to lie. Exaggerate, really. Massage the truth.

He knows that won’t fly with Charlotte.

Maybe that’s why they do so well together. Left to his own devices, Rob will keep warm from all the bridges he burns and his shame wouldn’t let him look back.

“Oh… that.”

“Uh huh,” Charlotte smiles with warm acceptance.

Rob doesn’t need to burn bridges to keep warm when Charlotte is around.

“Ah, I don’t know. She’s pissed. I don’t know why.”

There’s a nick on the floor he can’t take his eyes off of. That’s why he’s staring down - not because he’s like a child who doesn’t know how to give back his best friend’s toy he stole.

Charlotte just eats her ice cream.

“Well, you know. What the fuck would I even say?” Rob runs a hand through his hair and picks up his phone.

“Maybe start with hello.”

“Har har har,” Rob sarcastically replies. But he types it out all the same.

The response isn't immediate. It is a few minutes of writing, thinking, deleting, writing, deleting, and thinking. Because honestly, how do you find that groove again after it's been ripped away from you? How does one bridge the awkwardness of the situation? Could Rob guess that at the other end of that line, on the other side of that line, the receiver of that single uncapitalized word was currently in another text with a running man asking what the fuck she's supposed to do with this?

Who knows. But after a few minutes, the response finally appears. It tries so hard to be casual about things and not at all awkward.

Yo. Guess you saw the thing, yeah?

Rob doesn’t believe himself to be a smart man. Clever, sometimes.

But what the fuck is that?

“What the fuck is that?” Rob stuffs the phone in Charlotte’s face. Half a cry for help. Half like an indignant little kid showing he tried.

“It’s an opening. Stop being a dick. Also, I don’t think either of you are going to sort this emotional turmoil out over text. Get together. You two always seemed to be eating.” She takes one last mouthful of butter pecan before standing up. With a mouth full of his mother’s favorite ice cream she says, “Figure it out, I’m going to bed.”

“Love you, babe.”

Two kisses on the lips and one on the forehead. He holds her hand.

“And Rob?” She looks down at him.

“Yeah, babe?”

“If you smoke in here I will cut your balls off in your sleep.”

He nods and smiles, pushing his head into her hand as she pulls away.

Once he hears the door shut, he pulls the pack out of his pocket. It spins under his finger on the table before he flicks it aside and picks up the phone.

He stares at the melting butter pecan ice cream with a sigh.

I could go for a milkshake. 

That is how Anna Daniels ends up at some no-named dairyette, taking the tiniest sips of a strawberry milkshake big enough to match her hat and her sunglasses.

This is the type of place that feels like it's been around forever. A paint job from the sixties with machines from the eighties ran by employees born a few years after Y2K. Enough to make any soul feel old, but they tend to make some of the better milkshakes anywhere. In the midst of children yapping about their next pool party and adults making small talk to distract from the sweat pouring out of them, she simply sits there and thinks.

Inhale.

“Okay. So. How do we blast these bitches back into the shadow realm of irrelevancy where they belong?”

She can hear the Jacky in her head saying her name in a disappointed teacher tone and resists the urge to react to it. Reverting directly to business is an old cop out, but it works most of the time. It feels like movement even when you're going nowhere.

Cookies and cream.

The best of both worlds.

Rob slurps loudly as he reaches the end of the milkshake. With anxious avoidance he continues sucking as if something will magically appear in the empty paper cup.

He has to say something.

“I didn’t even realize they worked here. This should be, uh, light work, you know?”

The tension is choking him. He knows she’s pissed, but he isn’t sure why.

What could it be?

Well, let’s see. He lied about having cancer. Oh, he tried to kiss her that one time, too. Could it be because he partnered with Daytona instead of her to win the tag titles they seemed to be a chin hair shy of winning again and again?

He knew she still cared. She showed up when it mattered.

Accepted him when he admitted to lying about having cancer. Kept partnering with him despite all the losses.

Hell, she was the one who told him to keep his chin up when Charlotte and John walked out on him.

“I appreciate you… showing up to help with Keyes.”

Another tiny sip of strawberry. Anybody can sense the hesitation in the way he spoke, as if trying to tip toe around a feral animal who might rip his face off.

…should he feel that way?

She shrugs. Emotion speaks first.

“If not us, then who?”

A beat. Rationale takes over.

“Honestly, that’s a really stupid fucking question.”

It is. There's still two other Whoresmen and Charlotte was right there…although she couldn't do much. Anna noticed that bump, but it's none of her business.

“You didn't really need that much help anyway. Keyes was propped up to be this big deal because he wins things in places his connections deem worthy. But in the end, he's just an overrated gimmick who both has and is a giant pussy. We just stuck our damned nose into where we didn't belong. That's all.”

“I don’t disagree. Still…”

There’s nothing left in the cup, but he still rattles it.

“It means something either way. Finn has been coming around a lot. We’re training regularly. And you might’ve noticed - Char is pregnant. And I haven’t lost the Five Star yet. I feel like I’m getting all of the second chances here, you know?”

For the first time since they’ve sat, Rob looks at Anna.

She is truly like a wild animal. Beautiful. Dangerous.

But there’s so much more than that. Anna sees the best in people when there’s not much of it there. Despite her anger and negativity, she loves with her whole heart. The reason she’s always lashing out is because that heart sits on her sleeve.

Whatever looking glass her past gave her, she saw the world much like people saw her. Beautiful and dangerous.

So she keeps the tough exterior.

Which Rob understands.

“It’s so much easier to be angry, isn’t it?”

He doesn’t want to lose the connection with Anna. It’s Halley’s Comet. A hundred-year flood. Nothing like what he has with Charlotte or Daytona or anyone else.

“You know, I was lost when we met. Real fucked up. Winters had gotten into my head and was playing me like a fiddle. Then he set me up and took my title. I wanted to die. I hated everyone and everything. And you still wanted to be my tag partner.”

Rob’s never been one for words. He’s trying hard.

Anna nods.

“We always knew you were better than you think you are, Rob. Besides you chose us to be your partner, remember?”

“It feels like everything is going right in my life and I’m so goddamn close to being able to taste the fruits, y’know? Everything except this. I don’t know what the fuck I did, but I am sorry.”

Anna looks at Rob, analyzing him and finding the same conclusions she always does. He tends to tell the truth when he apologizes to her, sometimes even when everything else he says is wrapped in bullshit and ballyhoo. That's something he could never really fake.

He can fake cancer, he can fake anything. The buzz in her head lingered in the background.

Her eyes roll. Not because of him, but because of that little slice trying so desperately to rip apart perhaps the last fragment of the best friendship she’s ever had. Because Rob Williams is right. It's so much easier to stay angry. It's so much harder to be real.

It is because he deserves absolution that she chugs on her shake like it was the last beer before something way too uncomfortable can be said. If worse comes to worse, she can blame it on the brain freeze or something.

“When we first met, we were used to people fluttering in and out of our lives. We have never had anybody that we could actually rely on or lean on. Fuck, man, even Jacky–”

Subconsciously, she winces. Still a sore spot there, but one she forces herself to pick on.

“Even he wasn't around when we met you. And that's our husband. That's the one person you should be able to count on when the chips are down. So we have been used to having some distance because at least with that, it hurts less when people move on. But somewhere along the line, you and us became…”

There's a pause. She sips. Debates in her head. Flips her hand.

“Whatever we are. That distance flew out the window without us even knowing about it and despite everything, it was great! Then we failed to get those belts. Twice. Something felt off, we shrugged it off. Like okay, whatever. Rob’s still our dude. We just need to settle our own shit for a minute. Then you got booked to be teamed with Daytona. It was irritating but whatever, just one match. Means nothing. Then you won the belts…and it drove us crazy for a bit. But hey, when they lose the belts, we’ll feel better.”

She shakes her head. That idea was always a pipe dream.

“Y’all lost the belts. We didn't feel any better. By that point, you were so far away. Everything is so far away. And there's no point of being upset, right? Can't get pissed at you, can't get pissed at ‘Tona because it's neither one of your faults. That's just good business. We know this. So why are we so–”

Anna’s arms go flailing. Big emotions are hard to process.

“It's not your fault. It's on us. We’re the one that failed. We’re just all pissed off with nowhere to go and no clue to fix our thing. We don't know if we can close this little chasm. It's frustrating. And we’re the person who’s sorry.”

Rob grimaces.

The only thing harder than saying sorry is someone he cares about telling him sorry.

New World Trash. They’re not special. This isn’t a huge match. No gold or blood on the line.

But, it’s everything.

If the puzzle of what fucked Rob up is laid out before him, Anna was the only piece that’s missing.

Rob stares at the sun setting in the distance. He doesn’t have cancer.

He’s not technically dying.

John told him a long time ago the true measure of a man isn’t the things that he accomplishes or his wealth: it’s the people who choose to be around him.

If Anna chooses to be his friend, he can’t be that bad, right?

He looks back at her with a lazy, content smile.

“You know, Anna, about the only goddamn thing I ever done in my life was run out. Quit. Quit on my boy. Quit on John and Charlotte. Only thing I ain’t quit is fighting.”

The words need time to settle. He’s in no rush. Why waste a nice milkshake with his best friend?

“I ain’t quitting you.”

It hits. Anna's eyes widen underneath the sunglasses.

This isn't the first time she's done this. This isn't even the first time somebody has said something like that. Every time, people do the opposite. Perhaps they don't mean to or don't do it purposely. Yet if that were the case, you'd think at least one person would pass along a note or something. Here we are, doing it again. What for?

Because there's always a chance that this might be the outlier.

That he might be the outlier.

It's a crazy thought and she still couldn't stop herself from believing. Her smirk matches his smile.

“That's all we'll ever ask of you.”

For a moment, everything feels right. Time stops. The deadly laser doesn't burn so horribly. Possibility is in the air.

Then she cringes.

“Gaaaaawd, have we been talking about our fee-fees again? How embarrassing. We'll get ya another shake. Our treat.”

He smirks and nods.

Only a woman worth having around will buy you ice cream.

“Cookies and cream. Please.”

When Anna returns they spend a few minutes catching up. It isn’t like they haven’t seen each other at all, but you know, the finer details.

As the dust settles and Rob polishes off his second milkshake he turns to business.

“New World Trash. You know the problem with kids like them is I don’t know a fucking thing about them. Scott Hunter, FLAMBERGE, Towel… there’s a story with all of ‘em and it’s well known. The devil you know, right?”

He rattles the cup and takes one last pull out of habit.

“These two ain’t had an easy go of it, but that’s all I know.”

Anna pauses. There's a lot to say about the Trash. They've been a tag team since longer than anybody cared to know. Handed a contract. Had a match or two before bailing out. One of them died and then came back. The other bulked up and became better. Yes, they struggled. They also have Ami Troy, Ria, and an entire disgusting facade.

She pulls and tells the truth.

“Fuck ‘em.”

Rob shrugs.

That’s kind of their whole thing, right?

Fuck Your Tag Team.

“Yeah, fuck ‘em.”

Rob thinks of something he saw on one of Charlotte’s programs.

Boro.

When cotton and silk were too expensive, poor Japanese families would mend their clothes using hand me downs.

Generation after generation of material patched together.

Eventually the seams became the majority.

Wearing the stitches from each patch. All the experiences and sin and love of your bloodline.

“Boro.”

“What?” Anna asks.

New World Trash had their own material, sure.

But he had faith in theirs.

“Nothing. We got ‘em.”