Title: Drawing to an End
Featuring: Tchu
Date: September
Location: Columbus

~Advice~
Sunday, September 16th





“I feel like I made a mistake, Dad.”

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket, then pushed them together, effectively filling the role of the zipper he was too stubborn to use. The Ohio air wasn’t yet cold, but the mornings brought just enough of a chill to cause a shiver and persuade anyone with a lick of common sense to grab light coat or sweatshirt.

And Matt had just a lick of sense.

“I mean, how do you know for sure? And how the hell do you bring yourself to admit it to the person who matters most? I thought I had it all figured out, ya know? I thought the divorce would somehow turn things around, that making changes would be enough. But Mary wasn’t the problem. Guess she kinda is now… now that I gotta try to find a way to say ‘sorry for wrecking your world’. Does any of this make sense?”

Hearing his own rambling craziness, Matt laughed and shook his head, breaking his gaze of the gravestone for the first time since he’d arrived ten minutes earlier.

“Guess the only mistake you can really make is to refuse to fix something cuz you’re too afraid to admit it’s broken. I think that’s probably about what you’d say.” Matt paused and let his eyes trace the etchings of his father’s name in the stone.

“Miss you, Dad.”





~Amends~
Tuesday, September 18th





He took the deepest breath he’d ever taken in his entire life. Deeper than any of those breaths he’d taken just before he stepped through the curtain in front of twenty, thirty, even a hundred thousand screaming fans. Deeper than the breath he’d taken the first time he’d leapt off a fifteen foot steel cage. Deeper than the breath he’d taken the first time he made it past first base.

“Uhhgmmghh.”

The inhuman and unintelligible sound escaped his lips as he tried to ready his perfect greeting. This should have been simple, but his guts were knotted in a way he’d never felt before.

Waiting wasn’t helping, so he rang the doorbell and tried to fix his slouching shoulders. He had to look strong while he spoke strong, setting this off with the right tone. He had to nail this.

The front door opened and his ex-wife, looking stunning in the simplicity of a polo and a pair of faded jeans, forced a smile that seemed like it must have been a lot of work.

“Matthew.”

“Uhh… hi…hey, Mary.”

Nailed it.

“What brings ya this way?”

“I’ve got a couple things I’d kinda like to say.”

“Do you want to come in?”

“Maybe.” Matthew looked past Mary into the living room. He hadn’t really been into her new house, just stood on the front stoop a lot and handed over his kids. Their kids. “Just let me get this started first.”

“Okay.”

“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking and I’ve started to realize that there are some places where I may not have made the right decisions, and…”

“Is this an apology, Matthew?”

“A pseudo-apology.”

“Pseudo? What does that mean?” Mary folded her arms across her chest and raised an eyebrow. Just one.

“It means ‘yes’. I’m just a little scared. This is a big step.”

“So take it.”





~Adios~
Wednesday, September 19th
Hours Before the Show





“Must be pretty cool knowing that you’re gonna wrestle on the last ever episode of ReVolution in front of the hometown crowd.”

Lisa Tyler came up behind the Columbus kid, her voice causing him to divert his attention from the thousands of empty seats in Nationwide Arena. Around him, crew members worked to finish off piecing the stage area together, testing the PRIME*View and various other LED screens, positioning a few pieces of ‘apocalyptic’ props that were special for the final ReVolution in PRIME history.

“I’d say I picked Columbus because it was a natural stop between DC and Chicago, and I guess that’s true, but I wanted to come home. Killean objected a little bit, but I got everybody on the same pages. I guess Killer probably would have thrown a bigger fit if he’d known I was going to challenge him to a Colossus rematch. Homefield advantage and all that.”

“Pretty slick.”

“What can I say.” Matt locked his eyes on the vacant ring in the heart of the arena, and then his gaze carried up to a demonic steel structure that hovered thirty or so feet above.

“Cell match seems a bit crazy for a guy who was limping around on a cane just a few weeks ago. I guess I should have thrown a bigger fit about going with a hardcore-themed final ReVolution.”

“Guess you only have yourself to blame.” Lisa jabbed a playful elbow into Matt’s ribs.

“Seems a fitting conclusion for ReV. An epic way to go out.”

“Is Colossus really it? Is this actually the final run?”

“You say that like you don’t believe it.”

“Is any retirement in wrestling actually permanent? I think there are wrestlers out there who have probably retired and un-retired a half dozen times or more.” Lisa turned and raised an eyebrow. Just one. “Haven’t you retired a time or two already yourself?”

“Admittedly, this won’t be my first time.”

“You’re not that old. And just before PRIME temporarily closed in 2011, you were the Universal Champ. Just got a big win against Clyde, if you pick up a couple wins against Killeand and Lindz, you’d be on a helluva run to go and hang up the boots.”

“I love how casually you say that. Like it’s a given. “Just go ahead and on back-to-back shows beat two hall of famers with countless championships, including four Universal titles between them”. In case you didn’t notice, Lisa, Lindz has made a habit of handing me my ass when we step between the ropes.”

“I’m just saying, Matt, I think you’ve got a lot more left in the tank than you admit sometimes.”

“Physically, yeah. I probably claim to be more beat up than I am. Not to say that 36 in wrestling years is spring chicken stuff, but I’m prone to exaggeration.” Matt looked around at each of the empty seats, watched the giant screen behind him flicker a variety of lights and various images. It was strange seeing the stage so alive in an arena as silent as any library he’d ever been in. “But for the first time in my life, I don’t want it. I don’t need it anymore.”

“I think I’ve heard you say this before.”

“I didn’t need the rush anymore. I haven’t needed wrestling to prove anything in a long time. Now I don’t need the excuse. There are other things I want to do. Truth be told, I can’t wait for Colossus to be over.”

“Big retirement party?”

Matt smiled and turned toward the entrance of the stage, stepping over a bundle of wires.

“Even better.”





~Amends~
Tuesday, September 18th





“When Dad died, I kinda bottomed-out.” They’d been talking for close to fifteen minutes, but he found he was just now getting comfortable on the couch. “There was something about that thought… that thought that I couldn’t talk to him again. Whether I wanted to shoot the shit about cars, or ask for advice, or tell him how much I loved him… something I didn’t do enough of… or even yell at him and tell him that it really pissed me off that one time he did that one thing.”

“I know, sweetheart.”

“I just… anything that ever went unsaid, suddenly I could never say it. I suppose I just kept expectin’ he would beat cancer and he’d help me out and tell me what to do with my life and how to turn things around, but the truth was, there was nothing I had to turn around other than the way I was lookin’ at things.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean when I tried to sober up, kick the alcohol and the painkillers, I had to find something else to blame. So I picked our marriage, and I thought if I made this major change in my life, things would turn around.”

“We weren’t the problem.”

“No, we weren’t. I was the problem. I didn’t know how to handle Dad’s cancer. I didn’t know how to handle being the rock, terrified I would let him down, terrified I was letting you down.”

“You weren’t.” Mary stood from her spot on the love seat and moved over to the couch, sitting down next to Matthew and taking his hand in her own. She didn’t know what else to say, so she just squeezed his fingers.

“Mary, I can’t apologize enough for the hell I put you through. I screwed up, so afraid of letting you down that I dropped the ball. I threw away the best thing that ever happened to me and somehow thought it might make things better. Just give up what you have so you don’t have to worry about losing it.”


“Yeah, doesn’t really make much sense.”

He laughed for the first time in days and found some hope in her casual jab.

“I know it’s not gonna be that simple. I know I deserve to be told to go take a flying leap off a cliff, but a few weeks ago you asked about maybe getting together for drinks or something, and I was wondering if I could maybe get you that beer that I owe…”

“After Colossus.”

“What?”

“Finish things with PRIME and then you can take me out for that beer.”

Matt nodded as he smiled and, feeling more like himself than he had in ages, searched to match the bit of humor she had injected into the conversation.

“Soooo… after CVIII… it’s a date then?”

She responded quickly, as if she’d known he was going to ask the question before even he did.

“A pseudo-date.”



Mary, I don’t see
How you could ever be
Anything but mine.

-Kenny Chesney
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