Thursday, May 10, 2012

EPISODE 176: Dissolution

Sunday October 20, 2002
United Center
Chicago, Illinois
9:26 PM Local Time


“HERE ARE YOUR WINNERS AND STILL CHAMPIONS… THE WHIRLYBIRDZ VHS!”

Sore and tired, but ultimately grinning, Wendy Briese rolled off her downed opponent, and got to her feet, looking around for her fiancée.    He was sliding back into the ring, having dragged their other opponent out, and keeping him occupied long enough for Wendy to get the fall.  Now, the match over, he was rejoining her, as the referee raised both their hands, the crowd giving the champions an ovation, as the defeated challengers dejectedly climbed out of the ring.

Wendy took a moment to watch them go.  They had been a tough out, she had to admit.  Like she and Terrence, they were a rookie team, with a lot of potential and heart.  They had fought a good match, but her and Terrence’s isolation strategy had paid off towards the end, and they hadn’t been able to see the Vortexinator coming- until it was too late, that is. 

“Nice match!”  Terrence told her as the two embraced in front of the cheering crowd, exchanging a quick kiss.  Wendy couldn’t help but wince as her boyfriend hugged her- she was more banged up than she wanted to be.   It was understandable- the two of them had only just won back their titles the previous week, reclaiming the belts in a hellacious cage match from the exact same team that had beaten them back in August.  They had barely even begun to celebrate THAT win when they had been told that they’d be defending their belts just a week later.  She hadn’t minded, really.  For some reason, no one ever thought to run a wrestling show in Indianapolis, so competing in Chicago was pretty much the closest thing to wrestling in her hometown as she figured she was going to get.

But now that it was over, and the adrenaline was wearing off, she felt tired, albeit happy.  She couldn’t wait to get back to the RV, and just sleep for the next twelve hours.  She felt she both needed it and deserved it after tonights performance.

The referee handed them their belts, and Terrence held his high, drawing another pop from the crowd.   Wendy simply looked down at hers, smiling as she stared at the faceplate, with “World Tag Team Champions” written across the top, and her name etched into a smaller plate below the main emblem.  Even though everyone had complimented the Birdz on their spirit and heart after the Redondo Beach match, it had been devastating to lose the titles.  Wendy had thrown everything she had into gaining those belts back, to the point that even Terrence had started to worry about her. 

She loved title belts, she knew.  Almost an obsession with them, really.  It wasn’t so much the glory, or the prestige that came with it, although there was something nice about being recognized.  For Wendy, though, the championships were validating- she had to be doing something right if she was winning them.  And if she wasn’t… well, she was, so why bother thinking about it?

“Come on, hon.  Let’s go.”  Terrence was whispering in her ear, breaking her from her thoughts.  “Apparently they need this ring for another match.  Something about a World Championship, and time constraints.”

“Oh!  Yeah.”  She exclaimed, grinning apologetically over at the referee, who stood patiently waiting.  “Sorry!”  she exclaimed, before she and Terrence gave one last wave to the crowd, and rolled out of the ring, heading up the ramp, slapping the occasional fan’s hands on their way up. 

“WHOO! YEAH!”  Terrence whooped as they broke through the curtain, startling a poor stage hand into dropping his coffee on the floor at the sight of a two hundred twenty pound man screaming in his face.   Wendy rolled her eyes, in exasperation.

“Terry… I’m sorry, he’ a bit… wound up.”  Wendy apologized, guiding Terrence away from the poor kid, who was still staring wide eyed at the man.  “Really?” she hissed as they headed towards their locker room.  “You can’t be civilized for sixty seconds?”

“Sorry.  I’m just a bit excited, because I’m on the BEST GODDAMN TAG TEAM EVER WITH THE HOTTEST GIRL IN THE WORLD!” Terrence finished his boast, with a chest thump, drawing a few more looks from the stagehands.   Terrence’s voice quited, as he looked over at Wendy.  “But seriously, you were awesome out there tonight, hon.”

“Thanks,” Wendy said, turning an even deeper shade of crimson as Terrence stole another kiss from her.  “You kept us in it tonight, Terrence.  I just was able to capitalize and get the pin.  I’m lucky to have you.”

“No, I’m the lucky one, hon.”  Terrence argued.  “Just trust me on this.”

It wasn’t too far back to the locker room, the distance made shorter by the two half-jokingly arguing over just who the luckier WhirlyBird was.  Wendy was glad as they neared their door though.  She wanted to change out of these clothes, and get cleaned up, hopefully in time to watch the end of the World Championship.   But instead of the peace and quiet she had been expecting, she was surprised to hear raised voices coming from behind her door.  Giving a bewildered look to her fiancée, she turned the handle, and opened the door, prepared to defend herself in the event of an attack.

Instead, she saw something far more unexpected, her parent’s, standing toe to toe with each other in a shouting match.  Before Wendy could even begin to react, her mother winded up, and slapped her father across the face as hard as she could.  Gus’ head snapped to the side, while Wendy bleated in shock.  Gayle, her face flushed in fury, turned, and stormed out of the room, brusquely brushing by her daughter and future son-in-law as she did.

“Mother!?   What…?”

“Ask your father!”  Gayle snapped, her voice thick from being on the verge of tears. 

Wendy turned back to Gus, her eyes wide and questioning.  But Gus reacted first. 

“Gayle!  Don’t you DARE walk out on me!  Get back here and talk to me, dammit!  GAYLE!”

“Daddy?  What’s going…”   Wendy was cut off as Gus stormed out of the room too, stopping only to give a positively nasty glare to Terrence as he did.   Normally that would be enough to make her fiancée react, but Terrence seemed too stunned as Gus rudely brushed him aside, speed-walking down the hallway after his retreating wife.   Recovering somewhat, Wendy burst back out of the locker room, ready to run after her parents and demand an explanation for what just happened.  But after only a few strides, she gave up, turning back to Terrence, her expression of disbelief and dismay.

Terrence looked fairly nonplussed himself.  “What the hell just happened?”

“I don’t know!”  Wendy responded, trying- and failing- to keep the hysteria that was settting in  out of her voice.    “I didn’t even know they were going to be here!”

In fact, she realized, she had only seen her father a couple of times over the last few months, ever since he had visited her in California.  In truth, she hadn’t really minded, since every visit had been accompanied by increaslingly annoying and desperate demands that she quit wrestling and break up with Terrence.  She understood her father’s concerns, and frustrations, but this was the life she had chosen.  She enjoyed it (well, most of it).  Why should she give it up?

Wendy sighed as she headed back to the locker room, the weariness she had been feeling intensifying, while the elation  was completely gone.  Without anything else to do, she shut the door behind her, and began taking off her gloves and elbow pads. 

Terrence was sorting through his duffel bag, pulling out his street clothes, and setting them aside.  He glanced up at Wendy, and shrugged, offering a half-smile.  “Well, at least this happened AFTER our big title defense, right?”

The temperature in the locker room dropped about twenty degrees as Wendy looked up, her eyes narrowed as she glared back at Terrence, who to his credit, immediately realized that he had just said the wrong thing.  He grinned apologetically, shrugging his shoulders.  “That was a joke, hon.”

“I’m going to change,” Wendy snapped, picking up her own duffel bag, and storming into the adjacent bathroom, slamming the door behind her as she did so.

==================
Sunday October 26, 2002
Crowne Embassy Hotel- Lobby
Chicago Illinois
11:41 PM Local Time


Wendy shivered as she quickly scurried through the front doors of the hotel, glad to be out of the chilly Chicago night.  What she wasn’t happy about was her reasons for being at the Crowne Embassy in the first place.  She knew her parents were staying there- her parents always stayed at the Crowne when they were in Chicago. 

She had hoped that one- or even better, both- of her parent’s would have come back and explained to her why they were even in her locker room, much less arguing to the point where her mother stormed off.   Or at least a call to her cellphone, or something.  But she had gotten nothing, and had grown restless with all the thoughts running through her head.  She had finally given into her impulses, and told Terrence she was going for a  walk, making it clear she didn’t want him to come along.   Terrence had been uneasy about the thought of Wendy walking by herself in the middle of the night in Chicago, but, feeling that Wendy was still irritated with him, he had let her go.

In truth, she had gotten over that almost immediately.  After three years together with Terrence, she had gotten used to him saying stupid things at the absolute worst time, and this was no exception.  But she hadn’t gotten over her parent’s fighting, not by any stretch of the imagination.  She needed answers, and she couldn’t sleep until she got them.

She strode across the lobby towards the front desk, taking a short glance to her left, unable to keep the shame and guilt from washing over her.  She remembered all too well what had happened in that restaurant the last time she had been in there.  She doubted anyone who had seen it would ever forget the tantrum she had thrown, that had put another waiter in the hospital.

She briefly wondered whatever had happened to the man, but forced the thought from her mind.  She couldn’t afford to be distracted, not tonight.  She quickly conferred with the desk clerk, getting her parents room number, and headed to the elevator, pressing the button for the twelfth floor, and stepped back, forcing herself to breathe easy as the elevator acscended, the doors opening.  She stepped off, beginning the long walk down the corridor, her mind still ajumble with confused thoughts, along with the feeling that clarity was hardly going to be a good thing in this case.

She finally arrived at her parents room, taking a deep breath and raising her hand to knock, but stopped as she heard voices coming from behind the door.  She paused, quickly debating to herself over whether or not to simply eavesdrop- it might be the best way for the truth behind her parent’s fight to really come out.   Finally, her impulse gave out, and she crouched down, leaning into the door and resting her ear up against it. 

“...going to be devastated, Gus.  Did you ever think that?”  Her mother had obviously calmed down, but she was obviously still angry.

“She’s twenty-one, Gayle,” came the gruff reply in her father’s usual Irish brogue.  “She’s an adult now, like she absolutely insists on reminding me every time I see her.  She can handle the truth.”

“Gus, I can’t handle the truth, for crying out loud!  You’ve been sleeping with another woman for the past twenty-five years!  How the hell can anybody handle that!”

Wendy clapped her hand over her mouth to suppress the horrified shriek she gave at that.  She wavered for a second, wanting to kick down the door and demand an explanation.  But she hesitated, instead being forced to listen to the conversation continue.

“People cheat all the time Gayle.  And yet, life goes on.  Besides, it HASN’T been for the last twenty-five years.  It was twenty-five years ago.”

“And the last couple of months,” her mother replied, angrily.

“At least I’m being honest about it now,” Gus replied, coldly.  “And besides, you’re missing the bigger picture here, Gayle.  This isn’t why we’re in Chicago.  We’re here to give Wendy an ultimatum that if she doesn’t quit and leave Terrence…”

“Why, Gus?  Why the hell should we do that?”  Wendy was surprised to hear her mother defending her.  “Did you see her out there?  She enjoyed it, although I don’t have the faintest damn clue why she would.  But she’s HAPPY!  Who are we to deny that?!”

 “This isn’t about her happiness, Gayle.  This is about her throwing away everything we’ve given her like an ungrateful bitch.  And do you know how embarrassing this is?  What do you think our friends think about the fact that our daughters in this disgrace of a ‘sport’?  What do they think when they see her running around with a boy who’s spent his whole life covered in dirt and grease?”

There was a long pause.  “At least she’ll never have to worry about her husband cheating on her.”

Wendy cringed as she heard the sound of a mirror shattering, her mom shrieking, and Gus bellowing.  “SHUT UP!  JUST SHUT UP!  Our daughter… is… NOT… marrying… Terrence Thompson!  I will KILL that motherfucker MYSELF to keep that from happening!”

Wendy felt heat creeping into her face, and felt her nails digging into her palms, her breathing rapid and shallow.

“You don’t mean that Gus.”  Gayle was saying, and Wendy wasn’t surprised to hear a measure of fear in her voice.

“Oh, I mean it Gayle.  Don’t think I don’t.  I will have that jackass lying dead in a parking lot with a bullet in his brain if I have to!”

Wendy stood up, raising her hand to knock again.  She wasn’t going to demand an explanation this time.  She didn’t give a damn if that man was her father, she would SLUG anyone who DARED threaten Terrence like that…  but again, the voice of her mother made her hesitate- she was speaking in a tone that suggested something had just clicked in her head.

“Gus… that’s how they found Marg-“

“Don’t say her name.”

Wendy was alarmed by the fear in her mother’s voice.  “Did you kill her?  Did you kill Margaret Blaine?”

“I SAID DON’T SAY HER NAME!”  There was another crash, a lamp if Wendy could judge well enough by the sound.  “You know I didn’t.  You know that was a misunder-“

“I don’t know what to know anymore, Gus.”  Her mother sounded more resolute.  “They never would have arrested you without reason.   They released you so quickly though… I didn’t want to believe it.  But… you did.  I can see it in your eyes, Gus.  You-”

“Shut up, Gayle.”  Gus snarled.  “I didn’t shoot her. And no one… NO ONE benefited more from her death than you.  Had that not happened, you NEVER would have become the Angel of the Lyric.  You’d still be a goddamn understudy there.”

“That’s not how I wanted it…”

“Stop thinking life comes to you in neatly wrapped up packages!  It doesn’t matter how you get it, the fact is, you got it.  Everything has a price, Gayle.  Someone else paid yours that night when they removed an obstacle.  So shut up, and be grateful, for once in your goddamned life.

*CRASH*

Had she not been to the boiling point of rage, Wendy would have strongly doubted that she’d have the strength to kick a hotel door open.  At that point, having heard enough, she wasn’t too surprised at her feat.  Both Gus and Gayle turned, taken completely off guard at the sudden intruder.  Wendy ignored their shocked faces, and strode through the doorway, her eyes not leaving her father’s.

“Is all of this true?” 

Gus sputtered, staring wide-eyed at his furious daughter.  “Is… is all of what true?”

Wendy glare intensified, her emerald eyes boring into her father’s a snarl starting to form on her lips.  “Don’t take me for an idiot.  I was listening through the door.  I heard everything.”

Gus took a step back, exchanging a panicked glance with Gayle.  “You were eavesdropping?”

“Yeah I was.  I daresay that adultery, murder, and threatening to kill my fiancée are slightly more egregious breaches of etiquette, so pardon me if I don’t quite feel so apologetic.  Now, again.  Is. All. Of. This.  True?”

Gus took a deep breath, steadying himself under his daughter’s piercing glare. Somehow, through it, he managed to put a sneer of defiance.  “Obviously you didn’t hear me the first four times.  I haven’t killed anyone. But yes, I… have had an affair.”

Wendy turned away, shaking her head.  She was surprised to find herself laughing, although she hardly found any humor in this entire situation.  “Why?  Why the hell would you betray Mother like that?”

“I didn’t betray her,” Gus replied, rolling his eyes.  “It was just sex, and good sex at that.  Besides, it’s not like your mother hasn’t been with another man.”

Gayle turned to glare at him, but Wendy’s head snapped around, looking at her mom in astonishment.  Her mouth was open, ready to form the natural question, but Gayle spoke first, icily, her eyes never leaving her husband.   “That was your idea, Gus.”

Tears were welling up in Wendy’s eyes, and she wasn’t laughing in disbelief anymore.  “Are you kidding me?  All these years, to hear that you both have been…”

“Wendy, it’s not my fault.”  Gayle said quickly.  “Your fath… Gus… he suggested that I give a bit of… incentive, when I was trying to go back to acting after giving birth to you.”

“But you went along with it.” Wendy replied angrily.  She again looked from one parent to the other.  “For God’s sakes, you two.  What happened to your vows?  What happened to..”

“You have no right to judge us, dear DAUGHTER,” Gus snapped. 

“Just like you have no right to judge my profession, or my choice of boyfriend,” Wendy snapped, “both of which are apparently more honorable than you two will EVER be.  But that does remind me. I recall Mother saying something about an ultimatum.   So what was it?  If I don’t quit wrestling and leave Terrence, then what?”

There was a long, uncomfortable pause.  Finally, Gayle softly whispered.   “We would disown you.”

The pause returned.  Wendy looked from one parent to another, her tears no longer able to be held back, so they leaked out of her eyes, running down her cheek.  “Let me save you the trouble,” she whispered, reaching up and grabbing the rosary necklace Gayle had given her on her first day of school.   She pulled hard, snapping the chain, and tossed the cross on the floor at her mother’s feet.   “To hell with the both of you,” she whispered, before turning on her heels, and bolting from the room.

“Wendy!  Wait!”  Gayle exclaimed, but her daughter was already gone, out the door, sprinting down the hallway.  Crying herself now, Gayle leaned against the wall, sobbing into her arms. 

Gus looked down at the broken rosary.  “That ungrateful…”

“Shut up, Gus,” Gayle sobbed, before forcing herself to stop.  Moving quickly but with a sense of being on autopilot, Gayle moved across the room, grabbing her suitcase.  Quickly, she began throwing everything she could find into it, haphazardly.  “Just stay quiet, for once in your life.  Everytime I’ve listened to you, it’s made me miserable.”

“Wrong.  That’s what happened when you DIDN’T listen to me.  Like when when you insisted that we keep that ungrateful bitch instead of going to the clinic and…”

Gus didn’t even finish before a palm smashed into his face for the second time that night.  Gayle shook her stinging hand, and marched across the room, grabbing her suitcase.  She quickly threw everything she could into it, all the while sniffling and trying to fight back her tears.

“Where are you going?”  Gus demanded

“Away.  I don’t know where, but just away.”  Gayle said thickly.  “Gus, I’ve tried to turn a blind eye, but I can’t anymore.   You’re a heartless, cruel man, and you don’t give a damn about anyone else.  I’ve tried to convince myself for two and a half decades that it wasn’t so, but…  I can’t anymore.”  She looked up, tears falling down her cheeks, and splattering upon her dress, the suitcase, the floor, and the bed.  “I want a divorce.”

Gus chuckled slowly.  “We’re Cathlolic, Gayle.  We don’t believe in divorce.”

“Yeah, well, tonight’s destroyed my beliefs in a lot of things.  One more isn’t going to hurt.”   Gayle zipped up her suitcase, and walked to the door.  She turned around at the threshold, walked back inside, and picked up the rosary, putting it in her pocket.  “Goodbye, Gus.” 

And then she was gone.

Gus sat down on the bed, looking at the door, breathing slowly.  He tapped his foot on the ground, and waited.  Waited for Wendy to return, full of apology over throwing everything he’d ever given her away.  Waited for Gayle to come back, after realizing just how desperately she needed him.  Waited for twenty minutes with no result.

Finally he reached over, and picked up his cellphone, dialing a number, and holding it to his ear.

“You downstairs?  Yeah, she’s gone.  No, your room would be better… let’s just say there’s not much privacy up here at the moment.  Besides she might always come back.”

A smile curled across his lips.  “I’ll be right down.”


========================
Saturday May 5, 2012
New Orleans Arena- Briese Locker Room
New Orleans, Louisiana
3:53 PM Local Time


Well, it’s been a while since Wendy has decided to film a promo in the quiet and (air-conditioned) comfort of her own locker room, but today seems like a good day to do that, as its sunny and in the mid-eighties outside, a condition that isn’t going to do much good for the fair-skinned White Knight.  And so the scene opens with Wendy leaning up against the wall of the locker room, a table with a bottle of water and an empty chair sitting beside her.  In her hands is a piece of paper, and as she realizes the camera is on, she looks down at it, reading.

“You think the way you live’s okay. 
You think posing will save your day.
You think we don’t see that you’re running.
Better call your boys, cause I’m coming.”


Wendy scoffs and sets the paper down next to her on the break table.

“I think Leo got one thing wrong in his rankings Jo.  You have got to have the most fitting entrance music in the entire company.”

“I’m not sure you actually intended to be the object of that song when you chose it, but you sure have become it.  You are absolutely heedless of any consequences of your actions.  You certainly are adept at living a lie.  You’re as equally adept at running away from any responsibility you might have.  And you’ve developed quite the knack for becoming a low-level groupie in some vain attempt to cover your weaknesses.”

“And here I bet you thought you were actually a rock star.”


Wendy chuckles and shakes her head.

“I’m sure you’re rolling your eyes by now, Jo.  Of course, you had to have known that I was going to at least mention the nine-hundred pound gorilla in the room, right?  Your ugly breakup with Chris.  The one that wouldn’t be anyones business but yours had you not got on Twitter and broadcasted it to the entire roster of two separate wrestling companies.  You remember that night, right?  When you tore Chris Strike’s heart out and stomped on it for all the world to see?”

“Yeah, Jo.  That offended me, and I know I’m not the only one.   I’ll confess, part of it’s because of my own bruised pride.  After all, when Christian Kane started going around bragging about how he conquered you, I was one of the many who told him to put a sock in it, only to be proven wrong in the end.  I’m sure you actually loved that, didn’t you?  All those people coming to your defense, and you fooled them all.  Made them look stupid for thinking that you’d NEVER cheat on Chris, much less with a weasel like Kane.  The saddest part is that’s the biggest accomplishment you’ve yet had in your FFW career.”

“But God, Jo.  Seeing the hurt on Chris’ face when he returned your stuff, and the sickening mirth you derived from it, well yeah.  That just makes me a bit on the annoyed side.  I don’t know what your motives were to begin with.  Maybe you really loved Chris.  Maybe you got caught up with Kane, one thing led to another, and you got put in a position you had no desire to be in.  I can see that happening, especially to someone who’s repeatedly shown no inclination for any foresight whatsoever.  But whatever it was at first, you turned it into something ugly, something hurtful on someone who cared about you and trusted you.  And for what?  The attention?”

“Well, you got it Jo, although I’m not entirely sure this is what you’ve had in mind.  After all, everyone’s sick of the White Knight going on an indignant rant like this, right?  Well too bad, and brace yourself, because I’ve barely even begun here.”


Wendy sighs, and shakes her head, walking away from the table, towards the center of the locker room.

“I want to know, Jo.  I want to know why the blazes you are so hell-bent on ruining every single thing you have going for you.  Because however bad it was at Violent Night, it’s only gotten worse.”

“You impressed at Violent Night, Jo, even though you lost.  Even though you tapped out to the Banshee, begging me not to hurt you anymore.  Even though you decided to take whatever promo time you had and try and drag my name through the mud by bringing up every single trivial thing you could think of to make me look like a hypocrite.  Even though you tried to win by pulling my tights, then cry about it to the referee after she had the audacity to do her job and catch you cheating.  Despite all that, you earned my respect, something that I made no secret about.  And I sincerely hoped that you were finally turning the corner, and becoming the wrestler… and person… you SHOULD have been, instead what you were.”

“Yeah, I was wrong.   If there ever was a title belt for instilling blind optimism in me, Jo, you’ve definitely managed to hold it for the better part of the last year.”


Wendy chuckles at her own joke, but the shake of the head she gives is a forlorn one.

“You remember what I said going into that match?  When I knew for certain that this was going to be the one match in your life you’d actually show some fire about, considering you hand-picked your opponent?”

Wendy clears her throat

“Here it is, verbatim:  ‘I’m glad that you respect me enough to at least try to make something of this match.  But don’t you DARE disrespect me by going back to being the same old Jo McFarlane after it’s all said and done.’”

“Guess what, Jo?  You went back to being the same old Jo McFarlane.  Two weeks later, you came out flat against Shane Sanders.  Then there was that debacle where you proved how little FFW mattered to you by going to another, lesser company, and getting yourself hurt.  And then Kelly McGuffin wiped the floor with you in the prison of punishment.  All the while Jo, I was praying, honest to god praying that you’d wake up.  That Chris or Val or SOMEBODY would make you wake up and realize what the hell you were wasting.  But no, you clung to your Lord and Master Samantha Star like a suction cup, even after you got kicked out of the A-List.  And somewhere along the lines, you lowered yourself even further by bedding Christian Kane.”

“What the hell, Jo?  Ruining your career wasn’t enough, so you had to ruin everything else?”


Wendy scoffs, and shakes her head in disbelief.

“So here we are again.  Heck, it’s just second-chances galore for you, isn’t it?  You’re also taking one more stab at Future Shock after being the absolute first one voted off in Season Three, because apparently the FFW Faithful realized how unlikeable you were long before the rest of us did.  And then there’s tonight.  Five and a half-months after Violent Night.  The rematch of what could have been the biggest win in your career.  You face me.”

“The pressure’s not on you this time around, Jo, because you didn’t pick this match out.  This isn’t the bright lights of Jerryworld… there won’t be a hundred thousand people sitting in the stands.  This isn’t a pay-per-view.   This historically isn’t really the kind of match you’ve ever really gone out for, is it?  Is Jo McFarlane going to buck history?  Is she actually going to come out swinging for a match on a televised show?”

“I hope you do, Jo.  I hope you come out ready for a fight, to light up New Orleans and give these people a Cinco de Mayo show to be proud of.  I’m going to be ready for you, whether you come prepared or not, because I don’t need a hundred thousand fans and a forty-five dollar purchase on the cable box to tell me how big a match is.  A packed New Orleans arena, seventeen thousand strong, and a Saturday Night on ESPN is perfectly fine, because this is what I ENJOY doing.  Every match is big to me, no matter who I’m facing.  Whitley Mercer found that out the hard way a couple weeks ago.”


Wendy leans slightly towards the camera, her eyes blazing, although her expression is fairly neutral.

“As for me, I’d love to believe that I’m going to beat some sense into you, Jo.  That somehow, after tonight, you’ll finally wake up and realize that there’s a lot more to wrestling than sycophantically clinging to the owner and breaking out a kendo stick every time things don’t go your way.  But I’ve given up hope a long time ago that you’re actually going to learn anything around here.  So I guess it’s just  straight up kick your butt until you beg me to stop time.”

“Because I don’t know if you know this, but I’m still pretty steamed over what happened at Chaos Theory.  And I’m sick of every single thing I do around here being stepped on by the owner of the company, because I don’t fit into her short-sighted self-serving business model.  And if I need any extra motivation, all I have to do is remind myself that everything she said, you probably weren’t too far away, clapping like the little suck-up you are and cheering ‘Good one, boss!’”

“Considering that you and Starla are under the same umbrella, you’re the perfect person to make an example of tonight.  Because when it’s all said and done, and you’ve christened that new ring gear Ms. Star bought you by having it stretched out a bit by the Banshee, you can limp on back to Ms. Star, an tell her that Wendy Briese wants HER title back, and that she has three weeks before it comes time to collect.  It'll be a nice change of pace from what I'm sure your usual conversations are.  Because just like I did to Whitley, and I’m going to do to Starla, I’m not going to let anything stop me.  You’re not stealing this from me.  No one is.  And at the end of the night…”


Wendy is cut off as the door swings open, and in walk Terrence and Pollaski.  Her expression changes from one of intensity to one of confusion, then bemusement when she sees what they are wearing.

Pollaski: “CINCO DE MAYO ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRIIIBAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!”

Yeah, sombreros.

Wendy: “Um… I wasn’t done yet.”

 Terrence: “Oh, sorry.  There’s a taco wagon outside, and we wanted to see if you wanted anything.”


Wendy cringes, and holds her stomach involuntarily.

Wendy: “Um… before my match?  I can’t think of a bigger disaster waiting to happen.”

Pollaski: “She’s got a point dude.  That’s got ‘bad, yet memorable ending’ written all over it.”


Terrence thinks for a second, then nods in agreement, while Wendy smiles consolingly.

Wendy: “Tell you what, after tonight, we’ll go out to a nice restaurant.  In the meantime, I have a match to get ready for.”

Pollaski: “Oh yeah, about that.  Chris Strike sent us a bit of a ‘good luck’ present.  Hehe… wait til you see this!”


Wendy and Terrence exchange glances.

Wendy: “Uh oh…”

Pollaski: "Yeah.  It's awesome.  I love that guy.  Shame I'll have to kick his ass for the Defiance title one day."


Feel free to pause while you finish rolling on the floor laughing.

Terrence: “Oh well, you better finish up.”

Wendy looks at her husband, then back at the camera.

Wendy: “I think you guys kind of ruined the ending.”

Pollaski: “Oh hell no!  If Daniel Pollaski knows anything, it’s how to end a promo.  THERESA!  MY MARACAS!”

Theresa: “TA-DA!”


Theresa suddenly appears out of nowhere, wearing a cute little pink sombrero of her own, and holding up a pair of brightly colored maracas.  As usual, its adorable.

Pollaski: “Thank you, maracasquire.  Now…”

Pollaski starts shaking the maracas (and every ounce of his body fat), in weird dance that doesn’t even seem all that rhythmic, but is certainly time consuming.  He finally finishes, with a cheesy pose.

Wendy: “Um… “

Pollaski: “That’s morse code for POLLA OUT!”


Triple facepalm!  Quintuple if you count that Terrence and Wendy use both hands.

Wendy: “I think we’re done here.”

Fade.  Mercifully.

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