Performers

If the question is, “Why did you go to a strip club last night AWOL?” the answer is “Because I’m stupid enough to be friends with Hurse.”

If the question is, “Why are you telling us this in a narrative rather than a typical promo?” the answer is somewhat lengthier, but no less pithy. Most clubs of this nature don’t even allow you to take out a cellular phone for fear you may be taking video, let alone a camera crew. I wasn’t planning on making it into a promo anyway, but rather was just looking to blow off some steam. You could say that, since my crew of unwanted admirers felt they needed to ruin what was headed towards being one of the greatest Riot! main events of all time by interfering, I’ve been in a foul mood. Johnny Kingdom has been unsurprisingly silent on the matter towards the public or towards me. My training has suffered as a result. I’m angry, and unlike what most people would lead you to believe, you do not get a better workout when you’re furious, you just expend your energy on useless fits of strength that don’t fit into your training plan and more likely than not end up hurting yourself. And so Hurse, for reasons that make sense only to him, thought taking me out for a “guy’s night” would somehow help matters. When inquiring about the locale of said evening, he informed me it was somehow appropriate to the title I was fighting for this week.

Don’t ask, folks. We quit trying to understand why Hurse does things a long time ago.

Anyway, the intention was not to create a promo, as I was saying. Later, when I was thinking back on the evening, I discovered there were insights there that I felt I should share with the IWC audience at large as well as with you, Too Mag. I considered hiring a film crew and actors to recreate the scene, but ultimately I remembered who I’m facing and decided that was more effort and budget expenditure than you deserved. So instead you get this, me talking at you. Deal with it. I have to put up with your nonsensical ranting every time you’re in a match with me, so it seems only fair I return the favor.

The usual spread of carnal delights was on display for all to see. This club, through what I’m led to understand is a loophole in zoning laws, has literally no limits to what its entertainers are allowed to do on stage outside of the levels of prostitution (and, if rumors are true, some of the performers may even dabble in this as well.) The mind dulling pounding of rock music played to a volume where the bass lines can be felt vibrating in the jelly of your eyes acted as a siren call, bringing tantalizing flesh to the stage and men’s money free from their wallets. Women of all description were available, from petite flowers to gorgeous amazons straight from the pages of Greek myth. A man could be led to believe that in this place any desire was available. These women may dance every evening, shoving the faces of countless random men into their chests and moving on without a second thought, but clearly they only have eyes for YOU, and if you want them as well they can be yours.

If you have the cash, that is.

I first saw Maya as the third bachelor in the last hour was being drug onto the stage to be beaten with a leather belt, ground into a chair, and have water spat into his face. I looked around for something interesting, spying at first only the same visions of debauchery that had been present since I arrived. Here an olive skinned woman climbed a brass pole to the ceiling. There a girl from the crowd, obviously a worker planted by the owners, was being pulled onto the stage and stripped bare, one piece at a time, as the men she was with made it rain singles onto her supine form and howled with delight. Next to me, Hurse was trying to explain to a bouncer who was nearly my size that, in fact, the brunette glaring at him from onstage was mistaken and he had not tried to run his tongue down the length of her cleavage.

I was about to turn and suggest that we should leave before we end up on TMZ, when I finally saw something that made me pause. A woman was making her way downstage to our seats, her garter already stuffed full with singles. She had clearly been at this for several hours already, as even through the flashing red and blue lighting of the club I could see the lines of fatigue in the creases at the corners of her eyes. Random strands of her blonde hair were starting to escape the tight bun tied to the top of her head and her black glasses were perched precariously on the edge of her nose, probably one turn on the pole away from coming flying off. Still, she flashed the smile that I could tell was a big part of her success at us as she turned, dropping instantaneously into a split-legged pose inches away from the face of three fraternity brothers. She reached out, taking off one of their crooked baseball caps and putting it onto her blonde head as she pulled them in to earn the tip money placed in front of her. I must have been staring, because as she turned around to offer them the rear view she caught my eye, holding contact for a split second and flashing a smile and a wave across the stage before returning her concentration to the matter at hand. I may have smiled back, I can’t recall for certain. In any case, the moment passed quickly, and shortly thereafter she moved on to separate more fools from their money.

Later, as the hour was drawing on towards closing, I found my thoughts starting to drift back towards my upcoming match. Clearly, I was not in the mood for this place, but I had realized hours ago that Hurse had simply been looking for an excuse to come here and, in truth, I could get up and leave at any point and he would probably not notice I was gone until he realized that he now had no ride back to the hotel. I stood, leaving my seat for someone who actually wanted to be there, and wandered towards the lobby for some air. As I walked, I remembered Too Magnificent’s repeated advances towards me, how he had somehow taken it as a personal crusade to get into my face and insinuate that I somehow had something to prove to him. I must confess, I was thoroughly amused by Too Mag’s plight during last week’s show. I hate to say it, but the Brat Pack certainly came up with an appropriate metaphor for his worthless career when they threw him into a dumpster and lit him on fire. I don’t often compliment them, but that particular bit of symbolism was spot on. I wish I had thought of it myself.

I also remembered, with no small flash of anger, Simon Cagero’s boasts that somehow things were going to be different with him in charge, that somehow he was going to rise above the level of the common IWC competitor and that his Motherfuckers were somehow going to hold themselves to that higher standard for the betterment of…well themselves, mostly, but also what they perceived to be the dip in quality of the company. And yet, when the chips were down, what did we see from these reformists? When Christian Savior struck Johnny in the middle of the tag-team gauntlet, which I will reiterate neither Simon Cagero nor Too Magnificent should have been competing in at this point, did Simon make good on this claim? No. He stepped in and hit his own finisher and walked away with his ill-gotten gains. And yet, we are still to believe that Cagero is Savior’s enemy, that the two hate each other? It was laughable, and yet the irony of my criticism in light of my own situation with Psycho and Riggs did not escape me.

Why did people think I would want to have anything to do with them? Is it so inconceivable that these morons simply think they are recruiting me by interfering in my matches and that, in truth, their assistance is neither sought nor desired by me? I could hear the rebuttals already. How could I make that claim but still point the finger at Cagero and Savior? Simple. Cagero has only benefitted from Savior’s patronage, and he has accepted this benefit willingly. Riggs and Psycho cost the Empire the world title just as surely as Savior or Cagero during the Tag Team Gauntlet. Moreover, Simon’s unconscious form was not drug onto Johnny’s body for a three count as mine was at the end of last week’s Riot!. He saw Savior interfere. He was aware of what happened, and he chose to act, to do what everyone else in his situation would do, and finished Johnny off for the title. That’s what bothered me about it, I realized. It’s not that it happened. I’ve had countless matches stolen from me in similar fashion. It is simply the predictability of it all, the sheer mind-numbing regularity of the clockwork that drives us as professional wrestlers. Why is it so far outside any of our paradigms to do the right thing, or even just the unexpected thing in a given situation? Why must it always be the same story with different actors being put forward on our stage week after week? And the same criticism could be leveled at Too Magnificent. He was performing a knee jerk right now, challenging the biggest dog in the yard to try and establish himself as the new Alpha big man in the federation. I had seen this play out before as well, though usually it was from incoming talent from another federation, not a washed up, broken down piece of meat trying to play Mickey Rourke and make one last, big comeback. I was going to squash him and put him in the same box as Bluhd Raige, Andre Bates, and a thousand other nameless meatheads that thought they had what it took to break me. But I could tell I wasn’t going to enjoy it. It’s not something I was looking forward to, or even cared about. It was all so…played out. I just wished someone else could see it the way I do.

I realized then that it was up to me to give them something new to talk about this week, and I was afraid it would have to be done at Too Magnificent’s expense. I resolved then and there that, at the end of this show, the world will know for certain where my allegiance lay with regards to Psycho and Riggs.

I was thinking these bleak thoughts, sitting in a chair far enough from the entrance to avoid the stench of cigarette smoke wafting in from the outside, when a set of well-manicured purple fingernails drug their way lightly up the back of my neck. I turned, alarmed that I had let my guard down that far, only to find blue eyes framed by black glasses looking at me, a glimmer of amusement in them to match her alluring smile. “Your friend said you could use some company. Would you like to come to the back with me for a dance?” I turned, confused, only to spy Hurse sitting with a cat-that-ate-the-canary grin on his stupid face, lifting his massive, blue, fruity drink to me in salute. My eyes narrowed and I resolved to shove the paper umbrella poking out of the top of his glass somewhere unpleasant when this was over, but allowed myself to be led away from the lobby.

“What’s your name?” she asked over her shoulder as she led me down a hallway.

“Anthony,” I replied, knowing that she didn’t actually care.

She smiled, flashing teeth that were crooked, but only just enough to make them remarkable. “I’m Maya,” she answered. “Do you come here very often?”

“No,” I answered, trying not to let the irritation creep into my voice. This wasn’t her fault, after all. She was just doing her job, just like the rest of us, in a way. “I’m with the…I’m an entertainer. I’m just in town for the week.”

“Cool,” she replied, stepping through the door into a dimly-lit back room. “What kind of entertainment?”

Pausing a moment as I settled myself into an overstuffed arm chair, I flashed a sardonic smile. “I don’t know anymore, to be honest. Some nights it feels like I’m basically just doing what you’re doing, flashing my assets in front of random strangers night after night to satisfy their primal needs.”

She gave me a sort of sad smile, dropping the subject. Maybe she could tell I didn’t want to talk about it, or maybe the twenty-five bucks for a lap dance didn’t require her to pretend she was an amateur therapist. She looked up for a moment, listening to the song overhead moving on into the second verse, before kicking off her foot high platform shoes and plopping down into my lap, an arm draped around the back of my neck. My nose filled instantly with the overwhelming scent of her body-lotion. “I’ll wait for the next song, hon,” she said, giving me that crooked smile again.

An awkward moment passed, both of us waiting for the music to progress so we could get on with the show, when she finally dropped a sigh that sounded like it had to have started somewhere around her toes. “Ugh, I just want to be sober,” she said with a laugh.

Here was something new, I thought.

“I’m sorry?” I responded.

“Not your fault, honey,” she said, looking me in the eye again. “It’s part of the job, helps me get up there every night. Between you and me, I’ve been doing this four years now, and I still get stage fright.”

“I suppose it takes a little encouragement,” I said, giving her a genuine smile of my own. “You’re so…well you’ll pardon the term, but ‘exposed’ up there. It’s got to be tough.”

“What, you mean getting naked?” She laughed, dropping a hand onto my chest playfully. “Anthony, I stopped worrying about that after my first week. It’s flattering, really, having guys drooling in their seats at just the sight of me. It’s empowering. And it’s perfectly safe, since I know what’ll happen to any poor bastard stupid enough to lay a hand on me.”

I blinked. Had this stripper really just used the word ‘empowering’ in conversation with me? I was shocked, and equally shocked at myself for letting such a blatant stereotype into my thinking.

“No, it’s just, I don’t know,” she continued. “It’s stupid I guess. I take my clothes off for money after all, but I guess I want to put on a good show when I’m up there. At the end of the day, I want to feel like I’ve earned it. So many of the people I know in this job just go through the motions week in and week out, and it’s not really like the guys care, or even notice. I don’t know, I guess I’m just not built that way. I don’t know how to be ok with half-assing something.” She suddenly flashed a self-conscious smile, looking away in embarrassment. “Aaand I just spilled my guts out to a customer. Awesome. You’re probably about ready to head back to your seat now.”

She turned back to me, and I could see the surprise on her face at the earnest sympathy and understanding on mine. Apparently even strangers could tell how out of place the expression was. I nodded, slowly. “I know how you feel. Maybe better than you know.”

We resumed waiting in silence, the final chorus starting up. Examining her with freshly opened eyes, I saw a tattoo behind her right shoulder, a large letter A clearly evident in the center. “What’s this?” I asked, prodding it gently. The bouncer started to step forward before she gave him a look, letting him know it was alright. There was something else in her expression, something unreadable. “Take a look,” she said, turning her body to bring it closer. There were numbers written down the sides. I realized that, despite being written to be read as the numerals descended, they were dates, the first being 8-23-83 and the second, 9-13-09. Underneath was the phrase “501st Infantry” and, beneath that, “Always Remember.”

I looked up into her sad smile. “I’m sorry,” I said, the only thing that came to mind.

She nodded in thanks. “His name was Adam,” she quietly answered, “He was my best friend.”

The music stopped. For a moment, neither of us moved, not wanting to break the moment. She, however, was a professional, and stood up from my lap, removing the night-gown that barely covered her frame. In an instant the mask was back in place, the mark of a pro that I recognized from years of doing it myself when entering personal appearances, filming promos, and walking out to the ring. I settled in and was rewarded with…an event I’m not going to describe to you, Too Magnificent. Suffice to say, there was more going on than a business transaction during that dance. Even still, as I sit here composing this message, the memories play through my mind in sweet, short bursts of bodily contact. We were two injured people, looking to replace a missing piece of themselves with the warmth of a stranger. It was indescribable.

And then it was over. The song ended, and with a kiss on my cheek she whispered “I hope I did a good job for you,” breathily in my ear. I didn’t respond. I didn’t have to. My eyes told her everything she needed to know.

I stood, towering over her now that she didn’t have the platform heels adding half a foot to her height. With a smile and a muttered “Thanks,” I walked back out to Hurse’s seat, watching as a six foot three blonde slapped his belt down repeatedly onto his rear end. She paused, turning to the crowd and holding the belt into the air, waiting for the encouraging shouts from the audience before bringing it down yet again, the loud crack of the leather reverberating painfully across the room. I smiled as I winced, wondering how many times I’ve done the exact same thing with a steel chair or a crowbar in the middle of a wrestling ring.

Idly, I reached into my pocket for my cellular phone, looking for the hundredth time to see if Johnny had responded to any of my messages of apology. Instead, with it I found a piece of paper that I knew had not been there previously. I pulled it out, unfolding it as a smile slowly drifted onto my face.

“I get off at 4. Stick around if you want to go grab a drink together. –Maya”