- Event: ICONIC 2021
Before Refueled 83
David held the DNA test in his hands, the box’s edges cutting into his skin due to how tight he was holding it. Part of him was tempted to throw it off the balcony, the other part of him was tempted to tear it open. He just stood there for a moment, Lorelai looking at him with bated breath.
Lorelai: Did you love her?
David looked at her, surprised by the question.
David: I did.
Lorelai: Did?
David: Hard to continue to love someone who rips your heart apart, know what I mean?
Lorelai: Never been in love.
David: Fair enough. That would make it harder to understand.
Lorelai: When did you know you loved her?
David pauses for a moment, looking out across the balcony, and felt the various memories as they snapped across his mind.
The first date, when she wore a skin-tight red dress that accentuated her curves and her eyes had a dangerous look to them like they were telling David he had no idea the danger he had waded into.
The time when she was sick, caught the flu, right before they were supposed to go on a long weekend trip together. Instead of the trip, they laid in bed, and just watched movies all weekend.
When he came home from a particularly tough loss and she’d made him his favorite meal, ready for him to eat when he walked through the door.
It was tough for David to reconcile the two versions of Samantha in his memory. The version of Samantha he dated for two years, fell in love with, and then there was the Samantha who betrayed him, stabbed him through his heart and left him for dead.
David looked over at Lorelai.
David: The first time she grabbed my hand and held it.
Lorelai: So… like the first date?
David: No, not the first date.
Lorelai: You didn’t hold hands on the first date?
David: No, we did. I grabbed her hand. That’s the detail you’re missing. A guy will grab your hand. I imagine you haven’t had many if any dates, but guys will do anything to grab your hand. They want to feel your skin, have your touch. When a girl grabs your hand though, when she wants to feel you, that’s a different level. The first time she grabbed my hand, she was actually scared. We were going through a haunted house. It was probably two or three months into our relationship. Before we walked in, she grabbed my hand. I don’t know if it was just a reaction or what, but at that moment I knew she trusted me to protect her.
Lorelai took what David said and thought about it for a moment. He heard her sniffling after a few moments and looked over to see tears welled up in her eyes. It was tough to remember at times that while there was anger towards Samantha in his heart, there was a not-so-little girl who was making her way through the tragedy of losing her mother.
Lorelai: I’ve never heard that about my mother before. I guess I just never saw her that… happy.
David: Not even with your… dad?
Lorelai: Robert. That was his name. And no. They fought from what I can remember. I was… four… when he left. Never saw him again. And she never dated again. I think she just decided to focus on me, at least the best that she could.
David: Best she could?
Lorelai: She loved me, I never doubted that. She was just never… motherly? I don’t think that’s right. She just never knew how to hug that line of mother and friend very well. I think she wanted me to be more of her friend than her daughter.
David looked down at the box in his hands.
Lorelai: I think she was happy with you.
David looked over at her with surprise.
David: Not something I expected you to say.
Lorelai: I think Robert manipulated her. I don’t know. I wasn’t there, obviously. I just… when I showed her the birth certificate with your name on it, I saw something in her eyes. It was like… regret. I never understood it until now though. I think she regrets what happened, that she let Robert control her like that. I don’t know if we will ever know what happened then, but something doesn’t add up in my head. From what I saw, from what I know of my mom.
David: I hadn’t ever thought of that.
Lorelai: I imagine not. Still, it couldn’t have been easy on you either.
David: How do you figure?
Lorelai: Just having your life ripped apart like that. Having someone you think is your daughter removed in the way that it happened. It’s really sad. I feel bad for you. That this is how we came together.
David slowly nodded his head, still holding the box in his hands, trying to figure out the next step.
Then, without warning, he took the box and chucked it off the balcony, and watched as it disappeared. Lorelai looked on in shock.
Lorelai: Why did you do that?
David: I’ll tell you why.
He then turned towards her and for the first time, felt like the pain around Samantha left his body for good.
Present Day
I’ve said my piece about Darin Zion. Except for this. I saw HOW management decided to resign him to a contract. I, for the life of me, couldn’t figure out why they would do something that simply makes no sense. A person who is merely mediocre, getting an extension on their contract? Anyone, in any job, who performed like Zion did would be shown the door and yet Zion.
In all honesty, I probably spent far more time thinking about this than I would have liked to. There was something I couldn’t put my finger on. I didn’t think he had any kind of incriminating information on someone in HOW, you know, like lewd pictures of someone with a goat or something weird like that. It isn’t like he’s the cousin or son of someone in power either.
It took me a while to figure it out, but then it finally clicked in my mind. Zion was being kept around simply because you need to be able to measure yourself to know how close or far you are from being at the bottom. With Zion, he is a known quantity. You know exactly where he is at and there is no illusion when it comes to him. If you look at where you’re at in comparison to him, you can understand where you stand. For everyone else in HOW, that must be comfortable.
For me, it is unbelievably infuriating.
Then again, I shouldn’t be surprised because you also have the likes of Xander Azula and Brian Hollywood who simply should be in the dumpster with aborted fetuses.
If there are 30 wrestlers in HOW on a good day and Zion is 30th, then Hollywood and Azula are 29a and 29b. Simply scraping the bottom of the barrel.
And yet, they get to be on a card at ICONIC. A ladder match. With the winner actually getting something out of it.
It blows my mind. That you can be rewarded by your mediocrity. Then again, that shouldn’t surprise many people in this world because it’s those who are merely mediocre that somehow rise to the top, isn’t it? Look at any position you want to, President of the United States, CEO of McDonald’s, Time’s Man of the Year. All men that are paraded around as being these exemplary people when in all reality, they’re merely mediocre.
Azula and Hollywood are just further examples of that in HOW. Mediocre enough to have made it. For them, striving to be mediocre is exactly what they’ve been taught to do, and can you fault them for that?
Yes, yes you can. Fuck off with that nonsense.
This idea to put forth as little effort as possible is sickening. To do just enough to get by. That’s simply the difference between the three of them and myself. They do enough to just get by, put forth as little effort as possible, while I give everything I have day in and day out. At the end of the day, it is a choice. They’ve chosen to be mired at the bottom of the roster and I’ve chosen to be as far as fucking possible from the likes of them.
Azula. Hollywood. Zion. They don’t belong in the ring with me. They simply don’t belong in the ring. Nothing will ever change that because they don’t care enough to change that. They’re content with being bottom of the barrel as long as it gives them a paycheck.
This is how I know I’m different, that I’m built differently than them. They all agreed to their contracts. Another year with HOW. When HOW management approached me with a year contract, I refused. I wouldn’t be treated like being on the same level as Zion or Hollywood or Azula.
I didn’t think I was Roberts or Byrd or Davidson level. I knew my place on the card and what I’d carved out in a couple short months. I knew though that I was better than most of the roster.
So I refused the contract. Instead, agreeing to a shorter length contract, a contract that would force HOW to re-negotiate with me when I’d proven who I really am, show them what I am capable of, and remind everyone that I’m a class above.
That’s the difference between Azula, Hollywood, Zion, and myself. They’re content with just making it. They’re content to be middle of the road.
I’m not content unless I have the pressure night in and night out of being one of the best in the company, in the business. I bet on myself every single day to be the best version of myself when I step through those ropes. I’m not satisfied being average, but instead of being talked about as one of the best.
They’re not like me.
They will never be like me.
Before Refueled 83
David stood there, looking at Lorelai as a smile swept across his face.
David: I don’t need a test to tell me certain things. Right now, I’m your legal guardian. In two years, you will be an adult and move on to college and the next phase of your life. What does this test do for me? Nothing. I’m going to take care of you, give you what you need, support you. I’m going to help you into the next phase of your life and then you’ll be free to make your choice.
Lorelai: Why?
David: Because it’s not about what I need anymore, it’s about what you need. All that test will do is hurt you and I don’t think you need anymore hurt right now. I don’t care if I’m biologically linked to your or not, because regardless I would do anything to help you. It’s what I would’ve done all my life.
He watches as the tears build up and as she struggles to hold them in. David reaches out to her and slowly pulls her in, embracing her. He feels her sobbing into his chest, the tears running down her face, as she accepts that someone just wants her to be her, to be able to live her life and have love and understanding through it. Even if he wasn’t her father, David had been more of a father to her than anyone else could have been.
A few moments pass as she feels the emotion wash over her.
Lorelai: Are you sure about this?
David: Not even thinking twice about it.
Lorelai: Well, then, I guess I should thank you.
The two end their embrace and look at one another.
David: No need to do that.
Lorelai: Well I did and I’m not taking it back.
David chuckles.
Lorelai: So, what is next?
David: Well, we’ll finish up things here in the UK and then head home. I will need to get you enrolled in school and I imagine get you a room.
Lorelai: Do you even have a house?
David: Fair enough. I guess I should do that first.
Lorelai: Okay, but can it be like a cool house. Not some dorky house?
David: Is that even such a thing?
Lorelai: I have no idea, but I also imagine you have no knowledge of buying a house.
David: I will have you know that I’m much more versed than you would like to think I am.
Lorelai: Yeah, okay.
As Lorelai leaned into him, welcoming the warmth and comfort that came, David smiled and knew that the next chapter would be far harder.
As he stood there though, his phone buzzed as a text message came in. David didn’t hear it though, with him being out on the balcony, and his phone being inside of the hotel room.
The sender said ‘Dad’.