Chapter Twenty-Seven (Mad World) [PW]
Dec 14, 2016 22:45:15 GMT -5
Post by Admin on Dec 14, 2016 22:45:15 GMT -5
Miami || 08-19-2015 [off camera]
His forehead impacted with the desk hard enough to rattle the pens in the Watchmen coffee mug. The words on the laptop screen were still there when he closed his eyes against the sensation of that mythical knife twisting in his guts. When Lyv had said she wanted to start seeing a counselor to try and work through the things her step-father had done to her, he'd been supportive, despite how he felt about that whole process. Talking had never done him much good in the long run. She'd told him she felt numb and he'd chalked that up to the pregnancy hormones. She'd told him that she felt overwhelmed, that she felt like she was suffocating and he'd given her space. He'd cancelled two bookings in a row on bullshit, make-believe injuries just so that he was close. In case she needed him.
He'd gone to Estero at the end of July – a two-hour drive on the other side of the state. He'd blown out his knee again during the match and the damned Uncensored Primo Championship title belt had shifted back to James Donovan. Nobody cared. Nobody outside of a handful of Twitter followers and people in this godforsaken state even knew who that asshole was. It wasn't a big deal.
His knee, though? That was. He'd spent the night in the hospital under observation while they ran a bunch of tests. He'd barely made it back up the ramp under his own power and the second he had, he'd been on the floor, puking his guts out from the pain. His kneecap had ended up back where it belonged, but it felt wrong somehow and nobody understood what he was trying to tell them until they saw the dark spots on the first X-Ray. They were talking torn meniscus and debating if another surgery was going to be necessary within the hour and he'd had to fight tooth and nail to get a hold of his cell phone so that he could send her a message. They'd pumped him full of painkillers and he'd been over the moon for a few hours. He'd texted her, telling her that he was scared, that he'd let them push the pills into his hand because it hurt too goddamn much not to and that he was afraid that the seal was broken irreparably. He'd spent an hour sending message after message out there, watching the little check marks pile up as they confirmed and he hadn't heard a damn thing back. A day had turned into two because he'd lost time in the middle of a conversation with the specialist and they were convinced he had some sort of post-concussion syndrome now on top of the fucked up knee.
He'd been waiting for that reply from her for twelve hours by then and it was tearing him apart. He'd sworn he felt the phone vibrate in his pocket but there was nothing there when he'd pulled it out. Nothing. He'd zoned out because he'd had that ringing in his ears, that bullshit déjà vu all over again and he knew – they offered to call someone to come get him because he couldn't drive with his knee seized up like that. Thirty-six hours later, discharged with a new scrip for a new drug, cortisone shots in the joint to buy some time. Maybe he'd get by if he was careful – fucking safe words that meant nothing when he was getting raped by his own stupid decisions.
He'd waited in the lounge for two hours that morning with a brittle smile on his face because she'd finally replied, saying she'd been tired and hadn't been sleeping well the last few days. She'd missed his calls, missed his texts but she was sorry and she loved him so very much.
Sorry.
Two hours waiting and he'd finally broken, firing off a half dozen rambling missives full of spelling and grammar mistakes, not even caring. He'd told her that it might be over – he'd meant his career but he hadn't clarified. He hadn't stopped to think that maybe she wouldn't understand without the context because she hadn't been here to see the looks on their faces. Humpty Dumpty was broken. He wasn't getting back up on that wall. He'd told her that buying the house in Miami might have been the worst sort of mistake, given how unstable things in Uncensored had gotten. She hadn't replied. She didn't show up and the sun was setting in the western sky over the parking lot when he'd given up and just called a cab. He'd expected the house to be empty when he arrived home. He wasn't disappointed there.
He'd stopped bothering to fight inevitability. The retirement tour was almost out of stops and he knew that the end was in sight. He could see it now and the last thing he wanted to do was go out with a whimper.
darkhorseonline.net blog posting || 11-24-2016 00:36 HOURS MIAMI
(originally posted as private, changed to public on 11/27/2016)
DAYS SOBER: 1019
Back on the insomnia trip. Seems to go hand-in-hand with this time of year and I can barely comprehend where the year's gone. Been up for days. Still awake, brain won't fuck off and it's not because I'm stewing over the prospect of facing a guy who wears the same legend mask I do. Nope. Been steeped in bullshit memories, drawing a parallel 'cause that's my deal.
Everything's become some sort of déjà vu. Endless Fibonacci spirals – goddamned patterns repeating. I know by the time anyone reads this, the guilt trip holiday will be over. I'm going to make sure this doesn't go live until the weekend because I need that buffer. I need to revisit – revise – make sure I'm not telegraphing too much and I know I'm going to break something that's barely mended. I'm sorry, Pixie Lee. Maybe by the time people read this, you'll understand. Maybe I'll have owned my shit. Let's call a spade a spade. It's cowardice. It's the worst kind of climbing-the-walls paranoia. The machine is broken. Has been for years.
And now I'm thinking about poor decisions and how I've inexplicably made it despite my lack of common sense. Yeah, I'm too stupid – too stubborn – to stop before it goes too far. Those people out there, they get it. They know what to expect. They know I don't give a fuck – isn't a single altruistic urge stirring in these old bones of mine.
Things change. Erosion sucks.
People don't like to face that reality. Even I'm not exempt from that. I rant and I rail and I impotently shake fists at the heavens in lamentation but my hair is still silver and my bones still ache and the days where Jackson versus Nirvana would be a marquee headliner for MSG are six or seven years in the rearview. That's not downplaying. That's fact.
Dirty mindfucks serve as currency this month. I'm talking sure things and I know how stupid that is – laurel resting should be an Olympic sport – scaled bullshit mountain YEARS ago. Planted a flag. Few years later got impaled with it. History doesn't matter and I legitimately don't give a fuck about jockeying for position. I was being facetious when I asked for this replacement slot. Do I need another title? Nope.
Not that I expect any of you to read these little missives. I feel like I'm really just typing these to purge my own angst most times. And if you're reading this, you're probably thinking: "Jesus wept; when is this asshole gonna actually retire?"
Do I need to shut up? Yeah, probably.
Probably die before that happens.
––Jax
Miami || November 24, 2016 [off camera]
The Macy's parade was on TV, volume muted, blue light washing over him, doing no justice. His hair was still silver, more icy Jack Frost than jolly Santa, like the color had been leached from him the hard way. Shirtless, the difference to his body was very apparent - he was still toned enough, arms still covered in those faded signposts of a life half-squandered, still holding enough strength to rip a phone book in half. His ribs showed when he breathed in, the softness around his middle almost seeming like the latest state-of-the-art Jax subterfuge. He sighed, clearing his throat against the tickle there. Dry - he needed a drink but he didn't want to move. Didn't want to acknowledge existence beyond blinking blearily in the LCD glow.
Maybe he'd spend the whole day in bed. Why not? He'd already fired off a schmaltzy 'thankful' tweet that would have posted by now. What else remained for the day but gluttony and football? Neither held much appeal. He was happier to just sprawl, half-propped on pillows, loath to move because right now nothing was aching or throbbing or creaking or popping in some way.
The phone lit up again.
Third time's the charm.
He watched the light fade, wink out and then it flared again. Three missed calls. Three voicemails left. He waited until the shower in the bathroom turned on, the white noise soothing in its camouflage and then he was stabbing at the screen, missing that tactile release of pushing actual buttons.
That disembodied voice came from the speaker, tinny, muffled by the mattress. "First message, sent today at seven fifteen AM."
"What? Tell me you are kidding! I have been spending all day in the kitchen to create this dinner. Please, call me."
He winced with each word, closing his eyes. "Fuck."
"Second message, sent today at eight seventeen AM."
This one started with a sigh. A long, drawn-out exhale and then, "an hour's passed without you getting back to me. Dad? That's not funny. I am sorry if I have upset you in any way... but I wanted us to spend that day together. As family. We've already missed so much time. I can come to you." She paused for another sigh, the sadness there even though she was trying her hardest to keep it from her tone, "pick up your damn phone."
He shook his head, feeling that burning in his sinuses and he fumbled for the phone, trying to stop it, trying to keep from hearing the third because he knew the stages by heart. Denial. Sorrow. Surely anger was next. Accidentally, he replayed the second again, stabbing the button to erase it midway through. The shower cut off. He didn't notice because the only thing in the room was the unholy fury in his adopted daughter's voice.
"Okay, you know what? Whatever the fuck." She was breathing hard. Probably pacing. "You promised to come here and then decided you didn't care. Fine. Fuck it. I should be used to people not giving a shit. I wish you a great Thanksgiving."
The floor creaked. He didn't look up, ending the call without deleting the message. The silence was heavy, making him feel like he needed to fill it. "She's pissed." His voice shook, that raw emotion making his throat ache, "gonna have to tell her. Everything."
His forehead impacted with the desk hard enough to rattle the pens in the Watchmen coffee mug. The words on the laptop screen were still there when he closed his eyes against the sensation of that mythical knife twisting in his guts. When Lyv had said she wanted to start seeing a counselor to try and work through the things her step-father had done to her, he'd been supportive, despite how he felt about that whole process. Talking had never done him much good in the long run. She'd told him she felt numb and he'd chalked that up to the pregnancy hormones. She'd told him that she felt overwhelmed, that she felt like she was suffocating and he'd given her space. He'd cancelled two bookings in a row on bullshit, make-believe injuries just so that he was close. In case she needed him.
He'd gone to Estero at the end of July – a two-hour drive on the other side of the state. He'd blown out his knee again during the match and the damned Uncensored Primo Championship title belt had shifted back to James Donovan. Nobody cared. Nobody outside of a handful of Twitter followers and people in this godforsaken state even knew who that asshole was. It wasn't a big deal.
His knee, though? That was. He'd spent the night in the hospital under observation while they ran a bunch of tests. He'd barely made it back up the ramp under his own power and the second he had, he'd been on the floor, puking his guts out from the pain. His kneecap had ended up back where it belonged, but it felt wrong somehow and nobody understood what he was trying to tell them until they saw the dark spots on the first X-Ray. They were talking torn meniscus and debating if another surgery was going to be necessary within the hour and he'd had to fight tooth and nail to get a hold of his cell phone so that he could send her a message. They'd pumped him full of painkillers and he'd been over the moon for a few hours. He'd texted her, telling her that he was scared, that he'd let them push the pills into his hand because it hurt too goddamn much not to and that he was afraid that the seal was broken irreparably. He'd spent an hour sending message after message out there, watching the little check marks pile up as they confirmed and he hadn't heard a damn thing back. A day had turned into two because he'd lost time in the middle of a conversation with the specialist and they were convinced he had some sort of post-concussion syndrome now on top of the fucked up knee.
He'd been waiting for that reply from her for twelve hours by then and it was tearing him apart. He'd sworn he felt the phone vibrate in his pocket but there was nothing there when he'd pulled it out. Nothing. He'd zoned out because he'd had that ringing in his ears, that bullshit déjà vu all over again and he knew – they offered to call someone to come get him because he couldn't drive with his knee seized up like that. Thirty-six hours later, discharged with a new scrip for a new drug, cortisone shots in the joint to buy some time. Maybe he'd get by if he was careful – fucking safe words that meant nothing when he was getting raped by his own stupid decisions.
He'd waited in the lounge for two hours that morning with a brittle smile on his face because she'd finally replied, saying she'd been tired and hadn't been sleeping well the last few days. She'd missed his calls, missed his texts but she was sorry and she loved him so very much.
Sorry.
Two hours waiting and he'd finally broken, firing off a half dozen rambling missives full of spelling and grammar mistakes, not even caring. He'd told her that it might be over – he'd meant his career but he hadn't clarified. He hadn't stopped to think that maybe she wouldn't understand without the context because she hadn't been here to see the looks on their faces. Humpty Dumpty was broken. He wasn't getting back up on that wall. He'd told her that buying the house in Miami might have been the worst sort of mistake, given how unstable things in Uncensored had gotten. She hadn't replied. She didn't show up and the sun was setting in the western sky over the parking lot when he'd given up and just called a cab. He'd expected the house to be empty when he arrived home. He wasn't disappointed there.
He'd stopped bothering to fight inevitability. The retirement tour was almost out of stops and he knew that the end was in sight. He could see it now and the last thing he wanted to do was go out with a whimper.
hide my head, i wanna drown my sorrow
no tomorrow, no tomorrow
— Gary Jules
no tomorrow, no tomorrow
— Gary Jules
darkhorseonline.net blog posting || 11-24-2016 00:36 HOURS MIAMI
(originally posted as private, changed to public on 11/27/2016)
DAYS SOBER: 1019
Back on the insomnia trip. Seems to go hand-in-hand with this time of year and I can barely comprehend where the year's gone. Been up for days. Still awake, brain won't fuck off and it's not because I'm stewing over the prospect of facing a guy who wears the same legend mask I do. Nope. Been steeped in bullshit memories, drawing a parallel 'cause that's my deal.
Everything's become some sort of déjà vu. Endless Fibonacci spirals – goddamned patterns repeating. I know by the time anyone reads this, the guilt trip holiday will be over. I'm going to make sure this doesn't go live until the weekend because I need that buffer. I need to revisit – revise – make sure I'm not telegraphing too much and I know I'm going to break something that's barely mended. I'm sorry, Pixie Lee. Maybe by the time people read this, you'll understand. Maybe I'll have owned my shit. Let's call a spade a spade. It's cowardice. It's the worst kind of climbing-the-walls paranoia. The machine is broken. Has been for years.
And now I'm thinking about poor decisions and how I've inexplicably made it despite my lack of common sense. Yeah, I'm too stupid – too stubborn – to stop before it goes too far. Those people out there, they get it. They know what to expect. They know I don't give a fuck – isn't a single altruistic urge stirring in these old bones of mine.
Things change. Erosion sucks.
People don't like to face that reality. Even I'm not exempt from that. I rant and I rail and I impotently shake fists at the heavens in lamentation but my hair is still silver and my bones still ache and the days where Jackson versus Nirvana would be a marquee headliner for MSG are six or seven years in the rearview. That's not downplaying. That's fact.
Dirty mindfucks serve as currency this month. I'm talking sure things and I know how stupid that is – laurel resting should be an Olympic sport – scaled bullshit mountain YEARS ago. Planted a flag. Few years later got impaled with it. History doesn't matter and I legitimately don't give a fuck about jockeying for position. I was being facetious when I asked for this replacement slot. Do I need another title? Nope.
Not that I expect any of you to read these little missives. I feel like I'm really just typing these to purge my own angst most times. And if you're reading this, you're probably thinking: "Jesus wept; when is this asshole gonna actually retire?"
Do I need to shut up? Yeah, probably.
Probably die before that happens.
––Jax
and i find it kinda funny
i find it kinda sad
the dreams in which i'm dying
are the best i've ever had
— Gary Jules
i find it kinda sad
the dreams in which i'm dying
are the best i've ever had
— Gary Jules
Miami || November 24, 2016 [off camera]
The Macy's parade was on TV, volume muted, blue light washing over him, doing no justice. His hair was still silver, more icy Jack Frost than jolly Santa, like the color had been leached from him the hard way. Shirtless, the difference to his body was very apparent - he was still toned enough, arms still covered in those faded signposts of a life half-squandered, still holding enough strength to rip a phone book in half. His ribs showed when he breathed in, the softness around his middle almost seeming like the latest state-of-the-art Jax subterfuge. He sighed, clearing his throat against the tickle there. Dry - he needed a drink but he didn't want to move. Didn't want to acknowledge existence beyond blinking blearily in the LCD glow.
Maybe he'd spend the whole day in bed. Why not? He'd already fired off a schmaltzy 'thankful' tweet that would have posted by now. What else remained for the day but gluttony and football? Neither held much appeal. He was happier to just sprawl, half-propped on pillows, loath to move because right now nothing was aching or throbbing or creaking or popping in some way.
The phone lit up again.
Third time's the charm.
He watched the light fade, wink out and then it flared again. Three missed calls. Three voicemails left. He waited until the shower in the bathroom turned on, the white noise soothing in its camouflage and then he was stabbing at the screen, missing that tactile release of pushing actual buttons.
That disembodied voice came from the speaker, tinny, muffled by the mattress. "First message, sent today at seven fifteen AM."
"What? Tell me you are kidding! I have been spending all day in the kitchen to create this dinner. Please, call me."
He winced with each word, closing his eyes. "Fuck."
"Second message, sent today at eight seventeen AM."
This one started with a sigh. A long, drawn-out exhale and then, "an hour's passed without you getting back to me. Dad? That's not funny. I am sorry if I have upset you in any way... but I wanted us to spend that day together. As family. We've already missed so much time. I can come to you." She paused for another sigh, the sadness there even though she was trying her hardest to keep it from her tone, "pick up your damn phone."
He shook his head, feeling that burning in his sinuses and he fumbled for the phone, trying to stop it, trying to keep from hearing the third because he knew the stages by heart. Denial. Sorrow. Surely anger was next. Accidentally, he replayed the second again, stabbing the button to erase it midway through. The shower cut off. He didn't notice because the only thing in the room was the unholy fury in his adopted daughter's voice.
"Okay, you know what? Whatever the fuck." She was breathing hard. Probably pacing. "You promised to come here and then decided you didn't care. Fine. Fuck it. I should be used to people not giving a shit. I wish you a great Thanksgiving."
The floor creaked. He didn't look up, ending the call without deleting the message. The silence was heavy, making him feel like he needed to fill it. "She's pissed." His voice shook, that raw emotion making his throat ache, "gonna have to tell her. Everything."
