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I scoff and shift position to check his speed. Anyone else would be pulled over by now.
“Why not?” I ask, realizing his tanned and chiseled face looks more guilty than usual. “Did you poach him, too? How am I supposed to have good storylines when my bookers keep changing?”
“Come work for me and it won’t be a problem. Disastra all day and night.”
I fight the urge to stomp a foot like a child and settle for pressing them both against the floor. I focus on the pressure building in my ankles, rather than the enormous harumph escaping Mac.
“No offense, by the way, for not telling me,” Mac snaps. “But if you’ve got another character cooking –”
“There’s nothing to tell,” I say, pulling out my cell phone. “I don’t need anything but a little rebranding.”
Most wrestlers like talking about their first character. But Mac’s been hounding me about hanging up my space alien persona too much for me to dangle any alternative in his face. I can only do so much with the same tired moves Mac’s killing me with. The same goes for the support roles and lackluster promos, which I’m assuming is also going on. Plain and simple.
“It ain’t the moves,” Mac says. “It’s the shelf life. Hang her up while you still have a choice.”
“As always, a pleasure,” I reply, already going for the door handle as we pull up to my place. “But what Archimedes needs is a purpose and bigger punches. I need props. I need fewer rules.”
“Disastra,” my dad tries. “Talk to Fritz about some experiment gone wrong or something. You can fall into a vat of poison and pop out a goth rocker. But I agree with the reviews.”
“Goth rocker?” Mac asks, which is my cue to get inside my cozy two-bedroom.
“I’ll show you some pictures,” I hear Dad say through the car door.
I roll my eyes and shut the door. Archimedes isn’t going anywhere. But her reputation is. Starting with how she fights. Trainer or no trainer. Fans or no fans.
CHAPTER 2
Ronan
“Wow, Deeds, you’ve outdeed yourself.” I’m not lying to the enamored but harmless fan squealing into my ear.
The chalk rendition of my character Lawless glares up at me with his signature sneer, justifying Dee Dee’s vice grip on my back. The swamp monster has vision and style, if not zero boundaries.
Plus I don’t know what else to call Dee Dee’s latest homage to me other than a masterpiece. It just looks so good. So she deserves the praise, even if it means this two-minute hug I’m currently struggling through.
Her fan art has never been better. And she sent me a drawing of my own Christmas card one year that looked better than the original, which is saying something when that original is a high-resolution snap of me flexing shirtless while sucking on a candy cane and burning Santa’s nice list in my bare hands.
But she did it. Dee Dee’s watercolors changed me a little, which is why the fact she sent it to my home address is water under the bridge at this point. How can I punish someone so well-meaning and talented?
“And that’s my butt,” I say into her damp blue locks, the ones scratching my cheek up good.
Swampsters have some of the most interesting hair, rough like coral but as wet as water. A truly confusing sensation to find yourself buried inside. At least for an orc.
I can’t believe no one at Raucous’s training facility didn’t jump at the handsy gym employee’s offer to spruce the lobby up with an all-villain mosaic. Yours truly at the center, of course. I’d argue to save face but the artist knows best if you ask me, which is half the reason I’m here now. The state-of-the-art training facility, exclusively for Raucous performers, connects to their main offices, where my bastard manager and talent agent is no doubt hiding.
“Your hair smells like cinnamon raisin bread!” Dee Dee’s never been one to keep things in, not in the two years I’ve known her. She hides a smile behind her webbed hand as she lets me back away. “But you probably get that all the time.”
“I do.” I don’t, but what’s the point of wasting time? “Anyway, thanks, Deeds.” She swoons as I throw a lazy wave her way.
I’m here to give Marty Murphy a long-awaited ass-kicking. Verbal style, but still. I should save all my shit talk for the one who really deserves it.
“Wait!” Her lavender eyes bulge as she scurries to the facility’s side door. “After you, Lawless.”
“You found yourself a killer,” I say, drinking in her wide grin.
The fans love it when I hit them with my signature line. Or at least, one of them.
“The treadmills by the window are sanitized!” she hollers, and I toss her a thumbs up without looking back.
