“Let me tell you this: if you meet a loner, no matter what they tell you, it's not because they enjoy solitude. It's because they have tried to blend into the world before, and people continue to disappoint them.”
― Jodi Picoult, My Sister's Keeper
Undisclosed Cafe
Heraklion, Crete
15.04.2022
7:56am
“Could this be any more idyllic?”
With a faded rhetoric, running a hand back through the scarlet mane that seemed to relish the sea-salted air, Amber Ryan sighed contentedly as the aroma of dark roasted coffee and the faint yet ever-present rush of water racing up the beach edge seemed to satiate the usually stormy demeanour of the former World Bombshells champion.
Perhaps even just seeing the redhead out among the living was enough of a shock to most, usually holed up in a hotel room until absolutely necessary to leave – usually in a dark hoodie and jeans somehow always half a size too big – to see her out and about in a social capacity would have been considered jarring.
No, the Amber of the ring was a separate entity to the one that existed beyond it. Apathetic and unrelenting, the world had come to regard her as a woman willing to dominate any spotlight she might be afforded. Outside of it, she actively avoided socialisation unless mandated, blending in by standing out just enough that her visage might be too much to remember. A shock of red against a swathe of black swallowing her whole. There were hordes born of hell that were likely more approachable.
Amber passed a glance from behind her sunglasses to her left, acknowledging as it was curious. Beside her, SCW Talent Relations aficionado and unofficial ‘get out of trouble’ moderator Cassiopeia Mearns swallowed uncomfortably. Sitting up a little too straight to be natural, posture correct to the point of being physically painful to witness, she regarded the redhead politely, however said nothing outwardly in agreement.
“Honestly, I sometimes forget how much of the world there really is beyond a wrestling ring… We’re so busy going out there and killing ourselves night after night and yet there's all of this…”
Gesturing vaguely, with a little too much flourish to be deliberate, Amber slumped a little back into her chair. Stark white buildings seemed to capture the morning sun, causing them to give off an ethereal glow as though this were a place touched by the keepers of Olympus. Even Amber somehow managed to find it within herself to follow suit, as her slightly wrinkled plain white t-shirt made her scattered freckles almost frolic across her skin.
So used to the garish fluorescence of Vegas and its counterpart rip-offs, Amber bathed in the natural glow. Living by night had seen many wrestlers become almost nocturnal by nature, the kiss of sunlight almost as foreign as a night without restlessness or a morning waking up without pain. Unheard of, really.
Cassie’s silence seemed to touch an unseen nerve though, a static almost crackling between them that neither wanted to be the first to acknowledge. Everything so placid and tranquil, like a souvenir postcard in a gift shop marking up just in time for tourist season. Everything so… perfect. It was no wonder that Amber couldn’t help but break it.
“Alright… I give. Tried to do the whole small talk thing, tried to be conversational. Cassie, come on. What's up – what kinda PR mess have I made now that's got you so on edge? I mean seriously, I can feel it from here.”
Amber didn’t bother looking in the younger blonde's direction as she spoke – the rustling of Cassie's sundress as it fell around her knees becoming the only thing that might have touched the silence as it fell between them again. Casual yet scathing, like sarcasm had been framed and thrown into an exhibit as parody and taken as gospel.
“Don’t make me– ”
“You told me you were going to handle things with Masque.”
Amber trailed off before the smaller blonde interjected with an uncharacteristic bluntness, almost shrinking back in her seat a little as realisation washed over. In response though, Amber returned a brief, light hearted chuckle.
“Ah…”
“Yeah. Ah.”
Adjusting her t-shirt sleeve absent-mindedly, Amber thoughtfully considered the moment.
“Let me ask you a question–”
“Miss Ryan, if you are going to try and tell–”
Putting up a finger towards Cassie, Amber’s stare hardened and even through the lens of a cheap pair of airport sunglasses, it hit home far harder than it probably needed to, while Cassie settled back uncomfortably. Amber didn’t mean to be so… ‘Amber’ however sometimes things needed to be said, justifications and reasoning still had their place even in their chosen barbaric societal structures.
“Now, now. Let me finish… Has she done anything untoward since?”
It was an honest question laced within the depths of a minefield, unanswerable without setting off a chain reaction of potential responses as though they’d been rehearsed. Both of them knew, perhaps even before the question had fallen out limply between them and yet, they both indulged freely as though testing for whose legs might give out first.
“You mean aside from what's going to happen in that upcoming match with poor Miss Benton? Or any one of the previous … Can I even call them 'matches'? Feels like that gives it too much leeway as something controlled. Did you see her out there …”
With a dismissive wave, Amber replied ineffectually.
“Towards you, Cassie.”
“I don’t think that embrace actually changed–-”
“Has she---”
Silence for a few moments. Three attempts at forming the words with uncertain lips.
“No.”
Firmly, perhaps frustrated enough to see that the circular nature of their discussion was going nowhere fast, Cassie clasped her fingers together as though determinedly trying to somehow impose on Amber. Amber, however, didn't seem to notice as she idly picked at some stray threads that pulled from the rip towards the knee of her jeans.
“Precisely. So therefore… It is handled.”
Amber could see Cassie’s perspective freely, it was one that she’d held for the longest time. Even now the faint rustle of a 5 year old flyer from the last Boardwalk Wrestling event still folded poorly in her pocket carried that weight of expectation. She understood that from any outside perspective it might have looked like – perhaps as an exaggeration – that Amber had finally lost her fucking mind.
There was more to it than that though, however trying to explain it would never amount to more than disapproving and doubtful stares. Iit was no real secret that Amber and Masque had been at odds for the longest time. Opposing forces fighting for what they believed was right and true, neither willing to give ground, but not willing to advance for fear of reprisal either.
No, things had changed dramatically. Whether Cassie realised, or chose to believe it or not.
Their embrace had cemented a new level of trust between them – as uneasy as the foundation truthfully was. Hell, it left a burning sensation in her chest and a faint bitterness on the back of her tongue when Amber came to realize that she was actively defending Masque in spite of their history.
However, what was easily forgotten by those who chose to manipulate history for their own legacies was that from the moment she returned, to the moment the title was lost… Masque was the only one who didn’t treat the redhead as a victim of her own circumstances. That didn’t think she was losing her goddamn mind on a weekly basis for a trinket.
Throughout everything – for better or worse – Masque was the only one who never treated Amber any different whether she was champion or not. As a person, Amber was given total freedom without fear of judgement and in return perhaps Masque was one of the few who understood how much would need to be destroyed of the Vegas lights, leaving them to bleed sanguine fluorescence all over their best intentions, before they could be rebuilt. Before they could be made resplendent.
“Besides…”
Amber included thoughtfully, whilst trying to sift out all the bile and vitriol that had collected in her tone.
“By proxy, you signed up for all of this. The good, the bad and the criminally insane. You made that decision, so don’t you owe it to yourself to see it out?”
Reaching across the table and using a cursory glance for guidance, Amber rested a hand on Cassie’s forearm, the scars she knew were there hidden underneath a loose, billowing sleeve as the younger woman flinched reflexively beneath her touch.
“... And furthermore, Miss Mearns.”
A little sarcasm crept in as Amber arched her back in a stretch that cracked and popped, as vertebrae seemed to shift and groan beneath the strain.
“Who else would be as willing to save me from my own terrible decision making… Honestly Cassie, I really don’t know what I’d have done without you in the last few months. Probably gone to jail in all likelihood. I doubt Christian likes me quite enough to be bailing me out everytime something minorly inconveniences me.”
Another offhanded chuckle, this one though didn’t pull nearly as intensely between her ribs. Genuine as she might muster, the half smile cracked through the freckled glacial facade that Amber otherwise wielded constantly. If nothing else, she hoped to put Cassie at ease, even if Amber herself wasn’t entirely convinced of the words that tumbled forth so freely.
“Look, believe it or not… While I’m around, Masque can’t nor will do you any harm. I promise…”
Amber found the words falling heavily before she could do anything to stop them. An avalanche of syllables she hadn’t anticipated bringing the whole damn mountain on top of her already overloaded expectations. Cassie either didn’t register, or was too polite to make mention of the way Amber’s smile seemed to flicker uncomfortably before falling into something distinctly less emotive.
It wasn’t any less true though, Amber quietly admitted. She had no intention of letting Masque claim yet another Flower Girl Named After The Stars – even if this one had far less dirt collected under her nails.
******
“You’re gonna think I’ve gone mad.
Maybe you already think I am. Isn’t that quite the little paradox?
… but I saw the strangest thing today. Jigsaw puzzle pieces just scattered in the dirt, as though someone had dutifully taken a box and just scattered it's cardboard contents out into the universe. Imagine it Levana, a thousand pieces of nothing, meaningless as singular potentials just laying there begging to be made whole. Made tangible.
What struck me was that all the pieces were there… the wind hadn’t moved them, there wasn’t a corner nibbled or a handful of pieces left laying just beyond sight. No, everything that was required to make it worthwhile was right there.
And no one had touched it. I wonder how many had walked by and thought that it was too much trouble just cause it was a little dirty, a bit scattered- but otherwise close enough to whole that all it needed was time…
That's the trouble with what we do Levana, all we’ve got is time and yet it's our fucking worst enemy. Everything we do is predicated on it, our worth is measured by it to a degree- hell, if you speak to Jessie Salco and Mercedes Vargas they’ll tell you that longevity is the key to making your name.
Maybe if you’re content with mopping up the dregs of curtain jerkers, then you’d be inclined to believe them.
Others believe that everything has to be achieved fast- burn bright and burn out, no slow embers here… You show up for your 15 minutes and hope it was long enough that people don’t forget you as soon as the next face makes their way on stage.
Time is a cruel mistress cause a lot of stake is put into it.
It means absolutely nothing- yet here we are still running out of it.
That's where you are right now, I suppose. At the end of your fucking tether looking for a sacred minute to remind people you really weren’t just the flash in the pan that people are making you out to be. You weren’t just that hot little minute in the Blast From The Past coasting at the side of someone who wanted it just a little more. You weren’t just another fireball trying to turn everything around you to cinder in hopes that destruction was the key to memorium.
Don’t get me wrong- I recognize someone with a fire in their belly. One that might threaten to consume them if they allow it to, those fearsome embers that you keep stoking in hopes someone might be the fuel to your flame. Tell me though, are you willing to let it consume you- or do you stay your hand for fear that consequence might take more than it gives in this case?
After all, they say patience is a virtue but the clocks are ticking and we’ve already come to prove that time isn’t exactly on your side. How many more, with less resilience and less passion than you, are going to pull ahead before you decide to stop waiting to be lit up. How many more breakdowns and falters at the first major hurdle will it take to send someone already teetering on the edge of humanity and reason off the edge like a shot cause falling feels better than standing still, cause at least you’re going somewhere.
From where you were- to where you are now… What little you can pull together and call a career has become a case of plausible deniability.
What I wanna know was where the fuck you have been… Hi there, little girl. I’m looking for the bad bitch who came at me with a venomous diatribe laced with as many obscenities as there were harsh and ineloquent truths from a perspective that needed a voice. I’m looking for the woman who saw everyone shying away and decided that she didn’t give a fuck, that her life had been rendered enough of a forfeit that what she said didn’t matter- only that it needed to be said.
I’m looking for the woman who showed up on my fucking doorstep, when I begged for anyone to just show me a spark- you came and set my goddamn house ablaze. There were no underdogs between us, no deja vu of every other challenger who declared themselves defeated before stepping across the line I had drawn.
See, that Levana Cade came for me in a dark time when I was faced with a flurry of sympathy pleas and mercies unbecoming of the mouths they spewed from. In one moment they’d stake their claim and as soon as I gave them my attention, they wilted and retracted their virulence. You came at me with both barrels- a machine gun fire of brutal and frankly toxic honesty… and I fucking revelled in it. I came away from that match with you sporting a black eye and wanting more.
So tell me, sweet girl… if you see that woman around sometime soon, can you let her know that I’m looking for her cause I think I have something I wanna say to her.
I wanna tell her… that I respect the ever living fuck out of her.
Well, I did.
That's just time I suppose, maybe someone dulled a little of your garish shine. Burning a little too bright to be comfortable, turned down a notch for palatability like you ever really cared about that. Listen to me, talking like I know you… like I get where you’re from.
News flash sweetheart- this might not be a cookie cutter mold, but you sure as fuck aren’t the first person totry and give as few fucks as phsyically possible.
I won’t pretend that you don’t remind me a little of Evie Jordan. That you resemble some of what used to look back at me in the mirror. I get it- you probably hate everything and everyone, you think you should be in a far better place. That you’ve earned better, deserve better- publicly.
Outside the spotlight though, when the cameras stop rolling- the truth is you feel like this isn’t your success earned, that you haven’t done nearly enough to get this kinda attention. You wanna slink back into the shadows while telling everyone how resentful you are of them being cast.
By all means tell me I’m wrong, but accept that I’m right.
No longer are you this unknown quantity diving head first into the mire, no you’ve been in deep water for a little while now and still you keep forgetting how easily hell continues to freeze over. Maybe you’re not the open book you’re made out to be, but I know you aren’t nearly the enigma radiating an aura of un-fucking -touchable… cause lets be real.
Darling, you are very fucking touchable…
… That's why you ended up here.”
******
Bane Household
Las Vegas, ND
21.04.2022
10:29am
If you didn’t know otherwise, it would have been easy to assume that the relationship between Amber and Mac was perfect.
Even down to the way that Amber softly padded around the kitchen of a morning, bare feet almost skimming the floor as the heady aroma of coffee filled every space between them. Mac smiled as he sat at the counter, watching as she drifted like the lovely ghost of a hurricane finally bringing calmer winds to their home.
Under every illusion, it would have been easy to assume that nothing had ever been wrong between them- that the silence was simply an everyday comfort and the flashes of quiet smiles and furtive glances when they thought the other wasn’t looking- just a continued courtship.
It had been a little over a year since they’d gotten married now, the anniversary ticking over somewhere above international waters as they flew back from Greece. Briefly the discussion had been about staying a few extra days but business always demanded their time, Mac being World champion meant he’d made commitments long in advance and Amber- for the first time in a very long time… had time to kill.
“You know, it's been way too long.”
Amber quirked an eyebrow as the mug touched the countertop with a soft clink. Pushed across gently while the contents lapped at the edges.
“Since what, precisely?”
Taking a seat across, Amber’s lithe frame seemed dwarfed by Mac’s- even while seated. Somehow though, they struck a easy balance as Amber’s natural projected aura made her just as 6’6 and intimidating as her husband, even in spite of the gentle knowing smile he wore.
“Since we just sat down and didn’t have to rush off to see anyone or do anything… Probably been months since one of us wasn’t rushing to get out the door for one reason or another.”
Along the front verandah, Couyon lazily wandered through the door. Bear sized paws thumped along the floor, tongue lolling contentedly as he sidled up beside Mac for an ear scratch. Amber made a face towards the dog, who’d initially been hers, mouthing the word ‘traitor’ before resigning herself back towards her own coffee.
“I dunno Red, feels like we never get to just talk anymore.”
“That's because usually---”
Amber trailed off as she sipped from the mug, trying to avoid the chip at the rim. Perhaps it was easier to simply let the rest of the statement hang than force into a confrontation, perhaps she was somehow learning that not everything was determined to be an argument. A lesson still in progress.
“Yeah. I know darling. I know.”
More silence as Couyon panted happily, sitting against Mac’s leg.
“I have to say Red, that Mr McCrae seems like a nice enough guy. A lot nicer than the people who’ve been showing up on our doorstep in recent memory.”
Amber bit the inside of her cheek, swallowing the knee jerk response. She knew what Mac was trying to do- open some doors, break down some walls. Marriage wasn’t supposed to be built on a foundation determinedly left under shadows and tarpaulin- Mac was as open as anyone might be, his past laid bare with all it's good and bad free to be flipped through at leisure.
Amber didn’t feel as easily about exposing the underbelly of her background- not that Mac wouldn;t love her as unconditionally otherwise, but because it had already proven willing to try and cost them everything if she spoke the wrong syllable it seemed.
They’d lost almost everything because of her unwillingness to speak, as easily as they’d almost lost everything because she was too willing to vent.
“Reverend McCrae.”
Amber corrected thoughtfully, trying to pick through the mess of sounds that wanted to explode from her lips. Something twinged inside as she tried to swallow the response, a sense of deja vu like cold water splashed against the inside of her chest.
“Yeah, he’s certainly someone… A man with few problems and almost infinite reasons to solve them.”
Distractedly, perhaps in hopes of deflecting, Amber gently shifted the mug along the counter top between her hands.
“Normally I’d agree with you, however a man like that doesn’t just offer something for nothing… as charitable sort he might be. I just need to know if this is someone we can actually… I dunno… have faith in to do everything he says and what it might potentially cost us.
You know the man obviously better than I do Red, so the question is… is it worth it?”
Bluntly, it was a brave move to step so confidently into the minefield of Amber’s psyche. Each step threatening to be the one that left them in a place of irreparable conflict. Mac didn’t just want a yes or no answer, as much as Amber would have like to keep her response to something monosyllabic.
After everything, perhaps she owed Mac a little more than a vague shrug and a non-committal half truth. Besides- what was the worst that could come of it?
“He’s a man of his word Mac. Guy like that doesn’t get his fingers that deep into things while maintaining a shiny white exterior without being potentially willing to follow through on everything.
Personally, I don’t know him as well… our relationship I suppose was business. Dominic and I…”
Amber paused harshly, the taste of Dominic’s name on her tongue bringing her to a screeching halt. Gasoline fumes and ash. Choking. Smothering. God, how was she still so vividly able to feel that what on her skin…
“... We, uh, we did some work for him. Was supposed to be a step up- you know?
Young and ambitious, I was just happy to be making some real money instead of chasing down people for loans they were never able to afford. McCrae told us it would be more ‘honest’ work, at least on the surface, a more legitimate way to make our names and expand our contacts. Mutual benefits.”
Flashes of memories flooded through as Amber’s expression drifted further away, her eyes dulling as she rolled further back through the years.
“As you can imagine though, it wasn’t enough for Dominic. He wasn;t prepared to just be an underling, despite the fact we were making more in a day than I was making in months in the ring… So he started skimming off payments, using connections to get a hook into ‘clients’ that might have been inclined to do more private business with a ‘friendlier’ face.
Dominic Del Gado got greedy, shock and fucking horror…”
Amber’s fingers drummed against the countertop reflexively, the nervous energy building in a way that she couldn’t express. Mac simply watched on pensively, each word like it's own smaller tale, filling the gaps left between her pauses.
“McCrae told me that I should leave him… that Dominic’s actions had consequences and that I shouldn’t be brought down because of them. Just walk away and don’t look back.”
Scoffing slightly at the memory of her younger self, Amber gave Mac a knowing look that explained what came next without ever saying a word, before she continued.
“It's funny, cause I thought I was in love. I thought that I might actually be able to earn my way into being loved. God, I was young, blind and stupid. I tried to break things off instead of just leaving… like I fucking owed him anything of the sort.”
Something wells at the edge of Amber’s eye but she swiped it away before it ever gets the chance to trace down her cheek. Fury and hurt still radiating after years gone by.
“McCrae wanted to show that actions had consequences. He would have done just that, but Dominic was a brazen coward and left me to his fate. That's when I finally called things off for good.”
Swallowing hard, Amber took a moment to allow everything to process. Perhaps the openness being the first sign of willingness to heal. To change. To be better. Mac’s hand left Couyon’s head, much to the Cane Corsos annoyance and came to rest on Amber’s fidgeting hand- stilling it with a touch.
“Alistair McCrae is a man of his word as much as he’s a man of God, Mac. However that doesn’t mean his hands aren’t stained by just the bread and wine of communion. Whatever he thinks he wants- it's something that he can’t do himself.
As much as I don’t want to put us in that position, I know that the garage might become a project we never find the time to finish.”
Mac squeezed her hand gently, knowing that they’d both made their decision long before the conversation ever started.
“Just the idea of being in love makes us all do really stupid fucking things, Mac. Makes us choose the worst decisions by justifying that theres something there at the end unconditionally… It's the consequences though, that determine whether it was ever really worth it.”
******
“I won’t sit here and pretend you’re stupid enough to believe that things haven’t changed since we last faced.
I can’t pretend like I haven’t been adrift, lost in space recently.
I mean, after all, I lost the title right? The one thing that made me unstoppable… Well, you’d also be pretty fucking dumb to believe that I wasn;t already that before I had the belt- but honestly wonders never cease to amaze me around here.
You’re a smart enough girl Levana, I like to think you aren’t jaded enough by your own failures to start pretending as though you’re still worth a fuck when your win loss record starts looking like a bingo call sheet… 35. 77. 12.
Yahtzee!
I won’t sit here and tell you that I lost and everything was fine. That would make me a liar and frankly- there are more than enough people already lying to themselves around here without me perpetuating the cycle. No, Levana… I went and I hit rock bottom as hard as I fucking could, cause the problem with the top is that theres no where left but down, only they never tell you that theres nothing to stop you inbetween.
No I went and I hit rock bottom, and you know… I’ll be damned if it didn’t start hitting me back.
Tell me, do you feel lucky to find me so low?
Such a grand opportunity to just step across my backbone while I’m still pulling my face out of the dirt, I’d hate for you to simply let it pass you by.
No, Levana… don’t you feel lucky yet? This is your chance, hell I am GIVING you this chance. Do something with it, just anything instead of leaving it pathetically bleeding all over the floor cause some poor bastard just cleaned this carpet.
Really, you shouldn’t… You shouldn’t feel it at all.
Cause luck abandoned people like us long ago.
We didn’t get here cause the universe wanted us to. We both have something to prove to each other after all… Many will say that I haven’t anything to prove to someone whose greatest achievements have all come from winning via proximity, like lions aren’t supposed to care about the opinions of sheep.
You and I though, we aren;t the feline type chasing the end of our nine lives just to see if it really lives up to all the hype- no, we’re all teeth and claws fuelled by a burrowing void that determinedly eats any goodness we might inadvertently attract.
We are poison Levana, and you’d do damn well to remember that fact. Bloodstained and furious at a world that told us we didn’t belong, splattered in crimson derision the moment we tried to be something that wasn;t preordained.
Only you seemed to forget that you have to break through the ice as it tries to close you in, not wait to become irreparable numb.
By all means though, you go ahead and make note of my failure to continue reigning long enough for you to try and challenge- like I was planning on being World Champion when I was 62 years old and you decided to finally get your shit together.
Maybe you’ll say I was simply unfit to last that long, maybe you’ll say I just ran out of gas as though the tank wasn’t already dry two months earlier. Maybe you’ll tell me how you expect Roxi to be as disappointing as predicted despite being the lesser of two evils, cause lord knows the Myra Rivers ‘redemption tour’ is on it's fifteenth lap with no signs of slowing down.
You won’t, though, try and tell me that Roxi was the better woman… cause we both know that I’m still the fucking Queenpin of Sin City, and anyone who walks out of Into The Void as champion simply has the belt on loan.
That's the beautiful thing you see, I’m as irredeemable as I am dominant with or without MY title. I can still reign as Queenpin without a crown and sceptre to mark my rule- that locker room knows me better than anyone who might challenge in my stead. All those champions look over their shoulder for me, not the other way around.
Only thing that's changed really is I can no longer just drape some gold over the massive fucking chip on my shoulder and pass it off as a side effect of success. I’m still the top of the mountain, they just lowered the bar of entry- I built that world title mountain for everyone else to climb and you’re still trying to lace up your spiky boots.
Please do tell me how I was supposed to just roll over for you though like a loss on my record wouldn’t matter. I built this Queendom, but that doesn’t entitle every goddamn stray to take a bite off my plate.
Granted it's really easy to throw shade when you’re always sitting in the dark, but it's a damn sight harder when the spotlight is on and all of a sudden you’re struggling for something meaningful to say.
Granted this time around I don’t have a title to offer you, but allow me to stand yb and bare my throat- truth is Levana, I’ve done it so many times now that the idea of someone actually taking a bite is laughable and yet, you won’t hesitate… not because you think you can bring me down, but because you HAVE to attack. You have to continually be on the offensive otherwise the absolute drivel you sputter otherwise won’t mean a fucking thing.
You have to go out there and back up every syllable, Levana.
Otherwise you’re just another tough bitch with a big mouth and no fucking teeth left.
Yeah, congrats… You got my attention. Just a real shame you have no fucking idea what to do with it…
That's the thing isn’t it?
You need it, to say you had it. You mean more cause of what I’m doing. I mean we live and breathe in an industry that rewards self-sacrifice and selfishness equally. You have to be bigger than everyone else, but you need those around you to make you into that person to begin with.
Hell, we thrive in an industry where dying in that ring is almost as aspirational as getting a gold watch for 20+ years of hard service- as abhorrent as it is, it's something we’ve all considered at least once. We’re out there night after night Levana borrowing time, borrowing successes and borrowing our names.
Come Sunday Levana, I’m gonna change your perspective cause you think you understand this industry… Why, cause you know pain and you know hate so intimately you may as well let them live rent free. You understand the way people tick when they don’t tock and how their insides are just as filthy when they are exposed to the light. However you understand so much more little than you realize- the world might be a cruel mistress, but she’s yet to really show you what she’s capable of when you actually start giving a fuck about who you are.
You’re young and pretty, a lifetime of potential ahead despite how dim you think the lights are- and maybe if you stick it out, you’ll get left with a souvenir at the end of it all, if you’re lucky. A moment of glory that flickers between the concussions, a fleeting memory of that one point when you were finally everything you thought you deserved- and be damned if you don’t cling to it for dear life cause it justifies your existence.
It makes all this misery and horror worthwhile regardless of everything else in your life telling you otherwise.
You have everything you could ever desire at your fingertips… and to watch you just dither it all away cause you’re too pissed off about nothing to think straight.
Maybe you’re just finding your feet, taking all the bad streets to get there. Self sabotage. Addiction. Sacrifice. Eventually you just put on a face and tell everyone that's the best they are getting… except you’re tracing a little close to the line of apathy and frankly that's just gimmick infringement so maybe stay the fuck off my lawn, child.
In the end Levana, we aren’t just beautiful and fragile things to be broken by someone else's carelessness. We are the broken things passing themselves off as whole to the wrong people and expecting validation for simply still being.
You are just like me…
… and I’m going to prove to you why that's the worst possible thing you could have chosen.”
