The Web Unravels
Scene One
“We need to talk.”
The least reassuring way to start a conversation. Things had been a little uneasy lately. Alex was running a tighter schedule, travelling all over. Luna had done her best to give him the time and space he needed. A joke taken a little too far perhaps, had resulted in Alex’s phone ringing non-stop by the public. One of those calls had changed a lot for them.
“We need to talk.
Lies, whether overt or via omission were dangerous. Especially in a relationship with such a tumultuous past. Yet, she had no one to blame but herself. They all had no one to blame but themselves. They’d taken that vow, to ensure Alex’s sake of mind. To protect a wounded man in his time of weakness. They’d never expected Leon to go the way he did. They never expected any of it.
“We need to talk.
So they had talked. It hadn’t been a particular long conversation. He just wanted the truth. Why was Leon dead, and why had they hid it from him. So, even confronted with reality, why couldn’t she be honest with him? This person she loved, who had expressed nothing more than wanting to forgive. Who had been respectful in their decisions to not tell him of where Leon’s whereabouts after her brother had run him off.
“We need to talk.
Alex had flown from Jordan to Puerto Rico that night. That had always been the plan, but there was never a plan for the resentment. For the sadness, the sorrow.
“I can’t tell you, Alex.”
And he had left. He left her, without another word. Silence and resentment. They had lied, and now they had to be honest. She couldn’t be honest. She’d broken his heart for Leon. How would he react knowing that the one woman he held in highest regard. That Lauren, had also fallen to the same trap? That only weeks before she lost her life, Lauren had also betrayed his trust. To the same man.
Leon fucking Trucose.
She’d watched as Alex got maimed in his match in Puerto Rico. Her heart hurt, knowing that he was far away from her. His heart hurting, his body broken. He’d had a vein cut open in his arm in that match. Potentially life threatening. She’d tried to call, over and over. What did she expect? In the pain he’d simply forgive and forget?
No.
So, there she sat. In a foreign place, in a soulless hotel. Her heart hurting for her own mistakes. Knowing that the heart of ice she had thawed, would never again be warm. That no matter the choices made now. No matter the truth, no matter the way they posed it. There would be no happiness. There would be no love.
“Jimmy, please come help me.”
James, her brother. She’d been on the phone to him non-stop. She’d been pleading with him, begging him for an answer. Something to make the wound in her heart not hurt so deeply. A wound that her brother now shared. Knowing that his best friend would likely never confide in him again. That he’d betrayed his best friend, to protect him. They did it for their love of Alex. Yet…
The web was beginning to unravel.
“We’re fucked, Lulu. We’re fucked.”
And she wept.
Queen of an Empty Kingdom
Scene Two
“Love is a funny little thing. It brings joy beyond all other. A contentment with life that is unachievable in almost any other circumstance. A human emotion that brings with it such beauty and such pain. Love, is what keeps us on track. Love is what brings us to tomorrow and gives us that smile. The smile to greet each day as a new challenge. To know that there is one person in the world, one person beyond all others. One person that truly cares about you. That wants to see you succeed. That will do anything to help you achieve your happiness. Vanity, is not love. Not the the love I preach. Not the love I pretend it is. Self love? An excuse to be heartless.”
Luna sat beneath the steady stream of a shower. Her legs pulled tight to her chest, her head resting on her knees. Her eyes red raw, pained. A drowned rat. Her hair clung to her face in wet clumps. Her clothes, a simple black tee and white jeans, were soaked through. She’d clearly been under the water for a while. Steam filled the air, billowing from the water. Her skin red raw from the heat.
“You had some interesting things to say, when we last met. Deservedness, understanding of a partner. An accusation of being carried. An accusation of whoring myself out for the success. Language, may not be your more express form. A linguistically challenged air-head. But what you meant was clear. You don’t think I belong. You don’t think I deserved to be there, and you thought of me as nothing more than a layabout bitch. Who used someone better to get me over the line. Maybe you have some level of actual understanding there, Kim. Maybe, just maybe. Somewhere deep in that knocked about brain. A foresight into the comings. Problematically however. That nasty words cut deep. Though we came up short, again. You also failed. You failed to step to the plate. Just like us.”
“I already know the excuse. I can already hear the claims. How if Alex had of just kicked out, you and Peter would’ve strode towards victory. That you would have easily executed your master plan, and you would be the current Mixed Tag Team Champions… or whatever. The excuses… not really interested. But hey, why not right? That’s how it works, isn’t it? Kimberly Pain, over confident in it all because she knows best. The veterans always fucking know best. The experience tells them all they need to know, and then. Then they can fly above us pissant rookies. They can fly over us and laud their prior successes as if they fucking mean a thing. Your flagrant behaviour mocks me, Kimberly. It fucking mocks me, and I do not like it. I care fucking not for it. Just like you. I don’t give a fuck.”
She released one of her arms from the vice grip on her knees, moving it up into her hair. Grabbing hold of a bunch and pulling at it. Her fingers tightened around her own hair. A wince of pain, a flash of being uncomfortable. Then a blank face. Expressionless.
“See, here’s the fucking kicker, Kim. I didn’t step into this business to be carried. I didn’t step into this business to dance with the success of another and flout it as my own. No, I stepped into this business because I wanted to. I wanted to be like the men I love. I wanted to prove myself equal to my brother James. I wanted to prove myself right to stand beside him. To stand beside Alex, and hope that I could wash away the mistakes of our shared past. To fix the wrongs that had been perpetrated and begin anew. A queen to his kingdom, and with it, show everyone what vanity could be. That unflinching self-love is not a mistake of arrogance, but a virtue of truth. I wanted to be that person, and though I’ve stepped short. I’m no more a failure as a person, than you. Painful, though it may be. Painful to hear, and even more so to acknowledge. Yet, you should know what pain is like. You of all people should know what pain feels like, Kim. In your arrogance, will you deny the fault you hold in your own failures? You liked to throw those accusations around. Pretend that because of your steadfast romance, your partner and you were unstoppable. Yet the rookies beat us all. Eiley and Oz, they got the win. They beat all the veterans, and took the crown. How unfortunate for you, Kim. Another failure on your path of redemption.”
“I want you to understand this in particular Kim. Right now, my heart hurts. My love, ruined. My own actions have led to an outcome that was possibly avoidable, yet my fear. My fear in action resulted in watching the man I love, half way across the world, bleeding from a laceration that may never heal. I had to watch as he suffered through that, and knowing. Knowing that the one person in the world he would have found solace in, just days earlier. Had hurt him beyond anything else. Pain, Kim. Pain is something I am all too familiar with. All too familiar feeling, and far too familiar inflicting. Vengeful is the woman scorned, and yet. When she has nothing else to lose. Does she simply stand at the precipice of darkness and lose herself to it? I ask you, Kim. I ask you what you would do. If the mistakes of your past continued to hurt your future. To take away your love. To take away your ability to be who you want to be.”
Anger, and pain. Mixed emotions danced their way across her face, into her eyes. Ice cold, the sharp cutting gaze. Diamonds would crumble beneath the sharp eyes. It wasn’t fleeting, the eyes held the pain. It would not escape. It would not leave. She released her knees, and they slumped out onto the shower floor. Her hands up in her hair, fingers tangling up with the wet strands. Raking her fingers along her scalp, pulling out strands of wet hair.
“I have nothing to lose, Kim. I have nothing I want more than to show him that I am the woman he needs. I am the woman he loves. That I do the bad things I do, because I want to keep him swaddled in a wave of happiness. In warmth. Yet his heart ices over once more, and I can do little. I can do little to help him, unless I am truthful. I must speak the truth. Can you speak the truth too, Kim? Acknowledgement of your own failures? Your own short-comings? It seems an inability of the veteran elite. Always blaming the other person for failing, and never accepting that in the moment they were more skillful. Jessie Salco pretends that I choked. That it was my ineptitude that cost me. Failing to realise that if it was my own mistakes that cost me, then. Then I must be the superior talent. Better, stronger, faster. Just not smarter in that moment. I wonder, Kim. Do you too blame the ineptitude of another for their shortcomings? Will you pretend that you are some kind of superior talent when you stand across from me. Only to lie to yourself when the truth comes. Success is on the shoulder of the winners. Winners are not a fluke of fate. Winners are decided by their actions, and to claim the other’s shortcoming as their reason for victory. It denies you the ability to be uppity. To be superior. To be vain. Vanity allows for no difference. Vanity allows for no changes. Vanity is clear. You are either the best, or your fucking not. And I intend to be the best I can be.”
“I intend to be the best I can be, so that I am worthy. If not in his heart, at least in his pride. To stand beside him, even if he hates me. Even if he wants nothing more than to see me disappear from his life once more. I will prove that I worthy to be the queen of my empty kingdom, and in turn. The queen to his full of life. It all begins with you, Kim. It all begins and ends with you. I step to the plate broken-hearted and with vision. There is no teaching of self-love. A warped idea that fails to capture the truth. The truth that you are not the person you want to be, and you never will. A faux mocking of disinterest. Whatever, right? It doesn’t matter, right? Nothing is worse than the bitch who pretends to be uncaring. When every part of her speaks the opposite. Nothing is worse than those who pretend that they care not for the truth of the situation, yet spend every moment they can trying to be the moments victor. I have to win, Kim. I have to win, so I can give him the world. So I can give Alex everything he deserves. I need this, because without it.”
Darkness.
Unending black.
Luna’s face flashes through the black. Eyes wide, hair across her face.
Darkness.
Another flash, tears this time. Her gaze too cold and hard for the agony in them.
Darkness.
Once more, a drowned rat. Eyes red raw, blood dotting her face where the tears once were.
“Without it, I am nothing.”
Darkness.
“I will wake him up.”
Silence.
Nothing.
Alone
Scene Three
“Please call me, Alex. I’m sorry.”
She pressed the hang up button. Another voicemail. She lay her head down on the coffee table. Her legs laying limply to her side. She gazed at the phone, one hand wrapped around her third bottle of red. She was lost. And she didn’t know what to do.
There was a knock.
There was a knock.
She launched to her feet, and the world swam. Everything tilted in a drunken haze, but she steadied herself.
“Wait, I’m coming.”
She lurched forward, her hand wrapping around the handle. She pulled the door open. There he was. Still in the stupid white tee, and white jeans. They’d done a surprisingly good job of getting all the blood, mustard and dirt out of it. It was off-white, but she didn’t care. He was there.
And then the waterworks came. Tears of agony, regret. Pain. She knew she didn’t deserve to be the one who was hurting. She knew she owed the world to him. But right now, she was hurting. She was hurting for herself.
His eyes… She couldn’t see his eyes. She couldn’t….
And then she woke up.
Alone.
Her bed empty, the empty bottles of wine on the bedside table. Her phone, one notification.
She opened it, a message.
Lexi baby it read.
She opened it, and her heart ached.
“I need the truth, Luna. Why did Leon take his own life? And why was he chased away?”
She curled up, reading the message. Over and over. Her heart ached, but there was peace. A chance to be truthful. A chance to be honest. A chance to have him listen. She would make him listen. She would wake him up.