Chapter 77: The Divide
The morning after I confronted him felt wrong in my bones. Too quiet. Too bright. Too normal in a way that made my skin crawl. My body moved through the kitchen like it belonged to someone else. My hands poured coffee. My feet carried me from counter to table. My breath rose and fell in a rhythm that didn’t feel earned. Outside, the city carried on like nothing in it had shifted. But something had. Something in me. It wasn’t dramatic. It wasn’t grief. It wasn’t even fear. It was that strange, suspended state where numbness presses itself flat against the edges of something raw and restless. Like two opposing fronts meeting over the same landscape. The air between them electric but unmoving. I wasn’t falling apart. But I wasn’t whole either.
I stood there long enough that the coffee went cold. And the quiet became unbearable. Tasmin. Her name drifted through my mind like an impulse or a warning. He had gone to see her too. That thought throbbed with a violent sort of heat under my ribs. If he had scared her, If he had touched the serenity she’d built, If he had brought even a fraction of our past to her doorstep, The restlessness in me rose like a spark catching oxygen. I grabbed my keys.
Tasmin lived across town in a small apartment painted in soft colors that made every corner look like sunrise. The kind of place where time seemed to slow for her convenience. The kind of place that reminded me she had grown up differently than I did, even though we came from the same walls. I knocked once, and she opened the door almost instantly. Her eyes searched mine with that same unguarded concern she’d always had for me. A softness I had never quite known what to do with. “Kay,” she said, voice warm and tentative at the same time. “You came.”
“I did.” The words felt heavier than they should have. Like something in me dragged behind them, tethered to the ground.
She stepped aside, and I walked in. Her apartment smelled like vanilla and something floral, maybe jasmine. She always liked scents that calmed her. Scents that soothed the air before it could become sharp. She wrapped herself in comfort the way some people wrapped themselves in armor. I stood in the center of her living room, unsure what shape to take. Tasmin hovered near the doorway for a moment, watching me the way someone watches an animal that isn’t dangerous but could be if cornered. “You look…” She took a small breath. “Tired.”
“I am.”
“Did you sleep at all?”
“No.” The honesty surprised even me. She nodded, not pushing, not prying, just absorbing the truth like water into dry soil.
“Sit?” she asked gently. I didn’t want to sit. I didn’t want to stay still. Something in me felt like pacing, like tearing the quiet apart with movement. But I lowered myself onto her couch anyway. Tasmin settled across from me, legs folded under her, hands in her lap. She always made herself small when trying to make space for me. It wasn’t submission, it was care. For a moment we said nothing. The quiet felt like a tensioned wire between us, humming faintly. Then she broke it. “He came to see me,” she said softly.
I closed my eyes for half a second. Long enough for a shard of heat to flare beneath the numbness. “What did he do?”
“Nothing,” she said quickly. “Nothing bad. Nothing… wrong.”
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
Her brows pinched. “Kay…”
“What?” I asked, sharper than I intended. “He showed up after twenty fucking years. That alone is wrong.”
“He didn’t force anything,” she said. “He didn’t push. He didn’t raise his voice. He just asked if I was okay.”
“Of course he did.”
She blinked. “What does that mean?”
“It means he knows how to read people. It means he knows how to shape himself into whatever version gets him the least resistance……where do you think I learned it?”
Tasmin flinched. “You think he was manipulating me?”
“I think,” I said slowly, “that men like him don’t stop wanting control. They stop drinking. They stop fighting. They stop destroying the things around them. But they don’t stop trying to control how they’re seen.”
She sat with that for a moment. Let it settle. Let it sink in. “I don’t remember him that way,” she murmured.
“I know.” It wasn’t an accusation. It wasn’t a comfort. It was just the truth.
Tasmin was young when the worst parts of him unfolded like a storm. She remembered noise and tension. Maybe the smell of beer. Maybe the sharpness of our mother’s voice. But she didn’t remember the other things. The quieter things. The way anger lived in the air like mold. The way his moods shifted like weather patterns, unpredictable and devastating. I remembered it all. She didn’t. That was the divide. Tasmin tucked her legs tighter beneath her. “When he stood at my door, he looked… small. Not dangerous. Just… sad.”
Sad. That word again. That soft, forgiving instinct she had always carried. Sadness was not an apology. Sadness was not redemption. Sadness was a color you painted over guilt to make it easier to look at. “He looked older,” I said, voice low. “He looked like a man who’d run out of places to hide.”
Her eyes widened slightly. “Is that what he looked like to you?”
“Yes.”
“And what did he say?”
I looked down at my hands. They were perfectly still in my lap, but the restlessness ran hot underneath, like a pulse out of sync with itself. “He said he’s been clean for fifteen years,” I said. “He said he’s sorry.”
Tasmin’s breath caught softly. “Kay… fifteen years is a long time.”
“And?”
“And,” she said, choosing her words carefully, “people change.”
“Not always enough.”
She held my gaze. Not challenging….just steady. “Do you believe him?” she asked.
“No.”
“Do you want to?”
The question sliced through something in me. Want. The word dug in deeper than accusation or sympathy ever could. I didn’t want him back. I didn’t want a father. I didn’t want forgiveness or nostalgia or second chances. But did I want him to be better than I remembered? That was the part I didn’t want to look at. “I don’t know,” I said finally.
Tasmin nodded like that answer mattered. Like it meant something important. “Kay… I’m not asking you to forgive him, I’m not asking you to see him again. I’m not trying to rewrite what you went through. I just…” Her voice trembled slightly. “I want to understand who he is now.”
A flicker of heat rose behind my ribs again, irrational, protective, primal. “You’re allowed to,” I said quietly. “You’re allowed to talk to him. To ask your own questions. To figure out your own shit…..”
Her mouth parted slightly. “You’re… okay with that?”
“No.” Honesty again. Sharp, clean, unavoidable. “No, Tas. I’m not okay with it. But I’m not going to try to stop you. I won’t become another person who tells you what version of the past you’re allowed to keep.”
Her eyes softened. “Thank you.”
I looked away. “Don’t thank me.”
Silence settled again, but this time it felt different. Heavier. Less fragile. Tasmin leaned forward, elbows on her knees. “Kay… what about you? Will you see him again?”
The question turned the restlessness inside me into something hotter, faster. A pulse under my skin. A drumbeat I didn’t want to acknowledge. “I don’t know,” I said.
“Are you afraid?”
“Yes.” She nodded, not surprised. “And angry,” I added. “And tired.”
“I figured.”
“And part of me…” My voice tightened. “…part of me wants to know what version of him you saw yesterday. Not because I want him back. Not because I owe him anything. But because I don’t like being haunted by old memories when new ones exist…..when my new life exists”
Tasmin’s expression warmed, gentle, hopeful, but not naive. “Whatever you choose,” she said softly, “you don’t have to face it alone.”
I swallowed hard. “I might.”
“Kay….”
“No.” I shook my head. “Some things live with alone first. Some things you face on your own terms before anyone else can stand beside you.”
Her eyes softened but she didn’t push. She never pushed. And that was why I loved her. That was why I feared for her. Because softness like hers was easy to bruise. I stood after a moment, feeling the air shift around me. Tasmin rose too. “You’re leaving?”
“For now.”
She hesitated. “Are you… okay?”
“No,” I said. “But I will be.”
She nodded. “Come back when you’re ready.”
“I will.” And for the first time in a long time, I meant it. As I stepped into the hallway, the numbness and restlessness inside me pressed against each other like two storms converging. Not peace. Not stability. But motion.
And maybe, just maybe, that was enough for now.
Wolfe Huntin
”Oh, are you all scared yet?”
The English accent of Kayla Richards cuts through the darkness as we see her leaning back on a chair. It is an old wooden-style throne. Wait, where the fuck did Kayla Richards get a throne? We are getting sidetracked. Kayla is sitting on a throne leaning on one arm of it while her legs dangle over the other.
”You should be. Because mommy has her mojo back. I was terrified there for a moment. I lost to Frankie, watching my championship fly away. Then I lost to Victoria. That one hurt even more. You see, Frankie is a prodigy in this business and she has a mentor who many people fear. Not me. I’m not afraid of Amber Ryan. If that bitch decided to step foot back in SCW I would plant my Doc Martin squarely up her tight Karen asshole and send her packing straight back out of this company.”
“But I understand a lot of you on this roster are terrified of that bitch. And she has been teaching Frankie everything she knows. So Frankie is not without talent. Frankie is not without a great future. But Frankie is currently without legitimacy because after beating me in one of the craziest upsets that I’ve ever seen, she lost the championship to a has-been who keeps limping along in this company like some kind of zombie that time forgot. I didn’t even get my rematch. Instead, we had to watch as someone else took that championship back off her, and then to top it off, I ended up losing to Victoria Lyons. Now, that loss is the one that hurt me. I was already down, and this company decided to fucking kick me.”
“I lost to a woman who fancies herself a queen when she’s a fucking lady-in-waiting at best.”
“…Dunno actually, maybe a courtesan. Head whore in the harem? Store manager at the biggest Burger King in West Texas?”
“Sorry, getting a little sidetracked. The fact remains that when I suffered my first ever back-to-back losses in this company, a lot of you were running around here acting like it was a miracle. That a dark cloud had floated away and it was all sunshine and fucking rainbows. But then, I beat the shit out of Candy. That in and of itself is not a great accomplishment. Neither is beating Zenna, or anyone with the last name Zdunich…”
Kayla pauses, her legs swaying and kicking over the arm of the old wooden throne. Her long black hair flows down the side as she leans on her arm that is sat upward on the arm of the throne.
”So those wins, while not impressive because they were against people who are either has-beens or people who never will be anything, did do something that doesn’t help the rest of you. They reminded me who the fuck I am. And they made me realise that so many of you have forgotten. You all seem to be running around here thinking that you have been freed. Freed of my oppressive nature, freed of my dominance, freed of my championship aspirations and glories.”
“Unfortunately, I’m just getting started.”
“Something that perennial challenger and annoying brat Bella Madison is going to find out when we face each other. But before I get there, there is a lot of fucking around that seems to be happening in my division. You see, I’m locked up facing Bella Madison, and as much as I dislike the little blonde tart, the truth is that she would be a much better challenger for the World Bombshell Championship than the one who is currently going to be facing our champion. This family-divorce drama does not belong in my fucking ring. This is about who the best wrestler is, and Seleana Zdunich is not anywhere close to it.”
“But our ‘champion’ is being distracted by her marital issues.”
“Bella and I are going to beat the hell out of each other. But before I get there, I have to take another pit stop. And this one is just as disappointing as the other ones. Actually, I can’t say that—that would be cruel. Because Cassie Wolfe is not the same as the last two dingbats that I had to beat the shit out of….”
Kayla kicks her legs over the arm down onto the floor, her Doc Martens making a large thud noise as she stands up.
”Cassie, sweetheart, I want you to pay attention because this is the nicest thing that I’m ever going to say about you. You, on the scale of opponents that I have faced in the last few weeks, are the best. That’s it. That’s all I have to say that is positive about you. If we look at you on the scale of who I’ve faced since I lost to Victoria Lyons, you are by far the most challenging opponent that I’ve had and the best of the best that I have faced. Now, don’t get excited, because if you start looking at the competition that you have for that title, it’s definitely not great. Because you’re still not on the same level as me. I mean, don’t worry kiddo, not many people are. You see, as a great man once said, you’re either perfect…”
“…or you’re not me….”
Kayla chuckles and shrugs. Not only is she supremely arrogant, but now she’s ripping off lines from Vegeta in Dragon Ball Z Abridged.
”The truth is, Cassie, that you are being pushed forward here as just another name on my list. A name on a list of people that I’ve beaten multiple times. Not just multiple times, but in embarrassing ways. Every match we’ve had, I’ve won. But you and I have never had a one-on-one match, and that is the one saving grace that you have. The one thing that you can look straight down the camera and say is that I have never beaten you one-on-one, and it would be true because I haven’t. But that doesn’t mean much. It doesn’t mean much because everyone else who has faced me and everyone else who has been put in the ring with me has failed.”
“And recently, all you have done is fail. Hell, you had a tag match against Crystal and Mercedes with Harper at your back, and all it did was make those two look better. And sure, you can point out that I just lost to Victoria and to Frankie, but those are two top-tier talents who would’ve beaten the crap out of you. It is also a situation where I’ve reached heights that you have not come near.”
“You haven’t been close to the main event. You haven’t even sniffed it…”
“I am the main event. I am the hype. I am the best in this division. And it took me kicking around a few trash cans named Candy and Zenna to remember it. But now that I have—now that I’ve been able to look in the mirror and remember who I am—the entire division is fucked. That includes you, that includes Bella, and that includes anyone who is holding that championship. I don’t care who it is. I don’t care if it is Frankie, I don’t care if it is Victoria, I don’t care if Crystal has it, or if Mercedes inevitably turns on Crystal like we all know she’s going to when she finds a soft spot to plant the goddamn knife. Nobody is going to stop me, Cassie. Nobody is going to stop me from reclaiming my championship, and you are the next one standing in my way.”
“So… before I get to Bella, before I get to Inception and then move on to face whoever the champion is, I have to face you. And I hope Harper has your back, because you need to bring a hell of a lot more than just you to beat me….”
