~*~*~To Grace~*~*~
Wanda Grace O’Neil
August 9, 1954 - April 6, 2016
You know what I hate most about tombstones? That is pretty much all the amount of information that is given. What is missing is what happened in that area where the dash is. Wanda Grace O’Neil is my grandmother. Interesting to note, that I only really knew her from the age of 12 until she passed 4 years ago, but in that short time I found that I was very much like her. She loved to read, she was sassy as hell, she gave my grandfather a run for his money and no matter what, she loved everyone. She has this amazing ability to not put up with anyone’s attitude, put her foot down only when necessary and had this amazingly big heart. She saw the good in everyone.
Cancer took her, fast. She never got to see me graduate at the top of my class in High School. She wasn’t there to see me off to college. But no matter what I did before that, she made sure she was there to support me through everything I ever did. And I know while she didn’t understand it, she would support me now. One of the rings I wear on a regular basis, besides my engagement ring now, was a ring grandpa gave me that was hers. It’s been passed down through the last 2 generations, skipped mom but came to me. I hold it dear to my heart, only take it off when I’m wrestling, give it a kiss before I put it back on. She would always tell me “No matter what, to follow my heart.” And my heart has led me here, to Mal, to wrestling....and I don’t plan on ever letting her down. Especially being so close to what this time of year is....
Las Vegas, Nevada
Monday, April 6th
9pm
The sun has set over Vegas, the sky is clear and the moon is out. On the deck of the hotel we see a female figure sitting watching the practically empty strip of Vegas. Alongside her is a stack of shot glasses and a full bottle of whiskey. We hear a door slide open and the woman looks over her shoulder as we see it’s Bella’s mother, Laura “Phoenix” Madison. Laura smiles softly and stands up as we see Bella stride across the patio and straight into her mother’s arms, “Hey kid....good to see you.”
Bella sighs a bit, hugging her mom tight. It’s been a while since she’s got to even see Laura let alone hug her, “I am so glad to see you.”
Laura lets her go and smiles at her, “I know, this stupid virus turning this whole world into gumbo. Thankfully, everyone is healthy and here and we get to start our new tradition.”
“How have you been today? I know it’s rough on you...”
“It’s been a day, cried a bit...”
“Which is completely normal...”
“It is, but I still hate it. Thankfully Nick has made sure to try and keep me smiling, Aaron too. Jaime, Slappy, Levi and Emma all called to make sure that I was doing alright. I even heard from a few people that caught me by surprise. What about you?”
Bella shrugs, and looks around, “I’m doing alright. After what happened last year with...” Bella kinda trails off, “I think Mal kinda expected him to show up again but there’s been no sign thankfully and Luka has been by my side like she knows something was up with me today. Once I saw your message on twitter, I told Mal I just had to be here.”
“Quite the awesome fiance you have there, missy.” Laura grabs her daughter’s left hand to take a closer look at the ring, “It does look better here than in that box.”
“He told me he had asked you and Nick at Aaron’s birthday party. I almost yelled at you when I called you that night.” Bella said, swatting at her mom. “I come from a long line of sneaks and I’m marrying one too. It’s redonkulous!”
Laura can’t help but laugh a bit as we hear a female voice from behind, “Actually what I think is redonkulous is that you are both here and no shots have been poured yet!” Both Laura and Bella turn around to see a slender woman standing there with her arms folded with long brown hair and glasses down her nose.
“Aunt Cam?!”
“SURPRISE!” boast a bright smiled Cameron (formerly O’Neil) Russow with her arms out.
Bella can’t help herself, she runs over and engulfs her in a huge hug, “What are you doing here?”
“Are you kidding me? Vegas, Whiskey, seeing the niece and her man in a big match and finally getting to congratulate you in person? The minute Laura called, I wouldn’t have missed this for the world. Jen sends her love, but...” Cameron looks knowingly at Laura, “Well it’s your Aunt Jen. Either way, I am here...let’s get this toast on to remember mom and celebrate you!”
“No Jesse?” Laura said looking behind her questionly.
“He’ll be along soon enough, he ran into a few people in the lobby and I just couldn’t wait.” Cameron makes her way over to her sister and gives her a hug before grabbing the bottle and cracking it open. “It has been way too long since the crazy ones in this family got together. In fact I think the last time was....”
“Aaron-slash-Levi’s birthday, back in February.” Bella said, thinking quickly and lining the glasses up on the table.
“That was ...interesting but no, something like this was maybe the night before my wedding. Just the 3 of us talking it up before dad busted in, insisting we’d get sleep before I dragged Jesse down the aisle.” The girls busted out laughing as Cameron poured the whiskey into the glasses. If you only knew what it took for Cameron and Jesse Russow to finally seal the deal....
“Listen to them, squakin like a bunch of hens” Bella freezes for a moment knowing that voice.
“Maybe we should warn that fiance of hers to run while the getting is good.”
Bella turns around to see her step-father Nick Madison and her now uncle (Jack’s uncle as well), Jesse Russow standing there.
“About damn time you two showed up.” Laura spoke up handing her husband a glass.
“Only 5 minutes late. We would have been here sooner but Aaron spotted Malachi with Luka and well you can guess what happened from there.” Nick reaches over and pulls Bella into a hug, “I may not like him that much, but he treats you right. To me that’s what matters.....besides, I left him behind with Spinelli....”
“Oh God,” Bella laughs out, “Quick let’s get this over with so I can go save Spinelli from being maimed horrifically.”
The crew laughs once more as the rest of the shot glasses gets passed around we see Laura standing there looking at everyone, “Ok” she takes a deep breath, “4 years ago, we lost an amazing woman, and while not all of us could be here for this I know they too will never forget the amazing woman mom was. I know she is looking at us from wherever she may be, smiling because we have all found where we are supposed to be. I look at Bella and Aaron, and I know that somehow she has graced her grandchildren with amazing strength. So...” Laura’s voice breaks a bit as Nick wraps his arm around his wife and kisses her on top of her head.
Bella steps up and lifts her glass, “To Wanda O’Neil, to the legacy she left us, to the strength of family, friends, and loved ones. May we all carry that with us and pass it along and show that we, with the grace that she left behind, remind everyone that we are stronger than ever. To Grace.”
“To Grace!” everyone says, lifting their glasses and taking the shot.
From the doorway to the inside we hear yet another voice, “Dark knight, please! The Jackal did not mean to offend.”
We see Malachi pushing Spinelli through the door with one hand, holding Aaron in his other arm with the leash to Luka around the same wrist, looking a little frazzled, “Keep moving nerd.” Mal gets over to the group and gently pushes Spinelli towards Nick and Laura “I believe this belongs to you.” He also passes Aaron over to Nick, “Him too” and he turns and hands the leash over to Bella, “And this belongs to you.”
“Is everything ok?” Bella says to him.
“Hmmm? Oh fine, nerdboy was laying the Dad jokes on thick and I have not had enough alcohol to deal with that.” pointing to Spinelli. He looks down and sees the shot glasses and whiskey, “I hope I didn’t disturb anything.”
“Actually we just finished toasting to the memory of her, but....since you are both here....” Laura says grabbing the bottle, refilling everyone’s glass and giving one to Malachi and then one to Spinelli.
“Uhhh, Valkyrie, as much as I appreciate this....remember the last time I consumed liquor?”
Nick goes to say something but Mal reaches over and grabs the glass out of Spinelli’s hands, “I got this one. You all are one ahead of me anyways.” Mal raises the glass and shoots it down.
“Way to take one for the team babe.” Bella said under her breath as Mal winks at her.
“Ok, so I wanted to propose a toast to Bella and Malachi, first to congratulate them on their engagement but mostly to wish them the best of luck this coming weekend when they walk in to Blaze of Glory VIII and walk out as the number one contenders to those Mixed Tag Championships. You two have been through a lot in the last year, both growing professionally and personally and I cannot wait to see what this next chapter brings for you both.” Laura smiles brightly, “And while I know we are all not here right now, I know that every single one of our wild family wishes the same but we’d break laws if that whole crew was here. So here is to you two....show them exactly how it’s really done.”
“Kick ass you two” Nick says and raises his glass as well followed by Jesse and Cameron.
“That’s the plan.” Mal said, raising his other shot glass.
“We’re gonna show those Tigers, that we are not pushovers by any stretch of the imagination. We’re going to show them exactly what it’s like to be a real team.” Bella finishes as she also raises her glass and they all take the second shot.
~*~*~Just Keep Trying to Get Us~*~*~
You’re not gonna. You can literally have a movie of our last year and no one is going to completely ever be able to understand how every bit of what we went through truly brought us to this moment. I am not ashamed of it at all because we’re gonna pound it into the head of everyone that crosses our paths. We’re not going away.
We’re on the doorstep. Blaze of Glory VIII is here and we have been training our asses off. Yeah, girls vs. the girls, guys vs. the guys but we’re looking at it from a point that a team that works together does indeed stick together. Whether it's a 4 sided or 6 sided ring, we’re set and ready to go.
Can the Trenton Tigers, the BESTIES, say the same?? Mmmmm... lately???
I caught Dani by surprise and I’m still changing my game. It’s wonderful to know the amount of information that I have from all different walks of life. I keep telling people to not underestimate me. Hell I warned Mal right from the get go. I am not one to play games, I’m in it to win it. That’s one of the things I freaking love about Malachi as well. Never half-assing what he sets his mind too. And with this, I have never seen him more motivated. Well...scratch that the last time I seen this was when he was out to prove a lot of the naysayers wrong in Apex. Where he became the champ over there. Through this pandemic and this insanity of our world changing, he has refused to let me falter, even knowing what this week was for my family, he’s managed to help me kick my own ass. I don’t plan on letting him down.
~*~*~Not Now, Not Ever~*~*~
Friday, April 10, 2020
11pm
“Just stop for a moment. And listen....”
Silence falls upon the Las Vegas strip where we see Bella staring through the window of the hotel room.
“Even through a double pane glass window the sounds are eerily quiet. The world has completely changed and will perhaps never be the same ever again because of this stupid virus.” Bella turns and smirks, “But because most of the world stops does not mean we stop. We fight and we continue on because it is what we do.”
“I hate this virus, it has scared a lot of people and turned some of the people even dumber than they already were. I get why Malachi is the way he is, I can’t even get on most social media platforms anymore because the stupidity that is flowing anymore.” Bella grips the bridge of her nose and closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.
“It’s why when I see the Trenton Tigers try and compare Mal and I to the Barnhart’s I practically wanna smack them over the head with a steel chair. I mean, congrats, ya’ll beat them....that’s them. Not us. Dani had to learn that lesson the hard way. You can study so much tape, you can try and learn ALL the nuances and the moves and the ticks....and still get beat because you try and make things two dimensional in a three dimensional world.” Bella looks over her shoulder to the outside, “In a world that seems to be somewhere in the fifth dimension right now....kinda makes it a little hard. We’re stuck in a hotel, barely allowed to move around but we still all have stories to tell, we all have matches to win.”
“To the Trenton Tigers, to Daniela V. Rodgers and Brandon Sludge...you two have no fucking clue what you are getting yourselves into. You can claim just how much you really want to own the Mixed Tag Division, when you still can’t get it through your heads....we are out to make one hell of a statement. And it starts with you two school spirited clowns. All the video, all the study in the world can’t get you into one place....and that...is here.” Bella points to her head. “So you can both try like hell to beat myself and Malachi, but at the end of the day, I think you both know how this is going to end. And like Mal said, feeling generous....once it’s all said and done...we’ll give ya a shot, if you are feeling froggy. But what I want is for you two to learn a valuable lesson from this.....much like I have been in my time in SCW. School is ALWAYS in session. Ra ra ra.”
And with that Bella draws the curtains closed and things go dark.
“Time for the Tigers to fall from grace.”
