[Amelia Reynolds]

mirrors
02. the hero in the glass

★★★★★★★

The acrid smell of pyrotechnics wafted into the slowly emptying arena when the corridors began to go quiet. Most of the noise stayed on the other side of the curtains, the final camera sweeps, closing lines from production headsets. The crowd had long since begun their long shuffle to the exits. Back here, it was cables and road cases, fog machines being stored. The monitor had long since been turned off, and the sudden absence of sound made Amelia feel like someone had put a hand over her mouth.

She’d showered, pulled on a hoodie of Dickie’s that enveloped her three sizes too big for her frame, dressed in her skinny jeans and converse and waited. The adrenaline from her fourth match ever had long since settled into a low, tired thrum in her muscles. Her win might as well have been on a different show; the room in her chest where she’d put it was crowded with something much bigger now.

Aiden hadn’t walked past gorilla.

She’d waited, just off to the side of the flow of crew and talent, watching for the angle in his shoulders, the familiar frustrated sweep of his hand through his hair, the tight way he held his jaw when he was pissed off at everything, including himself. The main event had bled into a post-match celebration that she cringed at entirely. She might have been at their wedding, but she didn’t much like the Carter-McKinneys in the latest parts of this year.

“Reynolds!” A production assistant called out for her, headset askew as he balanced a coil of cable on one shoulder. “They’re doin’ a final sweep. If you’re not needed, you gotta start thinking about clearing.”

“Okay,” she nodded, with a clearing of her throat. “Just…I was waiting for my brother.”

He gave her an apologetic look. “Pretty sure he went out the other side with Wolfslair. The other one.”

It landed like a little stone in her stomach even though she’d been expecting that nonetheless. Wolfslair’s New York branch, one her people had been a part of, moved like a unit when they wanted to. Especially when one of their own came up short and didn’t want witnesses. “Right,” she said, “thanks.”

The stagehand nodded and moved on, the hallway swallowing him. For a moment, she just stood there with her fingers hooked in the edge of her hoodie pocket. She sighed, looking down at the ground. Aiden had lost by inches. She could still see it, replayed on the inside of her eyelids, the moment of the crucifix. It wasn’t a mistake so much as two stories trying to finish in the same second and one of them landing a fraction of a second ahead. Clinically, she knew how this could write itself in his mind. Near-miss, confirmation of every old script. If I were better. If I were more. If I were meant for this…

“Don’t wait on a door that he’s deadbolted, Millie.”

Amelia turned her head to find the colorful mane of her mentor, Aaron Asphyxia, bouncing in the ponytail that she wore.  Her voice was lazy and edged all at once, just like it always was. She had her arms crossed as she looked in the same direction, the black of her eyeliner had survived another main event; the rest of her looked like she’d gone ten rounds herself.

“Did you see him?” Amelia asked.

“For about five seconds,” Aaron replied. “Alex and Austin got to him first. He’s in their orbit tonight.” She jerked her chin toward the opposite corridor, where Wolfslair: New York’s contingent had their space – separate from the small cluster of people who ended up in the Denver branch. Even back here, the divide was visible: same name, but different banners and glances that used to stick instead of the current state of sliding.

“Is he….?” The words began to slip out of Amelia’s lips, but fell short. There were a dozen words she could put there, but none of them seemed to fit.

“Angry?” Aaron supplied. “Mostly at himself. Bit at Jasmine. Bit at the air. Normal post-world-title-loss-cocktail.” Her mouth softened a fraction. “He’s not in a place to hear you at all, little sister.”

“I don’t need to triage him,” her protest came out small. “I just wanted to tell him I’m proud of him.”

“You can still do that.” Her ponytail bobbed as she tilted her head to the side. “Just not tonight, and not by standing outside a door that isn’t going to open.” It was blunt, but there was no malice in it. If anything, there was a kind of tired mercy.

Amelia looked back at the door once more – there were no footsteps, no voices. Her phone sat heavy in her pocket, half a dozen unsent drafts already living behind her lock screen. She turned her head back to Aaron and frowned slightly, “I don’t like leaving without seeing him.”

“Like…I know,” Aaron started, rolling her eyes at Amelia’s altruism. “But I also know this is the part where you’re gonna make someone else’s spirals more important than your own nervous system and what you’ve done. You also wrestled tonight, and you won. Your body still thinks it's in a fight. Go back to the hotel, cuddle your golden retriever, and sleep.”

A flash of movement down the hall caught Amelia’s eyes as the door was opened – Alex was coming their way, phone in his hand, an efficient stride unbothered by the end of a thirteen-match marathon, of which he won as well. He gave Aaron a look that said time was moving, their own travel clock already ticking. He glanced at Amelia like she was an uninteresting science project as Aaron took a couple steps towards him. Aaron kissed him on the cheek, standing on her toes to do so.

“Van is loading for the airport in five.”

“Mmkay,” she smiled in what she considered was a very sweet smile, but to anyone else, it would have appeared insincere. She turned her head. “You text me when you’re back in your room.” She seemed semi-pleased when Amelia nodded her response.

Alex’s gaze flicked over her again with professional courtesy. “Good work earlier.” He said.

“Thanks,” Amelia replied, but the hairs on the back of her neck rose regardless. Loyalty. Aaron watched as he walked away from them, lingering a half a heartbeat longer, fingers brushing Amelia’s shoulder in a fleeting squeeze that was over before it could be misread.

“Don’t let his loss eat your win,” she said quietly. “You earned what you did out there. Both things can be true at once.” Then, she turned and followed Alex, swallowed into the New York orbit like it had more gravitation than she originally thought it did.

And suddenly…the space around Amelia felt a little emptier for it.

★★★★★★★

And we’re back. Did you miss me?

I’m not gonna say it was the greatest match on the card. I’m not gonna say it was even the best match on the card, but what it was was an exclamation point on the moment in which I sat there and said I did this and I will do it again. Affirming and powerful for my own moment. That’s what I needed it to be, to remind myself that whatever happened over the summer isn’t what defines me. I could have come in here and argued that I earned the same exact chance that others had because it was literally a second away…but I didn’t.

I’m not a hypocrite. And I’ll earn back the downfall that I had every step of the way, by going through every person I have to.

I wasn’t sure what Candy was going to do – I knew she was a former champion in this company. I knew she was great in her own time. But now? The Candy I faced was not the Candy that existed back then. There wasn’t a lot of umph, not lot of spice, and at the end of the day, it was a definitive win.

Listening to the sounds of the arena for the rest of the show…I think you all need to understand somethin’ about me. I am, yes, a Reynolds – and yes, there is a lot of talent in the family. You all know Aiden, and you know what he can do. He had your World Heavyweight Champion almost dead to rights and if it wasn’t for a cute little trap of a pin, Aiden would have the gold around his waist and a new era would have been ushered into Sin City. My other brother, Adam…he’s kicking up a storm in our home continent, eating at the sharks and takin’ names. He’s not interested in the big leagues, but he’s a damned riot just the same. And me? Little ol’ me, with my fluidity and my gracefulness…

Y’all should know I’m here to right some wrongs and maybe kick a little teeth in.

I’ll be a support for my brother just as he’s always been a support for me, and now that Dickie is here…the game changes too for both of us. He knows his limitations when it comes to my matches, but you best believe that if the slate needs to be changed, he’ll be out there for his best friend the second Aiden needs it.

But that’s what Wolfslair does, isn’t it? They gather around their people and they ensure that everyone in the mix has support. I know we see that from the other facilities in this company – everyone who is a part of Go Gym and Hero Academy and whatever backs them…but you don’t see it as prevalent as you do Wolfslair. Tell me the last time anyone in this company from any of those gyms had as much of if not more of a hold in Sin City…I’ll wait.

For almost two years, Finn Whelan had an iron grip on the Mixed Tag Titles – which went defunct while they were holding it because no one could beat them – and the World Heavyweight Championship. He was beaten by another Wolfslair member, who held onto the World Heavyweight Championship until our current champion got it. That’s like five hundred or something days alone. Tag in Aiden’s Roulette Championship, and Alicia’s current Roulette Championship…and the fact that Wolfslair went four out of five at High Stakes….

Did you forget Bella was part of us too?

We are so prevalent in the company that everyone seems to hate us.

Hate us if you ain’t us, we don’t care.

And I know we’ve got our own internal conflicts…but the one thing that remains is that all of us do the utmost to succeed. We protect our own, and we push the echelon just a little bit higher every time.

What do I have to provide to that? An inescapable sense of putting my best forth every night. A passion to fight for the right things in this business. Duty. Honor. Loyalty. I have a household and a facility where these things are tantamount, and I will fight every day that I’m in this ring to be successful. It doesn’t matter if someone doesn’t show up or show out, because I will. Every time.

Evelyn was clear when I came back that I needed to show proof over whatever words that came out of my mouth in a promise. That I needed to own my successes before I made big statements. And it’s true. Proof is what I need to show that I can be whatever I want to be in this company. In adversity and victory, I will show the ring the regard it has earned from me.

So, Harper…can you promise the same to me? Or are you going to flip flop on facts and futures and somehow make the whole thing about what you can’t survive?

I’m gonna repeat somethin’ that my favorite person in the world holds as a mantra.

I don’t need gold to matter.

And he’s right. Neither of us do.

We’re gonna make the world sick of us by the time we’re through.

★★★★★★★

Amelia turned then and hiked her bag up on her shoulder higher, walking the long walkway towards the back of the arena. She was able to avoid the stragglers, the ones seeking hopeful autographs that she wasn’t quite yet a name they were searching for. It only took a moment for her to note the blink of the headlights from a rental Toyota Land Cruiser. Her rental Toyota. She smiled.

Less than a minute later, she tossed her bag into the back of the vehicle and crawled into the passenger side. She looked up at Dickie, who was leaning on the steering wheel with a smile on his face. He reached out and touched her chin with a tap of his knuckles, and she smiled slightly from the affection. “No luck?”

“He left already,” she confirmed, a little shrug of her shoulders. “With the others.”

“Mm.” He didn’t say of course, or that’s what I expected. He tucked a strand of her white-blonde hair behind her ear. “Did you text him?”

“Workin’ on it, also tryin’ not to make it about me while still saying I’m proud of him.” She huffed a breath that wasn’t quite a laugh. “It’s a fun balance.”

He huffed, amused. “You’ll nail it. You usually do. Weaponized empathy and all that.”

She rolled her eyes, but there was a smile that flit up to her lips regardless. He turned the ignition on the starter with a press of a button and dropped his hand to the gear shift. The engine rumbled quiet between them. Outside, the last of the crew rolled a road case past. Dickie glanced at the side mirror, then the other, taking in the loading bay, the security truck idling by the gate, the red and blue lights at the exits to the parking lot, and the half-shut roll-up door all in once fluid glance.

Amelia watched his eyes move. Left. Right. Quick check of the rearview. The same pattern she’d seen a dozen times now, a loop that had nothing to do with traffic laws and everything to do with something else entirely.

“Everything’s clear, Commander,” she said lightly, leaning back into the seat and tucking her hands back into hoodie pocket. “No bogeymen in the forklift lane.”

“Don’t sass me in a rental,” he replied, but the corner of his mouth twitched. “I just like to know who else is breathing in my immediate vicinity.”

“That’s hypervigilance."

“Technical terms now, Amelia?” He scoffed, good-naturedly. “You know I hate when you start throwing the textbook at me. Takes all the romance out of my paranoia.”

“You’re the one doing laps with your eyeballs. I’m just naming it.”

“That’s the problem,” he muttered, easing the Land Cruiser into reverse. “You name everything. Feelings. Behaviors. My alleged neuroses…”

“Those aren’t alleged, they’re in the DSM and on your medical paperwork.”

He snorted and pulled them out of the space, heading into the desert Tucson air, one hand on the wheel, the other drumming once more on the gear shift before curling around it. The loading bay slid past, followed by the rest of the cars. As they sat in the traffic of the remaining vehicles, he reached over and tapped the mechanism the seatbelt sat in.  “Seatbelt.” He reminded her.

She clicked it into place and slouched down just enough to tuck her knees up, pushing her feet into the cushion while she wrapped her arms around her legs. For a moment, neither of them spoke. The world narrowed to the sway of the car, the hum of the tires over the uneven ground, and the way the night opened up outside the chainlink fences.

Then Dickie broke the silence in the way he always did when he felt the world was becoming small and difficult – by going sideways.  “So,” he started again after a second, eyes on the road, “fourth match ever, first supercard win…clean win, no concussions and no stupid clusterfuck of an ending. That’s not nothin’, Starlight.” He grinned.

“No stupid clusterfuck of an ending is a pretty low bar for celebration, babe.” She turned her head in his direction, smiling with a hint of a chuckle.

“You’d be amazed how many of us miss that clearness.” He tapped the gearshift again. “You were sharp as fuck. Timing, spacing – she was a champ champ, and you had a pretty decisive end there. That’s not rookie work.”

Heat crept up the back of her neck with a soft, embarrassed flush. “Don’t start. Aaron already gave me a debrief.” She reached for her water bottle and took a sip.

“Yeah, but she gives it like you made a failure in your life and need to fix it – I’m giving it like I’m incredibly proud and also maybe a little turned on.”

She coughed and choked on her water. “Dimitri,” she groaned, swatting at his arm. “Can you not–”

“I literally can’t.” a grin formed fully on his mouth, breaking through the tension that etched along his jaw. “I’m structurally incapable of not gremlin-ning at you, Amelia. You know this.”  He snickered when she groaned his full name, the sound low in his chest. The joke had opened a pressure valve that had been tightly closed off, and for once, it felt like the air was clean again.

“Seriously,” she muttered, still half-laughing, half-exasperated as she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “How are you like this?”

“Genetic flaw.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Or a gift. Depends on who you ask.”

“I’m dating it, I suppose. So I should probably call it a gift.”

“Atta girl.”

She shook her head, but the warmth in her chest had settled in a little more solidly, like something she could stand on. But that’s always what he did for her, wasn’t it? Even when she was frustrated with him, even when he kept things from her, he still took the moments she was most conflicted and made her smile anyway. A solid foundation that she’d eventually make a crack in his armor for.

They cleared the lot and rolled out onto the roads, the arena eventually shrinking in the rearview to a hulk of concrete and scaffolding under the Arizona sky. Out here, the air was dry and cool, the sky big in that Southwestern way that always made her feel a little like she’d stepped on the edge of a postcard. Neon from the gas station sign painted the cruiser’s hood in shifting reds and blues as they passed. She looked at the GPS in the center of the console and looked at the blue line that led them to their hotel.

“Fifteen minutes?”

“Twelve.” He always believe the GPS was a liar anyway. “We’re up at stupid o’clock anyway, so it’ll be just a little bit of rest. Six a.m. flight, remember?”

She groaned, “Why do you hate us?”

“Because if we don’t get back to Denver on the first one, Finn’s going to whinge at me about missing training blocks, and I’m not emotionally prepared to argue with him since his shoulder is back in play.”

“You’re never emotionally prepared for Finn.”

“Correct. That would require feelings from him too, and we know they don’t exist.” Another smile. “You gonna be able to sleep?”

She shrugged, watching a cactus slide by in the dark, outlined by some distant parking lot light. “Eventually. Once my brain stops replaying the crucifix and rewriting his internal monologue.”

“That’s his job,” he reminded her gently. “You don’t have to do that for him.”

“I know,” she said. It was true, technically. Knowing and feeling were still sitting in different chairs.

Her phone buzzed once in her hoodie pocket. She dug it out, thumb swiping across the cracked screen protector. No name she wanted to see yet…just a notification from Twitter and some promotional push email she ignored.

She opened Aiden’s thread anyway. The cursor blinked at her from beneath a line of nothing. Proud of you felt too small. Sorry felt wrong, like the loss was something she’d done to him by winning. I love you was true, but naked on its own.

She typed.

You were awesome tonight. I know it hurts. When you’re ready, I’m here.

“What’re you writing?” Dickie asked, not prying, just curious. His eyes stayed on the highway; the question came out casual.

“Nothing groundbreaking.” She hit send before she could overthink it, watched the message slide up. “Just…trying to leave the door open without trying to drag him through it.”

“Good,” he said. “That’s a much healthier sentence. I would have said to G-I-T  G-U-D.”

“So, growth,” she murmured.

“Look at us,” he agreed. “Real, functional adults. Terrifying.”

She let her head tip sideways against the seat, watching his profile in the wash of passing signs. He still looked wired under the jokes—jaw a little too tight, fingers flexing on the wheel, gaze cutting to the mirrors more than any rental warranted. She could have asked again what was under all that, what “bad habit” he kept brushing off. Instead, she slid her hand over, covering his hand where it rested between shifts. His knuckles went still under her palm.

“Hey,” she said quietly. “Thanks.”

“For what?” He glanced over, genuinely surprised.

“For being here,” she said simply. “For tonight. For…letting me have a win that’s just mine, even if everything else feels messy.”

His mouth softened. “It was never not yours,” he said. “I’m just lucky I get the front row seat.”

Her chest tightened in a way that had nothing to do with nerves this time. “You’re very sappy for someone who pretends to be an emotional disaster.”

“I am both emotionally profound and a disaster.” He replied. “Don’t stereotype me – fuck the diagnoses on the page.”

The hotel came into view ahead, one of those airport-adjacent towers with too-bright signage and a lobby that would smell like coffee and industrial cleaner. Not home. Just waystation. They’d be gone in a handful of hours, Denver skies and Wolfslair mats waiting, Aiden’s silence stretching between cities, whatever shadows were following Dimitri still politely unnamed. But for tonight, there was this: a rental car, a desert road, a win she’d earned, a brother she loved even in absence, a man beside her who was both manager and problem and anchor.

The Land Cruiser turned into the hotel lot, tires crunching over gravel at the edge before finding asphalt again. He parked under a pole light, killed the engine. The sudden quiet wrapped around them. “Last chance for vending machine snacks before I bully you into real food.”

She unbuckled, shoulder bumping his as she leaned over to grab her bag from the back. “Doctor’s orders,” she reminded him, mimicking Aaron’s tone. “Protein before bed, not just sugar.”

“Look at you, weaponizing your own advice,” he said. “I’m so proud.”

She rolled her eyes, but the smile that came with it didn’t feel forced anymore. “C’mon, Watson. Tucson’s not going to miss us.”

“They never do,” he said, but there was no sting in it. Just a tired fondness and the promise of a few hours where the world was shrunk down to four hotel walls, one too-small bed, and the two of them. They climbed out into the desert night, doors thudding shut in near-unison. Behind them, the arena lights dimmed to a distant glow. Ahead, automatic doors sighed open, spilling lobby light onto the pavement. Amelia hitched her bag higher on her shoulder, checked her phone one more time – still no dots on Aiden’s screen – and then followed Dimitri inside, letting the glass close on Tucson and its ghosts until morning.

★★★★★★★

Harper, Harper, Harper…’The Slaytanic Avenger’, a cute play on words while looking like a cookie cutter of every nineteen-year-old without the money or the courage to really sell yourself. The girl who can’t decide whether she’s cursed, chosen, or somehow both.

It’s good to have confidence – every female in this industry should have confidence in themselves. The way you pounded your chest and said you were going to defeat Victoria Lyons and Mercedes Vargas, that you were absolutely certain that you were going to stand over the woman who you said choked…it was exhilarating to see. Why?

Because you truly believe that you’re the good one in every one of these battles.

The hero.

The one that has to bring the rest of us poor, pathetic souls to justice so that you can stand tall at the end of everything as the true savior.

You brand yourself like a comic book hero. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised since you came out of Hero Academy and we all know that Roxi and Kiera Johnson are very prominent in that narrative. It’s really interesting how you say you’re an avenger, a slasher, trying to portray this big bad hero narrative while every promotional video I’ve studied sounds like a court case. Lemme remind you that heroes, when they’re on the precipice of a battle, don’t recount everyone else’s stories and history upon the eve. They live in the moment. They fight in that moment.

But you know what they don’t do? They don’t sit in before every Supercard thinking that every big show owes them a correction.

They don’t sell themselves as the Supergirl of the realm, the one with integrity, the one who ends reigns, the young standard bearer…and then turn around and have excuses for everything you’ve done. You care so much more about how other people get booked, lookin’ at it like a personal slight. There’s a difference, friend-o, between fightin’ hard and actin’ like the moral compass of the division. One is definitely earned while the other is self-appointed and you…you don’t get that ability.

Every major event that you’ve been a part of, in your own words, has had some form of a curse attached to it. High Stakes, every time, you had something that had a built-in excuse for how you performed. Year one, bad breaks; two, humiliating stipulations and booking; three? You had the audacity of people stepping into your business. Surely, if you didn’t have a triple threat for the Internet Championship just now, you would have defeated Mercedes, right?

I’m not fightin’ the ‘Slaytanic Avenger’, I’m fightin’ a very talented young woman who hasn’t learned how to speak without reciting her list of injustices. HarpHarp, how many times can a show go wrong before it stops being bad luck instead of how you handle yourself?

Let’s look at the triple threat itself, shall we? High Stakes didn’t really betray you, which I’m sure you’ll try to paint it as…it showed the gap between impact and composure that you have Harper. I suppose it’ll be because you’re young. But…let’s look at it, shall we? You took out Mercedes and Victoria in a huge aerial spot and neither of them stayed down. You tried to slip in with quick pins off the other things they did in the match – a little schoolgirl pin on the champ champ while someone else did the heavy liftin’. You did some good spots, I’m not denying you that. The finish was almost in your hands…you had the finisher on Mercedes, but you never saw Victoria comin’...and you woke up on the floor watching someone else hold the belt in your setup.

Again. In my opinion, you spent so much time callin’ them choke artists with fumbles and cracks in their armor, but High Stakes showed us your reflection. Don’t tell me this is about honor when everythin’ that lights you up on the page is payback.

Now, me…I was told to put results ahead of my rhetoric. Yeah, I beat Candy and I know you’re gonna tell me that anyone with a taco in the game coulda done that. But I also beat former Bombshells Champions. I could yell about the fuckery that was Summer XXXtreme, but I don’t need to scream about those to make it real. I fucked up, and I’ll own that until I get up to that point again. Because that’s what Wolfslair has taught me.

You rely so much on telling everyone else’s story that’s connected to you that I’m not so sure you’re all about carving your own path so much as hoping you’re in the family scrapbook in the future with an accolade that doesn’t suck. Jessie, how much she was hated. Josh, your manager, how he just got in the Hall of Fame. Cassie, who…ma’am, I defended sure because I was tired of seeing people jump on others when they do the same fuckin’ thing. You’re surrounded by people who can help or hinder…

Me? I’m surrounded by people who don’t need belts to know who they are…and that’s exactly why they keep winnin’ them. Aiden may have lost this one, but that doesn’t mean it ends. Dickie? My manager here, sure – everywhere else, he’s an open threat who has made headlines without a single championship on his placard. He’ll be there, by the way, to make sure Joshie doesn’t help you out to try to make a new story.

So tell me, Harper…if this doesn’t go your way, what’s the story gonna be? Unfair booking? You thought I was lesser than I was? I’m here to test the part of you that doesn’t have a script…there’s no triple threat here, no extra bodies. No title. Pride, trajectory…perception on the line. I’ll bring focus, craft, and the willingness to own every second of whatever happens.

This season of Sin City rests in my hands. And now it’s time for ya to learn it. Good luck.