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Travis McCoy · (03-22-2016)

“I'm not sure how to finish this story. I started hoping that I'd find the words by the end but it gets hard right about this time. Things get twisted and I'm not sure who to protect. I can't find the hero, and I'm not sure who should be. But you wanted it. Remember that by the time I finish. XWF doesn't want larger than life wrestlers. XWF wants larger than life people. XWF wants to know what brought us here and what happens when we aren't in the ring. I wish I could just go party with my friends in Vegas and show all of you that, hell we could rob a bank. It'd be hilarious.”
-Travis McCoy

Travis didn't want her to leave but he didn't want her to stay. He didn't know the next step.

Pack a bag. We'll run.

They were 18, nothing really stopping them, but common sense. Travis had no skills other than violence. What kind of monster raises his child in that? They'd end up right back here with their hands out, or they'd starve. Kaitlyn's parents would be no help. She didn't come from money, and they didn't care all that much about her. They'd simple shrug.

“Oh baby, hope that works out for you.”

Travis and Kaitlyn talked for a long time. They talked in circles, they talked in hypotheticals. They talked about working minimum wage jobs. They talked about using money they'd saved for college. They talked nearly all night before the word abortion came up. The first time it did it hung in the room like a toxic fog. It felt like someone filled the air with warm jello, it felt like even the noise of distant cars stopped. Just....silence.

“Travis...

Downstairs, now.”

His voice was calm but in the dead of night it rang out like a bell. Charles McCoy

“I won't repeat myself boy, get your ass down here. Tell the girl to stay upstairs until I call. If she tries to leave she'll regret it. You know that and so do I. Your mother will sit with her.”

Travis looked at her, she looked back. Just a scared teenage girl. Travis tried to be the man but in the moment he was just as scared as her. Travis left her with a kiss, and walked down the stairs, passing his mother on the way. They shared a look. She looked as scared as he was.

Chuck sits in his spot. Most men have a chair, Chuck lived in one. He had a parking spot, one where the wheels of his chair had dug grooves into the carpet. Right below an air vent. He'd sat there all night and listened to every word. Chuck wasn't really a drinker. Being in the chair had left him with a dangerously low tolerance. Alcohol does odd things to the paralyzed. But in his hand was a fresh glass of scotch. The bottle had just been opened. On the table sat another, Chuck motioned to the seat behind it.

“Sit, boyo. We need to talk.”

Travis did as he was told.

“I heard it all. From the moment she told you she was pregnant. If you think you're running away you're fucking nuts. I won't allow you to throw your life away over a cluster of cells. How far along is she? A month? Fucking hell boy that thing is the size of a walnut. Nothing to throw your life away for. I've worked to hard for that. We've worked to hard for that. You have dreams son. Big fucking dreams and you can't let this end them”

“You have dreams Chuck.”

“Oh not this shit again. You whine and complain. 'Noo dad, I don't wanna be a wrestler' you act like you don't enjoy it. That's the biggest load of horse shit I've ever heard. 'No dad I wanna play guitar' bull shit boy, your voice is shit. You only like that because you think the girls like it. Me and my dad did this because it was in us whether we wanted it to be or not and it's in you just the same.”

“You were losers”

“and? Ya, we didn't win all that much but go ask the guys we stood across from if we were slouches. Go ask if anyone ever got excited when they saw my name across from theirs on a ring card. We didn't win em all but they fucking remembered us. There are men all across this country with scars and limps that remind them every time they get out of bed that they stepped into the ring with a McCoy. It's what we do, it's the only thing we do well.”

“Not me, I don't want it.”

“You don't? You sure boy? Because last time I checked nothing was stopping you from quitting.”

“You are!”

“Me?! I'm an old man in a fucking wheelchair. The door is right there boy. You really want out fine. You're a grown man now. You're mad because I pushed you. Because when you wanted to quit I wouldn't let you, because once upon a time you looked up to your old man. Don't you fucking roll your eyes at me boy. Your third birthday you told me you wanted to be a wrestler. All I'm guilty of is keeping you to your word. Lots of kids say they want to be something when they're young and their parents clap. 'ooh that's so cute Timmy you want to be a police officer.' But whats more honest than a child? What's more pure than the answer from a three year old when you ask them what they want to be when they grow up?

If you wanted out you'd be gone. The second that girl told you she was pregnant you would of started packing but you didn't. You made excuses. 'Ohhh I can't get a job.' boy millions of people raise kids on less. You didn't run because you didn't want to leave this.”

“We're not killing it.”

“You think I want you to kill it? You think I poured you a drink because I wanted you to kill it? Boy we're going to celebrate. I don't want you to kill it I want you to nurture it. I want you to turn that child into a killing machine. Another McCoy is exactly what this world needs! We're gonna start now. The girl is moving in and I'm going to make sure she gets everything she needs to build a healthy baby boy! Part of your problem was your mother was never on board. We're gonna get this girl IN LINE! We're going to make her love this...”

People always say the biggest moments in your life happen in slow motion. This didn't, it happened so fast. It looked like something out of a after school special, Kaitlyn falling down the stairs. She tumbled and rolled with grace some how. Travis had barely heard the startled gasp before she lay at the bottom of the steps motionless bleeding. It was an unfortunate accident. The doctors said she felt nothing. The rattling gasps Travis heard as she lay dying at his feet told him differently.

Present Day.

Home again this week. Fuck Travis could drive to Chicago in five hours. No point spending money on a hotel. One thing you learn growing up in the business. Pretend like every check will be your last because it very well could be. Travis' has lived by this. He's in his office again. Behind his desk. The laptop has been closed for a while now, the bottle of scotch too. The XWF camera crew just walked in and set up. Travis asked them to leave the camera and stand outside. He's been sitting still like this for ten minutes staring into a glass of scotch. He's not drunk but his eyes contain the first bit of a solid buzz.

“You want to fucking rap at me boy? That's your idea of a promo. 15 minutes of hanging out with gutter trash, a few words then 16 bars of jiggaboo bullshit? Or was that 32? I don't know and I honestly don't think it matters much. You don't know shit about me. Yes I have heard that dog saying. Everyone has. I think it was originally etched in stone by a small man desperately trying to convince the world he was big. After that he got hard to work about 'the motion of the ocean'. It's basic physics. You're 150 pounds. You're not even average boy. You look like you should be in a late night infomercial, 'for fifteen cents a day you can feed this hungry African'. Praying on white guilt when guys like you destroy the community you are soo proud of.

I like to remind the world how much of a scum bag I am, but you go to jail for robbery and you don't even seem bothered. You seem proud that you're a drain on society. Peddling crack to a community you blame the white man for holding down. Who's problem is it boy? Who's really killing your community. Your daddy was probably hooked on the shit you were selling. That shit you handed out to anyone who would take it is the reason you grew up getting diddled by foster parents who saw your ass as a paycheck. But because you say it in iambic parameter and rhyme you think it's deep.

'Look at the black boy, he's deep and educated. Hard hood shell with a warm center of poet.'

You're garbage

The difference between what I said about you and what you said about me is my guesses were, in the end, true. You're exactly who I thought you were. You lived the life exactly that we thought. You try to paint me as a suburban kid. You don't know the first thing about me, and it's going to get you killed.

Not shot on a street corner.

I'm going to break your fucking neck.

You know for a second I thought I'd rap back at you. It's easy. Toddlers learn to rhyme. But I'm above that shit. Fuck your nonsense. I won't lower myself to your level. I'm going to do this the way I always do.

With deliberate decimation.

How cliché of you to talk about shooting me. You sound like a columbine rip off. Blame it on Marilyn, and the herion. Where where the parents at? Yours didn't love you enough to stick around. Daddy had better things to do and mommy decided to up and die. Guess what? She was a shit mom. Because look how you turned out. Drug dealer with a record threatening to shoot a guy because he's bigger than you. You're a scumbag. You're a waste of air. Blame the way you turned out on where you grew up. Truth is you could of turned your self around. The only person to blame is you.

See that's the problem with you. A walking black stereotype proud of the way you live. Proud that you got a record because it makes the things you rhyme about sound tough. You act like the path you took is one that shows steel in your spine. Anyone can steal, and sell drugs, anyone can act tough with a hand gun stuffed in their waste band. You know what I would have had respect for? If instead of getting high in school you would of fucking studied.

But you're proud of the opportunity you wasted. You had a chance to come from a rough place and make an example your community would be proud of. Instead you're just a little man with confidence radiating from crimes you've committed, and I'm supposed to tremble because you had it rough.

You made it rough on yourself.

You don't scare me. You disgust me.

You're a sad example of a man, and that bitch your hanging out with is a gutter slut. She looks at you and see's a provider? She see's a man? I see a scumbag coward. I see a man too small to get the deed done. I see a chump who thinks he's hard because he can break the rules.

I have my flaws. I don't hide them. I'm an asshole. I say things I shouldn't. I relish in hurting people. I'm not a white knight, but compared to you I'm Captain fucking America. So ya, I'm going to step on my soapbox and tell you everything that is wrong with you. Because maybe it'll sink in. Maybe you'll change who you are and become a real member of society. Not a wrestler mind you, you'll never succeed in a business I control. You probably won't change your path. Your kind never does. The only other option I have is wiping you off the face of the earth. The difference is I'm not going to threaten shooting you. I don't do many things that anyone could claim as righteous. Dropping you on your fucking head will be my good deed for the decade.”

FADE

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