Chapter 17
NOVEMBER - CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA
Now playing: Sign Of The Times - Harry Styles
I was frantically knocking on room twenty-three fourteen. My knuckles rapped against the wood in a staccato rhythm that matched the hammering of my heart. My panic was past the point of return, and I had no other place to turn.
Evan flung the door open with wide, concerned eyes, phone still in his hand like he had been mid text. “Si?”
“Can I come in? Please,” I said, my body suddenly trembling so hard my teeth chattered. I felt like I was vibrating out of my own skin.
Evan nodded immediately, stepping to the side to let me pass.
I walked through the door and flung my duffle bag to the floor with a heavy thud.
The frantic pacing started again, wearing a groove into the hotel carpet.
I couldn’t stop moving. If I stopped moving, the reality of what I had just done would catch up to me, and I was pretty sure it would kill me.
“Is everything okay?” Evan asked, closing the door softly. He was worried; he couldn’t hide it even if he wanted to. He stood by the door, watching me unravel.
I took in a huge, jagged inhale of air that felt like swallowing glass. My eyes watered, burning with the salt of tears I had been holding back since the elevator ride down. Cal’s words, his face, the way his voice dropped when he cursed me, it all started to swirl in my mind like a hurricane.
Righteous desires.
I felt faint. Was the room spinning? Or was it just my life collapsing?
I looked at Evan. His face started to drop, seeing the tears welling in my eyes.
“If I tell you this,” I choked out, pointing a shaking finger at him, “you have to promise it won’t change anything. You won’t look at me weird. And you will never, ever tell Callum. Do you understand me?”
Evan nodded slowly and sat on the small hotel couch, clasping his hands together between his knees. “What happened?”
That was all he said. I couldn’t read the emotion. I wasn’t sure if he was just hiding it, or if he was bracing for a body count.
I stared at him for a minute, chest heaving, and with a huff, the words spilled out like vomit. “Cal and I have been fucking. Or seeing each other. I don’t know what it was classified as. But it’s over.”
The silence that followed was deafening. The hum of the hotel mini fridge seemed to roar. Evan just stared at me. His face didn’t say anything. Neither did his words. It stung. Why wasn’t he speaking? Was he disgusted? Was he angry?
“I figured, Si,” Evan finally said, his voice quiet, devoid of shock. “You guys weren’t exactly hiding it from me.”
I looked at him, stunned. My mouth fell open slightly. We were. We were doing everything to hide it. The flirting with women, the sneaking around, the careful distance in public, the coded language. This just proved my point, I did what needed to be done. If Evan knew, who else knew?
“You’ve known?” I choked out.
“Yeah,” Evan shrugged, leaning back against the cushions. “The one bed in every hotel room never getting used kind of gave it away… Plus, the way he looks at you. Like you hung the moon and the stars, it’s obvious.”
The words hit me like a physical blow. Hung the moon.
I turned away, scrubbing my hands over my face, trying to wipe the image of Cal’s face out of my mind.
“Did he—” Evan started.
“I did,” I interrupted, my voice cracking. “We had to.”
“What do you mean ‘had to’?” Evan asked, confused.
I let out an exasperated, wet laugh. “Because! This would never end well, and I told him that. I’d never be accepted, we—”
“Okay, pause,” Evan said, holding up a hand, his brow furrowing. “Please tell me you didn’t say what I think you did.”
I looked to the floor. Evan knew me. Maybe even as well as Cal did. He knew my insecurities, my obsession with the family legacy, my fear of being the failure my father was.
“Silas, please tell me you did not fucking tell that man this was all about you.”
“I didn’t! I just said if we did this we’d never get pushes! We’d never be accepted! That I—”
Evan stopped me again, standing up abruptly.
“God damn it, Reed. You did,” Evan sighed, running a hand down his face, pacing the small room now. “Dude, I don’t even need to know more to know you undermined the fuck out of this on his end.”
“I told the truth!” I snapped, desperate for him to validate me. “I was trying to save him!”
“No, Si. You told him the truth you made in your head,” Evan said, his voice rising.
“Look, whether you like to admit it or not, you’re a legacy kid, Silas.
Even if the legacy was filled with fuck ups, you’re still a second-generation wrestler in this company.
You’re also a prize to Murran. He didn’t get to wring your dad and uncle dry, but he got another shot with you.
Which means it doesn’t matter how bad you fuck up, or what you do, Murran is going to cover for your ass. ”
Evan stepped closer, poking me in the chest with a hard finger.
“But Cal? If Cal fucks up, he’s sent packing. Because there are thousands of other guys out there that can do what he does. He doesn’t have a last name here. All he’s got is some merch sales and a few cool moves in the UWF’s eyes. And he risked all of that for you.”
“They would have never protected us,” I mumbled, the fight draining out of me. “You don’t get it, Evan. They want a star. They don’t want… this.”
“How long has this been going on? Like six months? That’s when I noticed the vibe was there,” Evan said, ignoring my excuse.
I shook my head, feeling the weight of the lie I’d been living. “A year. In January. Since Man Overboard.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, Silas,” Evan whispered, his eyes widening. “You mean to tell me this has been happening a year, an entire year, and you looked him in the eye and told him it didn’t matter? You’re a fucking asshole.”
I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. All I could do was feel the tears and fall to the hotel floor.
My knees hit the carpet with a thud. This was too much. What the fuck had I done? Why was this the outcome? How the hell did I go from spilling my guts and telling Cal I loved him this morning to absolutely decimating everything by sunset?
Evan ran to me on the floor. He didn’t speak. He just hugged me, pulling my head onto his shoulder.
“I… I think I—” I started, then stopped myself. The word stuck in my throat like a piece of glass. If I said it out loud, it meant it was all real. It meant I destroyed it all. It meant Cal was right.
It’s righteous desires.
“I know,” Evan said, his voice low, rubbing my back. “I could see it. In both of you. You loved him.”
I sobbed, hard, vicious, body shaking sobs, my mind flickering to Cal. To his face. How he was alone in our room right now. Was he broken like this? Or was he already hating me?
Sunday night came with vengeance. It was a blur in time. I felt lifeless, like my body wasn’t mine. I hadn’t seen Cal at all in the eight hours I’d been at the arena, and I knew that was on purpose. I hid in catering. I hid in the trainer’s room. I avoided the locker room at all costs.
We were in Gorilla, the waiting area just behind the curtain, both six-man teams. The noise of the crowd was a physical vibration against the floorboards. Our match was next, and we were lined up waiting to go.
Everyone except Cal.
“Anyone seen Deadlock?” the match producer called out, checking his headset, looking stressed. “We go live in two minutes!”
We all shook our heads. None of us had seen him, yet everyone turned to me, as if I should have the answer. As if we were still a unit.
No sooner had the producer yelled than he appeared.
He looked just about as bad as myself, but in a different way.
His eyes were dead. Hollow. He didn’t show emotion.
He wasn’t his usual self, charming, loose, ready to steal the show.
He was reserved. Cold. He looked straight ahead, refusing to acknowledge anyone around us.
He didn’t high five Evan. He didn’t nod at Martinez.
He just stood there, adjusting his wrist tape, staring at a spot on the wall. This was a job. That was all.
The Demolition team went out first, one by one, to a crowd hyped beyond belief.
Then, it was the Showdown team. Evan went first, popping the crowd. Then Martinez, flipping through the curtain. Then the two rookies, nervous and shaking.
Leaving me and Cal last in the dim red light of the Gorilla position.
We stood in the darkness. The roar of the crowd was deafening, but the silence between us was louder. It felt suffocating.
“Cal—” I started, my voice barely a whisper. I didn’t even know what I wanted to say. I’m sorry? Please look at me?
“Fuck you,” he said flatly.
He didn’t even look at me. He didn’t turn his head. He just spat the words out like poison. Then his music hit, and he was off, strutting into the lights like he didn’t have a care in the world, leaving me standing in his shadow.
Now, it was my turn. The crowd was chanting my name.
Silas! Silas! Silas!
I stepped through the curtain, my music blaring, my graphics illuminating me. My Carolina Blue and white gear glowed under the brightness. This was the moment. The one where I truly felt like a star. I pretended I was alright. I pretended this was the only thing on my mind.
But it wasn’t.
“And introducing… North Carolina’s own… Timeless Silas Reed!” the ring announcer belted.
I walked to the ring, forcing a smile, slapping hands with fans, but I felt like I was walking to the gallows.
The bell rang, and chaos erupted immediately.
The match started out fast, but it became clear very quickly that we were disjointed.
The Showdown team wasn’t a unit; we were six guys fighting individual battles.
Demolition, on the other hand, was a machine. They cut the ring in half. They isolated us exactly as the agent had laid out in the back, but it felt heavier, sloppier.