Victor Delgado, aka Ladrón de Tumbas, was a household name in Santo Domingo, particularly where he grew up in the barrio San Carlos. Or, so he said. It was difficult to tell when he was either embellishing or just being evasive, and that drove Jodie up a wall. When they first met, she had to double-check Wikipedia about his birthday, and even that held no certainty. Her grandmother assured her of his age several times, and considering that she was a devout Catholic, Jodie had to assume that she was telling the truth.
So, as Mitch watched a banner being strung up with Happy 50th Birthday! printed on it, the barrage of aggravated texts from Jodie were all the more delightful. Apparently, Victor insisted that it was his 45th birthday, not his 50th, and Mitch wanted more than anything to be in that car to bear witness to Jodie’s suffering.
“Looks good, guys,” he told the two students, both members of his stable Bad Moon Rising, while they worked together to straighten out the banner.
“You’re so official with that clipboard!” said one of them, a petite brunette woman with a pixie cut. She slid down the ladder without any regard to OSHA compliance, then bounded over to Mitch. Her real name was Sara, but she preferred to be called by her character’s name, Sandy. Prying the clipboard out of Mitch’s hand, and Sandy studied it intensely.
“Thanks? I guess?” Mitch’s nose wrinkled, and his head swung up as the other half of the pair, Louis, approached with a much more subtle rhythm, unconcerned with timeframes or schedules. Louis took a quick glance over Sandy’s shoulder, which was his default stance since due to being a giant, then turned his attention to Mitch.
“How long do we have to get the rest done?” he rumbled.
“Judging from the last text, 45 minutes tops.” Booting up his phone, Mitch confirmed the timestamp. “Jodie just left the McDonald’s on the Pike.”
“Cool,” nodded Louis, stepping aside as Sandy shoved the clipboard back at Mitch.
“Well, we’re basically finished, anyway.” She gestured to the warehouse-turned-wrestling school, and at the other students that also completed their assigned tasks. The decorations transformed the enormous room into something that vaguely resembled an event space, instead of an indoor skate park with its graffiti and posters and countless stickers on every available square inch. Jodie offered it as a venue for rental, and potential clients either loved or loathed the appearance; its only other consistent use outside of wrestling was practice for the local roller derby team on Wednesday nights, which Jodie gave them a steep discount on since she’d been a derby girl in the past.
Changing the subject, Sandy asked, “So, when do you think you’ll get cleared to wrestle again?”
“Dunno,” Mitch answered. “I have a follow-up at the end of September to see how healed I am. So if all goes well, hopefully I can start training-”
“Think you’ll be good for Graveyard?”
“I-” Mitch sighed. The Graveyard Smash was Monster Mash’s biggest event, which took place the weekend before Halloween. This year, it was going to be hosted at an actual sleepaway camp, and was nearly sold out. If he had beaten Lagoon Goon instead of getting injured, he would have advanced to the semi-finals, and potentially clinched the number one contender position. That meant a main event title match at Graveyard Smash. Beating back self-flagellation that broke the surface tension and began to bubble, he replied with, “God I hope so.”
“At the very least, we’ll get the tag titles,” Sandy nudged Louis.
“Still gotta get through Coven,” Louis reminded her, but she spun on her heel and wandered away, already chatting excitedly with someone else that walked by. Shrugging, he clasped a meaty hand on Mitch’s good shoulder and squeezed lightly. “Y’know we’re here for you, brotha.”
“Thanks,” Mitch smiled sheepishly, and waited until Louis had taken off before exhaling. Warmth crept into his cheeks, and he didn’t know how he could be one week removed from a relationship and already be so pathetically touch starved.
Then again -now that he was paying it any mind- even prior to the breakup, it’d been a good while since Calvin bestowed physical affection. And, then again, Mitch spent the better half of the year not in any position to be a recipient of such intimacy. “Goddammit,” he muttered under his breath, and ran his hand down his face.