Post by Evan De Parker on Dec 5, 2012 21:59:26 GMT -4
Evan Envi sits, tiredly, and admittedly half-asleep behind the wheel of his cherished BMW 760Li. It’s an unusually warm December day in Baltimore, Maryland and Evan leans back in the seat with heavily-tinted aviators hanging halfway off of his face, dangling by the ear, and his mouth slightly ajar-- completely unattentive.
We’re in front of an unnamed school, recognizable to the (dedicated) viewer as the same elementary school Evan had delivered and retrieved young Chastity Weaver from multiple times in the past.
And it isn’t any of the dozens of camera flashes that go off as children and parents a lot scramble for their cameras and phones to grab a quick photograph of the MegaMegaStar that disturb him. It isn’t the occasional screaming and yelping of loyal APW fans as they walk by, pointing through the windshield at the sleeping figure of the man known as Envi.
He’s jerked into consciousness as the passenger door is swung open. Ten-year-old Chastity Weaver throws her bags into the backseat, unapologetically clocking Evan in the head with them during the action. Evan furrows a brow and glares at her as she settles into her seat, acknowledging his gaze without returning it.
”What?”
Evan sighs. He re-adjusts his sunglasses and pulls away from the spot on the curb he’d been occupying for the better part of the past half hour.
”Nothing... How was your day, kid?”
”Don’t bullshit me.”
Evan frowns a bit and shoots Chastity a look out of the corner of his eye.
”What kinda language is that?”
”You’re nervous. You’re nervous as shit right now.”
”And why would... That be?”
”Kurt. You have to fight Kurt tomorrow and you don’t know what he’s going to do to you. For the past week, your whole life has been APW, hasn’t it? How many times have you seen Michelle?”
Evan hesitates before he opens his mouth to respond to the announcement, but the kid holds up a finger to silence him while he continues to drive.
”Not often. Trust me, I know.”
”Kid... It’s Kurt.”
”So?”
”So, he’s insane. I’ve just been--”
”You’ve been ignoring Michelle, and you’ve been trying to figure out what the fuck you could possibly do to beat Kurt Noble, which is something that a lot of guys only wish they could do. On one hand, you have something you can fix, and you can tend to. On the other, you have someone that-- as you said-- is insane.
“He’s not something you can fix. He’s not something you can control.
“So may I ask you, why is Kurt Noble getting all of this special attention while my cousin is crying in her room thinking you hate her? Need I remind you that you called her a cun--”
”I apologized for that...”
”Evan.”
”What, Lucipher?”
”Whether you beat Kurt or not, you’ve still treated Michelle like dirt. Asshole.”
”Who is TEACHING you all of these horrible, filthy words?”
”Kurt Noble.”
Evan groans and rubs his eyes with his fist, slowing to a stop as the car approaches a red light. Chastity continues speaking.
”I don’t think this Jenny Knite girl is as smart as she’s letting you think she is. Michelle doesn’t either.”
”Well, of course Michelle would say that...”
”It’s not something she would just say.”
”Jenny’s a little weird, but she’s been a perfect agent.”
”She--”
”She’s helped me make better calls than I have in months here in APW.”
”She talked you into challenging Kurt Noble to a match on Twitter. Hah, yesterday she talked you into challenging Anthony Bailey to a match too. You must feel like a real star.”
It reeks of sarcasm.
”Kid, you think those were poor decisions? You’re ten. You may think you’re some type of genius, but you are a ten year old kid with no idea of the inner-workings of society and a completely screwed up perception of reality. Got it?”
The light turns green, and Evan drives noticeably faster. Chastity gazes out the window for a moment, observing the bare, grassy terrain on either side of them that seems to stretch for miles. There is silence in the car for a few moment aside from the very faint ”Santa Clause is Coming to Town...” rendition pulsating through the car from the radio.
”When Kurt Noble started taking advice from-- no... Put his career in the hands of a girl with no idea what she was doing... Well, look at him. Eh?”
Evan doesn’t respond. He doesn’t blink. He feels her staring a hole through him from the side but doesn’t answer-- simply turns the volume on the radio up, drowning out anything she could possibly say.
Our next scene jumps forward in time, with the camera focusing on the starry night sky above Maryland... And for seconds, that’s all we get. Stars.
Eventually, we pan down and we see Evan Envi leaning over the balcony of his Baltimore home. He looks as if he just returned from a formal outing, as he wears a white Louis Vuitton button-up tucked into a pair of black slacks. He holds a near-empty wine glass loosely in his left hand as he looks up at the stars, joined only by the camera-man. By us.
”You know what I always thought was lame? Like-- REALLY lame to hear when I was younger?”
Evan turns to the camera and gives us a nod before gesturing up to the stars.
”It takes years upon years for the light from stars to even reach the Earth because of the distance. So when I was an eager, open-minded elementary school student, I was that loser that asked about time travel. I asked if it was possible. I asked if we would be able to do it one day-- to go back.
“And my teacher looked at me and said...
”Looking up at the stars is like looking back in time. Every light is a little piece of history.”
Evan laughs and shakes his head.
”That’s the lameness. It was like there was so much build-up and so much hype, and then... Nothing.”
In one swift motion, Evan finishes the remaining contents of the wine glass and guides the glass to a spot on the banister of the balcony.
”That answer wasn’t good enough. When I was a kid I always talked about how I wanted to create a time machine. And, damnit, who wouldn’t want that?
“You could go back in time and correct all your mistakes-- talk to all the girls you never had the balls to in high school, and take every opportunity that you turned down in your youth, and avoid the motherfuckers that would grow up to stab you in the back.
“Time travel would be so handy. I could think of dozens of things I would go back and correct, just in APW alone-- and I think my opponent this week might feel the same way...
“I can’t imagine that Kurt wanted things to end up this way, even though I always sort of had a feeling that they would. I wouldn’t think Kurt would like to walk out to the arena to a chorus of death threats and hate chants every week, and I’m sure he never wanted his wife’s protectiveness to cost him the Undisputed Championship. In fact, I’m willing to bet that’s the last thing he wanted.
“In fact... I think that’s what all of this is about, Kurt.”
Evan laughs a bit and rubs his eyes, walking slowly toward the camera, which shakily keeps its focus on the MegaMegaStar while timidly backing away in an organic rhythm with his progression.
”I can’t help but think that if you never lost the APW Undisputed Title that you would still be the pleasant, upstanding gentleman that everybody around the world came to know, and love-- and I’ll include myself in this last part-- respect. I think you would still be Kurt Noble.
“Despite what you claimed, you didn’t exist in APW because you wanted to save it and because you wanted to further its success... You existed because YOU needed to be saved.
“You needed to be saved from this disgusting, vile, prick of a guy named Kurt Parker and APW couldn’t do for you what you spent your career trying to do for this business. Jeff couldn’t do it. Terry Marvin couldn’t do it. Amy Noble-- Chris Hart could NOT save you from that bastard, and ohohoho, it’s far, far too late now, my friend. You’ve done it now.
“No matter what you do in this business from here forward, you’re going to be remembered for being a backstabber.
“And a coward.”
Evan lowers his head a bit as he says this, though a smirk is evident on his face.
”And let me clarify something before I elaborate, okay?
“I’m not gonna come out here and tell everybody that I’m going to pull the upset of the year on the last Overdrive in 2012 and beat the almighty KURT. Right now, I’m two and zero and over the past few weeks I’ve learned that I’m not in any sort of position to make those kind of promises... Logic dictates that I go out to the Nassau Coliseum in Long Island this upcoming Thursday, and you run through me on your way to a fifty-percent Chris Hart at Christmas Chaos...
“And if I can’t stop that from happening, then rest assured, I’m gonna make the seventeen days between tomorrow night and Christmas Chaos absolute hell for you. Chris Hart goes in fifty-percent, and the almighty KURT goes in at fifty-percent. Why should anybody else get an easy match? Huh?”
Evan laughs lowly and points a finger into the camera, narrowing his eyes.
”You’re a coward for what you did. I would expect shenanigans like that from Terry or Only, but from you, Kurt, I’m surprised. I shouldn’t be at this point in the game... But I am.
“And I don’t think you did what you did because you don’t think you can beat Chris Hart at Christmas Chaos. We all know you can, and will... Just like I can, and will beat John Dionysus.
“I think you attacked Hart because you know about him what you know about me, and it’s that regardless of the winner, Chris Hart knows how to hurt Kurt Noble.
“I know how to hurt Kurt Noble.”
Present now is a fire-- a vigor in Evan’s eyes that was previously nowhere to be found.
”Hart knows how to do it from the inside-out. I know how to do it systematically and methodically from the outside-in. I’ll become your number-one problem, Kurt, and I’m only your opponent for one night. And that’s all I need.
“All I need is one match to prove to the world that Evan Envi isn’t another name to be lost on the card on Overdrive in 2013. After our match, Kurt, while you’ll still be labeled as a backstabber and a coward no matter WHAT you do, I’ll be heralded as one of the greatest young wrestlers of our generation because of the lengths I took you to. Because of the things I made you do-- the old tricks I made you pull out in that ring, just so you had some glimmer of HOPE of putting me away.
“The spectators will look at me and they will see the same thing they saw in the legends, immortalized in society from when they were children. People will look at me and they’ll be awe-struck, and they’ll weep. They’ll fucking weep because they know I can do what you claimed you would, but were never quite able to.
“Because they know I’m the one. I’m the one that’s going to save all of this-- this ENTIRE business. I’M the guardian angel of professional wrestling, keeping everything around us from crumbling, falling to fucking pieces. The masses will look at me and they will have HOPE for the future because they’ve seen what I’ve done! They’ve seen the monsters I’ve conquered and the demons I’ve slayed.
“I’ll do what you couldn’t... I’ll rise to heights that you couldn’t... Have... Imagined...
“One day, all of this will be mine.
“I’ll look back, y’know.
“I’ll look back on matches like this, and I’ll credit you for all of your inspiration. Your motivation. You drove me and pushed me to be better than excellent, Kurt. I’ve said it before-- I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you.”
Evan shrugs and begins to loosen the buttons restricting the wrists of his shirt. He casts a glance into his house through the sliding glass door on the balcony but then turns his attention to the night sky again while he continues to speak to us.
”You told me that I wouldn’t even be in APW a month after I signed my contract, and I made sure that I was still here, still talking shit in your ear every chance I got to remind you that I was here, and that I was coming for you. Your title. Your throat.
“You told me that I couldn’t beat you, so I took you on in what was one of the greatest fights of my life and you barely-- BARELY walked away with the victory. And now... Now what? Now what do we have? Now what does all of this mean?”
Evan scoffs.
”It’s sickening that you and I are walking down the same path, y’know. I hate that I’ve been compared to you in the most negative ways imaginable these few months. It’s disgusting that after losing almost everything from my title, to my family, to my friends, to my... Fucking self-worth... I find myself looking at the things you’re doing on Overdrive and making excuses for you in my head. I mean, how fucked up is that, eh?
“Now when we meet in that ring, you don’t have any sort of Undisputed Championship I want. You don’t have a spot in the main event that I could snatch from you. You don’t even have the perfect life. There’s nobody close to you that I could taunt. There’s nothing you have to lose.
“There’s nothing you have to lose, Kurt.”
Evan sighs and looks away, but he ends his trek in the same exact place we started. At the edge of the balcony, gazing skyward.
”At Christmas Chaos, I’m going one-on-one with John Dionysus in what should be a classic match. A battle between the old guard and the new breed. And you? You’re going up against a potentially crippled man that you tried to injure... That you tried to maim, prematurely.
“It’s no secret that I need to be at one hundred percent where you could get away with taking a beating in this match. You can take risks that you normally wouldn’t because this match to you, Kurt? It has no immediate value. There’s no risk factor.”
Evan’s gives a single short laugh and his eyes drift toward us.
”But maybe we’ll learn something about ourselves out there tomorrow night. Right, Kurt?”
His eyes turn up toward the sky one more.
”Even, if you don’t have anything to lose, then I’ll make sure at least one thing happens tomorrow night.”
The camera pans upward toward the sky and finally settles on the stars, in the same angle and in the same position that it was when we were introduced to the scene just a few moments prior.
”We’ll make history in New York.”
Darkness.
We’re in front of an unnamed school, recognizable to the (dedicated) viewer as the same elementary school Evan had delivered and retrieved young Chastity Weaver from multiple times in the past.
And it isn’t any of the dozens of camera flashes that go off as children and parents a lot scramble for their cameras and phones to grab a quick photograph of the MegaMegaStar that disturb him. It isn’t the occasional screaming and yelping of loyal APW fans as they walk by, pointing through the windshield at the sleeping figure of the man known as Envi.
He’s jerked into consciousness as the passenger door is swung open. Ten-year-old Chastity Weaver throws her bags into the backseat, unapologetically clocking Evan in the head with them during the action. Evan furrows a brow and glares at her as she settles into her seat, acknowledging his gaze without returning it.
”What?”
Evan sighs. He re-adjusts his sunglasses and pulls away from the spot on the curb he’d been occupying for the better part of the past half hour.
”Nothing... How was your day, kid?”
”Don’t bullshit me.”
Evan frowns a bit and shoots Chastity a look out of the corner of his eye.
”What kinda language is that?”
”You’re nervous. You’re nervous as shit right now.”
”And why would... That be?”
”Kurt. You have to fight Kurt tomorrow and you don’t know what he’s going to do to you. For the past week, your whole life has been APW, hasn’t it? How many times have you seen Michelle?”
Evan hesitates before he opens his mouth to respond to the announcement, but the kid holds up a finger to silence him while he continues to drive.
”Not often. Trust me, I know.”
”Kid... It’s Kurt.”
”So?”
”So, he’s insane. I’ve just been--”
”You’ve been ignoring Michelle, and you’ve been trying to figure out what the fuck you could possibly do to beat Kurt Noble, which is something that a lot of guys only wish they could do. On one hand, you have something you can fix, and you can tend to. On the other, you have someone that-- as you said-- is insane.
“He’s not something you can fix. He’s not something you can control.
“So may I ask you, why is Kurt Noble getting all of this special attention while my cousin is crying in her room thinking you hate her? Need I remind you that you called her a cun--”
”I apologized for that...”
”Evan.”
”What, Lucipher?”
”Whether you beat Kurt or not, you’ve still treated Michelle like dirt. Asshole.”
”Who is TEACHING you all of these horrible, filthy words?”
”Kurt Noble.”
Evan groans and rubs his eyes with his fist, slowing to a stop as the car approaches a red light. Chastity continues speaking.
”I don’t think this Jenny Knite girl is as smart as she’s letting you think she is. Michelle doesn’t either.”
”Well, of course Michelle would say that...”
”It’s not something she would just say.”
”Jenny’s a little weird, but she’s been a perfect agent.”
”She--”
”She’s helped me make better calls than I have in months here in APW.”
”She talked you into challenging Kurt Noble to a match on Twitter. Hah, yesterday she talked you into challenging Anthony Bailey to a match too. You must feel like a real star.”
It reeks of sarcasm.
”Kid, you think those were poor decisions? You’re ten. You may think you’re some type of genius, but you are a ten year old kid with no idea of the inner-workings of society and a completely screwed up perception of reality. Got it?”
The light turns green, and Evan drives noticeably faster. Chastity gazes out the window for a moment, observing the bare, grassy terrain on either side of them that seems to stretch for miles. There is silence in the car for a few moment aside from the very faint ”Santa Clause is Coming to Town...” rendition pulsating through the car from the radio.
”When Kurt Noble started taking advice from-- no... Put his career in the hands of a girl with no idea what she was doing... Well, look at him. Eh?”
Evan doesn’t respond. He doesn’t blink. He feels her staring a hole through him from the side but doesn’t answer-- simply turns the volume on the radio up, drowning out anything she could possibly say.
***
Our next scene jumps forward in time, with the camera focusing on the starry night sky above Maryland... And for seconds, that’s all we get. Stars.
Eventually, we pan down and we see Evan Envi leaning over the balcony of his Baltimore home. He looks as if he just returned from a formal outing, as he wears a white Louis Vuitton button-up tucked into a pair of black slacks. He holds a near-empty wine glass loosely in his left hand as he looks up at the stars, joined only by the camera-man. By us.
”You know what I always thought was lame? Like-- REALLY lame to hear when I was younger?”
Evan turns to the camera and gives us a nod before gesturing up to the stars.
”It takes years upon years for the light from stars to even reach the Earth because of the distance. So when I was an eager, open-minded elementary school student, I was that loser that asked about time travel. I asked if it was possible. I asked if we would be able to do it one day-- to go back.
“And my teacher looked at me and said...
”Looking up at the stars is like looking back in time. Every light is a little piece of history.”
Evan laughs and shakes his head.
”That’s the lameness. It was like there was so much build-up and so much hype, and then... Nothing.”
In one swift motion, Evan finishes the remaining contents of the wine glass and guides the glass to a spot on the banister of the balcony.
”That answer wasn’t good enough. When I was a kid I always talked about how I wanted to create a time machine. And, damnit, who wouldn’t want that?
“You could go back in time and correct all your mistakes-- talk to all the girls you never had the balls to in high school, and take every opportunity that you turned down in your youth, and avoid the motherfuckers that would grow up to stab you in the back.
“Time travel would be so handy. I could think of dozens of things I would go back and correct, just in APW alone-- and I think my opponent this week might feel the same way...
“I can’t imagine that Kurt wanted things to end up this way, even though I always sort of had a feeling that they would. I wouldn’t think Kurt would like to walk out to the arena to a chorus of death threats and hate chants every week, and I’m sure he never wanted his wife’s protectiveness to cost him the Undisputed Championship. In fact, I’m willing to bet that’s the last thing he wanted.
“In fact... I think that’s what all of this is about, Kurt.”
Evan laughs a bit and rubs his eyes, walking slowly toward the camera, which shakily keeps its focus on the MegaMegaStar while timidly backing away in an organic rhythm with his progression.
”I can’t help but think that if you never lost the APW Undisputed Title that you would still be the pleasant, upstanding gentleman that everybody around the world came to know, and love-- and I’ll include myself in this last part-- respect. I think you would still be Kurt Noble.
“Despite what you claimed, you didn’t exist in APW because you wanted to save it and because you wanted to further its success... You existed because YOU needed to be saved.
“You needed to be saved from this disgusting, vile, prick of a guy named Kurt Parker and APW couldn’t do for you what you spent your career trying to do for this business. Jeff couldn’t do it. Terry Marvin couldn’t do it. Amy Noble-- Chris Hart could NOT save you from that bastard, and ohohoho, it’s far, far too late now, my friend. You’ve done it now.
“No matter what you do in this business from here forward, you’re going to be remembered for being a backstabber.
“And a coward.”
Evan lowers his head a bit as he says this, though a smirk is evident on his face.
”And let me clarify something before I elaborate, okay?
“I’m not gonna come out here and tell everybody that I’m going to pull the upset of the year on the last Overdrive in 2012 and beat the almighty KURT. Right now, I’m two and zero and over the past few weeks I’ve learned that I’m not in any sort of position to make those kind of promises... Logic dictates that I go out to the Nassau Coliseum in Long Island this upcoming Thursday, and you run through me on your way to a fifty-percent Chris Hart at Christmas Chaos...
“And if I can’t stop that from happening, then rest assured, I’m gonna make the seventeen days between tomorrow night and Christmas Chaos absolute hell for you. Chris Hart goes in fifty-percent, and the almighty KURT goes in at fifty-percent. Why should anybody else get an easy match? Huh?”
Evan laughs lowly and points a finger into the camera, narrowing his eyes.
”You’re a coward for what you did. I would expect shenanigans like that from Terry or Only, but from you, Kurt, I’m surprised. I shouldn’t be at this point in the game... But I am.
“And I don’t think you did what you did because you don’t think you can beat Chris Hart at Christmas Chaos. We all know you can, and will... Just like I can, and will beat John Dionysus.
“I think you attacked Hart because you know about him what you know about me, and it’s that regardless of the winner, Chris Hart knows how to hurt Kurt Noble.
“I know how to hurt Kurt Noble.”
Present now is a fire-- a vigor in Evan’s eyes that was previously nowhere to be found.
”Hart knows how to do it from the inside-out. I know how to do it systematically and methodically from the outside-in. I’ll become your number-one problem, Kurt, and I’m only your opponent for one night. And that’s all I need.
“All I need is one match to prove to the world that Evan Envi isn’t another name to be lost on the card on Overdrive in 2013. After our match, Kurt, while you’ll still be labeled as a backstabber and a coward no matter WHAT you do, I’ll be heralded as one of the greatest young wrestlers of our generation because of the lengths I took you to. Because of the things I made you do-- the old tricks I made you pull out in that ring, just so you had some glimmer of HOPE of putting me away.
“The spectators will look at me and they will see the same thing they saw in the legends, immortalized in society from when they were children. People will look at me and they’ll be awe-struck, and they’ll weep. They’ll fucking weep because they know I can do what you claimed you would, but were never quite able to.
“Because they know I’m the one. I’m the one that’s going to save all of this-- this ENTIRE business. I’M the guardian angel of professional wrestling, keeping everything around us from crumbling, falling to fucking pieces. The masses will look at me and they will have HOPE for the future because they’ve seen what I’ve done! They’ve seen the monsters I’ve conquered and the demons I’ve slayed.
“I’ll do what you couldn’t... I’ll rise to heights that you couldn’t... Have... Imagined...
“One day, all of this will be mine.
“I’ll look back, y’know.
“I’ll look back on matches like this, and I’ll credit you for all of your inspiration. Your motivation. You drove me and pushed me to be better than excellent, Kurt. I’ve said it before-- I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you.”
Evan shrugs and begins to loosen the buttons restricting the wrists of his shirt. He casts a glance into his house through the sliding glass door on the balcony but then turns his attention to the night sky again while he continues to speak to us.
”You told me that I wouldn’t even be in APW a month after I signed my contract, and I made sure that I was still here, still talking shit in your ear every chance I got to remind you that I was here, and that I was coming for you. Your title. Your throat.
“You told me that I couldn’t beat you, so I took you on in what was one of the greatest fights of my life and you barely-- BARELY walked away with the victory. And now... Now what? Now what do we have? Now what does all of this mean?”
Evan scoffs.
”It’s sickening that you and I are walking down the same path, y’know. I hate that I’ve been compared to you in the most negative ways imaginable these few months. It’s disgusting that after losing almost everything from my title, to my family, to my friends, to my... Fucking self-worth... I find myself looking at the things you’re doing on Overdrive and making excuses for you in my head. I mean, how fucked up is that, eh?
“Now when we meet in that ring, you don’t have any sort of Undisputed Championship I want. You don’t have a spot in the main event that I could snatch from you. You don’t even have the perfect life. There’s nobody close to you that I could taunt. There’s nothing you have to lose.
“There’s nothing you have to lose, Kurt.”
Evan sighs and looks away, but he ends his trek in the same exact place we started. At the edge of the balcony, gazing skyward.
”At Christmas Chaos, I’m going one-on-one with John Dionysus in what should be a classic match. A battle between the old guard and the new breed. And you? You’re going up against a potentially crippled man that you tried to injure... That you tried to maim, prematurely.
“It’s no secret that I need to be at one hundred percent where you could get away with taking a beating in this match. You can take risks that you normally wouldn’t because this match to you, Kurt? It has no immediate value. There’s no risk factor.”
Evan’s gives a single short laugh and his eyes drift toward us.
”But maybe we’ll learn something about ourselves out there tomorrow night. Right, Kurt?”
His eyes turn up toward the sky one more.
”Even, if you don’t have anything to lose, then I’ll make sure at least one thing happens tomorrow night.”
The camera pans upward toward the sky and finally settles on the stars, in the same angle and in the same position that it was when we were introduced to the scene just a few moments prior.
”We’ll make history in New York.”
Darkness.
