Chapter Text
Sydney’s been lying face down for what feels like hours now. He shifted his face a bit, as the spot on his pillow he’d been resting on had become too soaked with salty water and snot, and sniffed as quietly as he could. Everyone should be in bed at this time of night, his father’s strict curfew leaving no room for complaint or disobeyance from either Sydney or his siblings. Still, he figured he’d rather be safe than sorry, as disturbing his father and making him intrude in his room is the absolute last thing he wants at this point.
He’d just been back from the habitual hunting trip that his father insisted on taking him to every month. Going hunting was, in Sydney’s opinion, the worst fucking thing anyone could make him do. He’d tried vocalizing this to his father, at first, but after a year or two of persistence and one or many bruised cheeks, he’d learned to keep those reservations to himself.
He knew better than to question his father or go against his wishes, which made what happened make him feel all the stupider.
***
A familiar scene, Sydney’s rifle propped up on a log, sights trained on a forest creature and his father leaning behind him, always vigilant of their surroundings and, more importantly, his son. A few dozen feet from them, the stag that was to be their target grazed peacefully, rays of light filtering through the shrubbery and shining on it like spotlights, believing itself safe under the dark green cover of the forest, blissfully unaware of the encroaching danger. A picture of serenity that will soon be broken by Sydney’s own hands, finger on the trigger.
At 14 years old, he’s grown used to it. What were once sweaty, trembling hands have become accustomed to the touch of the rifle’s metal, his nose to the smell of gunpowder and blood, and his ears to the thundering crack of the bullet going off, and the cold silence that immediately follows.
He closed one eye and bit the tip of his tongue to focus, until all he can could hear was the rushing of his blood and the thrum of his pulse. He was in a waking trance, everything in the world fading out until there’s only him, the stag, and his father’s eternal presence. All he needs to do is apply a little pressure with his index finger and it would all be over.
Instead, a high pitched bleat rang loud, disturbing the silence of the forest and nearly making him jump. The spell was broken and he realized he’d been holding his breath.
All three of them turned their sights towards the source of the sound. A nearby bush rustled and, after a few moments of tense anticipation, a fawn, no more than a month old, strode out of it, unsteadily making its way towards the stag with clumsy, tangled steps. The stag, upon noticing, unhurriedly sauntered to meet it, lowering its head down so their muzzles could touch, and gave the fawn an affectionate lick across its head.
Sydney was in a different kind of trance. As he gazed upon the scene in front of him, so captivating in its simplicity (Like a storybook, he thought), a feeling he couldn’t put a name on weighed down on his heart and paralyzed him. Left him helpless.
“What are you waiting for?” His father’s, impatient voice sounded out, in that tone that indicated he was pissed off but was attempting to maintain a calm demeanor. Sydney didn’t hear him, though, couldn’t respond if he wanted to.
After about 10 seconds, Sydney’s father gruffed annoyedly and decided he’d had enough. With equally impatient movements, he quickly readied his own rifle and prepared to fire.
The click of the safety is what woke Sydney up. He turned his head towards his father, who was already in position and about to pull the trigger.
He doesn’t know how it happened. Can’t chart the line from point A to point B. All he knows is that next, he’s lying on top of his dad, hands wrestling for his rifle, barrel smoking from a recently fired bullet.
Sydney’s father bruskly pushed him off, making him land on his back with a thud that made him see stars for a second. Once he realized where he was, what he’d done, Sydney pushed himself up on his elbows and reluctantly raised his head to meet his father’s furious gaze.
His father doesn’t really hit him these days. Not anymore. Maybe he’s getting too old, maybe his father is afraid that he’d fight back. Doesn’t matter, really: Sydney’s scared shitless all the same.
“You’re a goddamn embarrassment.” He spit the words out as if they burned in his mouth.
The stag and its child were nowhere to be found.
***
And now he was here, face red and burning with anger, impotence and embarrassment. Ashamed that a display of animal sentimentality and a few unkind words from a weak man are all it takes to make him feel this small. He locks his feelings away, throws them deep into the ocean and waits for the unpleasant, violent thoughts that inevitably follow to bubble towards the surface. And then what’s his outlet? He had no stomach for killing animals, and no desire to hurt himself, so the next best thing was hurting others. Not anyone that deserved it (Like his father, for instance), but anybody who crossed his path and was unlucky enough to not count themselves amongst Sydney’s very small list of friends.
So hurt he did. Kicking, punching, grappling. Picking a fight every other week. ‘Roughhousing’ or ‘Pent up rage’ is what a kinder, perhaps naive, person might call it. ‘A fucking menace to society’ is what his father often said instead. Sydney didn’t have a horse in that race, didn’t care for the specifics. He just knew that it felt good, and he was good at it.
Not that this gave him any comfort in his current situation very helpful in his current situation, holed up in his room late at night. So he imagined unlikely scenarios instead. Running away from home, from this town. Making it as a pro-wrestler. Getting rich.
Or, for something slightly less improbable, picking a fight with a drunk and getting shanked and left for dead. All happy ends, in their own way.
Sydney was interrupted from his morbid daydreams by a sound coming from his window. An insistent tapping that drowned out the usual nighttime noise of nocturnal critters and sand being buffeted by the wind. He briefly considered shitting himself, then calling for help, in precisely that order, until he heard a muffled, familiar voice from the other side of the glass.
“Hello? Syd? It’s me”
Chase.
What the fuck?
Fog in his mind quickly dissipated, Sydney pushed himself up from the bed and swiped a shirt off the floor to make himself decent. He walked all of the two steps needed to cross to the other side of his small room, and, still wary from the earlier scare, he hesitantly looked out the window. There, he was greeted by what one could mistake for Sydney’s reflection, but was in fact, Chase Hunter. Standing in the dark, carrying a small backpack and awkwardly rubbing his elbows, either from cold or bashfulness (Sydney couldn’t tell).
Sydney didn’t keep him waiting. He very, very carefully lifted the old, creaky frame, already a growing pit of dread in his stomach from the prospect of being discovered, and leaned his upper body outwards to be face to face with Chase. “What the fuck??” He hissed between his teeth, exasperated but mostly curious as to why on earth Chase was knocking on his window like a serenading lover at 10:00 pm on a weekday.
“You didn’t show up at my house, so I tho-“ Chase paused, as he finally managed to get a good look at Sydney, and his expression shifted from giddy mischief to concern. “Um… is this a bad time?”.
Oh. Right. Sydney was supposed to be a mess right now. He clearly looked it, judging by Chase’s reaction. He rubbed his forearm against his eyes and nose to cover up the evidence as well as he could, discreetly wiping some leftover snot on his shirt. He thought about giving Chase some lame excuse to save face, but Chase already knew about his family situation, and he wasn’t an idiot. He thought about telling him to fuck off and go home, but, he begrudgingly admitted to himself, he’d really like to not be alone right now.
So instead, he extended his hand towards Chase in lieu of a response: an invitation. After a moment of trepidation, Chase took it, and clumsily shimmied himself up the windowsill with Sydney’s help. As he was about to make it to the other side, Chase slipped and nearly connected his chin with the floor, before Sydney caught him by the armpits, stopping his fall and rattling the contents of Chase’s backpack.
“Thanks,” Chase said, as he rose and dusted himself off. “You okay?” He had the gall to ask Sydney, as if he wasn’t the one that nearly ate shit and broke his teeth on Sydney’s hardwood floor.
“I don’t want to talk about it.” Was Sydney’s honest response. He appreciated the concern, really, but he wasn’t in the mood for pity right now.
Chase, who had been through this song and dance before, gave him a quiet “Okay.” Wanting to know more, but knowing it wasn’t his place to prod.
With that, hopefully, out of the way, Sydney crossed his arms, wordlessly urging Chase to explain what he was doing here. Meanwhile, Chase, who had only been to this room once or twice, and never at night, was feeding his curiosity by looking around the place, eyes landing on the numerous wrestling posters, the pile of messy clothes on the floor, and the ship in a bottle decoration displayed on Sydney’s night shelf, marveling at the difference the time of day can make in the ambience of a place. He quickly picked up on Sydney’s impatience, though, and somewhat embarrassedly fixed his attention back on his friend.
“Like I was saying, you were supposed to come to my house for the show, but you never showed up, so… I thought…” He stammered on his words, belatedly realizing that he didn’t *actually* have a plan before he came here.
Sydney closed his eyes and wracked his brain for the meaning behind Chase’s words, until he found it: “Oh.” He *was* supposed to be at Chase’s place to watch the pay-per-view, but the incident in the forest, understandably, sent everything else in his mind to the back burner.
Sydney slapped his own forehead at the realization. “Aw… Fuck, dude. I’m sorry, I completely spaced out.”
He really was sorry. They’d been looking forward to this for weeks. The pay-per-view in question was World Wild Wrestling’s 34th annual Beasts of the Ring live event. A 4 hour long program showcasing the best of the best from the world’s biggest professional wrestling promotion. It was, without a doubt, the biggest and most anticipated pro-wrestling event of the year.
And he’d missed it.
As if he needed any more reason to feel like garbage.
Sydney let out a long exhale and let himself fall backwards onto his bed. He’d been so excited for the main event, a no holds barred match between his favorite wrestler, Ray Gomez, and his sworn rival, Lucky Ace. The two had been locked in an intense feud for months after Gomez trashed Ace’s car and caused him to miss his daughter’s 8th birthday party. Throughout the year the rivalry kept building up momentum, the hatred between them getting to the point that both wrestlers had resorted to all sorts of underhanded tactics to put their opponent down for good. Even Ace got his hands dirty, and he was supposed to be a babyface, the epitome of a ‘good guy’ in pro wrestling! That’s how much he hated Gomez’s guts!
And all those months of match interferences, chair shots, kidnappings and kendo sticks wrapped in barbed wire were to come to a boiling point and culminate on this, the main event of Beasts of the Ring, with Ace’s championship title on the line.
“I’m guessing you didn’t watch it?” Chase interrupted his inner nerd-out monologue, the slightest bit of pity in his voice that Sydney tried his best to ignore.
“No, I didn’t,” Sydney said, trying not to make his voice sound as pathetic as he felt. “It’s fine, I’ll catch a vod or something.” Even though it wasn’t fine, because a vod wasn’t the same as watching the thing live. But them’s the breaks, he supposed.
With that bit of downer news out in the open, Sydney still had to deal with the messenger. He didn’t think Chase came all the way here just to rub it in. He could be an asshole when he wanted to, but he wasn’t cruel like that.
“What are you here for, anyway? Couldn’t you have texted me or something?”
“I did. You didn’t respond”
Fair. Sydney hadn’t cared to look at his phone since he got home. “Well, couldn’t this have waited until tomorrow?” A short pause. “Oh… Unless you just wanted to see me?” He said, pitching his voice up and making kissy faces at Chase, because he couldn’t pass up an opportunity to make fun of the otter.
Chase silently prayed that the cover of night would be enough to conceal the blush that was quickly spreading across his face, and leveled a devious and knowing smirk at Sydney, broadcasting that he knew something Sydney didn’t. Sydney raised an eyebrow.
“What?”
“You know Beasts of the Ring is still going, right?” This was true, the event was supposed to go until 11.
“Yeah, so fucking what?” Sydney said, his curiosity rapidly being overtaken by bitterness. “Where the fuck am I supposed to watch it, huh?” He made a show of spreading his arms around, his room missing the key component that was a television or computer. More importantly, he didn’t purchase the damn PPV, because he was supposed to watch it at Chase’s.
Unfazed by the sudden outburst, Chase continued. “Well, I figured you must have gotten in trouble or something.” Understatement of the century. “And I know your dad wouldn’t want to buy you the pay-per-view, sooo…” He said, making sure to stretch the o’s for as long as possible, now blatantly just trying to get on Sydney’s nerves, and undocked his backpack on the floor, crouching down so he could unzip the top and trudge through its mysterious contents.
“Aha!” He exclaimed, as much as one could exclaim when they were trying not to make noise, and produced a slick and shiny black square: a portable laptop. “We’re gonna have our watch party right here!”
Silence.
“I just have to log into my account and I can stream it no problem. Now, you missed most of the event, but we can still watch some of the last matches AND Ace vs Gomez. Um… You do have wi-fi, right? Wait, of course you do, you wouldn’t be able to do homework otherwise. Forget I said anything. I also brought earbuds and some snacks and don’t worry it’s nothing crunchy or smelly so your parents shouldn’t get mad at you just make sure you don’t spill on the floor also- Oof!”
In a single fluid movement, Sydney leaped from his bed like a vampire rising from his coffin and closed the distance between him and Chase, hugging him tightly and putting an end to his babbling. “Dude!”
“Hey, come on, we’re gonna miss it!” Chase wheezed, oxygen successfully crushed out of him by the hug. Sydney lifted him up a few inches in the air and swung him around a bit for good measure, before finally putting him down and releasing the shorter otter, knowing how much he disliked being manhandled (Not that it ever stopped him).
Chase sputtered and coughed into his fist, ego a bit bruised but otherwise no worse for wear. “Weirdo.” He said indignantly.
Sydney ruffled Chase’s hair, unable to resist teasing him a little bit more, the haze of sadness that had plagued him now fully lifted and replaced with playful, childish giddiness.
***
A few minutes later, after some technical setup, the two boys sat cross legged on the floor, knees brushing, illuminated by what little moonlight managed through filter through the window and the artificial glow of Chase’s laptop. The stream was not the highest quality, because Sydney’s bandwidth couldn’t handle high definition, and the sound quality on these earbuds were shit, but Sydney didn’t care.
The bits of the show they’d been able to catch were, as expected, amazing. Axel Swanson breaking Chainsaw Suzuki’s skull open, Los Fuegos showing off their insane acrobatics against The Exiles, and Nikita jumping from the top of the steel cage and landing on Lady Rose, breaking her through THREE stacked tables. Just an insanely stacked card, full of the greatest athletes in the business, all giving their absolute best.
But, of course, that all paled in comparison to the crown jewel of the night. Ace vs Gomez.
The lights in the stadium dimmed as Gomez’s theme kicked in. The loud, intense heavy metal filled Sydney with energy, and he wordlessly mouthed along to the lyrics, while Chase rolled his eyes.
Then, out came the man himself: A tall, jet black wolf of lean, athletic physique wearing green camo trunks, stepped out from underneath the Titantron, red fireworks shooting out of the floor as he did so. Ray Gomez spread his arms wide and took in the moment, before smugly raising his arm and making his way to the ring under a barrage of booing.
“God, he looks good. No homo.”
Chase stared pointedly at him.
“Hey, I’m just stating facts! Nothing gay about admiring a man’s physique and fashion sense.”
Chase snickered at that. “Whatever you say, fag.”
Their friendly bickering was interrupted by the iconic rock music of Ace’s entrance. The entrance went up in an explosion of white and blue smoke as Lucky Ace was revealed, making the crowd go wild. The muscular jaguar opted for a more traditional black tights, adorned with a poker motif that was synonymous with his gimmick. It was clear to anyone watching that Ace was furious, angrily stomping as he made his way to the ring. Not only that, but he was holding a microphone in one hand.
The jaguar got all up in Gomez’s face, spitting all sorts of insults and threats, and a promise to defeat him tonight, as the panther grinned mischievously.
“Ugh, so generic. Why do they even let him shoot promos.” Sydney said.
“You’re just saying that because you’re a Gomez fanboy.”
Sydney scoffed. “So you think he’s good with a mic?”
“I mean… He’s good in the ring.” Chase answered, dodging the question. “That’s more important, I think.”
“You can be good at talking and fighting! Just look at Gomez!”
“My point exactly.”
“Whatever! Be quiet.”
After the announcer explained the rules and stipulations of the match, and with Ace and Gomez stanced up on their respective corners, they would begin any second now.
As he sat there, watching wrestling on a tiny monitor and a bad quality stream, eating sugary garbage and talking shit, Sydney thought to himself: Chase did this for me. He made this happen.
Chase wasn’t Sydney’s closest friend. He didn’t think he was Chase’s either. But in this moment, he felt more deeply connected with him than he had with anyone else in his life. Just a simple gesture of kindness, and a shared passion.
Sydney thought this was the happiest he’d ever been.
The bell rang.