Unfinished Business: Part 2

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Off Camera

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The sounds of a female grunting as well the echoes of feet against a heavy bag are heard throughout an empty gymnasium on the outskirts of Boston, Massachusetts.  The concrete floor is gray and the walls are painted an off-white color, at least the walls that still have paint on them, as most of the paint on the walls have begun to peel.  There is a standard wrestling set up in the center, weights scattered all over the floor.  At one of the far ends of the room is a red heavy bag.  The lovely Kayla Jones is standing there at the heavy bag dressed in a pair of workout shorts, black tanktop, and her long red hair pulled into a ponytail in the back, as she viciously attacks the heavy bag with her well-educated feet.

With each kick, from roundhouse kicks to jumping spin kicks, Kayla grunts loudly and the bag heaves back and forth.  The force of these kicks would be enough to take the head off of any competitor; she just hopes they will be effective against the many competitors she may have to go up against in the Scaffold Scramble at SCW Rise To Greatness.  But these kicks from Kayla Jones seem to have an extra added intensity, even more force than usual.  And if you look deeply into Kayla’s eyes you can tell that something is there, something hidden away  that she is keeping a secret, perhaps something that is driving her current intensity level this very moment.  The kicks continue, increasing in ferocity and intensity, until Kayla finally decides to take a break.

Nearby Angelica Jones, the elder of the two Jones sisters, is doing sit-ups.  She is wearing a pair of black adidas windpants and a plain white t-shirt with tennis shoes.  Her hair is also pulled into a ponytail in the back.

Angelica doesn’t  seem to be too bothered by her sister’s current intensity level.  To be perfectly frank, Angelica thinks it is a welcome change.  She thinks her and Kayla need to be more intense and add more fuel to the fire, so to speak, as they head into Rise To Greatness.  They already aired one promo in which they stated that this Rise To Greatness could very well be the last hoorah for The Sisterhood and Angelica believes it.  She does not want it to be over but she realizes that it could all be over if they cannot seem to figure out how to win again in SCW.

Winning at Rise To Greatness this year won’t be some walk in the park, because this isn’t your standard wrestling match.  This will be Scaffold Scramble and there will be many competitors looking to give their career a major boost.  Don’t you think some of them would love to advance their careers at the expense of The Sisterhood?

They most definitely would.

Thus Angelica has been busting her ass in the gym to make sure she’s ready for war.  She’s been pleased with her sister’s intensity level, which gives her some hope that maybe they can achieve some measure of victory in Scaffold Scramble.  Perhaps The Sisterhood still has one more day to live?

“997…998…999…1,000!”

Angelica hops up off of the floor, reaching over and snatching her white towel before she does so.  Angelica wipes the sweat from her brow.  After dropping the towel back onto the ground she turns to look at her younger sister.  She finds Kayla standing over by the heavy bag, no longer working out, but instead talking on the phone…

“Oh for the love of God, don’t tell me they…” she is seemingly cut off as she shakes her head in disgust “…no!  Absolutely not!  I refuse!”

Angelica tilts her head to one side as she listens intently.  She only hears one side of this conversation, so it’s hard to tell what this is about, but whatever it is, it has her sister upset in a big way.

“I do not give a damn what they said, Oliver…” well that answers one question for Angelica, it appears that Kayla is speaking to Oliver Hardy on the other end “…no, I will not sign!  Tell them that!”

Kayla’s frustration clearly gets the best of her as she turns off the iPhone and then throws it onto the floor.  Lucky for Kayla, the phone lands on a blue wrestling mat, which softens the blow.  Had it landed on the concrete, it could’ve been damaged.  Kayla is usually good at keeping her emotions in check and the mere fact that Kayla appears to be losing her temper like this is not good as far as Angelica is concerned.  Not good at all.  It signals to Angelica that something is wrong.

The elder sibling approaches Kayla, stepping in front of her.  She arches a brow out of curiosity. “Are you ok, sis?”

“Yeah…” Kayla nods her head “…I’m fine.”

“What was all of that about?”

“None of your business.”

Those words shock Angelica to the core.  It isn’t like Kayla to say that to her.  They’ve always been up front and honest with one another.  Yet now, for some reason, Kayla seems to be bitchy…which isn’t all that unusual…but today she’s bitchier than usual, even towards her own sister.

“Kay, I’m your sister, and I care about you.”

“I appreciate the concern but it’s still none of your business.”

Angelica sighs and shakes her head. “Fine, then I’m going to speak as your tag team partner and not as your sister, because while I may not know what it was you were talking about, I do know you were talking to Oliver.  And Kay, if whatever that was is going to cause you to have a lapse in judgment at Rise To Greatness or lose your cool in the Scaffold Scramble, then damn it, it does effect me and it is my business.”

“I will not lose my cool and I will not have a lapse in judgment.” Kayla says, vehemently shaking her head. “What I was talking about is none of your business, Angelica, and I got it under control.  So let’s just focus on preparing for that Scaffold Death Thing that Jake Starr and Tommy Valentine’s twisted minds came up with.”

“Scaffold Scramble…” Angelica says, correcting her younger sister.

“Whatever.” Kayla rolls her eyes as she walks past Angelica towards the wrestling ring in the center of the gym.  Angelica sighs as she follows suit.

Kayla slides into the ring, underneath the bottom rope, while Angelica hops up onto the ring apron and then steps through the ropes into the ring.  Kayla turns and stares at Kayla nods her head.

“Are you ready to go?”

“Huh?  Now?”

“Yes…” Kayla nods her head “…now!”

With that, Kayla charges Angelica, wrapping her up and taking her down in a double leg.  She proceeds to pour on rights and lefts without any break or hesitation.  Angelica manages to kick her off and scramble back to her feet.  The woman charges again but this time Julia sidesteps her, sending her into the ropes.  She comes back and Angelica hip tosses her.  Kayla scrambles to her feet, charges, and Angelica connects with an arm drag deep into an arm bar.

The younger sibling doesn’t let that slow her down.  She slowly but surely fights up to her feet.  Angelica keeps wrenching the arm bar in tighter and tighter.  Eventually Kayla reverses the arm bar into an arm bar of her own.  But Angelica is ready for this and then counters again, this time into a hammerlock.  Kayla breaks it with elbows to her older sister’s face.  She runs off the ropes and comes at Angelica only to get floored with a beautifully timed and executed dropkick.  Angelica immediately goes back to the arm bar.

“Kay, you’re off your game…”

“Shut up!”

“No seriously, you are.” Angelica releases the arm bar and then stands up. “You never fall for such easy moves and tricks.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Kayla says, breathing heavily as she stands back up to her vertical base. “I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not.” Angelica says, shaking her head. “You’re not focused.  And I think I know why…”

She places her hands on her hips “…whatever it is that you were on the phone about, that has gotten to you, you’re still thinking about that and you’re distracted.”

“Bullshit!” Kayla spits out.

“You were distracted, Kayla, and that’s what I was trying to tell you.  If this kind of crap happens at Scaffold Scramble, if you’re not focused, we are going to lose.”

“We’re not going to lose!”

“We will if we can’t sort this out!” Angelica exclaims. “Now please, tell me what the hell you were talking to Oliver about?!”

“It’s none of your business…” Kayla’s voice trails off, she shakes her head “…it’s not even Jones business. It’s Hardy business.”

“Huh?” Angelica asks, blinking curiously.

Tears begin to form in Kayla’s eyes. “I thought it was all over when my foster father died.  Then I had to deal with it again when Marie’s demon spawn was born…”

A flash of anger spreads across Angelica’s face.  That is, after all, her daughter and grandson.

“Watch it, Kay.  That’s my daughter…my grandson…”

“Yes, and that demon spawn was conceived after Marie was raped by my foster father, the same asshole who beat and molested me throughout my teenage years, the man who took my innocence away from me!”

Kayla marches up to Kayla and pokes a finger onto her chest. “You don’t have to deal with that, but I do!  Every time I look at Marie in the face, every time I look her son in the eyes, I’m reminded  of that!”

Angelica gives her younger sister a slightly rough shove. “Back off…”

Kayla takes in a few deep breaths to calm herself. “Fine…but yeah, I got past that, or at least I tried to, and I thought it was all over but then Oliver Hardy Jr. came back into my life and brought these bad feelings and worse memories back to the surface.”

She wipes a tear from her eyes. “It took awhile but we dealt with it.  We both were able to move on.  But now…”

Kayla shakes her head vehemently “…now his damnable biological relatives are back!”

“What do they want?” Angelica asks curiously.

“They want Oliver Hardy’s ashes.” Kayla answers. “They want to give the bastard a proper funeral…as if he deserves one…he deserves to be rotting in hell…”

“I can agree with that,” Angelica responds “but can’t Oliver Jr. take care of that himself?  He’s the heir.”

“He isn’t the only one.” Kayla sighs, rolling her eyes. “In a move to torment me from beyond the grave my foster father made me an heir, so I couldn’t avoid dealing with his family business, and I couldn’t avoid having those memories brought back to the surface.”

“So in other words, you and Oliver BOTH have to agree to let them have the ashes?”

“Right,” Kayla nods her head “it’s not just him…it’s me too…almost as if I’m still Oliver Sr.’s daughter…”

“You’re not.” Angelica embraces Kayla in a tight hug. “You are not like him and you never will be like him.”

She breaks the embrace and Angelica chuckles. “But seriously, Kay, if that’s all this is, just agree with Oliver to let them have the ashes and that’s that.  It’s over.  End of story.”

It’s hard to tell what happened or what caused Kayla to snap but she snaps this very moment as she shoves Angelica backward and then snaps off a vicious Kaylan Wind Kick straight to the jaw of Angelica Jones, dropping her flat on her back.  Kayla then drops down onto her knees by her fallen sister’s face.

“You have no fucking place to advise me in this matter!  I told you this was none of your business and it isn’t!  It’s Hardy business and legally I’m one of them!  And you have no idea what I went through!  You were in a damn convent becoming a nun while I was getting beaten regularly so don’t you dare advise me on this!”

Kayla is breathing heavily, trying to calm down.  Angelica groans in pain.  Kayla’s eyes grow wide as she suddenly realizes what she just did.

“Angelica, I…I’m sorry…I…” she shakes her head as tears roll down her cheeks “…I didn’t mean to…”

“Kay…” Angelica’s voice is low and trails off but Kayla hears her nevertheless.

“Yes?”

“…I think we need to work this out…”

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On Camera

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The Perfect Storm is a biographical film telling the story of the Andrea Gail, a commercial fishing vessel that was lost at sea with all hands after being caught in the Perfect Storm of 1991.  The crew makes a living off of fishing.  They fish, they sell what they catch, that’s how they survive.

At the height of their fishing the ice machine breaks; the only way to sell their catch before it spoils is to hurry back to shore. After debating whether to sail through the building storm or to wait it out, the crew decides to risk the building storm.

After Andrea Gail endures various problems, the crew struggles to sail through pounding waves and shrieking winds, while friends and family worry and wait for a ship that never comes home. The vessel encounters an enormous rogue wave. The boat is overturned and one of the crew, a man named Billy, elects to go down with his ship, the rest of the crew are trapped inside.

There are no survivors.

Thanks for the story, Angel.

Now why would this crew or anyone else risk life and limb the way they did?  Why would they do something that most would consider incredibly stupid and dangerous, something that, in this case, cost them their lives?

Like Angelica said, it’s about survival.  You do what you have to do to survive in this life and that is especially true in the business of professional wrestling.  Everyone wants to be the greatest but sometimes it’s simply just about survival.

Angelica and I won’t deny it, we feel as if we’re backed up against a wall with nowhere to go.  We feel as if this could very well be our last chance.  So the question to us was simple; do we put our life and limb on the line in the incredibly risky Scaffold Scramble or do we take the easy way out?  Do we just quit?  Do we just let out careers slowly fizzle away?

Colleen Hoover puts it best; “Death. The only thing inevitable in life.  People don't like to talk about death because it makes them sad.  They don't want to imagine how life will go on without them, all the people they love will briefly grieve but continue to breathe.”

No one is immortal.  Everyone must die someday and that is a sad fact that we all must contend with. The same can be said of professional wrestlers.  No career is forever.  Eventually we all have to, at the very least, evolve or change.  It’s a fact of life.  And when their career is gone, people may very well miss them, they may revere their past glories, but ultimately the sport of wrestling will live on without  them.

As much as Kayla would like to think ourselves as an integral part of the SCW tag team division, we realize that when we are gone, the division will live on without us.

Kayla and I have tried to go our separate ways in the past but we never quite made it work out.  We always gravitated back towards one another, reforming The Sisterhood again and again.  But maybe it’s time we changed?  Maybe it’s time we evolved?

Or maybe it’s time The Sisterhood’s careers respectively ended.

No way in hell are we going to let our careers slowly fizzle away!

Scaffold Scramble may very well be our last chance, and if it is our last chance, then you can be damn sure that Angelica and I will put it all on the line at Rise To Greatness, we will risk everything, just like the crew of the Andrea Gail risked everything during The Perfect Storm, but unlike the crew of the Andrea Gail, there will be survivors…

…no, not survivors…there will be winners.  The Sisterhood Victorious.

Do we want the tag team title contract?   Do we want the singles title contract?  To be perfectly honest with you, we really don’t care.  We’re just here to show the world, to show SCW, to show our fans that The Sisterhood still has a lot left in the tank, that the Jones wrestling family still has a lot left to give this business!

So whether me and Kayla end up challenging for the tag titles at Apocalypse or whether one of us gets to continue in a singles career going for the United States, Adrenaline, Television,  or even Women’s Championship, the fact remains that the name Jones will still be on the lips and mind of the wrestling world, because at Rise To Greatness in Scaffold Scramble, we will accept nothing short of total victory.

And we’re going to kick your teeth, right down your throat!