Whether you’re a major league wrestler or someone just starting out on their path in the business, we all have one thing in common: very quickly, we all get very familiar with sleeping in unfamiliar beds. Your big league stars will find themselves in a different city probably three-quarters of the year, but even your young up and comers will find themselves spending most of their weekends in a different motel. If they’re really lucky, they’ll spend every weekend in one.
I was up at 7, even with the late end to my evening last night. Not because of anything wrong with the bed, or the room. Just my body’s internal alarm clock telling me that dammit, Maggie, it’s time to get going. So, rather than fight it, I got up. Few promoters in the indy world spring for five star hotels, and Kathy Davies was no exception. But the motel she’d booked for the girls at least had a modest gym, suitable for getting in a small workout first thing.
Which suited me fine. I mean, you never wanna overdo it the morning of a match.
After a healthy early lunch and a few hours spent collecting myself, I headed over to the building. It was a short drive from the motel, and from the outside pretty much exactly what I expected: a modest sized VFW hall, its tan aluminum siding obviously not new but not in particularly obvious disrepair, a short awning overhanging the sidewalk in front of a set of glass doors, the parking lot… honestly? Surprisingly litter free.
I didn’t turn into the parking lot. Kathy had told me the talent were all using the lot for the pre-school, just down one of the side streets behind the hall. Being the weekend and all, it would be pretty clear of cars, and it allowed us to avoid any potentially unpleasant social interactions with the crowd either before or after the show.
Finding a parking spot near the sidewalk, I got out of the car and headed toward the building. I was dressed… well, I wouldn’t say I was dressed not to draw attention to myself, because I felt like I was looking pretty cute today in a pair of white Reeboks, a set of loose grey slacks, and a long sleeved, light purple crop top that left plenty of my belly visible. But only the gym bag slung over my left shoulder gave any indication that I was here to work the show. I certainly wasn’t wearing a sign that said “I’M A WRESTLER, ASK ME HOW!”
As I got closer to the building, I could spot a back door open, as well as a man leaning against the wall alongside, glancing at his phone. The closer I got, the better I could make him out. He was cute, if you go far tall, lean, youngish… but older than me… men of middle eastern descent, whose strong jaw and upper lip were adorned with a moustache and beard which could pass for a couple of days’ stubble but were clearly closely groomed to foster that impression.
It didn’t take me long to recognize him. Shahid Soliman. Many people in the indy wrestling world wear multiple hats, which is kinda fitting when you think about how many people in the indy wrestling world have multiple faces. The fans knew Shahid Soliman as the voice of 3M, who called the action on their iPPVs. But to the girls, he was the closest thing that 3M had to a head of talent relations. Kathy had told me to look out for him when I got to the building, but I hadn’t expected to find him outside it.
I was about six feet away from him when he finally looked up. “Hi,” I said, flashing him my warmest smile as I offered my hand. “I’m Maggie. Kathy told ya to expect me, I’m hopin’?”
“Ahhh, you’re the new girl,” he replied as we shook hands. “Not sure what you did to piss Kathy off for this booking, but I hope you won’t hold that against me since she’s not here.”
Is anyone gonna miss the opportunity to not let me forget what my chances are tonight?
I forced my lips into a smile, and offered a strained chuckle before responding, “Just so long as you don’t hold it against me when I score a major upset.”
“Touché,” Shahid said, his expression turning sheepish. “Good to have you here, though. I mean it.” He swept his free hand toward the doorway. “Your dressing room’s gonna be the second door on your right.”
My dressing room…
Let’s dispel some misconceptions right away, shall we? Out here on the indies, there’s virtually no such thing as “your” dressing room. When he said my dressing room, he meant the room that had been commandeered for my side of the locker room to get dressed in. Which, with any luck, would be large enough to house all of us, but that was never a given.
“Thanks,” I said, giving him one more, warmer smile that ideally let him know there were no hard feelings on my end, and went inside. Just as his phone started to ring. I entered a very short hallway, about six feet long, that opened up considerably to my left, but only about another six feet to my right. There were a few tables set up with some equipment sitting on them, and a couple of cables running along the floor, but there was hardly any crew to be seen.
But I could hear them working, on the other side of a black curtain that had been erected to create a makeshift backstage. Obviously, they were busy getting the ring constructed and the lighting properly rigged.
Second door on my right, he’d said…
I was just about to reach for the handle when a vaguely familiar voice called from behind me. “Glad you could make it!”
I turned around, expecting to see either Jazmin or Nikki. But I saw two women, not one, standing in front of a doorway along the back wall. And neither of them was Jaz nor Nikki. The one on the left was the taller of the two, if only by an inch. She had brown eyes, full eyebrows, and long, dark blonde hair that spilled well past her shoulders. Her gurls weren’t huge, but they were practically straining against the super tight, leopard print tank she was wearing, along with an equally snug pair of blue jeans that sported several strategic rips in the denim.
The other woman had practically equally long, light black hair. It was almost like they were trying to meet in the exact center of the blonde-brunette spectrum but weren’t quite there. She had green eyes and pouty lips, and was wearing a white tube top that had a red oval in the center, inside of which was written “SAINTS & SINNERS,” only the ampersand looked to be comprised of a pair of interlocking S’s, one S fashioned to end in a devil’s tail, the other’s end sprouting into an angel’s wing, with a halo above their joined crown. Her denim had also met a set of scissors, but the scissors had completely won the battle with hers, resulting in a set of Daisy Dukes. White athletic socks rose out from a pair of chunky white sneaks, ending with a trio a stipes, the center one red, the two sandwiching it blue.
It didn’t take me long to figure out who they were, even though they weren’t sporting their championship belts: Ida and Rita Thibodeaux, also known as the Hurricane Sisters. The Twin Terrors of Bourbon Street, though they weren’t actual twins. But both the amount of carnage they could wreak and the alcohol they could consume were very nearly identical. Some said they were named after the natural disasters, others said their name came from the drink, and it’s quite possible that nobody was wrong in their assessment.
I swallowed down the building lump of anxiety, hoping that it didn’t show. Rita, the blonde, took a step toward me. Ida moved off to her sister’s left, beginning to circle me, her eyes studying me with searing intensity. My eyes in turn began darting around the room, getting a measure of the surroundings I’ve only been in for about the last ten seconds. When Rita noticed that, she offered a smug little laugh. “Relax, sweetheart,” she said. “We’re not here to hurt you…”
“Well,” Ida interjected, “not physically…”
Rita nodded slightly before clarifying. “Well, not too much.”
Ida smirked. “Can’t say how well your pride’s gonna hold up.”
“I’m bettin’ not well,” the brunette agreed. “But you’re Genesis’s toy tonight. And Genesis wouldn’t like it too much if we broke her toy before she got to play with it.”
“And I’m not stupid enough to get on her bad side,” Ida said. She was behind me now, forcing me to take a step back and pivot, enough to at least keep each of them in my periphery. But I was still taking in the lay of the land. There was no one else around, either on this side of the door or on this side of the curtain. I’ve never been one to back down from a fight, but the simple fact was, they had me outnumbered. There’s a certain type of wrestler who doesn’t have to worry about being on the wrong side of the numbers game.
But that type of wrestler wasn’t me.
“Just think of us as the welcoming committee, hun,” the brunette purred, looking me up and down much like a lioness would regard a tasty zebra.
“And it just wouldn’t be good manners if we didn’t initiate you into 3M,” Rita said, putting more than enough emphasis on that one word to leave no doubt what sort of “initiation” they had in mind…
I let my gym bag slide off my shoulder, my body tensing as Ida and Rita both began to circle now, and I suddenly found myself in the eye of the Hurricane Sisters. As soon as the bag hit the floor, I kicked it to the side. Specifically, I kicked it toward Ida’s feet, hoping to trip her up, and at least buy myself a few moments with just Rita, one on one. With any luck, I could land something that took her out of the equation long enough for me to deal with Ida once she was back in the mix…
… only Ida pulled up short of the bag before she could stumble over it, Rita halting herself an instant later. She glanced down at my discarded bag for a second, then looked back up at me with a smirk. “Quick thinkin’, babe,” the brunette said. “Honestly? I think I kinda like ya…”
“But I’m sure we’ll like you more when you’re sobbin’ and snifflin’,” Rita observed, before they started moving again. It was a tough task, keeping my feet moving, trying to keep my eyes on both of them, trying to spot which one of them would make the first move. And knowing that, even if I succeeded in catching whoever made the first move, the other would be ready to pounce the moment…
“Ladies,” a new and more familiar voice called out from behind me, “can anyone join this party, or do you need an invite?”
Even as all three of our heads were turning, another voice added, “You know that’s a trick question, Nikki. I’m always down to crash a party.”
I let out a sigh of relief when I saw Jazmin Wylde and Nikki Vasquez in the doorway. “The Wylde Childe” was dressed simply in a loose fitting tie dye tee, a pair of black yoga pants, and matching sneaks. “The Schoolgirl Crush” was almost living the gimmick in a black halter, plaid miniskirt, and a pair of white low top canvas sneakers. She had on a pair of shades, whether that was in any way accommodating a hangover from last night I wasn’t prepared to say.
I didn’t particularly care, either, now that I had some backup.
Now that they found themselves on the wrong side of the numbers game, the Thibodeaux girls grumbled their displeasure and slunk off back where they’d come from, Rita casting one last dirty glance back over her shoulder at me before slamming closed the door to their dressing room. “I thought I told you to find us when you got here?” Jaz asked as they came over to me.
“That was the plan,” I told her, “but they found me first.”
“Well, I told ya we’d find you,” Nikki said, pulling me into a quick little hug. “Glad we did when it mattered.” Apparently, the alcohol didn’t have too much to do with how affectionate and outgoing she was last night.
“C’mon,” Jaz said, opening the door to our dressing room, “before anyone else gets any bright ideas…”
I followed them inside, and we joined about half a dozen other women who were already there, in various states of both dress and undress as they got ready for tonight. Some of them I recognized, some of them I didn’t. Of course, one person I recognized right away, sitting in the far corner, was the woman who just last month knocked my opponent tonight from the ranks of the undefeated and took her World championship, Toni Edwards.
We might be blonde, but that was about where our similarities ended. She had a few inches on me. She wasn’t quite six feet tall, but she wasn’t far short of that. And she was just on the other side of 30, with about a dozen years of experience under her (newly won) belt. But while she was the first person I spotted, she wasn’t the first one I introduced myself to. No, there’s an etiquette to these things. You don’t just march up to the champ and say, “Hi! Here I am!”
No, I started with the woman closest to me. Who I also recognized. She was about my height and build, and about a few years older than me. And… at the risk of sounding crass, she had what some promoters would consider the good fortune to have been born into a gimmick. By which I mean, she was Native American. And much like Nikki using her youthful charms to play the schoolgirl, she had embraced it, as shown by her gear. She was just putting the finishing touches on her ensemble: a tan, suede top decked in fringe and in dangling turquoise beads, low rise boy shorts with long fringe around the legs, and a small, beaded flap that came across as a little loincloth.
I waited for her to finish zipping up her matching boots before extending my hand. “Maggie.”
She gave me a welcoming smile as we shook hands. “Nicoma Bylilly, nice to meet you.”
Seated just a little ways past her were two more women, both younger than her, and both younger than me. I definitely hadn’t worked with them before, but as I looked at them, there was something eerily familiar about them. It was hard to be sure with them sitting down, but they looked about the same size. They were both blonde. In fact, they looked enough alike that I was almost certain they were sisters. One of them had a slightly rounder face than the other. Both of them had brown eyes, but the one with the rounder face had slightly lighter eyes. Again, I introduced myself and offered them my hand.
“Nova,” Dark Brown Eyes Girl introduced herself.
“Starfyre,” Round Face Girl followed.
Before I could say anything else, Jazmin came up alongside me. “I see you’ve met the Spencer girls…”
Spencer…
I took another look at each of their faces, and then it clicked. These were Liberty Spencer’s kids! I’d never gotten to see Libby work live, but I couldn’t tell you how many of her matches I’d seen on TV growing up.
Nova grinned. “And there it is,” she announced, clearly spotting the moment where I’d worked it out, causing my cheeks to blush just a little.
“The Heavenly Bodies here are challenging for the tag titles tonight,” Jazmin informed me
“Trust me when I say I’ll be your biggest fan tonight,” I told them.
“I’m guessin’ you had a…”
“Mags?”
Starfyre had been cut off by a voice from behind me, and I slowly turned around. When I did, I found myself face to face with an extremely well built and well-endowed blonde girl, standing a couple of inches taller than me, wearing an open blue flannel over a black tank, blue denim shorts, cowboy boots on her feet and a hat to go along with on her head.
I didn’t offer her my hand.
“Quinn???”
I pulled her into a BIG hug!
I didn’t just recognize Quinn Hughes. I knew her. We’d worked a handful of shows together, in Kentucky, Tennessee and in Arkansas. We’d kinda bonded over those shows, two young girls about the same age and with about the same amount of experience. And, at least at the shows I’d worked with her, the crowds fucking LOVED her! I mean, one, c’mon, she gorgeous! But also, that cowgirl stuff goes down real well with southern crowds. Whether it would work as well in Indiana, I wasn’t sure.
But if anyone could pull it off, it would be her.
“I didn’t know you were here!” I said.
“Only my second show,” she told me. “Did the one in Kansas City two months ago.”
“Dammit, I missed that one,” I confessed, before turning to the Wylde Child. “Jaz, have you two met?”
The smaller blonde shook her head. “No, I wasn’t at Kansas City. Jazmin Wylde, nice to meet you.”
“Likewise,” Quinn replied as they shook hands. I couldn’t help but smile. As happy as I was to have made friends in Jaz and Nikki, it was always nice to have a few more buddies in the locker room. Especially if they got along with each other.
That left just one more woman to go, before I got to Toni. But she was perhaps the most intimidating of all. Nearly fourteen years ago, my dad had taken me to my first 3M show. At that show, little Margaret McMillan had watched as 22 year old woman named Tamara Thomas wrestled for the 3M Midwestern champion. Little Margaret had cheered her tiny little head off when Thomas won the title and had a smile almost too big for her face when she got her picture taken with the new champ and the belt after the show.
Fourteen years later, grown up Maggie found herself not sitting in the crowd, but standing in the locker room, looking over at that same Tamara Thomas.
Oh, she was older, of course. And in those fourteen years, she’d added another run with the Midwestern title, as well as become a four time, four time, four time, four time 3M World champion. She’d had offers to go to other companies. Bigger companies. But she’d spurned every one of them, electing to stay with 3M. That, as well as all her success, had made her beloved by the 3M fans. And had made her thoroughly respected in the locker room.
With every step I took toward her, I felt myself morphing back into that 10 year old little girl. And when I introduced myself to her, I could swear that I heard my 10 year old voice. Tamara gave me a reassuring smile, took my hand, and then she…
“’Mazin’ Mags McMillan.”
I blinked. “You… you know who I am???”
The veteran blonde nodded. “I’ve seen you. And I’ve been impressed.”
Suddenly, I found myself questioning whether the last 72 hours had, in fact, actually happened, or whether I should expect to hear the screeching of my alarm clock any second now. “Th… thank you, ma’am,” I stammered.
She raised a hand. “It’s Tamara,” Thomas said. “You can call me ‘ma’am’ after I retire.”
“Yes, ma…”
It was almost instinctual, but I caught myself. “You got it, Tamara.”
She smiled at me, then began to slip on a knee brace. “I hear you’ve got a big match tonight…”
“It feels like everyone’s head that,” I sighed.
Tamara patted the seat next to her, and I won’t lie, my eyes widened a little bit in disbelief. But she nodded her head towards the chair, and like any good newcomer in a locker room, I did what the vet told me to do. “I still remember my first big match,” she recalled. “I was a few years younger than you are at the time. You ever see a woman named Boudicca?”
I shook my head. The name rang a bell, but not for anything to do with wrestling.
“She was an Irish lass,” Tamara explained. “And when people talk about ‘monster heels,’ she’s who they’re talking about. She was well over six feet tall, easily two fifty, absolute Amazon. No one gave me a chance against her…”
“… but you won?” I asked.
“No, she kicked my ass.”
Gotta be honest, I’ve heard better pep talks.
“But there was a reason she kicked my ass,” Thomas explained. “Know what it was?”
“She was a hulking beast?”
“No,” Tamara stated simply. “I mean, that didn’t hurt. But the reason I lost was simple: I didn’t think I could beat her, either. I’d heard what everyone said, and I took it to heart. Even the occasions when I had her reeling, there was a part of me just waiting for the tide to turn back in her favor, because I knew it was gonna. Everyone had told me I was just some nobody kid going in to get my ass handed to me, and I listened to them.”
Again, I found myself blinking. Why was Tamara Thomas taking the time to build me up? Who the hell am I for her to be taking the interest to talk to me like this? “Do… do you actually think I have a chance?”
Done with prepping her knees for battle, Thomas started taping her wrists. “Doesn’t matter,” she said simply. “First lesson, Mags: no one else is gonna believe in you before you do. Doesn’t matter if no one in this room thinks you can win, or if no one in the crowd thinks you can. It doesn’t even matter if Genesis thinks you can’t win. As long as you believe you can win, you can. And the more you believe, the better chance you’ll have.”
I nodded. What else could I do? Well, there was one thing. “Thanks, coach.”
Tamara glared at me, but I could tell it was a playful
glare. “That’s another title you can save for when I’m retired, kid,” she
chided me, and I had to laugh. “It’s your night tonight, Mags. Just go out
there, show out, and let the chips fall where they may. And where they fall
just might surprise a few people.”
