“The older I get the more things I gotta leave behind, that's life.”
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Joe sat quietly, watching the road as he drove, each yellow strip only barely illuminated by the headlights. They were leaving the middle of nowhere, there weren't exactly going to be other cars or any signs of live until they got on the highway.
Was he afraid when you left him to die, Joe?
You bet he was! Terrified!
No, Joe didn't want to discuss it. So instead, when they did speak, it was just small talk. Joe hated small talk. And with his brother? That just made things even more annoying.
By the time they pulled up to Eric's home in New Jersey, Joe was suitably ready to be anywhere but here. He wanted to take a shower and go to bed. He hoped Lucy would be back from Chicago and Horizons by then. After his sibling gave him the results using his phone, he didn't expect her to be in a good mood.
He let out a sigh involuntarily and tried to disguise it as a yawn, but it didn't work.
"I tried to save him." Joe lied. In the moment he hated him a little for bringing it up, but it wasn't like he could stop thinking about it himself. He did it to end a feud and retire that nasty, vindictive 'Answer' persona for good, as best he could. But the thought of possibly killing someone in its last hurrah was disquieting.
"You did? Why?"
"Simply put, UGWC acknowledged my value, they didn't."
"You know people are gonna say you quit over losing the title match, right?"
"I don't care what people say," Joe added, hitting the steering wheel with a balled up fist. "Fuck them. Let them talk. Not a single one would say it to my face because they know what would happen."
He looked down at his fist and hit the wheel again, to emphasize his point. His brother just looked at him and waited, as JC taking his bursts of anger out on inanimate objects had long been old news to him at this point.
"So why leave?"
"A lack of respect," he said bluntly. Not getting booked showed a tremendous lack of respect, but he felt out of place there anyway. He felt unwanted. His love for Carnage was unrequited and so he decided to take his talents to a place that would appreciate them. At least if he couldn't control other aspects of his life, he could control the direction of his career.
Joe glanced over at his brother, who had a stupid cheesy grin on his face.
"Too soon?"
Seeing his brother make a fool out of himself just to cheer him up, he couldn't help but crack a small smile himself. He would likely beat himself up over that later, when laying in bed alone and going over everything he did and didn't do.
"Just a little bit."
"How's Lucy?" he asked.
After everything he lost that year, losing his best friend and fiancee would be too much. His hands gripped the steering wheel tight and he felt his heart sink a little at the mere thought of it.
"Stuff you can't tell me?"
"Stuff I can't tell you."
"Well, hopefully it works out."
"I'm getting the impression I wouldn't know if it does. She's been putting up this wall, like she pretends everything is okay but I can see the wheels turning. I know something's up but beyond the surface details, she's been very guarded. I don't know."
"I mean, I could call if you think it'd help," his brother suggested, although he wasn't sure if he was serious or not.
"That's up to you," Joe added, nodding. "Maybe I'm too close. Maybe she actually would talk to you."
Eric nodded, although he didn't confirm or deny that he would. Joe didn't press the issue, as he had already asked enough of him on this particular night. Even if Tempest were alive, his brother helped him finally end their rivalry for good, and for that he was grateful.
"No problem."
"No, I mean it. I have doubts about a lot of people in my life, but it's good to know I can always count on you."
The former GI smiled and let himself out of the truck. Joe watched him move up to his house for a few seconds, then decided to go ahead and head back home. He felt he earned that shower and that rest. Perhaps he could help Lucy or perhaps she would keep shutting him out, but it was beyond his control. And even at his age, that was a lesson he still needed to learn.
He had finally come to terms with his place with Carnage, or lack thereof. They would do his thing and he would do his, and that would be that. Let them succeed or fail on their own merits. He didn't care either way, and while that thought saddened him due to how much he had cared for the place, it was what it was. He was through wasting energy on it.
Starting now, he would devote himself entirely to his present and leave the past in the past.
JC would go where he was wanted and continue to face competition that provided a challenge.
Things with Lucy were, on the outside, fine. The holidays were tainted by the news Lucy got in her exhibition match over at Carnage. She was shaken up but still tried to fake her way through the holidays to give off some semblance of normal. Joe knew Lucy's genuine smile and one she faked to keep up appearances. Many of the smiles she gave over Christmas and New Year's fell into the latter category.
He had asked if she wanted him to go with her to see her mom, but she declined. Perhaps that was for the best. If she was as far gone as he'd been told, seeing a strange man there with Lucy would likely not help the situation.
They were buried at Berry Lawn Cemetery in Carlstadt, New Jersey. It wasn't where he grew up, that was in the neighboring borough of East Rutherford, but as where he grew up had no cemetery, that's the place his parents chose years in advance.
He wondered if he would be buried here when he died. He guessed it'd be up to Lizzie...and Lucy, if she ended up sticking around.
Joe gave a weak smile to the marble slab in front of him.
In 1991, a fourteen-year-old Joe beat two kids older than him into the hospital after they bullied him in the back of a mom and pop video store. He heard a voice in his head, a symptom of his psychosis, which helped set off a rage he still had trouble controlling. One of the teens, a jock, never played football again. The other he didn't hear about, but he remembered punching him in the face over and over, even after he fell unconscious.
When he was finally pulled off, his parents were called. Those same parents were driving in the middle of January in New Jersey, after a large snowfall hit.
It was the black ice on the roads that killed them. It was the tree they crashed into that killed them. But he blamed himself and he assumed he'd still blame himself while on his deathbed. No one else did, not even his brother, but Joe always knew better.
Whether it was over having loving parents or not having them anymore, Joe and guilt were well acquainted by this point.
"So, Dad...I don't know if you can ever hear me on these little talks. I think it's just another form of therapy for me."
Joe kneeled down and placed the roses on his father's grave, before pulling one out and giving it to his mother. He then sat down at the foot of both, cross-legged, just like he would when his father would read to him when he was young.
A tear began to roll down his cheek and this time he let it, even though the wind made it sting a little more than it otherwise would.
But his father, buried underneath him, would stay silent and listen.
"I know. I'm being ridiculous. I have a beautiful daughter, a woman who loves me at home and a career to be proud of. But fuck, sometimes it just feels like it's too much, Dad, you know? I wish you were here. I wish I didn't have to figure out this world without you."
"Yeah well, it's tradition."
His eyebrow raised and he nodded, letting her go on.
Joe grinned and stretched his arms out, leaning forward and hugging her, which she returned.
"That's great!"
"Yeah, it is...but that leaves one problem. It also requires a lot of travel and somebody's gotta watch Lizzie. I was hoping..."
Joe felt the question coming and still felt caught off guard by it. Obviously he couldn't say no, but he wondered how he would even make it work with his career. And what would Lucy say? It wasn't just his home.
He briefly glanced back at the headstone that his parents shared. Another curveball they wouldn't be able to guide him through. And even though he knew that agreeing without asking Lucy would give him a headache later, he knew it was the only answer he could give.
She nodded and hugged him again, before kissing him on the cheek. He turned back to his parents, who saw the whole thing. Really, he only had one thing left to say.
All the anger he had before the match with Tempest was washed away, at least for now. He was calm and relaxed. More than that, he was contemplative.
I've been thinking a lot about my father lately. My parents are never too far from my thoughts but as I grow into fatherhood myself, I wonder what he'd think of me. I wonder if any of the decisions I'd made would have happened if he had been there.
I loved my father. He was my hero. The day he died shattered me. It broke me in ways I've never quite recovered from. I still blame myself, regardless of all the facts saying otherwise. The night it happened, my younger brother looked into my eyes and told me it wasn't my fault. My kid brother, who I always looked out for, found himself consoling me for the first time. "You aren't the snow," he said.
He smiled, as if to excuse the silliness of repeating something a child said thirty years ago.
The lesson I should have learned that day was that there are things in life you can't control. It was true then and it's been true in the past year, which I thought would end differently than it did. Home means a lot of things to a lot of different people. As it turns out, to me it was just something else I can't control. But I've found this new home in the past year and I think I'm gonna like it here.
I thought last year was my tale of redemption, but instead it was a tale of reincarnation. A chance for me to shed the skin of who I was and step into that of who I will be. I cast aside old demons, turned away from familiar haunts and let those nasty wounds finally heal over.
Without even realizing he was doing it, Joe's hand went to the back of his neck and he rubbed the fresh scar where he had his latest surgery. He had so many of them these days.
I'm trying to accept that what happened, happened. It's up to me to move on and focus on my future instead of dwelling in how good things used to be or how much I want them to be a certain way. So I'm moving on and focusing my attention on things I can control.
I can't change the way people think or feel about me. They can believe what they want, no matter how wrong they ultimately are. I can't control the thoughts in my head or the condition of my body. But I can control how I react to things. How I move forward. How I take care of those I love.
I can also control what I do in this business, and I'm going to start with the Global Challenge and this match with Angelica Vaughn. With all my personal issues aside, the only thing that can sabotage a win for me now is me. There are no cabals of creeps to interfere.
He knew now that Tempest had survived and was apparently in enough shape to fight on this card. But he also knew Tempest wouldn't dare cross him again. Still, needling him a little for losing their war wouldn't hurt. They wrote their final chapter. He was simply reminding him to keep it final.
That doesn't mean it won't be difficult. Beating a former World champion is one thing, but doing it within a ten minute time period? Nearly impossible. And most would be happy with one point. But I'm not most people. I think I proved that over the past year. Sure, I didn't win any titles. I didn't even get any fancy year-end awards.
A solemn nod, then his cold gaze focused on the former champion that he knew would be watching him, even if he couldn't see her.
But I earned the respect of the roster. And where I come from, respect means almost as much as a title. It's validation. It's the acknowledgement that at least in some way, my hard work isn't going to waste.
But I want more than validation now, Angelica. And that's where you come in. Because I can't go into this match, the first of 2021 and the first of the Global Challenge, and come out with anything but two points. This match sets the tone. And if I have to beat you in ten minutes, then I will beat you in ten minutes.
I know what you must be thinking. 'Who does he think he is?' I think you know the answer to that by now.
He winked, although even he felt that his dumb joke was a little too dumb.
I know it's not going to be easy. You don't have the accolades that you do if you're a pushover. I know just how much the odds are stacked against me. How much pressure I'm putting on myself. But that's what I do. That's who I am. And #TeamJellyBeanToes doesn't mean shit to me when I have a chance to push myself back into the title hunt.
You should understand. You fought Hide too. I'm sure you want nothing more than to get the chance to square up with him again and take back what you think is yours.
But in that thinking, you are wrong. See, the UGWC World title isn't yours. It isn't Hide's.
He shook his head before placing a hand on his chest to emphasize his next point.
It's mine.
That title has been mine from the day I got back here, and every time I go after it I get closer and closer to taking it. JC becoming the UGWC World Champion isn't a matter of if, but when. It's inevitable. And I gotta say, Angie, I'm feeling pretty good about it happening soon.
Sorry, but I don't like your chances. Because 2021 is a fresh slate. A reset button. A chance for me to right the wrongs of last year. And you are in my way.
I don't appreciate you being in my way of getting what's mine...and this Monday, I plan to move you.
See you at Synergy, Ang. I'll send you some cat pictures as a parting gift.
JC smirked at his opponent before ending his speech. He felt confident in a way he hadn't felt in some time. He didn't know if he could do what he said he was going to do, but he was more than ready to find out.
There was so much he couldn't control. There was so much of his past that clung to him. But it was a fresh start. It was time to focus on what he could control and start moving forward.
It was time to grab the key to his future.
