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Post by Deleted on Apr 8, 2020 13:56:03 GMT -6
A Letter to My Younger Self (8-1-2012)
Dear Victoria,
Congratulations!
You just won your second world championship in PRW! After nearly a year of trying and falling short a few times to regain that title, you finally made it happen on PRW’s grandest stage of the year. You’re on top of the world! Your star is brighter than before. You’re the most popular, marketable star in the company, the fans adore you and you stuck it to all the locker room haters that you’ve developed for the last year and a half. That Larry Doane guy that’s been a backstage pain in the ass for years? He’ll be gone by the end of the month.
Life’s good, right?
What if I told you that by Halloween, your second reign would be over? What? Not what you were expecting? Is that too soon for you? Suck it up. That’s life… and you ran into a buzzsaw named Luciana Verdoza (sound familiar?) who was in peak form and would hold onto that title until the end of PRW. But… don’t worry. In 2014, after a stint in Mexico, you’ll wind up in Global Championship Wrestling.
Confused? Yeah, in your time GCW isn’t a company anyone has really heard of. Bear with me though.
You win their TV title in short order and you’ll feel like you’re the shit. In January 2015, you win their Civil War match of 81 people (across three rings) and you’ll go on to win a title vs. title match at Resurrection (their flagship) to win your third world title and achieve ultimate notoriety! There you are! Living the life! This is the BEST time of your career so far! It’s all going to be easy from here, right?
Actually… your 2015 goes all downhill from there.
You make one… JUST ONE… HORRIBLE mistake that makes that happen.
You join a faction called the “Slay Revolution” with women named Tina Valentine, Prii Foote and Mary-Allison Chainz. The latter two don’t stick and turn out to be busts… but your GCW World Championship reign ends at the hands of Mary-Allison. Your pride is shattered. It was already cracking when Tina essentially makes you a joke by association in a place named IWC. You’ll have faith in her as a wrestler and as one of your best friends, but she never rewards it. You lose confidence in yourself. You decide to crawl back into your teenage shell for almost 5 years, holding back because you don’t want to ruffle feathers or risk empty people saying empty things to you.
You and Luciana reunite in IWC… but it’s all about her and eventually you grow disgusted with her.
Remember that skateboarder you and Luciana met in 2010 for that movie Luciana did? In 2018, you get married to him for a month. It won’t end well. It drives your shaky confidence further into the ground. Sure, you win two more world championships, you turn your attitude around and you’re inducted into the GCW Hall of Fame in 2018… but after you leave GCW, your career becomes directionless. Suddenly, you’re 30, 31… and you’re wondering if the best part of your career is over.
Not feeling like you’re the shit anymore, are you?
As you are… you’re incredibly vain… you’re growing more conceited… the PRW locker room can’t stand you… and soon that will extend to the audience. The humbling you’re going to get over the next few years is one that you deserve and that you truly need. Don’t worry, you’ll regain your footing and after going through the ringer, you’ll realize and appreciate who you truly are. The only good thing about what you are right now… accomplishments aside… is that bold assertiveness and confidence you possess. At the moment, you don’t know how to use it and you’re misapplying it… hence the locker room hatred you have right now. But when you get to 2020? You will. So thanks for that confidence and assertiveness you gave me… and you’re welcome for teaching you how to use it when you get to 2020.
Sincerely,
The Future Self that You Probably Hate Right Now, but Will Learn to Appreciate With Time
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April 4, 2020
In the days following Down Under, Victoria is on the balcony of a two-story house that she and her husband Gavin are temporarily renting in Chicago among the mass chaos that is taking place around the world. This balcony overlooks the shores of Lake Michigan… shores that she’s not unfamiliar with considering it was these same shores about six months ago when she decided she was done being a victim and was going to do whatever it took to turn her career around. The great news of course, is that she has. Perhaps it’s this perspective that keeps her calm after the initial anger of what happened at Down Under. As she reflects on this perspective, her husband comes out to see her in this remote, quiet, isolated location that’s a safe distance away from public society.
Gavin: You’re holding up okay?
Victoria: Yeah… I am. It’s funny though… you and I were on that beach six months ago when I finally got over… you know… “that marriage”. It just sucks that I wrestled Bethany Driver at the wrong time. I should’ve beaten her but at the same time I’m not dwelling on it. I was the real winner in the end. To come back here all these months later… everything completely different… better… in fact… it’s a nice feeling even with… you know… what happened.
Gavin: Look, if you’re still upset about Down Under, I can’t blame you. Everyone knows you should be a six-time world champion right now.
Victoria: Oh yeah, I’m not going to deny that. But at the same time, I can’t just live my whole life thinking about it. At the end of the day, I’ve been through worse than this and I know I can get through this too. It’s really hard to stay balanced sometimes with all that’s going on. I know that revenge will be had. I know that Down Under was just the start of the journey to that world title and not the end of it. There’s no chance in HELL I am going to let this go. There’s no way that I will! If I let this go… I’m no better than that bitch Bethany Driver… and there’s no way I’m stooping to that piece of shit’s level. I spent SO LONG playing it safe. I spent way too long sheltering myself. I spent almost five years worrying far too much about what other people think because of some stupid, empty words said to me from a bunch of stupid, vapid whores that I used to work with. GCW in 2015 wasn’t the greatest environment on the planet… though I did bring some of it upon myself.
Gavin: You’re not wrong about anything you just said. Six months ago, I was really worried about you. You weren’t even close to being yourself. We both remember that you were as broken as could possibly be at that point. I got to ask you a question though. You really thought that the assertiveness and that confidence that you’ve got wasn’t really you?
Victoria lets out a soft sigh before letting out a smirk.
Victoria: I was going through some confusion. I was getting those positive qualities about myself mixed up with that horrible bitch I used to be during the PRW and early GCW days. Those were qualities that I abused, honestly. Why? What are you saying?
Gavin: You’ve always had that person in you, even during our high school years. Every time you stood up for myself or for Veronica, you showed that. You showed it when you pushed on trying to pursue this wrestling career of yours even when you had some people laughing in your face about it. You showed it every single day at the diner when you were trying to save up for wrestling school expenses and had to be… you know… more of a people person…
Victoria: You’re right… pretending to be a social butterfly at that diner for so long was tough…
Gavin: Vicky, you weren’t pretending. That WAS you. You just didn’t realize you had that in you yet. The woman in front of me… the love of my life...she’s the same girl I fell in love with and developed a crush on back in high school. You’ve always had that self-esteem inside of you… the only difference between then and now is that you realize it and that you’re expressing it more often. Yeah, you went through a period of time where you abused it but that’s life. You had to learn how to properly balance things and you have. It did hurt to see you going through what you were six months ago but I’m happy that you’ve got it figured out now. I love that you’re not going to just fade away into the goodnight after what just happened to you and just… give up.
Victoria: Not until that sixth world title is in my hands… I’ll go through every single person in APE if I have to in order to make that title mine. I’m not afraid anymore… not like I was when I went into that match with Bethany anyway…
Victoria takes a brief pause to let out a soft sigh. Gavin wraps an arm around her and gives her a kiss on the cheek, comforting her quite a bit and allowing her to keep her emotions balanced.
Victoria: The Australia tour taught me a lot. I realized how afraid I was of myself… but I also realized how much I shouldn’t be. I still wasn’t in the right place until right before that title match. I didn’t want a title shot handed to me because I felt like I didn’t deserve it yet but I showed that I did the entire time. I was… for some time… worried. I was too afraid of being a “fly by night” challenger that was going to get one chance and that was it but as it turns out, MWE was seeing more value in me than I was seeing in myself the whole time and I didn’t even realize it. I was seeing all these one-off challengers and I was too worried about me being another one…
Gavin: ...you sure as hell didn’t fight like one against Constantine.
Victoria: No… and with everything that just happened, there’s no way they can consider me one now. The people in charge in MWE will right this… but until that happens, I need to keep at it. I need to stay determined. I have to stay on top of the ball and I can help myself immensely by making it clear to everyone else that I’m not going away. That confidence and that poise that I’ve always had and that I just rediscovered? I’m NOT letting that go. Nobody in MWE is going to push harder for that world title than I am now because I’m NOT Bethany Driver god damn it!
Gavin: She wasn’t the only fly by night challenger though…
Victoria: No… but that bitch was so fucking entitled, I swear to god. She had her chance at the MWE title and she lost and she decided that it wasn’t good enough for her and that I was “just another match” for her, remember? Of all the fly by night challengers like Sophie and Melody, she was far and away the worst one of them all. She thought wrestling me was beneath her. I’m not going to be like her… I’m not going to make the same mistakes she made… and I sure as hell won’t be bolting from this company like she did… all because things didn’t go the way SHE wanted to… I guess all the shit with her still kind of infuriates me in a way.
Gavin: Hey, just keep it cool, alright? Well… not too cool. I hate to tell you this Vicky, but you don’t wrestle as well when you turn off the emotions.
Victoria: I can’t be offended by that because I already know that. All I know right now is… that despite everything that just happened… I know in my heart that my career is back in place… even if I don’t have that sixth world title to show for it…
Gavin: Not yet…
Victoria: You know what the best part is? My career isn’t just back in place, it’s heading toward its peak. It’s ironic… six months ago, I was on that beach, a total mess, worrying that I had already passed the peak of my career when all along I hadn’t reached it yet. They’ll all see the real me… they’re about to get a greater and permanent dose of what Victoria Salinas is all about…
No more words are said between the couple for the immediate moment as they overlook the Lake Michigan shores from their second story balcony. Angry as Victoria may be about the events of Down Under, she’s still feeling positive about herself. Her self-esteem, which had slowly taken a nosedive for years and which had undergone a gradual recovery over the last six months, has fully healed. Deep down she knows that. And deep down, she knows that the real journey has only just begun…
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“I’m not broken by the events of Down Under. If anything, I’ve been emboldened by them. With all that has happened, I can take pride in the fact that Victoria Salinas is finally back. MWE is only beginning to see a far more assertive, more aggressive, hungrier wrestler that is not going to hold a damn thing back and that isn’t going to allow ANYONE to stand in her way.
I’m a future MWE World Champion and I don’t give a fuck if anyone wants to think otherwise.
Number six is coming…
You can count on that… and you can count on me having every ounce of determination within me and then some to dethrone APE and make that a reality….”
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Post by Deleted on Apr 15, 2020 8:22:43 GMT -6
December 2014
“This is going to be the best thing ever, Vicky!!!”
Victoria is intrigued by words she’s hearing from her then-friend Tina Valentine a few days shy of Christmas.
Tina: They have NO idea I am planning this… and having someone like you in tow… a two-time world champion who has been a sensation for the last 5 years? I can only imagine the DOMINANCE that the Slay Revolution is going to be in IWC! The haters are going to get SLAYED!
Victoria: IWC huh? I’ve heard great things. What’s even better is the fact that I’m about to be the GCW TV Champion by the time I get there. I’m HIGHLY confident in my prodigal abilities to adapt to… well… whatever chaos comes my way!
Tina: Awesome… they’ll all rue the day they ever tried to make a mockery out of ME!
Victoria and Tina have a laugh to themselves, Victoria in particular looking forward to the day of her IWC arrival.
April 9, 2020
It’s the afternoon following Millennium and for obvious reasons, Victoria Salinas is not in a good mood at all. Physically, she’s fine… or at least as fine as she can be following what she went through. But still, it’s her pride that is hurting. She’s understandably glum at this point while trying to keep her head up, sitting on the bed of her Chicago rental home. The humiliation is still pouring through her as Gavin, her husband, enters the room.
Gavin: Sorry about last night…
Victoria: I really don’t know if I want to talk about that. Humiliating… that’s all I can really say. That’s right up there with that Charlie Webster situation from last year...
Gavin: And you avenged that, did you not?
Victoria: True… losing to someone like that did almost break my pride though. But what just happened last night…
Victoria pauses and sighs.
Victoria: ...and they wonder why I kept to myself and stayed in a quiet bubble for five years… and they wonder why I was having so much confidence issues last year… that did admittedly build up since that 2015 year that I had…
Gavin: I know it’s best to leave you alone…
Gavin stands up and begins to leave.
Gavin: But as I leave… I’ll leave you with three letters to think about: IWC. You’ll thank me later.
Victoria’s eyes slightly widen with surprise when her husband leaves the room.
Victoria: Boy… there’s three letters I haven’t heard in years…
And with that… Victoria goes into flashback mode…
April 13, 2015
Tina: UGH! WHY is this falling apart ALREADY?
Victoria doesn’t know what to say as she and Tina conversate backstage prior to an IWC event. Victoria, by this point, has won her third career world championship (and her first of 3 in GCW) and being only a couple of weeks removed from that, she’s still basking in the glow of it to an extent.
Tina: When I put the Slay Revolution together, this was NOT what I had in mind. I wasn’t planning on losing Prii and Mary-Allison! Hell no! But they both fucking failed me within weeks of each other. What the flying fuck, Vicky? They’re making ME look like a fucking dumbass!
Victoria: In all honesty, I don’t know why you recruited them. I was the only one of the three worth a damn.
Tina: You got that right. It’s just you and me now! I know I can count on you. I know that things haven’t gotten off on the right foot for you here…
Victoria: Right… let’s see… you’ve got one of the most overrated, bland, dime-a-dozen subtweeting me and calling me a “nobody” three months ago, I get eliminated from Last Stand by a NON-WRESTLER and ever since I’ve gotten here, I’ve been a crash test dummy. I really…
Tina: Vicky, don’t you worry… it’ll get better! I promise…
A few hours later…
Tina: Vicky…. VICKY!!!!
Tina is using a crowbar to pry open a FedEx crate. There’s a sticker that says “SHIP TO MEXICO” on it and it’s not long before that crate pops open. Tina pulls a slightly dazed Victoria out of the crate and Victoria is shaking a bit from the experience that she went through.
Tina: Wow. How the FUCK can Selena do that shit to you?
Victoria doesn’t respond. Instead, she just bolts away from Tina… the humiliation flowing through her like wine. Tina pleads with her to come back to her, but Victoria completely ignores her as she looks for somewhere in the parking lot to try and hide. She finds a corner cut off from the rest of the parking lot and sits down in it and the moment she realizes she’s alone, her eyes well up with tears and they immediately burst. She can hardly contain herself as she buries her face in her knees and just tries to hide from the rest of the world, feeling extremely humiliated that she was stuffed in a crate and beat up as if she was a complete nobody a couple of hours ago.
Victoria: I’ve made such a horrible mistake by coming here…
She just lets herself cry at this point, having already had enough of the IWC, which even now… after what she just went through on the last Millennium, she would consider the most embarrassing, humiliating, empty experience she’s ever had in her career.
Victoria: I deserve SO much better than this…
Back to the present day…
Even though it’s been five years since that horribly humiliating experience in IWC where she was knocked out as if she was the biggest pushover in the world and shoved in a crate to be sent back to Mexico… remembering that very experience still causes her eyes to water some.
Victoria: Joining the Slay Revolution was the worst mistake of my entire career… there was the “crate” incident… there was joining the “Axis” and being left on the sidelines to do nothing… there was being ridiculed as a sidekick… and of course… the last IWC show ever where I was eliminated from their stupid Last Stand rumble because I was arrested by cops in front of the whole world because of a bogus charge pressed on me by one of the stupidest people I’ve ever met… all because I was trying to help someone that never really appreciated me anyway. Figures that IWC ends with me looking like a fucking joke… I sure as hell looked like one last night…
Voice: And why are we reflecting on memories four to five years old?
Victoria takes a quick upward glance to see a familiar face… one which she hasn’t seen in months.
Victoria: Allison…
Victoria stands up to greet Allison Mayberry, her former manager and in GCW at one point, her former boss.
Allison: Come on Vicky… you mean to tell me that what you went through last night was just as bad as THAT? You and I both know that nothing in your career will EVER be worse… or just as bad… as the IWC.
Victoria: Yeah… you’re right. It stings… but I can move past it. In fact, last night wasn’t even the lowest, most humiliating point of my entire career. That award goes to getting pinned by Charlie Webster…
Allison: Which you’ve since avenged.
Victoria: Why are you even here though? Not that I’m not happy to see you, because I am but I don’t need you to be a spin doctor and try to numb the humiliation I am going through right now.
Allison: You’re right. You don’t But this isn’t about that. I’m here just to make sure that you don’t suddenly go back to being in your shell because of what someone else said or did. That’s the mistake that you made five years ago all because stupid ass Tina Valentine and her penchant for being the biggest wrestling disappointment over the last 10 years made you look like a joke by association and you had someone massively overrated call you a nobody. I just wanted to let you know that as of late, the Victoria Salinas that I remember has really come out of you… and you’ve done an incredible job of maintaining a hell of a poise and a hell of a confidence in the face of adversity. There’s this buzz… mainly a positive one… about you that hasn’t happened in years.
Victoria: Even after last night?
Allison: Yeah. Good, bad or in the middle, you’re drawing some attention. Sure, maybe you did go too far with criticizing the powers that be the way you did and it resulted in… you know, last night… but aside from that, nothing to worry about. You just need to keep up the fight, that’s all. At least you’re not being mocked as a joke like you were in IWC… and even with that whole IWC crap… remember… you managed to revive your reputation in that circle of wrestling companies in UWA and you made the most out of it… even if you never won a world title there and even if that culture wasn’t a fit for you in the long run.
Victoria: Hey, like you told me a few years back, just because I never won a world title in that company doesn’t mean that defines me. IWC and the Slay Revolution? That was the lowest point of my entire wrestling career… and as you just said? I managed to make something out of nothing eventually. So… remembering that?
Victoria pauses and at this point, a confident smirk appears on her face for a few moments.
Victoria: And also taking into account that I’ve been through worse in MWE too… I know I can get through this as well. I guess this wasn’t a public relations disaster like I initially thought it was…
Allison: Oh no… not even close. In fact?
Allison turns away from Victoria and begins to leave the room.
Allison: I’d say the best part of your career is coming. Just give it some time.
Victoria: Yeah… I think you’re right about that.
Allison: Oh and Grace?
Victoria: Yeah?
Allison: I can’t stand her, what a cunt…
Victoria: Thank you, I’ll be sure to keep that off the record. *laughs*
Allison leaves the room at this point and Victoria has the space all to herself. She takes a deep breath and relaxing sigh as she feels that her pride is beginning to recover at this point from what happened the night before. This has her thinking about what she needs to do to bounce back and what lies ahead. The answers aren’t clear to her at the moment… but her biggest takeaway is that if she can overcome even the lowest point of her career and even make ANYTHING out of that… she can overcome last night’s events as well with flying colors.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 22, 2020 0:32:01 GMT -6
February 2015
Victoria Salinas is backstage after the last night of Resurrection for that year. She had just won the GCW World Championship to go along with the TV Championship that she had won two months prior. Both championships are on her lap and she looks at them with a bit of a glum look on her face… quite the opposite of the way someone would react when they just became a double champion. She doesn’t have long to soak things in before her former friend Tina Valentine walks into the picture.
Tina: Congrats, Vicky! Of COURSE you get the job done! I didn’t expect anything less. Double champion? In just what? FOUR months? You really did conquer GCW in such a short amount of time, look at you.
Victoria: Yeah… thanks…
Victoria flashes a fake smile, almost as if she’s not that happy with what she accomplished.
Victoria (thinking): Never mind the fact that I don’t feel like I deserve this. I’m nothing but a joke over in IWC… I’m a “NOBODY” according to a certain bitch…
Tina: This all but proves that a certain, overrated dime a dozen bitch is WAY wrong when she calls you a nobody…
Victoria (thinking): Yeah… never mind the fact that I got eliminated from IWC’s Last Stand rumble match by a NON-WRESTLER. Instant revenge means NOTHING… it still doesn’t take that away…
Tina: If you were such a nobody, how did you conquer GCW in just four months?
Victoria (thinking): Yeah… four months. I don’t know… I don’t feel satisfied with this for some reason. I should be happy… but I’m not. Is the IWC stuff really fucking with my mind? Maybe I feel that this is all too soon. Mr. Holliday always warned me about the dangers of rising to the top too quickly…
Tina: Of course… conquering GCW in such short order is NOT a surprise considering the prodigy you’ve always been starting with…. Vicky, are you with me here?
Victoria: Yeah, I’m here. I was just… reflecting… that’s all.
Tina: Let’s reflect on this, okay. Six matches into your mainstream career? Champion already. Your rookie year? You were a champion for what? TWO THIRDS of it? PRW… you broke the longest reigns record for ALL of the singles titles and two of the three are going to last forever? 400 straight days as a champion at one point? 14 months in, a world champion at 22? Girl… this just further adds to your greatness. Very few wrestlers get to say that they’re a three time world champion by the age of 27.
Victoria doesn’t seem to be so inspired by this quick rundown of her career up to this point that highlighted her prodigal greatness of her early years.
Victoria: Yeah… life’s good, right?
Again, a fake smile from Victoria.
Tina: I’ll leave ya to it…
Tina walks away from Victoria leaving her to soak in her accomplishment… even though deep down, Victoria is doing anything but that.
Victoria: Yeah… I guess life’s good…
Victoria is left to try to cheer herself up… but whether it’s because of her IWC issues or because of her confidence beginning to decline around this point or because of guilt of some kind… what should have been the best moment of her career so far? It’s not making her happy at all.
April 18, 2020
Victoria returns inside her temporary Chicago residence after soaking in the winds from Lake Michigan out in the balcony for a bit. She’s not thinking too hard about wrestling at the moment… although that’s not going to last too much longer. Gavin, her husband, walks in with what appears to be a frame.
Gavin: Hey Vicky, I was digging through some stuff we hadn’t even unpacked yet.
Victoria’s curiosity is piqued.
Gavin: I found this…
Gavin shows Victoria what’s on the frame. It’s the moment that she defeated Cody Lindberg-Knight at Resurrection in 2015 to become GCW World Champion for the first time. Victoria takes one look at it and instantly rolls her eyes. Letting out a sigh, she walks away from it catching Gavin by surprise.
Gavin: Vicky?
Victoria: Throw that away.
Gavin: Vicky, this was one of your finest moments… becoming a double champion on the grandest stage of them all. Why would you reject this?
Victoria: Why? Because I’ve never been happy with it, that’s why. That’s the start of the WORST World Championship reign I ever had… of all five of them!
Gavin: Even if that WAS true… it doesn’t take away from what you accomplished.
Victoria: Right… because that third reign… SO much to be proud of… you know… with all the cheating I did during it… with all the bullshit I dealt with backstage… with all of the nonsense I had to endure like being called a “coward”, a “paper champion”... oh and the BEST PART… losing that title to a one hit wonder whose career I wound up ending a month or so later. I mean seriously… supposedly, I’m one of the best wrestlers in GCW history, right? And it took me HOW LONG to beat Mary-Allison Chainz even ONCE? I couldn’t even do it during that fucking title reign! I did have a lot going on in my head at the time with all the garbage IWC was feeding me, but that’s no excuse. I’m the type of wrestler that should have constantly blown out someone like HER out of the building….
Gavin: Well… you did… you know… when you snapped her arm and ended her career and all that…
Victoria sighs.
Gavin: Listen, I get that 2015 was… not a happy year for you. You dealt with a lot of shit. But that doesn’t mean that…
Victoria: Honestly… I think I had it WAY too easy in my early years. I mean COME ON… who wins their first title six matches in? It’s not like anyone knows who the hell Tony Jones is. I beat a “Hall of Fame” member for my second singles title… but nobody outside of PRW knows who the hell he is. Yeah… I beat Myra for my first world title… fucking great. That’s a plus. But it’s not like anyone knows the name of my second world title conquest, right? I’m almost positive that only THREE people besides me in MWE even know who Cody Lindberg-Knight is.
Gavin: It doesn’t matter… you still did what you did. You can’t control how the careers of those that you beat for your accomplishments fared otherwise. I’m just saying… it’s not your fault that Tony Jones was gone from the business by the time 2010 ended. It’s not your fault that Cody never met his potential in GCW. He did come back even though you had put him on the shelf…
Victoria sighs and takes a deep breath.
Victoria: You’re right. I’m sorry. I’m just going through a lot right now, you know.
Gavin: Hey, it’s going to all turn out for the best, you can trust me on that. I think you did a great thing by revealing a little of your shortcomings a few days ago. Just think about it, okay?
Gavin leaves with the picture that Victoria had rejected, leaving her to think about her first GCW World Championship reign.
April 2015
Tina: So… word on the street is… you fucked him up SO damn good he’s going to be gone for a LONG time…
Tina Valentine is quite happy as she stands next to Victoria who is treating her latest successful title defense against Cody Lindberg-Knight as another day in the office more than anything else.
Victoria: Yeah, I guess that’s true.
Tina: Cody deserved that shit too! Who the fuck did he think he is? I don’t know what the hell the “Cody Cares” crap was all about, just that it was really stupid. He’s trying to act all hard and shit…
Victoria: Tina, talk like a normal person. I’m not in the mood for your fake, ghetto Harlem speak right now.
Tina: Damn, what crawled up your ass? I thought you’d be happy with putting him away for a long time. I didn’t realize he was that annoying to you. I was just saying how he was walking in all privileged because of his bloodline and all of that and how you managed to shut him up when it mattered. I really hope you’re not feeling guilty for whatever injury he may have gotten in there tonight.
Victoria: I’m just glad that I put an end to that CODY CARES fucking trash…
Tina: ...why are you so offended by it? Jeez… it was just a stupid joke…
Victoria: Right… he couldn’t beat me at Resurrection, so he treats ME like I’M a joke with his stupid nonsense. “Victoria doesn’t believe in IHOP FREE PANCAKES”... SERIOUSLY? I’m THAT much of a joke to him? Am I a joke to GCW? Is that what’s going on here? You know how I feel about being treated like I’m a goddamn joke! I’ve had enough of being treated like one for an entire career just from IWC alone!
Tina: It’s not like that. You KNOW it’s not like that.
Victoria: Honestly Tina? I just want to be left alone right now.
Tina: You’re supposed to be happy, you know…
Victoria: Well I’m NOT, okay?
Tina sighs, realizing she’s not going to get through to Victoria before she reluctantly leaves.
Victoria: Yeah… being treated like a joke by that piece of shit was never okay… but neither is sidelining him either. I’m not living up to my potential as a world champion and I already know it…
Victoria sighs, trying to soldier on. But with three months to go in this title reign, she doesn’t realize just how bad it’s about to get for her.
April 2020
Shortly after her conversation with Gavin, she finds herself back on the balcony overlooking the shores of Lake Michigan. She’s trying to destress at this point as she tries to battle some negative thoughts that were running through her head her entire title reign. She doesn’t react much when Allison Mayberry walks into the balcony and stands beside her.
Allison: If you don’t mind me saying… I thought what you did on Wednesday was very brave.
Victoria: Really?
Allison: Yeah. There are few wrestlers out there that are willing to bare their soul like you did after the way you got humiliated on the show before. Shouldn’t that put “the title reign you’re most ashamed of” into perspective?
Victoria: I guess Gavin told you, huh?
Allison: Yeah, he did. I share his same sentiments, to be honest. There were a lot of things during that time that were really working against you: IWC, for one. You had surrounded yourself with PUBLIC RELATIONS DISASTERS like Tina Valentine and public relations CATASTROPHES like those other two morons that had the nerve to call themselves women. That was dragging you down a lot. But I can see how that reign was affecting your confidence for a while. You’re not proud of any bit of it.
Victoria: I never was. All I ever did was cheat and take the coward’s way out that entire time all while I had people in another company degrading me like I was worth nothing. I really didn’t realize how much my confidence was going down the drain the more that entire year dragged on. 2015? Yeah, that was “vainglorious” at its very worst. It’s what makes me determined to get things right and prove to the world I can really be a champion. My first two title reigns were earned, I don’t dispute that. My third? You know how I feel about it. And there’s a small part of me that feels that my last two world title reigns only happened because you were the Shotgun GM at the time… or at least that’s what a lot of people in the locker room were saying behind my back… and especially after we left GCW...
Allison can only scoff at this, both as an expression of shrugging off old locker room talk that may or may not have happened and as a show of how unbothered she is by any gossip.
Allison: Okay… so let me ask you this. Who was the one that beat Julia Braddock for #4? Was it me, or was it you?
Victoria: It was me… you had nothing to do with it. I earned that title shot by winning a #1 contender’s match… that you gave me…
Allison: Give yourself more credit, Victoria! Any sensible GM would have given you that contender’s match. It didn’t have to be me. Was it me or was it you that submitted Adrian Waters for #5?
Victoria: I did that. But I know that after we left, there were some that…
Allison: That doesn’t matter, let them talk. They can’t take away anything you did. See what’s happened here? For years, you had let your confidence slide because you cared too much about what other people thought. At least you’re past that now. I get that you’re not proud of the year you had in 2015 and I understand the domino effect it had on your career. You can’t let other people define your story here. You were very brave in opening up about your past. Keep doing so. In fact… that title reign you’re ashamed of? You can use that as a source of inspiration for why you want to be a world champion again. I have an idea for Wednesday… something that I feel will not only be therapeutic for you… but an opportunity for the MWE audience to REALLY get to know you… and you know you can trust me when it comes to public relations…
Victoria: You’re damn right I can. Thanks for reminding me of… you know… the positive. I guess the way things ended for me in GCW hurt. I did lose quite a bit of contact with many of those wrestlers for a while. You know how much of a pariah I was in that locker room when “that divorce” happened. Maybe I can still learn something from that reign… even if I’m not that proud of it. What’s your idea?
Allison: Let’s talk about it inside for a minute…
Victoria and Allison leave the room of the temporary residence at this point to discuss whatever it is that Allison has in mind. At the very least, Victoria is feeling better… determined more than before to not let the worse part of her wrestling past define who she is in the present and in the future… and determined more than before to use said past to make her better going forward.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 29, 2020 14:19:10 GMT -6
April 25, 2020
Victoria is at her temporary residence watching the main event of Riot. She’s intrigued by the shenanigans that are going on, but she’s mostly invested in the battle between Chris Constantine Jr. and Kelsey Spencer. When Kelsey ultimately pins CCJ, she doesn’t offer a reaction whatsoever. She’s not excited one bit, no matter how much Gavin is happy with the outcome.
Gavin: Nice! It’s about time someone gave them a taste of their own medicine!
Seeing anyone pin Chris Constantine Jr. would make Victoria at least smirk, but not this time.
Gavin: We’ve got ourselves a vulnerable champion as far as I’m concerned.
Victoria doesn’t respond and at this point, her husband picks up on the vibe she’s exuding.
Gavin: Odd… I thought you’d be happy to see that.
Victoria: I’m not.
Gavin: Is this a case of “I wish it was me?”
Victoria: No, it’s a case of “I wish it wasn’t her.”
Victoria suddenly stands up and walks away from the couch leaving her husband confused.
Gavin: What the hell? Vicky?
Victoria walks into the bedroom and slams the door behind her. She sits on the bed, reflecting on what appears to be some type of bad memory that she has yet to face.
Victoria (thinking): I came to MWE to resurrect a career that was sagging at the time. I remember that the first thing I was part of was this tournament… and it was nice winning round one… then I ran into… her…
June 1, 2019 (flashback)
Victoria: I guess now we get to know what would have happened had we had that match…
Victoria is on the phone with someone in the minutes before her Battle for the Briefcase tournament match against Kelsey Spencer.
Victoria: It’s going to be a tough one Allison… I know that.
Allison: Yeah… but… you’re Victoria Salinas… you know…
The affirmation from Allison Mayberry over the phone doesn’t seem to be helping Victoria that much at the moment.
Allison: I know things haven’t been the greatest for you lately, but when it comes to tournaments? You’ve ALWAYS killed them, Vicky! You’ve never finished worse than the semifinals of any tournament that you’ve ever been in. I know that there’s that whole “HYBRID” factor…
Victoria: Yeah, you’re telling me. I’ve had worse experiences but for some reason… things just didn’t work for me there. Kelsey and I were on a collision course for her world title there… but that match never got to happen after we both left.
Allison: Right… but now you get to show that you would have won number six had that match happened. So HYBRID wasn’t great for you. So what? At least it never got to IWC levels of suck!
Victoria: Yeah… you’re right about that. I’ll give it my best…
Allison: No… don’t say that. Say that you’re going to win.
Victoria: Fine, I’m going to win.
Allison: ...I’m not convinced of that. Are you sure you’re okay? I’m not feeling that same confidence from you that you usually have. I get that life since the divorce has been rough but that’s all over now.
Victoria: I’m FINE, okay? I need to go…
Allison: ...okay okay… fine! I’ll let you go! I’m here for you, okay? Good night, good luck, I know you’ll do great.
The line hung up at this point and Victoria sighed as she put her phone away. This was a time where her confidence was certainly not there. Of course, she hadn’t realized that her confidence had been going through a slow, painful dip for quite some time now… with events such as the last few months of her GCW career, her divorce and her HYBRID run driving a stake through it time and time again… still, the anchor was certainly burdening her and dragging down her confidence… and this night’s events? They wouldn’t help…
Later that night…
Victoria is experiencing a cold, empty feeling after that match with Kelsey Spencer. With HYBRID not going well for her and this loss proving to be a quintessential reminder of that, she finds herself alone in the locker room, back against the wall, her eyes exuding a look of someone who appears to be completely out of it. Psychologically, she’s cracking and even if she does realize it, she doesn’t realize the full extent of it. She glances to her right and sees an in-ring action shot of Kelsey Spencer and she quickly proceeds to rip it apart. Her cratering confidence at this point leads her to a conclusion she never thought she’d ever tell herself… especially at just 31 years of age…
Victoria: ...maybe…
She lets out another sigh.
Victoria: Maybe I don’t have it anymore… maybe I should just stick to being a trainer full time from now on. Because right now? All I can see is how things can get worse… not better. I guess had that match happened in HYBRID… I would have lost… and then gone right back to being nothing… back of the line… worthless… just another face on the roster…
Victoria shakes her head and continues to sulk, not realizing that rock bottom is coming for her.
April 25, 2020
Victoria snaps out of her flashback remembering how that last encounter with Kelsey affected her. She’s struggling to fight feelings of bitterness. Her heart knows that it wasn’t Kelsey’s fault and that she merely did what she had to do that night. It was all part of the business and the veteran that Victoria is absolutely realizes that. Yet, the aftermath of how she felt after the fact is something that she just can’t quite shake at this point.
Victoria: She’s been an indirect thorn in my ass lately, hasn’t she? More than likely, I’ll have to get through her too… since they wanted to give her a title shot so bad. She lives the charmed life right now… getting that win over Melissa Reeves too, now pinning Chris Constantine… it’s like FUCK… she gets to do everything that I can’t do. I got a shot at Reeves too… that triple threat…. And Reeves pinned me and I was just about to be done with wrestling after that point because my confidence never recovered from rock bottom. I don’t HATE her… and my heart knows that the feelings I went through after my last encounter aren’t her fault…
Gavin: ...but there’s a piece of you that DOES want to hate her, right?
Victoria doesn’t even protest as Gavin walks into the room.
Gavin: There’s a part of you that feels that she played a role in the downward spiral that you went through.
Victoria: She didn’t… but I can’t forget how that loss made me feel. I had preconceived feelings about myself that weren’t good and losing to her seemed to validate them.
Gavin: You’ve come a long way since then… don’t forget that. I was surprised when you reacted the way you did to the Riot match… but I understand it now. I’ll leave you alone for a while.
Victoria: Thanks…
Gavin leaves the room and Victoria walks out into the porch that overlooks the shores of Lake Michigan which as usual… are largely empty. This time alone causes her to reflect on the harshest summer she’s ever had in her career… even worse than 2015 when she was going through the worst of her five world championship reigns.
June 15, 2019
Two weeks after her loss to Kelsey Spencer, Victoria is alone in the locker room again with that loss still on her mind. It doesn’t matter to her that the week before, she bounced back with a win. She’s very much cognizant of the fact that she lost what would have been one hell of an opportunity for her. She’s still hanging her head over it and looking at the card for tonight doesn’t do her much favors. She’s in a four way match with Nikki Knight, Charlie Webster and Smoke… none of whom are in MWE anymore. Just seeing her name in the middle of the card saddens her. The wrestler inside of her knows she’s better than that, but being stuck in this “random match” isn’t doing her confidence any favors.
Victoria: What am I even doing here?
Victoria sighs before she continues.
Victoria: I guess this proves how far I’ve fallen, huh? A year ago, I got inducted into GCW’s Hall of Fame and now? I’m stuck in this random four way where… what’s on the line exactly? I’ve never even heard of these people. I guess the one bright spot in all this is that it’s a match that I should be able to win… or at the very least? Avoid getting pinned…
Victoria walks out of the locker room with an attitude unlike herself. It’s not the ‘go getter’ attitude that she had been known for her entire career, it’s the attitude of someone that’s going through the motions. Rather than aim for her best, she’s just going through the motions trying to avoid the worst possible outcome. Unfortunately, on this particular night, she did in fact, suffer the worst possible outcome.
Getting pinned.
By Charlie Webster.
Later that night… (after the show)...
All alone… in her hotel room… she’s lost it.
It’s the same “face buried in knees” feeling that she went through in IWC following the “Ship to Mexico” incident. It’s the exact same emotions… the embarrassment… the shame… the feeling that she didn’t belong… the feeling that she was nobody… the feeling that the best part of her career is over…
The same emotional reactions: the flood of tears, the shredding of whatever was left of her confidence…
Rock bottom has arrived.
Victoria: I can’t do this anymore…
She lets herself cry for a few more moments.
Victoria: Someone like THAT… 99 percent of the time… I beat someone like THAT with one hand tied behind my back, blindfolded…. I don’t want to do this anymore… I can’t… if I’m getting pinned by someone like CHARLIE WEBSTER than I don’t belong in this business anymore…
GOD, this is like Mary-Allison Chainz all over again… maybe WORSE...
I’m done…
I’m going home…
Victoria unburies her tear filled face out of her knees and reaches over for a notepad and pen. The tears are really flowing fast as she picks up a pen and writes “I’m done… I don’t have it anymore. Please grant my release effective immediately”. This note becomes partially illegible with tears dropping on the note and smudging some of the ink. She tosses the notepad and pen aside and just buries her face in her pillow… having hit rock bottom, having no confidence in herself anymore. This would be the second of three nights she would cry herself to sleep over her wrestling career (the third would be after getting pinned by Melissa Reeves in the triple threat that also included Bethany Driver). But this one hurt the worst… as this is the only time Victoria ever felt that her wrestling career was in fact, over.
Victoria takes in the sounds of the waves hitting the Lake Michigan shore before walking back inside the room. The rock bottom moment she experienced when she got pinned by Charlie Webster causes her to think a little bit as she looks in the bedroom mirror.
Victoria: I’ve come a very long way since that rock bottom…
This quick reminder to herself finally gives her some sense of happiness.
Victoria: I mean… I did get my revenge and I did run that useless twat out of the company so…
Victoria takes a deep, relaxing breath.
Victoria: More than that though… I have to remember this one thing. After the rock bottom ended… things not only began to get better… but they also got better VERY fast. I went from that Bethany Driver nonsense to main eventing an MWE Pay-Per-View in HOW long? Six months tops? There are very few people that go from the rock bottom I was in to something like that… that quickly. Instead of focusing on the worst… maybe I should be more determined to think positive. After beating the likes of Grimes, Leclair, Luna and Garrett in recent months… maybe I should start giving myself more credit. I should have never let that match with Kelsey get to me that way almost a year ago. My career has always been about overcoming the very worst I’ll ever face… and maybe I should start realizing how strong I really am. I’ve endured so much in my life to become the woman that I am… I’m so caught up on the destination that I forget about the journey sometimes. I really shouldn’t let that encounter trigger me anymore…
Victoria leaves the room, makes her way through the hall and finds herself in the kitchen, standing over the sink and letting things (pardon the pun) sink in a little more. While she reflects on some of the positive stuff, Gavin comes up from behind and gently wraps his arms around her, planting a kiss on the cheek and finally allowing her to smile for a change.
Gavin: Everything okay now?
Victoria: I’m going to be fine. I was just letting my last match with Kelsey get to me too much… and I had done so for way too long at that. The next time I get her in a ring? I’m going to beat her. She didn’t get me at my best last time. It’d be poetic justice if I were to beat her too for that title… all things considered. I’m determined as hell to redeem that loss because I know I will… no matter what it takes.
Gavin: Why did it take us so long to get married again?
Both of them share a laugh as Victoria turns around. They exchange an embrace and a couple of kisses before they let go of each other.
Victoria: Let’s just say that our marriage and my sixth world title have one big thing in common: both? They’re very much worth the wait!
Victoria walks back into the living room feeling a lot better, having sifted through the end of what was her five year slippery slope into the void she was in for a while. With the perspective she’s gained… not to mention her recent win over Kenzie Garrett… at the moment? She’s got every reason to smile.
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Post by Deleted on May 8, 2020 13:39:13 GMT -6
January 2016
Victoria: Are you recovering okay?
This is a question that Victoria asks Mr. Holliday, her trainer, as he sits in a wheelchair.
Mr. Holliday: Yeah… the prognosis for the hip replacement is pretty good… for someone my age anyway.
Victoria: Good. I’m glad.
Mr. Holliday: What about you? Are you feeling okay?
Victoria: Relieved… I’m just glad that Tina Valentine and 2015 are behind me. My confidence really went through a loop and I can honestly say that I’m not sure if it’s really bounced back yet. I feel just… empty…
Mr. Holliday: Why? You put Tina behind you for good.
Victoria: It’s just…
Victoria sighs with regret.
Victoria: I feel like… I’m farther away from where I want to be in my career. Everything else just seems so… I don’t know… things don’t feel right. In GCW, you have Amelia Robson being called THE BEST THING FOR SHOTGUN and I was excluded from that contender’s tournament all while she and Travis Vessey… you know, the asshole that I put in his place three months ago, got title shots coming out of it. They’re centering the show all around HER…
Mr. Holliday: And you think it should center around you?
Victoria: ...it’s more that… oh god… if I EVER say this publicly, I’m going to get killed so keep this between you and me, okay? I think Amelia is a fine wrestler but… the best thing for Shotgun? COME ON! It’s ridiculous! I think she’s an overrated, flash in the pan honestly. Oh… and IWC? Yeah… it hasn’t gotten much better. I’m just so tired of the backstage “bullies” you know? I might as well be in high school again. I’ve been relegated to Luciana’s sidekick more or less and I feel like I deserve better. But hey, at least I got Tina out of the way…
Mr. Holliday: Hmm… I think that explains what happened on Saturday then…
Victoria: What do you mean?
Mr. Holliday: Cassidy Carter is someone you should be wrestling circles around, Victoria. You didn’t lose… but you also didn’t win a match that you should have won. That actually damaged your stock as a possible world title contender, you do know that right?
Victoria sighs and suddenly looks glum, knowing that he’s right.
Mr. Holliday: You weren’t focused. You had your own appreciation night… in a Canadian city that LITERALLY has YOUR name on it. Yet, you’re bending the knee crediting your boyfriend for everything and saying it’s HIS appreciation night. That’s not the Victoria I know. Look, don’t take it the wrong way… I’m just being as honest as you’d want me to be with you. You feel like you’re far away from where you want to be because… it hurts me to say this… you really are.
Victoria: You’re not telling me something I don’t already know. I just wish I knew how to get that “it factor” back. I haven’t been feeling great. I’ve spent the last few months pretty depressed, honestly. I’m turning what? 28 this year? It feels like I’ve overstayed my welcome honestly… and if I have, please let me know. By the way, I’m surprised you haven’t pointed out that I’m losing weight or something because I haven’t really eaten that great in some time…
Mr. Holliday: You haven’t overstayed your welcome, I promise. You’ll find your way back, I’ve got all the faith and confidence in you.
Victoria nods before beginning to leave Mr. Holliday’s home.
Mr. Holliday: Oh and… about that boyfriend of yours?
Victoria: Yeah?
Mr. Holliday: I don’t like him. He clearly proved to be a distraction for you last Saturday.
Victoria: Sure. Thanks.
Victoria sighs before leaving the scene.
Present Day
Victoria is having a video chat therapy session with her therapist, Dr. Montgomery, as she reflects on a year that was frustrating for her.
Victoria: 2016. So… it was better than 2015. But this was the year where I felt like I was really hitting a wall. My confidence wasn’t getting better. Everything felt like it was a holding pattern… all the frustrations… all the times that I had failed to take the next step… all the victories that felt so empty…
Dr. Montgomery: Like what?
Victoria: There was Resurrection that year… beating Executive Order felt like a joke to me. Glory Braddock decided to pull a Glory Braddock after that and make it all about her. The match was in the fucking throwaway slot of night three of Resurrection… and to be honest? The way things turned out with Midas being abandoned and all… it felt like it really took the shine away. I go from the main event of Resurrection one year to some stupid tag team match nobody was going to remember the next? Oh… then there was the Kayla thing…
Dr. Montgomery: I remember that! It felt like such a big anchor for you, but I never understood why. Please… explain that one to me.
Victoria: When I first arrived in GCW… to be perfectly blunt? Kayla Jones was my bitch! So I went from overcoming her constantly to… suddenly not being able to beat her? What the fuck is that? At the time, it really felt like my ability was declining. Prior to this year, I was having issues with not beating people in MWE I should’ve beaten. Losing to the likes of Charlie Webster and Bethany Driver? SERIOUSLY? Four years ago… I couldn’t even beat Cassidy fucking Carter for fuck’s sake. Oh and then I’m shoehorned into the tag team division with Kayla and we won the tag titles but… I was so depressed out of my own mind with so little confidence that I just wasn’t into it…
Dr. Montgomery: I see…
Victoria: I’m very hard on myself… I always have been. For all that I do… for all that I’ve done… I often feel like it’s never enough. It held especially true during those years, I’ll say that for a fact. I hated wrestling in the tag team division because I always felt I could do better. Oh… then there was that whole “being the first elimination in the Pyramid while my flagship pay-per-view streak was snapped and looking like a fluke in UWA” thing going on… and when I got real depressed over my boyfriend at the time getting a serious concussion… when I started eating the depression away, feeling sorry for myself and… wow…
Victoria winces briefly.
Victoria: ...that was an overreaction, in hindsight. But still… it was a really bad summer. That’s the summer when the tag titles were lost and I was humiliated further with that forced hair dye job from Ginger Nation… and yes, I know the irony in keeping it for the most part since then. Turns out it was what I needed to make a clean break from the past.
Dr. Montgomery: But you eventually DID overcome Kayla, right?
Victoria: Right.
Dr. Montgomery: And you DID win your 4th world title right at the end of 2016. So it really wasn’t all that bad.
Victoria: What’s your point, exactly?
Dr. Montgomery: I’m going to make the argument that what you went through in 2016 prior to finally beating Kayla Jones was even worse than what you went through in 2019. You did get your mojo back after that…
Victoria: If that’s true, then I wouldn’t have regressed for about a year and change like I did in late 2018… most of 2019…
Dr. Montgomery: I’d argue that if you weren’t forcing yourself into a marriage you never wanted and spent how long worrying about the consequences of saying “no” just one time… there never would’ve been that regression. In fact, you might still be in GCW even now.
Victoria: That’s still on me though. I should have just said “we should stay friends”, I should have said “no” when he proposed. UGH… I’m not going to recount that whole relationship again. I’m far beyond it already.
Dr. Montgomery: The key takeaway through all of this… as we run out of time here? Be kinder to yourself. Give yourself credit… a lot more credit… than you give yourself sometimes. I understand that you’ve gone through some intense experiences… especially growing up… that have you believing that you’re lesser than what you really are. Wrestling should be a dream that you’re living… not something to use as a crutch. I’m almost certain that if you retired next week, your overall “legacy” that you leave behind is going to be mostly positive. There will come a point where you won’t be able to do this anymore. Then what are you going to do?
Victoria: That’s something I’ve never really thought about…
Dr. Montgomery: Maybe it’s about time you did… just something to think about. See you next month!
The Skype feed faded and Victoria was left with something to really think about… something that goes far beyond her wrestling career.
December 31, 2016
Victoria is with Allison Mayberry after having become a world champion for the 4th time in her career… (and the 2nd time in GCW). The moment has sunk in at this point and Allison is understandably ecstatic for her. However, she’s noticing that Victoria isn’t quite sharing that same ecstasy at the moment.
Allison: You went through SO MUCH to win that world championship. I think it’s fair to say that you really do deserve it. I’m almost positive that it’s going to go SO much better than your last reign. Knowing the wrestler you are, being on top of your game as you are, I’m confident that you’re not going to lose the title to a one hit wonder again.
Victoria: It’s a different time and a different place. I’m just glad that the nightmare that I endured for what seemed like an eternity is over.
Victoria’s comment brings a concerned look on Allison’s face.
Allison: THAT’S what you’re happy about? Vicky… you went through one of the most incredible journeys one can go through between world championships. This redemption story that you’ve lived is Hollywood material…
Victoria: It was a journey that was much harder and much longer than it had any right to be…
Allison: ...what?
Victoria: Yeah, I went through a lot. The challenges were heavy. Allison, I was so miserable during most of that journey that it’s hard to find any real joy in it. Yeah, winning this world title and claiming number four makes it worth it and all but… I wish it didn’t have to be so difficult.
Allison: Vicky… it’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey. It seems like the destination is all you care about. It’s like you’ve learned nothing.
Victoria: I learned that if I have to, I can overcome the worst I can ever face and be a champion again. As far as I’m concerned, those idiot critics I’ve had to deal with all year can shut the fuck up now and leave my name out of their mouths.
Victoria walks out of the room at that point with the world championship that she just regained.
Present Day
Victoria is wearing a look of regret on her face, remembering the night that she won her fourth world championship and how she treated the journey that she endured in winning it.
Victoria: Maybe that’s why I’m going through the same thing now… to appreciate what I hadn’t appreciated before. When I won that 4th world championship after everything that I had endured for more than a year at that point, I was far more annoyed that I even had to go through the ringers that I had to go through in order to make it happen than I was happy that I had regained the world championship. I treated that whole thing as just another world title. I wasn’t necessarily happy with myself…. I was miserable.
I hated myself for struggling so much to win the GCW World Championship for the second time.
I hated myself for having fallen so far in the hole like I did earlier in the year that… I guess in a sense… I felt like maybe I didn’t even deserve to be a world champion for the 4th and subsequently the 5th time.
Dr. Montgomery is right… I need to be nicer to myself. Everyone in my life treats me better than I treat myself a lot of the time. My general unhappiness and dissatisfaction with myself in general… I mean for god’s sake… even though 2017 was a good year for me… none of the good was enough. Retain the world title on the grandest stage… that didn’t make me love myself any more. Regaining that world title again a few months later didn’t make me love myself any more. I’ve always taken the journey for granted… hell… I’ve been taking MYSELF for granted for how long now? All I ever thought about during that time was how much everything I was going through sucked… how I was wishing things weren’t so hard… how I hated myself because I was engaged to someone who deep down, I never really wanted in the first place but wouldn’t break up with because I didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings…
Hell… for my ENTIRE CAREER… confidence or not… good times and bad times…
Victoria pauses, eyes widening in shock, once she comes to a very shocking epiphany.
Victoria: I’ve used wrestling as a crutch… as an escape… I’ve used it as an excuse to compensate for a childhood that I’ve never wanted to be proud of because of how rough it was. All I’ve ever done is run from it because I didn’t want to face it… because I didn’t want to deal with it. I don’t even like looking at pictures of myself during my high school years because all I’ve ever felt is shame… yet… that’s only because I allowed people during those years to tell me that I was such a blight and a waste. The wrestler in me… she’s confident again. Once the lights come on and I’m doing what I love, I’m so different. Once the rush is over, it’s like being back in reality. It’s almost as if the wrestler and the person have been so disconnected. No wonder I’ve always had some confidence issues or that I feel like I’m not worthy of something sometimes… because the entire time, I’m trying to compensate for a rough upbringing. Why didn’t I realize this before?
Victoria sighs as she walks out of the room of her temporary Chicago residence and into the kitchen. She’s alone in the house at the moment when she walks to the counter. She sees a random picture of herself at the age of 16 that surprises her but then she notices there’s a staple near the top. She looks behind the picture and sees a note.
Victoria: “No matter what people said about her back then or how terrible she was treated at that time… there was never anything wrong with her. This is the girl I fell in love with - Gavin.”
Victoria puts down the picture on the counter, still surprised by it all.
Victoria: I think it’s about time I started to believe that myself… especially now… with what’s coming. Life has its ways of teaching you things and I’ve learned my lesson. I had to go through this whole redemption journey again to really appreciate not just the wrestling business and the hard work and dedication it takes to be a champion… but myself as well… every era, every piece, every moment… good or bad…
I overcame the wall known as Kayla Jones 4 years ago…
And this weekend?
I overcome TWO! They’ve been the pillars that have been in my way in my MWE run… and I’m going to find a way to break them down to win number six… and THIS time?
I KNOW I’ll appreciate the journey!
Victoria glances at the picture of her sixteen year old self, reflecting on what she had to go through to even become a wrestler at all… as the countdown to Dark Web continues to slowly tick away.
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