Quail Park of Lynnwood [#8]

[anthonycaffrey]

“Hi Barbara, I wanted to leave a quick voicemail as I’m actually calling internationally and the fees can expensive. Thank you for sending me all of that information so fast, I didn’t think that’d be the case with all this crazy shit going on. I think you guys might be a good fit, especially since you’re only about a half hour south of Seattle, but let me give you some more details.”

“David is a… special case. I referred to him as an uncle, but we’ve never been that close. Recently, he’s just kinda shifted into being that weird uncle, because he’s expressed -- how do I put it delicately -- a lot of symptoms of brain damage, really. Like maybe some early on-set dementia? He’s unfortunately gotten a little soft in the head. He’s slipping. The plus side is he makes a lot more jokes now, even if they aren’t super funny. But he’s become a parody of himself, and it’s kind of sad. Someone let him blog the other day and it was just a mess. Then there was the time after that where he dressed up and did this ‘Mad Money’ bit, and it was just… if he has any family left who does care about him, they’re just exploiting him for money at this point. He's doing parodies because he's become a parody of himself. He just isn’t the same man.”

“I’m happy all of those therapies are included -- his broken-down body doesn’t move as well as it used to. From looking at your website, the amenities look incredible. Dave’s a big boy, so the sixty meals a week should help him feel at home. But I think what’ll truly make him happiest is the fact that television is included. Dave is currently still working full-time as a professional wrestler, and having to retire is going to be rough on him. I think he’ll enjoy getting to watch all of his favorites week-in and week-out on the XHF Network as he begins life after wrestling. From what I understand, I’m his favorite wrestler -- so he’s going to be a little more open to listening to me after I win the Rumble. Anyway, I’m going to bring this up with him after next Sunday-- I’ll keep in touch via email for now. Take care, Barb.”

The camera lights up on Anthony Caffrey, leaning against the balcony just outside of his hotel room as he finishes his phone call. The camera pans back to reveal his laptop open with the Quail Park of Lynnwood website. He turns around and addresses the camera.

“I didn’t want to do it, Trap. You brought this on yourself.” 

Caffrey shakes his head.

“I have so much on my mind right now. My tables, ladders, and chairs match for one. I just raised two grand the other day for wrestlers in need. I was focusing on other opponents for the Rumble, but I kept feeling this tug. A little tug there, a major tug with that blog… and you just kept tugging on Superman’s cape, asking for me to just respond to you. And I wasn’t going to do it.”

“I mean, I read the blog. It was the cutest take on me I’ve seen yet! You completely missed the point of me stealing Seth’s shtick and doing it better than him -- the idea is that I’ve always been better than him at everything I do, and as Seth unravels and shows his darker side, and I…”

Caffrey trails off, letting viewers at home finish the sentence.

“...you’ve talked about my achievements lately. And besides submitting Michael Storm, submitting fucking Santa Claus because the AWF roster literally turned down $10,000 to even attempt to fight me, beating Aidan Merric in a brutal no-disqualification match to begin the year, rendering the MONSTER Tarrasque unable to answer the count of ten in a Last Man Standing match, submitting Alex Withers, and pinning Timeless, I guess I haven’t been doing too much, have I?”

Caffrey laughs at the camera.

“I just recapped a few months in a minute. I didn’t need to spend what felt like an hour recapping what the viewers at home already know, did I?”

He mocks Death Trap’s recent retrospective.

“Oh, but I’m not a fun wrestler. Right, right. That’s the big exciting hot take you have on Anthony Caffrey. Dave, if you stacked up all the awful jokes, rants, and preaching about me from all forty of the other guys you would have HOURS of content to sift through at this point, Goddamn. But man, the shot directly at my heart, the real killer?Anthony Caffrey doesn’t do moonsaults or kickass german suplexes, what a fuckin’ loser!”

Caffrey holds up an “L” to his forehead.

“At first I thought you were just stupid, as I mentioned to Barbara, I think you may just have brain damage at this point. You think you’re better than me because why exactly? Oh, you show up to MCCW every week and beat the bottom of the barrel competition they throw at you?”

Caffrey puts a hand out.

“People have shit on me ALL THE TIME for the low-level competition I faced -- which always amuses the shit out of me as they try to do the mental gymnastics to say that guys like Anomoly or Maverick or Barratt weren’t fucking top shelves competitors in their own right. But just look at MCCW’s contribution to this Rumble, and you’ll see the massive talent vacuum. It’s Leon Chant, Mistress Discipline, and Death Trap. As much as I hate AWF these days, I’d be lying to myself if I said that AWF wasn’t sending over about five times the amount of talent for this match.”

“We both know, David, that ‘Death Trap’ couldn’t handle the talents of the AWF or SWAT, and that’s why you show up to MCCW every week. You can’t sit with us.”

Caffrey doesn’t even chuckle at his movie reference as he tears into Death Trap.

“Look at this Rumble this year, David. Caffrey, Zainovic, Storm, Cross, Card, Fox, Taborda, Rat, Sniper… the list goes on and on. This Rumble will go down as the most hard-fought Rumble of all time. You know what’s never going to get that same credit? End of Days 2019. Sit there right now and tell me who you fought in the first round without looking it up. I’ve got twenty bucks that says you can’t.”

“It was Alexis fucking Grace. I don’t even know if Alexis is a woman or a man, or even if they’re still wrestling this point. So congrats Dave, on winning the weakest End of Days in the history of the tournament, and then going on to absolutely blow your fucking championship match. Feel free to keep bragging about winning a tournament that, besides you, includes ZERO entrants into this year’s Rumble. Talk about weak fucking competition, if you somehow didn’t win that tournament you should’ve gone ahead and already retired, we could’ve skipped all this research I’m doing for you.”

“And ya know, Dave, I was gonna let all this fucking slide. I really was. I was going to let you just stay in your category with all of the other greedy and outdated has-been hacks desperately trying to stay in the spotlight for just a few moments longer. I was gonna let you just keep wearing your awful little hat and chain, even though 2003 has been calling for 16 years now to get their clothes back and let you know you how dumb you look, but you crossed the line. My agent knew this would set me off when you sent it, and he was fucking right.”

Caffrey plays the sound clip on his phone.

“Feel no remorse for killing a company then come back and bludgeon us all over how it was all you running the place.”

You can just watch Caffrey’s face go from pale to red in an instant. His hand quivers as he plays the clip again.

“Feel no remorse for killing a company”

He stops the clip.

“Fuck you.”

“David, do you know how many people have come up to me and accused me of that shit? Hundreds. So many misinformed assholes come up and point the finger at me, they say that AXW was doing just fine before I arrived. They sit there and taunt me, all the while claiming that I never gave a shit about AXW, that I never loved it.”

“And they are so, so SO FUCKING WRONG!”

Caffrey takes a series of deep breaths, trying his best to calm down.

“If you told me I could go back to AXW tomorrow, I’d drop everything to come back. From the moment I arrived in AXW. I tried to make it the very best show I could because V believed in me when no one else would even pick up the phone and give me a tryout. I rose that show out of a garbage ass timeslot into primetime. I volunteered for a match against Card no one thought I could win after AXW spent the previous year getting its ass kicked by AWF in cross-promotional matches and brought home the victory to get people to tune in. I took on all comers, sometimes even multiple times and all at once, and when all comers weren’t enough, we extended into fighting invading forces. Thousands of people would tune in every week to watch me get my ass kicked, but I was just so happy that we were getting eyes on our product. That show became my baby as much as anyone else’s. From the moment V signed me, I knew he saw great things in me, that someone saw I still had some potential left and was giving me a second chance, and I worked my ass off to prove him right every single day and to raise his company to relevance as a way of thanking him. There was a small stretch of time that we were the best wrestling company in the world, and I just… just wish he could be around to see it.”

Caffrey pauses, turning away from the camera for a few second. He turns back to the camera after wiping his face with his arm.

“I talked about wrestlers questioning their dreams when they suddenly find themselves out of the business, the feeling of drowning... and AXW ended up being the answer to all my questions, all my doubts, all of my worries. AXW was my life preserver, the second chance I needed. That company saved my wrestling career, it saved passion, it saved me from so much. The Anthony Caffrey you see before you today doesn’t exist without AXW, and after all of that, after all the hours I dedicated and gave to making that company the very best it could be, you have the NERVE to tell me I didn’t give a shit about it? Fuck you!”

Caffrey bangs into the balcony with his good hand, still coping with his emotions. He takes a deep breath and lowers the volume of his voice. He does not yell anymore.

“Dave, in addition to all this, you had the nerve to compare me to that unhinged moron maniac Michael Storm. My rage is not murderous. My anger is not out of vengeance. My ‘beast mode’, as you call it, is not animalistic. What I do have, that clearly you don’t have anymore, is a driving passion inside of me. A passion that gets me up at 4AM everyday to hit the gym and then stay up for another six hours studying tape. A drive that pushes me to aim to become the very top of the food chain and set the goal of becoming the X-Crown Champion. My passion motivates me when my stamina tank runs on empty to push a little harder, to hold onto the ropes a little tighter, to kick out at two one more time because the alternative is becoming a washed-up piece of shit like you who doesn’t have what it takes to be The Best anymore.”

Caffrey doesn’t even smile. Instead, he takes a final deep breath, using the time to look down a the ground before looking back up at the camera.

“When I move you into this retirement home after I kick your ass at the Rumble next Sunday, you’re going to notice all of your new friends wear dentures. Do yourself a favor and ask for their advice on how to get comfortable wearing them, Dave. You’re going to need a pair for yourself, especially after I walk down that ramp and elbow all your fucking teeth down your throat.”

Caffrey swings his elbow at the camera, stopping just short right as the scene fades to black.