I attempted some sort of plot development in chapter two and it kind of fell flat. Hopefully it laid down some foundation for future chapters, though. So here it is…

Date Uploaded: 13 November 2005

Chapter 02: I Need Some Quick Cash

'Money doesn't talk, it swears.' – Bob Dylan

»»»

Referee training at the Poobrain Zebra Bastard Wrestling Training School Place Thingy for Rejects, or PZBWTSPTR for short, went pretty much like one would expect. Okay, so granted not too many would actually know what to expect, and frankly Ryan hadn't either. He had visions of being taught how to slap the canvas for a long two count and how to reprimand someone three times your size not to use a closed fist.

He had two teachers who alternated seemingly depending on who wanted to teach that day. One was, as previously stated, Lady Honeysuckle Sky. 'Miss Honey', as she told her students to call her, stood a hair under six feet, weighed somewhere in the three-fifty pound mark and had a face a pit bull would have envied. Despite her suspiciously low voice and fearsome looks, she was soft-spoken, patient and addressed her students in the endearing, creepy manner that old maids had for little children.

The other instructor was a man named Bernie Gutierrez, a mouthy little bastard who could talk the ear off anybody. He spent most lessons trying to con his students out of more money by talking about sweet deals on cars, bootlegged stuff and 'surefire' horse racing bets. He wasn't exactly popular, but he owned half of the school and was a competent enough teacher despite his shortcomings. The fact that he seemed to be dating the infinitely bigger Miss Honey raised a lot of eyebrows as well.

And the latter was what Ryan came to class to, panting, yawning and half an hour late. Bernie looked up from where he was demonstrating a legal and illegal punch. "Masters! What's the big idea coming to class this late? Tell me it's some good excuse like getting wasted and going to bed with some skank who looks nothing like she did the night before!"

"No. I was studying," Ryan said lamely.

Bernie shook his head. "If you're going to screw up you might as well try to be interesting about it. Next time go with the skank story."

"Oh? And does Miss Honey enjoy that excuse as much as you do?" Gabby, the only female in their group, answered back cheekily.

"I'm going to let that insult slide on the sole reason that you've got boobs," Bernie said, showing that he wasn't above crassness and sexual harassment. "Now Masters, sit down and shut up."

If Ryan was more like Dean or Gabby even, he would have chosen this minute for a witty comeback. As such the only one that popped into his head was, "I know you are, but what am I?" and seeing as that didn't seem to fit within the theme of things he merely sat down and shut up.

As could be expected, referee training at the PZBWTSPTR wasn't the most popular of courses, and so the class was a relatively small one. Aside from Ryan there was the previously mentioned Gabby, who was actually taking refereeing along with managerial training, so if she bombed in the latter she still had the former to fall back on. There was also Lump, nicknamed as such by Bernie as he could indeed have been interchangeable with a lump of rusting metal in the brains department. And at that moment Lump, having been alerted to the fact that Gabby did have breasts by the ever gentlemanly Bernie, was staring at the poor girl's front, entranced and possibly drooling slightly. Gabby looked disgusted and inched away a little.

Last and unfortunately not the least was Wilmer. It was safe to say that Ryan didn't like Wilmer. This was because on the first day of their course the taller, better-looking, fitter and infinitely more charming Wilmer walked up to Ryan and said, "Consider yourself my rival from now on."

"Buh-what?" Ryan had asked rather stupidly, fiddling with his shoelace.

"I said you're my rival," Wilmer repeated, as if to a slow child. "Basically whatever you do, I'll damn well make sure I can do better."

"Huh? Why? I just met you today, for crying out loud!" Ryan exclaimed.

"Well it's pretty simple, really, Ryan," Wilmer said nonchalantly. "I don't thrive when I don't have anybody to compete against. Lumpy over there is, well, unsuitable competition and Gabby is a woman."

"Who can kick your ass," Gabby interjected from her place across the room.

"Point taken," Wilmer said with a grin. "But yet, I still wouldn't feel right going up against her." To Ryan, it seemed that he was only making excuses, considering Gabby was the most capable of the bunch. "That leaves only you."

And so far Wilmer had made good on his pronouncement. He could take a fall and sell it better than Ryan could. He missed tags and low blows better than Ryan could. He counted a fall better than Ryan could. He was even complemented by Miss Honey, saying that he looked better in stripes than Ryan could. And no matter how many times Ryan told the bastard that he was not competing with him, Wilmer still regarded him as his rival and nothing could change his mind.

"You know the basic rules," Bernie was saying in his too-loud voice. "Closed fists are illegal. Now and then you could probably let knuckles grazing the side of the head slide, especially if you hate the guy taking the blows. Whoever said refs shouldn't take favorites obviously took too many shots to the cranium."

"But refs SHOULDN'T take sides; it's the whole point of refereeing! To be an unbiased judge of matches!" Gabby pointed out.

"Right, sweetheart, let's see if you still believe that when some idiot wrestler gropes your ass and you have to call fair play on his steel cage match later on. You're going to find that resisting the temptation to hand his foe a steel chair is going to be very hard," Bernie told her.

Gabby rolled her eyes. "What an asshole," she murmured to Ryan.

The lesson went on mostly like this, with Bernie finishing on why the thumb to the eye is the most underrated move ever and why refs should always turn a blind eye to it, so to speak. Ryan's head drooped and shot back up again when a large hand smacked him on the shoulder. "I gotta tell you, kid, you show up late for my class and fall asleep during it to boot and I'm gonna hafta do to you what my fifth grade teacher did to me," Bernie told him gruffly.

"Oh? What was that?" Ryan asked, blinking sleep away from his eyes.

"Beat me 'til I was black and blue," he grinned. "Teacher was my mom and boy was she pissed."

"Listen, Bernie, I'm sorry," Ryan apologized, getting up and noticing that the other three were already in the process of filing out of the room, Gabby pointedly giving Lump a wide berth and Wilmer giving Ryan a smug little salute on his way out. "I've just been overworked what with the classes and my job and… roommate…" he had discovered Dean still unconscious by his busted stereo that morning.

"You're breaking my heart, kid," Bernie said dryly. He shoved Ryan back down to a sitting position. "Now I'm only gonna say this once, so listen up. I like you; despite the fact that you're about as interesting as a block of concrete, there's something about you. I think you have what it takes to go far in the referee career."

"Really?" Ryan hoped he didn't sound too hopeful.

Bernie nodded. "Right. That's why I've saved you this," he looked around conspiratorially for a while before pulling out a ticket from his jacket and showing it to him. "Know what this is?"

"Reservations for your movie date with Miss Honey later this evening?" Ryan hazarded a guess.

"Funny, kid… wait, how did you know I was going on Honey tonight?"

"Because these really are your reservations for the movie," Ryan pointed out.

Bernie looked at the ticket and shook his head, grumbling as he stuffed them back into his pocket and pulled out what he intended to show in the fist place. "Goddamnit. All right, here's the real deal," he flashed another ticket, this time noticeably smaller with muted colors. "It's to get you into the abandoned warehouse a block from here midnight tonight."

"Why would I want to enter some run down warehouse in the dead of night?"

"You will when you find out who's going to be there," Bernie said. "There's this freestyle/beatbox sort of thing that's going to happen, and only the ones with connections can get in. One of the competitors later on is gonna be Brian Hebner. You know the guy, right?"

"Uh, son of Earl, disgraced former WWE senior ref?"

"Disgraced or not, Earl Hebner still has tremendous pull in this business," Bernie said, seemingly annoyed that Ryan wasn't getting this through his thick head fast enough. "You get in with Brian and end up rubbing elbows with him and his father and they're invaluable connections. And you might even learn a thing or two from those guys."

"And you're offering this to me?" Ryan was skeptical.

"Of course! But for a price, you understand."

Ryan knew it. "How much?"

"Masters, you know you're a pal! Make it four hundred and the ticket's yours."

Ryan blanched. "FOUR HUNDRED? For a stupid ticket?"

"Hey, hey, nothin's stupid about a little strip of paper that could decide your future! Now are you willing or will I have to end up talking to Wilmer?"

"Wilmer? What's got to do with this?"

"You two are rivals, right? Now don't get me wrong, I hate the creep as much as you do – too chipper, too eager, really annoying – but I will go to him if you don't accept this deal. You'll want a leg up over him, right?" Bernie said.

Ryan was about to say that he had never fully committed himself to the blasted rivalry that Wilmer had shoved on him, but then he thought about it. Why not? If he could wave some mockingly in that arrogant dick's face then he would take it. That and this was a good step towards realizing his dream. "You know what? I'll take it."

"That's my boy!" Bernie beamed. Ryan was about to take the ticket when he grabbed it back. "Hey, pay up first. Cash, small bills preferably."

"Right, the money…" Ryan said, thinking quickly. "How about I meet you at the warehouse at eleven or something. I'll have the cash to pay you then."

"All right," Bernie said, although he looked disappointed. "I'm putting my trust in you, kid, so you better fuckin' show up."

As the two of them parted ways, Ryan quickly ran his options through his head. Maybe he could get a small advance in his salary at the gas station – he had been due for a raise anyway. Feeling in good spirits, he rushed off and was soon backing his busted old Toyota Corolla out of the parking lot and zooming off down the road.

»»»

"I've been WHAT?"

Brady, his boss, or former boss in this case, merely glared at him like he would have liked to feed the younger man to lions. "You heard me. You're FIRED. Sacked, canned, whatever you want to call it. You missed your shift last night, Masters. That's the third time in the past five months. I had to fill in for you, and when I got home after it I found out my wife walked out on me and took my dog with her! I lost two bitches in one night!"

"Uh… that sucks," Ryan could think of nothing else to say.

"You think that's bad? A crackwhore broke into my house an hour later, hit me over the head with a broken baseball bat, stole my mother's prized figurine of a man in swimming trunks, and when I came to and called the cops, they thought I was the one who was high and rummaged through my house looking for drugs!"

"Okay, that is bad…"

"And in the morning, instead of going to the doctor to have this lump on my head examined, I have to come over here and supervise that idiot new trainee who hasn't done a thing but snap gum and flirt with customers! And she's your replacement!"

"Yeah, about that, is firing me really necessary? I mean you're obviously stressed and all…"

"Forget it, Masters. I've made my decision and it's final. You stay fired."

Ryan groaned. "Fuck…" he said, as outside his ex-girlfriend passed by arm-in-arm with the junkie who hung around the gas station.

» cont'd

Useless Tidbit: There was nothing particularly interesting to comment about in this chapter.