I went to my room to get ready for class I was trying to push nerves out of my mind because I haven't performed in front of a camera but I needed to get used to this if I wanted to get anywhere in this industry because I needed to perform in front of groups of people, regardless if it was five people to maybes hundreds depending on the promotion and how far I got with this business and I was always dreaming far into my career and making it far into this industry, I wanted to make a name for myself in this business much like both Jeff and Matt. I changed and slid on my tennis shoes as I grabbed my boots for wrestling. I walked out to the living room seeing Jeff playing with the camcorder bag as I sat on the arm of the couch.
"Would it affect me any if I wasn't wearing ring attire tonight?" I asked.
"I don't see why not…you have any thoughts on what you want your ring attire to be? You need to do promo shots as well, I know a really good photographer and I can hook you up with a ring attire because I know a good seamstress that will do me a favor or two." Jeff spoke with his back to me.
"I think I would like that…how did you know how to do all of this since you and your brother didn't really have anyone to help you?" I asked curiously.
"We just thought about things logically, did a lot of networking…" Jeff said honestly as he turned to look at me, "I am glad that I had made it this far in my career where I could help others like yourself get to where they want to get and expand my knowledge." Jeff said smiling.
"Well thank you for that…it's really helpful…especially right about now." I said with a smile and chuckle, "Thank you Jeff…for all this hospitality…" I said as I was trying not to cry but I couldn't do that right about now.
"You're welcome…" Jeff said smiling as he walked over giving me a big hug, "You know you don't have to be strong all the time, you can cry…" Jeff whispered as I chuckled as he broke the hug as I wiped at my eyes.
"You noticed that." I said chuckling again, but this time it was out of nerves.
"Yeah..." He said smiling as he went back to doing what he was doing before he led me to the wrestling training facility as I was trying to toughen back up because I had to go back to being strong like I always was. I hated that Jeff said it was okay to cry and that I didn't have to be strong all the time, if I wasn't strong who would be strong for me? I knew that Jeff was trying to be strong for me and wanted to be there for me so I could be weaker and let someone else be strong for me but I couldn't let that happen. I was an independent woman for so long that it is hard to adjust, it's hard letting myself depend on him even though I've let him do it thus far but it's been a day or two and I hate every minute of it but what other options do I have? I stepped into the training facility behind the set of brothers, I sat in one of the foldable chairs slipping on my wrestling boots before I slid into the ring doing a few additional warm ups by myself as I could hear Matt and Jeff whispering, well talking amongst themselves but to me it made me feel like they were whispering and talking about me making me self-conscious so I just continued focusing on my warm-ups. I needed to focus on my wrestling, not the politics, concerns or if anyone hated me but Matt and Jeff were my trainers, so they didn't hate me I had hoped but their concerns were probably for the best and to help me out in the end. I walked to the ropes closest to them sitting down so my legs slid out from under the bottom rope and I leant against the middle rope watching the two men as I was trying to catch my breath. I knew I should really roll out to get some water to keep hydrated before rest of the class begins to show up but I felt really uncomfortable with them chatting seeing Jeff holding the camera knowing that they were viewing over the promos that I had done earlier in the day. I finally let out a sigh rolling out of the ring going over to get a drink of water from the bottle I had brought with me when another student arrived. I pulled myself up onto the apron to watch as the other student began to pull on his boots and climbed onto the apron with me as I climbed into the ring with him as I went through the warm-ups again with him before we had came to an end after we had finished the last warm-up that was normal for us.
"What do you want us to do until rest of the students arrived?" The other guy asked as he leant against the ropes beside me as Matt smirked.
"You can guys either wrestle each other or you guys can work with each other to build characters or promo work." Matt said as I looked to the guy next to me slightly smirking.
"I'm okay with either so bring it on big boy." I said chuckling and cockily as the guy next to me.
"You really want to take this on?" He asked as I nodded.
"Let's do this." I said as I began to back up to take my own corner as I stared him down as he placed himself across from me as we began to walk around the ring staring each other down whilst we do this. When I felt like he gave me the visual cue to run in, I did just that only for him to do the same when we locked up and beginning to call the match on the fly whilst more and more people showed up for class as we just kept on going and going in our match since neither of us wanted to lose for different reasons.
"Can you guys wrap it up already?" Jeff teased as we both stopped mid-move looking at them as we both smiled and stuck our hands out.
"Truce." I said as he nodded and repeated it to me as we slid out to drink some water as we let the other warm up and catch up to us as we weren't sure how the match looked. I was one of the two that weren't in the ring when Matt and Jeff asked for all of our attentions, I crossed my arms over my chest as I looked at them unsure what they wanted to announce or what they were going to have us do tonight in class.
"Ladies and gents, tonight's class we will be splitting up into pairs and putting together matches. When you are not performing a match, you will be working with either your partner putting the match together or with Jeff and I working on your promos and/or character building. I know this sounds weird, you all think that this sounds stupid and want to learn something tonight, laddy laddy da but you will be learning something and that is how to construct a match and character building which are two of the most hardest concepts for you to learn, so consider this lesson one and we will pick up with more lessons in the future and think this will be an excellent time to put together all things you have learned thus far in your training and really amplify what you excel at and learning what you need more work on. Like Tyler, you sir I know you need more work and practice on those hip tosses." Matt said calling out Tyler as we all looked or glanced at him, I felt bad for him being singled out by Matt, but Matt didn't mean it to come out rudely but he was trying to help him out because if one thing is weakly executed or you are weak at, it can bury you and can be noticed. I could tell that Tyler was blushing and was nervously scratching at the back of his neck as I bit at my bottom lip feeling bad for him. "So tonight I am going to pair you guys up with another student in which you well work together to build the heel and face in the match, the character you will be portraying in that time frame so when you make your entrance we can get the full on what or who you are. Then perform the match, we will be able to tell and point out what the flaws are and be able to clarify what each of you need more work on."
"And what I want, before the match I want the ref, who would be one of us two, will do a fake interview and we will ask only one or two questions but that is your chance to do your promo. I want the heel to go first since majority of the time the heel is the one that will end up losing then I want the face to do a promo at the end of the match with the backstage correspondence will be the other one of us." Jeff explained knowing that was Jeff idea to help build up my promo work and to help me to perform in front of an audience.
"We will be recording this so that way we could hook this up to the television over there so everyone can comment on what they had noticed while watching the match except those that are being critiqued." Matt continued to explain as I began to look over who was all in class tonight to see who I could be paired with and I knew that I would be put with Heather only because she was the only other girl in the class.
"Now I look to you two girls, since it is pretty obvious that we would want to pair you two together but would you guys want to be put against a guy and are the guys okay working with the girls on this project? I just want to say I don't care because you may or may not compete in inter-gender matches on the independent circuit where you will face a woman or man." Jeff spoke as I began to feel myself blush that Jeff was going on about this because I honestly didn't care which way because let me at Heather because she was always giggling and smiling with her bouncing curls that were obviously not natural and her low cut shirts.
"I don't mind at all, they are just like one of us…" Another student spoke smiling and I liked to be included in these men sports. I was a girl which was not prominent in this sport so I was trying to be manly to be with or like the guys.
"Bring it on, let's see what the ladies have to offer against us men." Tyler said as I smiled as he reached forward slightly pushing at my shoulder.
"I for one don't want to wrestle the men, they are much stronger than me and could hurt me." Heather said.
"Then why did you even enroll in wrestling? Don't you understand we get paid to get hurt?" I retorted angrily knowing it came off snobbish and rude.
"True but I think it's unfair to go against the men, it should be woman versus woman and man versus man." Heather said as I let out a deep sigh before taking a deep breath trying so hard to not argue with her. I knew that everyone could tell I was getting frustrated with her as the guy next to me nudged me to get my attention before he leant over to whisper into my ear to not worry about her and how him and I had put on a hell of a match before class started.
"Well before we have this gigantic debate that could last the whole session, I guess it will be Heather and April together." Matt said as he began teaming up the men together as I just glared across the ring at Heather trying to think of the multiple things she isn't good at as to wrestling and I couldn't wait to see this promo she was about to badly give.