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Date April 1st 2018 / Time Unknown / Status Not Recording
Location The Wylde Residence – New York City, New York

(Excerpt from Gabriel’s RP: ‘Chapter Seven – Funerals and Farewells…’)

Oh Lucy… You got some ‘splainin to do…

I left you gifts and gifts and gifts and… Nuttin’.

Wassup wit dat?

I came to visit and you weren’t there so I left some of me behind for you to find.

I hope you found it.

I wonder what you did?

Did you change it?

Wait! Did you use it?

Oh… Em… Gee!

What? I’m talking about the picture… You know… For those moments where Maggie doesn’t quite hit the spot.

Oh please… Don’t act like you don’t know what you’re talking about. *Side glance to make sure no-one is looking… aaaaaaand….* Psssst… I saw the drawer.

Hey, now! Don’t be shy. Eden even has one. But don’t tell her I told you. I’m just saying, yours isn’t the first house I’ve snooped around.

But I’m hoping it might be my last… If you know what I’m saying? Right? Right? Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

Oh come on… You can’t still be mad with me. It’s not as fun when someone throws themselves at you.

I enjoy the thrill of the chase… And I’m chasing you Lucy Wylde… I’m chasing you alllllll the way.

Now, if I could be serious for a moment – Ugh…. Actually, nah… This is way more fun. I have a question, if you prefer ladies now, why is it that your drawer is filled with things that look like dicks?

It’s a legitimate question… Or do you just swing both ways? Because… If that’s your bag? I’m totally down… Get it? Down…. Heh.
In all seriousness, should we have a December wedding? The snow would look wonderful against your alabaster skin.

What? I know skin tones. I’m a doctor. It’s nothing to do with the fact that I used to collect skin when I was younger… And no, it wasn’t from my victims…

Or was it?

Wait, what was the question? Oh yes! Decmeber wedding… You, me, central park and around a hundred guests – that’s what I was thinking anyway. You can even keep Maggie as a pet. I’m sure I can have my people find a cage big enough.

Alright fine, I’ll be serious for a moment. How did it feel? When you came home that day and you realised that I’d been inside your life. That I’d touched… Everything. That my shadow had fallen across every surface? How did it feel when I laid rose petals across your floor, when your fondest memories had become those painful memories of you and I? A moment that could have become a life? A life that could have become eternity? Did it sting, like an old wound reopened?

Or did you feel the heat spreading between your thighs at the idea that it was as close to inside you that I could have ever possibly been.

Did you fear what I’d seen? Did you panic at what I could have done? Did you wonder what I’d touched… Smelled… Tasted? Did you wonder what exactly I’d left behind? I have to ask you, Lucy… All of that fear, all of that unknown… Did it burn at your heart to the point that you almost wanted to leave? Did it make your insides clench at the very thought?

Or did it excite you that I could have touched your underwear? That I could have felt your intimate items in the palm of my hand?

Did even ever consider throwing anything away? Or did you hope that it would maintain the connection between us?

I gave you what you’ve always wanted, Lucy – for those few moments I was a part of your life. I was inside you. Heart, body and soul. For those few moments I got to understand just what it would have meant to have been a part of Lucy Wylde… And that won’t ever go away. You know who I am, Lucy… You know what I can do. You remember what it is to be caught up in my world and it’s the only time you’ve ever felt truly… Alive. Although, I appreciate you may have forgotten… You may have chosen to forget. But never mind, we can fix all of that….

Please allow me… To introduce myself.

 

Reading it again and again does nothing to quell the feeling of disgust in the pit of my stomach. Well that and the knowledge that he was here, like he said… among all of my things, touching them, moving them… smelling them…

I drop the paper on the ground beside me, leaning my head back against the bed. Truth be told, I haven’t touched a damn thing in this condo since I came home to find it like this. I’ve barely been here for a month now, staying in hotels and at Maggie’s in between brief visits here and there to grab clothes or check the mail.

And yeah, every time I go in my closet, or I grab something from anywhere.. I do wonder… Was he looking in here? Did he touch this? Did he take something?

It’s kind of hard not to when you feel that every single inch of your privacy has been violated. And that note laying at my side? Only makes it worse. Only makes the feelings that much harder to stomach.

And that’s exactly the reason I haven’t even come back here to clean up.. Because I don’t know if I actually can clean this up. I don’t know if I can actually make this place back into what it was before… him.

I look around the room again, at the remnants of his visit.. On the surface it’s pretty damn hard to miss. The rose petals everywhere, the pictures everywhere… The pictures of a kiss I should have never wanted. A kiss I should have never pined after. And here it is haunting me, courting me, stalking me like I wished it would all those months ago.

To say I feel like a damned fool would be an understatement. To say I’m excited by all of this? Ridiculous. I know he’s trying to get under my skin, I know he’s trying to fuck up everything I’ve got going for me… Except I guess he also knows that that’s not one hundred percent true right now anyway.

He saw the papers. He fucking organized them for Christs sake. He knows what’s going on with my father, even more intimately so than what Maggie does… But then again, I guess that’s not true either.

I don’t even know what is true anymore.

It’s all like a bad memory that won’t go away.

 

Pause II
Rewind <<

Date March 15th 2018 / Time 11:11AM / Status Not Recording
Location The Paper Street Tattoo Company – Inwood, New York

(Continuation from Maggie’s RP: ML – 003 – “Collateral Consequences”)

Bradley and I have been sitting here for over an hour, worrying and wondering what in the hell Maggie was up to. She’d summoned us both here, wanting us here for whatever reason and yet, she was nowhere to be found.

I called. I texted. All of which were ignored.

None of the other girls knew where she’d went, and that was both unnerving and scary. Not that I don’t trust her. I trust her with my life. But it’s not like her to do something like this. It’s not like her to be off of everyone’s radar like this.

If I don’t know, it’s almost a guarantee that someone else will know.

And while I don’t like him, Bradley Dyne seems to always know where she’s at on any given day. I mean, he is her manager after all. So for him to be as clueless as me, that raises a huge red flag for me.

I lean forward in the chair, catching Bradley’s attention as I pull my phone out of my pocket.

“I guess I’ll try again…”

I unlock the phone and bring her number back up on the screen as the front door of the shop opens. I look up to see Maggie and Rosalyn walking in with big grins on their faces.

Both Bradley and I jump out of our seats and approach the girls, and I can’t really say that either of us are nearly as thrilled as they seem to be. Maggie turns her attention away from Rosalyn and wraps her arms around me in a tight hug.

“Where were you?”

I ask, pulling away from her. I can’t just let it go. I guess that seems kind of cold, but something inside me tells me that Maggie knew exactly what she was doing by bringing Bradley and I here to the shop while she ran off wherever she was.. To do whatever in the hell it was that she was doing.

But then something catches my eye. Maggie steps backwards, and I notice that her long silver hair is covering the side of her face in such a way that makes it seem like she’s hiding something.

I step towards her once again, reaching out and brushing her hair out of her face – revealing a deep bruise on her cheek.

“And where did you get that?”

Bradley steps in beside me, his arms crossed over his chest. I glance over at him and I see his eyes narrowed in on Maggie. I don’t know whether to be angry, or worried at this point but I turn my attention back to my girlfriend, hoping that she’s got some kind of explanation for what she’s been up to this morning.

“It’s a long story-”

She finally responds. Every impulse in my body is telling me to calm down, but I can’t. I can’t control the feeling in the pit of my stomach, not since Gabriel broke into my condo, not since my girlfriend ran off and got beat up for some unknown reason… not since I’ve got this court date looming over my fucking head like a God damned rain cloud.

She knows this… So why add to it?

“Long enough to keep us here worrying about you for over an hour?”

“Why’d you call us here anyway?”

She bites her bottom lip and glances over at Rosalyn, who shrugs her shoulders in response.

“I just needed you two to be in the same place.. So I could–”

“So you could what?”

I interrupt, my patience growing thinner by the second. She flashes her bright green eyes up at me, the irritation on her face showing through as she sighs.

“Meet with your father.”

Her words fly from her lips so effortlessly, and they fly across the space between us and they slap me across my face so hard that I nearly fall to the floor. I can’t.. Did she really just say what I thought she did?

“You.. You what?”

I can see Bradley shake his head from beside me as he turns and grabs his jacket from the chair that he was sitting on. Maggie turns her attention to her manager as well as he puts his jacket on and buttons it.

“I can see that this doesn’t involve me… So if you’ll excuse me, I do have other clients to see today.”

He clenches his jaw and leaves the store, his phone in his hand before the door even closes behind him. I watch him for a second before turning my attention back down to Maggie, my mind still not truly comprehending what I just heard.

“Listen, I texted him from your phone and got him to meet me.. I figured if I could get him to sit down with me long enough to talk, that perhaps he might start to see things – a little bit – my way. For a change.”

I turn away, my fists clenching so hard that I can feel the blood leaving them. I can feel the other six or eight sets of eyes inside the shop on me, wondering what I’m about to do I suppose. Hell, I don’t even know what I’m going to do… She went behind my back, used my phone to contact my father and set up a fucking meet and greet.

After I’d asked her explicitly not to.

“And I assume he gave you that.”

“He didn’t exactly like what I had to say.. But we got what we needed, right Rosalyn?”

I don’t hear a response from Rosalyn, but as I turn around I see a smug smirk on the redheads face, and an equal, if not more satisfied look on Maggie’s. But both women’s grins fall off as soon as they see that I’m staring at them again.

“I only did it for you… I wanted to expose him for what he really is so that–”

“Because I can’t do it myself? Right?”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying Luce… But I think with the video we got today, he won’t have a leg to stand on in cour–”

I put my hand up, stopping her mid sentence as I move back into the heart of the shop and grab my own jacket, not even bothering to put it on as I walk towards the entrance to the shop. Suddenly I feel like I’d be better off back in my condo where someone has trifled through all my things than here…

“Lucy..”

She says softly, pleadingly as I get to the door.

“Come on… “

“No!”

I say, raising my voice as I turn around to face her again.

“You had no right! You just don’t fucking get it! I asked you to stay out of it.. I asked you to leave it alone! You think you’ve fixed everything like the fucking hero but all you’ve done is put yourself right in his cross-hairs. And next time it won’t just be a fucking bruise on your cheek..”

“I can–”

“You can what? Take my phone again? Trick him again? Whatever Maggie… I’m out of here.”

I hear her say something else, but I ignore it and push my way back out into the frigid air, shivering as I cross my arms over my chest and begin the long walk back to my condo.

 

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Date April 1st 2018 / Time Unknown / Status Not Recording
Location The Wylde Residence – New York City, New York

Sure, I’ve gotten over it.. Mostly. But I haven’t forgotten and I’m still not happy with what she did. I also know that my father isn’t going to let her get off with that simple bruise.. I know he’s going to come at her again and I know that I might not be there to save her when that time comes.

It scares the shit out of me.

“Redecorating, eh?”

A strange voice pulls me from my thoughts, and I’m on my feet, fists bared only to see Rogan MacLean standing in the doorway to my bedroom. Instantly my muscles relax and I move to sit down on the bed, but I stop myself – remembering that Gabriel had left more presents on there too.. In the form of thorny stems from all those rose petals scattered around the place.

“Jesus Christ, Rogan… You can’t just- Wait, how in the fuck did you get in here?”

“Ye left the door open. I called out for ye when I came in, but I guess ye were reminiscing about a time when your place didn’t look like, well, this.”

He motions around him at all the now deceased rose petals everywhere. Brown and dried up, it made the place look like a graveyard for love or some cheesy shit like that.

“Yeah, well we can thank our old friend for the ‘gifts’ as he so lovingly calls them. Left me some fond memories too…”

I take a few steps towards the nightstand where I grab one of the heavy black picture frames holding yet another picture of he and I kissing and show Rogan who grimaces and waves it away.

“Yeah, I saw a lot more of them on the way up here. Trying to tell ya something, is he?”

I shake my head and toss the frame onto the bed.

“I’m sure he’s trying to tell me a lot of somethings. But whatever. What brings you to my neck of the woods?”

He takes another quick glance around the room before I motion him out of the room. As he begins speaking, I grab the note from the floor and lay it on top of the discarded picture frame, figuring that I’ll return to it later… If I’m in the mood for more self hatred.

“Aye. I guess it does look kind of odd that I’m here, doesn’t it? I just wanted to check in on ya and I stopped by Maggie’s shop and she said ya might be here.”

I follow him down the steps and into the living room before I respond.

“Well thanks. Not sure why I needed to be checked on, but I appreciate it.”

“Didn’t expect ta see the place in such… discord, specially since all that happened over a month ago.”

I nod my head.

“Yeah, I rushed home after we left Jase’s complex to see what in the hell he did… Then I couldn’t bring myself to begin to clean it up. Something about feeling violated… Yeah.”

I kick some of the dried up rose petals out from under my feet, the gritty, crunching sound sending chills down my spine. I shake my head and move towards the kitchen, wondering if I’ve got anything in the fridge worth trying to consume.. Probably not.

“Gabriel has that effect on people.”

I scoff and laugh.

“You’re telling me.”

“Ye could just get someone in here ta do it for you… That way you don’t have to deal with it.”

I open the fridge and instantly I’m hit with the foul smell of spoiled food. I gag and close the door, turning my back to it as I face Rogan, suddenly feeling embarrassed over the sad state of my life – considering I always act like the poster child of being ‘okay’.

I’m so obviously not okay…

“Yeah, I’d rather not have anymore strange people in my condo, moving shit and snooping where they don’t belong.”

I sigh and run my hands through my hair.. It’s too much sometimes.

He claps his hands together and steps forward, motioning me towards the door.

“How about I take ye for a drink an we talk?”

“I don’t know if you want to know what’s going on inside this head…”

“You’d be surprised.”

 

Pause II
Rewind <<

Date March 28th 2018 / Time Unknown / Status Not Recording
Location En Route from The Lee Residence to New York City, New York

Hot tears stream down my face as I throw my car from one lane to another, weaving ignorantly through traffic. I honestly don’t think I could care any less right now about myself, or anyone else on the road.

JC needed to see me, needed to talk to me and I figured, why not just go up there today? Why not go see him and talk about whatever is so important.

We haven’t really talked anyway since that day I popped by the house to see him, scared that my father had seen us outside him home on that fateful morning.

Little did I realize that our talk today pertained to that. Well, mostly.

I wipe my face off, the car veers into the next lane over but I catch it before I hit the car next to me.

First Maggie, now Joe.

Apparently I’m not meant to be close to anyone. Apparently I’m supposed to be alone.

That’s fine.

Joe doesn’t have to worry about me anymore. He never has to worry about me being anything to him ever again.

 

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Date April 1st 2018 / Time Unknown / Status Not Recording
Location 169 Bar – New York City, New York

“What did he need ta talk to ye about?”

He asks as he takes a drink and sits it down in front of him. I don’t respond right away, opting to down half of my own drink before looking up at him and shaking my head.

“I don’t really want to talk about it.”

He shrugs.

“Understandable. Ye think he’ll come to his senses?”

“Don’t really care if he does.”

I don’t.

“The point is, you know… first Maggie, then Joe… Not to mention Gabriel’s bullshit and… and my parents.. I’m at my fucking wits end.”

“Didn’t ye say the court date was soon?”

“Continuance.”

I say, the disdain dripping from my lips like the little bit of whiskey that found it’s way out of my mouth and onto my lip. I wipe my mouth and shake my head for effect. As if the original court date wasn’t enough of a thorn in my side – pun not intended… but now I have to wait even longer. Now I have to wait even longer for this to be over.

“I should have expected it. Honestly.”

“Your father sounds like a real piece of work.”

“You don’t even know the half of it. But don’t you go behind my back to find out, okay?”

He chuckles and takes another drink.

“Aye. Gotcha. But what about the video Maggie got?”

I roll my eyes.

“Inadmissible. It was obtained through illegal means and my lawyer wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole.. So all of that was for nothing too.”

And that gets my goat too. Maggie went and did all that behind my back, got herself a nice new target on her back and what did we get from it? Jack fucking shit.

“Damn.”

“Yeah, damn.”

Silence settles between he and I as we both finish our drinks and take to looking out at the other patrons of this establishment. If I didn’t already feel like a hopeless cause, then I’d definitely feel like one now. Taking a moment to look across at Rogan, I realize how stupid I really do look.

“Listen, I’m sorry this turned into Lucy’s problem hour… I–”

“Maybe Jase could help us with this.. Problem.”

My eyebrows raise in question.

“What do you mean? If I don’t want my girlfriend or Joe to be involved, what makes you think–”

“I’m just saying.. He’s got that entire compound at his disposal… Maybe he’ll have an idea.. Or two.  Besides, maybe yer friends have a point, Lucy.”

My eyebrows raise further.  I don’t need to hear this right now.  Don’t need to hear another person telling me that I should give in and accept help for this ‘problem’.  It’s my fault.  My problem and I don’t want anyone else I care about to be involved.

“What? That I should take their help?  That I should let everyone else handle my fucked up life because I so obviously can’t?”

He stops and ponders for a moment, finally looking up into my eyes with a serious grin.. If that’s even possible.

“That’s exactly what I’m sayin.”

 

Let’s play a game, shall we?

I ask a question, and you answer it. Sound fun? No. Oh well.

How many times in the past few months have I had the distinct pleasure of going up against The Vain one, Alan Wallace? How many times in the past few months have I had the privilege of going up against Jessica Mathis?

If your answer is ‘more than once’, you might be right. But if you more creatively answered, ‘Less times than your partner, Rogan MacLean’… Ding ding ding! You’re a smart cookie. Nice work.

While this might be a repeat of past matches, and there is no doubt that we’re going to steal the show… Let’s just call a spade a spade here, okay? We’ve been here, done this and I don’t know what more us four can do to one another before they stop putting us into the ring together.

Yeah, Alan beat me for my Cross-Hemisphere championship. Nice job losing it to Travis Pierce though, Alan. And yeah, Rogan, Tweeder and I sent Vain, Mathis and Pierce Inc. out of the Lord of Trios tournament – So I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say that this is as close to a ‘tie breaker’ as we’re going to get.

Maybe not, but hear me out.

Mathis, you’ve proven yourself here in UGWC. You’re definitely someone to watch. I’m sure a lot of other people.. Well besides anyone in the court, are saying that too. I think it’s nice that you and Alan are getting along so well. It’s sweet, really.

It’s nice that two people don’t let a title get between them. I’ve been in that position once or twice. But your record against me isn’t very good, is it Jessica? I’m not trying to rub salt in the wound, I’m just stating facts. Hell, you did just beat Eden Morgan at the last Synergy so I guess crazier things have happened.

Then again, I’m better than Eden so there’s another fact for you.

And Alan? Maybe someday we’ll get our one on one rematch. Until then, I’ll just keep fucking your world up in tag team action so you’re prepared for when I dominate you one on one.

I don’t really know what else I can say to you, Alan. You’re a great wrestler. You’re a great champion and I honestly respect you. I respect both of you and what you bring to UGWC. You bring way more competitiveness and positive vibes to this place than some other people that I won’t name.

Bordy. Gabriel. Eden. Just to name a few.

Shit.

I named names. Damn. Ooops?

Anyway. I look forward to Monday. I look forward to proving that Rogan and I are a great team just like you’re looking forward to cementing yourselves as a team. So I guess that’s it. Rogan and I will see you two on Monday and may the best team win.

 

OOC: Maggie and Rogan used with permission!