Bronwen O’Connor
"Necrosis of the Bride"
 

They were still sitting in the Burger Boy, listening to the muzak drone dully in the background. Some mothers were there with their girlfriends and a brood of children running amok, but for some reason, it still seemed quiet. The drone of the coolers in the kitchen leaked out into the eating area, and Jagger still rested his back on the Monte Carlo, a stupid grin on his face, sunglasses on as he smoked a cigarette, waiting.

“Do you think,” Shane said with a long pause, “that Jagger got messed up with Till?”

“I sure as hell hope not,” Bron whispered, staring out the window intently, her fists clenching and unclenching.  “But it would certainly be appropriate.”

They watched as Jagger stretched and took off his jacket. Impossibly white skin glared in the sun under a wife beater, only emphasized by the black tribal tattoos that traveled the length of his biceps and across his back.

“He used to be part of an Aryan pride group in Belfast,” Bronwen muttered, watching the tell-tale symbol ripple across the back of his neck under his black shaggy hair. “He was part of a squad that ambushed three British soldiers at an army base outside of the city a month ago. They were three young lads, just getting ready to ship out to Afghanistan,” she shrugged.

“So they order a pizza, and go to meet it at the gate of the base,” she continues lowly. “The squad ambushes them, kills all three, and seriously injures the pizza delivery boy. I read this in the paper yesterday, and you know what a tell of Jagger’s is?” 

“What?” Shane grunts, eyeing up the unwelcome intruder who is now circling the Challenger in a boredom-passing inspection, waiting for his quarry to come out and confront him.

“He shoots the spinal columns of the three soldiers,” Bronwen starts, “and rips their fucking heads off. The MPs come to tell them to get ready to get on the shuttle to go to the airport, and they find these three boys’ heads mounted on their guns outside the gate.”

Shane’s mouth opens a little and he looks back out at Jagger, who is now jumping on the back bumper of the Challenger, laughing and smoking his cigarette as the car creaks up and down.

“They put a note next to the decapitated bodies,” Bronwen adds, “that says they’re the ‘real’ new IRA--  Racist to the core, and just violent. They don’t even know what IRA stands for; they just want to kill British Soldiers. Fuck, it’s 2009 for fuckssakes…” she muses.

Jagger is now on the roof of the Challenger, making obscene gestures and pointing towards them as he gesticulates his hips in a thrusting motion. Shane is visibly maddening by the second as he watches the man’s boots skip and slide across the paint job.

“The audacity,” he growls.  As Jagger turns around to waggle his bum tantalizingly, Bronwen spots what she’s been looking for sticking out of the back of his black cargos—the shiny hilt of that huge Magnum that had followed Jagger through his exploits.

Bronwen stood up and shrugged off Shane’s arm that shot up to prevent her from leaving.

“I’m doing this now,” she said. “I should have done it 2 years ago when I had the fucking chance.”

She strode out the door, gun drawn and leveled at Jagger, his back still turned to her as he lazily descended from the roof of the Challenger down the windshield.  A dent appeared where he slammed his foot down on the hood before he jumped off onto the pavement. 

She fired the gun once and nailed him in the calf, spinning him around to look at her face twisted in horrible anger.  She got off another round and pegged him in the shoulder, and he keeled a little and slammed into the asphalt, reaching for his gun. He fired once and missed and by the time he went to aim again, her foot was on his neck pinning him down and pulling the gun out of his bad hand.

“What are you doing?” she hissed. “Why are you here?”

“I came to save you,” he moaned, “and this is how you repay me?”

“Save me from what?” she spat, pushing down a little with her foot.

“Save you from that,” he said with a smile, nodding towards Shane as he angrily lumbered across the parking lot.

“I love you more than that stupid American lout will. He’s white trash, and you deserve better,” Jagger gurgled, trying to push his fingers under the tread of her boot.

“ Jag, you’re so damn fucked up,” Bronwen sighed, lifting her foot and watching the blood trickle down his arm, soaking his thin wife beater in a blossom of crimson.

Shane came up beside her and stared down at Jagger for a long while as he watched Bron light a smoke.

“Get up, you piece of shit,” she snarled to Jagger. She could see he hadn’t anticipated her ruthless actions, and that he was winded and trying to evaluate the situation as they both stood over him.

Jagger started laughing and rolled onto his stomach, pushing himself up slowly, one hand on his knee and one hand on the Challenger as he got to his feet. A bloody handprint marked the hood as he let it go and turned to face them.  He slouched a little on his lean frame and inspected the bullet wound in his shoulder a little with a disdainful expression before he met their eyes with his.  Bronwen was puzzled, as his eyes glowed with a fierce white hot expression despite his calm expression. She glimpsed the look on Shane’s face and saw he was unmoved.

“I don’t think ye know how much trouble you’re in mate,” Jagger drawled towards Shane as he lifted his bloody calf up and flexed it a few times before putting it down with weight on it. Blood gushed and visibly soaked his pants further, but she saw no wince of pain on his face.

Bronwen reached out and backhanded him, pressing his head against the Challenger as she cracked his face with a few more punches.

“Stop fucking around, and tell me what you want Jagger,” she said threateningly. Jagger’s hands reached up and grabbed onto her forearms as she pushed down on his forehead with her palm.

“I want….” He gurgled, through his bleeding lips, “to see him fuck you… up. I want to see him end your life…I want to see….you die.”  She shoved his head away, and it bounced off the car again as she pulled away from him.

“He doesn’t love you though,” Jagger laughed, his eyes rolling a little weirdly, “not like I do.  I know everything you’ve been doing since we were together, everywhere you’ve been, who you’ve been screwing around with,” he spat, “I even know when you change your goddamn toothpaste brand. This though, Clemmens, he’s a disgrace. When he came in, I knew you’d have to die. You were free to live your life how I wanted, but Clemmens will sully you. I can’t have that now, can I? Not on this conscience.” 

He jerked two thumbs towards his head as he crouched a little and sidled towards Shane, hands out and flexing, a snake about to strike.

“Who are you talking about?” Bronwen snapped. Her face was red hot, and her ears were roaring with what Jagger was insanely spouting out. She heard sirens rising up in the distance and this only inflamed her rage further. 

Shane backed off from Jagger a little, and Bronwen decisively stepped into take Jagger down, pinning him to the pavement.  His body bucked powerfully underneath her in resistance as she reached out of the full pin to grab his head with her hands, slamming it hard on the pavement. She felt a crunch in the blow, and Jagger’s body went a little slacker, though he still pushed against her, writhing strongly against defeat.

Jagger came to quickly in her grip, and she watched his eyes flutter before fully opening to stare at her.

“You’re dead,” he mouthed, suddenly pulling out his hand from under him and jamming a syringe into her thigh.

“What the hell?” Bronwen panted, looking down at her leg and back up at Jagger who was coughing up blood in a fit of laughter. Shane moved in to pull her off of him, pull the syringe out of her, but it was too late to stop her from lifting Jagger’s head up as far as she could with an anguished cry. With a noise that echoed across the quiet parking lot in the fading light, she brought his head back down with a sickening crack.

Bronwen lifted herself to her feet, felt her legs burning and rubbery and reached for Shane, grabbing his arm and holding herself up. Her breathing had turned erratic, and as he watched her, her lips turned blue, her skin whitening impossibly.

“Baby,” she said, struggling to get coherent words out as the mysterious injection continued to strengthen its hold, “for the record, I love you. I don’t know what this shit is,” she coughed and he could see her chest spasm, “but you gotta know that the reason I’ve been so difficult and awful lately, is because…”

“Shh,” he murmured, pulling her closer to him and towards the car. He sat her down in the Challenger’s passenger seat, but she pulled him close before he could close the door.

“I didn’t think I was good enough for ye,” she mumbled. “I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to show ye that I loved ye enough. That some other bitch would.”

He just looked at her as her features turned even grayer before she managed to speak again, “I don’t know what I’d do without you. I may not say it often, but every time I do, it fucking counts. Every moment with you, always fucking counts.”

“Baby, we need to go to the hospital, ok? You’ve been poisoned,” Shane said in dismay, trying to fight the urge to stomp the shit out of what was left of Jagger’s corpse as he pushed it away from the tires of the car on his way to the driver’s side. The Challenger roared to life and squealed out of the parking lot, a curl of rubber outlining Jagger’s body as it lay out aghast in death.

The silence of the empty parking lot is deafening. The huge Burger Boy sign creaks gently as a breeze kicks up and a gentle rain starts to fall. A dark figure can be seen walking through the parking lot, imposing and surprisingly agile despite the huge powerful build.  The figure stops next to Jagger’s corpse and pauses, lighting up a cigar with the flare of a match that winks out after a second. A long arm reaches down and grabs Jagger’s hand.

“Get up,” a deep voice commands, “it has started.”

Jagger remains still and minutes pass where the tall figure drops Jagger’s hand and meditatively smokes the cigar. After a while, Jagger’s body stirs, his limbs and face sodden from the rain. He slowly makes his way to his feet and sways uneasily until Till places a hand on his neck.

“You’ve done well.”

The two figures get into the Monte Carlo, and the dark car rumbles throatily to life, brake lights glowing an eerie blue as the car pulls smoothly out onto the highway. 

So it is the honorable Seth Dryden I face this week, as well as the much more dishonorable Rayn, the acidic reflux. Well hells bells, I can hardly wait. I’m excited, I’ll admit it. It’s been too long since the last show, the last graceful spill of blood upon the ring. I’m sure you read the bylines at least… but who knows? It is far too incredulous a thought for me to believe that either of you would be pre-occupied outside of yourselves. In fact, I am certain that for the next few days, I will be hearing the same repeated accolades from both of you. Who you’ve defeated. Titles you’ve won. Years in the industry. I realize I rail against this a lot, so here, new tactic:

Who do you think you could be defeated by? What are the qualities of those you’ve been defeated by in the past? Were they faster than you? Quicker? Smarter? Deadlier? Less inhibited in the ring, or more gloriously violent? I’m genuinely interested in these answers from both of you. I do think it takes a better opponent to win a match, but I wish to call into question what does make us better opponents? One thing, it is certain, is a certain amount of reflection and improvement.

It takes a big man to win a match, but it takes an even bigger man to confront his mistakes and learn from them. I’m interested to know which of these you both fall under.  

While I am no man, something I expect both of you to profoundly fester over in your thoughts about me in anticipation of this match, I assure you that every single mistake I have made in my career, I have steadfastly learned from. I will come back stronger, faster, smarter after every blow, kick, punch, and drawn blood, every time, sometimes quicker than you will come back from what I dole out in return. If there was ever something that would build any kind of reputation around myself and my growing career, it would be my ferocious tenacity in the ring.

You ever hear stories about dogs that rip children apart? It seems so unfathomable doesn’t it? In one moment, the pit bull happily licks its owner’s face, but in the next, it is ripping the limbs off the screaming child in the next room, blood on the curtains, soaking in the rug.  A shocking turn in behavior. Unpredictable. Were the master to be the person inclined to jump into the fray, ripping the child and what remained of it away from the vice-like grip of the dog’s jaws as it shook the child’s neck like a toy, the dog would turn on its master, too enamoured of the scent of blood and destruction, too sunk in the stink of instinct, to turn away--to ever lick its master once again—until the act was done.

 A beast, though traveling under the ruse of domestic pet, is still a beast underneath it all. A killer such as myself, going through this fed with the ruse of wrestler and other ideas of social fixation fluttering about, is still a killer underneath it all.  

Do be careful Seth, the bitch has teeth.  

In the hospital, under the harsh lights of a dirty noisy emergency room, Bronwen dies surrounded by a throng of baffled nurses and doctors on a metal table loosely obscured by a curtain. After two minutes of intensive charge, she Is brought back from cardiac failure, now resting peacefully in a coma rather than the composed nature of death.

Shane is in a chair next to her hospital bed, sleeping with his head next to her hip, her hand icy cold next to his cheek. The IV is a clashing intruder on her arm, the crude gauze and tape a harsh contrast to the dark and vibrant colors of the tattoos that cover both arms. She’s on oxygen, and the heart monitor is a slow but steady beeping sound in the distance of her unconsciousness. 

Bronwen’ s body lay still, but her mind buzzed with frenetic dreamscapes.  In one moment, she was lying in Shane’s arms, staring at a mole nestled in his shoulder blade as he slept, memorizing the lines in his face and curvature of his arms as he slept, his warm breathe soft against her ear. As she watches his chest rise, she notices a drop in temperature. His skin begins to cool, and his grip begins to tighten around her.  His skin turns icy, sucking the warmth out of her as his grip tightens around her. Her ribs squeeze together and she can feel herself losing breath as Shane’s arms wrap around her tighter and tighter. She struggles to free herself, clawing at his grip, notices his skin has turned deathly white.

A deep hollow laughter reverberates in her mind and suddenly she is cold, naked and suffocating whilst staring into Till Rammstein’s face.

“Did you miss me?” he murmured, kissing her on the cheek with frigid lips. “It’s been so long since I found you near death in the gutter, my little beacon of beautiful violence.”

She recoils from his grip in horror.

“What do you want? Why are you here?”

Where did you go? Her mind screamed. After she’d left Ireland for the US, she thought he’d meet her there, her new mentor, frightening as hell, but apparently capable of showing a small light of kindness to her in that time.

“You were much more innocent then, “he murmured, “not nearly as disturbingly cruel as you are now. You truly have become a wicked little cunt in the ring, just as I foresaw.  I knew your significance the moment I laid eyes on you.”

She stared at him and felt feverish as she beheld his horrible smile.  He caressed her cheek.

“What do ye want from me?” She whispered.

 “Till,” Shane said calmly, watching Bronwen twitch and shudder in her sleep, her eyes moving rapidly under her fluttering translucent eyelids.  Her hands rose to her throat, and dropped just as quickly, her fists clenching and unclenching.

“Fuck.”

“You haven’t realized it yet?” Till replies smoothly, his voice a mellifluous amber sound that searches her skull for an entrance, a vulnerable spot to corrupt.

“You would know,” she breathed in an even tone, gathering her senses. Snap out of it girl, he’ll rip your mind out of its skull if you let him. Till was akin to the devil…something she hadn’t realized fully until she’d seen Till’s vice grip on Shane’s mortal coil. A wake up call. The man she’d once thought only a dangerous enigma had proven himself otherwise since she’d first met him, in ten fold.

“Explain it to me,” she added, gauging him carefully in her mind’s eye. He didn’t seem nearly as decrepit as he used to. An unholy sheen to his skin, an eery glow behind his eyes, adding to his sharpened youthful features made him appear hellish, a djin in the flesh, Mohawk black as coal, gaze smoldering.

In a dark room in the nether regions of her mind, they sat there naked, staring at each other a while as she waited for him to answer the question.

“I was grooming you,” he said quietly, reaching a hand across and trailing a finger down her cheekbone, tilting her chin up and looking at the slender white of her neck and the wisps of tattoos that flickered there like flames on the edges of an creamy white piece of paper.

“With the greatest damage,” he continued meditatively, “comes the greatest reward.”

She looked at him, puzzled. “I don’t understand.”

“He loves you,” Till said with a small satisfied smile. “Maybe the most out of any woman he’s ever met. Maybe not. You bring out the best in him, that much is true, the strongest Clemmens has arisen out of knowing you. You in turn, compliment him with your own strength. He may simply love you the most out of all of them, because of your absolute denial of death in all the time you’ve known him and beyond.”

“And you?”Bronwen ventured, “You’re not a good Hallmark Cupid, Till. You’re too damn ugly. What’s in this for ye? It’s not just this ‘love is a beautiful thing’ shit. You’re acting like I should still trust ye and everythin’ that comes out of your mouth though.”

“It is pretty inconsequential Bronwen,” Till laughed, “whether or not you should trust me at this point, I assure you.”

“Tell me Till,” she hissed.

“The stronger Clemmens is before he comes back to me….” Till drawled, “the better.”

Bronwen gasps and her eyes fly open as she sits up in the hospital bed. Shane is gone and there is silence except for the beeping of machinery and the moans of the hospital wing. The clock on the wall enmeshed in wire says it is 2:30 in the morning. She whips off the blankets, catches the IV tubes on the corner of one and stops to inspect the two lines running into her arm. With one swift jerk, clear liquid saline and glucose, propelled by a spurt of blood, sprays across the bed. She clamps a tissue over the hole and grabs a rubber band to hold it in place. Grabbing her pants, she unceremoniously pulls up the black faded jeans and does up her decrepit AK shell-belt, yanking on her black teeshirt in the next instant, followed by her black hoody. As she stands up fully, looking for her shoes, she feels a little woozy, and grabs onto the bed for support, feels a fog flush in behind her eyes, but shakes it off.  She throws open the small cupboard and finds her cons, and jams them on, ties them quickly. Wheeling around, she pats her pockets for smokes and a lighter, and is comforted by the familiar bulges, but comes face to face with a nurse, a petite Latino woman look at her with enormous concern.

“Oh senorita,” she says with a small smile, “I’m so glad you’re feeling better. Your young man friend, he’ll be so happy. He’s just gone down to get a coffee, he’ll be back---“ Bronwen glares at her icily, and the woman stops in mid-sentence, watching Bronwen leap onto and over the bed to avoid smacking into her. 

“Don’t tell him you saw me leave,” she says, choking a little with the words as she turns to run out into the darkened hallway.

The nurse hurries into the hallway, calling out to Bronwen frantically, “Senorita, you almost died! You shouldn’t be leaving yet! Your heart! Your heart, it stopped on the table!”

A good 60 feet down the corridor and headed towards the stairs, Bronwen comes to a halt, the  nurses words ringing in her ears.

“Whoa dude,” she whispered, “not cool.” She sways a little and grabs the wall rail reserved for the normally frail and leans heavily against the cool paint smelling of bile and disinfectant.

“Bronwen,” a new voice shouts.

Shane.

“Hey, Bron.  Baby, don’t walk away like this, you’re in real bad shape,” she can hear him calling as she pushes off the wall and shoves open the door to the stairs and passes through into the dimly lit stairwell, pausing only for a second to light a smoke before she runs full tilt down to the ground level.

The night is crisp and pitch black as she bursts out of the exit and into the parking lot. She knows he’s going to be right behind her, knows she’s got to get going if she even has a hope of outrunning him in this piss poor of shape. Her heart is beating itself to death on her ribcage as she rounds the corner, not even started the first part of her pathetic scheme to get away.  She drops to her knees in the grass, smoke still lit and dangling from her fingers, hoody pulled over her head, hair falling into her eyes as she hears the exit open.

“Where are you going,” a voice booms through her mind interrupting, impossibly loud and deep as it scatters her thoughts like moths. It rumbles through her skin and crumples her brow as she shudders, slouches forward further.

“I see what you’re trying to do Bronwen,” the voice says, “And I don’t like it. Desist.”

“Fuck you,” she snaps.

She can hear the faint sound of Shane’s footsteps as he hurries towards her, the fire door clanging behind him. Bronwen sighs and drops the smoke into the grass where it fizzles out in the early morning dew, and pushes herself up. She sways unsteadily for a moment before leaning forward and starting to run. As she gets farther from him, she can feel herself returning gradually to normal as her blood starts pumping some warmth and life into her veins.  

“Please let him be safe. I’m not the type to pray, but please keep him safe since I cannot this time,” she panted under her breath, a mantra, as she cleared the next block, his shouts fading to nothingness behind her. 

Get the fuck out, Rayn, really…this is really something you should have done while you had the chance, saving me the bother of beating you down further than you already are. And buddy, you’re a long way down. I would love to field your accusations, hear your hurled insults clearly, because I’m sure they’re amusing. But you’re in a deep dark hole right now. It’s dark, dank, and you fucking dug it yourself. Look down at your feet—that shovel lying in the water at your feet, just dug you your fucking grave. Finally, the prima-donna sore loser’s “legacy” laid to rest? One can only bring oneself to the blood sport with the full intention of fulfilling that hopeful wish. I’m so sick and tired of you. Same old tired insults—same old tired story of personal tragedy, same old “fluffer” comments—it sickens you, doesn’t it, that you could be brought to your knees possibly by a woman, doesn’t it?  Interesting, yeah, maybe it’ll happen this time—I can honestly say though, that as much as I’ve lost in the past, I’ve lost on my own merit.

Everything I win or lose is on my own merit, not on anyone else’s. I love Shane, it is true, more than anything—even my career, as much as it brings me joy to be immersed in the raw brutality of it all-- but this bond he and I share is of little consequence or influence on my career—my career, is something I’ve forged completely on my own, from the minute Till abandoned me on your soil. It may not be much, but I can lose against cretin like you, and still hold my head up high because it was my fortitude, my strength, my ferocity, that got me here.  You however, you are wavering, even as I watch you now and have been watching you. You are railing against reinforced walls in vain, you are struggling to keep a grip, you are clambering desperately, but your head is still falling downwards to the wayside of your pride, your head at hang-dog level.

Right now, all you can do is look up here…from down there in the unnavigated deep darkness of failure you have thoroughly entrenched yourself in.  I may not throw you a rope, you sad shit, but I’ll throw you some insincere sympathy and a razor blade.

Beg.