andromeda } district 4 . fin

I don't really know what I'm fighting for. 

The gong rings, a sharp chirp through the warm humidity - it smothers us like one of those fuzzy blankets Giselle always has. I envelop myself in it, in the heat and the thickness, in the spandex around my own thighs and an eye mask, I mean hey? What big idiot lets their mask cover anything, you gotta breathe somehows. Clean intakes of air, it's steady waves as we circle the mat; I'm no idiot. You've gotta breathe - duh - the simplest and most important thing to survive is just to use your own lungs, I inhale as the match bell cracks through the air again. Opponents lock eyes, her brown's in my green's and our bodies hit in a single inhale, in a single, simple step to survive it's chaos, it's sound and fury and it's beautiful, I smile as the audience cries her name to begin with. 

I hear a single voice, near the front, a single girl's voice shouting purple puma as loud as she can against the sea of people who want to see me fall; it's alright, I'm nothing against being the underdog.

Nothing new to me anyways.

There's one crash, my body against mounted white pillows I took from Priscilla's room - the nerd always goes out and buys a new matching set when one goes missing. She's into pairs or something, I dunno, probably something to fill a void in her heart or blah beb blah. Even though it's been like uhh, how ever many years since Stevie's been alive, Prissy's still pretty strung up over losing Rose, and I mean, I miss her too. I wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for her (sometimes I'm not even sure I want to be,) but she's still reallllllly upset. She hates it when I call her that too, Prissy, but eh, it's her name, I can't help it if she's just a cosmic nerd. Prissy, Stevie, Gissy - okay, I call her Elle if anything, for pretty good reasons we both decided on. And me: Andy. That's right, I'm so awesome I got to give myself my own nickname, Andromeda is such a like, ugh name. Y'know? Too many syllables or whatever. 

Crazy Eyes throws a leg at me - her stage name is stupid. One of those ugh names, I picked one that nobody could argue with, who doesn't like purple pumas? I'd kill to be a purple puma. It hits my rib cage, rebound with the force while I catch it under my right arm - (don't hold back,) "I never do!" A toothy grin, I laugh as I throw her foot to the ground, locking my arms around her neck and throwing us both to the ground, her hitting with her face and my landing on my back. It stings like ridiculous but it's nothing I can't beat back into Crazy Eyes, I bounce back fast, back on my feet - I always land on my feet. Something to do with felines and pumas are one of those, I lock eyes with Stevie, somebody next to her starts screaming my name as well.

The others have something more I guess - Stevie, Giselle and Priscilla. Even Greg, too, I don't know, they shut me out a lot. Prissy always says it's because I'm too "childish!" ("You forgot reckless, loud-mouthed and vulgar, it's just what makes me awesome!") We don't really get each other a lot, she wants everything so 'perfect' and boring and type a vs type b, y'know? She's a type a herself, and of course in her world that'd make me a type b but uhh, that's why it's my world here. On that stage it's my world, where I'm a type whatever and whoever doesn't like it can get a chair to the face. You see, it's so much more fun being purple puma than just Andy or hell even Andromeda, I just feel like I have something worth fighting for on that stage. 

Even if it is just the lights itself.

Blinding, the lights on her skin - damn, has this girl ever seen the sun? - she gets up and I expect an uppercut, something to my freckled face but she punched my gut, and I hunch as she pounds my gut my mouth gapping before she throws us back to the ground, my forehead high fiving the ground and this is great. But I ain't regret nothing, I spit as I hear a "one!" echoed through the mat, my leg kicks and I get up. Crazy Eyes smiles, "I thought you knew when to give up." I cock with my left hand, landing straight in her fists before I knock her ass with a punch to the ear with my right. "You kiddin' me? I never know when to give up!"

I've heard that so many times in my life now that it's gotta be true, with all the "learn when to drop it, Andy"s. Sometimes I like to just count the silence, y'know? All the times they decide I'm too defective, too dysfunctional, that I stayed a child too long and never knew when to grow up. I feel em in my wrist, when I punch out Crazy Eyes, all I hear in the white noise is Greg telling me to "cut it out," or that I'm "take it to far," and ughUghuguhHhh - I think the two of us aren't friends anymore. Growing up around him he was always my hero, I guess? In a less sappy way, I looked up to him and grew my hair out longer; that's right, these locks used to be a bob. Anyways, he's the reason I got into wrestling, and he was always the one person I could go to - I wasn't like Stevie, I didn't have three moms and one dad to go to, just Greg. And I guess I fucked that up.

Fuck up, I crash onto Crazy Eyes, my elbow to her rib cage and there's apart of me that wants to hear a crack, some type of brand that she got her ass kicked by me. I guess it's the defective side of me. But that's my entire existence baby! I bounce to my feet, the audience is yelling, "Puuumah! Puuuumah!" Not the first person I gots moaning that name. ("One!") I wipe my hair back, a loose strand of white dabbed with warm up sweat, I look to the audience, flashing bull horns with my tongue out - "I'm just getting started!" Crazy Eyes gets up - "you need a nickname," her stage name sucks, too much to moan I guess, "I'll just call you nerd," and I cackle, pretty much all throat noise if I do say so myself. "I'll call you a pest," she swings for my head and I drop my ass, it's practically fan service as her throw goes over my head and I ram her chest. 

"Ummm, chill it dude." 

I've always been good at that, if anything, being the one to actually have fun. Giselle's aight sometimes I guess, Greg doesn't like hanging with me but Priscilla ugh, it's like she got every fun bone in her surgically removed and then organized them all by length under her bed, labeled and all. Stevie is chill, I mean I guess, but she's just a kid y'know? I'd be scared more if she wasn't. She comes in my room and takes shit all the time from my trash piles - I'm a collector. I know a cry for attention when I see one, and I chase her around the house laughing, "you can't outrun me, Stevie, we both have short legs!" She's my favorite and I guess I might be her's, I don't think I'd be anybody else's. 

One inhale, one exhale, slight unsteady breathing that I don't have time to follow; she rebounds on the ropes, trying to catch balance and I climb on top of them as she's dazed. My hands find her collar - "let's mash it up! aHAHAHA" - legs rap around her neck, her fingers on my spandex thighs and I moan in her ear to fuck with her and I push us off the ropes, leaning all my weight to the back of her head and she hits. Hard, my legs sting with the hit of the ground - she hits still. ("One!") I stay on her neck, ("two!") and I breathe, pulling my hair back behind my ears again, the audience roaring. 

"Three!" 

Fuck em. 

A whistle blows, he grabs my hand - "the winner, Purple Puuuuuumaaaaah!" And our arms shoot in the sky and I stick my tongue out, "how do you feel about that fight Puma?" His hands on my collar bone, cold against my worked heat, I shrug. 

"I swallowed a rock, I think."

[ purple muscles ]