The Shine

Like a virgin

Last night I worked a guy called Mandonna. He was a big ugly lug that looked like those guys you see on every police show. He's the guy that stands in the background with the other mob goons and never has any lines. His ring gear was white lingerie with rocket boobs. I wonder where he found lingerie big enough to fit him.

Mandonna has a memorable gimmick that's great for getting heat but I found out it was a reference to an old singer. So no points for creativity. And if you're going to do a reference gimmick I think you should reference someone that people still know. If I have to google who you're supposed to be I call that a failure.

I went over. The Mandonna is a character so hated even someone like me is allowed to beat him. I'm not sure how many matches I've had now, more than 30 but less than 50 I think, this was my first win. It's stupid how good it felt. Taking pride for winning a fixed fake fight? That's like being proud of where you were born. It means nothing.

My loop through the south has been a good one, I thanked the guy in Pine Bluff who helped me out. Aside from seeing the inside of a guy's elbow the shows have been without incident and I've gotten good paydays. Relatively speaking. Flush with cash, very relatively speaking, I stopped at a diner outside of Macon. That's my current barometer, when I can afford food things are going well. When I can afford greasy diner food things are going great.

It was an all-night place and there was no one else in there at 2:17 AM besides the waitress/cook who looked like Zoe Renne a little. We managed some small talk while she made me some soggy bacon, burnt toast, a pretty good grilled cheese, and some tomato soup that was weird and thick.

I'm not great at small talk, or any other kind of talk. She told me about how her son and his friends were in trouble for stealing a hearse to use in a video for some social media platform I had never heard of. I lied and told her I was a college student. I could see her wanting to ask about how I got my scars and telling herself not to. I'm good at spotting that.

After she brought my food she said she had something to do in the back and to give her a shout if anyone else came in. Sitting there alone I realized how jumbled the layout was. The booths were at a funny angle and there was a beam in the middle of the counter that looked very out of place. I walked around chewing on some wet bacon and dry bread and the more I looked at the place, the more off it seemed.

I moved down the counter to the stool next to the beam to finish my meal and after a few minutes there was a very faint but noticeable feeling. The feeling I get when I'm working magic. When I was finished eating I searched around some more. The tile on the floor, the paint on the walls, the ceiling, all of it was in a very bizarre pattern. I think that the highway system is laid out to channel magic, this was like that, only I could feel it, it wasn't just an idea.

I sat down on the floor by the beam and I could feel the energy for certain. It was very weak, but it was unmistakable. The cook/waitress came back out and asked me what I was doing with a half-wary smile. I told her I was studying architecture in school and I was curious who built the place. She didn't know.

I asked her who owned the place and she didn't know that either. I asked her if she could give me her manager's phone number and she said that she didn't feel comfortable doing that. The small bit of amiable comradery I earned with my small talk went away, replaced by unfocused fear. She might have thought I was going to rob the place. Or that I was just out of my mind. Probably that one.

I tried to convince her that I thought the place had been built by a famous architect that I made up but if she believed me she didn't care. I'm not very good at convincing people of things.

I feel like I should investigate this place, but what can I do? Where do you look up who owns a building? I hear all the time that we have no privacy anymore these days because of young people like me. That everyone's information is online against their will somehow.

How do I make that work for me? 

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