01-10-2022, 06:46 AM
01-12-2022, 11:51 PM
Haven't had a chance to work on the new layout this week due to not feeling 100%. However, I wasn't going to let a little thing like that stop me from writing this.
Enjoy.
Life in Seasons
Book Two, Chapter Fifty
Enjoy.
Life in Seasons
Book Two, Chapter Fifty
01-13-2022, 10:58 PM
SNAKE IN THE GRASS
A Derek Adonis Production
Men pass in front of our protagonist, the ever-Godly Derek Adonis, reformed womanizer, certified preacher, Supreme Championship Wrestling employee, and former Champion of Television, as he sits on public property - a park bench placed mere feet from the edge of his property.
Or rather - his former property.
A ‘Forclosed’ sign had been perched on the land, telling passers by that the bank had repossessed the small chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada. The men passing him carry many of his personal effects. There’s a framed photo of him dressed in his ministerial whites, his alter, his chairs, his crosses, his stained glass images of his own journey to “the Lawrd”. Everything. Derek Adonis is a man left with nothing.
One of the workers walks by carrying a pink adorned box. Derek reaches out…
“No no…” he says, almost begging the man. “There’s nothing worth any money in there. It’s just…”
The man scoffs, pitching the box onto his lap. Derek holds it in his hands, the last of his meagre belongings. His bag is set beside him, clothes inside, as he holds onto the end. His “Conquest Box”. He looks at it and a tear trickles down his face as a public bus pulls up to the bench. Stopping, it’s doors open. Derek grabs his bag, pushing his box into it before standing up, walking onto the bus.
“Toll?” the driver asks. Derek stops, checking his pockets before he is able to procure a crumpled up ticket. He passes it over to the driver, who motions behind him. Derek moves back over to an open seat on the bus, where he sits between a prostitute and a gambing addict who had clearly lost it all himself. Derek looks at the two.
“Great,” he says sarcastically. “I bet you think I deserve this too…”
“Deserve what?” the prostitute asks. Derek motions broadly.
“All of this,” he points out. “If you knew who I was, you’d know that I’m walking a path of reconciliation with the Lawrd…”
“You mean God?” the gambler asks, this time with his voice clad in sarcasm and bitterness. “There’s no God in a place like this.”
“Son, the Lawrd is everywhere,” Adonis reaches out, patting the man’s cheek, but the gambler flinches away, pushing his hand back. “Sorry… old habits.”
“Your old habits include being so touchy?” the gambler remarks with disgust in his voice. He understands Adonis - or that’s what Adonis believes. He nods in conciliation.
“Leave him alone. It’s clear this man has had a tough day…” the prostitute waves off the gambler, who turns away with a look of disgust mixed with shame on his face. He had been through a lot too… but apparently wasn’t as pathetically sad about it. The prostitute moves around to Adonis, motioning next to him. “May I?”
Adonis sniffles a bit. “You don’t want to sit next to me.”
“I do,” she retorts. Adonis, not expecting that, slides back over towards the window, allowing the young woman - no older than 21 - to take the seat next to him.
“You shouldn’t,” Derek says, his voice awash with self-deprecation. “I’m not what one might say is a good man.”
“I think I can judge that for myself,” the woman remarks. “You’d be surprised at the types of “terrible characters” I’ve encountered.”
“I’ve been married six times and divorced six times,” he confesses.
“So you’re unlucky with lo-”
“Let me finish,” Adonis interrupts. “I used women as objects for my own personal desire. I was the sole-proprietor of a softcore and… sometimes… hardcore production company. I have fathered numerous children that I know of, and there are probably more that I don’t. I began speaking against the very people who flocked to follow me because I had a vision on a dirt road that the Lawrd wanted me to do His bidding. I have since dehumanised everyone who I felt did not live up to His expectations… including… well…”
He motions up and down the woman, as if to say “prostitute” without saying it. She nods in understanding.
“I pushed my friends away,” he continues. “I basically neglected my last wife until she was pushed away and left me… that one was the record too… like a year, two years… I can’t even remember. Time just kind of blends together. I have used my influence as a religious figurehead for my own personal gratification and now this bag is all I have to show for it.”
Adonis rests his hands on top of the bag. The prostitute looks it over.
“Okay,” she takes it all in and processes Derek’s sin grocery list in remarkable time. “So you’re something of a flawed man who has something of a cult appeal.”
“That’s just the religious part,” he points out. “That was the cult part.”
“You had people focking around you to follow your lewd presentation,” she corrects him. “I’d say your cult following has been more than religious in nature. So what puts you on this bus here Mr…?”
Derek clams up.
“Come on,” the prostitute prods at him.
“I’m afraid if I keep talking to you I’m going to end up doing something I can’t afford to pay for,” he points out. She laughs.
“You’re not my type anyway,” she notes. Derek shakes his head.
“When it comes down to it has that ever stopped you from collecting?” She smacks him upside the head. Adonis bows his head again. “I deserved that too.”
“Yes you did,” she agrees. “Now what’s your name.”
“Adonis,” he responds. “Derek Adonis.”
The prostitute laughs at him. Derek looks up, a tad insulted. She stops laughing… mostly. Derek glares over at her as she clears her throat.
“Sorry,” she apologises, though he doubts her sincerity. “But Adonis… that’s ironic, right?”
“With the amount of women I’ve pleased over the years,” he begins, before noticeably trailing off in his own thoughts.
“Please stop,” the gambler asks, turning back around. “Some of us are up here dreading going home because we lost a large sum of money and now have to explain that to our wives. Okay?!”
“Tell her the truth,” Derek advises. “Just tell her the truth.”
“She’ll leave me,” he responds.
“If she leaves, she leaves,” Derek notes with a hint of sadness in his voice. “But we can’t keep delaying conflict because it makes us uncomfortable. We have to accept responsibility for our failings. If I had done that, maybe I wouldn’t be here today.”
“So what did you do, Derek?” the prostitute asks. Adonis sits back, clutching his personal effects.
“I trusted the wrong people with my money,” Derek notes. “I thought all of my affairs were tidy and the people taking care of me were actually taking care of me. I put my trust that the Lawrd would provide me a safety net. My money was embezzled and now I have nothing.”
“A clean slate,” the prostitute notes. Adonis smirks bitterly.
“A clean slate,” he remarks. “How do you do that?”
“When I moved to Vegas, I didn’t plan on this life,” the prostitute responds. “This was Plan B… something I had to do when my managerial plans fell through.”
“You manage?” Adonis responds, his ears perking up.
“I manage tourist sites,” she responds, nodding her head. “I thought if I wanted to really get into it, Vegas would be the best place to do it. But no one really wanted to let a young girl manage here, so I had to make ends meet. I started waitressing to make money, but saw that dancing got more money. And when I started dancing, I saw that this got even more.”
“Yeah, that’ll happen,” Adonis notes. “But if you manage… do you think maybe you could manage… me?”
She laughs, but shakes her head.
“I don’t think so,” she remarks. “I really need a job where I can get paid, you know? I can’t just work for free and as you’ve already noted, you’re not exactly rolling in disposable income right now.”
“No,” he agrees. “But I do work. I could get you a job with SCW and have them assign you to me. Or… or I could simply bill them back for you at your cost… If that’s something you’d be interested in.”
“What’s an SCW?” she asks. Derek is floored.
“Even better! You don’t know the product,” he claps his hands. “You’re hired.”
“I haven’t even applied yet…”
“Oh, details!” he laughs. “I think this could be the start of something good… you know?”
“I guess I could try it out,” she relents. “For a couple of weeks. The worst thing that could happen is I have to send you a bill for services.”
“Heh heh… yeah,” Adonis says, not understanding what she means by “services”, or the scandal that could cause. Still, he happily agrees, and apparently we embark on a third chapter of the career of the man known as Derek Adonis.
--------------------------------------------
“I am an imperfect man who has let a lot of people down. I know this is true. All you have to do is look at the list of people who have been FOA… Friends of Adonis… only to have turned their backs on me or leave me in some other fashion. Stabbing me in the back to my face.
But this imperfect man has a perfect opportunity ahead - the chance to reclaim the Championship of Television and, maybe in the process, rediscover who I am. After all… I can’t go back to being a lady’s man. After all, with my recent bout of religion, I don’t know if I can ever look through my box of conquests without a sense of deep shame again. And the religious thing…
I don’t know.
But one thing I do know… one thing that has come to define me, at least in my professional life, is the SCW Championship of Television. I coined that term! Me! And now I want it back. I know what I’ve heard - that Autumn Valentine is an impossible task. That she’s unbeatable as Champion. But I have shocked the world before! I have overcome the odds when everyone counted me out because everyone counts me out. And I’m fixing to do it again!
…
Kablam.”
01-13-2022, 11:17 PM
Part 2 for the week. Had a lot of fun writing this.
Enjoy.
Life in Seasons
Book Two, Chapter Fifty-One
Enjoy.
Life in Seasons
Book Two, Chapter Fifty-One