Stranger Than Fiction // Sammy Guevara VS Jeff Hardy NO DQ Match Feb. 15, 2024
The last thing we want to see in front of our faces peering out/in/wherever is a mirror of ourselves. In the part of our mind where we write stories we’ll never tell we’re always the plucky heroes. You line up all the little moments in your life you felt genuine fear or a deeper darker anxiety than usual and you contrast that with however it is you’re feeling right now in this moment. No matter how low you are you’ll never be that low again. Then you seek out stories of other who come from places that are worse into places that are better and that makes you feel good. Good conquers Evil, Skinny Cops beat Fat Sick Robbers, Red is humiliated by Blue.
But when Sammy Guevara took to the skies like so many times before for what was a fairly routine dive onto his opponent he hung his dumb skinny leg out like a plucked chicken drumstick. He over rotated horizontally lining up his knee with the side of the skull of a helpless North Carolinian and brought it down with all the force of what must have felt like a highly motivated brick to the face. The neck snapped grotesquely sideways and that skull bounced. The entire crowd instinctually began making a llively double tap motion into the air in front of them. A subtle tell and sign of deep and lasting approval just below the facade of cosplayed concern.
Jeff Hardy has been here before. Probably more times than even the most perverted and dilligent Hardy Boys scholar is aware of. If Jeff has a bump card it’s not like you and I’s. He has some extra stuff in between his brain and his skull. A bright creamy blue layer of viscous gel. There, hold this light up to his ears. See it? So just calm down. He can do this forever and every night while you sit slouched, setpum deviated, fingers curled back into your hands. Say it you fucking clown—say the goddamn words to him,
“We-want-taaybles”
It’s you! You’re Sammy Guevara. That’s why you dislike him so deeply. So needlessly. How many rooms full of potential friends have you walked into and just—fucking—bombed? OH WHILE maybe they weren’t chanting “sam-my sucks” while gently helping their toddler clap along to the harassment—they might as well have been. How many big breaks have left you just broke down. How many chances did you miss that you didn’t even know you were taking. God it’s enough to crumple a person. INSTANT REPLAY: there goes your knee in a confident arc off the top turnbuckle. Jeff Hardy staring upward at you. Not as sharp as 10, 20, 40 years ago, but he’s still plenty sharp enough to immediately know how badly you just fucked this up. He knew before you knew. And while it was enough time to process just slightly turning his head—it was a few nano seconds too slow for him to meaningfully protect himself from you.
If this match hadn’t involved near catastrophe Saturday afternoon the wire would be alght with a heroes tale: That starts fittingly when Guevara walks out to boos, vitriol and condemnation in his own state like some also-ran politician served up as carcass meat for a main-eventer encumbant. Humiliated in an instant in front of dozens of his friends and family. Gut cut wide open splish sploshing onto the cold entrance ramp as his music crescendos and—he—just—continued—to—smile. He didn’t show weakness or that he could be gotten to. He smartly didn't meet eyes with anyone old enough to possibly have a Reddit account. One foot went confidently in front of the other—chest stayed puffed out—he retreated deftly and perfectly into his mind palace. Safe from the bellows of slobs and the clicking of their rat like families. His lip curled just slightly as he brought his perfect teeth down onto his fat pink wet tongue. This crowd has no idea what the two of you have planned and how here—tonight in Austin Texas—Jeff Hardy is gonna get you over.