Oh she was going to kill him.
She’d only just gotten home a few hours ago, but thanks to the wonders of the internet and fucking social media, Maggie McIntyre had already seen her husband agree to compete with X-Calibur in fucking SHOOT Project. Her business trip had gone well, another trip to a potential distributor in California to sort out the final details. She’d been so fucking excited to tell her husband the news; she’d been so thrilled to find out that her Banshee Battle Gear line was expanding into a new market.
But barely an hour from home and that fucking clip had come across her feed.
The ride home from Logan airport hadn’t been awash with conversation. Michael Draven knew that his wife was pissed off and while he wasn’t going to go back on his word, he was going to have to try and talk her down. Hopefully without her telling him that she wanted a divorce, she’d only threatened that once in the EWA before they even had children. He was a father three times over, how could he even think of trying to step back in the ring with all of his ailments? Still, she would put on a happy face for their kids when they got home. Their oldest, Leo, had just turned eight. The twins, Shelley and Erik, were six now. Thankfully, all three of them were still in school, so Maggie was free to yell at her husband for the next hour, at least.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Maggie finally came back into the lower level of their house in Magnolia, they’d turned the space into a combination home gym for them and play area for the kids.
She began to pace the room as he sat up on the weight bench. “I mean really, you know what the damn doctors said when you retired. You take a few more good shots to the head and you’ll end up a vegetable. What the fuck were you thinking, Mike??”
“It’s been eight years, Maggie.” Michael sighed. He’d thought about how to approach this all the way on the short overnight flight back to New York City. Michael had hoped to beat her home, but when she’d failed to call or message him the night before, he knew she’d seen. Truthfully, the events of Zenith were somewhat of a blur. He’d never intended to commit without talking to Maggie, but after X-Calbur had regaled him with memories of long ago, and fed his ego…the handshake had happened before he’d even realized it. The war was about to begin all over again.
If, that is, he survived this war, with the most dangerous opponent in his career.
His lovely wife.
“You know all the medical advances that have been made since then. We see these guys coming back all the time - hell, remember Dredd?” Cal Rayner, wrestling as Dredd in the EWA, was a 7’0” monster, stoking fear in anyone who stepped in the ring with him. He also was in his mid-50’s. “Rayner did this shit for years, and he’s way older than I am.”
“Cal-fucking-Rayner didn’t have doctors telling him to stop, Mike! Cal Rayner didn’t have his leg snapped into pieces in the middle of the ring! You’re in agony on a rainy day, Mike.” The daughter of Ed Johnson began to quicken her pacing in the weight room. “And–”
Michael gently interrupted her, understanding he was treading on thin ice right now. “I know, babe. The doctor. But we’ve talked about how the headaches went away a few years ago. The gaps in my memory….all of it is okay. I feel great, I look great…I need to get some serious cardio again, but Maggie…I think I can do this. Remember when I broached the subject about the exhibition match a few years ago? My only fear back then was that putting myself out there would draw…him back into our orbit. But he’s gone. He vanished from the face of the planet eight years ago…hell, for all I know he’s dead. And if he’s not, Erik’s right next door now. He’d never let a soul touch our children.” Michael’s brother, Erik, had moved into the guest house on the property, wanting to be closer to his niece and nephews.
Maggie went quiet for a long few moments, frowning as she moved to sit down on the lone bench on this side of the space. She glanced out the windows, looking over the quiet beauty of Magnolia harbor. Their enormous house, bought during their last year in the EWA with a lot of help thanks to Erik Draven’s wedding present, didn’t feel so gigantic anymore with the addition of their three children. Maggie had once remarked during the house tour about why anyone would need six bathrooms. Well, she was thankful for so many bathrooms now they were a family of five, sometimes six when Erik came over for dinner…which was almost every day.
“I don’t care about Indrid-fucking-Calder.” She spoke flatly, dark eyes moving back to her husband. He’d done some irresponsible things before they were married, but this was right up there. “Yeah, I remember the exhibition match idea, your only fear was Calder. You know what mine was and still is? Watching my husband and the father of my children either get paralyzed or suffer an aneurysm on live TV and end up in a wheelchair or dead. Mike, you’re only a few years away from 50. You’re in great shape for your age, but how many years did it take for you to feel great again after the EWA shuttered?” She didn’t give him a chance to answer that. “Five fucking years, that’s how long it took…and you wanna throw that away to feel the crowd yelling your name one more time…”
She didn’t move from her spot on the bench. Maggie just folded over, hiding her face in her hands. She didn’t want to break down crying, even though if she did it would likely stop any thought in her husband’s mind of going back to active competition. She’d only just turned thirty-five in December, she was between promotions herself but Maggie didn’t have nearly the amount of damage that Michael Draven had.
“You wanna throw away everything we’ve built to what…go brawl in a fucking Arby’s again? Oh yeah, that’ll totally be worth the fucking brain damage.”
Despite her anger, Michael couldn’t help but crack a smile. This outburst was all out of love for him and the family they’d built together. They’d been together for eleven years now, brought together through the hardships of the business of professional wrestling, and he wouldn’t trade her for anything. If this was her putting her foot down, then so be it, nothing was worth losing her over.
But Michael knew she wasn’t aware of the real reason he felt the need to do this. It was time to put all the cards on the table.
“Babe, come here.”
Maggie reluctantly walked over to Michael, allowing him to take her hands. The younger Draven stood up, looking down into her eyes.
“You know how the kids always ask us about when we used to wrestle? And how we never show them that footage, because they’re too young to see things like everything that went on with us and Lauren, and Calder, and all the horrible things that we did to each other?” The EWA was, at times, an incredibly violent time in the industry, and certainly in their lives. Despite having met there, the couple were at the center of a great deal of said violence; including a fair amount inflicted upon each other. “Maggie, I….I want them to see me in the ring. I want to show them that their father meant something to people. I think–”
“Mommy! Daddy!”
The kids had arrived home early with his brother Erik shouting a quick hello before departing and it was Leo, their oldest, ran to Michael, always a flurry of questions.
“Dad, dad, Frankie at school said that his dad was talking about you and that you were gonna be going back to wrestle. Is that true? Is that really true? Are you gonna fight again?”
Michael looked at Maggie, and she couldn’t help but laugh as he shrugged, a grin spreading across his face.
“Dad! Dad!”
The twins, Shelley and EJ, dumped their school bags at the front door and ran after their older brother. Shelley, the apple of her father’s eye, was the first to speak after Leo. “Daddy!! Dad! You’re gonna wrestle? Can we see you wrestle at the Arby’s and get some curly fries?”
Maggie’s children always made her smile, they were her chance to not repeat the same bad decisions and bullshit her mother had done. “Guys, we’re still talking about it--”
“But MOOOOOOM! We wanna see dad compete!” Leo crossed to his mother, the eight year old wrapping himself around her like he often did when he wanted something. “Please please please?”
The twins soon joined him in wrapping themselves around her. Maggie was soon mobbed by her own offspring and despite the anger at her husband, she would never show the kids a sour face if she could help it.
“We’re still gonna talk about it first! Dad and I, I mean. You guys need to go get changed for karate, Uncle Erik said he would take you tonight.”
That sent the kids into a wave of cheers. All three of them adored their gigantic uncle and Erik Draven had no issues keeping up with them even now he had to use a cane. They went off to their rooms to change, knowing after karate was over their beloved uncle would take them to Virgillio’s for dinner. Maggie turned her attention back to her husband, the smile fading quickly.
“If you really wanna do this, I have some conditions. Not a lot of them, but you need to get a doctor…an actual sports medicine kind of doctor to look over your whole-ass medical history and clear you. And we’re making sure we have everything legal-wise in place in case your ass does end up a fucking vegetable, I can’t take care of the kids and afford a house this size on my own even with Rich Uncle Warbucks next door.”
“One step ahead of you, babe. I reached out to Uncle Warbucks’ neurologist. He can squeeze me in after hours on Monday. I knew you’d insist on that, and besides…you and the kids mean too much to me. If he won’t clear me, this ends here. That’s a promise. I really don’t want to end up sucking my food through a straw and having you wait on me hand and foot. Besides…” Michael picked his wife up suddenly in his arms, a sharp but loving protest coming from her…that quickly ended in silence as the married wrestlers shared a long, deep kiss. “...I love doing this way, way too much to give it up.”
And he meant it. Once upon a time, Michael had given up on life itself…and it was a young rookie that saved his life, just by happening to be in the right place at the right time. She had made life everything for him, and he’d do anything for her.
“I love you, Maggie.”
“I love you too and I have one more condition—you come home after every show. You’re not leaving me and Uncle Warbucks to chase after our three hellions alone for that long alone. Shelley never listens to anyone but you.”
Michael chuckled, knowing Maggie spoke the truth. She could be a little hellion at times. Just like her parents used to be. “Consider it done. My days of all-night benders, or all-night anythings, are pretty much long gone.”
“They fucking better be.” He knew that she wasn’t happy with this, but in the end…the most she could do was pray the doctor didn’t clear him and just have their children be okay with watching a few of the tamer matches from their past. It wasn’t easy for her, seeing that fire in his eyes again. That fire that had led to dangerous obsessions in the past and he just barreled on ahead with his tunnel vision, willfully blind to what the people around him had warned against. She loved him, but fuck this was going to be hard. Maggie felt no jealousy about being left at home, she made the decision to take the time off competition to spend time with their children and be a mother. It wasn’t easy, but she always tried her best and she always asked for help when she was feeling overwhelmed.
They’d learned to do that together after some marriage counseling after the EWA shuttered and before the pandemic happened. The married pair were among the lucky ones to not have their lives change dramatically, and given how great the interest rates were at the time--Erik Draven hired a manager for his land in North Carolina and bought the house right next door to them. The biggest ways their lives changed were gaining a new neighbor and the addition of two more members of the family.
“It’s not like you have to fly to Vegas again and just…I know the EWA was brutal but SHOOT’s no different. I didn’t wrestle there, but I did manage Sinn for a couple of months and…besides the fact that she was a raging addict cunt,” Maggie didn’t often use that word, but now that she was older she was less forgiving of other people’s shitty behavior. “It didn’t last and…goddamn it, I just want you to be careful. What we have now, what we worked our asses off to build over the last ten years, isn’t worth destroying for one more moment of glory.”
Michael nodded, agreeing with Maggie’s assessment of the situation. He held her close, looking into her eyes. “You have my word. I know what you’re thinking, and I don’t blame you for it…but I need you to trust me. The days of obsessing over certain goals, titles…individuals….” He chuckled, knowing the raven-haired former pro understood exactly what, and who, was being referred to here. “...long gone. This is partly to see if I’ve still got it, and mostly to let the kids see Daddy. It’s not going to be long term, and at the first sign of trouble, I’m out.”
If Michael was being completely honest with himself, he was only doing this because there were no signs of trouble. Sure, there was X’s kid and his weird cult…but that wasn’t the same. It wasn’t HATE.
It wasn’t Calder.
“I love you, and I love the business, but I love you more. And if you see something I don’t, tell me. I’ll listen. This isn’t the past, Maggie.”
“I love you too.” Maggie heaved a big sigh before wrapping her arms around him in return. None of this was definitive yet. He still had to be cleared by a doctor and at least Erik’s neurologist wouldn’t falsify paperwork for any amount of money. She needed to calm down and at least they would have a few hours tonight while Erik had his niece and nephews to take them to karate and dinner.
“If you don’t listen to me, I still have the baseball bat in my gear bag. Just fair warning, okay?”
“You know, in another time, I would’ve thought that was hot, Maggie.” Michael laughed, and his wife raised an eyebrow, a smile on her face. “Warning received, babe. Don’t worrry.”
And yet, that’s all she could do about this situation.
Worry.