esperate
MANHATTAN, NEW YORK | DILLINGER ESTATE
“No, Ken, I told you three days ago the Fairview account is to be - no, listen to me - sweetheart…”
Peter tucks his cellphone into the nape of his neck and silently whispers as he gently tugs on the exposed ankle of his slumbering daughter. Her bedroom bearing a striking resemblance to Hugh Hefner’s former playmates - bright pink walls, plush pink round bed, baby pink carpets, pink curtains…
“Yes, the Fairview account is our top priority, do you hear me? This is set to make us millions, Ken, I need you to grasp that - honey, please…”
He applies a bit more pressure as he tries to nudge his daughter’s nearly comatose body.
Mmmm…
Peach groans as she pulls at her plush pink duvet, pulling it over her head and sinking lower into the mattress.
“I’m not doing this with you, Cherry is preparing your egg white and spinach quiche and once you’re finished breakfast you have an 8:45 am massage with Bronson.”
“8:45?!”
Peach sits up, throwing the blankets off of her. Peter knew this was going to turn into a debacle.
“Ken, I’m going to have to call you back but have Charlotte and Andrew on the jet in thirty. I’ll meet you guys in the city before the Fairview meeting.”
Peter hangs up and motions towards the door, telling Peach it was time to move.
“Daddy, you can’t be serious! This is my day off!”
“Honey, eat your breakfast and have your massage. It’s not a day off - you’re supposed to be training in the afternoon. You have your first match in PWE and let me tell you, the amount that I had to fork up to that Ophelia woman to let you in there…”
“I don’t care!” The stressed out Peach Dillinger runs her fingers through her blond extensions. “You know getting up early stresses me out and when I’m stressed I get overwhelmed and when I’m overwhelmed I don’t like to be told what to do.”
“Princess I know but this is your once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and we both know how badly you want this. If you want to be successful my darling you’re going to have to make some sacrifices.”
“Dad, this is a lot.”
“Have your morning massage and think it over,” Peter hurriedly says as he starts dialing another phone number and walking backwards towards the door. “You’ll feel better once Bronson works all those kinks out and then you’ll be nice and relaxed to focus on your match.”
“Where are you going?! Nothing you said made me feel any better!”
“I need to get to work - breakfast is downstairs, massage in an hour, and then Carlos will be waiting in the private jet to take you to Orlando. He leaves at 2:15 so make sure you’re packed.”
“Packed?!” Peach’s voice shrills and her icy blue eyes widen. “Daddy you literally cannot expect me to do all of this by myself, it’s like you don’t even want me to win!”
“Persephone I don’t have time to argue about this right now,” Peter says in his most calming voice.
“And ANOTHER THING…” She props herself up on her knees, arms crossed over her chest, “Why am I even in this battle royale? You specifically put on my resume that I. HATE. BATTLE. ROYALES.”
She starts fanning herself off, beginning to feel overwhelmed.
“Okay, okay, calm down Princess. I’ll take care of it.” He sighs, once again tucking the phone between his ear and his shoulder and with his free hands frantically grabs Peach’s hot pink Dior suitcase from her closet.
“Ophelia, it’s Peter Dillinger,” he nearly whispers. “If this battle royale doesn’t go the way it should, you can expect me to cancel this hefty deposit. And this better not happen again.”
____________________________________
“Is my hair okay?”
Peach fluffs her platinum blonde locks while simultaneously checking herself out in the reflection of the camera.
“Oh, we’re filming?” She says through half-puckered lips, applying a baby pink tinted gloss. “A little warning would have been nice…”
She sighed.
“A battle royale. How original,” Peach rolls her eyes. “Battle royales give off such a desperate vibe and that just doesn’t sit well with me because it’s like, exhibition for what? You would think that after my father, Peter J. Dillinger, nearly funded Ophelia’s little wrestling federation project here just by securing me a spot on the roster that we would be a little bit further along than an exhibition match.”
“What exactly did you want us to showcase? What exactly do you want Lachlan to prove in this ‘exhibition’ match because I’m pretty sure we should’ve seen it already when he was representing Victory as a former champion. This guy won an award for feud of the year at Strategic Assault… and the trophy is an opening match. Honestly Lachlan you should have had a rich dad.”
Peach shrugs nonchalantly, as if she was so confident this situation would never - and could never - happen to her.
“Couldn’t be me. You couldn’t possibly catch me selling myself so embarrassingly hard. If you noticed, The Socialite Sorority - you know, myself, Sabina Sainte and Mia Castillo, also known as the most gorgeous and talented women in the world, also known as the women you could never even dream of getting with, also known as–” Peach takes a dramatically long and exaggerated breath in, “the women your mothers warned you about… We weren’t about to make such a weird and desperate appearance at Strategic Assault. We didn’t really feel the need to have to talk about our boring history and dance around the fact that Victoria Lyons obviously wants to, like, Oedipus her brother or whatever, or pull an Ellie Quinn and just shoot on everyone in this match even though she isn’t even in it? It’s like, you all want to be relevant so badly and talk about us like we’re the ones that have to catch up…”
Peach scrunches her face up while twirling a lock of her platinum hair between her fingertips.
“We already knew the low hanging fruit would be picked. We’re so unphased, though, and it bothers all of you. You think you’re all the first ones to call us vapid, spoiled little girls? Hi, The Socialite Sorority is built on having money, being hot, never losing, and doing whatever we need to do to get to the top. The misconception is that we can’t do it without help… and if that’s what you people think, then you’re all as wrong as you are ugly.”
“...And y’all are VERY ugly,” She snorts.
“Not one of you are going to have the balls to say it to all of our faces at once, though, because once we’re in the ring it’s The Socialite Sorority versus everybody. And if you think that you can pick us apart one by one, you have no idea how strong our bond is. I don’t even see any qualified candidates that could possibly take on the three of us - you think somebody like Noah Ortega who is basically just a short king with an anger problem and lots of rejection issues is going to be able to hang with three hot women at once? This is Noah’s highschool dream that he jerks off to every night, there’s no way he’s going to be able to eliminate us by throwing us over the top rope. The second his ugly little ginger-freckled hands touch our soft, luscious skin, he’ll crumble and go back to being the 5’10” incel he seems like he is. He admits himself that he’s a sore loser, so you can bet once we collectively toss him over the first thing he’ll do is go back home to his little gaming computer to make a really mean Reddit thread about us.”
“Like, sure you could pick apart how new to wrestling I am. I don’t have as much experience as my sisters do. You could make fun of me by expertly using a slap in the face while people are out here doing too much with their flips and their submissions… But watch what happens when a dominant woman can make a man drop to their knees with a firm slap. Noah’s going to cream his little speedo and Lachlan will forget he has a wife until he comes to.”
“Might take Enigma away from his fiancée, too. You mean to tell me this six-foot-five Russian soldier-lookin’ dude is nothing but an obedient dog? Look at the facts - you can’t call yourself a Monster Machine and then basically advertise to the world that your wife controls your life. It’s literally so embarrassing. Go ahead and be the biggest guy in the match with the most potential to win while also being the biggest target - we’re all just going to try and take you out first. That way once The Socialite Sorority pretends to do some of the heavy lifting, you topple over, and we easily take on the three opponents we have.”
“See? There’s brains in this strikingly beautiful blonde head. The fact that we’re placed in a tight little box tells me that we’re being stereotyped. Overlooked. Underestimated. And that puts us in an extremely advantageous position. You’re all just jealous. You’re all jealous that you’ve been led to believe that “passion” and “hard work” and “dreams” matter. Nobody cares. Nobody cares how violent you are or how edgy you are. Nobody cares about Victoria Lyons’ little threats or her pseudo-poetic descriptions about blood and bones breaking. We get it, you’re all out for blood or whatever but it’s just giving off desperate, try-hard vibes. It ain’t us. You can literally be hot and still be a wrestler. You can be hot AND rich, and still be a good wrestler. Well…”
She shrugs her shoulders with a faint smirk. “We can. You can’t.”
“If you haven’t caught the drift, this is essentially The Socialite Sorority versus… a bunch of ugly die-hards. Because there’s no way in hell Mia, Sabby and I are going to fight each other. It’s either the three of us win, or none of us do - and you know that’s impossible. With our combined talent, experience, and y’know, Daddy Dillinger’s helping hand, we’re a shoe-in to be collectively skyrocketed to the top of the Victory brand.”
“It’s how we’ll be ensuring our success from this episode of Victory to the last. We share everything. Wins. Championships. Secrets. Strategies. Hardships. Everything. So take note, because the real exhibition… is us.”
