The Live Series
The next day, I finished the contract in secret at WWO headquarters, with only Stacey, the head of the legal team, and the lawyer I had brought present.
“You’re officially one of us now.”
“Thank you for offering such good terms.”
“Let’s make this work.”
“Yes. Looking forward to it.”
After that, I met with the people from HK Motors.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Charina.”
“Oh. You speak Korean.”
Charles—Lee Dong-il—looked thoroughly startled by my greeting in Korean.
“Of course. Even if I’m a Korean-American, I’m still Korean.”
“We’ve never seen you speak Korean on camera, so we assumed you couldn’t. A lot of second-generation Korean-Americans can’t, either. And your pronunciation is perfect. You don’t sound like a second-gen at all.”
It was a ridiculous thing to say, but I smiled and pretended to take it as a compliment.
“Thank you.”
The lawyer Jane had introduced confirmed there were no issues with the contract, and we wrapped it up on the spot.
“We’ll shoot the commercial right after The Live—sometime Wednesday or Thursday.”
They were in a real hurry. Then again, next week was going to be my freest stretch of the schedule.
“Understood. Where will we be shooting? And what time?”
“We’ll need to discuss it, but it’ll be either Atlanta or Orlando. Once we see the synopsis we’ll know for sure, but a single day should be enough.”
Orlando would be ideal, but even Atlanta was only about an hour and a half by plane. Not far at all.
With that, my schedule for the day was finished, and I headed back to Orlando.
On Wednesday, the final voting rankings were announced on NEXT’s show. I watched it at Selma’s house with her family.
I had no idea how the judges had scored it, but Alf had pulled off a second-place finish. James landed fourth. Considering first and third went to the top- and mid-card champions Michael and Luke, you could basically call the two of them first and second. The fans had clearly bought into that ridiculous gimmick—the bizarre dancing and singing included.
“Hahaha! Fifth? Is fifth even a ranking?”
“You little shit—you wanna die?”
“Haha! I’m second! If I’d come in fifth, I’d already be out practicing my bumps. Hey! Who the hell has time to sit around resting when they’re fifth?”
THWACK.
It wasn’t Selma who had just smashed Alf across the back.
“Uh… Mom!”
“You cut it out too! Fifth is still a great result.”
She had a point. Fourth was IC Champion Elizabeth. Third was World Champion Anne.
“Whoa! Holy crap! Olivia beat both Anne and Elizabeth.”
“Olivia’s probably crying right now.”
“Yeah, I bet.”
It helped that the women’s champions, along with main-event names like Charlotte, Alicia, and Miyu, hadn’t been in the running. Some of the more popular WWO talent had probably split the vote as well.
“That’s our Rina!”
“Thank you, Lupita.”
“Your mom and dad must be so proud up in heaven. You worked hard.”
“Probably.”
My mom and dad are actually doing just fine back in Korea. If they knew, they’d be proud of me from Seoul.
I still checked my brother’s Star account every now and then. The little bastard was living the spoiled only-son life—and he’d even managed to get a girlfriend he never used to have.
I received congratulations from Selma’s family, plus texts and calls from the coaches at the academy.
The next morning—Thursday—I was loosening up in the hotel gym when Clint came bursting in, out of breath. He was my assigned staffer from TPA, though lately I’d been out and about so much that we barely crossed paths.
“Whew. There you are.”
“Huh?”
“You weren’t answering your phone, and you weren’t in your room either.”
“Ah—sorry. I didn’t notice it ringing.”
“It’s fine.”
“So what’s going on?”
He caught his breath before speaking.
“We got an interview request from a Korean network called BI Sports. They’re the ones who hold the WWO broadcasting rights in Korea. What do you want to do?”
BI Sports was the channel I’d watched in my previous life. I’d never met any of them in person, but I knew exactly who the commentators and casters were.
“I’ll do it. When?”
“They said they’ll work around Charina’s schedule. We’re flying to Boston tomorrow morning, so the only free windows are tomorrow afternoon or sometime after the show on Sunday. Your call.”
Normally you’d do the interview after the match, but since I was booked to lose, that didn’t feel right.
“Let’s do it right after we land in Boston. That seems better.”
“Good thinking. I agree.”
Friday morning, the wrestlers booked for The Live boarded the charter plane WWO had arranged and headed for Boston.
The venue for this event was TD Garden—home of the Boston Celtics. Inside the interview booth BI Sports had set up, I met the Korean broadcast team.
“Hello, I’m Kim Seong-cheol, the caster for BI Sports in Korea.”
“Good to meet you. I’m Choi Jae-joon, a commentator for BI Sports.”
Seriously? First HK Motors, now these guys—why does everyone assume I can’t speak Korean?
I answered straight in Korean.
“Hello. I’m Charina from TPA. You can speak Korean.”
They reacted exactly the same way Lee Dong-il from HK had.
“Oh! You’re fluent!”
“You really are. No twisted second-gen accent at all.”
I just smiled, and we launched into the interview.
“Please say hello to the viewers and fans watching in Korea.”
“Hello to everyone watching in Korea. I’m Charina from TPA.”
“First of all, congratulations on finishing first overall in the voting.”
“Thank you.”
They had a lot of questions; they poured out without a pause. At this rate the scheduled thirty minutes would be gone in no time.
“We understand you came out of Team 3D Academy. Before that you had no wrestling background, no athletic career at all…”
“I did have a preparation period on my own. Conditioning, flexibility, strength, the basic techniques—you can work on all of that at home.”
“The technical side, by yourself?”
“I watched YouTube and practiced on a dummy. The resources these days are excellent.”
They seemed to realize time was short; the topics kept leaping around like a pinball.
“When people talk about Charina, they can’t leave out that hardcore match against Anne Clemens at Emergency. How was it? Weren’t you scared?”
I hesitated a moment, searching for the right words.
“I was scared. But I wanted to try following in the footsteps of Mick Foley, someone I really respect, at least once. And looking back, I think that decision was the right one. Without that match, I don’t think I would’ve finished first overall.”
“That’s real guts. You could’ve scarred your face.”
“Heh. If you’re scared of that, you can’t wrestle.”
“True enough.”
After that I answered questions about my matches with Asuna and Charlotte, and the interview wound down.
“Finally, any last words for the Korean audience?”
“I’ll work hard so I can appear on your screens more often. And please—never try any of this at home. Thank you.”
“That’s right. Absolutely do not try this at home.”
“Having a wrestler appear on TV regularly is the best gift you can give the fans.”
And with that, the first official interview of my life was over.
“Great work.”
“You handle promos so often that you speak really well. That was a solid interview.”
“Thank you.”
Caster Kim Seong-cheol hesitated, then asked,
“Would you be able to tell us anything about your upcoming schedule?”
“Well… once tomorrow’s show is over, I’ll probably head back to Orlando for now.”
“Is the rumor true? Is TPA really merging with WWO?”
Hmm. What should I give them?
“What’s the BI Sports broadcast team’s schedule looking like?”
“We’re covering Smash Down and NEXT on Sunday, then flying home Monday afternoon. Why do you ask?”
“If you can change your plans, I’d recommend following Law to Pittsburgh on Monday.”
“Law?”
“Yes. I think you’ll see something interesting.”
With that, I stood up and left.
Saturday night, with all twenty thousand seats packed, The Live began. Miyu and I were booked fifth on the card.
On the Law side, one bad match wouldn’t end a career. On the TPA side it was different. The voting rankings mattered, but they weren’t final—and even if they were, which brand you started on still had to be decided. Tonight would probably settle whether it was NEXT or Law. The worst-case scenario was getting a contract and still being sent to the WWO Performance Center.
Two matches before mine, I headed toward Gorilla Position. The second match was a four-on-four: the Inquisitors versus Heritage. At the entrance to Gorilla, both the Inquisitors and Heritage were standing around with faces set in stone. I knew it would be like this. Tsk, tsk.
I slipped in behind them and, working right to left, gave each of them a sharp smack across the back.
SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!
They were bare-backed male wrestlers; the sound cracked out clean and loud.
“Ugh!”
“Ow!”
“What the hell—who was that?!”
“Ah, that stings! Charina?”
“You heading out there to die? Why does everyone look so stiff?”
“Who’s stiff?!”
“Hey, you’ve been hanging around Selma so much you’re starting to sound like her.”
“Ah! Still stings. That’s gonna leave a mark.”
They scowled and complained, but their expressions loosened a little.
“Tension’s down a bit, right? Just go out there and do what you always do.”
“I wasn’t tense. I was meditating.”
“More precisely, visualization training.”
“Ha! Alf and James maybe, but Jake and I have WWO experience! You think we’d freeze over something like this?”
Alf and James were talking nonsense; Billy played dumb.
“That so? Then sorry! Anyway—go get ’em. Watch the injuries. I’m out.”
“Hey! Charina!”
“Yeah?”
I turned back. Alf gave me a thumbs-up.
“Rina! See you later.”
“Yeah. Finish quick and let’s go grab something good to eat.”
“Mm.”
I waved and headed back to my locker room.