Following the matches, my father and I went to eat at Romo’s. The owners of the pizzeria, John and Mona Romo, used to run an indie promotion called Southwest Wrestling Association, and my father wrestled for them briefly during his “Mangler” days.
The first time I ate at Romo’s was when TJ Masters, an ACW wrestler, brought me after one of my football games. He claimed that the restaurant had the best pizza in town—coldest beer, too—and offered to buy me one, even though I was only sixteen. I didn’t think the Romos would serve me a beer, and I don’t think TJ did, either. He just wanted to see how I’d react.
Mona came around the register to greet us. “There they are,” she said. “My two favorite men. And I hear that somebody’s graduating from high school pretty soon.”
“Well, it isn’t me, so it must be this guy,” my father said, clapping me on the shoulder.
“Congratulations, Jesse,” she said. “Me and Johnny are very proud of you. We’ll definitely be at your party.”
I looked at my father. “What party?”
Mona cupped a hand over her mouth. “Oops. Did I let the cat out of the bag?”
“That’s all right,” my father said. “I was about to tell him anyway.”
She picked up a couple of menus. “Follow me, darlins. I’ll give you the best table in the house.” At near closing time, the place was almost empty.
After we were seated, I asked my father about the party.
“You’re about to reach a big milestone, and we need to celebrate it,” he said. “We’re planning on having it the day after your graduation. Mom’s checking out caterers. She’s also thinking about getting Rick Dunham to DJ it. We’ll have the party in the back, so feel free to invite as many of your friends as you want.”
Our yard had plenty of space and a large swimming pool. Maybe if the weather was warm enough, we could make it a pool party.
Mona stopped by a few minutes later with a pad and a pen. “Y’all know what you want?”
“Sure,” my father said. “We’ll each have a Calzone Supreme and a Coke.”
“Um, can you make mine diet?” I asked.
“Honey, we don’t have diet calzones,” Mona said with a straight face.
“No, I mean . . .”
She flashed my father a wink. “I know what you meant, darlin. I’ll bring your food right out.”
Since it was late, I had thought of having only a small Caesar salad, but my father was treating, and I didn’t want to order something different. Besides, a calzone wouldn’t kill me. According to TJ, most foods were okay, as long as you ate them in moderation.
“All right, so we’ve got the party,” my father said. “Mom has some other ideas, too. But let me ask you, Jesse. Is there something in particular you’d like for graduation?”
Nothing came to mind. I had everything I wanted or needed, including the black Dodge Challenger he’d given me for my seventeenth birthday.
“A special trip somewhere,” he suggested. “Maybe to London or Paris.”
London sounded awesome. My parents had been there several times with the ACW, but I never had.
Suddenly a thought struck me. “Actually, there is something I want, but I don’t think you’ll go for it.”
“Well, I hope it isn’t a Learjet because that might be a little bit out of my price range,” he joked.
“I want you to train me to wrestle.”
My father stared at me for a few seconds. Then he said, “I’ve been wondering when you were going to bring that up.”
“You have?”
“I know you’re dying to get in the ring. I see it in your eyes every time you go to the Factory. I hadn’t mentioned it because I wanted it to come from you.”
“Will you do it?” I asked, my heart racing.
“Sure, why not? I can have Mace show you how to run the ropes, take bumps, stuff like that.”
I couldn’t believe it. If I’d known it’d be this easy, I would’ve approached him about it a long time ago. “So how soon do you think it’ll be before I have a match?” I asked, thinking of Alonzo Barclay as a possible first opponent.
My father’s cheerful disposition vanished. “Hold on, I never said anything about letting you wrestle.”
“What? But you just told me you would.”
“No, I said I’d let Mace teach you the basics.”
“Yeah, but . . . then what’s the point in training me if I’m not going to wrestle?” Somewhere in the back of my head, I could hear the old advertisement warning: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
“The point is that you’ll be in top physical shape,” he said. “And isn’t that the reason you started going to the Factory in the first place? Because you wanted to get in shape?” Then in a jab that was totally unnecessary, he added, “And isn’t that why you used to spend so much time with your buddy, TJ?”
“My buddy?” I snapped. “Dad, he was your buddy first, remember? You’re the one who introduced me to him.”
Mona arrived with our drinks. “Everything okay here?” she asked.
“We’re just talking,” my father told her.
She gave us a questioning glance, then left.
“Anyway, you know my policy,” he said. “I don’t put anyone in a match until they’ve had at least four or five months of training, which you won’t be able to complete, because you’ll be living in Austin by then.”
Up until that time, I’d been tentative about sharing my thoughts on college with my parents, but I felt my hand being forced. “That’s the other thing, Dad. I’m kind of thinking about waiting a year or two before I start school.”
“What for?” he said sharply. “So you can stay here and wrestle? Absolutely not. You get your degree, Jesse, you hear me? You get your career going. Then you can come back and talk to me about wrestling.”
Mona was tending to two geezers at the bar. She and the geezers turned and stared at us, but my father dismissed their concern with a shake of his head. Softening his voice, he said, “Look, everyone on my roster’s got a regular job. Steve’s a software engineer, Mando’s a security officer, Kendric works for a printing company . . . I could go down the list, but you know what I’m getting at. Wrestling’s a hobby for them. They’re weekend warriors, if you will. Most of them don’t have any real expectations of going beyond the indie circuit.”
“But you did,” I said. “And you made it big. I mean, the whole world knows who you are.”
My father leaned back and crossed his arms. “I see. So that’s what this is about. You want to be famous.”
“No, Dad, it’s just that wrestling’s the one thing I honestly believe I can be really good at. And if I were to hold off going to school, I could focus on developing my skills and . . .”
“And what? Become the ACW heavyweight champion? Listen to me, Jesse, I got lucky, plain and simple. I also happen to have a degree in criminal justice. And if things hadn’t turned out the way they did for me, I would’ve been proud to have gone into some field of law enforcement.”
The difference between my father and me was that he’d studied criminal justice because he wanted to be a cop. It had been his dream since he was a kid. Wrestling was something he stumbled onto by chance, when he met a former pro wrestler who saw potential in him and recommended him to people he knew in the industry.
I didn’t particularly want to be a mechanical engineer. Or a teacher, as my mom had suggested. Or anything else. The only future I could see for myself was as a pro wrestler.
My father continued to lecture me about how I needed to make college my first priority, retelling the stories I’d heard a million times before: how he and my mom had struggled financially, trying to live on her substitute teacher’s salary, while he was getting beaten up in rec halls and high school gyms all over the country for pennies; how he used to have to work as a bartender to help make ends meet; how even after he signed a lucrative contract with American Championship Wrestling and made more money than he’d ever imagined, his grueling schedule forced him to spend most of his time on the road, leading to his and my mom’s divorce; how at age forty-seven, his body was a wreck, with injuries that would never heal completely.
I resisted asking him why he was operating a wrestling school if he thought the profession was such a bad one to get into, but I knew the answer. It was fine for everyone else, just not for me.
“Here’s what I’ll do for you, Jesse,” he said at last. “I’m having tryouts on the first Saturday in June. Then the following Monday, I plan to start a beginners’ class. You’re welcome to participate in the sessions until the fall, but I’m not putting you in a match. Take it or leave it.”
Texas had plenty of other wrestling schools where I could train, but I didn’t want to cause a rift by defying my father and enrolling in one of them. So, I agreed to his terms. For now. Maybe after he saw what I could do in the ring, he might change his mind.
Mona came by with our food. “Enjoy your calzones, darlins,” she said, but the bubbliness that had been in her voice earlier was gone.
For a while, we ate in silence. Finally, I looked at my father and said sheepishly, “Can we still go to London?”