Teddy is a broken man, a sack of feed on the canvas, but that doesn’t stop Ice Pick Pat from working him over some more. Pat stomps him and stomps him, then picks him up for a powerbomb that rattles the Lake Charles Civic Center. The crowd is losing it but not in the right way, not how we drew up. I got the boss, Jerry Hollins, buzzing in my headset, telling me I gotta stick to the angle for the broadcast.
Weeks of animosity have reached a boiling point! You just know Pat is replaying in his head everything Thumper has put him through. Every man has a breaking point!
Twenty-five hundred people—they’re supposed to be cheering the dogmatic preacher Teddy Thumper finally getting his comeuppance, but these animals start throwing beer bottles at Pat. They’re mostly oilmen on the tail end of a two-week bender, on their way back out to the rigs. Jerry is stubborn, hates when the crowd doesn’t go along with the story, but now he’s starting to panic. Finally, he gives in and sends out “Big Gumbo” George Bourdeaux.
“Born on the Bayou” hits the speakers, and Gumbo comes out in his overalls, holding Lucille the Gator over his head, with Shrimp, his six-year-old son, in tow. The pop is huge, and there’s no use trying to yell over it. I’ll give it to Pat. He doesn’t miss a beat on the audible. He’s working like he’s scared of Lucille, but I can tell he’s relieved. Gumbo marches down the ramp and throws Lucille into the ring, and Pat’s eyes bug out. He rolls out of the ring and knifes through the crowd. He makes it out the exit, covering his head as he gets pelted with everything you could imagine.
Wow, Pat sure hightailed it out of here after one glance at Lucille! Not to mention, he knows Gumbo’s gator-clamp hold can put a man out in seconds!
Lucille is laying still, just a few feet from Teddy, but he’s in no danger. Lucille is a small, geriatric gator with hardly a tooth left. She’s more liable to keel over than hurt anyone. Gumbo and Shrimp go in the ring and check on Teddy, and Teddy’s really selling it. Gumbo pulls him up to his feet, but he can barely stand. He hangs limp onto Gumbo as they go up the ramp and the crowd chants “GUM-BO! GUM-BO! GUM-BO!”
Shrimp is crying, and I can tell it’s a shoot. Seems like the chubby little kid has come to worship Teddy these past few months. I worry he really swallows the sermons whole.
I sign off, and the drunks linger around for a while and finish their last beers before stumbling out. Before long, it’s just me and Lucille, who’s still laying in the ring, asleep.
I can’t find anyone when I get backstage. The locker room is empty, but I hear loud voices on the other side of the exit door. I step outside, where Gumbo has his finger in Pat’s face. Pat takes a step back and tells us we’d better settle Gumbo down or there’s gonna be a problem.
“I been doing this shit since you were pissing the bed,” Gumbo says. “I know what a shoot looks like!” Pat goes after him, and I get in between them, and it takes me, Jerry, and this local jobber to keep Pat at bay.
“Teddy’s just soft, man,” Pat says. “Soft as hell. He should’ve stayed in the church back in Texas.”
Jerry tells everyone to shut the hell up for just a second. “Teddy’s gonna be fine,” he says, but Teddy doesn’t look fine. He’s sitting on the curb with his head down and a cigarette in his hand, but he’s not smoking it.
I go over and nudge him with my foot. “How ya doing, Pastor Walker?” He takes a second to look up, then smiles. He shakes his head.
“I dunno. Just, ya know,” he says, and smiles again. He’s definitely not all there. He needs to lay down.
I help him up, and he’s a little wobbly still. Gumbo asks me what I’m doing with him, and I tell him Teddy needs to lay down inside. He takes over and picks Teddy up like a baby and takes him inside.
When Gumbo comes back out, he starts in on Pat again, even madder than before. He’s got his fists balled up like he really wants to do something. I grab him and try to pull him back, and it’s not much use. He’s three-hundred-plus, but at least I’m in between the two of them.
“Take a walk, George,” I say, and he stops resisting. Sometimes when I use his real name, it snaps him out of it. Doesn’t always work, but thank God it does this time.
“I’m good,” he says, and raises his arms. He turns around and walks away and keeps going until he disappears around the corner of the civic center to the side that faces the lake.
“Smartest thing he ever did,” Pat says, and I gotta agree. Gumbo is rough, real rough, but Pat is all muscle and ten years younger.
I go check on Shrimp. He’s sitting on the curb, and he’s not crying anymore, but he’s still sniffling. “Is Teddy gonna be okay?” he asks.
“Yeah. He’s gonna be fine.”
“Is he going to hell?”
I gotta laugh. “No! That’s just what we called it. Just for fun.” It was a Loser Goes to Hell match. Teddy’s idea. They’ve put their eternal souls on the line!
Gumbo comes back around the corner, all cooled down, a new man. He walks right up to Pat and sticks his hand out. “Shit happens, man. No hard feelings.”
Pat laughs and takes his hand. “Whatever you say.”
Me and Gumbo go back into the locker room to check on Teddy, but he’s not there. There’s just a folded towel on the floor. “I had him laying down with his head on the towel,” Gumbo says. We check the bathroom stalls, but he’s not there either. We look all in the arena. Nothing. His jeans and shirt and boots are still in his locker. We go back outside and tell Jerry and Pat and do it quiet so Shrimp doesn’t hear. Me and Gumbo start walking around the building one way, and Jerry and Pat go the other.
“Who knows where he stumbled off to,” Gumbo whispers to me, Shrimp following behind. “He wasn’t right, man. Pat scrambled his brains. He wasn’t making sense.” He’s not on this side of the parking lot, but he couldn’t have gotten far. We look down the sidewalk along Lakeshore Boulevard, and there’s no one that looks like him. It doesn’t mean he’s not on the other side of one of the bars or restaurants. I tell Gumbo I’m gonna walk down the sidewalk a little and see if he’s not around.
It’s the kind of sticky Louisiana night that makes you sweat even at 10 p.m. I stick my head inside the Dock, and it’s packed and smoky. A lot of the crowd has migrated over, fighting over the pool tables and dartboards. Teddy hadn’t had a drop of booze in all the time I’d known him up until a few weeks ago when I came out of the bathroom at this dive bar in Baton Rouge and saw him lapping tequila up off the bartender’s belly. People here would buy him drinks until he dropped dead. He’s got the crowd in his pocket. It’s a feeling I know he’s never had before. Even his best sermons at our church in Beaumont, with the congregation hanging on every word, can’t come close. Twelve years with Gulf Coast Wrestling, and I’ve seen it really fuck with guys. I’ve seen them lose their families, their jobs, lose themselves. All for the pop.
I keep walking down Lakeshore, checking places, until I get to Beau’s. I’ve never seen more than three people in there at once, and tonight’s no different. Jazz plays low, and the old bartender gives me a look like he remembers me or just wonders what someone is doing here in a suit on a Saturday night in July.
I take a seat at the bar and order a glass of Evan on the rocks. I bet Teddy just stumbled outside and got a ride from a fan, didn’t think to let us know. He might already be back at the motel. I ask the bartender to use the phone and Yellow Pages, and he plops them down in front of me like it’s a big hassle. I feel bad, so I order another whiskey and tip him a few bucks. I find the Slumber Inn, and the front-desk guy connects me to our room. I let it ring for about a minute but nothing.
If Jerry’s smart, he’ll just have Teddy work face and Pat heel. He’s gotta realize the crowd has a say in what happens. Our thinking at first was that people don’t like being preached at when they’re not in church. We had Teddy condemn them for their drinking and cursing, but they just cheered. We had him crank it up, tell them their uncleanliness was a disgrace to God. And the Lafayette marks still ate it up. That’s when I came up with the prophet gimmick. I thought Jerry would shoot it down right away, but he liked it. He just wanted to get heat on Teddy so Pat could go over. Teddy told the crowd God had sent him from Texas to save Louisiana from itself, or whatever state we happened to be in. He went on about how great Texas is and how much more civilized it is, doing that angle, but they started bringing Texas flags to the shows and bowing to him when he came out.
When I get back to the civic center, Jerry and Gumbo have their pickups pointed at the lake with the high beams on. I can’t help but laugh. “Y’all think he’s in the water?” I say, and they look at me like I’m an asshole.
“It can happen,” Jerry says. “Bodies wash up on the shore all the time.” He’s sweating bullets, looks terrible. I feel bad and get my Camaro and point it at the water too. I got it when Cheryl left and took the Caravan and not to mention the kids. I like to blame it on the business and leave it at that.
We stand on the shore and look out and can’t see anything but the dead surface. “What if the gators got to him?” Jerry says. “They eat everything—bones, everything.”
We look to Gumbo.
Gumbo shakes his head. “Nah, not this fast. There’d still be part of him floating. He ain’t in this lake, trust me.” Gumbo knows what he’s talking about. It’s not just a gimmick. He’s a real-deal gator wrestler and puts on shows sometimes at his family ranch just south of here near Deatonville. It’s been in the Bourdeaux family for generations.
“He probably got a ride with someone,” I say. I don’t tell them I already tried the motel. I don’t want them to get too worried. I feel like Teddy’s my responsibility. I’m the one who brought him into all this.
Pat and Jerry take off, and Gumbo goes inside to fetch Lucille. He comes back and tells Shrimp to get in the big Chevy C/K truck and tells me to keep my distance. He’s so worried all of a sudden for some reason. He opens the tailgate just enough to let Lucille crawl under the hard-shell cover and slams it shut. I’m about to get in my car when he tells me he’s got some fresh crop back at the ranch. It’s been a fucked-up night, and that’s exactly what I need.
I ride with the top down. The dank air feels nice when you’re moving. I follow Gumbo south down 384 until we get to Deatonville. I put the top up and park at Castaways Bar. I climb into the truck, and Shrimp scoots to the middle. From here, it’s all off-road. Gumbo turns on his four-wheel drive and starts tearing up the mud. We bounce up and down, and Shrimp giggles.
We ride along the shore of the Calcasieu then turn back inland. The gator pit is the first thing you see when you pull into the ranch. It’s this little fenced-off river inlet. Gumbo parks the truck and gives me and Shrimp flashlights and tells us to make sure no gator is lingering by the gate door. When I get close to the gate, two gators slide right out of the water up to me, and I freeze. I know they can’t get to me, but they’ve never done this before. “I ain’t got any food,” I tell them.
“They’re waiting for you,” I say to Gumbo.
He laughs. “Welp, gate’s not gonna work, then.”
“They’re hungry, Daddy,” Shrimp says. He distracts them while Gumbo walks down the fence a little and drops Lucille inside.
“Yup, they’re getting a meal tonight?” I say. It’s wild to watch them feed.
“Nah, they’re fine. Just that time of night where they get wily.”
I remember him telling me they eat every other day or so when it’s hot out because their metabolism is going. When it’s chilly, they can go a week or more.
We load back into the truck and head to the house. We sit at the kitchen table and drink Bud Heavy and keep quiet inside so we don’t wake Dee. Gumbo tells Shrimp to go to bed, and we get a joint going on the back porch. No one thinks you can grow good grass in the swamp, but Gumbo finds a way. I want to relax, but my mind keeps going back to Teddy. I go inside to use the kitchen phone and dial 411. I ask for the motel and get through to our room, but no answer again.
I go back out. “Anything?” he says.
“Nothing. He’s probably the only person I know who still doesn’t have a pager. Sorry to keep bringing him up.”
“He’s probably laid up with some ol’ girl,” he says, and rocks in his chair.
“Maybe. I never would’ve thought it before the last month or so. I wanna check with his wife, but I don’t wanna squeal on him either.”
“Yeah,” he says, and giggles, stoned.
“I just feel responsible for the guy.”
Gumbo nods, but he’s not listening. His eyes are closed, and he’s about out. Pat’s probably right. Teddy doesn’t belong in the ring, doesn’t have the build to take the bumps. It’s just that it’s easy enough to find big bodies who can work, but guys who can work the horn are rare. Teddy was always low on money, and I told him it would be quick cash, a few weeks on the road.
I knew he was special on the mic the first time I heard him preach at Mesquite Baptist in Beaumont. For years, he was the guy standing to the side while old Pastor Sullivan lulled us to sleep every Sunday morning. After Sullivan dropped dead from a heart attack at age 82, Teddy was next up—Pastor Walker. He woke us up from our slumber that muggy day, went right into Peter’s denial of Jesus and God’s eternal mercy. It was like he was singing. I closed my eyes right there in our pew and repented for my complacency.
I can’t have gotten more than a few hours’ sleep. The couch is rough, and I wake up before anyone else. The sun is just coming up and I hear a rooster crowing, probably from one ranch over. That’s who Gumbo buys his chickens from to feed the gators. Says he’ll go through twenty a week in the summer.
I put my shoes on and go out to the back porch, and it’s not too hot yet. The chicken coop is about fifty yards away, and I start towards it. I like seeing them when I’m here. They remind me of going to Granny’s ranch before she passed, out by Tomball, not far from Houston. She had a huge coop. Gumbo just has a couple bare-bones things he threw together. They’re stuffed in there, pecking at each other for space. I count forty-three in all.
It’s not long before Dee is up fixing bacon, eggs, and grits. Gumbo leads us in prayer before we eat. He asks dear Jesus to watch over Teddy and lead him to safety. I finish my plate quick, and we talk and drink coffee. The phone rings.
“That’ll be Jerry,” Gumbo says. We’ve got a show tonight in Biloxi before we make the long haul back west for the big show in Houston. Gumbo picks up and says we need to hit the road soon so we can get to Mississippi in time to set up.
“Tell him I’ll catch up later,” I say. “I’ll stay back and find Teddy then head out.”
“He said that’s not gonna work. He wants to talk to you.” I take the phone, and Jerry starts in on me. You just gotta let him get it out of his system. He’s mad because he knows if I’m not there, he’s gonna have to fill in on the broadcast, and he’s a train wreck in front of the camera. I let him finish, then tell him sorry, I just can’t leave Lake Charles without Teddy.
Teddy’s not at the motel when I get back. I try the hospital on the off chance someone took him there, but they haven’t seen him. I call the county jail to see if he got thrown in the drunk tank, but no luck there either. I go to the front desk and get coffee in a Styrofoam cup. It’s terrible and just makes me more restless. Where the fuck is Teddy? If I call the cops, the first thing they’ll do is call his wife, Pam, if they do anything at all. It’s not like he’s some kid who’s gone missing.
I can’t take it any longer, and I give in and ring up Pam. She sounds surprised to hear from me, says she hasn’t heard from Teddy. “He hasn’t called me in weeks,” she says, and sounds upset. “I honestly couldn’t care less where he is.” I can’t believe it’s Pam I’m talking to, the woman who’d sit in the first pew with perfect posture, keeping little Melvin and Pearl in line, the woman who kept her eyes glued to Teddy, full of pride.
“God knows what he’s up to,” she says. She starts getting a tone like she’s upset with me too, like she’s annoyed I called. I say bye and apologize for bothering her. Sounds like they’ve been having issues for a while now. I would’ve thought he’d talk to me about it. He always talks about how family is the utmost, second only to God.
I can’t take being in this dingy little room anymore. I get my keys and drive back to the civic center, get out and check out the lake again. I drive around Lake Charles until the bars start opening up for the day. I go inside and describe him—not a big guy, five-ten, 170, beard, in a black singlet, busted-up face. No way you’d forget him. Not a soul has seen him. Jerry is paging me, but I ignore it.
I give up and go through the drive-thru at Krystal and get the four-little-burger combo and head back to the motel in case Teddy calls. I’ve just started eating when Jerry calls and says I need to get my ass to Biloxi with or without Teddy. I tell him again I’m not leaving without Teddy, and he threatens to fire me. I hang up. He’s bluffing. The phone rings again, and I just let it go. I know if I talk to him, I’m gonna say something I can’t take back. He’s quick to send his boys in to change people’s minds, but he wouldn’t cross that line with me.
He doesn’t give a shit about Teddy. I know they’re going through their issues with the contract, but c’mon. After Teddy got white-hot with the crowds, he started wondering why he was still only getting a couple hundred bucks a show when he was the one they were paying to see. Jerry doesn’t like anyone getting too big of a head, and maybe Teddy has, but I see where Teddy’s coming from. Trust me, I know what a tight-ass Jerry can be.
I have a thought that I wish I could take back, but now that I’ve had it, I can’t get rid of it. Jerry was a big-time wrestler in New York City and knows all types of dudes who you’d cross the street to avoid. Likes to keep them around. Makes him feel like a big shot, I guess. I wonder if he was behind Pat shooting on Teddy. Maybe Teddy stumbled outside and ran into one of Jerry’s guys and got put in a car. Things can spiral fast when you’re using muscle you can’t control.
My mind is running wild. I’m just being paranoid. Teddy will turn up. I just gotta stay put and wait for him. I watch Dallas reruns and climb up the walls. I have pizza delivered. The idea keeps coming back to me, though. I need to talk to Jerry, but he’d never admit to anything. Maybe Pat would let something spill. He’s the man, but he’s still pretty green. I page him and wait. They’re probably about done setting up. Probably getting dinner before the show.
It’s 5 p.m. and I’m thinking he blew me off when the phone rings. “It’s Pat. What’s going on?” he says. It’s loud in the background. I can tell he’s calling from the auditorium. He doesn’t exactly sound happy to talk to me. I try to sugarcoat it, but he’s not having it.
“What’re you getting at?” he says. “We got a show to do.”
I ask him if he was shooting on Teddy, tell him it’s okay if he was. Shit happens. I just need to know.
He sighs. “I’m hoping your guy turns up okay, man. But yeah, I was giving it to him for real. Not all the way. Trust me. But I was letting it go a little.”
“Because Jerry told you to?”
“Hell no. Jerry doesn’t even know. All the boys told me to. Everybody’s sick of his shit. He thinks he’s an actual fucking prophet. I was happy to do it, to be honest. Everybody knew but Jerry, and nobody tried to stop me.”
“What about Gumbo?”
“It was practically Gumbo’s idea. He got real deep about it, said the whole angle is an insult to God—hitting people with a wooden cross and all that shit.”
I don’t know what to say. The line goes silent. “You there?” he says.
“Yeah.”
“I gotta go. For real, I hope he turns up, but if you tell Jerry any of this, you’re going missing too.” He hangs up.
It’s true Teddy has taken the gimmick to a place I never thought he would. I’m the one who’d been pushing him to take it further, but Jesus Christ. What about Gumbo, though? If Pat ain’t lying, what was all that shit after the match about? Gumbo going after him? I don’t know Pat that well, but I can’t see him lying about that when he was honest about the shoot. Maybe Gumbo was just selling like he was upset to cover his own ass. He knew Pat couldn’t call him out in front of Jerry, and he knew Pat could take the heat because he’s the new cash cow.
The phone ringing startles me at 2 a.m. I pick it up fast, but it’s not Teddy.
“I didn’t wake you up, did I?” the voice says. It’s Gumbo. He asks about Teddy, and I tell him there’s nothing new to report. I wanna talk about the shoot, but not like this, over the phone in the middle of the night.
“I’m just sick to my stomach over this shit,” he says. “I wish I could be there and help look.”
I need to talk to him in person. “Honestly, that would be great. I could use somebody to cover more ground.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. If you leave before everyone else, you can make a stop here for a night and still make it to Houston on time.”
It goes quiet on the line. He’s thinking. “Of course, yeah. Of course. I’ll get a couple hours’ sleep, then head that way.”
Gumbo gets into Lake Charles about noon, and we get a picnic table outside at Tammy’s Pit BBQ. We order brisket sandwiches and beer. Gumbo says Biloxi was nothing special. He squashed Vandal Thompson in five minutes, then Pat came out, and they went at it for a minute before the schmoz, the whole locker room clearing out. “Pat is gonna go over clean on me in Knoxville. Jerry says it’s a done deal.”
“Yeah. That sucks,” I say, but Gumbo just shrugs. I’ve known for a while.
“It’s the right call. It’s time he goes over. He’s good everywhere—the ring, on the horn. Got the look too, the body.”
“Yeah, he’s goddamn talented,” I say. “Now, if Jerry would just turn him heel already. That’d be strapping a rocket to him.”
“Jerry ain’t into the idea?” he says, and I know I slipped up. Jerry likes to keep booking between the two of us. I don’t say anything. I need to talk about the shoot, but it still doesn’t feel like the right time. You just never know how he’s gonna react to something. We finish eating.
“Maybe Teddy’s got that—what do you call when you can’t remember who you are?”
“Amnesia,” I say.
“Amnesia, yeah. I seen that on the news. They find this ol’ boy wandering in the desert in Arizona I think it was, half dead, and he doesn’t even know his own name. Turns out he’s got a wife and three kids.” He laughs.
“Maybe,” I say.
We split up, and he takes the south part of town because he knows it backwards and forwards, and I take the rest. I don’t know what I’m fuck I’m doing. Like Teddy’s just gonna be standing on the side of the road in his singlet or something. I look in Super Food Mart. I go into Lynn’s Seafood, and I ask the people smoking outside Bayfront Inn if they’ve seen anyone who looks like him.
After a few hours, me and Gumbo meet back up at Castaways in Deatonville and ride in the Chevy to the ranch. Dee is fixing jambalaya, and I can’t say no. I stuff myself on it and sit on the couch in a coma.
We go out on the porch after Shrimp goes to bed, and Gumbo lights a joint. We pass it back and forth a few times until I finally feel like I can say it. Gumbo’s rocking in his chair, stroking his beard, relaxed as can be. I bring it up casual like I think it’s funny. He stops rocking, and his eyes open. He turns his head and looks me right in the eye, then starts laughing.
“Okay, okay. You got me. I may have had a little something to do with that shoot. We like to handle things internally, I guess you could say. That’s the business.”
I laugh too. “You had a little issue with Teddy, then?”
He shrugs. “Nothing too serious. Listen, the whole prophet thing he’s doing, it’s getting over, and that’s great. I don’t fault a man for working his gimmick, but then I come to find out he’s saying shit to Shrimp when I’m not there.”
“Really?”
He nods hard and crosses his arms. “Weird shit too. Nothing like you hear at church. Not at my church, at least. I dunno how y’all do it Texas, but, anyway, I tell Pat to give him a couple for me. I think he got a little carried away, personally, but afterwards, I tell Teddy why. He has a right to know. Then I had a sit-down with Shrimp and straightened things out, and that was that.”
“You told Shrimp not to believe what he hears from Teddy?”
He laughs. “Yeah. I tell him our savior’s name is Jesus Christ. He ain’t some dope in a singlet, carrying a little cross.”
“When did you talk to Teddy?”
“When? After the match.”
“When you took him inside?”
“Yeah, and don’t think I don’t regret it either. I didn’t know he’d take off like that.”
I nod. “Right. I know.” I bet he’s just mad or scared. I don’t think he’s ever even been in a fight before. He’s soft, like Pat says.
I wake at the crack of dawn again with the roosters, my back hurting from the goddamn couch. I get up and take a piss and try to go back to sleep, but there’s no use. I go onto the back porch, and I’m startled to see Shrimp outside, standing in the grass. He didn’t hear me come out, doesn’t turn around. He just keeps staring ahead, totally still.
“Shrimp,” I say. “What’re you doing?” He turns to look at me, then turns back around. I go over and put my hand on his head. “What are you doing?” I ask again.
“Seeing if the sun’s coming out.”
I laugh. “Well, there it is. Sun comes out every day, doesn’t it?”
“He’s gonna come on a day with no sun.”
“What? Who?”
“The savior. The sun’s not gonna come out on the day he returns. It’s gonna be a dark day, and it’s coming soon.” The boy is serious, and he won’t look at me when he talks.
“C’mon, let’s go see what the chickens are up to.” I take his hand, and we walk over there. The coops are jammed full like last time. The chickens are dirty, and there’s shit all in the coop.
“Could use some fresh mulch,” I say. I take a second and count—forty-three total. “Shrimp, has the chicken guy come by the last few days?”
Shrimp shakes his head. The sun is shining bright in my eyes now, and I feel dizzy. I shake my head and look back at the chickens. They fight for a spot to lie down, peck at each other.
I take Shrimp’s hand, and we walk back to the house. I find Gumbo’s keys on the counter and go back out. Shrimp asks me where I’m going, but I don’t answer. I get in the truck and drive down the path. I stop when I get to the gator pit. They see me, I’m sure, but they don’t move. They’ve already found their spots in the sun, not wanting for anything. 
Drew Buxton is a writer from Texas. His short story collection So Much Heart won the Texas Institute of Letters’ 2024 Sergio Troncoso Award for Best First Book of Fiction. His work has been featured in The Drift, Joyland, Archway Editions Journal, SARKA, Electric Literature, and Vice, among other publications.
Illustration: PG Dios
