Participants pick three stipulations/match round types on a coin flip. The winner of two of the three rounds wins the match.
Dinah Barbeau’s boot heel drummed against the floor backstage, keeping much the same beat as the last time she had awaited a match. She should probably put that beat in a song sometime.
Three rounds again. Three coin flips again. And once again the man across from her had walked away with two picks: Submission to open, Knockout to close. Neither exactly surprised her. Compared to Keith, this Clyde Gastin didn't have the same social media presence. He was a wrestler, and he was playing it gritty and straightforward.
But Dinah?
Dinah had looked at the board, felt the buzz from the Keith match still crackling under her skin, and thought: Go bigger or go home. So she’d slid her glossy nail across the list and tapped the one that made a few too many producers behind the curtain smile. A smother match for the middle round
.
The crowd had lost its mind when the graphic popped up. Her agent had lost his mind in the group chat. She’d just grinned at her phone and typed back a single cherry emoji. The doubts were already crawling in from comment sections and podcasts - “She barely survived her first match, wait till a real wrestler gets her” - and that little voice scraped at the back of her skull, telling her not to fuck this up or look like a one-hit wonder. But the louder voice, the one that always won, purred: Then make them eat those words with lipstick on them.
The opening beat of “Nice Type” slammed through the arena and the place detonated.
Dinah exploded through the curtain, twin-tails bouncing, red shades flashing, leather jacket open and skirt barely legal. She hit the ramp already singing in full voice, no backing track, belting the chorus like this was the Juno Awards and not a sweaty wrestling ring. Hips rolled, hands traced the barricade, and every catcall got an answer: a wink, a hair flip, a playful little grind against the air that made the front row damn near drop their signs.
Halfway down she snatched a “SPINNERS” sign from a fan, held it high and interrupted her singing to call out to her fans. “You better keep screaming for me, Spinners! ‘Cause your girl’s getting addicted to this - AND YOU’RE GONNA SEE ME DO IT AGAIN AND AGAIN AND AGAIN!” She tossed the sign back, blew a kiss, and turned the last ten feet of the ramp into a full-on dance break, popping her chest and dropping low enough that the hard cams probably had to zoom out fast.
She slid under the bottom rope on her belly, popped up in the center of the ring, and whipped the jacket off in one smooth motion - revealing the same revealing wrestling top, the same tiny pleated skirt riding high on her thighs, the same “come get it” confidence as she had wielded against Keith. The music cut, but the arena stayed loud, hungry. Dinah spun slowly, arms wide, drinking it in.
Then she dropped into a crouch, palms on her thighs, eyes locked on the entrance way, tongue touching the corner of her lip as she waited for Clyde.
Spoiler
