It had taken some guts and some gall but Frost had sucked up the courage to actually step forwards and make a note of what was going on with his career, he could understand exactly why he wasn’t being pushed to the forefront of the company, after all Frost had been convicted of drugs possession and had spent a considerable amount of time in rehab with regards to the drugs that he had fallen into. To begin with he was a liability, he knew that and so did the company, so his return was downplayed, there were no fanfares or anything he simply slipped back in to the under card being given low key matches.
However he had proven himself, he had showed up regularly to all of his psychiatric meetings his appointments with Dr Jenkins had been continuing for what felt like months now and the two had developed a true rapport, he had shown up to every public appearance that was required of his whilst under contract with FUSE, he had shown up to public signings, photo shoots , interviews anything that they had thrown at him, he had shown up for and more than that he had been an awful lot more receptive than he normally would do.
All because of one simple thing, he wanted to make a good impression.
It had not been noticed though, not until he had turned it up a notch and actually stated his intentions. As a result he had been rewarded, a match of note and that meant something. Next match it was Ethan Frost vs. Aimz for a shot at the Gateway Title and more importantly Lane Stevens, right hand man of The Affliction, bane on both of their existences and all round jackass.
The trouble was that Frost and Aimz, for all intensive purposes were friends, they had known each other for years and as a result, had formed a sense of camaraderie they essentially looked out for each other, there was never anything in writing, for example they were never a tag team and were never a member of the same stable. However they always had each others back, that friendship and colleagueship was going to be put to the test though. As with all rewards, all with everything where there is something to fight for, there is always a winner and a loser, suddenly friendships take the back foot and own personal drive and instinct kicks in, especially when both competitors had an amazing desire to take on the man ahead of them.
Take Aimz for example, she and Lane Stevens didn’t exactly see eye to eye, far from it in fact, if you locked the two of them in a room together, it would be a safe bet that only half of one person would come out alive, they would have torn the flesh from each others bones, such was the hatred that they shared for each other. Lane Stevens had done everything that he could think of to get under her skin, up to and including circulating nude images of her, pictures from a past that she had tried to forget, but the past always catches up with you and now, Aimz was looking to make Stevens pay.
Frost on the other hand was wanting another shot at Stevens for a continual sense of fight against ‘The Affliction’ for as long as he could remember, Lane Stevens, The River Rat however was not someone that scared Frost, in fact it was the complete opposite, Frost was biting at the bit to face Stevens again, Frost wanted to have the title that was around Lane Steven’s waist. Frost also wanted to be the guy who had not once but twice, taken a title from Lane Stevens. To hold that over him would be something special and all he needed to do was to get through Aimz…
Something that would not be as easy as he hoped it would be. That was always the way when facing a friend, you never quite know how to approach it, you never know when the lines are going to be crossed, when exactly the friendship would be thrown out of the window and the fight just kick in.
It had become something that was just another part of his routine now, Ethan Frost and Dr Claire Jenkins, the two of them in a room together discussing how everything was going, analysing his mood diaries, seeing points which are high for him or low for him, needless to say the events of the week had been discussed, how he had finally stood up his bosses and demanded a bit of recognition for his work and it had all worked out for him. He had a chance at a title shot, all he needed to do was beat Aimz and everything would fall into place.
However upon mentioning Aimz, Dr Jerkins had reacted quite adversely, she had slammed down the clipboard that she was holding firmly on the desk which had caused Frost to actually leap out of his chair slightly, it had caught him that much unaware.
“What do you mean you are fighting Aimz this week? I thought I told you to cancel all contact with that woman, I thought that I told you that she was an x-factor with regards to your issues, she was a key source with regards to your problems, I firmly believe that contact with this woman is not a good thing for you.” Dr Jenkins eyes were burning with a fair amount of anger and almost hatred in her eyes, the venom that spewed from her mouth as she uttered the name Aimz made Frost question in his own mind exactly what was going through her head.
The first time that she had recommended avoiding Aimz, it had not really made sense to him, but at the time he didn’t know exactly how well that he was, his mind was in a completely other place, but now he felt that in his head he was better, he had a better grasp on things around him, he felt like he genuinely had some control over his life, the thing now was that as he sat back thinking, there were a lot of things that weren’t adding up with regards to Dr Jenkins….
“It’s in my contract Dr Jenkins.”
“Call me Claire….” She almost purred as she said this, there was something uneasy in the way that she said call my Claire, thought Frost. Surely she was supposed to be a doctor and should maintain a set level of professionalism at all times, however with Dr Jenkins it was different, she was always making comments that seemed to push the limits of professionalism, insisting that Frost called her Claire was just the beginning.
It was also the unneeded touching, little things that normally on their own would mean nothing, or at least not be picked up on. Things like holding someone’s hand on a little too long during a handshake, or hugging someone a little too tightly when saying goodbye. It was the little things which caused problems.
“I have to face her, I don’t get to pick or choose my fights, believe me if I did I wouldn’t have been dosing around for the past few months. I have to do what I’m contracted to do, surely you can understand that.” Everything that he had said there was true, it was not his choice, it was simply a case of after every show you were told what was planned for next week and then you spent the week training, unless you stepped up and made a choice to challenge someone and they accepted them, that was the only time that you would know exactly what was going on.
Dr Jenkins face was twisted and contorted, she stared at Frost, you could see in her eyes that she did not believe him, but that wasn’t the point. She didn’t care about that you could see there was only one thing going through her mind you could see it burning away at her, you could see there was one name that she was running through her mind over and over again, with each repetition of the name in her head.
Aimz, Aimz, Aimz…..
“She is not good for you Ethan, she will tear you apart and will undo all the work that we have done together, it will ruin the rapport that we have built together, it will undo all of our hard work.” Dr Jenkins had tried to put everything together, she was trying to compose herself, but it was noticeably so, it was the fact that her voice fluctuated as she spoke, it was the fact that her hands were almost shaking, they would have been if she didn’t have her hands clasped together, so tightly that the whites of her knuckles were showing.
“What do you mean by that?” Frosts mind was finally beginning to put the pieces together, everything, everything was suddenly beginning to make sense of it all, Dr Jenkins had gone beyond the stage of having a crush, she was doing absolutely everything possible to keep seeing him, false information and just generally doing everything in her power, to keep him in the psychiatric scheme, the regular reviews, was she even holding him back? Was she the reason that he hadn’t been developing as quickly as he would have intended, or wanted.
“I don’t want her to come between us, I don’t trust her I don’t want her to hurt you and more importantly force you to hurt yourself. We both know that it was her that got you in this state in the first place all I am trying to do is protect you.” The words were becoming a lot more frantic now, the stress and her web of deceit was beginning to unfurl in front of her and more worryingly in front of Frost. Her face was beginning to turn red as her true intentions started to flow, the floodgates had now been opened, she knew that there was no coming back, too much had already started to fall away, the walls and defence were just not there anymore.
Even Frost had picked up on it, a man who never really would win a prize for most observant person in the world, but even Frost knew what was going on now and everything was beginning to make sense, answers that had been lost for so long, were suddenly becoming extremely clear to him.
“Whoa, hold up there, what the hell are you talking about come between us? There is nothing between us you are my therapist that is all. I don’t know what you are talking about...” Frost was beginning to get extremely worried, for a large number a reasons, the primary reason being that for the way it stood at the moment Dr Jenkins, had full control over Ethan Frost, if she decided to spiral out of control, she could quite happily section Frost, have him locked away. This was not going to be as simple as he first thought, it wouldn’t be a case of letting her down gently.
“She’s the reason for all your hurt….” Dr Jenkins continued once again but even she was struggling now, her words trailed off as she spoke before she was even intercepted by Frost.
“No, no she really isn’t my problems are because I am recovering from a drugs dependency, my problems are because I have turned to self harm and am trying to curb my impulses with regards to that, there is a whole host a reasons as to why I have problems, but Aimz is not one of them! Aimz is a friend and someone that I will have to face this week, do you know how hard it is to face a friend? Frost was trying to play this as best as he could, primarily he wanted her to know that there was nothing between Aimz and himself, which was the key point here.
Dr Jenkins felt that Aimz was going to be some sort of sticking point, something that would potentially get in the way of the two of them being together. Aimz after all was an attractive woman, she was in the same profession as Frost and they had things in common, any woman would naturally feel threatened by her alternative beauty, one thing which stood out though and a point he really wanted to get across was that Aimz was a good woman and more importantly she was married.
“It is her problem, she’s stopped us being together.” Her words were extremely quiet and muffled as though her own thoughts were beginning to become entwined and tangled, then there was a sense of clarity as she composed herself and sat backwards, her breathing became a lot more calm, shallow and collected as her mind became incredibly focused on one simple thing.
“Now Ethan, I think we need to have a little talk about our relationship, I don’t think its going as well as it should be…”