Page 89 of Pure Silence

“Help with what?” Goldie was instantly suspicious.

“Help get you into the modern era, my man!” Florence grinned. “I can set up your Twitter, your Instagram, we can make some TikToks—”

“Those can’t be real things.”

“Come on. Before you come on as my co-host, you’ve gotta get this shit ready.”

“Wait, wait.” Goldie scoffed. “Co-host?”

“Yeah!” Florence sat on the couch and kicked up his feet on the coffee table. “I’m thinking about rebranding as Big Bear and Goldie’s Man Cave. Or Goldie and the Big Bear’s Hive. I don’t really care whose name goes first—”

“Fuck, hang on a second!” Goldie took a deep breath. “You want me to come be your co-host now?”

“Hell yeah, I do. It’ll be just like old times, man. Papa Bear and Goldie back at it again! What do you say?”

“No,” Goldie replied flatly.

“What? Come on.” Florence laughed. “What else do you have to do?”

“I got work. I got other stuff going on.”

“Like your new fellow, huh? What, you get a boyfriend and you can’t hang out with your best bud now?”

“He has nothing to do with this.” Goldie crossed his arms with a scowl. “This is between me and you. You can’t just fly off and make fuckin’ decisions like this without talking to me first.”

“What? You always love my ideas—”

“Usedto love,” Goldie corrected. “We’re not tag team partners, Flo. You’re not in charge anymore. You come to town a week early—”

“Hey, I texted you.”

“—you show up here uninvited, and you’ve already made these plans for me to join your stupid podcast without even fucking asking me? And wanting to take over my social media that I don’t even have?” Goldie glared. “The fuck, man?”

Florence looked sheepish.

Goldie narrowed his eyes. “What did you do?”

“What?”

“What did you do, Flo?”

“Well, I wasn’t expecting you to be so fuckin’pissy,” Florence muttered, raising his voice to confess, “so, yeah, maybe I went ahead and set you up with some stuff, okay?”

“What stuff?”

“Twitter, all right?” Florence rolled his eyes. “I wanted to take advantage of that hashtag while you were still trending, and—”

“Take it down. Right fucking now.”

“What? No! Just listen for a second—”

“Fuck you!” Goldie barked. “That’s fucking fraud! You can’t just make some bullshit Twatter thing and pretend to be me!”

“You are so fuckin’ stupid!” Florence exploded as he leapt off the couch. “Do you have any idea how many guys would kill for the kind of fuckin’ attention you’re gettin’ right now?”

Goldie flinched, but he refused to budge, glaring angrily down at Florence as he shouted right in his face. He half-expected Day to come flying out of the bedroom with the damn shower liner and right at the moment, he wasn’t sure if he would have stopped him.

“Everybody’s wanting you in the Hall of Fame, to come out and commentate on matches, to host pregame shows!” Florence raged on. “Hell, there’s even people talkin’ about you getting back in the ring! You know as good as me that nobody gets second chances in this industry,”