Karl and I are pleased to give New Pop Lit readers a special story today: The Unshakable Kayfabe of Tommy Rage, by Alaska-based writer Andrea Gregovich.

Ms Gregovich’s sharp story about amateur-wrestling fandom will brighten your Post-Labor-Day week and inject a healthy dose of pop lit into your Wednesday. Enjoy!

That was the night the heat war between Danny and Sergeant Smackdown culminated in a knockout barb from Smackdown. As Danny stood at the base of the ring, barking wicked old school chants through his hands in the form of a megaphone, Smackdown issued his knockout barb: “I should buy you a saddle for Christmas so you can ride my dick.” The poetics of the thing rendered us all speechless, blinking and mouths agape for a moment on the white plastic patio chairs as Smackdown stood in the ring in his tattered camo pants, basking in the yellowish glow of the crappy spotlights they had rigged up in there and the brilliance of the thing he’d said against the background of his death metal entrance music.