#seth did just eat him up on the mic but WHATEVER!!!!! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

waywardscorpio · 3 years

Text

Chapter 4: You're Our Omega, And We're Your Alphas

Tag list: @callmekda @braunstrowmangirl @phoenixoffiretwo @luna-loo @scuzmunkie @fanfiction-san @omg-im-such-a-masochist

*Dean's POV*

Y/N's now six months along in the pregnancy. I was pacing the locker room lost in my thoughts, until Y/N, snaps me out of it. "Dean?" She calls out from the door of the locker room, with one hand on her belly and the other on her hip. "Yes, Baby Doll?" I replied looking at her. "I'm hungry. I want jalapeno cheetos and yogurt." She said waddling over to me carefully. "In my duffle bag is some cheetos you like, and the yogurt is in the fridge over there, Baby Girl." I replied to her as I held her hips and kiss her softly. She smiled kissing back. "Thank you, Daddy." She said softly to me so, only I hear it.

"You're welcome, Baby Doll." I replied. There was a knock on the door. "Who is it?" I called out. "Nia and Randy." Randy calls back. "Come in." I said to them. "Hey." They said as they walked into the room. "Hey. What's up?" I asked. "Nia and I, are coming to watch over Y/N." Randy said. "Okay. She is not to leave either of your sides." I said as I finished taping my wrists off for my match. Nia nods her head. "We know Dean. I will not let her out of my sight. Someone tries to hurt her I'll break the bones." Nia said. "Good." I replied as Y/N absentmindedly watched videos and ate her food. I kissed her forehead before I went to leave for my match tonight.

*Little time skip*

After my match with Baron, i walked to my locker room and seen Y/N, sleeping and Randy and Nia talking quietly. Y/N stirs in her sleep whimpering a little. Knowing the reason she is stirring I lay my hand softly on her belly humming to sooth the pups movements. After a minute the pups relax and Y/N stops stirring and whimpering. Her eyes flutter open as she looks at me "Thank you" she whispers softly before drifting back off to sleep. "You're welcome, Baby Doll." I whisper to her. I look over at Randy and Nia. "What are y'all talking about?" I asked them as I stood up and walked over to them. "Randy here is wanting to court a female but can't figure out how what to get her" Nia said to me as she looks at me." I looked at Randy "What is one thing that she loves more than anything?" I asked him as I sat down and talked with them. "She loves to draw, dance, take photographs" Randy replies to me. "Okay. Why don't you buy her one of them computers that will allow her to record videos, has the pen and apps to draw, a camera to take as many photo's her little heart desires." I offered. "Thank you, I just said that to him" Nia said. "You can also get it in her favorite color(s) too." Nia said. "It won't be cheesy will it?" Randy asked us. "No, it won't but, even if it is, it's the thought that counts." Nia said. "I agree with Nia. The courting gift that I picked out for Y/N, was a necklace with a little teddy bear and ice cream pendants on it. She loved it and wears it still to this day." I said to him.

"Thanks you too" Randy said to me. "You're welcome" Me and Nia said at the same time to Randy. "So, who's all coming to the baby's shower?" Nia asked me. "Well for a sure note so, far it is going to be, You and Randy, Lana, Rusev, Me, Roman, Seth, some of the other wrestlers and divas will be there as well. Y/N invited her family and friends outside of the wwe as did me and the guys did. Y/N wasn't leaving her friends that has been like family to her since she's been here." I said. Nia smiled as she nods. "You okay?" Randy asks. "Yeah just hoping I'll be a good father." i said to them as I turned my head to check on Y/N before I turned back to Randy and Nia. "You will be Dean" I heard a small voice say. I turn my head to the voice and it was Y/N, sitting up on the couch rubbing her eyes softly. "I'm sorry, Baby Doll. I didn't mean to wake you up." I said to her as I watched her get up and waddle over to me to sit on my lap. "No, Daddy it's okay." Y/N said to me as she snuggles into me.

Roman and Seth, walked into the room and looks at us. "Wrapped around her finger" Roman whispered to Seth. "I heard that. And I won't argue with the statement either. I don't care that I am wrapped around her finger." I said to them. Nia and Randy just chuckled as they stood up. "We're going shopping to get stuff for the Baby shower." Nia said. "Rusev, and a few of the others will meet us at the huge mall" Randy said to us. "What happened between him and Lana." Nia asked Randy. "Lana divorced him for another alpha."

I looked down at Y/N, as she was eating her food while looking at her Tumblr. I smiled seeing her happy and relaxed for once and not upset and scared. She went from lookin' at Tumblr to lookin' at Wish. I knew she wanted something by the fact she would pout at me and show me what she was looking at. I pulled out my wallet, an handed her my credit card. "Get whatever you want Baby Doll." I said to her. Triple H walked in and seen what I did and chuckles. "She definitely gets what she wants." Roman nods. "He doesn't tell her no" He said. Y/N, giggles softly. "Nope, I don't tell her no. If she wants something she gets it." I said to everyone. "Told you." Randy, said to Seth. Seth, grumbles and hands Randy, fifty dollars. "Alright Baby Doll, I have to go get ready for my match." I said as I softly set Y/N, down. She whines softly "Nooooo." I frown a little "I promise, I'm coming back as soon as I am done with my match."

"Okay." She said. I hated leaving her side but I still had a job to do. I give her a kiss on the lips before I walked to the gorilla pen. "Here is your number one contender for the Wwe world heavy weight championship. Dean Ambrose!!!!" Jillian announced. I walked out to the ring with a firm glare set on my face. I knew this was going to be a long match because I was going against, Matt Hardy. He is one hell of a fighter and neither one of us get along with the other all that great.

As the match went on me and Matt were both bloody. I was able to get him with Dirty Deeds. "1...2...3... and your new champion is Dean Ambrose." The ring announcer says threw the mic. I walk up the ramp backwards holding the title up in my hands smirking evily.

I walk behind the curtain and walk down the corridor to my assigned locker room. I hear shouting and stuff crashing. I ran into the room seeing Y/N, hiding and Rusev and Bobby Lashley going at it while Seth and Roman are protecting Y/N, by standing in between her and them. "What the fuck is going on?" I yelled. "Bobby started it with Rusev." Nia said. Nia and Randy are trying to break them up. Bobby throws a vase at Rusev who ducks and it hits the wall beside Y/N's head. Dean dropped his belt and grabs Bobby, and throws him. "Now you fucked up you son of a bitch" I scream heated as I swing on Bobby. Y/N was shaking and crying. Seth picked her up checking her. He seen her hand is cut from accidently setting her hand on it trying to push against the wall to hide from all the yelling, and she was bleeding on the cheek from the glass bouncing off the wall. "Roman she has glass in her hand and cheek" Seth said. Roman's eyes went wide and he growls and pulls me away and grabs, Bobby himself. "Your my next match next week. I'm gonna show you what pain feels like" He said throwing Bobby, out the room and drags him to Triple H where him and The Rock was talking. They look at him and he tells them what happened. The Rock, growled "Make that a tag team match." He didn't like Alphas messing with other Alphas ladies or them causing harm to females.

"I will go announce it tonight at the end of the show." Triple H, said to Roman. Roman nods walking back not seeing us because we had took Y/N, to the infirmary. Roman panicked and only got angrier. "Y/N!!!!" He said looking for Y/N, Seth and Dean up and down hallways and locker rooms. Y/N, jumps hearing Roman yell for her. "Roman's mad." She whimpers softly looking at Seth. "Shhh it's okay. I'll go get him and let him know you're safe." Seth said to her softly kissing her cheek that wasn't cut. I held Y/N's, hand while Seth, went to find Roman. "Hey, she is okay just a small little cut on the cheek and the palm of her hand." Seth told Roman. "No, one came and fucking told me she was being taken to the infirmary." He said enraged by the fact no, one told him that Y/N, was going to the infirmary. "Calm down, Roman. We just wanted to make sure she was okay and not seriously hurt." Seth said to Roman. "And I'm her mate I should know too." He yells. "Okay, next time we will tell you. Please calm down. Y/N, can feel your anger and it is upsetting her." Seth adds as he looks at Roman. Roman rubs his hand down his face sighing. "Okay. I am calm. Now can I go see her?" Roman asked. Seth steps out of his way to let him by. Roman walked into the infirmary where Y/N, was at sitting on the edge of the bed and I was between her legs comforting her. "Daddy Roman!" She said reaching for him. He looks at her and walked over kissing her lips resting his head on hers. "I'm sorry Princess, for upsetting you." Roman said apologizing to her. She snuggles into him. "It's okay. You were worried about us. I understand, Daddy." She said. "I love you, Daddy." She whispered to him. "I love you, Princess." Y/N, smiles softly at his words until she whimpers seeing someone walk in.

"Oh look the big dog has been tamed by the little bitch." Dolph said laughing as he looks at Roman. "What did you just say about them?" I said to him. "I called her a Little bitch." He repeated. Roman growls pulling away from Y/N, making her whimper and reach for Roman. "She isn't no, such thing. She is beautiful and smart." Roman said. His eyes changed to a fiery red. "What's wrong Big Dog? Your lesh being pulled to tame you some more." Dolph said. "You can say what you want about me. But, you leave Y/N, the fuck alone." He said punching him in the jaw hard. Y/N, watched what was happening. I picked up Y/N, and carried her out as Seth pulled Roman, off Dolph. "Come on Roman, stop before you get arrested." Seth said as he pushes Roman back. "I don't care. No, one calls Princess, a Little Bitch." He said to him as he looks at him. "But beating him almost to death isn't gonna do anything either. Roman roars and throws stuff starting to get everyone's attention. "Roman you need to calm down." Seth said, to him. I knew Roman would calm down if Y/N, was there to sooth his angry Alpha side. "Okay I wanna help him. Take me to Daddy Roman, please?" She said reading my mind. I nodded my head carrying her. "Okay Baby." I set her on her feet as she makes slow steps towards Roman. He felt her presents and swiftly turns to her, eyes still red. "Daddy, its me. Your Princess. Y/N" She said softly reaching her hand up to touch his cheek. He growls a little but not to scare her. He wraps his arms around her waist pulling her close to him. "Shhh relax. It's okay. I'm okay, and I am safe." She said soothing the angry Alpha. He placed his head on her shoulder nudging her neck softly with his nose which earned a small mewl from Y/n's, lips.

I watched relieved that he calmed down. I hated seeing my brothers upset. Me, Roman, and Seth were like brothers.

#wwe fanfiction #wwe raw #wwe smackdown #wwe nxt #abo #stephanie mcmahon #triple h #wwe x reader smut #wwe the shield x reader #x reader #fanfic #wwe x reader

63 notes · View notes

illfoandillfie · 4 years

Text

5 Simple Rules for a Successful Fake Relationship: One Small Hitch

READ PART 1

Pairing: Ben Hardy x Reader

summery: You and Ben have your first official date and settle into your "relationship". But, with filming coming to a close, you'll need to be more committed to the act than before, especially when Ben's keeping secrets.

Warnings: Again, nothing much. Some language. Drinking. Nothing else I can think of.

Words: 8355

AN: Chapter 2 is finally here! Sorry for the delay but hopefully the next part will be up faster. I'm really really enjoying writing this series and I am so very excited about what's coming! The song mentioned is Reckless Serenade by Arctic Monkeys. Sidenote: Can anyone work out the theme of the chapter titles?

Taglist: @laedymoon @dtfrogertaylor @vee-ndetta @atomic-watermelon @kellypenac @labessieisallama @deakyclicks @jennyggggrrr @drowseoftaylor @hannafuckingsucks @i-cant-hangout-im-drumming @queenmylovely @supersonicfreddie

“I’ve got something for you,” you half shouted at Ben when you saw him walking towards you from across the field you were filming in. You shuffled your shitty takeaway coffee into your other hand so you could reach into your bag, pulling out a piece of paper folded in half. He took it and pulled you into a hug, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. “Funny cause I have something for you too,” Ben said as he let you go, reaching into his backpack and handing you a magazine, “Oh, shit, it’s our rules. You want page 15 by the way.” “Figured you’d want a record of them. What exactly am I looking f-” you let the word hang as you found the right page. It was decorated with a photo of you and Ben kissing on his doorstep, his hand around your back, the shirt you’d borrowed riding up just enough that it was clear you didn’t have shorts on underneath as you clutched at him. There was some text beside it, mentions of your most notable roles and his, a brief description of the movie you were in the process of making, and some speculatory remarks with a couple of innuendos thrown in. The usual gossip mag fare. On the other side of the paragraph was another photo, both of you leaving set the previous Friday, hand in hand and smiling. “We look pretty good together,” you laughed, getting only a noncommittal grunt in return. He’d suddenly become very interested in the sheet you’d handed him, staring at it like he hadn’t been there when it was written. You reread the brief article, trying not to gawk at the photographs. It certainly looked believable. “I’ve had about four people wish us well this morning,” Ben suddenly said, seemingly pulling himself together, folding up the rules and shoving them into his back pocket, “and I’ve not been here long. It’s kinda weird having everyone know we’re together. Or think we’re together,” he quickly corrected himself. “Yeah, Mel kept asking me questions about it while she was doing my makeup this morning, so I hope she took my awkwardness as me wanting to keep things private and not me not knowing how to answer some of them.” Ben chuckled, “yeah, Gail gave me a bit of a grilling too. I just told her we’d been sort of seeing each other for a few weeks and had only just like made it official or whatever and she seemed to buy it.” “Good, I told Mel the same sort of thing. Hopefully that’s enough for them.” “I’m more concerned with what my friends are going to say. I don’t think any of them read Heat though so hopefully it doesn’t come up any time soon,” “Lucky. My friend Felicity has the dumb site bookmarked. Checks it religiously. Bloody miracle she hasn’t called yet.” “Better turn of your phone then,” “And come back to a full voicemail and about a hundred texts demanding to know why I’m ghosting her?” “Tell her you were filming. I do it all the time,” he was grinning at you and you couldn’t help but grin back as you pulled your phone out and shut it off, “atta girl,” he pulled you into his side and gave you an affectionate squeeze that you leaned into , fully aware of how many people were around you, potentially watching. It was a feeling that didn’t really let up. You knew, rationally, that everyone there was focused on their jobs, but you couldn’t help feeling like you were constantly being scrutinised, and not just for your acting. It didn’t help when Seth had to stop recording to fix a problem with the boom mic and, good-humouredly, said, “don’t worry lovebirds, we’ll have her running in a second.” Or that one of the ADs delivered your call sheets for the next day with a, “I always thought you’d be cute together.” And it certainly didn’t help when you turned your phone on at the end of the day to find a series of texts from Felicity each with more exclamation points and capital letters than the last, and a missed call from Mary. “Better call her back,” Ben said, following you towards the carpark. You rolled your eyes, already holding the phone up to your ear listening to it ring. “Y/N, I was just about to try you again,” “Sorry, Mary, I had my phone off while we were recording, what’s the matter?” “Are you free this weekend?” “Um yeah, I think so, why?” “We’d like for you and Ben to go on a date this weekend. Somewhere in London preferably but it’s up to you. You saw the article in Heat? It seems to be going well. The hits your names have got on google have increased and there have been a few tweets about it. Nothing huge, you’re not trending or anything but you’re still relatively unknown so we weren’t expecting that to happen, certainly not overnight. But we think if we get a date story out quickly it’ll really help get people interested.” You rubbed your temple as you tried to process everything she’d just said, “Okay, I’ll talk to him and we’ll organise something. I’ll text you the details once I have them.” “Okay, let me know as soon as you can though. And send Peter the info too.” “Will do. See ya Mary.” “Was that about me?” Ben asked, smiling as he leaned against your car. “You up for a date this weekend? Apparently the first story went well and they want a follow up ASAP.” “Sure, where are we going?” “I don’t know, somewhere around London would apparently be best, but we get to choose. Any thoughts?” He thought for a moment, “This isn’t our first date is it? Like, we’ve said we’ve been on others before, right?” “Yeah, why?” “Well normally for a first date I take girls out for dinner and then, depending on the girl and how the dinner went, either a quiet drink or like a romantic as fuck walk in the park or something.” “That’s pretty standard stuff, Ben,” “Yeah, but in the fiction of us as a couple, this isn’t our first date. This’d be, what?” “Fifth maybe?” “Fifth. So I’m still trying to impress you a bit, but it’s like, more relaxed. We’ve done the dinner date, we’ve done coffee and a movie, we’ve even done the Museum. Now we’re getting into the fun shit.” “Museums don’t count as fun shit?” you chuckled, not sure where his train of thought was taking you. “It’s a bit overdone is all.” “What do you have in mind then?” “There’s this place that runs art classes during the day, right? Life drawing or like painting for beginner's type stuff. But a couple of nights a week they run these art and wine nights. They’ll give you a canvas or a ceramic figure or something like that and some paints and you can have a few drinks and do something arty. I did it with some mates a while ago, had heaps of fun. Seemed like the sort of thing yo- a girl might like to do on a date.” “That definitely sound fun.” “Really? You’re into it?” “Yeah, for sure.” “Okay,” Ben pulled out his phone and began typing, “shall I book us in for the Saturday night ceramics session?” “Go ahead. What time was that, so I can let Mary and Peter know.” “Seven thirty. If we get a cab in a little earlier we can grab something to eat on our way.” “Cool, okay I’ll text them. Is it BYO?” “Yeah. They do sell some stuff but it’s a pretty small selection.” “Okay, well that’s something to look forward to. Anyway, I should be going since I have about a million texts to sort through, I’ll see you tomorrow.” “Wait, one thing,” Ben said before you could open your car door, “There’s a few people coming off set now so I’m going to kiss you, okay?” “Thanks for the heads up,” “No worries,” he stepped closer, his hand rising to cup your cheek as he kissed you softly. He took longer to break away than you’d expected, letting the kiss deepen instead, but you didn’t mind too much. It was a good kiss. And if it hadn’t been for Ben and the movie, you would have been severely lacking them recently. Which explained the vague feeling of disappointment that hit you when he did step back.

On your way home your phone beeped with another text from Felicity but you ignored it until you were inside and changed into the comfiest clothes you could find, flopping down on your bed to scroll through what she’d written. They varied from, “omg why didn’t you tell me about this Ben guy?” to “Y/N!!! Answer my texts!!!” all the way up to, “BITCH!!! CALL ME!!!!” She picked up on the first ring. “Where the fuck have you been all day?” “Some of us don’t have office jobs we hate,” you laughed, “I actually had to work, funnily enough, and because we were on location I had to keep my phone off while we recorded.” “Well I’ve been going crazy over here. Imagine my shock when I boot up my computer and open Heat and see your fucking arse being grabbed by your co-star.” “He was not grabbing my arse.” “Close enough. You didn’t tell me how fucking gorgeous he is.” “No, well, I don’t usually think about the people I work with like that, do I?” “Which is why I was so surprised to see you’ve shacked up with one of them.” “It’s not quite that serious.” “One night stands aren’t your usual thing. Definitely not with guys you work with anyway.” “I never said it was a one night stand, just that it wasn’t super serious!” “How many times then?” “We’ve been on like four dates.” “You fuckhead! You mean to tell me you’re actually dating this guy, who by the way looks like he could be a fucking underwear model, and you didn’t think to tell me? No so much as a I got dicked down by a total babe aren’t you jealous message?” “I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it if it wasn’t going to go anywhere.” “But still, I’m your best friend, I tell you about every shag I have.” “In graphic detail,” “Exactly.” “Look it’s just a bit weird still. Neither of us have really hooked up with a co-star before and we didn’t want to say anything until we worked out what was happening.” “I guess that makes sense,” you could tell she didn’t mean it, “But, now that it’s out you owe me. I want to hear all about it.” “There’s not much to tell. We became quite good friends during all the pre-production stuff when we were rehearsing and all that. Our director wanted to make sure we clicked and had the right chemistry and stuff, since it’s a romcom and our characters get engaged in the first scene, so we hung out a lot. And then just before filming started he asked me out. Took me to this nice Chinese restaurant. It was fun so we agreed to go out again and it’s sort of just kept going.” “Those photos, was that the first time you’d stayed over at his?” “Second. First time was a couple of weeks ago. The night that led to the photos was just a few drinks after work with some of the others and we ended up ducking out a bit early and wound up at his.” “And?” “And what?” You had a hard time not laughing when you heard her groan. Her eagerness to know every sordid detail made her easy to fuck with, and that made the whole business of being secretive a lot more fun. “And, how was he?” “I mean…y’know,” “Y/N, I swear to god,” “He was good, okay? Really good,” you remembered what Ben had told you to say, trying not to laugh too much while you repeated it, “like, three orgasms good.” “Shit, really?” “Uhuh. And then another in the morning.” Felicity replied with a long whistle, “shit, girl, hold onto that one then. That’s definitely worth any trouble working together could cause." “Believe me, I know. We’re going out again this weekend.” It was surprisingly easy to lie about dating Ben. Though, of course, you weren’t technically lying since you would be going on a date. “Shit man, date five. That’s serious shit. You better tell me everything, in graphic detail.”

When you told Ben about the conversation the next day, admitting you’d spent ages praising his sexual prowess, he laughed and then thanked you, pulling you into a tight bear hug. You thought it was a slight overreaction considering he’d been the one to tell you what to say but his happiness was infectious, and you found yourself smiling more than normal as you hung out between scenes. An attitude which could only help your performance, making people more ready to believe you were a couple. His easy laughter and bright smiles continued until the afternoon when you were telling him more about Felicity and what you’d talked about. “She thinks you’re a keeper and kept telling me not to let you go.” “Your friend knows what she’s talking about.” “Lucky for you I can’t let you go since it’s all written up in a contract,” Ben laughed but when you glanced at him his smile seemed to falter. “You okay?” “Brilliant. Just had a bit of a late night and it’s catching up on me. Think I might try to have a quick nap before we’re needed again.” “I was thinking of grabbing another coffee if you want one?” “Thanks Y/N but I think the nap will do me more good.” “Probably better people don’t see us heading off to a trailer together anyway or they’ll suspect we’re getting up to mischief.” “Very true. I’ll see you a bit later.” “Sleep well!” Ben turned to leave, his smile seeming more forced than earlier. You would have worried except he seemed to be back to normal when he was called for your next scene. And it continued on through the week, his happiness only getting more pronounced the closer it got to the weekend.

You couldn’t quite match his energy on Friday, anxiety over your date getting stronger the closer you got to it. Hanging out at his place had been easy, even if it did include leaving half dressed. All you’d had to do was kiss him which you’d done enough times during filming that it was no longer too odd. But a proper date was something else. It was going to be the first real test you faced, the first time you’d really have to sell yourselves to the public as more than co-stars and more than a hook-up. “Hey are you okay?” “Huh?” “Your jiggling your leg a lot which you only do when something’s worrying you, what is it?” “Oh,” you forced your leg to stop moving, “nothing,” “Is it about our date tonight?” “What if it’s bad? What if we don’t look like we’re actually together and Mary and Pete have to cancel the whole thing?” “I’d get a decent night sleep not thinking about us,” he muttered. “What?” “I’ve been worried about it too,” he said louder, “but I think we’ll be okay. It’s not like we’ll be starved for conversation and we’ll have the paint and the wine and we’ll be fine. Plus, weren’t you the one who said this would be easy?” “Yeah I was,” you said sheepishly, “but -” “No buts. It’ll be a piece of cake. We go and have a good time painting a couple of plates or bowls or whatever, and then hold hands while we head home. They’ll get whatever shots they get, and they’ll spin it so we look like a couple.” “Yeah, you’re right. Sorry,” “It’s okay,” he reached out to rub the back of your hand, smiling softly at you, “the nerves might actually help you look like you’re legit. And worst comes to worst we can always run lines. I’m honestly so much more nervous about shooting that scene tomorrow.” “The one where we’re playing matchmaker?” “Yes! Have you seen how many names are in there?” “Theres like six, Ben,” “Yeah but they’re all repeated, and I know I’m going to get the order wrong,” You giggled and shook your head, “You’re unbelievable,” “Oh whatever,” he pushed your shoulder almost making you overbalance, “Just cos you know the lines already.”

Ben’s efforts to calm you down worked and you got through the rest of the workday without a hitch. Though your stomach was once again tight with nerves in the hours before the date. You spent a solid half hour standing in front of your wardrobe, freshly washed hair slowly dripping down the back of the towel you had wrapped around you, trying to settle on what to wear. When you were finally dressed you checked and rechecked the contents of your purse, and, in a moment of panic, you grabbed the heavily highlighted and notated script pages with the matchmaker scene and shoved them in beside your lipstick and bank card. By the time Ben arrived in an Uber to pick you up, ushering you into the backseat with a kiss on the cheek and a complement about how lovely you looked, you felt like you were on the verge of throwing up. But, once again, Ben’s natural charm eased your mind. The way he talked to you and smiled constantly had your heart rate slowing and your stomach settling within minutes. Even the way he squeezed your hand when he helped you out of the car, and the way he laced his fingers with yours as he led you towards your destination were welcome comforts. “D’you wanna grab something to eat?” Ben asked, stopping on a corner and looking around, annoyed people passing by on both sides. “Uhh, s’pose so.” “Has anyone ever told you you’re indecisive?” “I swear I’m not normally.” “Oh? Do I make you nervous, snookum?” he asked, playfully. “No, you git,” you laughed back, though you found it hard to meet his eyes, “I just don’t know I’m that hungry.” “Well, keep in mind there’ll be wine drinking. Don’t want to do that on an empty stomach.” “Valid argument. What’s nearby?” After some wandering you ended up in a McDonalds, Ben wolfing down a burger while you picked at the fries, not quite certain you’d be able to keep your food down. It was when you were coming out of a bottle shop, Ben holding the wine you’d agreed on, that you spotted the photographer. It was the same one who’d been outside Ben’s house when you stayed over, camera aimed at the two of you. Quietly you nudged Ben. He just wrapped an arm around you, pulling you into his side as you walked. You struggled to not watch the photographer as he followed you towards the art studio, having to keep reminding yourself to pretend he wasn’t there. “Relax,” Ben said softly in your ear, “He’s not important.” You nodded, afraid if you said anything you’d lose the meagre dinner you’d had. Ben’s thumb rubbing over your own gave you something else to focus on, counting each soft, smooth stroke, until you reached the right place.

You weren’t the only couple there, far from it. Most of the claimed tables were taken by pairs sitting close together, hands clasped or laying on thighs as they talked. A few tables held larger groups, double dates maybe or perhaps just friends. You felt a few eyes on you as you found a table close to the clear glass of the shopfront, but they turned away again quickly, more interested in their own little bubbles than yours. You glanced outside to check if the photographer was still there but couldn’t see much more than the reflection of you and Ben. His knee bumped yours under the table as he leaned toward you, pressing a finger to your jaw to turn your head towards him. “Forget the photographer. Forget Mary and Peter. Forget our arrangement. We're just two friends having a fun night out, okay?” “Okay,” “Okay. So what are you thinking of painting then?” He unscrewed the bottle of wine and grabbed one of the glasses you’d been handed on arrival. “Well what are my options?” “Well there’s your classic teacup, mug or plate options. There’s a couple of different jewellery boxes, I think. And then there are the statues, ummm, fairy, dragon, alien. Maybe a princess one, I can’t remember.” “More than I thought there’d be. What were you thinking?” “I did a dragon last time I was here. But I think I’m going to do a mug this time. Need some extras if you’re gonna be staying over more often.” “Maybe we should both do mugs, then? Something we can use at each other’s places.” “Alright, deal. But we can’t look at what the other is painting until they’re done.” “That’s going to be so hard!” you laughed, feeling properly relaxed for the first time all night. “Yeah but it’ll be fun though. Wait here, I’ll go grab us the mugs.” You took the opportunity to look around the room, trying to think of what Ben might like on a mug. There was art everywhere – paintings hanging on walls, examples of what the classes could teach you, decorated ceramics lining windowsills and shelves. Judging by the wildly differing levels of talent displayed, you assumed at least some of them were left behind and never claimed. There were plates decorated with fruit trees and ocean scenes, jugs covered in splatters of different colours, aliens in shimmery blue and princesses with green hair and orange dresses. But nothing that sparked your imagination. The noise of the room was steadily growing as everyone got stuck into their creations. Ben sat down, took a drink and got to work mixing colours. “You know what you’re going to do then?” “I have an idea. But I will warn you I’m not a particularly good artist so it might not look anything like what it’s meant to.” You picked up your blank mug and put it down again, tapping the end of a paintbrush against the table as you tried to come up with an idea. What did Ben like? He liked coffee. And dogs. And his guitar. More than once he’d brought it to set, playing it in his downtime. He’d been embarrassed the first time you mentioned overhearing him as you passed by his trailer, but you’d assured him you’d liked listening to him. You’d had the song stuck in your head for a week afterwards. “Made up your mind, have you?” Ben asked, glancing up from his handiwork as you mixed a pale peach colour. “No peeking,” “I wasn’t peeking. If I’d been peeking, I would have done this,” Ben craned his neck, leaning over to where your mug was. You laughed and pulled the mug closer to you, pushing him away with your other hand. He caught it in his own, taking the paintbrush from you, “Oi, careful with that.” “Oops, sorry,” Ben laughed and kissed your palm before letting you have your hand back, “No harm done. But y’know if you splattered me I’d have no choice but to get payback.” There was no need to reach for the script you’d brought as you and Ben fell into conversation while you painted. He asked if you’d had any more awkward phone calls with your friends and told you about what had happened when his mates had found out. Nothing like the conversation you’d endured, though there’d been plenty of teasing. You had to admonish him for nearly getting paint on your work when he began using the largest brush he had to artistically spray drops of paint over his mug. And then he’d laughed when you paused, admitting out loud that you weren’t actually sure how to paint the thing you’d planned on painting. He’d promised not to peek while you whipped out your phone to look up a reference image, going to far as to cover his eyes just to make sure. Once you gave him the okay he went back to painting, switching to a thinner brush and shushing you so he could concentrate. It was ridiculous how cute he looked, tongue between his teeth, bent over the mug as he slowly outlined the design. You shook your head to clear the thought and went back to your own work.

“Okay, I’m done. You wanna see now?” “Yes, absolutely. Unless you think we should wait until after they’ve been glazed?” “Fuck that, we can’t pick them up for a couple of days, I wanna show you now.” “Alright, show me then,” you put down your brush, focusing all your attention onto the mug in Ben’s hands. The base coat was a light purple, with splatters of darker purple over top. Slowly he turned the mug to show you the design on the front. It bore a slightly wonky engagement ring, similar to the one his character gave yours in the movie. On either side of the ring, in thin, not quite straight lettering, was the words we’re really good at this dating thing. You smiled as soon as you read the quote from the script, “I love it, Ben” “Thought it was kind of fitting,” he chuckled, “plus it’ll be a nice little souvenir once the movie wraps.” “That was a fun scene to shoot. Best proposal I’ve ever had.” Ben smiled and carefully turned his mug back towards him, “Best proposal I’ve ever given,” He seemed to be about to say something but stopped himself, shaking his head. You lowered your voice, “Promise I’ll get to keep it after we break up?” “Promise,” Ben said, matching your level and leaning in close, “Until then maybe you can use it as a reminder whenever you feel anxious about this whole dating thing.” “Thanks, I will.” You were suddenly very aware of how softly you were speaking, how close you were sitting, leaning in to hear each other over the rest of the room, and for a split second you thought he was going to kiss you again. But then the moment passed, the noise of the room intruding as Ben leaned back in his seat, “So do I get to see mine?” “Uh, it’s not quite done,” you said, picking up your brush again, the moment gone, “give me another couple of minutes.” “Masterpieces take time, I get it,” “This is by no stretch a masterpiece,” “I’ll be the judge of that thanks very much,” Ben turned to look out over the room while you tried to finish your painting without smudging anything, occasionally making comments about other people there or the art that decorated the room. You took one last look at what you’d painted, the guitar with the words stun gun lullaby written in cursive beside it, “Alright, I’m done now, you can look. Careful, some of it’s still wet.” Ben gently took hold of the handle and turned the mug so the design faced him. He broke out into a grin and you felt relieved that he liked it. “It’s definitely a masterpiece. For someone who didn’t know how to draw a guitar you’ve done an incredible job. And how did you know that’s one of my favourite songs?” “Is it? It's just the song I overheard you playing that one time. I thought that line was a good one for a mug. Nice and short so I didn’t have to paint too much.” “This is definitely my new favourite mug.” “Oh stop it.” “And hey, they kind of match.” You laughed when he pointed out the similarities, “Guess they do. Y’know that’d make a pretty cute Instagram post.” “You going to tag me as my mug?” “Of course. You could post a photo and tag me in it too,” “I don’t know. I don’t really post much personal stuff online.” “Well at least comment on mine,” “I can do that.”

After you’d taken a decent photo and posted it online you cleaned up, handed your mugs over to the woman running the night’s activity and stepped back out into the night. There was no sign of the photographer anywhere and you supposed he’d got what he needed and then left. Still, Ben grabbed your hand as you walked back up the street, just in case you’d missed the photographer in the crowd. “Guess that means we don’t have to worry about going home together,” you said, nudging Ben. “Guess not,” his lips quirked down in a soft frown.” “What is it?” “Nothing, nothing, just...feels kind of weird to just end the date here, I guess,” he scratched the back of his head and laughed, “Normally I’d offer to give you a lift home. Or at least give you a good night kiss, but I guess that’s not really needed now.” “Well, it’s like you said, we’re just friends having a fun night out. We could share a ride home though, if you wanted. You live near enough to mine it wouldn’t matter.” “Nah, don’t worry about it. I actually might go grab something to eat, don’t think that burger was quite enough. See you on Monday?” “Oh, yeah, okay, see you Monday.” There was a pause, both of you hesitating and then Ben gave you a much too quick hug before he walked off, disappearing into the crowd. You sighed and hailed a passing cab, spending the whole ride home wondering what the hell had just happened. But you pushed it from your mind once you were home, going through your usual nightly routine and very deliberately thinking of anything other than Ben. It didn’t help much. You still dreamt about him. Dreamt about the goodnight kiss you’d missed out on.

When you woke you had to laugh at yourself. You were sure that, had you binged a few episodes of a tv show or read something before you’d gone to bed you would have dreamt about it instead. Brains were suggestable like that. When you felt awake enough you rolled over and grabbed your phone finding a text from Ben and one from Felicity and an email from Mary. You opened Mary’s first, skimming over it and vowing to look at it properly once you had a coffee in your system. Ben’s was much easier to understand, a short message to say he had fun last night and that he’d pick the mugs up on his way to work on Monday. Felicity’s was just a series of question marks. You sent back a short response saying the date had been a lot of fun. It wasn’t enough and she was bound to come back at you asking for more details, but it would have to satisfy her. Slowly you got out of bed and made yourself a coffee, setting your laptop up next to you at the kitchen counter so you could try to read Mary’s email again. There was some information about some scripts she was going to send you, a couple of potential future roles, but the majority of the email was about you and Ben. She’d already seen the photos, apparently, and some of them would be run in the coming week’s magazine while others were being put online. She’d also seen the Instagram post and commended you for thinking of it. Another date would have to be organised, but it was better to wait until the next weekend or even the one after, so as not to fatigue the public.

So you and Ben fell into the routine of it. An email from one or other of your agents sometimes as vague as just telling you to organise a date, sometimes much more specific in what they wanted you to be doing, then the date itself, and in between work where you played up the romance as much as possible. You got good at pretending to stay over at each other's places, often just hanging out watching TV or running lines until the photographer called it a night and you were free to leave. Once or twice you’d opted to sleep in your own bed but get up early and head over to Ben’s for the required morning after shots but that process got old very quickly so you ended up actually staying over more and more. There was one day when your period came unexpectedly while you were at Ben’s. You were halfway through asking him to take you home when he offered to run to the store for you instead. “No, no, you don’t have to go out of your way like that, I’ve got plenty at home I just didn’t think I’d need any today.” “Y/N, I promise, it’s no trouble. I feel bad I don’t have anything here for you already. Been a while since I’ve lived with a girl and it didn’t even cross my mind. Seriously, it’ll take me two minutes.” When you still weren’t convinced he continued, “Plus, if I go we won’t ruin Peter and Mary’s plan for today. And the Paps can get a shot of me staring at boxes of tampons like a good caring boyfriend. It’ll help our image.” “Oh alright, as long as you don’t mind.” He was out the door a second later and back within ten minutes, though you did get a call from him at the shop, asking what brand you preferred. Once he was home, he made you a cup of tea, gave you a painkiller and, after checking you didn’t mind, cuddled up with you on the couch, teasingly calling you his cuddle bunny as he pulled you back against his chest. You almost complained, almost cited Rule 5, but it wasn’t so bad. Some might even go so far as to call it cute. It was better than snookum at any rate.

The dates themselves got easier after the first. You knew what to expect now so it wasn’t as nerve wracking as before. And Ben was always fun to be around, your list of inside jokes steadily growing as he became the one person you spent the most time with. You let yourselves relax a bit. On your third date Ben’s arm stayed glued around your waist as you walked around the zoo, only losing contact when a lemur jumped on his shoulder and you stepped back to take a photo. It wasn’t low enough to violate the rules you’d put in place but his hand was dangerously close to falling below your belt, and it was definitely something you would have put a stop to when you first started the charade. The Instagram posts had got more frequent too, though Ben still refused to post anything to his own profile. But he commented on everything you posted whether it involved him or not. And people were buying it. You’d been moved from page 15 to page 13 and then to page 10 in the magazines. You both picked up more followers online as your photos were shared across Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr. There were some downsides like rude comments and nasty messages but mostly they were easy to ignore. Worse were the phone calls and messages from family members and friends asking when they’d get to meet Ben. He’d had to fend off his own family as well, but you both stuck to Rule 4, making up excuses and promising it would happen eventually, but it just wasn’t possible right now. But your biggest problem was the issue of intimacy. It wasn’t the lack of sex itself, that was easily managed. It was that Ben had started to intrude on your fantasies. You’d be there with your fingers or your toys and suddenly it was Ben’s voice you were thinking of, Ben’s hands, Ben’s teeth and tongue and chest. Ben’s name falling from your lips. And you knew it was just because you were pretending to date him, on and off set. It was the dumb suggestable brain thing again. The thoughts were only there because you were pretending to be in love with him and usually sex was tied up with love or at least relationships. And really, you hadn’t been attracted to anyone much lately because you hadn’t been looking because you’d been pretending to be attracted to Ben so it’s really no wonder you’re brain got all confused and mixed him into those other thoughts. The first time you saw him after it first happened you wondered if he could tell, a slightly flustered awkwardness hanging over you. But it wasn’t worth mentioning to anyone. You just vowed to push him out of your mind as much as you could.

Nearly two months later you found yourselves back in the office where the idea of pretending to date was first floated. With filming drawing to a close Mary and Peter were keen to check in with you. The first thing either of them said when you and Ben turned up is how well the story was going. “Projections have the sales for this movie increased by five percent, just because of your relationship and that number is expected to grow as we get closer to release,” Mary spoke fast though whether that was excitement at the boosted numbers or just a busy schedule rushing her along you weren’t sure. “What happens now?” Ben asked, “I mean, since we won’t be filming together anymore after this week,” “That’s exactly why we wanted to talk with you both today,” Peter opened a pocket notebook and thumbed through a couple of pages, “so not much will change but we may occasionally need to balance out the loss of on set photos with shots of you out and about together. Nothing stressful and all very easily staged. You probably wouldn’t even need to be out for more than an hour or so at a time. People have been loving the domestic sort of photos you’ve been putting online, Y/N, that one of you using the coffee mugs you painted was especially good. So we’d like a few more of those sorts of moments. The two of you grocery shopping or walking a dog, do either of you have a dog? No? Hmmm, we could hire a dog and write a story about you sitting for a friend. We’ll put a pin in that for now. But yes, just some candid shots of you walking around London and doing regular everyday things together.” “We’ll also need to schedule the argument soon. We’re thinking somewhere within the first two weeks of filming being over. It means we can run speculation about whether the relationship is on the rocks now that you aren’t working together anymore. We’ll see how things go this week and make some decisions later, but we’ll give you plenty of warning before you have to perform it. Obviously, it has to be scheduled so we can guarantee someone will get photos but we need it to seem as natual as possible so we’ll leave the specifics of the argument up to you.” You nodded along but Ben had more questions. “What does this mean for any jobs we might be looking at taking after this movie wraps?” “You can still take on whatever roles you want provided they’re filming here. It’s harder to keep you in the public eye if you’re separated and while the drama of a long-distance relationship might be interesting at first, it’s not sustainable.” “If it was filming somewhere else in the UK we could maybe organise something. We’d have to look into it and see if it was possible to stick to our same plan but just shift the location. Maybe have a weekend visit angle to it, Y/N flies out to see Ben, Ben comes home to see Y/N, that kind of thing.” “Leave it with us Ben and we’ll get back to you on the logistics of it all.” “Oh, that’s okay, I don’t have anything set in stone, I was just curious.” “Is there anything else you have questions about?” “No, I don’t think so,” He looked towards you. “No, I’m all good.” “Okay, well, if you think of anything you can message us any time.” “Really, though, this is going very well. It’s already paying off but we need to keep the momentum during the post-production phase, so we need you both to be committed to this.” “We are.” “Unbelievably committed,” Ben added.

You and Ben left the meeting joking about potential arguments you could have and for the rest of the day, whenever you passed each other in the halls or had a moment alone you’d try to one up each other's suggestions. It was a good way to keep your spirits up even though the end of filming was fast approaching. One by one each cast member recorded their last scenes, saying an emotional thank you to the crew when the director called cut. You and Ben were the last to finish since you were the leads. A small pillow talk scene that you could do in your sleep. It was a nice way to end it, lying in bed with Ben’s arms around you, even with the heat of the studio lights. While you were waiting for the cameras to be positioned you and Ben joked around with the crew that were flitting around angling mics and adjusting set decorations. “Hey, Seth,” Ben said suddenly, “can you pass me my phone. I think we need to document this moment. What d’you say, cuddle bunny?” You laughed and poked him in the side but agreed. Ben stuck his arm straight up into the air, trying to angle the camera just right but he couldn’t quite get the photo to take without blurring. Seth took pity on you and offered to take the photo himself, allowing you and Ben to snuggle in close. “If you post it on Insta you better credit me,” Set laughed, turning it round to show you. “I’ll do that,” He said with a smile, “It’s pretty cute, I think I have to post it.” “Really?” you asked, surprised he’d volunteer to do such a thing. Ben didn’t have a chance to respond because everything was ready to go. Seth put the phone back away so you could film the scene, laughing in between takes until everyone was satisfied. “That’s a wrap on Ben Hardy and Y/N Y/L/N everybody,” A round of applause started as you pushed yourself to sit up, trying to stop yourself from welling up. “And that’s a wrap on The Perfect Match.” The applause continued and Ben pulled you into a tight hug, rubbing your back and pressing a kiss to the top of your head. You had to say a few words but you managed to get through it, and Ben’s little speech, without completely losing it. Afterwards, as people packed up the equipment and you headed back to your trailers to change, Ben pulled out his phone again. “I guess I should post that photo now, how’s this caption,” he said each word slowly as he typed it out, “Thank you Y/N for being the perfect Edith to my Andy. And thank you @theperfectmatchmovie for finding me my perfect match.” “Did you tag me?” “Of course,” “Did you tag Seth?” “Uhhhh, camera emoji by @seththesoundman. Now I have,” “Then it’s perfect. Little bit cheesy but I’ll let it slide.” “I’ll post another lot of photos with everyone else later and write a longer thing about how much fun this movie was and all of that, but I think this’ll do for the minute. Mary and Peter better fucking appreciate it.”

That evening most of the cast and crew headed out for drinks at the local pub. The official party would come later but everyone needed to get out and celebrate for an evening. You and Ben stayed for a few hours, Ben getting a little more clingy with each drink he finished. You limited yourself to only a couple. Ben wasn’t going to be able to drive so you decided to fall on that sword, switching to water quite early on. When he reached the point of intoxication that had him constantly complementing everyone you decided to call it a night, taking a final lap to say goodnight to everyone. There were a few wolf whistles and slurred comments about getting some as you left, Ben’s arm around your waist and his laugh in your ear, but you waved them off and led Ben out to your car. “C’mon Benny boy, I’ll drop you home.” “What about my car?” “Well you’ll have to come get it in the morning, won’t you.” He hummed and lay his head against the back of the seat, chatting animatedly as you made the trip to his. You wished him goodnight as he got out of the car and watched him make his way up to his front door. There he paused, patting his pockets. “Everything alright? You called out to him. “I don’t have any keys,” he laughed, turning around to come back to the car. “You fucking goon, did you leave them at the pub?” “Guess so,” he shrugged, “Can I crash at yours?” “Get in,” “Thanks cuddle bunny, you’re the best” You rolled your eyes, “Guess this means I’ll be your taxi tomorrow, running you around to find your keys and your car,” “That’s what girlfriends are for,” “If you say so.”

Once at yours you headed to the kitchen to make tea, Ben following to grab a glass of water and a snack. He knew where you kept everything by now, making himself a sandwich with whatever he found in your fridge, and then carrying it out to the couch. By the time the teas were made Ben already had Netflix queued up, ready to play the next episode of the series you’d started watching together. Nearly Twenty minutes into the episode Ben’s phone dinged. “Ah shit,” he said as he glanced at it, “forgot I said I’d call Joe. Do you mind if we pause the ep? We’re trying to organise travel stuff for him and it’s easier if we talk it through rather than texting it all.” “Sure,” “I promise I won’t be long.” “Take your time, it’s fine,” you were already reaching for your laptop. Ben smiled at you before ducking out of the room. You head him walking down the hall, footsteps fading as he got further away. For a while you just enjoyed the quiet as you checked your emails and social media profiles but after commenting on the photo Ben had posted and replying to a few messages from people you knew there wasn’t really much left to do. You drummed your fingers on your keyboard trying to think of another website you could visit. There was still no sign of Ben and you didn’t want to continue the show without him so you stood up, stretched, and headed back to the kitchen to grab some chocolate from the stash you kept. You were just about to shut the fridge when you heard Ben’s voice coming from the other side of the wall. Your spare room where he’d clearly gone to make his phone call. “Yeah, Joe, I fucking know. But I don’t have much choice.” He sounded more sober than he had when he’d got up. There was a pause as Joe spoke and then you heard Ben again. “I don’t know what I was thinking getting into this mess…..Yeah maybe. Doesn’t really matter though now does it…. What’s that supposed to mean? I can’t just call it quits now, the story is doing too well and Peter has assured me that the numbers are promising or whatever I don’t really know how they measure it. All I know is that people are going to see the movie because of us.” There was a long pause. You quietly shut the fridge and took a step back towards the doorway. This was not a conversation you should be listening in to. But then Ben spoke again, and curiosity got the better of you. “It doesn’t matter Joe. It doesn’t matter how I feel.” He laughed but it was completely devoid of humour, “Of course it sucks. It’s fucking shit, man. I just keep waiting for her to tell me she feels the same but it’s not happening…... No, I know it’s completely one sided…..No, I don’t think she knows. She wouldn’t have wanted to do it in the first place if she knew…. I just wish things were different. I love being around her and being able to hold her and kiss her but it fucking sucks that it’s only in public….. I don’t know. Maybe not filming together will ma-” You could feel your cheeks burning as you tiptoed back towards the lounge room, not quite sure what to do with yourself. You paced back and forth for a moment before deciding to go to the bathroom, at least then Ben couldn’t walk in on you as you tried to process it. You let the door shut loudly behind you, hoping that if Ben had heard movement he’d think you’d just got up to use the loo. He couldn’t know you’d overheard him. You leaned against the sink and tried to make sense of what you’d heard. Ben couldn’t have a crush on you, he just couldn’t. But it was the only thing he could have been talking about. What the fuck did that mean for your arrangement? What the fuck were you meant to do now?

#my writing #my fics #ben hardy x reader #ben hardy imagine #ahhhhhhh #ya'll im so excited about this series #i have all the chapters planned out #i have all the titles planned out #i wrote a short synopsis of the film they're making #so that i can reference it throughout the fic and be consistent in what the scenes might be #god can ben please just make a romcom now #i want it more than anything in the world

235 notes · View notes

let-me-love-you-loki · 4 years

Text

An Ending Within--Ch. 8

Chapter 8

The house in Davenport was bursting with noise. I was in the kitchen, pulling a ham from the oven, while Seth pulled plastic plates from the cabinet. The counter was piled high with food—green beans, cooked carrots, mashed potatoes, gravy, roasted corn, biscuits, hot baked apple pies—and cheesecakes waited in the fridge. Our dining table was nowhere near big enough for the group who had joined us for an early Easter dinner. Luckily, the weather was nice and we could eat outside.

Roman swept through with Sefina on his hip and his daughter JoJo trailing right behind. He plucked a carrot from the pan, blew on it, and held it out to Sefina, who gummed it apprehensively. “Fingers out of the food!” I called over my shoulder when I caught him.

He laughed and rounded the counter, dropping a kiss on the top of my head. “Aua e te faʻalogo i lou tina faʻamaoni,” Roman cooed to his goddaughter.

I turned toward him, brows raised. “Did you just tell my daughter not to listen to me?”

“Maybe,” he replied before snatching a biscuit and dashing out of the room, JoJo on his heels.

I rolled my eyes as I basted the ham. “Everything ready?”

Seth smiled. “Yeah, want me to get everybody?”

I watched him walk toward our living room. He let out a yell and the noise died away. “Thanks for coming. There’s enough food for an army in there, so eat whatever you want. As much as you want.”

Leaning against the counter, I watched as friends old and new crowded into the kitchen, forming a haphazard line at the food. Jon and Renee were in the middle of the pile, talking to Roman’s wife, Galina. Jericho was at the front of the line, grinning and making jokes with my brother Bran. The Jacksons were there-Matt and Dana, Nick and Ellen, all their kids—and so were Becky and Alexa. Seth hopped into the back of the line behind Adam and his wife Amanda, easily starting up conversation with both of them.

“Seriously,” I said as Matt came by, “take as much as you want. Please.”

“Don’t say that around The Elite unless you mean it,” he replied, lifting one brow. When I nodded, he shrugged and started piling up his plate. I grinned, happy to see my new family fitting almost seamlessly with the old.

One by one, people passed by and loaded up their plates with food. Seth opened the backyard doors and soon, the party had spilled out onto the stone patio and beyond. The kids made use of a stack of patchwork blankets to have a picnic. The Jackson kids took up spots with JoJo and my nephews. Nick’s wife Ellen, her one-month old baby boy Michael in her arms, kept an eye on them.

“I’m sorry Kenny and Cody couldn’t make it,” Matt said. He, Roman, my brother Georgie, and I were sitting on the deck steps.

“Don’t worry about it,” I replied, looking out at the people milling about our backyard. I was happy to see Seth standing with Jon just like old times. For a moment, I was thrown back to the early days of my life in WWE. My adoption into The Shield.

Roman bumped me in the shoulder. “It’s good to see you again, itiiti.”

I grinned. “It’s good to see you too, uso.”

Matt and Georgie had become fast friends. They shared a love of basketball and had quickly devolved into a good-natured argument over which team was better—Carolina or USC. I was also pleasantly surprised to find that Matt got on well with Seth. But I shouldn’t have been surprised based on how much those two loved coffee.

***

Seth dragged the metal firepit out of the shed and set it up in the middle of the yard. He and Roman got it burning while Jon went in to grab the pile of marshmallows, chocolate bars, and graham crackers from the pantry. Matt, Nick, Bran, and Georgie worked together in a circle to strip some branches for roasting sticks. I sat with my sisters-in-law and Ellen and Dana. Sefina was curled up in my lap, her arms around my neck as she dozed on my shoulder. Baby Michael was cooing in his mother’s arms. The other kids swarmed Jon as soon as he appeared from inside the house, sweets in hand.

“I’m surprised they’re all getting along,” I said quietly, watching how Roman and Seth slipped into easy conversation with Matt and Nick as they prepped the firepit for the kids. “If only the dirt sheets could see this…”

Ellen chuckled. “None of them would ever admit it happened.”

“Of course not. Jericho can’t be seen hanging out with Elite trash,” I replied.

It had been almost a month since the pay-per-view, and I’d been spending most of my time with AEW running interference for Jericho and the Inner Circle, doing my best to distract Jon whenever I could. I’d attacked Jon from behind twice and, at least once, held his attention long enough for Jake Hager to sneak up from behind and choke him out. I could feel myself settling into my new life, but I missed traveling with my boys. It was strange to have so much time at home.

Jon started opening packages and created a quick assembly line with Bran, Georgie, and Nick. One by one, they spiked marshmallows and gathered kids around the firepit. Dads and uncles and godfathers and friends kept the kids back far enough that they wouldn’t get hurt, but close enough that they could roast their marshmallows. I grinned as I listened to them. Adam insisted that the marshmallows had be burnt black before they were done. Roman looked like he wanted to throw a punch over that.

I couldn’t remember the last time I was this happy. When I felt as fully loved and accepted as I’d ever been. I was so grateful that they had all taken the time to come with their families. That they would spend just a little bit of their free time with me.

***

“Are you sure you’re not upset?” Seth asked as I packed my new gear into a bag. Dynamite that night was going live from the TaxSlayer Center in Davenport.

An ache in my chest. Like my heart was being squeezed hard. A faint wishful sensation. The desire for what Jon and Renee had.

“It’s fine, Seth,” I replied, shouldering the bag and heading down the hallway to kiss Sefina goodbye. She would be asleep by the time I got home. “I know how Vince can be. You don’t want to be seen at the competition’s show.”

A spike of frustration. Maybe a little anger. I’d watched Britt Baker show up at WWE events with no repercussions on either side. Jon had popped up on an at-home edition of Backstage on FS1, but no one was told off.

But Seth was… Seth. And he was Vince’s golden boy.

“Llane… Sophie…” He snatched at my hands, pulling me back. “You know I’ll be watching. I haven’t missed a moment.”

I forced a smile and leaned up on my toes to kiss him softly. “I know.”

***

“Jon… Jon…” I stood at the top of the ramp, surrounded by the Inner Circle. Jericho stood at one shoulder, Hager at the other. “Don’t get too comfortable. You have something that belongs to us.”

Pacing in the ring, Jon slammed into the ropes, title over one shoulder. He held the mic up to his mouth, eyes wide and wild. “You know what, Leighton, I’m sick of your mouth. And I’m sick of you following Jericho around like a little puppy and doing his dirty work. All because he’s not man enough to face me again.”

I took a few steps forward. “I should challenge you for that title, Mox. You know as well as I do that there’s only one person in this company who has your number. And it’s not Chris.” I held my arms out, wiggling my fingers in his direction.

Jericho took the mic from me and, giving that smarmy grin of his, taunted Jon. “What d’you say, Mox? Huh? Are you a champion or a coward?”

I knew him. I knew the wheels were turning in his head. A little bit of Dean Ambrose slipped into his face. He paced, breathing heavy. He backed away from the ropes, running his free hand over his hair.

“I guess that’s our answer,” Jericho laughed. We backed toward the entrance tunnel, the entire Inner Circle smirking as Jon stood in the ring looking like a fool.

“I’m not the one getting a woman to do my dirty work,” Jon spat vehemently.

The Inner Circle turned as a unit. I took off toward the ramp, only to be caught around the middle by Sammy Guevara. I flailed, actually kicking Sammy in the shin, trying to get to the ring. I knew Jon was only talking shit, but I couldn’t help but feel fire in my veins at the fact that I’d been called just a “woman.” I’d trained with Jon. I trained with Seth and Roman. I could hold my own with any of them even on my worst day.

Jericho looked back at me and then toward the ring again. “Why don’t you find a partner, Jon. That is… if anyone in that women’s locker room can stand you. I know you have… history… in mixed matches.”

Tag List

@mox-made-me-do-it @lakamaa12 @sammyfireheartashryver @cburdine @easyobsession @xbutterflius-effectusx @0paint-the-stars0 @echrai @themumbler @bigdunneenergy @queenofthearchitect @vebner37 @reigns-rollins-ambrose @mother-forker @gwyneirastorm

32 notes · View notes

harryandmolly · 5 years

Text

i could write it better than you ever felt it - FINAL

summary: fuck growing up. this is freedom, this is life, this is youth – 2007 Warped Tour style.

warnings: Language, vintage Something Corporate, oversugaring tea amidst Londoners

word count: 5.2k

A/N: this is it, fam! thanks for coming along in my time machine. I hope it’s everything you dreamed it would be. Shawn’s song is “As You Sleep” by Something Corporate, highly recommend a listen. thank you for everything you are and everything you give me. I love you guys.

Lucky 13.

The emblem of the 2007 Warped Tour has surrounded her all summer, but it feels especially present today somehow, on the last day of tour in Carson, California.

It seems a contradiction in terms, lucky 13, which Val supposes is probably the idea. She knows it’s a cheeky nod to the counterculture vibe that Warped Tour represents, but it also feels representative of her in some ways.

Val’s had a very contemplative and quiet three weeks since she gathered her things and walked out of that hotel room, leaving the scribbled note on the pillow behind her. She’s turned inward, no longer hounded by her conflict with Raf or Bea, able to focus on herself for the first time in a few months. And she’s picked out a few things that coincide with the theme of the summer.

Val is often reckless, and sometimes maternal. Val is book smart, and also street smart. Val embraces academia, but sometimes thinks she could drown herself in music and never read books again. Val is vibrant even when she is broken.

Humans are made up of contradictions, Val knows that as well as anyone. She is not suddenly realizing that she is not only one thing -- her dichotomies are not really news to her. But as she thinks about the people she loves most, she sees the way certain parts of their personalities bump up against other parts and fight for dominance, and she loves them more richly for it.

Humans are made up of contradictions and Val is embracing that from here on out. She arrived on the first day of Warped wearing a blink t-shirt with a textbook on Ming dynasty art in her trunk. All summer, she studied the ways she doesn’t fit in here in the scene anymore like she was looking for reasons to make a clean split and join her adult life across the pond. But the truth is, she failed. She looked for the ways that made her feel different from this world that she helped in her small way to build, but it’s as much a home to her as academia is and it will never truly feel foreign, no matter how many hours she spends crouched over a 9th century vase with a tiny brush. So her biggest contradiction, her inner strife over choosing academia over pop punk, it fades into her skin like her tattoo, as much a part of her as the dimple in her chin or the curls in her hair that she decided not to straighten today.

Val walks the grounds as the sun begins to fade. The last sets of the day are in progress or being set up. With earbuds in playing Boys Like Girls, she strolls between booths of merch people clinking beers and congratulating each other on a summer well done, between groups of kids comparing signed merch, between crew guys beginning to break down and pack away equipment to be pulled out next June for another go around.

She imagines who she’ll be next June.

She walks slowly on her way to Smartpunk. It seems her body is just as hesitant as her mind to attend this one last set, but she’s doing it anyway. She’s not sure why -- to prove a point to herself? To indulge in the talent one last time? To try to believe in a miracle?

She doesn’t like any of those options. She settles on curiosity and keeps her feet moving in uncharacteristically small steps.

She stands at the back, nice and far from any moshing action, by the All Time Low booth so she can sit on the edge of the table without getting grief from Vinny Vegas.

She wears a small smirk as the space around her fills in. It seems every Warped attendee is a Forefront convert now. She doesn’t blame them. But damn is it a far cry from their first sets in June.

They’re announced over the yelping cries of fans wearing out their last screams of summer. They hustle out in a group, with their tall, gawky frontman bringing up the rear as usual. He plants himself in front of the mic and swings one powerful arm above his head with a wild grin to wave as his adoring fans.

And it begins.

They put on a hell of a show. It’s not a given -- just because you’re good in the studio doesn’t mean you have the chemistry or energy to do well live. There are special bands that make a live concert a nearly religious experience -- her friends in Paramore and All Time Low among them. Forefront has gotten their sea legs this summer and won’t easily lose them now.

She takes the time to notice each member -- passionate, goofy Francis on rhythm guitar, hard-hitting, soft-spoken Seth on the drums, raucous pretty boy bassist Bobby. And then Shawn, switching between his keyboard and guitar effortlessly like he was born with a damn instrument in his hand, charisma leaking out of him all over the stage, making everyone in a fifteen mile radius certain that he’s born to do this.

She closes her eyes through the end of “Open End” and waits for “Swim” to start. When Shawn switches back to the keys at this point in the set, he usually engages in some chit chat with the boys or yammers on to the fans about how much they inspire him or whatever. But he’s quiet and the air around the stage is tense because everyone knows something’s up.

Val opens her eyes. He’s where she expected him to be, propped at the edge of his bench with his fingers resting over the keys, looking down at them frozen.

“We’re gonna play you a new one today.”

Val’s stomach falls out and flops into the dirt at her feet. She’s glad she’s sitting on the table because she can’t feel her legs. She overwhelmed by certainty that whatever’s about to happen, it’s going to be personal. And it’s going to hurt like hell.

Shawn is quiet for a few more electrically charged moments before he closes his eyes, rolls his shoulders forward and leans into the mic, singing before the instruments join him.

“Close your eyes and I will be swimming, lullabies fill your room, and I will be singing, singing only to you. Don’t forget I’ll hold your head, watch the night sky fading red.”

His fingers work furiously against the keys. The piano line is so intricate and shows off his talent for the instrument in a way she’s never seen. He keeps his eyes down at his hands as they dance, distracting him enough from the content of the lyrics so he can get through them without breaking down like he did when he wrote it.

“But as you sleep, and no one is listening, I will lift you off your feet, I'll keep you from sinking. Don't you wake up yet, cause soon I'll be leaving you. Soon I'll be leaving you, but you won't be leaving me.”

Val closes her eyes again and lets herself fall back into their last night, into their frantic lovemaking punctuated by irresponsible, unkeepable promises. She thinks about the weight of his legs between hers as she drifted off with him in the last full night sleep she got on tour. She remembers the way she let her hand rest on his side of the bed to try to tell when he left by how cool to the touch it felt.

“In the car, the radio leaves me searching for your star, a constellation of frustration driving home, singing my thoughts back to me, and watching heartache on TV.”

It feels so good to get this out, Shawn thinks as he hits each note just the way he wants it. This song came spilling out after their last night together in a way that felt too easy. After all that he put her through, he doesn’t deserve to have his art come easy. But art is never fair.

By the second chorus, Val knows the words. It’s hard not to zero in when you know they’re about you. She notes the way the crowd reacts, arms in the air waving at him like he’s Jimi Hendrix, cheering along, eating up everything he gives them.

Good, she thinks, he deserves it.

The lead into the bridge is still piano heavy, but his fingers know the strokes of the keys as well as his heart does, so he gets to sit up and look around, grinning as their fans cheer, watching the sky explode vibrant summer watercolors over the trees on the horizon. A thick, soothing breeze passes through.

He looks back through to where he saw her a few songs ago. He lets his gaze stay there long enough that she knows now that she’s been spotted. He licks his lips and leans into the mic, but keeps his eyes up at her, perched on the ATL merch table like she owns it.

He repeats the lyrics even though each word feels like tearing at scabs that won’t be healing for a while. He pours it all in, everything he has left, every piece of I’m sorry, every hint of thank you, every whisper of I love you, it soars out over the heads of the fans who love the words but don’t know the boy that wrote them.

They’re for her.

As the final note fades out under sweeping cries of gratitude from the scene kids that came to celebrate their home and community, Val stands, brushes the dust from her skinny jeans and secures her earbuds back in place. With a final nodding smile to Vinny, she turns from the stage and walks off in gigantic, loping steps to read about John Singer Sergeant and listen to Dookie on repeat.

+++++++

December 18th, 2017

Shawn doesn’t often fit most musician stereotypes -- he doesn’t drink too heavily, he doesn’t do any drug harder than weed, he’s kind of a serial monogamist.

But he does love a moody walk along a body of water.

With a pair of good headphones, a carefully curated playlist and a path along the water, Shawn can figure out anything. When he gets stuck on a song, he goes to the water. When he’s in a weird spot with someone he’s dating, he goes to the water. He doesn’t like to get too spiritual about it, but it does feel somehow clarifying.

So one afternoon in London when the sun is out and the Londoners are out with it, Shawn decides to join them. He’s there on business promoting the latest Forefront album with a Live Lounge performance on BBC Radio 1 with Nick Grimshaw. He’s jetlagged and a little turned around by the Underground system like he usually is when in London but he’s otherwise feeling just fine. He just needs a walk by the water today. He tries not to look too closely at why.

He bundles up in the Barbour jacket his mum got him last Christmas and sets off down the stairs into the opulent Savoy hotel lobby decked out with a Christmas tree in every corner and fresh garland wrapped around every non-moving object in sight. He smiles at it -- nobody does Christmas like the Brits. He’s looking forward to going home in a few days to see his mum and the rest of his family and decompress for a few weeks before heading back over to the UK to write and record their next album.

He gets reflective like this -- the combination of the water and the music offer him perspective he can’t usually reach otherwise. He tucks his hands in his pockets and sets off through the garden that opens up into the Victoria Embankment Gardens, usually lush and green in the spring and summer, full of life and people. He likes it like this, though, cold and quiet and almost like a little secret.

2017 has been good to him. Forefront played seven new countries this year on their world tour in celebration of their sixth studio album. He’s gotten a little better over the years about being more present in those moments rather than looking forward anxiously to the next album and the expectations that surround it. That attitude really spoiled the last few records, but the new friends he’s made in the industry have helped guide him through that. He’s even becoming friends with the Irish guy from One Direction now, though they had very different paths to the music industry. He seems like a cool guy.

Personally, 2017 wasn’t really a banner year. He broke up with Jess in April after almost a full year. He’s had a few of those lately -- relationships that start hot and don’t make it past a year mark. He should take a closer look at that and figure out why he can’t seem to stay in a relationship for longer than 11 months, but he’s too tired to think about it now. It’s been a long fuckin’ year.

It’s been a long ten years, actually, since Joy Ride. He thinks back to the show they played at home in Toronto over the summer to celebrate the big anniversary. They played the whole album start to finish, something they’ve never gotten to do. Being immersed in it like that brings back a lot of memories of that summer when everything really kicked off. Not all those memories are ones Shawn likes to think about.

He doesn’t think about Valentina much. It’s by design. He doesn’t even play “As You Sleep” as often as it’s requested. It just… doesn’t feel healthy for him. He’ll pull it out every once in a while when curiosity gets the best of him, when it’s been long enough that he forgets how sharply he still feels every word of that song. He usually regrets it.

He lets himself wonder about her sometimes, like today when he’s knee deep in nostalgia anyway. He still sees Raf and the other Streets guys. They went on a hiatus for a while around 2013 but are back again recording a new record somewhere in Malibu, from what Shawn’s heard. When he sees them, he doesn’t ask about her. He doesn’t want her knowing he’s asking. And he thinks sometimes he doesn’t want to know what she’s really up to, he’d rather imagine.

He falls into his favorite daydream. He likes to think she stayed in the UK (he always felt like that was the place for her to end up). Maybe she got a job in conservation at Oxford or Cambridge or some other hoity-toity university. Maybe she met a nice, polite, skinny, bookish English guy who looks at her like a miracle every time she speaks to him. Maybe they had a small wedding at his local church and his family loves her because she’s colorful and articulate. Maybe they have dogs -- sheepdogs or setters or something, good country dogs. And maybe they’ve had a little girl.

That’s where he usually shuts the daydream down. For obvious reasons.

But when he doesn’t, he thinks about her and who she might be. He thinks about thick, lush curls flopped over a tiny forehead. He thinks about pouty little lips and a chin dimple that matches her mother’s. He thinks about little feet that kick hard because she’d have to be strong, of course.

Now that he’s letting himself think about it, he thinks maybe she’d look kinda like the kid that’s staring at him, reaching out from her pram that’s parked next to the bench he’s strolling past. He smiles at her and she beams back with a grin that has only two teeth. It makes Shawn laugh.

He glances over at her lucky mum or dad.

And it’s almost like he expected it, like it had to be her. I mean, this kid really couldn’t have been anyone but Val’s. She’s just… so Val.

So when Shawn looks her over, from her sweeping dark curls and her leather trousers and her ankle boots, he’s barely even surprised to see her. He just tips his head back and chuckles at the universe.

“Hey mister,” she calls, and her voice sets his skin rough with goosebumps, “Can I have your autograph?”

Shawn lets go of where he’s holding on to the wrought iron fence above the banks of the Thames and walks over, his chelsea boots scratching at the frosty stone.

She doesn’t stand to greet him. She’s got a similar look on her face, bemused acknowledgement of fate and its tricks, like she was thinking about him too and they both somehow willed this to happen. Her long slender legs are crossed. She has one black leather-gloved hand in the pram in the grasp of her little girl who’s chewing on her finger and no longer paying Shawn any attention.

“Hey, Vally,” he sighs. He doesn’t mean to call her that, it just happens. She doesn’t visibly react beyond a slightly deeper dimple in her cheek, so he figures he scraped by with that one.

“Were you on your way somewhere?” she asks, glancing back as if she realized she might be taking him away from something.

He shakes his head. “No, I just-- I’m staying at the Savoy and I like these gardens. I just wanted a walk.” He has enough presence of mind to pause his music. He doesn’t bother to mention it’s an old Streets song. That she wrote.

“We like it out here. We live over by the Farringdon stop but we take the train out here because we like the waterfowl.”

Val looks down at the pram as she speaks. Shawn takes that as an invitation to acknowledge her more formally.

“Who’s this?” he asks breathlessly.

“This is Alice,” Val replies with as much pride as he’s ever heard from any mother, “Alice Fernanda Moreno, she’s nine months old and very hefty for her age because we run a body positive household and she loves mashed carrot and swede.”

Shawn lifts a hand and waves in that open-close way he does like he’s a big toddler himself. Alice kicks hard and squeals at him.

“She’s… so beautiful,” he marvels. Val’s smug smile tells him she agrees. Shawn doesn’t share his next thought because it feels like a line and he doesn’t want to go there.

Because she looks exactly like you.

“I picked out a real pretty one,” she jokes, tightening the wrap of the thick wool blankets around Alice as she yawns.

Shawn continues staring at her openly, trying to pick out features that could belong to any potential father, but as far as he can tell, Alice is simply a clone of Val. It’s Val’s throat clearing that brings him back.

“Sit, Mendes,” she suggests, patting the warped wooden bench. Shawn lowers himself on the other side of the pram as Val rocks it back and forth with her foot.

“She’s been fussy today, but it’s naptime. She has to give in eventually,” Val mutters like she’s reasoning with herself. Shawn grins.

“You have a daughter.”

Val doesn’t look up from the pram as she rocks it. She just nods and snuggles into her prim peacoat.

“I have a daughter.”

Shawn can’t bring himself to ask. She’s wearing gloves so he can’t see if she’s wearing a ring. He stays quiet and studies her instead.

She looks largely the same, barely even older than she did at 22. Her sense of style is maybe the only thing he can see that’s changed in the ten years since he’s seen her last. There’s something comforting in that.

He wonders if he seems different. He works out more now, eats right. He’s definitely put on a whole lot of muscle since he was scrounging for burger scraps on Warped. He’s gotten a few more tattoos she can’t see. He also has an actual stylist now, which is sometimes weird, but he’s elevated the black skinnies, Vans and band tees to black skinnies, $800 boots and silk button-ups. So there’s that.

He’s still got that lip ring though.

But… he wonders if he seems different. If he carries himself differently. If he comes off more confident, more calm, less wide-eyed and wondering.

Because she seems the same. She’s always glowed from the inside out like this. Maybe the glow feels a little stronger now. Or maybe it’s just because she glows through herself and her baby girl all at once. Shawn sits back and watches them -- he could bathe in it all day.

“You know it’s been ten years?” she breathes.

Shawn nods slowly. “I know. Kinda feels like 40.”

She laughs and a piece of him astral projects back to nights tangled up in her bunk kissing her neck and trying to keep her quiet so her brother won’t come mock them from outside the bunk curtain.

“It does,” she muses, “But sometimes it feels like fifteen minutes ago, too.”

Shawn tips his head back and sniffs, looking up through a tall pine as its needles shiver.

“Has your decade been good to you?” she murmurs. He lifts his head back up. She’s staring down at the baby.

“Yeah, yeah, it’s been great. We’ve toured a lot, done a few more albums. The guys and I, I mean, you know us, we’d push each other in front of a bus most days, but we’re brothers and maybe obsessed with each other, too. We’re on a great ride.”

Val lifts her eyes to his briefly, all too knowingly, and lowers them back to the pram. “That’s good.”

Shawn shakes his head. “That’s not even at all what you meant, was it?”

“Nope.”

Shawn goes quiet, contemplative. Val waits him out until he’s ready.

“It’s harder than I thought it would be,” he chokes finally, “Everything about it. Writing after Joy Ride, it was… it got bad. I mean, I was ok, like fundamentally, but I didn’t feel good. We had so many eyes on us. We had no idea what to do, just like no one else does. Some tours were great, some were bad. And the whole deal makes everything else harder. It’s hard on my family, my friends. I… I haven’t been in an actual good relationship in… five years, at least. This year was better. We’ve gotten our feet back under us. I let it all out in the last album, and that helped.”

“I know, I heard it.”

Shawn looks up from Val’s hands in the pram. For the first time all morning, he’s really, truly shocked to the bone.

“You did?”

Val doesn’t answer him exactly, just mutters something about needing to get the baby inside and announces they’ll head down the lane for a cup of tea. She leads them to a little corner coffee shop made for hipsters, not for women with very expensive prams, but Val doesn’t seem to care and parks in the corner by the fire. She layers down, stripping off her scarf and coat to a black turtleneck. Her cheeks go warm as she settles in and orders for them.

Shawn keeps his mouth shut and tries not to do the mental math of how many of the songs he’s released in the last ten years have been written about her, and exactly how many of them she might have noticed are definitely, totally written about her.

She folds her manicured hands together and looks up at him. His brain mercifully shuts off.

“It took a while after that summer for me to get there, but about three years later, I was around Oxford with some friends and I saw your latest album, on vinyl no less, in some indie record store. I suddenly got this feeling that I had to stop my whole life for a minute and go in and buy it. I bought it and the one that came before it, I said goodbye to my friends and I shut myself up in my flat for a couple days with a bottle of whiskey and just… let it happen.”

Shawn winces. “Wish you’d have just skipped over Making Midnight.”

Val smirks. “I wish I had, too.”

Shawn scoffs and leans back in his chair, mock offended. Val giggles and dumps an ungodly amount of sugar in her Earl Grey.

“I was glad to just hear your voice again, actually. I’d done a good job of avoiding it. Too good, maybe, because it was a real shock to the system when I heard it again.”

Shawn knows how that feels. He went through a Val cleanse too, a much shorter one because he doesn’t have her willpower. And then he heard a song she wrote with Alex Gaskarth for All Time Low’s Dirty Work and he let her back in.

“From then, I just bought your records when they came out. I really loved this last one. It really… I dunno, it just really felt like you, I guess.”

Shawn keeps his head down as he stares at his tea. He hears Alice coo. He looks up to see Val lifting her out of her pram to bounce her in her lap, baby in one arm, cup of tea in the other.

“God, it’s so fuckin’ good to see you,” he croaks, shaking his head a little, “Especially…”

He trails off, unwilling to finish. He ducks his head again.

“Especially with a kid I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to have?” Val guesses.

Shawn glances up and nods.

“Do you want to hear about this?” Val murmurs, ignoring Alice as she yanks at some silky curls.

Shawn chews on his lower lip. “Yeah, I think I do.”

It’s Val’s turn to look down. She stirs the mountain of slowly dissolving sugar at the bottom of her mug and sighs.

“She’s just mine. Last year I started to get a little anxious about my biological clock, especially given the last time I got pregnant. I saw a fertility specialist and we discussed my history and she agreed if I want to have children, it’s probably better to start now. So I went in for IVF. On the second cycle, I got pregnant with Alice. The pregnancy was complicated, but my doctor was a saint and did everything absolutely right. The birth went perfectly. So now it’s me and Alice against the world.”

Shawn slides his tongue against his lower lip, taps his foot impatiently against the leg of his chair. “Just you two?”

“Just us two,” Val replies easily, “There were a couple guys in and out before her, but I haven’t gone out with anyone since I got pregnant. I didn’t feel the need. I just wanted to focus on her. I’m glad I did.”

They’re quiet for a few minutes, reflective. Then Val stands and looks down at him.

“Would you mind holding her for a minute? I need to use the loo.”

Shawn bites his lip and nods, standing to complete the transfer. Alice is asleep in her mother’s arms, but, as Val explains with a chuckle, “she’s a snuggle whore -- she’ll go with anybody for a little cuddle.”

Shawn sits. Alice curls up against his chest and pops her tiny lips in her sleep. She radiates warmth from her little swaddled bundle. As he stares down at her, Shawn fundamentally understands why Val hasn’t needed anyone else in her life since Alice arrived. He thinks if Val let him, he’d never put her down.

Alice stretches a tiny arm out in her sleep and punches Shawn in the chest. He snickers, jostling his little bundle, but it doesn’t wake her. He starts to get comfortable, sliding down in the chair a bit so he can rock her, but Val’s hand on his shoulder startles him.

“It’s ok,” she says, “Keep her, if she’s not fussing. I’d rather she stay asleep.”

Shawn nods eagerly and strokes Alice’s back with his long, rough fingers. Val sits across the table with her elbows propped up like she’s physically restraining herself to keep from snatching her child out of his arms. It makes Shawn grin.

“You ok over there?”

Val blushes, caught. “It’s usually just the two of us. I don’t ever have to share her. I’m not used to jonesing.”

“I’ll give her back if you want,” Shawn mumbles reluctantly. Val giggles.

“No, it’s ok. She looks happy.”

Shawn hums. She does look happy.

“So are you working?” he asks quietly, not wanting to wake Alice.

Val nods. “We are, we work at the V&A in the medieval department. We just started back about a month ago after my maternity leave. The museum’s been very generous. They let me walk around with her strapped to my chest all day. She helps consult on various matters, charms my coworkers into letting me leave bottles of breastmilk in every fridge in the museum. I shifted from conservation to curation a few years ago, which is a steadier, more lucrative track. I think it’ll be better for us.”

Us. We’re working at the V&A. We started back at the museum. Shawn’s enamored. He goes pink and brushes through the curls on the back of Alice’s neck.

“Sounds like you’ve got a great partner here,” he quips.

Val is quiet for a minute. “We’re very happy together. But we get a little lonely sometimes. Like when it’s cold and mummy really doesn’t want to get out of bed but Alice is screaming bloody murder. Those are the only moments when this isn’t the greatest thing in the whole world.”

Shawn looks up. Val is watching him carefully. Before he can speak, she swallows and lowers her gaze.

“But we get along, you know. We’re ok.”

“Yeah,” Shawn says, “I know you are.”

They chat. They talk about Raf and his wife Rachel and their little ones -- Val and Alice will be heading across the pond to spend Christmas with them and her parents. They talk about Bea and how she’s spent five years with the same guy up in Edinburgh and she seems actually happy. They talk about their near miss at Alex’s wedding last April -- she came for the ceremony but had to skip out of the reception, Shawn the opposite. They chat through several more cups of tea, an array of pastries, and another nap cycle until it’s dark and quiet outside. Val stares mournfully out the window as she puts on her jacket with Alice back in her pram, gurgling quietly.

Shawn is silent, brow furrowed. He pays the tab with a ghost of a smile and thinks about walking back to his hotel to sit in his room with the TV to try to drown out this day. It’s… unappealing to say the least.

They walk to the door. Shawn holds it open for Val and Alice and considers that they probably look to anyone else like a young family that spent the day together and are headed home to a warm dinner and a cozy night in.

Val’s heart pounds in her ears faster than their boots’ steps on the crunchy ground. She wants to swallow the words, but she doesn’t think she can. Not with him.

“Would you like to walk us home?” she breathes.

Shawn’s smile is extraordinary. He looks up from Alice’s curious brown eyes.

“Yes, please.”

Support your local Ho for Happy Endings and buy me a ko-fi!

Taglist: @smallerinfinities @the-claire-bitch-project @stillinskislydia @achinglyshawn @infiniteshawn @alone-in-madness @alone-in-madness @singanddreamanyway@accioalena @randi-eve @shawnitsmutual @embracehappy @itrocksmysocks @yslsaint @peacedolantwins2 @kitykatnumber

#shawn mendes #shawn mendes fanfic #shawn mendes fan fic #shawn mendes fanfiction #shawn mendes fan fiction #shawn mendes fic #shawn peter raul mendes #shawn mendes angst #shawn mendes fluff #punk!shawn #warped tour shawn #dad!shawn

156 notes · View notes

darktammy · 5 years

Text

New roses in my Womb (part 3)

Tags @instantbouquetdestinysblog @thelonelunatic @cosmic--daydream @sausagefest1996 @sassybrose @mrsambroserollinsacklesmgk @nonnirenea @purpleskiesandcherrypies @beenlovingromansincedayoneish @drxcleaner @deanseths @thatwrestlingfan91 @theneverendingthirst @ambrollinsbabe

You laid in bed with Kenny’s t-shirt on covering your whole body, you look up at the ceiling thinking about what Dean said to you. You read the note over and over again thinking this is crazy he don’t mean it right? You sat up in bed still thinking about it still. It’s been two days since that night, two days since he did what he did touching your thigh making you touch your thigh. Making you bite your lower lips every time you think about it. Dean it seems he's been in your mind a lot lately. The way he grins at you eyes full of whatever it is his thinking of making you feel numb. You start to move your hand down to your core as you close your eyes thinking of him, no you can’t your with Kenny, but Dean his in your mind again.

You see him sitting down on the chair from the dinner table. You laying on his dinner table with your legs open you start to rub yourself making yourself moan every time you circle your bud thinking of Dean sitting there watching you playing with yourself. “Yeah Y/N that’s it keep rubbing yourself.” You thought Dean would say to you. You took your other hand sticking two fingers inside of you making you moan even louder than before. “Oh god Dean is this good enough for your cock? I want it so bad please give it to me baby please!!” You keep saying as you imagine him right in front of you. Dean leaning in as you keep pleasing yourself. “I will I need you to come for me.” You added another finger inside of you pumping yourself as you rub your bud picturing Dean smiling at you pleasing yourself. “Your a little slut there Y/N, teasing me like that baby girl. I’m going to enjoy eating your pussy out so much your going to be screaming my name.” You started to feel a knot your stomach, you know that feeling your getting close. “Yes Dean I’m your little slut, I’m a dirty girl for you, yes I’m so close baby yes!” You imagine Dean getting up from the chair pulling for you to sit up as he grab a hand full of your hair kissing you hard then, his other hand grabbing and massaging your breast. It was enough for you to finally come undone, yelling out his name over and over again. You laid back down on your bed opening your eyes looking back up at the ceiling once more. “Oh my god what did I just do?” You look at the time it read 2:30 am. “I better get some sleep.” You said.

You waited for Kenny to come home with a smile on your face. You hugged him as you both headed back to your apartment. Once inside you and Kenny start to kisses each other making out with one another until you both had full blow on sex in the living space. After some time Kenny got up pulling his shorts on he look back to see you sleeping on the sofa. He headed to the room grabbing his shirt already he sees that you have already worn it. “Oh Y/N babe.” He laugh as he look over at the night stand seeing a note on there. He pick it up opening it as he read what it said. Kenny’s face went from excited to piss off fast. “Dean!” was all he could say as he rip the note in half. “I’m going to kill Dean once I see his ass.” Kenny turn around leaving the bedroom looking at you with small smile on his face. “Don’t worry Y/N I’ll keep you safe from now on.” He said blowing a kiss at you.

Once Monday came around Kenny had his eyes set on Dean, he didn’t care whoever or whatever gets in his way, he was going to get his hands on him. The night started off pretty good the show ran fine, then it was time for Kenny to come out to talk about what happened last week on Raw. This time instead of talking about bobby he was going to talk about Dean, but how so can he do it. Kenny knows that you were watching so he knew he had to make it count. “So looks like I have a bone to pick with a few dogs if you all get what I’m saying.” The crowded cheer Kenny on. “You see people I think I need to set someone in that little three men group a massage. One that I think needs to understand, he needs to know that he can’t have what I have. He needs to know that the lunatic can’t have what belongs to Omega.” A loud siren noise was made then the heavy guitar riff after then Dean walks out wearing a leather jacket with his skinny jeans holding a mic with that same smug look on his face.

Dean look at Kenny in the ring as he held the mic close to his mouth. “Did I hear you correctly Kenny? You said what belong to you? Like what your title? Oh wait I forgot you don’t have one, so what the hell are you talking about?” Making the crowd laugh at what Dean said. Kenny who at this point was ready to lose his mind. “Oh think you know that little note you left me last week that said ‘I’ll make sure…’ you’ll make sure of what Dean?” Dean’s face want from confuse to surprise because now he knew what Kenny was talking about. The note Dean left you last week with the stuff animal in the bag.

Dean was mad now that Kenny found out about it. “What I mean to say was I’ll make sure I kick your ass.” Dean said throwing the mic down then walking down the ramp. Making Kenny toss his mic out the ring ready for Dean to enter which he did, as they both started to throw blows at one another. Dean giving Kenny a clean uppercut to Kenny’s face making him laugh as Dean ran giving Kenny a closeline from hell making him lay flat on his back. Dean fell on his knees as he whisper to Kenny. “Y/N she’s a sweetheart the way she feels is exciting I know at night she thinks about me more than she does about you.” Kenny punch Dean hard in the face knowing that it was going to leave him a black eye. Kenny got up grabbing Dean ready to knee him in his face until Roman and Seth came for the save. Making Kenny run out of the ring so piss off that he started to trash talk about the whole thing.

Once backstage Undertaker, Hunter, and Shane where all in the back wondering what the hell was that out there. “Ok Maybe just maybe I got a little carried away from that.” Roman look at Kenny. “Boy you try to kill my bro!” Seth tried to keep Roman back. “Hey everyone calm down right now!” Taker said looking at everyone in the room. “Kenny I don’t what’s really going on in that head of yours, but you better and I mean you better watch what you say or what hell you do next time, do you understand?” Kenny nodded his head then he looks over at Dean with death stare.

Back on the bus Dean was on his phone watching a video while Kenny was catching up on some of his favorite Japanese shows he use to watch back in Japan with you. His phone rings only to see you calling him. It put a smile on his face as he answered. “Hey babe how's everything?” You smiled as you was taking a bubble bath. “I’m fine babe just taking my bath drinking wine.” As you sip your wine glass. “Yeah I know how much you love drinking wine when you take a bubble bath. So yeah let me guess you called about what you saw?” You nodded your head, “well yeah babe I mean what happened right there? I know what made you snap, but what?” Kenny sigh as he look out the window. “Try to understand your mine and for Dean to leave that note for you, nah I don’t think so. I did what I did and yeah I got in trouble for it.” You giggled a little as you and Kenny start talking about both your nights. Little did Kenny know Dean was listening while Seth and Roman nodded here heads to one another.

On the next week Kenny had a match with Seth which turn out to be a great match between them. Kenny pick up the win as he walk up the ramp while the crowd goes wild. Seth sat there in the ring in shock. Kenny headed to the back getting ready to change just so he can head to the hotel. “Kenny?” A female voice was heard in the back. “Cara?” Kenny said. “Hey Kenny long time no see. How you been?” He nodded his head as look down at her. “I’m fine just doing great with myself yeah. How about you Cara how's life?” He said with a smile smile. Cara and Kenny’s past was pretty much ok. Kenny being in Japan Cara being in america it was hard for them but they tried to make it work until one day Cara just told Kenny that she couldn’t do it so they ended it as friends.

Kenny smiles as they both started to walk away together talking about how everything is. “You know Kenny I’m glad you’re here in america, I mean look around it’s great your going to love the food the action you know.” Cara spoke. Kenny laugh as he look at her. “Yeah I know but I’m here because I want to end my career with WWE.” Cara look up at Kenny with a smile. “Oh yeah then what?” Kenny smiled as he look up into the sky. “Then move back to Japan and marry Y/N.” Cara stop as she look at Kenny. “You mean the writer the one who makes all those poems in her book Y/N?” He nodded his head. “Well that’s great I mean….it’s good.” She said with fake smile. “I know I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with her you know?” Cara nodded her head as they both started walking again.

Cara and Kenny walk back to the hotel entering the lobby, little did they know Dean and Roman were both sitting in the bar watching them both enter then sitting next to each other ordering drinks. “Who’s the chick?” Dean said. “That my friend is Cara Kenny’s ex.” Karl said to him, “Why the hell is she hear?” Karl said. “Who know maybe to break up Kenny and Y/N?” Roman said. Dean look back at Roman. “Oh yeah I bet she can do one hell of good job with that.” Dean said laughing at them.

Kenny and Cara start laugh while Cara start to take shots while Kenny just drank down his soda. “So Kenny how long have you both been dating?” Kenny laugh at Cara, “Yeah we’ve been together for two years so yeah. We meet in Japan when she was doing her book signing and I was like wow.” He laugh while Cara just look at him. “You know Kenny I love her, I love her books I mean she’s a great writer and all.” Cara said looking up at him, “But I missed you so much I just wishes we could have work things out a little better then what I made.” Cara look up at him as he moved her finger over Kenny’s lips.

Kenny look down at Cara then he turn his head the other way. “Cara were just friends now I’ve move on I’m with Y/N now so me and you are done. You even said it yourself.” Cara started to cry, “Please Kenny can we please try it again?” Kenny shook his head as got up paying for the drinks. Cara got up as she walk with Kenny back to her hotel room. Once upstairs Kenny help Cara enter her room as he laid her down on her Cara kiss Kenny as he move back from her. “Kenny please?” Kenny look down at her as lean in kissing Cara back. Dean was on the outside of Cara hotel room door hearing the noise. “Damn Kenny.” Dean walk away from the door and enter his hotel room laid down on his side of the bed looking over at Roman nodded his head. “Yeah Kenny gave in you was right?” Dean gave Roman the $100 as they both watch a movie.

You sat on your sofa watching your favorite show on Netflix you look over to see the door to you apartment open just to see Kenny rushing in. “Hey baby how was the live show?” As you got up from the sofa walking to Kenny then he grabs your face kissing you hard. You move your head over just so you can talk. “Kenny I miss you as well clam down.” Kenny pick you up then laid you down on the sofa. “You know what Y/N let’s have a baby right now.” You sat up looking at Kenny. “What?” Kenny start to to take his clothes off, “Y/N please have my baby will ya.” You nodded as you took off your bathrobe. That night you and Kenny made love and rough sex all because Kenny made one little mistake.

#kenny omega x reader #Kenny Omega #dean ambrose #roman reigns #fan fiction #fanfic #fanficwwe #WWE #dean ambrose x kenny omega

32 notes · View notes

deepdisireslonging · 5 years

Text

Family Found Part 30: Challenge Accepted

Some of the last pieces for Clash of Champions are put into place. The Reader wants Dean to help her out with a little experiment she’s running.

Warnings/Promises: wrestling violence

Word Count: 2080

Total Word Count So Far: 89,730

Note: Or as I like to call this chapter, ‘poke the title week’! I do it way too much in this chapter, but I feel like it’s the best way to rile someone up. Who doesn’t dislike getting poked? And I have a total count for the chapters! There’s going to be 50, so we’re over half-way through! If you’ve been enjoying the series, please let me know with a comment or a message sent to my inbox. I’d greatly appreciate knowing your favorite bits. Have fun reading this chapter too!

Part 1: Welcome to the Team

Part 29: A Dangerous Road

Monday Night Raw – December 3, 2018

Balor Club welcomed their leader as he made his way to the ring. Finn made sure to lean deep on the ropes, showing off his red and gold championship. Then he stepped through the ropes and accepted a mic.

“Last week was… interrestin’.” He started. “And Seth, I bet you have to agree. So why don’t you get out here so we can talk about it?” Waiting patiently, he smiled as the crowd cheered ‘burn it down’ and may have joined them. Just a little bit.

Seth strutted into the ring with a smile. “What’s there to talk about, Finn? We were doing what we do best, fighting to be the best man, and then our, uh,” he rubbed the back of his head, “our partners decided to flip the play.”

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” Finn said. “They tried us, then we continued to do what we do best, and be the workhorses of this company. The best men. The ones worthy of the gold we carry. ”

Smirking, Seth had to agree. “We did good. Heaven forbid we ever get the tag titles in our sights. Or, sorry Balor, hell forbid.” But he shook his head. “Don’t let last week go to your head. We may be friends, but come Clash of Champions, we will be opponents.”

“I wouldn’ want it any other way.”

They both paused, looking each other over. Somewhere, someone tried to start a ‘hug it out’ chant, but it didn’t have the chance to run as Finn raised his microphone to his lips.

“I would have beaten you.”

Seth shook his head. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

“It’s not my sleep you should be worried about.” Finn circled him. “I have a feelin’ I’m not the one tossin’ and turnin’ because of how close some of those counts got. You may be the Intercontinental Champ ‘round here,” he stopped. Seth turned around to face him, flinching as Finn tapped the title on his shoulder, “but I’m the Universal Champ. The people’s champion. And I bet t’at just eats you up inside. Knowin’ I am more worthy of this title than you will ever be. T’at’s what I wanted to tell you. See ya at Clash of Champions.”

He nodded on last time, then stepped through the ropes, leaving Seth behind and not turning his back until he was up the ramp.

***

The next round of the women’s tag team tournament was the first official match of the night. Mickie and Alicia came out to the ring, ready to throw down and win their spot at Clash of Champions. Alexa Bliss came with them, dressed in a sharp suit to be their ring-side accompaniment. Bayley came out next. She laughed to see Alicia already mocking Rhonda’s punch-n’-bounce. But Rhonda Rousey music didn’t hit. Sasha Banks’s did.

“What!” Corey shouted. “How can Bayley trust her? After all the times Sasha has stabbed her in the back.”

Renee took over while he sputtered. “Maybe that’s why this could work. Bayley isn’t going to give second chances, and Sasha’s not going to be preoccupied with coming up with a back-stabbing plan. No plotting or looking over their shoulders. Just the goal at hand.” She hummed. “It might just work.”

They continued to debate the ability of Bayley and Sasha as their opponents did everything they could to break them apart. But the trio was so focused on distracting them, that they were distracted themselves. The friend-hate duo played into every trick, but in such a way that drained Alicia and Mickie. By the time the women realized it, Bayley had flipped Mickie out of the way with a Bayley to Belly, and Sasha had Alicia locked in a Bank Statement. Alexa couldn’t get into the ring in time to keep her from tapping.

Standing on either side of the ref while he raised their hands, they gave each other guarded smiles. The plan had worked… this time.

***

Backstage, Seth spoke to a techie, who pointed further down the hallway. “Thanks. Ambrose!” He quickened his steps to catch up to Dean. “Hey, man, do you know where your cousin is? She wasn’t in her office and I need to ask a favor.”

Dean finished off taping his hands. “She was coming back from a situation in catering.” He smirked. “Finn got under your skin again, didn’t he?”

“No.” Seth fiddled with his wrist straps. “Fine. Maybe. But I’m just as deserving of the Universal as he is and just as much of a people’s choice.”

“Alright, alright!” Dean held his hands up in defense, chuckling when Seth’s shoulders deflated.

“Sorry.” He looked Dean up and down. “What are your plans for Clash of Champions?”

He ran his tongue over his lips and tilted his head. “Dunno. Might just sit back and watch this one. Maybe I’ll text Renee notes on her commentary. Maybe… I’ll pay you and Finn a visit during your match. Haven’t held the Universal yet… and I’d love to have my Intercontinental back.”

Seth stepped back from Dean’s fingers ready to tap at the belt. “Don’t you dare,” he said with a grin. “We’d both kick your ass.”

“Ha, assuming I wouldn’t kick both of yours.” He shook his head. “But weren’t you looking for the other Ambrose?” He punched at Seth’s unoccupied shoulder, then twisted away, leaving Seth to once again stand alone.

***

As the runners-up for the guy’s tag team number one contenders, the B-Team had challenged the Revival. They wanted to prove that they could win on their own, and then take care of any distractions that might come up. The Revival was more than happy to answer the call, and they kept the B-Team on their toes. The longer the match went on, the more the Revival noticed something. If Curtis was in the ring, Bo was reaching for a tag. He was watching the ramp and the back of the ring. And vise versa.

Neither was paying much attention to their present opponents.

It cost them the match. Dash and Wilder rolled their victims out of the ring so they could have their arms raised in an empty ring.

***

Charly Caruso rounded a corner and almost bumped into her next interviewee. “Braun, sorry. Um, could you tell us why you’ve joined up with the man we used to know as Bray Wyatt? You’ve been a dominant figure here on Monday Night Raw. What do you gain by teaming up with Dr. M?” She held up her microphone, patiently waiting while he thought over his answer.

He gently took the mic from her so she didn’t have to reach. “For the past several months, my goals have been just out of my reach.” He crossed his arms, one giant elbow wrapped in a black bandage. “My best, my rage, it hasn’t been enough. Even though it got me so close. Now I’m a tag team champion.”

Charly nodded and moved to take her mic, but he held it up out of reach. She motioned for him to continue.

“Bray or Dr. M, he’s… healed whatever problems I’ve had focusing on how to get what I want. I’ve got another goal in mind. And I know he’s going to help me get that one to. In time.” He finally returned Charly’s equipment, then continued on his way.

***

“You want this.” Natalya watched herself on the Titontron standing toe to toe with Nia from last week. “And you know what, I want to see you try. Next week. I’ll see you there, and I’ll see you fail.” The video ended and Natalya focused her attention to the stage. “Well, Nia. I’m here. You want this?” She nudged her shoulder, raising the title. “Then come out here and get it.”

A minute later, Nia did just that. When the bell rang, they circled each other. They both froze as Ember Moon’s music sounded, and she walked out onto the stage. She made a show of walking just to the top of the ramp, then turning back towards the announce table and joining them. “Hey Corey, Cole, Renee. Thought I’d drop in and give my input on this match, if that’s alright?”

In the ring, the women went back to fighting each other. Nia had a height and strength advantage, but Natalya had the champion’s advantage. She dodged most of Nia’s attacks. And she rolled out of the ring, making the other woman fume and rage.

“Are you worried about this match at all,” Corey asked. “Nia’s got this opportunity because she and Tamina beat you and Dana last week.”

“Nope. Not one bit. “I may not have made it into the tag title match at Clash of Champions, but I am still going to have a title before the year is out. I don’t care if I have to beat Nia or Natalya for it.”

Natalya moved out of the way at the last second, making Nia run into a set of steel steps. She rolled back in the ring and motioned for the ref to count. By nine and a half, Nia was just getting to her feet. He made it to ten before she could reach for the ropes. They glared at each other as Natalya accepted her title from the ref.

As Nia went up the ramp to leave the arena, Ember passed by and gave her a little wave and a smile. Ember joined Natalya at the ropes, the champion not giving her the room to even enter the ring. No matter. She shrugged and lightly ran her fingers down the red and white belt.

“Clash of Champions. I’ll see you there.” Then she hopped off the apron and left with her head held high.

***

Dean bounced into your office and waited a second for you to finish an email. “Did Seth find you?”

“Yes he did, and I was able to help.” You shrugged. “And Jose found you, so I could talk to you too.”

He smiled, then clapped his hands so he could rub them together. “Who you got for me this week, Ladybug?”

“Well… are you okay with being a guinea pig?”

He stepped back and squinted at you, unsure. “Sure.”

“Great. You have a match with Drew McIntyre tonight.” Before your sentence was finished, Dean had cocked his head and leaned towards you.

“What’s the catch?”

With a deep breath, you bit back a grin. “I want you to push his buttons. Can you do that?”

Dean grinned for you. “Hell yeah, I can.”

“Win, and there’ll be a surprise for you next week.” You giggled as his eyebrows shot up.

“Oh?” He rolled his shoulders back and forth. Wiggling, even though he always said he doesn’t wiggle. “And what would that be?”

“I can’t tell you, or it wouldn’t be a surprise.” You scoffed, “don’t you trust me?”

“It comes and goes.” You both laughed. Dean patted your shoulder before heading out.

***

He did all that you needed and more. If there was one thing that Ambroses were the best at, it was poking the proverbial bear. Dean just had the fighting skill to back it up. And the forethought to do it when the ref wasn’t looking.

This bothered Drew McIntyre to no end. He tried moving faster, hitting harder. But each time, Dean got right back up and did it all over again like only he could. The ref had to pull the Scottish Psychopath away from the ropes where Dean had dodged out. Behind his back and right into Drew’s glare, Dean smirked.

“Not all that without Dolph doing the dirty work for ya, huh?” He rolled completely out of the ring before Drew could swing a punch. He ran as he was chased and slid back into the ring. Drew tried to follow, but Dean left again, circling the other way, much to the amusement of the crowd. But Drew didn’t take the hint and had a chair ready for him as Dean came around the corner.

Before the first hit even landed, the referee was calling for the disqualification and naming Dean the winner of the match. Once the bell had rung, Dean turned on his own dark side and beat Drew down to the mat surrounding the ring.

“How’s that for pushing buttons?” he asked, walking backward away from the ring.

Part 31: Sending a Message

Series Masterlist

Masterlist

Forever Tags: @blondekel77 @hallemichelles @laochbaineann @lavitabella87 @ramblingsofabourbondrinker @savmontreal @southsidebucky @tinyelfperson @zuni21798

WWE/Series Tags: @a-home-for-stray-stories @amballins-priestess @top-1-percent @mother-forker @neversatisfiedgirl @racheo91 @roman-reigns-princess @secretagentfangirl @thetherianthropydaily @wwe-smutfics @scuzmunkie @likeisaidwhatever @cait-kae @ramsaypants @sony-undead18 @brianaraydean @st4yingstrong @dopeybubbles @crystallizeme @jessica91073 @denise8691 @stalelight @kenyadakblalock @1dluver13xx @lauren-novak @lunatic-desert-child @littledeadrottinghood @livelifewondering

10 notes · View notes

easyobsession · 6 years

Text

A Vow

SQUEE!! I feel like I’ve been working on this for DECADES when in reality it’s only been a few weeks, but IT’S FINALLY DONE! So here you are! I proudly present my latest creation, inspired by all the time shit happens and WWE likes to pretend Seth and Roman have never met and wouldn’t run out to defend each other.

Enjoy.

It’s all because of a promise.

A stupid promise, actually. A goddamn piece of shit horse crap fucking dumb promise.

It happened the week after Elimination Chamber. Roman had waited until Raw ended and they’d both signed autographs and taken selfies with the fans; after they’d gotten something to eat, showered, and settled in to bed at the hotel, taking a few minutes to simply come down from the day’s craziness and enjoy being in each other’s arms.

“I need you to do something for me,”

Much to Seth’s disappointment, he could tell whatever was about to be discussed wasn’t at all sexual, which was perplexing because aside from something dirty Seth truly couldn’t imagine what his lover would need to talk about. He could tell it was important though, from the way Roman had pulled back enough from their embrace to look him in the eye.

Seth let out a slow breath, frowning a bit as he finally responded.

“Okay…”

“I know things are starting to pick up for both of us at work,” Roman began, “Especially after tonight, our paths for Mania are becoming clearer.”

Seth nodded. Ever since he’d won the Elimination Chamber Roman had been getting ready for his match against Brock Lesnar, calling the other man out for not being around and arguing with Paul Heyman while Seth was heading into a feud for the Intercontinental Championship with Finn Balor and the Miz. Of course a small part of him wished he was the one going for the Universal title, but he was also beyond proud of his man for winning a title shot at Wrestlemania. Plus, this way they could both leave the Grandest Stage of Them All as champions (and maybe indulge in a longtime fantasy of fucking with nothing but the belts on).

“There’s gonna be a lot of shit starting,” the Samoan continued, “You know as well as I do Lesnar isn’t gonna let that title go without a dog fight, and I wanna take as much pleasure as I can ripping it from his hands-” he let out a small laugh as his boyfriend surged forward, kissing him deeply.

“I like when you talk like that,” Seth murmured against his lips, clearly not the least bit sorry for interrupting, “It’s sexy as hell,”

“You’re sexy as hell,” Roman returned, dropping another quick kiss before pulling back and blurting, “You can’t help.”

“What?” Instantly Seth’s arms fell from their position around his shoulders while his face filled with confusion and a bit of hurt, “What the hell does that mean?”

“You can’t come out and back me up,” Roman elaborated, reaching for the other man’s hands as he tried to explain, “Look, we both know this thing is gonna get ugly- it already is. This is something that started over three years ago and never really got proper closure. Don’t,” he put a finger to Seth’s mouth as it began to open, already aware of what he was about to say and having no desire to go over it again. They’d had many discussions both in private and with Ambrose since Seth’s cash in at Mania 31, and the event and Seth’s betrayal in its entirety was a thing of the past. Hell, Roman and Dean had even admitted that, personal issues aside, the move was pretty fucking epic.

“You know what I mean. It’s only gonna get worse from here. You know how tired I am of having a champion that’s never around- I’m gonna do everything I can to make the rest of the locker room and the fans see it that way too.”

Seth nodded, still unsure of why this meant he needed to apparently not get involved. He was completely on board with everything Roman said. Shit, so was a good percentage of the locker room. Even if some of their coworkers weren’t Roman’s biggest fans and hadn’t wanted him to win the Elimination Chamber, they were ready for a champion that actually showed up on a regular basis.

“And you know I’m with you all the way,” Seth promised.

“I know, baby. And you know that means the world to me,” Roman pecked the smaller man’s nose before continuing, “But this has to be something I do on my own.”

“…alright,” Rollins let out a small sigh but relented with a nod. It made sense that Roman wanted to do this without help and Seth fully believed he could and would, so while it sucked it wasn’t too ridiculous to suggest. Plus, since Dean’s injury nearly two and a half months ago the reboot of The Shield had been placed on hold and he and Roman were doing the singles thing anyway. “I won’t come out for the match,”

Roman frowned. The other man wasn’t getting his meaning and it broke his heart to actually say it out loud.

“Seth, you can’t come out at all,” he corrected, “No promos, no matches, nothing. And you can’t come defend me if anything goes south. Even if I’m getting my ass handed to me.”

“Wait a minute, you’re saying if Lesnar gets the upper hand and starts beating the shit out of you, I can’t come out?” Seth demanded, pulling away to glare at the other man, “What if he has back-up, Roman? Or Heyman makes some sort of deal and he’s got people backstage? They’re both so far up Vince’s ass you know he’ll give them whatever they ask for. What, I’m just supposed to stay back and watch you get hurt? That’s bullshit.”

“I have to do this my way. This is a two-man game, Seth. Him and me- that’s it. Nobody else can be involved.”

Seth cocked an eyebrow, “What about Heyman?” he questioned, causing Roman to shake his head.

“Heyman might be an asset at times, but at the end of the day there’s only two people in the ring,” he replied, “When Lesnar gets taken out, it has to be by my hands alone.”

“So what, this is all for your pride?” Seth scoffed, unable to believe what he was hearing, “Roman, come on!”

“It’s more than just my pride, Seth! It’s my dignity, my livelihood; it’s everything I’ve ever stood for!” Roman exclaimed, “It’s about a rivalry that’s gone on for years and finally proving once and for all who’s top dog around here. This is for me, it’s for you, it’s for Dean, our families, the fans, and everyone in that locker room!” his volume lowered significantly, eyes pleading for the man before him to understand, “This is about what’s right and proving that title still has value and holding it stands for something bigger than just one person. This is what we do, Seth. We fight because it’s what we love and because it means something,” he reached forward, grateful when his boyfriend didn’t yank his hands away again, “I have to do this.”

Seth grimaced down at the bed sheets. “If Dean were here-” he began, only for Roman to cut him off.

“Nothing would change,” he interrupted calmly, “I plan on telling him the same thing when I talk to him next. Whether he comes by to visit or gets cleared early, nobody else can get involved. Not you, Dean, the twins, anybody,” Roman let out a small breath. “I know this is gonna be brutal,” he promised, “Lesnar wants to break Punk’s streak and putting an end to that isn’t gonna come without a little pain. But I’m ready.” He leaned forward, letting their foreheads rest together.

“I have to do this,” he whispered, “It’s time.”

The entire situation blows, basically. Especially because Seth knows he can’t fault him for a word he said and what’s more, if the roles were reversed, Roman would respect his wishes and stay back. Hell, he already did when Seth had been fighting with Finn Balor for the very same belt years prior.

“I fucking hate you, Roman Reigns,” he pouts, finally allowing their eyes to meet again and making the other man laugh.

“I know,” he promises fondly, “But you love me too.”

“Yeah,” Seth leans forward to meet him for another kiss, “I really do.”

…

As expected, the promise sucks.

At first it seems like maybe fulfilling Roman’s wishes won’t be too difficult since Brock is never around. There’s much less of a chance for something to go south when it’s just back and forth with Heyman on the mic. Seth does get heated after Vince suspends Roman from Raw the following week, but he holds his tongue when the Samoan assures him it’ll be fine.

“They’re not used to someone calling them out,” Roman says patiently while packing up his belongings in the locker room. “It’s understandable. Not acceptable, but understandable. They’ll figure it out, even if I have to force the point,” He leans forward to peck Seth’s lips twice. “I’ll meet you back at the hotel. See if I can get us an upgrade to something with a Jacuzzi tub to celebrate you kicking Finn’s ass.”

…

But when US Marshalls appear the week after and put Roman in handcuffs, Seth isn’t so comfortable anymore. And when Brock comes out and attacks him with his hands bound, things get ugly backstage as well.

“HE CAN’T USE HIS FUCKING HANDS!” Seth shouts, unable to understand why no one else is as upset as he is about the situation. “And they’ve got some second-rate security guards and a few refs out there? What the hell, man?!” His heart nearly breaks in two as the man he loves is put on a stretcher, a bit of comfort coming at the sight of the Beast Incarnate seemingly having his fill of unnecessary torture only to be ripped away when Lesnar apparently reconsiders and heads back towards the ring.

“Seth, try to calm down-” Sasha gives him a look of sympathy as she and a few others block the locker room door. While loving him with all his heart, Roman knew the likelihood of Seth losing his cool was high and had taken precaution and spread word to a handful of their friends in advance.

“He’s on a goddamn stretcher, dude! This isn’t okay!” the Architect exclaims, searching for some way to release his fury at the situation, “Let me out!”

Apollo frowns, “Sorry man, Roman made us promise,”

“Fuck promises! There was nothing about stretchers in the stupid promise!” Letting out another swear, Seth throws a kick against the locker’s wooden paneling. “He needs help!”

“Honey, he has to do this himself,” Nia says gently, quickly echoed by Matt Hardy.

“She speaks the truth! It is a quest indeed the Large Canine himself must complete without the aid of even his most beloved,” Matt places his hands together, tone full of serenity as he speaks with complete confidence, “Though fear not, he who seeks the Title of Intercontinents! I have foreseen this journey’s end and can guarantee that after the necessary trials and tribulations have been conquered your suitor will indeed emerge triumphant!”

For a moment the room is silent, everyone turning to stare at the self-proclaimed Woken Warrior until finally Seth snaps out of it and questions, “Who the hell even let you in here?”

(It’s once Roman is being wheeled out to the awaiting ambulance and demands Seth stay for the rest of the show that he manages to calm down a bit simply because the other man is able to speak. The only reason he doesn’t ignore the instructions and head to the hospital anyway is because Mike Kanellis agrees to go in his place and keep him updated and Roman threatens to ban Seth from his bedside.)

…

“I should never have agreed to this,” It’s the following week that Seth is once again watching chaos unfold on the locker room’s tiny television screen.

“You know as well as I do if you go out there he’d never forgive you,” Dean Ambrose’s voice barks from the cell phone speaker, “Once he makes up his mind there’s no changing it. He’s a hard head like you.”

Seth doesn’t even bother arguing. It’s a trait all three of them have in common and they know it. “Yeah well, his head is giving me an ulcer,”

“He can handle it, Uce. Look, he’s holding his own, see? Totally fine,” Rollins can almost hear his best friend grimace a minute later when Roman goes flying through the stairs. “Shit that looked painful,”

“You’re really a big help, man. I can’t say it enough,” he comments dryly.

“Suck it up, Princess. He’s taking a couple bumps, not being permanently confined to a wheelchair. Get him some ice and maybe a shot of whiskey for yourself and quit the crying.”

Seth sits forward in his folding chair and stares at the monitor intensely, his left leg bouncing with nerves, “Get up, Roman. Come on, sit up,” he murmurs, letting out a sigh of relief when the other man slowly begins to rise.

“See! What I tell ya?”

“Dean, shut the fuck up.”

…

There almost isn’t even time to panic at Wrestlemania simply because everything happens so fast.

After an endless (epic) week in New Orleans, Sunday is spent doing last minute press and getting ready until show time.

Fresh off his triple threat victory, when the finale comes Seth is beaming from ear to ear as he watches the love of his life walk out to thousands of screaming fans. It’s obvious the Big Dog isn’t super over at the moment, but to Seth it doesn’t matter if he gets the crowd reaction of Daniel Bryan or Tommaso Ciampa. Love him or hate him, Roman Reigns owns this yard and everyone watching live in Louisiana and around the world through the WWE Network is about to see why.

It isn’t easy to watch. Roman kicks ass obviously, but after the third F5 Seth can tell the battle is wearing on him. Which is expected, of course, however throughout the entire match he can’t shake the feeling that something is off. Roman is on fire as usual, but there’s something in the air Seth can’t quite describe that has him shifting the Intercontinental title over his shoulder uneasily as he watches among countless other Superstars just past gorilla position backstage.

“Fuck,” the word slips out of his mouth without warning when red begins to seep at the Samoan’s hairline, and he can’t even bring himself to care that countless higher ups are milling around to hear his profanity. It’s clear from the hushed murmur of his peers he isn’t the only one starting to get anxious.

“That’s… a lot of blood,” Bayley points out nervously, Natalya nodding in agreement from her place nearby.

“Was that spot planned?” she asks, glancing to Jimmy and Jey Uso, who both shrug, and then Seth for an answer. But the Architect can only shake his head. Everyone knows Roman isn’t the type to go for gore or special effects; he’s been raised to always showcase talent over anything else. Besides, Seth knows that every attempt to contact Brock to map out the match had gone unanswered by the self-proclaimed mayor of Suplex City.

“…he’s not moving,” Renee breaks the silence after a few more minutes when Lesnar lands another F5, this time through the announce table. Even Dean, who can be seen connected via FaceTime on the phone in her hand, is looking a bit paler than usual.

Xavior Woods shakes his head. “He’s good, he’s just taking a second to regroup,” the gamer attempts to reassure the room as well as himself, staring on.

“Yeah,” The twins force themselves to nod, backing up the sentiment, “He’s got this,”

…

To everyone’s shock, Seth doesn’t try to rush out when the ref finally counts to three. Instead he remains silent, feet slowly moving until his back hits a concrete wall, the gleaming white belt slipping as he stares ahead with a blank face.

He didn’t expect this. He was prepared for a lot of things to happen tonight, but never did the possibility even cross his mind that Roman would lose.

He wants to throw up. He wants to scream and cry and throw a fit like a child whose mother refuses to buy them candy in the grocery store. Not because he’s upset with Roman for losing, but because of the situation as a whole.

This shouldn’t have happened. It wasn’t supposed to happen. Lesnar was supposed to drop the title and go back to the UFC- that was what everyone heard. That was the plan. So something had to have changed. Except Roman would have told him if that had happened, there was no doubt in Seth’s mind. So what the hell happened out there?

The crowd of Superstars has spread out by the time the performers are arriving backstage, a handful giving Brock polite applause when he appears. The reigning champion barely spares anyone a look, shaking hands with Vince and a few other big wigs before making his way through the parted crowd, Heyman at his heels like that of an obedient Golden Retriever.

It takes a little longer for Roman to arrive, a towel in one hand soaked with blood and a look of pure defeat clear on his face. His gaze is locked on the floor, unable and unwilling to look anyone in the eye until Samoa Joe of all people slowly begins to applaud. One by one the rest of the roster joins in, as well as a large part of the crew, meeting his eyes as they shower him with respect.

Roman sucks in a breath, doing his best to hold back the tears already building. While Vince only offers a solemn nod of the head, Hunter steps forward and pulls the other man into a hug, quickly murmuring words no one else can hear before releasing him with a pat on the back and push towards his peers.

The Superstars keep it brief, offering a few words of encouragement or a clap on the shoulder as he passes. Everyone knows what it’s like to come off of a huge match on the opposite side of victory, so the rest of the talent quickly disperses to finish their own tasks and give Roman his space.

It’s Seth that meets him at the end of the line, of course, finally having snapped out of his revere when Roman reaches him. Rather than speak he simply turns to the concerned ref nearby and holds up a hand, silently asking for five minutes before having the wound examined at medical. Receiving a quick nod in response, he follows Roman to their shared locker room and twists the lock behind him, dropping the title onto his bag before letting out a breath as his back hits the door.

For a moment there’s nothing but heavy silence, a small groan slipping from Roman’s lips as he lowers himself to a plush sofa in the corner the only audible sound.

Naturally, because he’s Seth Rollins and it’s what he does, Seth speaks first.

“I love you,” he announces, taking no offense when he receives zero response from the other man’s bowed head, “There’s a lot more I want to say, and we both know I will eventually, but right now I’m just gonna say that I love you and I’m here and that’s never gonna change.”

A few beats pass before Roman opens his eyes, face rising as Seth crosses the room and crouches down in front of him. Rollins holds back a sob when their gazes connect. The other man’s face is the picture of a broken human being. A few tears have escaped and roll down his cheeks, devastation and frustration and humiliation just a few of the emotions radiating from his person.

“I didn’t know,” Roman’s voice is garbled, thick with physical and emotional exhaustion when he finally speaks, “They changed their mind and nobody told me. He was coming down the ramp when the ref pulled me aside.” He shakes his head, almost as if he himself can’t believe the situation. “I didn’t know,”

And because he isn’t sure what else can be done in this type of scenario, Seth just pulls him into his arms and lets him cry.

…

As much as he wants to believe the worst is over, Seth knows once Mania ends things aren’t going to ease up any time soon. The Greatest Royal Rumble is announced to be taking place in Saudi Arabia in just three weeks time, including a Wrestlemania rematch for the Universal Championship inside of a cell.

By now Roman is over his sad phase. He isn’t the type to feel sorry for himself anyway, but he has moments of weakness from time to time like anyone else because he’s human. Once those are over though, it’s back to protecting his yard and being the warrior everyone knows him to be.

And of course, now more fired up than ever, he’s also hellbent on Seth still staying out of it. Luckily Brock doesn’t show up (shocker) until the Raw before the Rumble, and even then somehow things manage not to get out of hand. So it isn’t as difficult.

Then they go to Saudi Arabia.

Don’t get him wrong, Seth totally loves the UAE. The cities are beautiful, the culture is incredible, and the people and the fans they meet are the best.

But some complete and total horse shit goes down at the Greatest Royal Rumble.

It’s not confusing. There’s not a debate. The rules announced before the match clearly state the first contestant’s feet to hit the floor is the winner.

Roman’s feet hit the floor first.

No ifs, ands, or buts about it. It’s on freaking film.

But of course, by sheer coincidence and one of the only recorded times in history, the ref makes the wrong call.

Naturally, Seth is livid. He manages to remain in the back, but the locker room is rather impressed with the extensive vocabulary of curse words he throws out. Titus O’Neal even quietly reminds him they are indeed in a foreign country as guests and trying to make a good impression not just as a company but as individuals, so he does lower his volume slightly, but his peers still wear masks of surprise at his vast collection of swears.

Roman doesn’t even know how to react. He’s so exhausted at this point, between the physicality of the match and the mental fatigue, not to mention their bodies are all thrown off by the time difference, all they can do when they return to the hotel is exchange a few tender kisses and pass out in bed.

…

The following day on Raw, when they make the announcement that they won’t be reversing the call, everyone expects an encore of the previous evening’s tirade but Seth can’t even muster up the energy. Like Roman, he’s tired. He’s very, very tired. Hell, by now he’s barely surprised.

He does get pissed off when Bobby Lashley and Braun Strowman of all people get to run out and help defend Roman, and that they get to tag with him against Owens, Zayn, and Jinder. Because yeah, Seth gets that he’s doing his thing with Miz and Finn and the IC title and it’s epic, but he hasn’t completely forgotten Roman exists. Like seriously, Braun Strowman? Didn’t Roman try to run him over with an ambulance a while back?

But of course Braun didn’t make a promise to stay in the back and the man adores any excuse to beat the shit out of someone, so when management calls for him to head out and assist the Big Dog he doesn’t have to think twice.

Damn semantics.

…

It’s clear by now Brock won’t be dropping the belt any time soon, no matter what happens. Not until he beats and seemingly erases Punk’s record from the history books, outcome of the matches be damned. Management won’t allow any other result as a possibility. It’s crap and it’s unfair, not just to Roman but to the entire locker room and the fans, but they can’t change anything. So really, they might as well not waste time crying about it.

All they can do is show up every day and do their best to put on an amazing show for the fans time and time again and have as much fun as possible in the process. That’s why they got into this business in the first place: because they love what they do. Not because of notoriety or fame or ugly red belts, but because it makes people happy, makes them feel alive, and because it’s so much fun every single time.

Every night they lay in bed, almost unable to tell whose limbs belong to whom in the tangled mess under hotel sheets, bodies pressed tight up against one another, they make sure to remember that.

When the time is right, Roman will get his turn with the Universal championship; whether that’s next week, next month, or ten years from now, it’ll happen. And it’ll be the ride of a lifetime and Seth will be the first one out to the ring to celebrate.

Until then, at the end of the day, they have each other.

And as it happens, compared to that, the glory of a title is practically insignificant.

fin.

#rolleigns #wwe fanfiction #oneshot #idk what else to tag i feel awkward #rolleigns fic #lo writes things #rolleigns fanfiction

22 notes · View notes

blazingtheway · 3 years

Text

Through the Looking Glass – Storyline 8 – Together - Part Five

Continuing on from...

↬Embry Call ↫ Since Mom got sick whatever free time I had, was pretty much spent with the pack and the imprints. I had almost forgotten how norms reacted to us eating... and especially Leah. People expected girls that looked like Leah to eat rabbit food, drink fat-free protein shakes and spend every spare second in the gym. She did look like she could have stepped out of the pages of a fitness magazine, but she wasn’t afraid to eat or drink what she wanted, when she wanted. She wasn’t one to put on airs for others. "Yeah." I nodded. "Never use Touch ID if you plan on falling asleep." 'You actually spent the night?' #Seth almost choked. "No, I made the mistake of taking her home... She had roommates. It won't happen again." I smirked at Leah. "I've instated a new rule." I smiled at her when she was talking about my undeniable talents. "I think I can get the crowd psyched up." I shook my head at #Mac and laughed. "Hey... You gotta give the people what they want. I can't promise it won't happen… It wouldn't be the first time I took my shirt off in this place or the last." #Tony almost choked on his food he laughed so hard. When we were all done laughing at #Seth getting slapped and finished eating, we got back to work. There wasn't all that much left to do on the stage, so #Tony asked me to set up the sound system with him. I couldn't stop myself from eyeing the keyboard. I had played an identical one in the store in Port Angeles, not that. 'How old were you when you stopped playing?' #Tony asked when he caught me. 'Your mom is something else when she plays... She still does, right?' "Mom?" I grinned and focused on the last part of the question. I always hated lying around Leah, she was honest to a fault and now that she knew all my dark secrets; I really didn’t want to start lying around her again. I didn’t really know why it was becoming so important to me. "Yeah, when she has a good day there's no stopping her. She’s never happier than when she's playing." ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ I smirked, recalling him telling me about that chick, and the smell of her cheap perfume had seeped into his skin and his clothes to the point I could still smell her off him after he’d showered. My eyebrow raised at the ‘𝙉𝙚𝙬 𝙍𝙪𝙡𝙚’ comment. But before I could say anything #Seth jumped in. ‘New Rule? What are you taking pages from Sis’s book of life now? Rules and regulations to follow?’ I knew #Seth only meant it as a joke, but it earnt an eye roll from me. “There’s nothing wrong with setting rules to live your life by Kid, it keeps everything and everybody in their right place. The world knows what to expect from you and you know how much you are willing to give.” He gave me an apologetic half smile and I waved it off. Wiping my hands, I pushed myself up from the table. With my stomach full now at least I knew I could go a few hours without the need to stop. “Okay, so what is next?” I ask moving back over to the far side of the bar. The guys had all done really well while I was out grabbing the food, and there wasn’t much of the stage left to pull together. ‘Let’s finish off the stage, then we can check the lights and place the instruments too?’ #Mac called out from the table as he was cleaning up with #Seth. I stood looking down to the stage, trying my upmost not to eavesdrop on #Tony and Call. It wasn’t hard for me to block people out, but sometimes when there was no background noise it was a little more difficult. But when I heard #Tony asks if Call and Ms. C still played I fought myself not to listen. Keeping my eyes down on the stage, I stood there pulling my hair up into a messy bun over the top of my head, before getting back to work on completing the stage. But it did occur to me then, that #Tony knew that Embry Call played the piano? ↬ Embry Call ↫ I smirked at #Seth when he made his comment about me taking a leaf out of Leah’s book. But everyone here knew me well enough to know that I was not good at following rules, mine or anyone else’s. Not for long anyway. I winked at #Seth.

“Would that be a bad thing?” I smirked. ‘No… because it’s never gonna happen!” #Seth teased. I shook my head at Leah and laughed, #Seth gave me a pointed look, as if to say ‘Told you so!!’ and he was right… The idea of one rule in my book shattered all around me at the mention of ‘𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮𝙗𝙤𝙙𝙮 𝙞𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙞𝙧 𝙧𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙥𝙡𝙖𝙘𝙚.’ “Your sister makes a good point.” I was teasing Leah but talking to #Seth. “New rule is scrapped.” ‘That lasted all of five minutes!’ #Tony mocked. Once the other started on the lights #Tony and I began moving the speakers to the stage. We were debating the complexity of the set up he’s brought. “Do we really need monitors for an open mic night?” I asked. “Seems like a lot when it will mostly be solo singers or musicians.” This, of course, completely horrified #Tony. ‘Uh! Yeah! Of course, we do.’ He insisted. #Seth started looking between the two of us. ‘What are you talking about? I don’t see any monitors?’ His brow furrowed. I had already surrendered the argument and was running the cables from the back to the front of the stage, keeping them along the edge so the main part of the stage was clear. I laughed at #Seth. “No, we mean the speakers.” I chuckled and pointed to the smaller ones; shaped like large doorstops. “You turn them away from the crowd so the artist can hear themselves.” #Seth’s mouth made a little O shape, and then he pressed his lips together. He dismissed us both with a wave of his hand and muttered something about musicians being weird. ‘Yeah… We’ll leave that up to you guys. Whatever you think will sound good.’ #Seth smiled and headed back to work. ‘He seems like a nice guy.’ #Tony said quietly; if only he knew that even a whisper wasn’t quiet enough in this room. ‘Bit of a joker.’ “#Seth?” I chuckled. “Yeah, he is. Too nice for his own good sometimes. He’s been like that his whole life. He’s more like his sister than you’d think, too.” ‘Really? They seem like polar opposites.’ #Tony glanced at Leah again and I smirked. “They are...” I laughed. “Polar opposites and exactly alike in different aspects. Both of them are honest to a fault. They look after everyone around them just in 𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮 different ways. They work harder than anyone I know. The Clearwater’s are good people.” I had forgotten the pair were still in the room listening. ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ ‘To the left a little Lee.’ #Mac called out, we’d given up on #Seth helping as he disappeared off to speak with Call and #Tony. So, I climbed up on the ladder and was helping to attach the lights and then adjust them. I was always trying my hardest never to listen into the conversation around me. I was always somebody who liked to stay in my own head as it was a safer place to be. But I found myself mumbling about why they don’t just call the speakers 𝙎𝙥𝙚𝙖𝙠𝙚𝙧𝙨. ‘Did you say something Lee?’ #Mac called from in front of the stage. “Do you need this one to my left or yours?” I asked. And then adjusted it as he guided me to do so. By the time I was screwing in the last couple of the lights, #Seth was stood below me with the outlet, he reached up to hand it to me. The both of us were intensely listening to Call talking to #Tony. I cleared my throat really loud so to remind Call that he could be heard from this side of the room. It felt like for a moment he’d forgotten that #Seth and I were in the same room as him, and we could hear everything as clear as if he were shouting it off the top of the cliffs. ‘That is high praise coming from Embry there sis.’ #Seth muttered to me with a slight chuckle, but then when I looked down to him, his gaze was on Call with something amiss in it. I had to wonder if Call knew me or my brother at all. #Seth was nothing like me. He was kind, and sweet. Smiling from the moment his eyes opened in the morning, until the moment they closed for sleep again. My brother is always there for everybody and he never would kick arse if messed with. Instead, he would explain the mistake in a calm and caring way.

Taking the path of words than physical action. Me? Well, the 𝙥𝙤𝙡𝙖𝙧 𝙤𝙥𝙥𝙤𝙨𝙞𝙩𝙚𝙨comment was at least correct. ‘He sees a lot more than you would like him to Leah.’ My wolf was sitting up a little amused as she watched from her hide away. ‘Perfect Lee! Right there!’ #Mac called out and I tightened the attachment and waited for both #Mac and #Seth to give me the go ahead before I came down. Looking at the time, I dusted my hands off. “Right, if you need me, I’m going to head behind the bar and get start up going.” Giving the work a once over I stepped away from them all leaving the guys to play with all their new toys. But Calls words got me to thinking. ‘𝙋𝙤𝙡𝙖𝙧 𝙤𝙥𝙥𝙤𝙨𝙞𝙩𝙚𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙚𝙭𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙡𝙮 𝙖𝙡𝙞𝙠𝙚 𝙞𝙣 𝙙𝙞𝙛𝙛𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙣𝙩 𝙖𝙨𝙥𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙨’ What had he seen that he wasn’t supposed to? Had I let something slip when it should have been locked down? ‘You aren’t the same Leah, remember the lessons. Remember that Embry Call is on a journey of his own to discover himself and the world around him. If he is aware or unaware as it happens that’s one thing. But he is seeing a lot more than he did before.’ The tail of Truhoki, Kluskap and Skagedi was still fresh in my mind as I bought out the lemons, limes and oranges from the fridge under the bar out to slice and prepare for the night ahead. ↬ Embry Call ↫ ‘I can’t believe she can lift those lights… she’s not even struggling.’ #Tony chuckled, glancing up at her on the ladder. I had heard Leah clear her throat for my benefit, but I hadn’t said anything that would get my arse whooped and I was never one to filter my thoughts. So, I shrugged it off. “Yeah, she's tough.” I chuckled and could help glancing up. I knew Leah hated when people downplayed her strength, but sometimes we all had to, or claim that we worked out a lot more than we did… although few of us actually worked out. I did… because in my job staying in shape was kind of essential, and it would be hard to explain how I could take a guy down with ease and not needing to throw a punch without showing up to work out with them every once and a while. Plus, a liked burning off the steam. I was a lanky, skinny kid even after I phased; shooting up six inches in three months would do that to a guy. Working out in my human form is what got me the build I had today. Of course, the wolf in me meant I could lift heavier and go longer in the gym than any human could; so, it had been easy. I couldn’t help but chuckle at #Seth’s comment. I knew Leah was on top of that ladder now; reeling in her head that she was nothing like her brother. He was unfailingly kind and caring. He would hug a stranger to make them smile; go above and beyond to help someone. But, isn’t that exactly what Leah had done for me and Mom? Maybe she hadn’t done it with a smile… but there was no way that would have worked on the council, even if Mom was Quileute. And as much as I loved #Seth… like he was my brother, there was no way he could have done that. He didn’t have that type of determination in him; this wasn’t something that you could reason them into with kindness. But he would give his life if it would save Mom’s, I knew that. As would Leah. Leah’s way of caring for the people she loved was different, unrelenting and unstoppable. Especially when she knew she was right. Leah moved behind the bar and at my urging Tony started directing the guys on where to put what instruments. He was the one that knew what he was talking about; he set up a full stage a few times a month, probably more since they started the hire service. I couldn’t help but bite my lip as I coveted the keyboard; my finger ran over the buttons at the top with notations of different sounds and settings; I was already planning to YouTube keyboard tutorials when I went home, even though the button marked 𝙘𝙡𝙖𝙨𝙨𝙞𝙘 𝙥𝙞𝙖𝙣𝙤was the one that appealed to me most. ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ “Tough? Tough my arse” I muttered, slicing the lemons I knew that Call didn’t mean anything by using the word 𝙏𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝... We had to play down on

our strength in front of all those who didn’t know about the Spirit Warriors. But it still grinded on my nerves a little. ‘Relax will you, before you cut through the lemons and the chopping board too.’ My wolf was amused by all that was taking place today at the bar. I huffed at her. I was the woman who kicked more arses around this town than anybody in the packs. I told her. ‘Yes, and that has something to do with the fact that others used their words where as you choose to use your fists.’ My eyebrows pulled together. Telling her how I’d not hit another person in over….. ( Fine I had to think about it but not for long ). Well.. Since Seattle. ‘That was different, I’ve told you this before. One knew he was stepping into a ring with a woman and was looking for a payday. It’s his own fault he underestimated you when he saw you as a piece of meat, and not as the fighter you are. And the other… He is lucky to be alive.’ She was the one with the anger in her voice. But she’d helped to remind me that I’d been putting something off. I took out my phone and shot off a quick message to #Lucky. ( #Lucky was my underground fight Promoter and Organiser. The one person who’d helped me to become a name in the under-world fighting seen. Which in turn meant that I could help my Ma, #Seth and some of the members of the tribe with financial support. ) 𝚃𝚘 𝙻𝚞𝚌𝚔𝚢: 𝙰𝚗𝚢 𝙽𝚎𝚠𝚜 𝚘𝚗 𝚃𝚘𝚖 𝚊𝚗𝚍 𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚛𝚎𝚌𝚘𝚟𝚎𝚛𝚢? -𝙻 As I stood hitting send, my wolf growled and then turned her back on me. ‘You are better than me on this one.’ She said, and I knew her anger was towards the mistakes I had made. The clues I’d missed. But she was taking it out on the memories burned into our mind for the rest of our life. I walked over to the music system turning it on. The sounds wouldn’t block out all of the conversations or the memoires flashing in my mind right now that I needed to push away. I wasn’t ready to face this mess here and now. But it would help if I turned my attention to other things. Singing in my own head was a good cheat to keep the voices of others out. https://youtube.com/watch?v=lnEU_dy7sW4&feature=share As the song started to play out of the speakers around the bar, I started to hum along low so that nobody would notice. “𝘐'𝘭𝘭 𝘣𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘦, 𝘯𝘰 𝘮𝘢𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘨𝘰 𝘐'𝘭𝘭 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘣𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘩𝘦𝘭𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘳𝘦 𝘧𝘢𝘳 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘩𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘑𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸 𝘺𝘰𝘶'𝘳𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘦” Other than #Seth that was, even when he wasn’t a wolf, his hearing was better than all of us put together. His head jerked towards me and he was smirking. He liked it when I let the music wash over me, he knew it was the only time in my life that I was myself. Even if it was for a flittering moment or two. #Mac called for #Seths attention, ‘Need some help there Seth?’ Mac asked and Seth nodded pretending he needed help lift the drum set into place #Tony had pointed out to them. As I moved my attention back, I did a double take. My gaze lingering on Call, watching his fingers moving on the keyboard. He had that look in his eyes, the same as the one he had when I witnessed him playing his mom’s piano, and then again at the hotel in Seattle. Biting the inside of my cheek as I began to think. (Music: Walls – Walking on Cars )

youtube

↬ Embry Call ↫ I had to bite back the chuckle when I heard Leah mutter about my comment on her being tough. There was a chance I get a punch in the arm for that one next time I was within arm’s reach of her. I heard the knife hitting the chopping board harder and harder each time. I was definitely getting a punch when she could reach me. I couldn't help but grin at the song she put on, was this shuffle or was she a Walking on Cars fan? It was still shocking that we liked so much of the same music. I had crossovers with almost everyone I met; because I grew up listening to every kind of music imaginable. I

shared an artist or genre in common with most people. My fingers pressed down a few keys, they weren't un-piano-like, and they were much more polished, or at least newer, than the old ones on my mother's. Even having it tuned and cleaned professionally every year it still aged over time, I liked the slight roughness of the keys. But these glossy, polished ones weren't unpleasant but a long shot. But I felt a slight twitch work its way up my neck because, of course, nothing happened when I pressed the random keys... it was an electronic instrument, and nothing was powered up. That was irksome, if you press on a piano key it made a sound, even an out of tune one, sometimes even an unsettling sound at an unskilled hand... but it always made a sound. I was being ridiculous, though. There was nothing at all wrong with the keyboard as an instrument. If it wasn't for the fact my Grandfather gave us his piano after I was born; I probably would have learnt to play on one. The keyboard made it possible for a lot of people that never would have had a chance to learn, to play the piano in the first place. I cleared my throat and headed over to take a seat at the bar. If I was going to help out with this thing I needed to talk to the mastermind of the #HWH. "Have you decided when you want to do this?" I grinned. "We'll need the signup sheets and a little promotion online to get the word out." ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ The garnishes were ready, and the metal containers filled, I washed and packed away the knife and the board. Having a knife laying around a bar where stupid people came to get drunk was never a good idea. And I hated to think it, but it was a known fact that one in ten people were without common sense. So, in my eyes these were the people who were classed as stupid. These were the fools who thought it was okay to feel up a girl when her back was turned, or to shout out some obscene comment, which would end with me kicking their arse out the door. These were the people who if they saw something they could use as a weapon, would take the opportunity to do so. Which also ended up with me or the guys kicking their arses out of the bar. Which meant that something as simple as leaving tools you needed ( a knife ) to do your job, had to be packed away. I moved onto refilling the mixed juices, taking half of them and enthused them with the fresh herbs that had arrived with today’s delivery. There wasn’t much call for them with the local crowds, but it was the townies who had gotten a taste from coming down to #HWH who always ordered the cocktails now. An idea that had been the brain child of #Mac and #Seth, but when they realised it wasn’t as simple as throwing fruit juice over a spirit, they started to back away from the drinks. Now it had become my bug to bare, not that I minded it. It was kind of like becoming a mad scientist, thinking up ways to infuse drinks and make them taste good. My back turned to the main floor, I gathered a few bottles and started to think what I could create with them as a special, and this was also a good way to sell the product that wasn’t flying out of the door as fast as we needed it to. My phone buzzed as I set the bottles and mixers on the bar, and I looked to see who it was. My eyebrow raised as I read the message and bit the inside of my cheek. 𝙵𝚛𝚘𝚖 𝙻𝚞𝚌𝚔𝚢: 𝙽𝚘𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚏𝚘𝚛 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚝𝚘 𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝚊𝚋𝚘𝚞𝚝, 𝙸 𝚑𝚊𝚟𝚎 𝚒𝚝 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚒𝚗 𝚑𝚊𝚗𝚍. 𝙴𝚛𝚒𝚔 𝚒𝚜 𝚊𝚜𝚔𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚠𝚑𝚎𝚗 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚠𝚒𝚕𝚕 𝚋𝚎 𝚋𝚊𝚌𝚔? I knew that #Lucky would take care of things in Seattle, but it was the unknown of if he’d follow my request on how I wanted this issue to be dealt with. Which was the right way and not the way he managed his other businesses. Shooting him a reply: 𝚃𝚘 𝙻𝚞𝚌𝚔𝚢: 𝙸 𝚝𝚛𝚞𝚜𝚝 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚝𝚘 𝚏𝚘𝚕𝚕𝚘𝚠 𝚖𝚢 𝚊𝚜𝚔𝚜, 𝚍𝚘𝚗’𝚝 𝚖𝚊𝚔𝚎 𝚖𝚎 𝚛𝚎𝚐𝚛𝚎𝚝 𝚒𝚝. 𝙺𝚎𝚎𝚙 𝚖𝚎 𝚞𝚙𝚍𝚊𝚝𝚎𝚍…. 𝙽𝚘 𝙿𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚜 𝚒𝚗 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚗𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝚏𝚞𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚎 – 𝙻 I set my phone to the side, I heard ↬Embry Call ↫clearing his throat, and then felt him coming

towards me. Combing my fingers through my hair as he took a seat, I motioned for him to come in closer. Reaching over the bar I smacked him up the side of his head. With no explanation as to why, then went to work on the test drink for the night. “Hmm… I was thinking the sooner the better.” My eyes on the cocktail shaker as I filled it with crushed ice. “Like I said Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday are the days we need to bring in more of the younger crowds. So, do you think this coming Monday is too soon?” Licking my lips my eyes still down as I started to mix the spirits in. “With the promotional stuff, I know Seth had got an Insta set up for #HWH, only the Spirits know what he posts on it. With the signup sheets, are you talking in the bar, or can we do that online too? And—” Stopping I looked around finding the flyer #Tony had handed to me. “—Tony was saying we should get something like these printed and some posters to… What do you think we need to do?” I knew word of mouth would work on the normal crowds, but we needed to pull the attention of some new faces. And I wasn’t past hearing the opinions of others. Mixing up the drink I poured it out into a glass. It was a layer of Blue, green and a lighter green at the top. Setting a lemon garnish on it and slid it over the bar. “And tell me what you think about that.” I stood with my arms crossed over the bar, my eyes darting to my phone before looking back to him. ↬ Embry Call ↫ Leah was mixing up all the things she used to make the cocktails the townies liked so much. They were mostly fruit juice… but it still seemed to get them pretty wasted. I watched her run her fingers through her hair, I’d never noticed how often she did that before… Not that she did it a lot when I thought about it… but, why was I thinking about it? Before I could dwell on the thought, she slapped it clear out of my head. “Hey!!” I chuckled and rubbed the side of my head, mostly for the benefit of the humans and partly to fix my hair. I didn’t ask why… I knew. I had been expecting this…. Why couldn’t I dodge it? “Most of the open mics I’ve been to were on Monday’s, so I think that’s the best move. And I’m always free Monday.” I knew Leah had something to do with that. The rare occasions I patrolled on Monday’s it was early hours of the morning; then I had the day and night to myself, always. It let me get Mom to and from her appointments, get her shopping and do whatever she needed doing around the house. Not that it was ever much. #Sue kept the place immaculate. I took a look at the flyer she passed to me. “Yeah, something like this locally and in Forks… #Tony could pass a few out in the store. But online is really the best way to go. And if you make it monthly, you’ll get a steady stream of regulars.” I turned my attention back up to her when she handed me the drink, pulling my brows together I gave her a smirk. “It looks like antifreeze.” I teased but I lifted the glass and tasted it, it was sweet. Of course, the alcohol content was a lot lower than my preference, but it was more than high enough to get a townie drunk on two. “It tastes good for sure.” I couldn’t help but be curious about what was in it. I swirled the glass around and watched the denser blue liquid mix upwards, then slowly settle back down at the bottom. “What’s it called?” I took another drink and looked at it again. The colour would definitely appeal to the bunnies… I could imagine the duck face selfies with the cocktail in the frame flooding Instagram and Snapchat. “Hashtag #MermaidSpunk.” I grinned at Leah and laughed hard. #Seth cracked up across the bar; when he really shouldn’t have let on, he heard me. ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ Rolling my eyes at him. “Your hair is fine, a little too much product. But fine!” Smirking at my own joke because only the pack knew that 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙙𝙪𝙘𝙩meant the forest and all she had to offer the running protectors. Resting my elbows on the bar now I listened to him. He knew more than he ever let on with all this music thing, and of course I knew that it was in

his blood. His grandfather loved to play the guitar and piano, and his grandmother loved to sing. From my recollection of his grandparents visits here to La Push, I recalled the sound of music always coming from the Call house. And then there was his mother. Tiffany Call. She took peoples breath away. She sang and played and was beautiful in every sense of the word. Ms. C and my Ma were two ladies all the girls in town wanted to take after. My sight was set on the guys working in the background, they were laughing and joking. #Mac trying to be the grown up and failing with #Seth and #Tony cracking up at his dance moves. “The Spirits” I muttered, looking down at the flyer too. “Okay, Mondays and Monthly, flyers and get something going online. Signup sheets and finding bands..” I nod my head the check list getting a tick beside it in my mind. “I’ll take on your runs on the Mondays you are here.” Lowering my voice as I said this part. It would mean I doubled up on my own time out in the woods, but if I were to ask him to help our business this was the least, I could offer in return. Also, at the thought of more time in the forest made my wolf stir a little and smile. “If we have the bands come and do their thing once a month too, but alternating the two things, it will keep the crowds coming for one reason or the other.” The clogs in my head were turning, until he took the drink. About to tell him to hush up and just drink the damn thing but he was on it before I could. He was paying a lot more interest in the glass than any of the others had done when I asked them to test something I made. Like he was actually going to rate the thing out of ten. My eyebrows raised at the fact that he liked it, and there was no smart-arse comment, and then I thought too soon. Dropping my head as his laughter filled the bar. Call’s laugh was one nobody could mistake for another. I looked back up at him. I wanted to punch him, to tell him to grow up, to stop talking crap and then… I just burst out laughing. A full belly, rolling laugh that I couldn’t stop. Dropping my head, I pushed back off the bar and leant on the counter in the back. ““Hashtag #MermaidSpunk? Really Call?” The words coming in between the laughs. The guys were looking in our direction as I spoke. “I don’t know what I should worry about more right now… The fact that you liked a cocktail.. or the fact that you know what Mermaid Spunk looks and tastes like?” I dropped my head; my hair fell forward covering my face as my shoulders rotated with my laughter. Brushing my hair back I finally looked up to him. “I am so putting that on the specials board Call.”

↬Embry Call ↫ I rolled my eyes and then settled them on hers, I was starting to notice eye contact made her squirm, especially when she was in public. Now that she drew attention to the 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙙𝙪𝙘𝙩 in my hair; I was highly aware that I needed a shower. Being a Spirit Warrior made most days a two-shower minimum. When she leaned on the bar, I was a little shocked, it wasn’t like her to stop working when she was listening to someone. Not that it was a bad thing; she was more than capable of doing both at the same time. I supposed it was her way of keeping a little distance; it was just how she always was. My brows pulled together a little when she offered to take my runs. “Leah, I hardly ever run-on Monday.” I said quietly “And not in the evening. Besides… Where else would I be on a Monday? Especially with live music; I’d be here regardless. You know that.” “If Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday are the nights you want more people, I’d go with Wednesday. Bands have a hard time booking mid-week slots and you can get them to talk down their fees if you throw in a few free drinks.” I said this very quiet because I knew it happened to #Tony a lot. “Once the turn over goes up on those nights, you can start offering a little more for the gig.” I knew low-balling artists wasn’t something Leah would like to do, but it was a big expense. Was I actually giving Leah solid business advice? How the hell did that happen? I leaned back in the bar stool. “You cannot put that on the specials board, Leah! No one will order a drink called Mermaid Spunk. Seriously!” ‘Do it!!’ #Seth called out from across the bar. I was talking loud enough now that his hearing me was believable to the human. “#Mac! Back me up with this… You can’t advertise that name!” I was still laughing, highly amused as I watched Leah start to write on the board. #Mac was moving closer to hear us better. ‘I don’t know… a lot of cocktails have… you know, suggestive names: Sex on the Beach, slippery nipple.’ He shrugged, #Mac was not backing me up. “If you call it that, I bet cold hard cash that you will not sell a single one!” I grinned. “Or I would if I wasn’t broke as fuck.” ‘What else you got to offer Call? I’ll take that bet! What fun is it betting with cash anyway?’ #Seth’s brows shot up. And I realise I still had the glass of Mermaid spunk in my hand. ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ Still standing back, the laughter had subsided a little. But there was still the aftermath of it playing on my lips. My eyes met his and I froze in place. He was doing it again, that look he’d given me that felt like he could see past the walls I had spent years building. And yet I knew it wasn’t the case. Nobody got past those walls, not even my Ma or #Seth. ‘Are you sure about that? He saw the real you in Seattle Leah. There was no hiding from what he stepped into there.’ My wolf whispered. Rubbing the side of my neck I pulled my gaze from his dark brown eyes. Clearing my throat, I wanted to tell him that the offer to do his run on the Mondays he was here in the evening was my way to pay him back. It was hard for me to ask for help, let alone accepting it. And of late it seems all I was doing with Call was taking help. I let it slide for now, knowing myself and knowing that I’d find a way to pay him back. ‘To grow is to accept help when it is needed.’ Again, my wolf reminded me of lessons I’d been learning. This was a harder one to formulate and action. I wasn’t just independent; I was the Beta of my Pack. I was the one to hold my family together. ( pushing the thought away that I was also the one who broke my family apart. ) I was the one who had the answers, so to be stood here. Now. like this. It was a big step; a step I wasn’t even sure I knew how to take. “Okay, Wednesday sounds like a plan I could work with.” In my mind I was trying to work out if the night were a hit how I’d need to move the staffing around to make sure we were covered. “Hmm..” I frowned a little. “Yeah, Tony offered to do the first gig for a few drinks. But it doesn’t feel right to me. I

can’t help feeling like that is taking advantage of his friendship with Mac.. And you now too... I don’t know. I’ll see what I can do for him.” I kept my voice low as I said it, my eyes moved over to see the guy’s stepping towards us, so I set out some sodas for them all. Shaking my head at the banter that was taking place, I saw the lost look in #Tony’s eyes. “Don’t worry Tony keep coming here and you will get to witness a lot more of this madness.” I winked at him and smirked and then laughed at the way his cheeks blushed a deep red. ‘By the Spirits, that’s twice now!’ #Mac grabbed a can and opened it. my questioning look gave him the go ahead. ‘Twice now I’ve heard you laugh your real laughter. One I’ve not heard in a long time Lee.’ He took a sip, and I threw a lime wedge at his head, hitting him between his eyes. “I laugh!” is all I said moving around the back of the bar again, looking for the chalk pen I knew we had laying around. “Found it.” I mused. My gaze moving between the guys. “Oh, Call I hear a challenge there in your voice. Seth, Mac, Tony? Did you three hear that in his voice too?” Walking up to the black board I stretched up and started to write with my back to them all. ‘I hear it Sis, Bry saying your cocktail making skills aren’t up to it.’ The Kid was flaming the fire of competition, knowing that I wouldn’t let it go without a bet. ‘I don’t know Call, I kind of heard it too dude.’ #Tony was stepping up too. ‘I’m staying out of this one, I can see I could end up paying in one way or another.’ #Mac chimed in. “Chicken!” I smirked and stepped back looking up at the sign, reading it out. ˜”*°•.˜”*°• 𝓢𝓹𝓮𝓬𝓲𝓪𝓵 𝓸𝓯 𝓽𝓱𝓮 𝓝𝓲𝓰𝓱𝓽•°*”˜.•°*”˜

𝑀𝑒𝓇𝓂𝒶𝒾𝒹 𝒮𝓅𝓊𝓃𝓀 $𝟙𝟘.𝟘𝟘 My lips curled up as I now turned my attention to the guys. “So, ↬ Embry Call ↫ , this is what I heard.. You don’t believe I can sell a single one of these #MermaidSpunk cocktails tonight? I also heard you don’t have the money to put where your big mouth is. So.. Like the kid said.. What have you got up for offer if I sell one?” My eyes narrowed, daring him to back out of what he started. I felt at ease now, a glint of mischief in my eyes. I’d not had somebody challenge me in a few days. ↬ Embry Call ↫ She was doing that internal conversation thing again, but she didn’t pull her eyes away as fast as normal this time. I tried not to smirk and earn myself another swat across the back of my head. “I wouldn’t feel bad about taking that offer. When it comes to the store; Tony is a great salesman. But with the band… he knows his self-confidence is a weak spot, but once a venue sees them on stage… he knows he’ll get called back. They are that good. Seriously, take the offer; he is really popular in Port… the place will be packed.” I watched #Tony’s whole face turn pink, then crimson when Leah winked at him. I rubbed my forehead… This guy’s game was beyond tragic. What the hell was I going to do with him? I laughed, but the sound of Leah’s was catching my ear. #Mac brought it to my attention how little she laughed like this. I mean she laughed… sure. But it was normally sarcastic. “#Mac actually makes a good point, Clearwater. You should laugh more.” I smirked; I couldn’t stop myself biting the corner of my lip when she stretched up to reach the board. It took less than a split second for #Seth to clock it and crack me across the back so hard the sound made #Mac and #Tony cringe. It stung a bit… but #Seth never hurt anyone in his life, at least not anyone that was alive. They burst out laughing and I just smirked. It wasn’t the first time I’d been caught checking her out… and probably not the last either. “Hey, I never said it wasn’t good… I mean it’s good for a glass of blue fruit juice with a splash of booze. But calling it Mermaid Spunk is the problem.” I shook my head laughing at the board, looking between all the guys. They were all challenging me. I wasn’t massively competitive but there were certain things that would get under my skin and this, apparently, was one of them. I think it

was mostly the way Leah was looking at me. “Okay… If you do 𝙨𝙚𝙡𝙡one of those, I will open the show on Monday.” I offered. “And no cheating, passing out freebies doesn’t count!” I pointed to the three that served the drinks. “And if you don’t… Leah closes the show with a song. I’ll even play as your back up.” I grinned at her. ↬ Leah Clearwater ↫ “Oh, I most definitely plan on taking Tony here up on his offer. And the beers will flow once their set is completed.” I was a business woman after all, but the not paying them part I knew was what I found a hard pill to swallow. We did it with the pups all the time. If they were drinking in the bar and the bottles and glasses needed collecting, we didn’t even need to ask it was done. And Rachel. If she saw the bar was busy and she was in, she never thought about it, she would get up off her stool at the bar and walk around to serve. But the Pack and the Imprints were different to this guy. #Tony didn’t even know us, however I knew at the same time this would opened him and his band up to another gig, and more people who would follow their music My eyes were on #Tony and his blush, it was that of a teenage girl. It was kind of cute seeing a man react in such an innocent way when a woman winked at him. With every passing moment with him in the bar I got a little glimpse into him, and it made me smirk to myself at the first impression he had given when he pulled up. ‘And you were going to kick his arse? Look at him. Just a smile and a wink from you and the boy is a puddle on the floor.’ My wolf was teasing now. There was a time that she would have told me to calm down, to give people time to show us what they were made of. There would have been a joke about my #HotHead getting the better of me. but right now, she was on guard with any man who approached that we didn’t know. “Mac actually doesn’t make a good point Call. I laugh just enough.” Staying put I throw a lime slice at #Mac’s head and hit him. Smirking I slowly turned my head a little just enough for him to see my smugness; “Golagi nigesvna” ( Idiot ). Then I turned my attention in between Seth and Call again with a raised eyebrow with #Mac and #Tony laughing I could guess what had happened. The Kid was fast at picking up behaviour in the pack towards me. ‘Wow Leah do you sing?’ #Tony was leaning on the bar now with his elbows on top and his chin resting in his hands. ‘Oh, this is getting interesting’ #Mac mimicked #Tony leaning on the bar, in turn making me straighten up and step back from it and cross my arms over my chest. #Seth stiffened looking between Call and me. The kid knew this secret of mine and was about to speak. But I raised my hand to stop him. Call was trying to get me to back out, and it would be a great plan if I were somebody to jump first in the game of Chicken. I knew myself and my selling skills. That grin of his was back and the Spirits I wanted to reach across the bar and hit him again. “You know what, I’ll make it interesting for you.” I told Call, “Forget about one. I will up it to ten. And you will need to up you’re offering to kick start Monday with a big musical number.” I narrowed my eyes, the tip of my tongue passing between my lips. Turning back to the board, I picked up the pen and made ten straight line marks on it. “For each one I sell, I will mark it off.” Pushing the cap back on the pen I set it down on the bar between us. “So, Call. Are you game?” I reached my hand out towards him, smirking ready to take him down. All eyes moving between the two of us. I had no plans to lose this one.

TBC...

#LeahClearwater #Leah #HotHeadSheWolf #SpiritsHotHead #EmbryCall #Embry #BADBOYEMBRYCALL #Twilight #TwilightRP #TwiRP #AUStories #Youtube

0 notes

canaryatlaw · 4 years

Text

heyyy, well today wasn’t as bad as yesterday at least so that’s something I guess? same deal, up at 8:45 for court, of course my laptop has decided it won’t play sound right on this specific zoom call when it worked perfectly fine on Zoom for our staff meeting yesterday and our whole small group session tonight....ugh, but I just pulled out my phone and did it from there. I had to dismiss two cases but they were in different courtrooms, so I hop on the one that has the dude gonna come first and tell them, they’re generally pretty good with it given that we’re pretty much the only lawyers they see consistently so I guess they like us or me at least haha they’ve always been chill. so it takes a bit but we get in there and do the thing, no big deal. I hop over to the other one and now I have to wait in the queue for a while because I’d only logged into that room at like 9:30. so it took a little while but I got in, this was the weirdest fucking case and the order like, didn’t actually solve the situation and it was solved by a different thing like two days ago, and the order’s about to get set for a full two years and instead the case gets dismissed lol. but that was done, I was a bit tired so I was able to nap for like an hour, but was only asleep for like half of it haha but then I had to be on alert for my instacart delivery and like shortly beforehand I get a super panicked phone call from a client and the service was shitty and I couldn’t even hear her name like 3 times. and basically it’s this whole clusterfuck where the goddamn clerks, once again, fucked up and had put in the system that my client’s case had been dismissed when she’d been granted a 2 year order, and when she’s trying to get a police report they told her her order was dismissed because she didn’t come to court (which she did) and she had to file a motion to reinstate now and it was this whole thing so I was basically brb I’m gonna talk to my boss to figure out wtf we’re doing, so then I tried to reach my boss somewhat fervently and I did hear back from her but she was like can we talk in ten minutes so I said sure. I knew one of the answers might be filing the motion to reinstate, and I had just filed one a few weeks ago so I just pulled up the draft and started typing furiously, channeling all my rage into the motion with just polite enough words telling the court just how much they fucked up, and because I’m fucking good by the time my boss called me back I had the motion finished haha. but basically we’re going to see if they can fix it without us making motions, but we might end up having to do that anyway, which also sucks because I have two other clients who are in the same situation (they’re not aware at the moment and I think as long as they can live safely without knowing making them panic is not a good idea) so that’s gonna be a lot. so that was a whole big thing haha so we’ll have to see how it goes, we do still have the pending lawsuit against the clerk’s office about the orders (which is how this all started) so depending on how this goes we might be bringing this stuff as evidence for the case and MAN, there is pretty much nothing I would love to do more than that haha that is my jam. so we’ll see, but I just hope they fix it, one way or another. but yeah, all of that happened and the groceries had been delivered and I said it was fine to just leave them at the door and I could grab them in a bit, so I go down like 20 minutes later (stairs are ok today, I fucking hate all of this) and of course they’re not at the side door where they’re supposed to be so I had to like, leave the door slightly open and run to the front of the building which I can’t access from my apartment so I have to go outside and walk around to it. but I got them, a guy was coming out as I was walking back and I was like oh please leave the door open! and he was like oh yeah it’s open, I didn’t know who needed to do, what so I appreciated that. worked for a bit more before our case acceptance meeting at 3, wasn’t terribly exciting and the rest of the day followed that but there was still a lot to do and we had small group at 6 so I can’t take too long, I managed to get away at like 5:45 and just had time to get everything together. we were doing fish tacos using tilapia but they said we can sub whatever other protein we wanted and I don’t really like straight fish, my mom cooked it a lot when I was younger and I very much did not like it then, so it was basically just reinforced, so I grabbed a bag of frozen shrimp with my instacart grocery run. it’s nice, they kind of put together the overall thing and then I pick what I do and what I do not want to do out of it and it worked very well! The shrimp were raw since pre-cooked ones wouldn’t be much fun, and they were shell-on but you couldn’t like pull it off when it was frozen, it had to be cooked to take it off, which I’m sure probably makes it more delicious and everything, so I just peeled those off before eating, and they were all very good. we all just talked on zoom afterwards for a while, a lot of laughing and casual talk, my skills as a lawyer were involved for a good amount of the conversation as people were talking about their various issues and I’m just like hey do you want to sue them we can sue if you want and you should, and on from there haha it’s just a skill you pick up in law school kind of just as a side effect of everything, you can always tell when there could be a potential lawsuit in the situation, which is always fun. but yeah, we logged off eventually and then I turned on the debate with the new york times live commentary up in my browser and watching the commentary for some of the time but also just watched the tv while I was on other sites. this things are so goddamn dumb. like I thought we talked about muting mics, it’s not hard if you say they have two minutes after two minutes MUTE THEIR FUCKING MICS it really does not take a genius to figure this out, and watching it was all such a hot mess and I can’t wait to be done with this election (though I’m counting on a Biden victory for that because if he gets 4 more we will never leave this hell). so when it ended I put on Chicago Fire and watched that for a bit, then turned over to Jimmy Kimmel at like 11:10 and watched him and the opening monologue from Seth Meyers before calling it a night, showering and getting ready for bed, now I’m here and it’s past 2 am because of course it fucking is! ugh. so yeah, Imma go to sleep like, now. Goodnight friends. Happy Friday.

#daily journal #October 2020

0 notes

grizzlefur · 7 years

Text

WWEm - Too Much Shit For One Man to Kick

In which Emma’s heart grows three sizes.

Broadcast date: Monday 4/Tuesday 5 September 2017

Now that I've torn myself away from the combination of Destiny 2 and trying to fix my phone, it's time for MONDAY AFTERNOON RAW!: The Nacreous Gem Around The Intrusive Sand Of Roman Reigns Trying To Cut A Promo

trialling a new slogan

daniel's uncle's idea

apparently owning the building means you can give production advice

price of free offices, i guess

anyway, i'm like 70% sure he doesn't read these, so i can say whatever

but yes, the actual show

the bright orange blur in this tumbnail suggests we may be hearing from one mr cena

straight in on a recap video of the contract signing from last week

only presumably without cena kicking a hole in the fourth wall like the fucking shockmaster

also they've edited it to remove roman forgetting how to english

some damn good promos, though

i'm just loving all the shots of kurt in the background gawking like oh god what have i wrought

oh, apparently this is labour day

you'll pardon me for not exactly giving a shit

and we're in omaha

and here's the cena himself

here to cene all over us

oh, apparently we're just kicking straight into a match

and booker's back

i never thought i'd be glad to hear that slurred bullshit

and here comes jason jordan and his dodgy synth music

here to fight cena for unspecified reasons

oh, so we can play the clip of cena debuting against kurt 15 years ago

back when he was ruthlessly aggressive

who doesn't love cross-generational parallels

omaha is super behind cena, possibly for his music containing actual instruments and vocal tracks recorded at the same time

jason goes straight into the amateur mat game, which is not exactly cena's forte

lots of lingering hugs

i think booker just managed to get jason and cena mixed up, but let's be real, i wasn't listening

my mind just levels out everything booker says into a kind of mealy blur

but hey, that's better than the unignorable shittiness of the jerry

(my favourite kundera book)

cena gets a comeback phase, including whipping jason so hard he also faceplanted himself into the mat

that seems poorly thought out

tries to deploy his five moves, jason manages to counter out my backflipping out of a suplex and dropkicking him

fuck you, cruiserweight division

jason takes a five knuckle shuffle, then counters an aa into an indescribably weird rollup

takes an stf for ages, then reverses into a crossface/chinlock thing

cena says fuck you, i'm john cena, stands up out of it and goes for another aa

jj counters out into a beautiful rolling double nothern lights suplex

straps come down, jj unleashes his true power level

and immediately eats an aa for the pin

way to disprove roman's argument that cena buries young talent

oh hye, speaking of

-slips into pre-emptive coma-

and he's got a mic

fantastic

roman's like why the fuck did that take you 20 minutes that guy's been on the show for like a month

roman really needs to work out what point he's making

so yeah, argument today is that cena's not as great as he thinks he is

and is a lion

fake-ass little bitch

"Roman, I'd say I'm happy to see you, but...I'm disgusted by your whole face."

cena is all out of shits to give

like stop trying to use your brain, it's not your thing

cena immediately addresses roman's inconsistent point

and that his fly is open

which roman turns into lol cos i'm the big dog

men

and cena counters with a balls joke, and roman with a gay joke

fuck's sake, guys

there's a bar, at least make a cursory effort to get over it

cena takes it to roman for having everything handed to him, like damn dude i fucking hate the miz but at least he works for his shots

this is all true

cena's mostly just exasperated

like damn dude, get a clue

so roman's like hey if you want to beat me up let's do that

roman, stop being smug

or just, yknow, go away

cena does not beat him up, so roman's like hey fuck you dude and walks off

that worked, i guess

but later, we apparently have braun/show in a cage

so we can play the gif of those two crushing the ring

also later jeff hardy has an ic title match

but now, enjoy this advert for total bellas

or don't, very much up to you

but now, here come the not-shield

entering to dean's intro

they're gonna be on announce for slater and rhyno vs the kkb

seth and dean should totally rebrand as the sword

god, i love that they've managed to get a dragon ball reference into their entrance

dean's like welp, that's a great entrance,can't take that away from them

confirmation that we've got their title rematch at no mercy

dean goes off on a tangent about jurassic park and getting your face eaten by velociraptors

seth starts giggling

send for the man

corey asks if seth and dean are getting on as a team, dean's like eh, i've had five years to punch this guy in the face, i'm kind of over it by now

back in the ring, heath slater is getting the fuck kicked out of him

but then, that's what he does

inevitable hot tag so rhyno can get some offence in

and then eat a brogue for the pin

dean starts talking smack on the bar, then he's like well we're the bar now hey we should steal their name

dean talks like he fights

cesaro and sheamus do their fusion dance in the ring, and i'm like 90% sure their fusion would be goro from mortal kombat

although more the plasticine fantasticine version from the film, tbh

that's science right there

toasty

cut back to the announce team, where seth and dean have evaporated

and they talk to book about the hurricane

briefly

but now, renee interviews the hardyz

matt breaks in with a semi-broken accent

crowd goes mental

and jeff's like yuuuup gonna win this or get myself killed with the FIRE THAT BURNS WITHIN ME

man can preach

so that's next, i think?

after this ad for randy/shinsuke on smackdown

insert comment about what competition means

and here comes the match

starting with the hardyz

jeff's wearing a connor's cure tabard over all his other clothes, and seriously, i think the man has a problem

it also makes it very hard for him to rock out to their music

cole makes a reference to them wanting to delete paediatric cancer

well played

and enter the miztourage

maryse has a new vest/pvc leggings/sparkly knee boots combo, and as ever, i want it

also perilously close to real human clothes

apparently it's just over 10 years since jeff had the ic belt

bell rings, jeff goes straight for a rollup because fuck wrestling

miz cowers against the ropes like please mr hardy don't beat me

and uses it to throw jeff out to his cronies

a scheme

who would have thought

back in the ring, jeff just punches the hell out of miz's oh-so-punchable face

whisper in the wind for a nearfall

it's taken this long for jeff to jump off something, he must be taking it seriously

sets up for a swanton, bo distracts the ref so curtis can pull jeff off the turnbuckle

sparks a brawl outside the ring, ref is just like fuck this noise all three of you can fuck off

matt is deeply offended like how could you do this to me i was defending my brother's honour

miz counters out of jeff's crotch leg drop, which is good to see, because it is such a trivially easy move to counter

this match is actually p good

it's been like 60% reversals

maryse is still at ringside, which can't possibly be foreshadowing anything

ooh, she's gone with acid-green nails as well

maryse is just my style icon

(as if you didn't know)

miz pulls jeff off the apron, then collapses against the barricade in fornt of a small child in a cena shirt who's like um what

miz gets a figure four one, jeff just goes to counter by punching miz in the face

makes sense when you think about it

eventually gets to the ropes

then hits miz with a stunner, nearfall when miz gets the rope

live by the rope break...

miz crawls out of the ring while the ref shouts at jeff, then immediately eats a baseball slide

and then poetry in motion off the steps

kind of feeling sorry for miz atm

he's bumping like a demon

maryse pulls her husband out fo the way of a swanton, leaving jeff to fuck himself upon the mat

goes for a twist of fate, miz counters into a finale for the pin

damn good match, solid finish

but now, women do things

or so i am assuming by this recap package of banks/bliss

oh yeahb, and nia's inevitable betrayal

announcement: sasha has her rematch at no mercy

and now nia accosts kurt backstage

she's not impressed that she doesn't get a title shot

and emma interrupts to talk about her twitter analytics

she also wants a title shot

nia's just like fuck off or i will actually break you

kurt holds them apart, and hatches a plan

nia/emma v sasha/alexa tonight

if the undercarders win, he'll make the title match a four-way

foreboding shot of the cage, insistent mentions of the ring being reinforced

and have some more recap videos of brig showman fucking the ring

never noticed how hard the ref bumps to the outside when it happens

caught it now, of course, because they've replayed the clip from SEVEN HUNDRED AND THIRTEEN FUCKING ANGLES

but now it's time for cruiserweights to not get an intro

dar, nese and gulak already in the ring

and cedric and gran metalik get to enter with enzo, because seriously, nobody's getting a fucking intro

except enzo, who's brought a mic as usual

enzo tries to spin cheating to win matches as some kind of god-given right because it gets you wins

babyface?

despreately hypes 205 like please watch my show

he introduces cedric and metalik in the shittiest way possible

i spoke too soon, his smacktalk introductions for the other three are even worse

match kicks off with cedric/tony doing the cruiserweightiest wrestling ever

and enzo tags himself in to ruin everything

drew tags in to kick a non-trivial amount of shit out of enzo

not all of it, of course

the man contains too much shit for one man to kick

the heel team start doing rolling tags to take turns fucking up enzo's shit

and then they all just cruiserweight over everything and i can no longer narrate

stereo topes from cedric and metalik, during which enzo tags himself in because he's a twat

and then sticks a thumb in drew's eye to get his stupidly-named finish for the pin

the alleged faces celebrate as drew's outside with his friends like aaaaaaaaaaa i am blind

end segment

and now alexa collars sasha in the locker room to bitch about their opponents tonight

alexa has a cancer shirt too because she's a face by default tonight

this conversation quickly turns into a huge row

that match'll go well

up next, finn bálor wears a shirt

boo

and an advert for the myc, which continues to be great

and here comes everyone's favourite irish possible serial killer

-does the arms-

goes 'this is bálor club' like he's introducing his new talk show

waxes lyrical on his previous titles and how bray wyatt's a dick

finn has chosen his fate

or possibly faith?

this just in, he has an irish accent

calls bray out, immediate wyatt cut

and now we're in the void with bray

talking about learning to hunt as a kid

and the day he decided to stop using a bow and just kill things with his bare hands

i think we could have all filled in that backstory, tbh

taunts finn for only being able to beat him using the demon as his weapon, rather than doing it with his own power and will

and obliquely challenges him for no mercy

finn starts shouting back at him, which is a rarity for these segments

bray calls finn a rabbit, wyatt cut, end thing

so yeah, bray v human!finn for no mercy, presumably

oh hey, more ads for smackdown and total bellas

and now it's women's tag time

cole claims total bellas stars alexa bliss, corey's like um dude that's just a lie

she is here though

this much is true

oh my god i had forgotten how fucking angry i was about emma's new music

although that said, i think it's changed again

it's still not as good as her proper music, but better than last week

cfo$ are clearly going through a weird phase atm

corey is critiquing emma's hashtag efficiency

someone had to

the basic theme if this match thus far is 'tagging yourself in for giggles'

my inner bitch is loving the reluctant passive-aggressive teamwork in this match

(also my outer bitch)

(aka me)

as the smaller woman in the team, emma is performing her proper function of getting fucked on relentlessly

this rule does not apply to alexa, because her rage gives her virtual height

she's like one of those tiny dogs that will FUCKING HAVE YOU

emma finally gets a tag to nia, alexa gets a chance to vent at her

and get creamed

eats a big-ass samoan drop, sasha breaks up the pin after a moment of internal conflict

gets the tag, shining wizard for a nearfall

emma blind tags, nia leg drops sasha, emma gets the pin

i'll be honest, i was not expecting that

four-way should be good, though

emma celebrates extravagantly in the middle of the ring, nia's like um

and samoan drops her

nia will also fucking have you

back to the ambiguous backstage room, where renee has acquired a braun

asks what he's thinking before his first cage match

he's like really what the fuck was kurt thinking, this match might hurt me before my title match at no mercy but will definitely hurt company property

the man does a surprisingly good promo

but up next, seth and dean are back

their walk backstage is briefly interrupted by elias thrashing out a new song

long beat as they just kind of stand there like what's up with this guy, then shrug and carry on, dean playing along on the air

but next, they fight the good brothers

after these ads for every show we make

back from ads, sheamus and cesaro are in the ring arguing with gallows and anderson for some reason

who am i kidding, you don't need a reason to bitch on those guys

seth and dean still using dean's intro

like, if you're going to just use one, seth's is way better

BURRRRRN IT DOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWN

ref eventually manages to usher the kkb out of the ring, match can commence

sheamus and cesaro seem to have settled on just sarcastically applauding from ringside

someone needs to get them popcorn

this match is a little formulaic, but damn do i love how in sync seth and dean still are as a team

seth/dean v jordan/gable v gargano/ciampa v dawson/wilder

give them a whole show, best tag match possible

as opposed to this particular long-ass superplex setup that didn't even work

dean counters a chokeslam into a dropkick, which is p cool

seth gets the hot tag, commences to jump off every goddamn rope before braun and show fuck them up

dean tries to join in, does a shitty suicide dive

seth hits a lovely top-rope frankensteiner on anderson, the kkb try to interfere, seth gets the pin anyway because they're just that good

and then the good brothers take sheamus and cesaro out while they're distracted

they take a long moment to consider their options, then go back to the ring to fuck up anderson and gallows

and now here's the connor's cure video basically the same as last year, because history and cancer haven't changed much

and they've got the wwe makeup department in to give kids superstar redesigns

that's kind of sweet

and steph giving them all hype ring announcements is cute

dammit, i've fallen for a cute ill kids advert

and they brought alexa, miz, and finn

which seems like a super weird collection

to inspire these kids with cancer, we've brought our resident bitch, a self-important asshole, and a guy who draws power from being possessed by a demon

perfect sense

but up next, main event time

but first, cruiserweight recap vt?

because now we see enzo and his mates in the locker room being annoying

cue sarcastic clapping from neville

and news that those three have all qualified for a five-way elimination match for a title shot at no mercy

neville sows dissesnsion with a few ominous geordie words

closeups of techs reinforcing the ring

and now charly interviews the ref from the ring explosion match, of all people

oh, apparently the ring's double reinforced

not just reinforced

fancy

he's like welp this match is gonna be carnage i'm just going to focus on dodging

and now renee gives big show a hype chat

gah, i'd forgotten his new hairlessness

come on show, give us a YOUUUUU DID THISSSSS TOOO MEEEEEEEEEE

Shockingly, Giant Baby Show says Braun ain’t shit

the dramatic climax of the promo is just show telling us his own nickname

you know how i said braun could promo surprisingly well?

well...not that

seriously guys, how many ads do we need for total bellas?

it's back

we know

ad for 205, in which we learn that the other two slots in the 5-way are kendrick and nese, for no adequately established reason

wait, has anyone seen kurt and show at the same time?

feels like we might have a dr angle and mr show thing going on

corey just referred to braun as "the steam-breathing monster"

i have no clue what to say to that

is he coal-powered?

bell rings, braun kicks show in the face

and starts bodychecking him into the cage

weirdly, it goes wrong on the fourth one

show counters with a magic fist, doesn't climb the cage for some reason, cut to ads

cut back and nothing at all has happened

ecept show is now taking his turn to throw his opponent into the cage walls

show starts climbing, braun follows

weird scale going on, since they can both stand on the top rope and touch the top of the cage

show gets crotched really hard

guys, stop doing that spot

it is not good for you

show sets up on the top rope, everyone goes wtf

and does an elbow drop for the first time in like two decades

doesn't connect properly, but still a good moment

goes for the pin, braun kicks out at two because fuck you i'm braun strowman

show crawls for the door, braun walks over, grabs it, and hits show in the face with it

then braun tries to walk over show to get the door himself, and show does eexactly the same thing back to him

see, that was just dumb

braun kind of wanders into a chokeslam, then counters into a ddt for a nearfall

few spots later, show manages to land the chokeslam, braun kicks out because see the above re: fuck you

show goes for a magic fist, braun counters into a powerslam, show counters out and throws braun into the wall

show goes for the climb, followed by braun

gets his chest over the top before braun drags him back down because NOT FINISHED WITH YOU

i have never seen big show on the top rope this much before

braun gets a superplex in, the double reinforcement does its job

still a hell of a crash

and running powerslam for the pin

okay, i'm not usually one for large man punch fights, but that was actually really good

braun looms ominously over his fallen foe, then somehow acquires a mic

calls out brock to see big show's corpse as an object lesson

long ominous beat, then tells big show it's time to go to pasture, picks him up, and powerslams him through one wall of the cage

crowd goes wild

next time they should maybe think about also double reinforcing the cage

show lies on the broken cage wall going aaaa i'm dying, braun stalks off and roars, end show

in all senses

right, well, i've got some bad news

the horizontal line's off in Marbella this week, so we're gonna have to roll straight on

-checks the list of test slogans again-

MONDAY AFTERNOON SMACKDOWN!: Takes Hotter Than Your Dad.

i swear, the things i do so we can have somewhere to record this show that's only occasionally filled with vengeful woodland animals

so yes, the raccoon incident aside, let's watch mackdown

or indeed smackdown

mackdown is the wrestling dating sim i am now going to have to make

opening on a weirdly-saturated recap package of the orton/nakamura situation

the worst holmes story

and yes, the best thing about smackdown today

i'd had it spoiled, but still

JBL IS FUCKING GONE

he's off to do charity work, so we get the double whammy of disadvantaged kids getting support and me not having to listen to his voice

and they've replaced him with corey, making pretty much the ideal announce panel

Tom: "Did you miss me, Graves?" Corey: "Yes!" Tom: "I...am surprised!"

i live for these two talking shit

so yes, orton/nakamura tonight for a title shot at hiac

and here's randy, standing in three-quarter profile in a dimly lit corridor

yknow, like people do

and giving a speech about how he' gonna fuck shinsuke up

cut to shinsuke shadow boxing in the locker room

tells us about how he's gonna fuck randy up, i mostly get distracted by his left shoulder, which i hadn't noticed before

it's kind of fucked

i'm guessing that's a dislocation that healed weird

cut to the ring, and ellsworth announces his bae

only to be interrupted by...kevin?

he's decided he's going to be guest referee for carmella's match with nattie

begins trying to intimidate the ref into taking his shirt off

here's shane

who may have opinions on this fuckery

takes a moment for a cheap pop before getting into professional mode

he's just like kevin

dude

sort your shit out

long tense faceoff

shane's like maybe take responsibility for all these failures which are in all ways your fault

kevin's like fuck you i don't even want to be on this show

shane's like well yeah, cos this isn't the bullshit show where we just give people belts

kevin calls shane out on him needlessly inserting himself into eveything on the show

mentions his dad, gets an ooooooh, mentions his kids, shane immediately gets in his face like fuck you

kevin spins the helicopter crash into this, says his family would all be better off if he'd died there

mentions his kids again, shane explodes on him

well, he did warn him

trips getting out of the ring, killing the moment a bit

throws kevin over the announce table and just absolutely goes to town on him

security pull them apart, bryan turns up to be like the fuck are you doing dude that's an employee

and give the most disapproving dad look you've ever seen

and...cut to an ad for total bellas

way to maintain the mood, guys

and recaps of what happened thirty seconds ago

in which they've edited out shane tripping

backstage, kevin staggers through the room supported by three officials

bryan comes out to apologise

kevin promises to sue shane, wwe, and the entire mcmahon family

bryan's like wow, that seems wildly disproportionate

kevin's like fine, i'll go press assault charges insteads

cut back to announce, corey and byron are both like well he totally deserved that

but yes, now we actually have that carmella/nattie match

recap from last week reminds me precisely how fucking awful carmella's singlet was

thankfully, she's back to normal gear today

provided you count bright orange leggings with leopard-print piping as normal

announce team start spinning next week's 'Sin City Smackdown'

carmella gets her face punched off, retreats to her ellsworth

pan out to naomi watching the match with a look of deep concentration as carmella does a long-ass guillotine choke

nattie powerslams her out, gets a comeback

carmella superkicks nattie, gets a nearfall, ellsworth gives the ref the briefcase

carmella's like wtf no i'm not cashing in give my that back, throws it at ellsworth, and gets rolled up for the pin

ellsworth comes back into the ring to apologise profusely

carmella starts being all magnanimous, then opens up on him

including using the same line twice

calls him a 'genetic defect'

and asks how he's still employed at wwe

really, the question we were all asking

"You are a charity case, and your mother should have given you away at birth!"

wow

harsh

and officially dumps him

takes her case, struts off

leaving james in the ring and the depths of despair

backstage, here's shane looking conflicted

up next, dolph ziggler re-debuts

i have no clue how this is going to go

expect everything

after these ads for the myc and no mercy

and tom giving us a talk about paediatric cancer

roll the video again

refer to my comments above

well, that gave me plenty of time to curate my itunes library

fringe benefits

and here's the dolph

looking...exactly the same

he's got a mic

presumably to tell the fans to go fuck themselves

yup

railing at the fans for not appreciating the greatest performer in the company

and they'd prefer some dumb gimmick

lights go back down, and here he is again

doing cena's entrance

all credit to the crowd for the DOLPH ZIGGLER SUUUUUUUCKS singalong

dolph's like hey, did that not work? i'll try another

lights go down again, and now he's...who had land of hope and glory?

-research break-

yeah, thought it was him

dude, if you're gonna do a macho man entrance, you could at least have the shades

gives up on it, shouts at the crows for not doing the usual nostalgia pop

sends his valet away

and now he promises to have exactly what the crowd want and deserve

and...now he's naomi

the fuck is this

does the knee slide, then gives up

all gimmicks are defeated by ennui

and now he's back to railing against the idea of gimmicks, because anyone can do them

says he, after clearly showing that not everyone can dance like naomi

tells the fans they make him sick, stomps off backstage

so that happened?

up next, sami zayn v aiden english

because this is 2014 nxt, apparently

aiden gets about one line into his aria before sami's music interrupts him

oh yeah, this is the rematch from last week when kevin fucked on everything

and aiden gets a rollup out of nowhere

that lasted about 90 seconds

the bookers have some sort of problem with sami

and aiden's got his mic back

so he can give us some more singing

swiftly tailing off as sami chases him out of the room

let's have yet another recap of shane brutalising an employee

pan out to bryan rewatching it

only to get interrupted by the new day

here to lift his spirits

oh, and here are the usos

to do the opposite

announcing the stipulation for next week

street fight

which seems ill-advised when you're fighting a team of three

bryan gets a call, ushers the new day out

someone bryan calls 'sir' (so vince) wants him to do something in the ring

i know what, because i have a dreadful habit of going on twitter and getting spoilers, but i'll maintain the mystery for now

bryan disagrees, is shut down

and he's going to do............IT right now

(couldn't resist)

and here he is in the arena

gets in the ring, calls shane to come too

he doesn't

finally, here he comes

with nary a HERE COME THE MONEYYYYYYY

not sure i've ever seen either of these this sombre

bryan's like remember last year when the miz was pushing me every week and i made the bold choice to NOT FUCKING ATTACK HIM?

bottom line, you can't assault our employees

fair policy

shane's like yeah sorry but when people talk about my family i go crazy

bryan's just i don't give a single shit you've endangered this entire show because we both know kevin's a vindictive bastard who'll take us for everything

shane offers to go and reconcile with kevin

bryan's like no, i talked to your dad, you're suspended indefinitely

and leaves

shane's left in the ring like welp

why would you leave him there if he was suspended?

eh, wrestling logic

many crowd chants later, shane slumps off

gets a lot of thank you chants for a man who's just been suspended for attacking an employee

and now renee is in the blue curtain room to interview jinder

in an ugly-ass houndstooth suit

asks which guy he'd rather fight, he doesn't give a shit

claims he represents asia better than shinsuke ever could, despite shinsuke actually being from fucking asia

does the promo again in punjabi to speak to 3% of the great nation of india

back in the arena, aj's on announce

to talk about paediatric cancer

(i feel like i'll be writing that phrase a lot in the next few weeks)

and here's baron

sidebar fact: "Won the Money In The Bank ladder match earlier this year"

guys, maybe stop reminding people of that

recap vt of styles/dillinger last week

and of baron being a tool

i feel like i might need to specify that more

and here's tye

and they haven't synced his music with his new tron, so the sexy number voice says 10 when the video's on about 6

kind of love the KO'S A BITCH sign in the crowd

works on many levels

baron slides out of the ring to face off with aj, so tye just jumps out and fucks him up against the barricade

solid advice: maybe keep an eye on the other guy in the match

cut to ads, come back to a really slick spot of baron lariating tye's head off

tye tries to set up for the tye breaker, is thwarted by his opponent being large and heavy

and baron continues to stop having the match he's actually having so he can shout at aj

and i love the complete lack of shit aj gives

baron scores a cheap shot to tye's throat, angering aj, and end of days for the pin

actually a pretty good match

you forget that tye's got a lot of skill in the ring

aj is shocked at baron's lack of honour

because he doesn't watch the show, i guess

up next, "a special look at bobby roode"

ok, whoever edited it to go directly from saying that to a total bellas advert needs firing

backstage, aj congratulates tye on his fight and says next week, the us open challenge will only be open to him

dude

that's not an open challenge

that's just a challenge

and now for a bobby roode video package

enhanced by corey being on this show now so he can run hype for him

and now we're backstage with ellsworth pleading for carmella to forgive him

and being like yes i'm subhuman and i don't deserve anything please take me back

this is not healthy

carmella says from now on, they're doing things her way

gives him a huge kiss, then slaps his face off

flounces off, leaving ellsworth to be like the actual fuck is my life

but now we have a main event

here comes the very finest in flailing japanese men

and adverts for all our other shows

and also a fucking snaaaaaaake

loving the contrast of entrances

incredibly theatrical alien dance vs walking slowly down the ramp

cut over to jinder and the singhs in his skybox

tom mispronounces kinshasa even before the bell rings

this is why we got corey on here

whoever you are trying to get your MAGA sign to constantly show up on hardcam, kindly fuck off

randy does a massive hotshot, aided by shinsuke being an extremely floppy man when he wants to be

randy goes for his draping ddt out to the floor, shinsuke reverse out because that would be dangerous as fuck if he hit it

throws shinsuke into the announce desk, corey's like this is the worst first day ever

shinsuke just decides to get a comeback spot like oh hey maybe i should just kick him in the face a bunch

superplex to shinsuke, and the setup only took a small percentage of my life this time

lovely spot as shinsuke's reeling on his knees then just leans back into doing his cmoooooooon

goes for a kinshasa, randy counters into a snap powerslam

into a draping ddt, because you know randy's spots

strikes up the snake, which is still weird when your whole thing is hitting it out of nowhere

goes for an rko, shinsuke counters into an armbar then transitions to a triangle

that was fucking lovely

randy powers out, shinsuke counters an rko into a backstabber

see, this is how you preserve finishers

and kinshasa for the pin

oh, sorry corey

KINSHAAAAAASSSSSSSAAAAAAAAAAA

(totally why corey's here)

well thank fuck for that, i'm not sure i could have taken another orton/mahal rematch without taking up amateur tattooing or something

backstage, bryan tells kevin they're done

kevin's like fuck that, imma run the show next week

and bryan drops the bomb that vince'll be there next week to sort shit out

great

ah well

and brief cut back to shinsuke partying so we have something to end on

and thus we finish the week's shows

by which i do of course mean last week's shows

one day i'll actually get my shit together and be punctuahahahahaaaa sorry i couldn't get through that

[Don’t forget to follow Emma on Twitter, where she’s @Waruce]

#WWE #WWE Raw #wwe smackdown #Wrestling

1 note · View note

ryanonwrasslin-blog · 7 years

Text

The Wrestling Optimist - March 9, 2017

For those newbies, this is my first in what I anticipate becoming roughly a weekly edition of my thoughts, from a mostly optimistic viewpoint, on the wonderful world of professional wrestling. I'm working my hardest to stop being such a miserable smark, and this column is my best effort at both keeping myself honest and funneling out the various thoughts I have on wrestling. For the most part, this will be a WWE-themed piece every week, and it's still evolving, but for now I think I've found a solid format. Also, I typically intend for this to be a weekly column, but I was excited to try it out after Fast Lane (and really put my efforts at optimism to their most extreme test), so this particular column will only cover Raw, Smackdown Live, Talking Smack, 205 Live, and NXT.

Theme of the Week: We really are in the fast lane to Mania. The PPV may have left a lot of people a little displeased, but I think Raw and SDL did a nice job this week of building to the Jaws-like creature lurking in our midst, the reportedly 6.5 hour Wrestlemania now less than a month away. On Raw we got Y2J vs. KO, and the Women's Triple Threat officially booked, set up a possible Cruiserweight title match, while also getting Lesnar vs. Goldberg hyped, and Reigns vs. Taker hinted at with the subtlety of one of the Big Dog's Superman Punches. And the inevitable pre-show Tag title match will get clarity next week. That's an awful lot of productivity even for 3 hours.

Smackdown Live, not to be outdone, settled on Wyatt vs. Orton officially, made an intriguing Women's Championship free-for-all, kept the build on for the Mixed Tag, set conspiracy theory AJ Styles loose on Shane O'Mac, and hinted that we're going to get a hardcore type of Intercontinental Title match between Corbin and Ambrose.

The Mania card is now starkly visible, with the unknowns being whatever is happening with the Triple H/ Seth Rollins/ Samoa Joe/ Sami Zayn/ maybe Finn Balor storyline, whether Big Show vs. Shaq happens, how the poor SDL Tag division will be handled, which undercard guys will fill out the AMBAR, and then designating a few of these as pre-show.

For my own druthers, I mostly don't care how the card order stacks up, but I'm going to lose it if the Smackdown women end up on the Pre-Show as I fear they might. My girls Becky and Alexa deserve better than that.

10 Best Moments of the Week

Teasing the Phenomenal Forearm into the RKO Some day they are going to have Orton hit him with the RKO when going for either the forearm or the 450 and it's going to be the coolest thing since the Curb Stomp RKO, and I'm glad they clearly know how cool that is.

Heyman rushing out to address the CM Punk chants and halt whatever ill-fated improv Goldberg was about to attempt I'm not positive that Heyman was rushed out there early to cut off the Punk chants and prevent Goldberg from saying something that would only make the chants worse, but it certainly looked that way and it was another hilarious reminder of how little WWE can trust Goldberg to do pretty much anything.

The Miz motherfuckin' ETHERS John Cena I have nothing to add to his masterpiece. Go watch the SDL and Talking Smack segments.

FORK YOU! - I loved Baron Corbin pinning Dean Ambrose under a forklift. I'm always in for goofy prop fights, and there's always a place on the card for something like this at Mania. I hope this is how the match goes at Mania, a sometimes goofy, sometimes brutal street fight sort of affair. We know that Ambrose wanted the Mania match with Lesnar to go way too far last year but was rebuffed. Let him try this year with someone young and hungry like the Lone Wolf.

Austin Aries, the hero the Cruiserweight division needs Running Aries as the apparent face against Neville could be a weird fit in the long run, but I was all in for this segment on Raw. Aries is the outsized character the division needs right now to complement all the work Neville is doing and the better ring-work we've started seeing from guys like Tozawa and Swann.

The SAnitY and Dillinger story really comes together I don’t know about everyone else, but seeing Roddy get dragged out beaten half to death by the rest of the group, and seeing Tye and Jose get fired up about it, worked like hell for me. That awkward trio coming together against the heels was lacking something and this helped fill in the storyline, as did EY yelling “YOU DID THIS” at Tye. Good stuff.

As the Smackdown Women's Division Turns Becky gets turned on by a tag partner again (at this point I’m surprised Luke Sanders hasn’t turned on her), and Mickie at last turns on Alexa. Sometimes the easy story is the right one. If Naomi makes it back, she's pretty clearly going to win the title, but if not I really hope they have Becky overcome a whole Rogues gallery of heels to win (throw in Eva Marie and Carmella to really put it over the top). She's been turned on so many times that she needs the perseverance story.

For a night, the Part-Timers were booked well I'm as deeply skeptical as anyone that Raw can get me fully invested in a Lesnar/ Goldberg feud or an Undie/ Strong Roman feud, but credit where it's due, they did an excellent job on Raw this week. Goldberg eating an F5 was long overdue and I honestly wanted to see the whooping get worse.

TJP and Shinsuke dab on each other WWE spent a few headscratching months booking TJP after the Cruiserweight classic, but this was a fun match and felt like the right way to handle him, as a cocky, shitty, sorta heel who also does some seriously cool shit in the ring.

The way AJ Styles says, "Randy Orton burns down a man's house and gets rewarded for it!" I knew AJ was among the best in the ring prior to his WWE run, but his promos have been a wonderful surprise to me. He is a natural on the mic and has a goofy charisma, and for whatever reason I chuckled for a long time after he said this particular line.

Let the Smark Out

For as much as I’m trying to be an optimist, wrestling is not a perfect product. Far from it, really, and when you have problems with something, it’s healthy to let that sort of thing out. So, in the hopes of keeping a 5:1 ratio tilted toward the good side, here are my two complaints of the week:

Are we seriously doing this with Emma again? She was in such a good place as Evil Emma with the half-gloves and the shoulder pads. Given how shallow the Raw Women’s division is, why did they feel the need to screw around with something that was working????

I’ve known for weeks that the Styles/ Shane O’Mac feud was coming, but now that it’s here, it hurts even more. There is obvious proof on the roster in multiple forms that you only get so many Wrestlemania’s out of your top workers (like Balor and Rollins both being potentially on the shelf for this year after not being on last year’s card either). To use up one of those years for Styles, unquestionably the best in-ring performer in the company, and probably the world, is asinine. I know there is no bigger honor in WWE eyes than to fight against a McMahon (and I strongly suspect we’re heading toward either a Bayley or Sasha vs. Stephanie program in the next year), but I have no interest in seeing AJ selling for ol’ Baby Jabs McMahon.

Let’s Rank Stuff!

One of the best things to do as a wrestling fan is to compare things. Who's on the Mount Rushmore of wrestling? Who was the most over with the crowd? Who's the best in-ring worker? What's the most uncomfortable Attitude Era storyline in retrospect? That's what I'm going to do here every week, pick a topic and rank it as I see it. Feel free to chime in with your own thoughts! I'd love to hear them.

This week's ranking: The Status of the Championship Belts

It's been almost 8 months since the Brand Split, which saw WWE add a whopping 4 title belts to their company (and a fifth in the UK Title even more recently) and with Wrestlemania approaching, I thought now would be a fun time to rank those titles in terms of their current level of prestige. Keep in mind the old adage about the wrestler making the belt, not the other way around. So without further ado, in reverse order:

13. UK Championship - Too young to be any higher. If Pete Dunne gets it, though, this thing could rocket up the list. That dude has incredible potential.

12 US Championship - Man what a precipitous fall. A short 18 months ago, Cena had made this thing into probably the second best belt in the company. But more recently it's been seen being dragged around by a disinterested Roman Reigns like he was worried that touching too much of it might infect him with some terrible disease. The good news is that I can see KO winning this at 'Mania and proudly defending it, not because it represents America or anything, but because KO is convinced anything he has is just the best.

11 Smackdown Tag Team Championships - Another letdown since the brand split. Slater/ Rhyno was fun, but American Alpha is surprisingly struggling right now.

10 Raw Tag Team Championships - The shenanigans required to get New Day to the tag title record didn't help anyone, and now I can't help but view The Club as utterly inconsequential. Tag team wrestling on the main roster is in a bad way right now. Thankfully, there's hope on the horizon if WWE is smart enough to realize it.

9 Cruiserweight Championship - Talk about the wrestler making the belt. Putting this thing on Neville was the step that was badly needed to salvage this belt and the entire division.

8 Smackdown Women's Championship - This division has done wonders in terms of drawing out depth and giving its characters chances, but it's in need of some excellent, or rather Bex-cellent, wrestling and something memorable. I think maybe they missed an opportunity not having Becky and Nikki fight for this at some point. Face vs. Face can be tricky, but these two could have done it, it would have given more prestige to the belt and now rumors are Nikki may be on her way out. That’s a seriously missed opportunity if so.

7 WWE Universal Championship - Yikes. I was closer to putting this thing 8th than moving it higher. It's impressively ugly, KO's title run was consistently neutered, and now Dadberg is drenching it in sweat for the next few weeks before Lesnar takes it from him at Mania and promptly disappears for a few months. If we do this ranking again in June, this belt might be 13th.

6 NXT Women's Championship - Asuka is obviously great and the coming feud with Ember should be a lot of fun, as should Nikki Cross' pursuit, but the belt hasn't kept up with some of the others under the WWE umbrella. From where it was during Sasha/ Bayley, things have slipped a bit in part because no one legitimate has come for Asuka. Yet.

5 NXT Tag Team Championships - Several of the best matches of 2016 were contested for this belt, and honestly I feel like it should be higher. I just couldn't quite bring myself to pull the trigger. That said, there's no shame in being 5th and the sole beacon of light for tag team wrestling in WWE.

4 Raw Women's Championship - I didn't love the hot potato of the belt, same as most people, and I loathe it when WWE starts talking about "making history," but this title is a very important one right now.

3 Intercontinental Championship - This likely would have been number 2 if I'd done this ranking in the fall thanks almost entirely to the Miz. Ambrose has been fine as champ since then thanks to his pedigree as a former WWE Champ, and if they are setting up Baron Corbin to win the title at Mania, that could be a great step toward both making a star and helping keep the belt relevant.

2 NXT Championship - One of the most impressive lineages of any championship belt in wrestling history right now. At times, it probably has surpassed even the WWE Championship itself. I'm curious to see how they handle Bobby Roode's reign after having one indy giant after another hold it for years on end. Obviously Roode is no slouch, but this does feel like an interesting point for the title.

1 WWE Championship - I'm glad they're back to just calling it the WWE Championship. That just sounds so much better than adding any sort of "world" modifier to it. It's the franchise, the belt with all the history behind it, and that WWE itself even clearly tries to pay respect to, and this past year or so has only added to the legacy. Getting AJ Styles' name on the belt was great for everyone, Cena tied the record with it, and now Bray Wyatt, a character that WWE has always viewed as a long-term face of the company, is battling another all-time legend in Randy Orton at Wrestlemania for it. That's great stuff.

Match of the Week

This was supposed to be a column that covered everything after Fast Lane, but I have to give it up one more time for Neville vs. Jack Gallagher. That’s unquestionably the match of the week.

Where Do We Go From Here?

I sketched out a rough idea of the Mania card earlier in the column, but for the next few weeks I’m excited for the build. That’s where these matches are set up for memorable moments and big crowd pops or destined for failure. I covered the Triple H saga in this segment in the Fast Lane column, but I was surprised to see it not get a ton of attention on Raw this week. It’s starting to feel like WWE doesn’t even quite know what to do with it at this point.

If we get through this week’s Raw without some kind of stakes for Mania set for those two and the various other players in their drama, I’m going to start doubting whether the match is actually happening, and if maybe we’ll only get some kind of confrontation only at the show.

The Finisher

Big Show vs. Shaq would be kinda cool if it happens, but if it doesn’t, I hope they do Strowman vs. Show II. Strowman is ready for something more than winning the AMBAR, and Show deserves a reward for getting into such ridiculous shape. Plus, those two had low-key the most surprisingly fun match of 2017 so far, and you could do a lot worse than a ten minute hoss fight at Mania. Make it happen, WWE.

#WWE #wrestling

0 notes

grizzlefur · 7 years

Text

WWEm - The Chairening

((25-6 Sep))

!WAR NOONRETFA YADNOM si siht ,secnerefer s'relggiZ hploD naht ytrap eht ot retaL

niaga yaw gnorw eht epat eht dedaol ev'uoy ,leinad lleh gnickuf

tuo ti tros

--------------------

ahem

technical difficulties aside, let's watch some wrestling

it's monday because fuck off, i don't do schedule

this is the go-home show from no mercy, so presumably something will happen

even if it's just cesaro getting new teeth

and miz is already here

wait, shit, apparently this is actually ontario, california

now i need to retract that whole rant from last time, on the grounds that this is apparently a real place

anyway, slideshow of jj gettng fucked on by the miz to resounding cheers

everyone loves miz cos they're still in SoCal

even if he is wearing a janky-ass check suit

oh, and he's here to interview roman

great

now people love miz even more by comparison

miz kicks off by mentioning taker so people remember how much they hate roman

throws roman a softball question about how it feels to take over from cena, he stares into the middle distance for an uncomfortably long time

and then canned monologue about how he now respects cena

and he doesn't see why he should be spending time in a room with miz

who's like well i'm the one here with a belt so nyahhhhhh

takes the opportunity to throw shade at jj, roman stands up for him and says miz couldn't beat him one on one

asks the miztourage for a beer

miz is like no my talk show has standards

and like hey yeah it's such a bad thing to have two guys helping you out oh waaaaaait

floats the idea of the miztourage vs the shield, the crowd goes nuts

roman laughs, is like yeah fuck that, crowd hate him

and then talks about his path to the universal championship, manages to mess up brock's name

miz commences to a+ ranting about how he's the most important champ on the show

certainly the most hardworking

roman's like fuck it, okay, let's fight

miz desperately backpedals

is like nope sorry can't wrestle in this suit and also my wife is pregnant

so relevant

makes his farewells, leaves, but OH WAIT here's kurt

to be like yeah cool let's do this shit

roman/miz later on, mizoturage v matt hardy and jj now

because jeff's shoulder's fucked AGEEN

but first let's have this advert for hiac

although why you'd need to advertise it is a mystery to me when you could just read kevin's outstanding twitter feed

back in the room, and here are the hardyz

jeff's here to watch

and rock out to their music

slowmo replay of the tower of doom spot that fucked his shoulder, doesn't look pleasant

and here's jj, met with overwhelming ambivalence

matt's got his green trousers on so at least they're coordinated

bell rings, jason commences to dismantle the other team by himself

finally tags matt in, crowd start paying attention

matt brings his usual brand, laughing like a goat and shambling curtis axel to death

ad break, so the miztourage get some offence in

because we all know heels are allergic to being filmed

apparently they did it by stepping to jeff and making jj defend him

you'd think that'd be a job for his actual brother, but then you clearly don't know the hardyz

corey talks about his time in the ring with bo for some serious oldschool nxt nostalgia

jj throws curtis out of the ring, double hot tag, cue matt mashing bo's face

side effect, curtis breaks the pin, jj spears both of them into the corner, twist of fate on bo for the pin

cole manages to mix matt and jason up

i guess they are both basically the same colour

positioned on the thin line between actual poc and tan as fuck

up next, we talk about the universal championship match

yay, more brock on my tv

after this ad for smackdown

and total bellas

featuring nikki and john arguing about power of attorney

thrilling

corey claims the universal title match was like a sci-fi movie, offers precisely no information to back this up

well, i guess it was less interesting and well-executed than the premise would suggest, so i guess there's that similarity

yeah, that's me throwing shade at disappointing adaptations of hugo award-winning books

(all of them)

come at me

in any case, here's elias

wearing his chicago tour shirt

(which i now own)

ontario have mixed opinions on walking with elias

apparently we're having a rematch of him and apollo tonight

this diss track is primarily about apollo, because nobody has anything interesting to say about ontario, CA

anyway, here's apollo

and titus

fight starts immediately as the bell rings, ref has to sneak in to pick up elias' scarf

booker talks about titus' political ambitions, corey reprimands him that "we don't do politics"

if only everyone in the company took that view

(wow, there's shade for everyone today)

the crowd are vocally behind apollo, which is novel

elias punches titus in the leg to distract apollo, superkick and drift away for the pin

after which titus runs in to fight elias

and everyone's like ohhhh yeah he's a wrestler

very short scrap before elias runs away

up next, finn does a thing

and we need to stop hyping the whole 'Man vs Man' thing

how was nobody on creative like welp that's a fucking stupid tagline, let's just do some more coke instead

cancer kids ad, and now charly interviews finn in a room made of curtains

i wouldn't put it past finn to have an interview in twin peaks

finn thanks bray for pushing him to succeed, restates his universal title ambitions, leaves

well that was short

meanwhile, here's curt hawkins and his 118-match losing streak

and here's braun

this'll go well

curt's like waaaaaaait a second this was a bad idea

and runs away

into the crowd

braun doesn't give a shit, leaps the barricade to chase him throw the crowd

and chokeslams him through a table

guys, that table was presumably there for a reason

now where will the tech guys keep their snacks

picks him up, takes him up to the stage and powerslams him through the led boards

god bless you, curt

bumping like a champ

braun goes back to the ring, gets a mic

like fuck that guy who wants to come and give me a real fight

and it's dean, because ill-considered decisions are totally his thing

walks over to examine curt's corpse, shrugs, heads to the ring

dean is, as ever the living embodiment of eh, fuck it

he's here with the scars of having the best match on the last night's show

but all his teeth, so could be worse

so braun's just focusing on working his bad shoulder

which is weirdly technical for him

you'd think just pounding the shit out of him would work just as well whether he's got a bad shoulder or not

dean tries the princess bride-style sleeper, gets smashed into some turnbuckles for it

keeps trying punching braun and getting headbutted to death

collapses, braun tries the foot pin

doesn't take

this match is like 90% just dean ragdolling around the arena, but it's actually p good

he gets a bit of offence courtesy of an eye poke

dean tips braun over the ropes, braun's like whatevs dude i'm tall and just stands on the floor

booker makes reference to braun having a "cloak of invincibility" [sic] despite the fact that he lost the night before

and dean gets powerslammed into oblivion

where's seth anyway

not here for his best bro

corey's commentary on the highlights package from that suggests he may not in fact know what a ddt is

backstage, kurt tells a ref to be extra careful in the miz match

and now here's enzo

who we gave a belt for some godforsaaken reason

he proposes a 'celebratory brouhaha'

kurt's like dude that was the shadiest win do you actually deserve it

enzo makes more noises, kurt caves

offers some advice from a longtime champ, enzo's like nah dude you're good and leaves

up next, alexa exists

after this archive footage of stone cold driving a beer truck into the arena eighteen years ago

presented by snickers for no particular reason

but now here's dean in the trainer's room

seth's brought him ice, asks him to be less ludicrously self-destructive now they're working together

like dude maybe at least let me know next time

dean calls him predictable, seth tries to prove he's not

so he's going to ask for a match with braun next week

dean's like yeah, fair, i did not expect that

perhaps not a great idea though

ah well

in the ring, here's alexa

in a sleeveless silver jacket that i would so totally wear

now maryse isn't on the show, i'll just have to steal alexa's wardrobe ideas

alexa thinks of all of us as her personal friends, and she's very disappointed in us

for not appreciating her victory

and looking forward to asuka too much

and here's...mickie?

god, this division is so arbitrary with who the next contender's going to be

apparently alexa said some uncomplimentary things about her on raw talk

i was busy not watching it

in my defence, it had 100% more lawler than i need in my day

alexa is just doubling down on the sarcastic praise of mickie

can't really narrate it, because we all know how sarcasm works in text

damn this restrictive medium

alexa's like hey i would fight you, but i don't want you to break a hip

mickie comes back by making fun of alexa's boobs

class

she wants alexa to repeat what she said on raw talk or fuck off

oh, apparently it was calling her an old lady

alexa repeats, gets kicked out of the ring

yet more hype for roman/miz

i am resolutely unhypened

but up next, seth/sheamus

after this asuka advert

still with the sun tzu quote for whatever reason

here comes seth, still burning it down

i love the person in the crowd with a giant milk carton sign with MISSING above a picture of cesaro sans teeth

sheamus is in full kkb gear, cesaro's just in a grey suit and aviators, which mostly has the effect of making him look like pitbull

cue slideshow of the match at no mercy

including the spot that should totally have been the finish

ooh, apparently cesaro's teeth were pushed up into his gums rather than out

ouch

not that i ever really trust wwe's descriptions of injuries, tbh

seth suicide dives sheamus, takes a moment to mock cesaro, eats an irish curse for his trouble

sheamus gets seth up in a stretch muffler, which is a move that seems to have undergone something of a resurgence just recently

and then into a cloverleaf

eventual rope break, but that did not look fun

speaking of moves that are coming back, seth gets a punt to the face

sheamus and cesaro take a moment to grandstand, giving seth time to dodge the eventual brogue

sheamus goes to the top rope, seth meets him downstairs with a gut kick, kingslayer for the pin

which apparently they're calling the ripcord knee now?

well w/e

up next, talking about cena

yaaaay

after more ads for our other shows

and now finn's backstage

runs into goldust, who's got his mojo back

goldust takes issue with finn positioning him as a victim and someone who needs help

a view you might recognise from previous editions of this blog

hi, dustin

finn apologises, goldust accepts but then punches him in the face a bunch

quotes godfather 2 at him, breathes in his face, leaves

but now it's time to talk about cena/reigns

have this slideshow in which we try and make it look way more dynamic than it atually was

and the clip from raw talk with cena being magnanimous

which i did watch, thanks to the miracle of...THE INTERNET

*internet theme plays*

(answers on a postcard what you think that would be)

video package ends, we move on

really thought we were gonna get something more than just replays of last night

but hey

nexg up, roman/miz

after this advert for story time and title card about how wwe's the best at twitter

here's roman, nobody cares

case in point: i spent his entire entrance staring blankly at my facebook feed before realising i should probably say something

a+ journalism

as i type that, enter the miz in a delightful silver lamé sheath

and also his minions in human clothes

bell rings, miz kicks off by trying to talk his way out of this match

makes the point that nobody really has anything to gain from this entirely meaningless match, and he's not wrong

roman accepts the handshake, then punches him a lot

such mixed messages

miz gets out of the ring and hides behind his dudes to rant, roman stands there and laughs douchily because his current gimmick is 'You know that smug fucker who's in your friend group for no reason you can really establish and whom you could quite happily punch in his big grinning twat face? Yeah, him."

miztourage are continually interfering whenever they're more than about five degrees from the ref's eyelines

wwe refs are like the shitty starting enemies in any stealth game

roman's selling an injured back, corey waxes lyrical about sciatica

as you do

and then takes the chance while roman's getting kicked in the face to say 'xiphoid process'

superman punches to all three heels, giving miz time to get away

that last line spoken in the voice of sandra bullock

(yeah, esoteric references)

miz eats a driveby, hits a big ddt for a nearfall

roman counters a finale into a spear, pin, #romanwinslol

the miztourage immediately come in to kick the shit out of roman

they'll be a long time at it

he is so full of shit

fights them off, superman punches miz again, stops to taunt him

sets up to powerbomb him, curtis and bo hit him with chairs

oh yeah, we're setting up for the furniture PPV

makes sense i guess

miz hits a finale, gloats

end thing]

or not

miz decides he didn't get to take part in ç, runs back to the ring to give roman some

and then another finale onto a chair

hits him with another chair, then the three of them do the shield fists over him

good moment

speaking of things that are not that, enzo's brouhaha is coming later

but next, finn/goldust

after this ad for 2k18

and nxt

back in the room, goldust is here and i've only just realised how much his music reminds me of music from freespace 2

*does the arms*

wait, does this mean we're having enzo's dick party as the main event?

well, i guess that means something eventful will happen

and it'll presumably be in the form of everything going wrong for him

this match just went really quickly into both of them being really vicious

finn's like i'll be helpful and magnanimous and shit, but if you cross me i will fucking end you

seems reasonable

goldust is floored by a pele kick to the air a couple inches above his shoulder

followed by a really sloppy sling blade

who do i blame for this

and then, despite selling hurt ribs, hits a coup de grace for the win

i know when i've hurt my ribs, i like to concertina my body onto another human from a significant height

wyatt cut, house lights go out, creepy child singing

wyatt cut again, end thing

huh

apparently later we have sasha/bayley v nia/emma

and here's bayley and sasha backstage

tension abounds

they both try and passive-aggressively semi-apologise for fighting over the belt last night

and bayley tells a sad story about her shoulder trauma and physiotherapy

they bond, end thing

and now here's kurt backstage

enzo accosts him, kurt has the facial expression any of us would have when accosted in a corridor by enzo amore

enzo wants a stipulation for his party

anyone touches him, they lose any shot at the belt

kurt's like fine whatever please go away

"Oh, and one more thing: you're annoying as hell. Annoying. As. Hell."

kurt angle, speaking for all of us

time for the women's match now

here's noa

or indeed nia

Pro Wrestling NOAH Jax

have a hispanic heritage month thing for julio cesar chavez

just under the bar before we run out of month

back in the room, emma's here, as is her excruciating new music

what are cfo$ even on atm

and now sasha in her matador jacket

and bayley in a cancer charity tshirt, because if one wrestler was going to wear one, it'd be her

did we really need that slowmo footage of bayley's shoulder shitting the bed?

this match presented by novartis, because we at dubby dubby wee are 100% cure there could be no problem with emphasising the link between wrestlers and pharmaceuticals

nia leg drops bayley's bad arm, which is a move that would look nasty as hell on an uninjured arm

bayley throws emma into nia, ensuing tension gives her time for a hot tag

sasha and bayley both outside doing some strong team work, bayley runs nia into the post

emma almost gets a rollup, eats a bayley to belly off a blind tag for the pin

that was...functional?

as long as the intended function is continuing the shittening of emma, i guess

backstage, enzo rants at strangers like a homeless methhead

guess what we've got next

after this ad for raw in denver with rollins/strowman and roman/miz for the belt (why?)

enzo arrives, corey commences to rage against them taking the belt away from the best thing in the division and giving it to "essentially a Muppet"

and now he's trying to convince booker to cover for him while he sneaks off

wait, can i do that?

daniel?

...

daniel is gone

touché

enzo's doing a speech

and he's personifying the belt as a woman again

essay question: Are there objects or status symbols that Enzo Amore *doesn't* want to put his dick in?

[30 marks]

mocks cass for getting injured, rails at the fans

compares himself to cena, batista and the rock

unveils his baseball jersey which he's had framed

mocks 205 live

...is he still a face?

i have no idea

cue the 205 theme music

and the entire fucking cruiserweight roster pouring out onto the stage

he starts talking again, they all stand on the stage looking just beyond done with him

mocks rich for dancing and cedric for having no charisma, they're both just like dude have you seen yourself

calls gran metalik fat

"I call it how I see it, right?"

the clarion call of the douchebag everywhere

mocks jack, drew and noam for...unclear reasons, is interrupted by neville's entrance

uses the phrase 'real man', i reach through time and the television to slap him in the face

makes fun of neville's ears

this is some incisive material right here

neville gets on the mic, so i'm happy

calls enzo out for being a toxic shitbag who's alienated everyone he's ever met

fair

spins us a tale of how enzo was dumped on the division's doorstep and the rest of the division convinced him to keep him

and does a superlative rant at him for making the division into a joke

and announces he's here to kill enzo on behalf of the whole division

enzo pulls out his piece of totally legally binding paper

which may in fact be a post-it note?

talks shit at him some more, continues to mock everyone in the division

tells him to fuck off

neville thinks fuck it, i have principles, kicks him in the stomach

and throws him into his framed douchebag jersey

and also everything else

enzo tries to run, the entire roster walks up the ramp to block him in

this is some heartwarming shit right here

neville catches him again, resumes the murder

feeds him his piece of paper, kicks him in the head to raucous applause

this is the greatest double turn ever

red arrows him so hard he does a full handspring out of it

and we fade on a fallen douchebag with a mouth full of paper as a conquering king breathes heavily on him

as all great works of literature do

right, since daniel's not here i guess i need to do the technical bits

which lever is it that switches tapes to smackdown

gonna try this one

----------------------------------------

Well, let's all just accept that that was not the correct lever to pull and try and move on

daniel got back just in time to get my leg out of the tape deck

also he brought sushi, so is forgiven for being slightly late for the second show

with all that said, let's get on with some THURSDAY AFTERNOON SMACKDOWN!

(okay, daniel was *very* late)

i'm only a week and a bit behind, i've done worse

although hiac is on sunday, and i'm going out tomorrow and saturday

this could be fun

need to watch a week and a bit of wrestling in like a day an a half

woooooo

anyway, the show's starting with a recap of vincegate

and shane talking about how great the mcmahons are

and somehow being a face, despite the fact that the mcmahons are just objectively the worst

and everything kevin has done is totally proportional

speaking of, here he comes in the present

(the present time, that is)

(kevin owens has not been giftwrapped)

just had that smackdown moment of remembering how good the announce panel is

or at least it should be, if tom could remember how to speak english

we're like two minutes into the show and he's cocked up three times

kevin gets in, calls shane out

and also everybody who called him a coward

like sure, i wasn't here last week, but now i am and shane's nowhere to be seen hmmmmmmm

calls shane a very smart man

[citation needed]

kevin claims to personally like vince, so that should get some heel heat

and he's like look what i did to someone i respect and like, so how much will i fuck you up, you twat

on a related note, here comes sami

looking serious

steps in and just straight asks kevin what is wrong with him

like dude, we hav our problems but you are seriously off the rails here

apparently this feud is going to destroy kevin's career and also his life and family

kevin's like yeah w/e you're just jealous

sami is despondent

some people just can't be helped

no kevin, don't draw our attention to the fact that shane mcmahon is going to be headlining hiac

kevin argues sami has never done anything as important as him headbutting vince

sami comes back like yeah, while this is all technically true, you're a cheating fucker

sami will have his day and it will be beautiful and wholesome

(when all of current creative have died)

calls kevin trash, both drop their mics and square up

here comes bryan to interfere

confirms that shane is not here, and might not turn up tonight

a+ commissioning there

proposes kevin/sami tonight

well that'll be original

oh, who cares

i mock, but every one of their 84736395 matches has been great

end thing

later we have a pride of bulgaria celebration

apparently

and also dillinger/corbin next

after this ad for new day/usos at hiac

which is so going to be the best match again

and the first of many plugs for the hiac theme

by a band i've actually heard of for once

and here's baron

i think they've tweaked his music again?

i don't remember this many vocals on it

but it's possible i just stopped paying attention when baron came on screen

roll recap vt of the ongoing feud

tbf, i don't mind this new music of baron's

it's kind of shitty nu metal, but he's a shitty nu metal kind of person

and here's tye

i miss his alien waistcoat

(five words i have never said before)

and also here's aj for some reason

possibly just to show up both of their themes by being so much better

tye throws baron over the ropes while he's looking at aj

cue ad break

during which the heel has had a bunch of offence

funny how that works

the internet confirms that baron's music is new as of this ep

good to know i'm not completely unreliable

meanwhile, tye is wrestling a good match and baron is being baron

and aj is on announce

baron gets chased outside, ends up face to face with aj and throws his bottle of water over him

and then throws tye at him

and tye loses to a weirdly fast countout

so that happened and wasn't bullshit at all

aj runs into the ring, baron fucks off like a shitty nu metal motorbike wolf guy type

oh, he's sticking around

gets up to the stage, decides to get a mic and head back down to taunt aj

claims aj can only win with help, because he apparently hasn't been watching wrestling in the last decade

challenges him for the belt at hiac

end thing

another ad for the pride of bulgaria celebration

during which rusev will apparently receive the key to the city of plovdiv

which sounds like the shit i'd make up, but it's actually what they said

anyway, next it's jinder being just the worst

after an ad for total bellas

and a recap of all the shit that just happened with aj and baron

and confirmation of their hiac match, if we needed it

but now here's the indian contingent

flanking jinder

(sick burn)

this week jinder is apparently here to compliment shinsuke

oh, no, he's going to laugh at his face some more

who wrote this angle

and who didn't fire them

as they were laughing at one picture, he started moving

THE FEED IS COMING FROM INSIDE THE BUILDING

shinsuke announces his presence, cue the best entrance

jinder freaks out, the singhs rush him and get beaten up

allowing jinder to come from behind and slam shinsuke into things

like he does so...

well, like he does

shinsuke fights back, beats up all three and kinshasas jinder

end segment, hire new writers

apparently tonight will be the first owens/zayn match on smackdown live

this is the only reason they rebranded, so they could make that matchup fresh again

up next, hype bros/usos

and here come the new day, who are notably neither of those teams

they've brought popcorn and snacks

presumably to lurk and be hilarious for this match

after this cancer ad

i'm not convinced by the SUPER DELUXE FURNITURE KALEIDOSCOPE graphics for tlc

better or worse than HANDS AND SKUUUUUUUULLS

hard to say

but i think the designer of both needs to calm the fuck down a bit

back from ads, the bros are already in but the usos get an entrance

new day are in the front row of the crowd

but e still has binocualrs

bell rings, the usos immediately kick a significant percentage of the shit out of mojo

new day start a mojo chant, giving him enough of his namesake back to get a hot tag

looked away to answer the phone, came back thirty seconds later to see the usos get the pin

why is this such a ppv setup show when there's another week to go

usos get mics, go over to call the new day out

e produces a mic from his box of popcorn, because of course he fucking does

new day clap back, xavier challenges them to a cell match

that match will be every flavour of bonkers, and i am very excited for it

corey's like well we have to wait and see whether it gets made official

because apparently he doesn't know how wrestling challenges work

but up next, plovdiv pride

wait, i'm being told that that may not mean what i think

after this ad for raw

and here's aiden?

in a lovely suit

he's emceeing the party

what a cravat

(actual cravat for once)

and he has the mayor of plovdiv with him

huge if true

aiden does a big hype piece for rusev, he comes to the ring as aiden sings the national anthem

crowd boo and do usa chants, because dicks

okay, imma have to look up the bulgarian national anthem and see if this is actually it

if it is, props to aiden

well, at least half the crowd held the boos until after the national anthem

okay, one research break later i can confirm that someone in dubby dubby wee actually did their homework this time

the mayor is reading from a scroll kindly held by aiden

in bulgarian, obv

boos resound

i caught some of it, because it's quite similar to russian

repeats the speech in english for the cheap seats

and apparently september 26th is now rusev day

add that to your calendars

i didn't mention it, but rusev is wearing a natty waistcoat and on a bulgarian flag podium throughout

rusev thanks the mayor, replays the vt of his nine-second win over randy

plovdiv has the cheapest-ass key to the city i've ever seen

and believe me, i've seen the keys to many cities

rusev repeats his claim to have ripped out randy's fangs

p sure i'd remember that

it's apparently his jungle now

which is handy, because nobody had said anything about a jungle before now

aiden has a rusev day song he wrote for us

randy appears out of the crowd to rko aiden mid-flow

and then i thought for a minute he rko'd the mayor as well

but rusev had pushed him out of the way and gallantly taken the fall for him

there's way more nationalism on this episode than i'm comfortable with, ftr

but now, sami gets called into bryans office/curtain corridor/upholstery and poster shop

apparently shane is on his way

sami wants him to hold off so he can beat on kevin himself

bryan will see what he can do

but up next, charlotte/carmella

after this ad for 2k18

and yet another total bellas plug

and now randy's in a corridor

accosts renee, rather than the other way round for once

gives her a challenge for rusev at hiac if she sees him

wishes her a happy rusev day, leaves

and now we're back in the room

with charlotte

but still no peacock robe

booo

really long recap vt of charlotte/nattie

when it could be summed up with 'she's a hart, she's a flair, not gonna go well'

carmella arrives with her briefcase and her boo on his leash

which she then fastens to the turnbuckle

i have no clue what they're trying to go for with this, but i'm enjoying it

tom's like corey, you're down with the alternative kids, the fuck is this about

carmella distracts the ref with deviously detachabale jewellery, letting ellsworth push her off the turnbuckle

which was kind of charlotte's own fault for going up the turnbuckle her enemy's minion was chained to, tbh

carmella hits her with a dodgy-ass crossbody

charlotte kind of had to jump into it to take the bump

and after a functional few minutes, carmella eats a superkick for the pin

this remains such a ppv setup show

what will we do next week

now here’s nattie in new gear

even more transparent than usual

she's like hey char good to know your dad's ok he can watch me kick you to death at hiac lollllll

grin, end thing

this episode, snickers brings us the debut of cena for some unstated reason

but more importantly, fashion files returns next week

and by next week, i do of course mean two days ago

time, eh?

and...

undertaker bongs?

whaaaaaa

oh wait, it'll be dolph

the announce team are all buying into it because of course they are

oh hey, corey's got his number

just like really dolph the fuck is wrong with you

while this is true, the big hat kind of suits him

the crowd twigs, they hate him

he's like come on guys, did you really think you'd see taker twice in one year

which is fair

i need a gif of him going "Ahhhhh, the 90s" there

halfway through his usual rant about how anyone can gimmick, here's a walking gimmick to...prove his point?

anyway, it's bobby roode

i could cheerfully slap both men in this feud

bobby gets into the ring, calls dolph out for being a hypocrite

someone had to

are they trying to angle him as a kind of face-of-the-people babyface here?

cos that's just weird after his nxt run

challenges dolph for hiac

crowd chant for it, dolph's like i don't give a shit guys, shut up

dolph accepts, tries to do the rest in peeeeeeacehmgrlfrgn, bobby shuts him up so he can say glorious some more

but now, main event time

all the matches in this episode have been functional at best, so hopefully this'll pick it up

after this ad for 205 and a recap of all the shit that went down with enzo

and here's a sami

specifically zayn

although i do kind of want him to ride a eindeer to the ring

and here's kevin, no bullshit

bell rings, mutual pummelling begins

these guys are fighting like they're very aware that another segment overran and they don't have a lot of time

so they're just having the same match, but sped up like 20%

sudden cut to another feed, shane is in the building

back in the ring

kevin dodges a crossbody into a beautiful superkick

clip from the ad break of sami hitting a brainbuster on kevin on the apron

okay, yeah, these guys are elevating it

sami jumps over a popup attempt, counters into a blue thunder bomb

kevin dodges a helluva kick, so sami hits an absolutely brutal tope on him instead

and by 'on him' i do of course mean 'largely on his own ankles'

goes for a torpedo ddt, kevin blocks with another superkick

lovely timing there

and hits the apron powerbomb

at which point the ref calls for the bell

because apparently that move was worse than sami's apron brainbuster?

enter some medics to do helpful yet unspecified medical stuff

sami tries to fight them off while being functionally dead in his usual 'dead fish who will fucking have you' style

kevin sits on the announce table watching all this, then decides he sitll has more rage to vent, and bodychecks through sami and all the medics

and now he has a chair

KEVIN OWENS OF EARTH.

YOU HAVE GREAT RAGE IN YOUR HEART.

puts the chair around sami's neck, sets him up to throw him into the post, and HERE COMES THE MONEEEEEEEY

shane mcmahon, a man of deep principles who will only intervene when one of his employees is inches from death

kevin throws sami at him, hitting him in the face with his chair necklace, and runs away

another average day in the life of kevin 'maladjusted preteen' owens

everything focuses on shane and kevin staring at each other between the ring and the top of the stalls, and corey's like ummmm should someone maybe check on sami?

and we fade with that question still hanging in the air

but hey, sami'll be fine

we all know those two are like those irritating paired bosses in every rpg where you have to kill them at the same time or they'll just keep bringing each other back

nothing short of a complete detonation of canada will stop them

and on that bombshell, good night!

(i hate myself)

0 notes

grizzlefur · 7 years

Text

WWEm - M. Night Parablamyan

You’ll be pleased to hear that Comic Sans has gone on indefinite leave. Also, the formatting has now become single line spacing, until I find I don’t like it or something. Let me know if you like it/love it/don’t give a monkey’s butt.

As ever, Emma can be found on Twitter as @Waruce, usually during PPVs.

Transmission date: Monday 12/Tuesday 13 June 2017.

all up in this bitch, cos it's SATURDAY AFTERNOON RAW! raise your hands if you can't remember thing one that's been happening on raw shit, can't type with my hands raised rescind that last advance warning: if i make more mistakes than usual in this writeup, extend me some leniency on account of i can barely see straight, because it's fucking summer so my eyes are full of TREE SPERM and MUCILAGE and THE DEATH OF ALL THINGS seriously, it's a party but oversharing aside, let's watch some wrestlemans and wrestlewomans, although the raw wrestlewomans' division needs to figure out what the fuck it's doing

we open with a recap of joe talking shit to an absent devil who i think is going to be turning up this week? i say that like i care and also him choking the life out of a small portly jewish man and being the most well-spoken kind of psychopath snapping into the present, we're apparently in the cajundome and immediately hit brock's music hey, they know what the fans want now i just need to figure out why they want that so yes, the championship is here, attached to the walking embodiment of technically-legal masking agents but thankfully, only paul has a mic apparently this is the day of joe's fuckupening i paraphrase, but i wish i wasn't "Like a shark luring the chum into his domain..." paul, i think we need to take you to seaworld or some shit apparently joe was somehow abusing brock's ring, despite the whole bit where he hasn't been here in a couple of months paul is hastily retracting everything complimentary he said about joe last week and now throwing shade about the fact that joe's not part of the anoa'i dynasty? that's certainly an esoteric burn the angle is that the coquina clutch would probably fuck brock up, but joe won't be able to get it on him because he ain't shit related note: can we have a moratorium on white dudes calling poc a 'mutt' or similar? leaves something of a bad taste joe arrives, him and brock immediately unload on each other kurt sends in security, brock kills them all, so paul calls in the whole roster to pull them apart and they kind of suck at it leave security to the pros, guys all the faces are clinging onto joe like he's the messiah and end thing, apparently tonight's main event is kkb/hardyz for the title round #34982, but this time it's two out of three falls cut for ads, and we come back on a recap video of the exact thing we just watched i know i say my memory's bad, but seriously booker's still here, because shut up with your reasons

but now, here's elias and his guitar and his array of scarves weirdly, this crowd seems pretty split on him he's written a song about the brave inhabitants of the cajundome asks the crowd to be quiet while he plays, cole immediately starts talking so yeah, this is a song about how louisiana and dean ambrose aren't collectively shit so here he comes elias, please never try and rhyme 'breath' with 'darkNESS' again recap video of the deep strangeness of miz's championship celebration aka, The Day Mike Fucked A Clock With A Chair (and offended his wife) i did like the ending of it, though it's nice to have the cameramen acknowledged as something that exists in-universe elias samson is present, so naturally corey is immediately salty as fuck he hates dean, too, but seriously "The man has the vocal stylings of a pigeon that's been stepped on!" (fun fact: i would probably listen the hell out of an elias samson album) (just do acoustic covers, whatever, i just like his voice) so far, this match consists mostly of dean trying to trashweasel his way out of trouble and elias shutting him down duelling chants seem a bit harsh: "You can't wrestle!" "YOU CAN'T SING!" dean gets his usual comeback sequence comprising a strange mix of real wrestling skill and just running in the vague direction of your opponent and hoping they fall harder than you do elias stands far too close on a suicide dive, basically just grabs dean and walks backwards like oh no i am defeated dean gets the upper hand of a super slow turnbuckle spot, miz runs in to bother him elias still can't even pick up a distraction pin maryse is backing miz up, so at least they're still okay dean goes for miz, he does the wife-shaped shield thing it doesn't work at all, miz gets beaten on a lot dean gets back in the ring, elias does a nasty knee drop on his back as he comes in, swinging neckbreaker for the pin "By hook or by crook, a W is still a W!" are you in a fucking ionesco play, corey

but now let's have more of goldust doing his thing his thing, of course, beign sitting in a chair at a terrible frame rate and quoting films dude, if you just turned that chair a bit, you wouldn't have to crane your neck like that can't be good for you but yeah, vague threats in the vague direction of r-truth

but now we're backstage, and an angry kurt has words for the miz those words basically being FUCKIN' QUIT IT he has enough trouble with big samoan guys named joe miz insults kurt, alludes to his indeterminate personal problems, you could chew the tension demands dean be suspended or fired, kurt retorts with a) shut the fuck up, and b) no maryse is apparently still angry at her husband kurt walks off, miz splutters, end thing cruiserweight time now, after this video to remind yiu just how good cedric alexander is, since he's been away for a while and here's noam dar arguing with his phone backstage cedric comes in to remind noam how done he is with him and his girlfriend's collective shit she is, of course, on the other end of the phone she's injured, but she wants her scottish sleazeball to beat cedric right the fuck up tonight cedric's like fuck, fine, whatever, i'll fight you tonight, but then can you please go bother literally anyone else

so yeah, now it's time for that match noam is still on his phone on speaker as he starts his entrance they're having a barely-audible argument and the phone's casting to the tron for some reason also, noam has a new jumper, and it's nowhere near as good alicia wants to be on the line through the match, noam does not want this the ref's like dude sort your shit out we've got a match to have finally puts it down in the corner, bell rings, lumbar check, end alicia is piiiiiiiiissed that's still an absolutely vicious finisher noam is trying to salvage this telepresence argument while also going oh holy fuck my spine hype no. 58 for the main event

but up next, bray wyatt...does a thing, i guess? he's certainly present and i'm ok with that but now a video package of roman, because god knows we haven't seen so much of him see, this package makes him look good, cos it's just the big spots and not all the slow-ass bullshit between them next week, roman has an announcement about summerslWYATT CUT bray fills the screen, tells us cheerfully that the world is ending does the i'm here thing, and now he is after a randy-based wyatt cut, for some reason did someone click the wrong file? corey calls bray 'bizarre', somewhere goldust is like wait a fucking minute bray's going to kill everyone who sins, sits in apathy while people sin, or blaspheme against him apparently seth lives in a house where his architect's blueprints cover the windows and block out the sun this may just be a parable, but it's a fucking great image oh, apparently bray shattered it because it was a glass house? did you mention this before, bray? bit of a shitty twist other wise m. night parablamyan and now seth will be picking splinters of glass out of his soul for eternity that's a fucking greek god level of ironic fate so yeah, anyone who takes the dark lord's name in vain will get fucked on speaking of, here comes seth to get fucked on/pick glass out of his soul i'd be good for either he's like wait a minute dude you cost me my match because i called you names that seems disproportionate but by the way, you suck seth claims he's here to pipe bomb some truth at us, calls bray a coward don't insult him, he has a backwards tractor bray takes the opportunity to give a sermon on pride, tells seth he, too, ain't shit like lol kingslayer ain't that cute *teleports backstage* bray claims he'll win because gods live forever think we need to read you some egyptian/norse myth there

but now, charly has the hardyz in the led interview backstage corridor whatever thing the hardyz would like you all to remember that they're awesome and that jeff has an unhealthy predilection for jumping off things but now, enjoy this montage of what cena's been up to and remember that he'll be back in an episode i am unlikely to blog

but now we have kalisto vs titus, through the medium of his younger, happier dude and akira tozawa is standing in the front row, because titus wants him on brand apollo beats on kalisto, titus stands by the barricade shouting at tozawa like DUDE LOOK AT MY BOY ISN'T HE GREAT tozawa is like please stop shouting at me kalisto goes for an excessively flippy handspring springboard stunner, apollo counters to a spinout powerbomb for the win titus drags tozawa into the ring for an uncomfortable selfie with them he's just like dude stop hugging me

but now, HARD CUT TO CLOSEUP OF RHYNO PUTTING CHEEZ WIZ ON CRACKERS we all needed that miz has come with a proposal for heath to become part of his entourage rhyno is like dude i'm standing right here miz promises to make all heath's dreams come true, heath's like well i've always wanted to be ic champ hmmmmm miz offers him a shot if he joins the dark side rhyno's like you know what fuck you dude i'm gonna go find kurt to give us a match against you maybe rustle up a friend we're out *aggressively eats crackers* so yeah

spot about that theme park competition thing, but now here's alexa our resident wrestlewoman with her shit together oh hey, a recap of last week's match so it did happen after all no, alexa, don't kick off by mentioning your match at extreme rules we're all trying to forget on saturday, we've got the first women's mitb match, but fuck that noise, tonight's about me but here's nia to take issue with the fact that alexa offered her a title shot, then whined about it and cheated out of it alexa's like i know right we should have had a great match but those two fucked everything up so here come those two mickie's redesigned her gear to play up the Native elements again chest dreamcatcher and everything mickie and dana try to remind everyone how much of a bitch alexa's been to nia in fornt of everyone alexa's like lol no i think your eyesight's going ah, cheap ageist jokes but now,...hit emma's music not that i'm gonna complain fucking love that music *beep boop beep boop* emma announces her dramatic return, demands a shot for the title alexa's just like um do you even go here and now here's sasha fuck it, everyone in the division in the segment that's how we do wrestling, right? so wait, are alexa and nia the only heels on the show? seems unbalanced sasha mocks alexa for literally everything she does, punches her in the face, cue brawl and hard cut to an advert for the episode of smackdown i'l be watching later back from ads, and we've got the 6-woman tag match we all saw coming so yeah, emma's still a heel, just one with a problem with the even heelier champ so yeah, emma's back, with weird shoulder things and boobface and everything although following a gear redesign, the boobface has gone from :) to :o it's great that she's back because she's great, but it does mean i have been once again demoted to the second coolest person to bear the name formulaic tag, sasha hot tags in to beat on emma, alexa decides to just walk off instead of letting emma tag out, bank statement for the tap this is not how you make friends

confirmed, later we have slater/rhyno vs miz/[NAME]

but next, corey talks to bayley about her utter lack of extreme after this advert for gold bond and MONEY MONEY MONEY MONEY cole massively hypes it, then is like wait what the fuck am i saying that's the wrong brand smoothly done and now, have a package about how great finn is, and that is THE ONLY ORDER THOSE WORDS GO IN complete with lots of shots doing the arms and telling us how good he is

but yes, now we have corey/bayley just by his existence, corey must remind her how extreme she's not for the love of god, woman, get a tatt bayley's like hey i've never been in that situation before i'm a normal person i don't want to hurt people corey's like um have you ever wondered why you're in this business bayley does this whole motivational self-improvement thing which doesn't really work on its own cena does that, but with the understood subtext that if you get in the way of him being his best self, he will fuck your shit right up and bayley says her next thing is to get the belt back manageable steps slightly awkward hug, end interview so that was a thing

but now, here come A ONE MAN BAAAAAAAAAND (and his friend) rhyno should rebrand as a one man road crew miz and maryse arrive, wearing the mania jackets again, because all the best people read this blog (hey, mike) apparently he approached elias during the advert break, who said yeah fuck off dude so here comes his partner with music that sounds like the laughing fucking gnome of something and on a tricycle it's the bear although this bear is much taller and walks like dean ambrose corey christens him Big John Cubb crowd chant for a tag, miz is like i'm not a moron do you think i don't know who this is corey is just spamming us with spurious life facts about the bear because of his refusal to tag in a large mammal, rhyno is just fucking miz up all over the place cole makes a reference to the jbl and cole show, to reward dedicated weirdos bear tags himself in heath tries to take his mask off, bear punches him in the face good to know bears follow lucha tradition does a bearhug (naturally), heath nearly taps miz tags, then starts beating the piss out of the bear at ringside rips off the mask, revealing some dude, once again and rhyno spears miz into the netherworld throws him back into the ring, bear follows, heath tries to convince him to turn on his master, bear hits heath with dirty deeds, excessively long realisation beat, he unmasks and is in fact dean did...did we just get twin magicked by a bear? IT WAS ME ALL ALONG, MIZANIN! ahem dean goes for miz, he jumps and knocks maryse off the apron she hobbles off with a dark look dean stands there with a magnificent ooooooops look until miz turns around, when he hits him with dirty deeds and puts a still-unconscious heath on top of him for the pin slater and rhyno leave, dean puts the bear head on miz and walks off this just became strange this feels like it should be on one of those serial killer warning sign lists miz eventually rips it off, glares, end segment

hopefully we should have the main event next, if they want to give it the time it deserves oh, looks like we actually are huh was not expecting them to do the whole sensible booking thing recap video of the most beautifully-executed surprise return at mania and also this entire feud i'd forgotten how good their heel turn was, as well oh wait, never mind, neville's here phew if wwe started booking things in a sensible, organic way that gave things room to breathe, i wouldn't know what to do rich swann enters, does his usual dancing, gets punched in the back because neville's taken a bunch of levels in twat oh wait was that the neville level i get it beats swann all over the place, rings of saturn until he stops twitching demands his belt and a mic neville crouches by swann, recites a list of pretenders he's fucked on, kicks him out of his ring starts a monologue like it's good to be the king but will all you usurpers just fuck away off namechecks tozawa, hopefully kickstarting a feud that i am down for like you would not believe apparently titus tweeted that selfie and suggested tozawa might win the title the king is less than amused but now, charly interviews the kkb cesaro has a copy of the hardyz' autobiography so they can laugh and throw it away they keep getting more things on their jackets including they live OBEY patches, which is cool

and next, enzo/cass vs anderson/gallows seriously, you should really logically need more time for a two out of three match than a normal one this show has like half an hour left and we still have to see enzo do a thing or not, who knows with this angle douchebag joisey music hits, nobody is here cut backstage, cass is on the floor under some girders the revival walk past in the background, no reason cass says he went down with one blow to the head, emphasises how HARD they hit enzo doesn't want him to fight, but he insists but in the ring, gallows and anderson are here to trade secondary school burns and muttley laughs about enzo and cass hit twat music again, long beat, and here they are accompanied by a bunch of refs like seriously dude this is a terrible idea if only we had some power to stop this match happening alas, we are only lowly wrestling officials, all we can do is point and harangue corey calls enzo a trash fire masquerading as a human being, which i'm like 80% sure is a john oliver line? sort your material, dude cass beats on anderson through weaponised staggering, finally ags out enzo's 3am-behind-a-hollister style works for a bit, until anderson just kicks him in the head a bunch and tags gallows in cass is lying on the floor outside and magic killer for the pin turns out going into this match with a recent head injury was a terrible idea who knew they set him up for another magic killer, but here comes a big shooooooow to help at which point the heels run away and enzo and show awkwardly hug which is what cass comes around to see fuck daggers, he's glaring broadswords show leaves, cass comes up to his partner like the fuck dude, cut to ads

main event next, fucking finally

ok, no, we have to watch an r-truth reaction video first these have a solid frame rate at least, but that's come at the cost of things like 'colour film', and 'not having r-truth' truth quotes network, forgets to cite it, promises to get goldust got get got got get, end and now in the corridors, enzo comes up to show like dude, the clues all kind of point to you, so i have to ask show's like what the fuck you twat i...oh wait, it's your partner, what a twat calls cass sawft, walks off, end

but now we have a recap video of brock and joe from the start of the show why the fuck do we even need to see this just get to the main event already less than 20 minutes left this is not enough time for a properly-paced best of three match with build and everything oh, and now we get to see joe talking to mike mcmikemike backstage apparently this whole debacle has been exactly according to joe's plan this plan has never been clearly stated which is probably also exactly as planned we are all dancing on a large samoan's palm

but now, here come the hardyz fucking finally oh, and an advert break and that package for how great roman is again siiiiiiiiiiigh thing i didn't quite catch before this cut: is matt hardy wearing a fucking button-fronted short-sleeved shirt? that makes no sense for anyone whose gimmick doesn't include the words 'Caribbean', 'dipshit', or 'Caribbean dipshit' cut back, and now he's wearing no shirt ah well guess some things can just never be known and here are the kkb they've kept the jackets, but gone without shirts to maximise the orbital terawatt laser effect of their entrance bell rings, just over twelve minutes left in the show fucking hell, wwe trust your talent the teams clearly know time is against them - sheamus tries to open with a brogue, then immediately takes poetry in motion and a twist of fate for a nearfall and then sheamus basically just punches jeff in the face for the first fall? this match had so much potential sigh and now, let's cut away for an ad break and naom, gallows and anderson advertising pizza hut buy pizza from us, so twats can take it off you and back to the match recap of the first fall - jeff went for a twist of fate, sheamus countered, threw him into the corner, and did a slightly underwhelming kick to the face for the pin and now we have sheamus just kicking the shit out of jeff jeff mule kicks sheamus into a blind tag, matt hot tags in and starts mashing cesaro's head into all the turnbuckles does a delete, on the grounds that anthem probably don't give a shit, right? kicks sheamus off the apron, twist of fate on cesaro for the win i hope this narration is giving some sense of how perfunctory and artificially quick this is that's two falls in just under five minutes in a fucking championship match sheamus kicks jeff off the apron, kicks matt in the face, knees matt in the face, still can't get a pin turns out all my problems cannot, in fact, be solved by kicking jeff breaks up a pin, sheamus throws himout of the ring, cesaro goes for a neutraliser on matt, matt counters, cesaro counters that back into a sharpshooter, rope break nice sequence then matt goes for a small package, which kind of just seems like a dick move double hot tags, jeff does his usual spots, twist of fate to sheamus, cesaro breaks it just in time sheamus drops jeff on the ropes, cesaro uppercuts him, still no pin jeff bullfights sheamus into the ring post, hits a lovely swanton, cesaro pulls sheamus out of the ring just before 2 cue brawling at ringside aaaaaand double countout with which the cajundome is just so fucking satisfying brawl continues, because fuck you and your matches and your belts and we fade on the hardyz shouting from the ring while the kkb pose with their questionably-retained belts

so yeah that's it that's the show the fuck, guys? i mean obviously it was meant to be unsatisfying, and they're going to be doing it again, presumably at GBoF, but still you could still have done it without that shitty tease match but who knows maybe it'll be narratively significant

anyway, let's clean out that bad taste with some SATURDAY AFTERNOON SMACKDOWN! oh wait it's the setup show for a ppv roll on the shitty tease matches! setting up for mitb, so everything is ladders and tonight we have 6-man tag of the men's mitb contestants and randy and jinder 'face to face'

but now, the new day being played to the ring by their very own marching band, because we're in new orleans, so why the fuck not they could probably take shinsuke's violinist, but i'd watch it kofi opens by thanking the band even before doing their own introduction, which is good form the usos interrupt their gyrating to angrily enter and be thug at them and they can't even finish that before the fashion police turn up fandango claims to have compelling evidence hat their day one is not so h after all "If anything, your day one is...G." tell em tyler tyler gets to finish his sentence before the colóns enter to talk shit about breezango's policing skills (psst, guys) (they're not real detectives) so yeah, we're getting an 8-man tag match here although it's not immediately clear how the fashion police are allying themselves with three men wearing about 17 strings of beads between them the levelling for the announce mics is just fucked to hell tonight does smackdown even *have* a tech team, or is that how they run such a streamlined, modernised show? i do love that this push has given tyler and dango the opportunity to remind us how good they are at wrestling jbl, please stop making bead string jokes *brief shudder* xavier and tyler do a weird-ass combo move consisting of tyler doing a rana-style headscissors on xavier, then stopping at the top so xavier can throw him at primo followed by xavier joing the burgeoning dropkick to the back club the faces take everyone else out of the ring, stop for a brief trombone break and now we get to watch more american adverts i am officially tired of this shit i would much rather be watching this match than adverts about how cigarettes will fuck your mouth or this enormously fucked mountain dew advert and i can't even watch the tiny version in the corner i am very easily distracted oh thank fuck, we're back tyler's in trouble thanks to those dastardly usos jbl reminds us again how the usos are the greatest tag team in the world, and somewhere jason jordan is crying i mean, that's statistically likely at any given point, but still yeah, tyler's just getting the piss knocked out of him including a simultaneously dull yet impressive vertical suplex from epico comes back by throwing a bent-over epico at primo, then clotheslining primo so he ddts him nice, if making no sense whatsoever kofi tags in, kicks everyone, hits jimmy with a boom drop and trouble in paradise for the near-fall and tags in xavier for upupdowndown for the pin and taunt the usos as they retreat in failure

but later tonight, we have charlotte/nattie

but now, aj talks to shinsuke backstage and sami walks in like hey guys what do you want to do in this match asks for ideas, then talks over aj with his usual overthinky ring general thing does a they don't want none, goes for a high five, aj just stares, asks if shinsuke likes the plan, he just stares, sami answers himself and walks off to get warmed up long beat Shinsuke: "...I like him." AJ: "Of course you do." some lovely chemistry between those two which shoudl really surprise nobody

but now, dasha interviews mojo in some random corridor hey mojo, how did it feel to fail and not achieve your dreams last week? mojo is still wearing his watermelon hat magnanimous in defeat he's kind of happy he lost, because he responds to adversity with HYPE and we haven't seen the last of him and as he says this ZACK FUCKING RYDER appears the crowd are as stoked about this as i am he is officially back, and the hype bros are back together get the fuck in so yeah, this tag division's kind of huge

but now, here's naomi who we are reliably informed is amayayayayzing although the same cannot really be said of this new flourescent halter top she's got and she's fighting everybody's favourite leather-clad lunarian (shut up, i'll stop making that joke when and only when it stops being really fucking funny to me) bell hasn't even rung when the trash jazz begins just look at that woefully impractical dress and that super fucking awkward walk down the ramp we couldn't have brought her up through nxt and moved billie and peyton up to perform exactly the same purpose because... jbl explains the incomprehensible ascent of lana with leicester city, neglecting the fact that leicester had in fact played premiership football before that season anyway, tamina and naomi are just beating the hell out of each other tamina like i'll see your bouncy moves and leg lariats and counter by PUNCHING YOUR FUCKING HEAD OFF YOUR BODY try punching her leg off of her leg i hear that works against people with legs i don't think i will ever not love that somersault facelock escape naomi does although it does kind of pose the question why she doesn't just commit to it and do a shiranui and split moonsault for the pin good match lana blindisdes the champion incredibly slowly, does a weird-ass glam slam type thing, then gets the belt off an official just by asking for it didn't know you could just do that and all jbl can say is how the belt matches her dress siiiiigh

but now, here are the singhs to introduce their boss he comes in wearing the sharpest fucking blue suit you will ever see next up in entrance music i like way more than i feel i should... the ring is sporting a fucking lovely carpet jinder briefly calls out randy, then goes straight in to calling him a coward and insulting his father maybe ramp the smacktalk up there? and now we're up to the 'promise to dismantle your enemy's legacy backward through history' step this curve feels like it's going to end up in actual bloodshed very soon starts his promo to his people/shouting at the crowd in punjabi, gets partway through, randy's music hits sends the singhs down the ramp to head him off, only for randy to run in out of the crowd and rko jinder on that lovely carpet and then he just fucks back off throught the crowd who love him for being a dickbag but somehow also a babyface dickface? yeah, let's go with that even if it wasn't in his hometown, they could not be setting this up for a 'shock' randy loss any more cue several seconds too long of randy posing and glowering in the stands

and now we have kevin coming into the locker room to brief baron and dolph who don't give the slightest shit what he has to say he's just like guys, i don't actually like either of you, but it's mutually beneficial to work together to take out the babyfaces rather than being dicks for the sake of it and shooting ourselves in the foot which...actually makes sense? dammit, kevin, stop bringing logic and game theory into my wrestling leaves to let them process this, cut to ads

up next, charlotte/nattie

but first, renee interviews randy backstage and he's just like have you even been listening talk less hit more i'm win the thing and leaves well, at least he's sticking to his epiphanies

but yes, now we have the women's match natties back to her old gear, and i'm not thrilled jbl just used the phrases "most likely" and "statistical certainty" right the fuck next to each other in a sentence dude, words mean things and you need to stop just saying whatever but yes, charlotte is here too, with new gear patterned off the terrible moulding on your grandparents' bathroom fittings shot of becky watching the match backstage pull up a fucking chair for once, someone

more wrestling in a minute, but first, YOU WATCH THIS ADVERT BREAK MOTHERFUCKER including an advert romanticising the fact that people need stimulant shots to participate in capitalist society see, this is what happens when you make me watch adverts whioe i'm freestyling i just end up veering into political/economic philosophy, and it's hard to come back from that oh thank god, we're back

we come back on natalya surfboard stretching charlotte like fuck you, i'm a real wrestler charlotte moonsaults nattie for a nearfall as we pan out to carmellsworth watching the match on a tv bigger than either of them again with fuck you i can wrestle, nattie powerbombs charlotte out of the corner for a nearfall (don't tell anyone, but this is actually a good match) naturally, as i say that, it turns into a series of cheap rollup attemtps, then natural selection for the pin but it made charlotte look desperate, which it's always nice to see side note: they've recoloured the GBoF logo so BALLS is the least eye-catching part

time for fashion files noir bitches dango opens with a gritty monologue about his terrible parents cut to him admirin his pecs in a mirror and cut to tyler, lying in the trashed fashion police office dango gets a description of their attackers "One arm....No, two arms!" dango sketches something, tyler confirms that it was them who attacked him dango hustles tyler off to get help, and we slow zoom on the pair of stick figures as the segment ends

but now, let's have an inspiration porn segment about a kid not dying of liver disease let's not get into my ranting about disability politics

moving on, dasha grabs lana backstage for an opinion lana's like i don't actually give a shit what any of you think byeeeeeeee

but now it's main event time opening with kevin's massive distorted face it's like neville and tjp selling their names for power, this is clearly a 'you can be champion if we can reveal how you look like hodor when viewed from below' situation and now here's baron, accomnpanied by a vt of him being a twat last week (but which instance? we may never know) dolph's entrance is mostly overridden by an advert for talking smack, which i won't be watching because jbl's on it sami and aj enter with less fanfare, but they still don't want none to leave time for the best music in the company but how will he enter tomorrow night the suspense whoever the tommaso ciampa-looking dude in the corner is, he is freaking the fuck out about being within reach of shinsuke cut for ads, during which the match apparently started and as we come back, i realise that i didn't fully appreciate the awfullness of those godawful cyan tights dolph iswearing only emphasised by putting him in the ring with shinsuke shinsuke counters dolph's elbow drop through his signature technique of 'being elsewhere', hot tags aj in, and he opens by basically hitting dolph with the bitter end and then an ushigoroshi, except we don't say that any more ooh, nice counter goes for a styles clash, dolph counters to a tornado ddt everyone else gets involved, cut for ads, and we come back on dolph/sami natursally, kevin immediately comes in as i type that sami counters kevin's senton with his knees, basically turning it into a self-inflicted lumbar check as often happens, this heel team seems much more concerned with shouting at everyone within range than having the match sami gets the shit beaten out of him by kevin, counters to a blue thunder bomb, can't quite flop fast enough to make the tag takes some more punishment, pulls out a big lariat and then bullfights all three heels out of the ring in succession sloooooowly flops to his corner, and just as he gets there dolph and kevin pull aj and shinsuke off the apron lovely bit of timing so sami just goes fuck it and helluva kicks baron for the pin maybe lead with that general fighting ensues and now kevin has a ladder he and dolph hit sami and aj with it "Unforgiving impact of that ladder on your flesh." byron's freestyling for his upcoming black metal album meanwhile, baron gets the ladder and fucks on everyone with it sets it up under the briefcase, climbs sloooooowly enough for shinsuke to push it over and somewhere, randy orton began to bleed kinshasa to baron, and shinsuke dramatically climbs the ladder himself and retrieves the most important business supplies in the world and we fade on him posing

so yeah, setup show, but that was pretty good and it looks like mitb should be good better than extreme rules, at any rate and certainly less of a misnomer unless it suddenly becomes clear that shane's accounts were frozen long ago and there was never actually any money but in any case i'll try and get this up tonight (Saturday), and then it's mitb tomorrow hmu on twitter @waruce if you want to see me struggle not to fall asleep and also to reconcile my excitement for MONEY MONEY MONEY MONEY with the failings of late-stage capitalism (shit, it happened again)

anyway, that ends this week's show, but up next, it looks like it's gonna get a bit finnegans wake

#Wrestling #WWE #WWE Raw #wwe smackdown

0 notes