A/N: This is kind of my belated birthday present to myself. I felt like writing and it's what happened. Jillian calls Melina 'Marley' for reasons of her own, I have learned this from twitter and used it as I saw fit. This is also a continuation of Lody's story "Harper Takes a Bite Out of Life" and my sequel to that "Always and Forever," you should definitely read both to familiarize yourself with Alex's and Harper's situation before diving into this fic. Lody gets credit for helping out with several ideas and letting me bounce them off of her until they met with my satisfaction (she's awesome and you should go read her stuff because it is too) and also for the title.
Warning: Femslash. It's what I do. Don't like it? Turn back now.
Disclaimer: I don't own WoWP or the wrestlers. Chances are we'd all be having a lot more fun if I did.
*****'*****
GRAPPLING WITH SECRETS
"Alright! Get her Jillian! Yeah! Take that! And that! Woo!"
Coming home from a few hours of vandalizing subway walls and scaring tourists with her fangs Alex cautiously approached the door to the apartment she shared with her vampire lover, Harper. Noises like that were not what she expected to hear upon coming home. Harper had her blood up about something.
Curious, Alex opened the door and walked into the apartment to see Harper standing in front of the television apparently enacting the action on screen on an invisible opponent. Harper hadn't even acknowledged Alex's arrival which wasn't so unusual; vampire senses tended to take all the mystery out of identifying other occupants in a room, which made it particularly difficult for she and Harper to sneak up on one another. Alex stepped further into their living room so she could get a clear view of the television screen and what she saw made her groan aloud.
"Augh, Harper, wrestling again? You know I don't like it when you watch that because then you talk about it with my obsessive family and they expect me to have watched it," Alex complained.
Harper tossed Alex a tolerant look and then tuned fully back into the action on screen, "Oh please, dear, as if you don't love it as much as we all do."
"That's not the point!" Alex hastily defended.
"Oh? Then what is?" Harper's challenge came with a little smile; she knew Alex's arguments and had heard them many times before but seeing Alex riled never failed to amuse her.
"The point?" Alex started heatedly as she began pacing beside their couch and gesturing expansively with her hands and arms, "The point is that they take something I enjoy and they turn it into some crazy spectacle! I don't need to put on a costume and a mask just to watch a match, and they do it for every single one! I don't even like half the wrestlers they get all excited about! I just want to sit down and watch some hot women throwing each other around without it becoming some huge event! And I so do not need to see my parents or brothers in unitards ever again. Is that so hard to understand?"
Harper patted Alex's shoulder when she came close enough, "Of course, dear. No one needs to see your father in a unitard. But I know you still like watching wrestling, just like I do. And don't even try to pretend you haven't been keeping up on things with YouTube. I've seen your browser history."
"Well, yeah," Alex flopped down on the couch and Harper slowly sat beside her, both of their eyes glued to the screen, "It's like a soap opera…but with violence and costumes and play by play announcements. What's not to like?"
"It's also an excellent outlet for pent up aggression," Harper pointed out as they watched Jillian slam her opponent, Melina, into the mat. "Yeah!"
"Ouch," Alex commented, wrinkling her nose. "That looked painful."
"Eh," Harper replied, "Jillian is only giving as good as she's gotten. Melina's really hit her hard this match."
"So, you're rooting for Jillian, huh?"
Harper clapped a little, "Of course! I admire her plucky spirit. They keep making it seem like she's not a great wrestler but she's obviously talented, and she's so much fun to watch in a match because she commits to that singing and the moves and everything."
"Huh," Alex had no real reply to that. Harper was certainly a fan of the blonde wrestler. Alex could see, even from this angle, the joy in Harper's eyes as she watched her favorite athlete in action.
Suddenly Alex had an idea.
Why watch a match on the television screen when, with magic, they could be right there in the arena?
A crafty grin spread across Alex's face and she stood up and grabbed Harper's wrist.
"Alex?" Harper's eyes shifted away from the screen briefly, "That's your mischief face, I don't like it when you do that and involve me. What are you doing?"
"Taking you to meet your idol," was Alex's reply.
And before Harper could protest Alex doing anything crazy the brunette had already mumbled some words and wrapped them up in a bubble of purple magic.
***'***
An instant later the bubble exploded and they were surrounded by a cloud of smoke. They could hear surprised shouts of "What the-?" and an awful lot of noise but couldn't see a thing.
"Alex?"
"On it," Alex waved her hands and a wind sprang up to dissipate the smoke and left the two vampires with a clear view of their surroundings.
Alex quietly said, "Uh oh," as she looked around and noticed they were in the middle of the ring with a baffled wrestler on either side and a stunned crowd staring at them.
"Oh my gosh!" Harper said lowly and quickly her voice rising to a squeak in her panic, "Alex what did you do? Why are we in the ring?"
"I don't know! I guess I missed," Alex hissed back, "I still don't have a handle on these powers since you turned me."
"Well," Harper elbowed her girlfriend in the ribs as her eyes darted around them and a nervous smile plastered itself on her lips, "Do something!"
Alex nodded, "Okay, right, sure. I've totally got this."
She sidled over to Melina, a hint of her predatory grace stealing into her swagger, and threw an arm around the fierce wrestler's shoulders. Then she said, loudly, "You call that wrestling? I've seen better moves from my grandma in the produce isle." The crowd gasped and oohed in good humor thinking this was all part of the show.
Offended, Melina growled "Excuse me?" Melina didn't know what the company thought they were doing throwing two barely legal girls in the ring like this, but whatever it was didn't mean she had to put up with crap like this.
"What?" Alex asked mockingly, "From where I was standing it looked to me like Jillian here was handing you your pretty feathered boots on a platter. Are you gonna take that?"
Melina growled again, "I'm certainly not going to take any lip from an upstart like you!" Melina grabbed Alex around the waist and bent over backwards intending to slam her into the mat as she'd done to many opponents throughout her career but Alex, being a vampire, with her superior reflexes was able to get her feet underneath herself and reverse the move just like her grandmother had taught her when she was little. A shocked audience fell silent as this slip of a girl out maneuvered one of the division's top faces.
"Alex!" Harper cried out, "What are you doing?"
Alex looked up at her girlfriend and grinned, "Having fun! I could never do that when I was little!" Alex released Melina and bounced a little on her toes looking giddy, "No wonder Max kept trying that all the time." She laughed.
"Alex! You can't do that!" Harper marched over to her girlfriend and grabbed her by the ear.
"Ow! Ow! Harp, hon, don't be mad! Ow! Let go," Alex twisted away from Harper and out of her grip, then cupped her hand protectively over her ear and pouted, "I just wanted you to meet your favorite wrestler," she pointed over to where Jillian stood looking deep in thought, "is it so wrong for me to have a little fun, too?"
It was then that Harper remembered a match was generally comprised of two competitors and she had completely ignored the other one up to this point, "Ohmygosh! Jillian! I'm such a big fan! Will you sign," Harper patted around herself looking for a scrap of paper and a pen, "actually, I don't have anything you can sign. But oh wow! It's such an honor to meet you! You're my favorite wrestler ever! I admire you so much! Your wrestling, your singing, your whole career! You're amazing. How everybody puts you down and makes fun of you and you don't give up no matter what, you're such an inspiration! And wow! I can't believe I'm standing here with you!"
Jillian smiled hugely. "That's great! I'm always happy to meet a fan…especially one with such a great sense of style!" They both took a moment to admire Harper's seaweed inspired outfit complete with buoy earrings and real seaweed shoulder straps.
Alex felt her eyebrows lift, maybe Harper had found a friend after her own heart…she wasn't sure whether to be horrified or pleased. On the one hand if Harper had found a friend like that Alex wouldn't have to hear about all the crazy clothing ideas her girlfriend had and on the other hand…there are two of them. Sweet Merlin, there are two of them. Alex wasn't certain she could survive two girls like Harper. While she loved her girlfriend dearly she was sometimes an awful lot to manage. She has so much energy and such an outpouring of goodwill that sometimes Alex just wanted to muzzle her…and now, putting two of them together…Alex mentally groaned, what had she been thinking?
Lost in thought of her own folly Alex didn't notice when Melina recovered and came up behind her.
But Jillian noticed and politely excused herself from Harper to intercept her enraged opponent with a boot to the abdomen.
Alex looked behind her to the winded Melina and then up to Jillian with an impressed look on her face, "Thanks."
"My pleasure," Jillian responded brightly, gearing up for round two of her match with Melina, "What do you say you two team up with me for this one?"
Alex made a face, "Nah. I've had my fun." Alex slid out of the ring and waved to her girlfriend, "Enjoy yourself, Harper!"
Harper stood paralyzed by indecision as Melina and Jillian duked it out all around the ring. She wasn't sure whether it would be ethical to involve herself in this match. She had a clear advantage over either of the wrestlers, her vampire senses and strength made both of them child's play for Harper, but…this was her favorite sport and her favorite wrestler had asked for a team up. It was a once in a lifetime opportunity, one that probably wouldn't come her way again. But it wasn't right for her to interfere. But Jillian is her hero. But if she got involved Melina would be fighting impossible odds. But she wanted to make a good impression. But it just wasn't fair!
While Harper mentally battled with her morals Melina and Jillian were locked in serious combat. Each of them were throwing everything they had at each other, determined to prove themselves. Melina had a lot of face to make up for after getting slammed by that skinny kid, she was embarrassed and angry and looking to take it out on a convenient target. Jillian, for her part, wanted to perform well for such a devoted fan and live up to the admiration the younger woman had presented her with. The two of them traded blow after blow and kick after kick, driving each other into the ropes and the mat with punishing moves.
Jillian managed to grab Melina's head and drag her into her chest for the Boob Job, which always gave the crowd a good laugh and unbalanced her opponents but Melina broke free and they resumed their fight. They grappled until Melina got a solid lock on Jillian and performed one of her signature finishing moves: the Sunset Split. She had Jillian down and covered her for the pin, but just before the official was able to count the third beat Melina was dragged off of Jillian by the other girl who'd appeared in the ring. She was rolled off Jillian by her shoulders, somersaulting backwards with the force of the removal.
Melina stood and faced the obviously nervous redhead, "What do you think you're doing?"
"Sorry," Harper said, "Sorry. It's just, I can't let you pin Jillian. She's my favorite and though this goes against all my morals and fair play I'm going to have to help her out just this once."
Melina rolled her eyes, "Whatever, pinky. Let's go."
Melina charged at Harper, intending to grab her around the waist and toss her to the mat but Harper suddenly wasn't in her path and she was flying through the air after having been thrown. She hadn't even seen the redhead move! She landed on the mat with a thud, winded and surprised, and a recovered Jillian scrambled on top of her and grabbed her leg for a pin. Melina was too stunned to respond and Jillian, in a shocking turn of events and against the script for the night, won the match.
Jillian jumped up from the prone Melina and did a happy dance bouncing her way over to Harper and grabbing her in a huge bear hug. "I won! I won! I won! Me! I won!" Jillian squealed, "That almost never happens!"
Melina rolled out of the ring still wondering what the heck had happened and was confronted by the girl who'd reversed her move earlier making a sympathetic face at her. "What do you want? Going to rub it in?" she asked unhappily.
"Nah, not this time," Alex waved her hand, "Sorry about that. It was a total accident. Instinct, you know. And sorry about," Alex gestured to the wildly celebrating Jillian and a giddy Harper, "My girlfriend just really doesn't like to see her favorites lose."
Melina sneered, "Whatever," and blew by Alex and up the ramp to the backstage area.
Alex shrugged and turned her attention back to the two cheerful women in the ring. "Hey Harper! Come on!" she called, gaining both celebrants' notice and waving them out of the ring while the announcers reported the stunning win and moved on to the next match.
***'***
Jillian escorted Harper and Alex backstage where a fuming Melina was waiting for them. "What the hell was that?" the angry Latina demanded.
"Now Marley," Jillian started.
"Don't you Marley me, Jillo!" Melina retorted, "You know I hate it when you do the Boob Job on me! There's close and then there's too close! We're friends Jillo, but I don't want to spend an awful lot of time face first in your boobs!"
"Huh," Harper said thoughtfully, "You know, Alex never complains when I do that to her when we're-"
"Harper!" Alex cried out, "They do not need to know about that!" Harper blushed and ducked her head, contrite.
Their outburst brought Melina's attention back on them, "Where the hell did you two come from and why the hell didn't you stick to the script?"
"Uh," Harper looked like a deer in the headlights, mouth dropped open and eyes wide.
"Er," Alex began, "You see-"
"It was magic," Jillian stated matter-of-factly. "A teleportation spell, right?"
Alex nodded dumbly, shocked that anyone here would know about magic and forgetting that she wasn't supposed to go around admitting that she knew about magic.
"Magic?" Melina scoffed, "You expect me to believe 'magic' got these two in the ring? Please. What next? Are they going to turn someone into a frog? Are dragons going to pop out everywhere?"
"Hey, Marley," Jillian scolded, "That's not nice. Magic exists."
"And how would you know?" Melina challenged.
"I'm a wizard," Jillian said while all three of the others' jaws dropped. "Well, was a wizard. I lost my powers when the council heard I was engaged to a mortal."
"Aww," Harper said, patting Jillian's hand, "Alex was going to lose her powers, too. But then I was turned into a vampire and she got to keep them."
Melina looked in horror at Harper, "You're a vampire? Ay, dios mio!" She stepped back holding her hands up in a warding cross, "Quedarse atrás."
Harper hastened to reassure the wrestlers, "With a soul. I have a soul. So does Alex."
"You mean she's a vampire, too!"Jillian exclaimed with wonder, "And you still have powers? How? Why?"
Alex shrugged, "We're not really sure and I'm starting to think this is a conversation we should be having somewhere else. Also, there's an angry man in a suit headed for us, that's never a good thing. Trust me, I know."
Melina and Jillian looked where Alex had pointed out the red faced suited man. "Shoot," Jillian said, "That's one of the company yes-men. He's not going to be happy with you two."
"So what do we do about it?" Alex asked, placed in one of those rare situations where she was unsure of herself. Harper reached out and took Alex's hand.
Jillian turned to Alex, "You're going to put a spell on him."
"What?" Melina, Harper, and Alex all asked at the same time.
"Just something to make him more agreeable," Jillian said, "You're going to recite this with him as the focus: Piper Flair Jericho Rock, this man our actions cannot knock!"
Alex nodded and prepared herself as the man in the suit bore down on the quartet.
"You four have a lot of explaining to do!" the man nearly shouted as he came to a stop wagging his fingers at the four women. "I've had the execs chewing me out for the last fifteen minutes because of that stunt you pulled! Care to explain to me why I shouldn't fire you two and have you two arrested?"
Jillian whispered, "Now."
Alex recited the spell and watched as the red suddenly faded from his face and he grinned, "Nice match out there ladies. Great surprises. Keep up the good work." The man turned on his heel and wandered down the hallway away from them.
"You just put a spell on that man!" Melina hissed, incensed.
"Oh relax," Jillian breezily replied, "It'll wear off in about an hour and hopefully we'll be long gone by then."
Melina looked askance at her friend, "I don't even know you, do I?"
Jillian fought down the heartbroken look that momentarily flashed across her face, "You do know me, Marley. You just don't know everything…Yet. Come on. I think we've all got a lot of explaining to do."
***'***
Jillian and Melina had rushed their showers and changing, hiding Harper and Alex away in the locker room until they could all be ready to leave. When the two wrestlers were ready Jillian asked Alex to take them all someplace they could discuss everything without being overheard.
Alex teleported them all into the lair she and Justin had installed in her apartment years ago in the broom closet.
"Alright," Jillian said, "We should probably start with names first. You two know us, but we don't know you."
Harper blushed for the second time that evening and introduced herself and Alex to the wrestlers.
"Good," Melina cut in, "Now someone can explain to me exactly what the hell is going on!"
Jillian looked at her long time friend, "I'm sorry I didn't tell you before, Marley. I wanted to I don't know how many times, but it's against wizard law for us to reveal magic to anyone for fear it could be exposed to the world at large."
"And what about the stunt these two pulled," Melina questioned, "appearing in the ring like that? Won't that draw some attention?"
"That was an accident," Alex defended herself, "Usually I'm really good at teleporting exactly where I need to be. But since I was turned my powers have changed and I don't really know how yet."
Jillian patted Alex's knee, "We'll be able to explain you two getting in the ring. It'll just take some fast talking. You're good at that Marley," she directed softly towards her friend, "Say we wanted to try something new, introduce protégés or something, and we rigged the ring and bribed the lighting crew. People will believe it. It's the easy explanation and they'll want to believe it."
Melina nodded slowly, it did make a sort of sense. Wrestlers had been known to do things like that before. Installing trap doors and paying for some creative lighting to get the dramatic effects they were going for. The company would claim credit if the fans ended up liking it, and if they didn't it would all be swept under the rug and never brought up again. "So, Melina said, finally allowing herself to relax, tell me more about this wizard thing."
They chatted for hours. Alex and Harper taking turns telling stories and explaining what had happened to them over the years while Jillian and Melina listened, fascinated. They went through all of Alex's misadventures, her finally telling Harper and the other misadventures that caused, Harper getting turned and turning Alex, and how and why they came to be in the ring that night (the result of another one of Alex's impulses). Then it was Jillian's turn to explain.
"I was raised as the sole heir to my family's magic. I knew I'd be responsible for it so I was always a good student in magic, but it turned out that I was a bad one in school. That's why I dropped out and started wrestling. I knew I'd never get the degree I wanted without cheating, and I didn't want to do that," Jillian said.
"You ever use your magic to win a match?" Melina felt compelled to ask. She didn't think it was in her friend's personality to do that, but she was learning she didn't really know her friend as well as she'd thought.
"Never," Jillian said firmly, "I loved my magic and I loved using it. But I honor the sport and my opponents too much to resort to cheating like that. I've only cheated in the time honored ways of wrestling, no magic necessary." When she waggled her eyebrows all four of them laughed. "Anyway, I was really good with my magic and I loved having it. But I fell for a mortal and the council found out and took my powers away…I thought that was a little hasty because my fiancé still doesn't know I'm a wizard, or was one, and I had no plans to ever tell him."
Alex looked at her confused, "You would hide that part of yourself from him? How? Being a wizard…it's such a huge part of who you are?"
Jillian smiled a little sadly at the younger woman, "There are people out there who hide worse things. And as long as he doesn't need to know, I don't need to tell him."
"But what about if you guys have kids?" Harper asked, "Wouldn't you have to tell him when your kids started manifesting their powers?"
"I wasn't planning on having kids for a long while yet. I suppose I'll have to cross that bridge when I come to it," Jillian replied thoughtfully.
Melina, who had been listening interestedly, broke in, "That's not fair to either of you." She looked into the eyes of her friend, "Even without your powers this is a part of who you are and he deserves to know. Otherwise how can you marry him with this huge secret between you? I'm just your friend and I feel betrayed you didn't tell me, imagine how your fiancé would feel."
"Marley," Jillian murmured, wanting to reach out to her friend but knowing the gesture wouldn't be welcome just then. "I don't want to lose him," she admitted, "And I'm afraid that if I tell him after so long he'd leave me."
Melina glowered, "If he leaves you for that he'd be an idiot and I'd kick his ass."
Jillian smiled, her heart warmed by Melina's show of support, "Thanks Marley. I love you, too."
Melina grinned, "Yeah well. Just don't go getting any ideas about putting my face in your chest again. We're not that kind of friends. Not like our new protégés here."
Jillian and Melina laughed while Harper blushed and Alex scoffed, "Yeah, whatever. I tried that lie out, too. It lasted for about half a second and now look where I am."
Harper raised her brow at her girlfriend, "And where is that, Alex?"
Alex turned a charming smile on Harper, taking her hand and placing a kiss on the back of it, "Happier than I've ever been and completely in love with my best friend."
Harper cooed and patted Alex's cheek, "Nice save."
"I thought so." Alex puffed up proudly, and then promptly deflated, "I'm hungry, who's for pizza?"
***'***
The four spent the remainder of the evening enjoyably. Chatting about their lives and about wrestling, a subject they all could enjoy, until it was time for Melina and Jillian to make their ways home. They exchanged contact information, the wrestlers extracting a promise from the vampires about future appearances and then Alex grabbed each of their hands and told Harper she'd be back shortly before teleporting them back to the empty arena. Jillian quickly split, in a hurry to get home to her fiancé but Alex held Melina back a bit.
"Hey," Alex said, pulling Melina's attention from a retreating Jillian, "Don't let her get away feeling the way you do."
"What?" Melina asked, startled.
Alex hiked one eyebrow up and stared at the other Latina, "You might be able to fool her, but you can't fool me. I can smell how you feel about her. You love her." Alex held up a hand to forestall the reflexive protests, "Save it. You love her, you don't want her to marry him, you need to tell her. For your friendship's sake if nothing else."
"I couldn't," Melina said softly a note of defeat entering her voice, "She'd never speak to me again."
"Pssht, you're dumber than I thought," Alex disappointedly shook her head, "Look. You love her. You should tell her no matter what. It'll work out. Trust me."
Alex took a few steps back and prepared to teleport back home.
"Why should I?" Melina asked before Alex could go.
"Because I'm Alex Russo."
Then Alex winked, as if that had answered anything, and disappeared.
Melina snorted. But as she started to consider Alex's words she started to feel hope that maybe things would work out in her favor. She knew Jillian was gone for the night, but there was always tomorrow. And with a new resolve and new hope Melina left the arena.
***'***
A week later Harper and Alex were camped out on their couch with their eyes glued to the television screen as Jillian was taking on Alicia.
Jillian had just taken Alicia to the mat and won the match when Melina hopped into the ring and made her declaration.
Breathless the crowd waited for Jillian's reply and the vampires leaned forward in their seats eager to hear what she would say.
They watched as Jillian smiled, released Alicia, rose up from the mat, and swept Melina into a kiss they almost felt embarrassed watching.
The crowd roared.
Alex and Harper squealed.
Alex said, "They're gonna be together forever!"
Harper agreed. "We should go congratulate them."
Alex looked proudly at her lover, "I was just thinking the same thing."
She stood up and took Harper's hand, and as Alex's purple magic surrounded them again Harper leaned into Alex, kissed her lightly, and said "You did a good thing for them."
Alex just smiled bashfully back, "I know."
THE END
*****'*****
A/N: The things Melina says in Spanish are "Oh, my god!" and "Stay back." Translations courtesy of Google Translate. And there you have it. Now let me have it in a review!