Disclaimer: The characters and real people in this story do not belong to me. The characters belong to WWE, and the real people own themselves.
A/N: This is just a little one-shot that I wrote, it's nothing long or tough to read, but leave a review anyways and tell me what you think. If you want to be brutal, go ahead. Just enjoy if you can. :)
Lists can make you do things.
Lists can make you not do things.
Chris just wasn't sure what kind of list this was.
Sure, it should've been an easy decision, but you come to think that most decisions in life are going to come easy. You come across a fork in the road and you look down each path. Robert Frost tells you that you should take the road less traveled, simply for that fact, it's less traveled; it'll be an adventure. If you go down that path, surprises will await you at every turn, and it'll be something great at the end, because it'll make all the difference if you take the road less traveled.
Robert Frost was an idiot.
Sometimes the road that you've been on, that well-traversed path is the right choice. Sometimes a person wants that familiarity that they can wrap around them and use as a safety blanket. Was it then cowardly to do this? Was it cowardly to go down the road you had tread many a time before? No, it wasn't, it was home, sometimes, it was safety, it was knowing that when you got to the end, something really great was waiting for you and you knew that you had made the right decision.
So he made a list.
The first one was easy, why he should go to TNA, why he should switch companies, take that proverbial road less traveled. Well, he thought it was going to be easy when he started writing, but he sat still for a few moments, chewing on the top of his pen, the soft clicking of his teeth against the top of his writing instrument the only sound to break up the monotony of his thinking. But then when he brought that pen from his mouth, the words seemed to flow and scratch the page sitting in front of him.
Closer to home, wouldn't have to travel as much.
Get paid per appearance, can probably get a lot.
Have friends there, Jay, Kurt, etc.
The boss seems nice, from what I've seen of her. She's also better-looking than Vince.
Breath of fresh air…
It was that last one that really got to him. Maybe he needed just that. He needed that breath of fresh air, to be nothing again and have to work his way up, win over those fans in TNA. He figured they might be a slightly different demographic, but he was Chris Jericho, and he could win them over with one promo, he had done it with WCW, he had done it with WWE, he could do it again. He would have to get used to a different ring, a different style, a different locker room, different opponents, but that wasn't such a bad thing, no it could be a really good thing.
Maybe Robert Frost had something going for him after all.
The road less traveled could be better than the road he was so familiar with. He would definitely be champ in no time. He wasn't so ignorant to see that he would be the highest draw they had. Kurt had turned his fans against him somewhat with the way that he had just jumped with no warning, but if he gave warning, put his name out there and told them why he was doing it, then the fans couldn't begrudge him, they wouldn't begrudge him. He could parlay this popularity straight to the title. What, you didn't think he played politics? Chris did play politics, and he could politick his way all the way to the NWA World Heavyweight Championship. That would be something, and he deserved that something.
He smirked and checked over the list, it was looking better and better with each passing moment.
He drew a line through the paper though, putting a big, "WWE" just underneath it. He supposed that he had to write out this other list as well, see what his old job had to offer. He sat there for a few minutes, again thinking, again chewing on his pen. He put his pen to paper a few times, but still, no words were coming forth. He twisted his mouth to one corner, sucking at his teeth a little, surely there had to be something…
Travel the world.
Well, that was…something. He did like to travel, and he remembered when he got to extend his birthday by flying across multiple time zones. That had been a blast, and he really did like to travel and fly places, and see new parts of the world that he hadn't yet seen. Wrestling afforded him that, and with WWE going everywhere except the North Pole nowadays, that was a good reason.
I'd get paid.
That was true too, with the bargaining chips in his corner, he could demand what he wanted. That would be sweet justice. He knew that he could finagle a really great deal out of Vince. Hell, maybe if he played his cards just right, he could get more than that douchebag, Paul Levesque. That would be just perfect. He'd love to rub it in that man's face.
Rubbing how much I'm getting paid in Paul's face.
No, scratch that. That wasn't cool, he didn't think that was a good enough reason to put it on the list. He could still gloat to Paul if he were in TNA, it would just involve a little more work to get to a show and then go up to him, casually mention that he was getting bank and then watch as Paul's face turned that fetching shade of red right before he would storm off and be the baby that he was. It was only fitting that he wore those teeny-tiny underwear-like shorts to the ring, reminded him of a baby's diaper.
So back to the list, back to the list, well, if he had put he had friends there in TNA, he had to put that he had friends here, it was only fair.
Have friends there, Benoit, Edge, Shane, etc.
And then he was stuck, absolutely stuck. He had nothing more, and it seemed like TNA was looking like the better deal, the better…everything. Sure, he had friends in WWE, but he could still see them. He could visit from time to time. He could still rub stuff in Paul's face. And TNA would appreciate him more. He had to remember that and scrawled it onto the top half of the paper.
Appreciation! Finally!
Yes, there, the choice was made. He laid the pen down and then he got up and walked out of the room. He had to call his agent, start the negotiations, get the ball rolling. He wondered if he could get an interview somewhere for this, make a little announcement, let his fans know that he was coming to Thursday night.
He made it to the third step on his stairs when he turned around, walked back into his room and sat down again, picking up the pen and then grabbing a new sheet of paper.
She had brown hair, long now again, and I swear, when she whirls around to see your face, it's like she's hung bells in her hair that sound off whenever she moves.
She has a smile that starts with the corners of her mouth turning up ever so slightly, almost like she's fighting it off, and then you see her teeth and then you get a sweet reward when her eyes light up.
She has the softest hands and I would always ask her where she got her lotion from, because they were so soft. She subtly told me when we had our business partners storyline and she worked it into our story.
She has a beautiful laugh, and you just want to keep making her laugh because when you stop hearing her laugh, it's like suddenly someone turned the switch off. Her laugh makes her who she is.
Her voice in the morning, when it's not screechy, just scratchy from all the screeching is when it's the best to listen to. Sleep lacing her voice is the perfect caffeine in the morning.
Her tears are beautiful, because they tell you that she's feeling, and you've always loved when she's feeling something, even if it's sadness…even when it's aimed at you.
He put his pen down, looking over his list, his writing almost illegible. But it was there, all written and into the world. It was out now. It was out there and he had written it, and there it was. The familiar path, the path that he knew would lead to somewhere great, somewhere that he had been many times before. That path was home and it was familiar and it was safety, it was all those things.
Yes, Robert Frost knew absolutely nothing.
Because TNA had a lot of things, but it was missing the most important thing.
It was missing Stephanie.
THE END
