Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or real people portrayed in this story. The characters belong to WWE, and the real people own themselves. This it tame for now, so read at your leisure!

A/N: Over on tumblr, someone requested a Daniel/Brie, Dolph/AJ double date. I decided to take the challenge, and this is what came out, so...yeah. I really tried to keep it a one-shot, but there's a lot to say, plus I came up with a plot, so it was productive, and this will be multi-chapter, I just don't know how multi, but we'll see.

So read, leave a review telling me if you want to continue. And if you want to back out, you've still got time (not really). Enjoy!

He would do anything for her.

Sometimes that came back to bite him in the ass, but he was who he was, and that was gone for her. That ended up meaning he would do anything for her. "I can't believe we're doing this."

"Just be nice."

"How did I end up in this situation?" Dolph groaned, looking down at his petite girlfriend, who stared up at him with those eyes of hers. He would never admit it, deny it until his last breath, but AJ clearly wore the pants in this relationship. He could hem and haw and act like he was the one in charge, but he wasn't, not by a long-shot. His girlfriend called the shots, and he was just happy to be in her company.

"Look, we're just being nice, alright?"

"It's weird."

"I know it's weird, believe me, I know it's weird, but Brie and I have kind of been getting along…sort of, especially with Nikki not traveling to live events, and I don't know why she wanted this. I mean, maybe she wants to report back to Nikki all my faults or something, tell her that you traded down or something."

"I dated Nikki like three years ago, babe," he told her.

"I've seen the way she looks at me still, thanks, baby," AJ said, "but, I don't know, Brie away from Nikki is…better."

"Better?"

"Yeah, better. I don't know, in South Africa, we were just…I don't know, friendly towards one another, but I'm as surprised as you are that she asked us out to dinner," AJ shrugged, "but I couldn't be rude, baby."

"Sure you could, it's called saying no, not that I've ever heard that said to me before," he shrugged one shoulder carelessly. "When you look like I do, all you hear is, 'yes, yes, yes!'"

AJ stared up at him and blinked, "Oh, really, with all those girls you've been with?"

"Hey, I could have lowered my number, thank you very much, just to spare you the embarrassment whereas you could have had half your fingers severed and still would have been able to tell me the number." She slugged him in the stomach and he grunted from the force of her small fist. "Damn it, for someone who pretty much lost that power of the punch, you sure do hit hard."

"Aww, you remembered I sucked at that," she told him, scrunching up her nose. "And you should be happy I haven't been with many guys, means I don't have much to compare you too, probably better for you that way."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, I'll have you know, I have left lots of women satisfied," Dolph told her, "and in a lot of different places."

"I don't know whether to take that as places as in a physical location on the earth or places as in somewhere on the body," AJ furrowed her brow, "don't think I care to know which one you meant."

"Both, obviously," he told her, patting her on the head, "but don't worry, babe, you're the only one that can actually do the leg trick, how you get your leg to bend that way while your body is contorted in that direction, I'll never figure it out. Then when you do the splits and you fall…that's really nice."

"I'm glad you didn't say it was me you learned that trick from the other week," she told him as they walked up to the restaurant door.

"Oh, I should have, but there's only so much humiliating I can take," he said, his mood turning sour for a moment.

The storyline they were in bothered him, far more than he let on, and AJ knew it, so they tried to avoid work talk when they were at home. It was simply easier that way because when they talked about it, Dolph tended to get heated, that was how much he hated the things he was forced to say. He tried to make it up to her every now and then, like it was actually his words he was spewing, and she'd gently tell him she knew he didn't mean them, knew it was his character talking, but that didn't stop him from doing things like buying her new video games or making her breakfast. It was like he was trying to compensate for a guy that didn't exist.

"Hey, hey, hey, remember, no talking about that, alright?" she stopped him right there in front of the door. She turned to him, bringing her cool hands up to his warm cheeks and cupping his face, tilting it slightly so he looked down at her. "That's just storyline, that's not us, baby, you know that."

"Doesn't mean I have to like it."

"And I know you don't," she told him, standing up on her toes to kiss him. "Please, let's just get through the evening, and who knows, you might actually enjoy yourself!"

"Yeah, right, sure I am," Dolph said as he opened up the door for his girlfriend. She ducked under his arm and into the restaurant. She looked around, but didn't see Daniel and Brie there yet so they must have arrived first. She got them a table, and they were led to a small, intimate corner of the restaurant. AJ slid into the booth while Dolph followed.

"You're sitting next to me?" she asked curiously.

"Why? Can I sit over there?" he pointed towards the bar.

"I meant, shouldn't it be like, men on one side, women on the other or like…I don't know, I haven't really double dated much. One time, before I was in the WWE, I went on a date that my sister set up and I was with my sister and her boyfriend, and it was really uncomfortable, but I sat across from the guy and I sat next to my sister…should we do that?"

"Nope, I'm comfortable now, I'm not moving," he told her, "we'll just have to deal."

"Okay," she responded, picking up the menu. "I was just trying to think of things, I'm trying my best here, baby. If Brie starts humiliating me or something, we'll go, but I don't know, she's been tolerable, and I felt like being nice, so we'll be nice, alright, best behavior."

"I always am, don't look at me like that," he picked up his menu, "Is this a vegan place? Am I going to have to eat veggies all night?" He made a gagging sound at the thought.

"No, it's not," she answered him. "It does have a vegan menu, but they have other things, they have meat."

"Because if I had to eat veggies all night then for dessert, I'd get to eat something far better," Dolph smirked over at her, lifting one eyebrow as his eyes skimmed over her body.

"Oh my God," she buried her face into her menu, laughing so hard she started to snort a little bit.

"Hey guys!" Brie said brightly as she and Daniel walked up to the table. AJ peeked over her menu, but she couldn't stop laughing. Dolph, being the one who wasn't currently dying of laughter, stood up and gave Brie a friendly hug. Once upon a time, they hung out a lot, but that was before a lot of things.

When Dolph was with Nikki, he thought he was happy, and to an extent, he was. Nikki was fun and spontaneous, but she liked the nicer things in life, which made John pretty much perfect for her. Back then, he was still trying to make a name for himself on the roster, and Nikki was doing the same. For a while, they worked, but it was never going to last. He knew that even then. While they liked some of the same things and liked having fun together, the future never came up. So his happiness had an expiration date.

With AJ, it was just different. He hated being cliché, trying to put his relationship into words like he was, but she just made him happy in a different way. He was content with her in a way he'd never been. It wasn't just happy. Happy was too broad a word, something you said when you couldn't define what you actually had. She made him content with life around him. Whatever came around, he knew she'd be there, and that was all he needed to be confident.

"Hey, it's nice to see you," he said, putting on the charm.

"It's been forever since the two of us have even hung out," Brie said, kissing his cheek as she pulled away. "I'm so glad you guys were able to come out tonight with us."

"Hey man," Dolph shook Daniel's hand as AJ started coughing and turned to her side so she could kneel on the booth and actually greet the other two. "Don't mind my girlfriend, she's just rude."

"Shut up," AJ smacked him in the stomach as she leaned over to give Brie a quick hug. "Hey, Brie."

"Hey," Brie said brightly, taking a seat as AJ hugged Daniel.

"Hey guy I used to kiss," AJ said, "sorry, I just like making other people feel uncomfortable."

"Not me," Dolph scoffed as AJ crawled back to her side of the booth and sat down. "Sorry, man, but the last guy I'm going to be jealous of is you."

"Wow," Daniel nodded, "So that's how you want to play tonight?"

"He's kidding," AJ said, "we're all being nice tonight, so Daniel, did you love Australia? I heard it was beautiful from Nattie, and that you guys got to go see koalas and stuff. Dolph and I went to see some lion cubs, and we got to feed giraffes, Dolph almost go into trouble for petting the lion's head."

"Apparently he could have bitten me, but like I was going to let a lion get the better of me."

"It's called natural selection," Daniel said.

"Yeah, well, I was selected at being awesome," Dolph shrugged.

"So…how do you guys like Phoenix?" AJ changed the subject, poking her boyfriend in the thigh in a silent way of telling him to be nice and to stop acting like his character. He tended to fall into that when he didn't know what else to do. While he and Daniel didn't hate one another, he couldn't call them friends necessarily.

"Oh, we love it here, don't we?" Brie turned to Daniel.

He nodded, "Yeah, the weather is pretty much nice all the time, and we've already found some great farmer's markets. I'm getting a garden set up in the backyard, it's going to be a little tough with the weather, but I might have a nursery built."

"That sounds really nice," AJ told him, "we don't have anything like that in Dolph's backyard, but then we don't really have the time or the ability to keep something up like that."

"I read a lot," Dolph said, and AJ squinted her eyes at him.

"Reading is fun," Daniel said, looking around the table a little bit.

"We all like reading, great!" AJ said.

"So, you don't live out here yet, AJ?" Brie asked.

"No, not yet, he hasn't asked," AJ nudged her shoulder into her boyfriend's.

He turned sharply to her, "Do you want me to ask?"

"What?" she was a little startled.

"Did you want me to ask? Is that a thing that you want?" he wondered. He'd never really formally asked AJ to move to Phoenix to be with him. He always just figured she liked Tampa so he never bothered to ask. Plus, they'd only been dating for about nine months, a couple months before their storyline relationship started.

"I don't know, um…no, yes, maybe," AJ glanced across the table, "we'll talk about this later."

"You should move here, AJ," Brie said, "I don't really have many people I know here yet. Plus, I really actually kind of like hanging out with you, and Dolph and I have history. We used to hang out all the time. Oh my God, do you remember that time we went to Vegas, and we went to that club and got so drunk we somehow ended up at some seedy strip club and Nikki tried to get up there when it was open pole?"

Dolph started laughing, "I had to get up there and pull her down, and someone yelled for me to take it off."

"Oh yeah, and it was like some bachelorette party, and it was weird because they were there in the first place, but you turned so red, and you had to pry Nikki off that pole."

"She really wanted to try it."

"I know, I still sometimes think she kind of wants to, just to…oh well, never mind," Brie laughed. "I'm glad she didn't though, you just know someone would have filmed that, and it would have been bad. That was such a fun weekend though."

"I know," Dolph chuckled. "I feel like that guy was a completely different person though. That was years ago."

"I know, God, we've actually matured or something," Brie giggled, "oh, you guys, I'm sorry, we're ignoring you." She leaned over and kissed Daniel's cheek. "I think you would have hated me then."

"I probably would have," Daniel joked, and she rolled her eyes and kissed him again.

Dolph reached down and squeezed AJ's thigh. She turned and smiled up at him. "I was not the guy I am now. I've definitely matured."

"I should hope so," she leaned up and kissed his cheek before he went back to talking to Brie and Daniel about some event in the past she hadn't been a part of. AJ watched as Dolph talked, his hand occasionally rubbing her thigh. She thought back to his story, how he used to be so spontaneous and fun, and she wondered how much of that Dolph was still in there, and how much did that Dolph resent her for always wanting to stay home and do nothing.

"You okay?" Dolph leaned over and whispered, "you're being quiet now."

"Just listening," AJ reassured him, and maybe a little bit herself. Dolph loved her, and they were happy together, more than happy together. Dolph told her constantly he'd never been happier in his entire life, but what if he was lying? No, that was silly, Dolph was not a liar, Dolph told everything as it was, and she loved that about him. Sometimes, the truth hurt, but Dolph always said to her in a way that made her feel okay afterwards.

"You sure?" he asked. "Are you feeling okay? Should I ask them for some bread or something? You'd think they'd bring you bread, it's like the law of the restaurant, or do they give you sprouts here? When was the last time you ate? We ate kind of an early lunch, if you need food, I'll get someo—"

AJ pressed her hand to his cheek. "I'm fine, baby, I'm fine, I was just listening to your crazy stories."

"I wasn't crazy, I was just…passionate," he winked at her. He loved her, that was it, that was all. The guy he was wasn't him anymore. That Dolph was gone, and in its place was this one who loved her.

The one who would do anything for her.