Puppy Love

A Trish Stratus/John Cena One-Shot

A/N: So here's the one-shot that I promised to all of you who voted so faithfully for this pairing in Her Head v. Her Heart. I hope that it doesn't disappoint. I'm not a big fan of pure fluff, but that's what this is. No real conflict, just some cute conversation between two beautiful, beautiful people. As always, I know you're not delusional or whatever, but I don't own them. Also, feedback makes my day. Enjoy!

He felt his heart speed considerably when she crawled onto the bed, creeping like a cat on all fours between his wide-spread legs. She hovered above him, her long locks brushing his bare shoulders and chest, as a wide grin spread across her full lips.

Trish Stratus was, quite simply, the sexiest woman John Cena had ever seen. They had only been out on a couple of dates, but it was enough to keep him wanting more. She was just hot, and he liked hot.

Her breath teased his neck as she leaned over him and wrapped her lips around his earlobe. John felt the groan escape his chest before he could think to reign it in. He was fairly certain that he could stay in this place, on this bed, with her, forever.

But a knock sounded on the hotel door, causing his eyes to squeeze shut in abject defiance. Trish dragged her tongue across his throat and then pulled back, meeting his eye with a wink. "You better get that," she nodded over her shoulder.

With a grunt, he shook himself from sleep and threw the covers aside. He was somewhere in Louisiana, the air was stuffy, and now he was pissed. Whoever had the nerve to wake him from the best dream ever was going to pay for their sins. Throwing the door open, he growled.

"Hey," Trish smiled shyly and waved. He blinked against the harsh lights of the hallway as she shifted her weight from one leg to the other and looked around nervously. "Did I wake you up?"

John watched as she walked past him and into the darkened hotel room. "No," he shook his head and closed the door firmly. "I wasn't sleeping. I mean, it's three in the morning. Who sleeps at three in the morning?"

She turned on a bedside lamp and gave him another guilty smile. Twirling her hair around her index finger, she looked at him through thick eyelashes. "You wanna get outta here for awhile?"

"Huh?" Maybe he was still sleeping. Or maybe that hit to the head he had taken in the ring earlier blocked his ears. Surely she didn't think he was going to leave the hotel in the middle of the night.

But her expression said that she thought just that. "I'm so bored, John," she pouted as he sank to the bed beside her and laid back, staring at the ceiling and fighting to keep his eyes open. "Let's just head for New Orleans now."

He chuckled and shot her a side-long glance. "Trish, you know you're beautiful, right? And I love your sense of humor," he sighed and reached back for a pillow, "but I'm not leaving until, like, eight. And that means that I don't have to get up until, like, seven thirty. And that means that I can sleep for another four hours," he mumbled as his eyes drifted shut again.

Trish bit her lip and looked at him from the corner of her eye. Slowly, she let her hand drift toward his knee, brushing her long nails over his exposed skin. "Please?" she whispered. When she heard him groan, she moved her hand higher. "It'll be fun."

There was nothing he wanted more than those four hours of sleep. Touring to promote his album, and the WWE Championship, and his new movie, had taken its toll on the young man, and sleep was a gift he didn't take lightly.

She was crazy if she thought he was sacrificing it for a three-hour car ride with her. She was crazy if she thought that two dates gave her the leverage to manipulate his schedule. She was crazy if she thought that they were anywhere near the couple that did stupid shit like this. She was crazy, but she was right.

Struggling into a seated position, John ran his hands over his face and sighed. "Give me fifteen minutes to shower and pack?"

After only twenty minutes on the road, John's brand new Navigator refused to go any further. He inwardly thought that even the car had better sense than to be awake at three thirty in the morning. Since none of their friends seemed to have their cell phones on, and neither of them knew the number of a Louisianan all-night tow service, they decided to walk for awhile. It probably wasn't the safest idea, but the air was warm, and there had been no one on the road since they started their trek, so Trish said it was a sign that they were supposed to hoof it.

"So, junior year in high school, I've got this girl in the back of the car, right?"

Trish watched her feet as she listened to John relay stories from his youth. He was smiling so widely at his own recollection that she couldn't help but return the gesture. She had met a lot of colorful characters in her career as a diva, but never anyone who loved his life as much as John Cena did. "What did you do to her?" she asked.

"Unspeakable things, baby," John winked. The glow of the moonlight reflected off the swampland on either side of the road, casting a dim light on the blush in his cheeks.

"I think that's the first time I have ever seen you blush, Cena," she teased.

John shrugged and stuffed his hands into his deep pockets. "Just realized I was talking about sex with an ex while I'm with this totally amazing woman. Seemed kinda rude."

Trish wrapped her arms around her stomach to protect against the sudden breeze. She wasn't sure she had ever met a man, in her adult life anyway, who made her feel like a thirteen-year-old with a crush. But that's exactly how John made her feel. Her stomach flip-flopped when he shot one of those smiles her way. And she could feel her skin tingle when he held her hand. Just the sound of his voice made her heart speed up.

John noticed that she was holding her sides tightly, and he wished that he hadn't left his sweatshirt in the car. "Wish I had a sweatshirt for ya," he mused under his breath. Trish just giggled, sending most of his blood rushing south. "Come here," he offered, opening his arms as he stopped in the middle of the street.

Trish stepped toward him and held her breath when he wrapped her in his massive embrace. His palms ran quickly up and down her arms, but she knew she didn't need the friction to keep her warm. Just being so close to him was doing a more-than-adequate job of sending her body temperature through the roof.

"Better?" he asked, his breath tickling her ear. Trish nodded and buried her face against his chest, his rapidly beating heart pounding against her forehead. He slowed his hands and trailed his fingers over her shoulders, past her elbows, and then wove them with hers.

Taking a slight step back, John looked at the tiny woman in his arms. He was fairly certain he had never done anything to deserve a moment like this. And he wondered, not for the first time, if anyone knew just how great Trish Stratus really was. Would anyone ever be able to see what a vulnerable, and incredibly fun, woman she could be when the spotlight was turned off and they were alone?

"We could head back," he suggested.

But Trish shook her head and moved closer to him again, wrapping their entwined hands around her waist. "Can we just stay here? Like this?"

Smiling, John realized he would love nothing more. Usually, after three dates, he would be sharing a bed with a woman. But Trish was different. She made him want to behave – to move slowly. She evoked this desire to just savor the quiet moments where neither of them spoke, just enjoying each other's touch and presence. "Hey Trish?" he asked as she let go of his hands and stuck hers into his back pockets.

"Hmm?" she mumbled, turning her head to rest her cheek against his chest.

"You ever think about shit like this when you was a kid?"

She looked up, staring into his piercing eyes and then smirked. "Standing in the middle of a Louisiana highway, cuddling with the WWE Champion? Can't say it was on top of my fantasy list," she answered.

He smirked and pulled away from her, afraid that, if he didn't, he would do more than either of them was ready for. "Smart ass," he mumbled, taking her hand and starting to walk down the road again. "I meant, did you ever dream about leaving Toronto? Seeing all sorts of weird places? Doing all kinds of crazy shit?"

Trish settled into step with him and thought about the question. "Honestly?" He nodded. "I always thought my face would be out there. But I didn't really dream of leaving Toronto," she turned her head toward the sky and then looked at him for a reaction. "It's a great city, ya know? I had everything I wanted or needed there."

John licked his lips and thought back to his life as a kid in West Newbury. He had always known that the town was too small for a personality like his, that he would leave someday. Sharing that with her seemed like the most natural course of conversation at the moment. "I always thought I'd be a rock star. A hip-hop star. Something with music," he admitted.

Trish nodded. What was it about the late night/early morning air that made her want to discuss her childhood dreams with him? "I wanted my own Sit Com," she laughed. There was a long pause as she watched his face. He just nodded. "That doesn't surprise you?"

His nose scrunched when he shook his head. "You got good comedic timing, Trish. Makes perfect sense to me," he told her, smiling when he caught her staring in his direction. "What?"

She shook her head and fought the blush in her cheeks. She had seduced men far more imposing than this punk kid from the East Coast. How did he make her feel like she had lost all control over her own tongue? "Nothing," she answered with a sweet smile. "Everyone just always acts like I'm crazy when I tell them that."

Pulling her closer to his body so that their arms brushed against each other when they walked, John gave her hand a squeeze. "Well, I'm not everyone."

"No, you're not," she conceded, more to herself than to him. "So," she looked up at him and grinned again as she reached her free hand across her body to hold his arm. "What about you? Rock star, huh?"

Shrugging his shoulders again, he looked out at the road ahead of him. The longer he stared into Trish's eyes, the more at-risk he became for saying something ridiculously stupid. "And WWF Champion. But that wasn't something I ever really thought would happen, ya know?"

"How come?"

"I don't know." John didn't like projecting insecurity to anyone. His character in the ring was tough-as-nails, and he didn't mind everyone thinking that the real John Cena was the same way. "I was an athlete and stuff, but I wasn't a monster.. I knew I would be too small when I stopped growing in tenth grade."

"But you lifted and stuff, right?" She thought she remembered him saying that he started lifting weights in high school.

"I did." John was flattered that she had remembered anything he had told her on their first two outings together. Sure, he remembered everything she had ever said to him, but he didn't expect someone as together, and as out-of-his-league, as Trish to remember anything about his punk ass. "But I was no Hogan, either."

"Please," Trish rolled her eyes and ran her fingernails down the soft, tender skin on the underside of his arm, from elbow to wrist and back again. "Why do you guys think that girls are all turned on by the twenty-four-inch pythons or whatever? Hogan's a legend, no doubt, but you have those abs that just beg to be licked." When she realized what she had said, she bit her lip and looked to the other side of the road, turning her blushing cheeks from his view.

Silence followed her words as John tried to process it. It wasn't a particularly risqué comment, really, but coming from her? It seemed like the most seductive compliment in the world. Trish was doing something to him that no other woman had ever managed to do. She was making him feel all conflicted inside. On the one hand, he wanted to throw her down on the asphalt and show her exactly how crazy she made him. But on the other, he just wanted to hold her hand, hear her thoughts, and spend time just getting to know her.

"Can I ask you a question?" her voice broke the stillness of the night. He nodded. "Does it make me a total nerd if I say that this thing with us," she leaned her head on his shoulder, "feels different to me." He raised an eyebrow. "It's comfortable, ya know?"

His silence said that he didn't know if she was paying him a compliment or not. Sure, comfortable was great – for couples who'd been married thirty years. But they were young, and unattached, and free. Didn't the really good relationships make you feel like you were about to jump off a cliff at any second? Or had he been chasing the wrong feelings all along?

Swallowing all of the pride that said he shouldn't open up about his feelings, or anything remotely sensitive, with any woman he'd only known for a few months, he cleared his throat. "All I know's you got me doin' shit I ain't never thought I'd do," he laughed and shook his head, stopping again. "You knock me off my game, Trish. I can't be the smooth guy I am with most chicks, ya know?"

She smiled and looked at her feet, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Moving to stand before him, she put her hands into her own back pockets and stretched her back to look into his eyes again. "I remember, when I was in middle school, I went to this dance. And all my friends had boyfriends, and they were all dancing, and I just stood by the wall."

"I find that hard to believe," he challenged, crossing his arms over his chest.

But she shook her head and held up a hand. "I didn't have to. I wanted to. Because more than anything, I wanted this guy – Troy – to ask me. I watched him move around the room, flirting with all the girls and everything, and I just wanted him to come over and acknowledge me. He was the most popular guy in our class, and I just wanted to know that he knew my name."

John watched as she licked her lips and reached her thin hand to his face. For a long moment, neither of them spoke – she just ran her thumb over his bottom lip and stared deep into his eyes, like she was looking for something. "Did he?" he finally asked, mostly to fight the hypnotic effect of her feather touch on his skin.

She shrugged. "Right before my mom came to pick me up, he walked by on his way to the bathroom, and he smiled at me. I don't know if he ever knew who I was, but that smile made my entire weekend." She watched his eyes cloud with confusion as to where her story was going. "You make me feel like that girl again."

His eyes lit up as his laughter broke the silence of the night around them. "Great."

Sliding her hands down his chest, Trish played with the thin fabric of his tee shirt, staring at the emblem there. "Every time I see you backstage, or at a press conference, or in a hotel lobby, it's like I'm just waiting for you to come over and say "hi" or ask me what I'm doing later. Twenty-nine-year-old women are not supposed to have these feelings, John," she reminded.

He agreed with a nod, resting his large hands on her shoulders. "Maybe it's what we need, ya know? Maybe we been livin' life so hard-core for so long that a little innocence is good for us, ya know?"

It made sense. Trish had lived an "adult" lifestyle since before she was out of high school. Maybe doing this thing the right way was exactly what she needed. "Ya know what I think would be good for us?" she asked, smiling into his amused eyes.

"What?" he asked, unable to tear his eyes away from her dancing expression.

Trish turned on her heel and pointed down the road to a large, fluorescent sign. "I think we need waffles." She glanced at her watch. It was nearly five thirty. Their friends would wake soon, and the real world would crash back in on them. But for a few more minutes, she just wanted to stay here with him, in their innocent world of puppy love.