Roman tightened his grip on the Championship Belt as he walked through the backstage corridors. Sweat dripped down face constantly, causing him to reach up with his free hand and wipe it away every several minutes. His cousins, Jimmy and Jey walked a few steps behind "Big Dog", each of them soaking wet with sweat as well, with Jimmy especially rubbing his arms to try and soothing the pain, which while subsiding, still hurt like a son of a bitch. Roman's whole body ached and he just wanted to get back to the hotel, and relax.
It had been a long and stressful (emotionally and physically) 48 hours. Doing press for Payback, heck any pay per view event, was long and exhaustive and that's before you even set foot in the ring. Two nights in a row Roman had fought Styles, and his "minions" (As Jey would "affectionately" call Anderson and Gallow), though it was only on the second night that the three versus three set up was intentional. Jey and Jimmy had rushed out on Payback night to help pull Tweedledum and Tweedledee (Jimmy's nicknames) off of Roman's back.
But this night had been brutal. Each being knocked over barriers, Roman picking Styles up and throwing him into the announcers table to end the night after the proto-Bullet Club reformation had won the match that night. Anderson and Gallows did quite a number on him with the chair that night and while Roman knew that it was all exaggerated for show, it still stung like a son of a bitch and he was already counting the ways that he was gonna take it out on the punching bag tomorrow morning.
Roman and the Usos said their goodbyes as they reached a fork in the hallways, with Roman heading towards the SuperStars locker/dressing rooms and Usos heading straight for the showers so they could wash away the musk and count the number of bruises they had acquired that night.
Roman turned the handle of his room's door and let it swing open. He still felt sore and weak in the legs and knees so he slowly made his way into the way, quietly huffing and grunting with each step. He moved so slowly in fact that the door began to swing back close and hit with enough force on his elbow that he winced in pain and gritted his teeth, holding in the reflexive curse word on the tip of his tongue. Fuck. That alone is gonna be five minutes on the bag tomorrow, Roman thought.
As he walked over in front of the couch, he picked his phone up and pressed the home button. No calls. No texts. Nothing. Hmmm. Maybe he's occupied…
Roman tossed the belt onto the couch with as much care as a teenager tossing their phone onto the bed. He slunk down into the couch next to the belt, lifted his head up and looked at the ceiling. He knew he was getting the couch dirty and wet with his sweat. Most times he would make sure to at least set up a towel so that his slick caramel skin didn't make the couch stink but tonight… fuck it. If someone came in here and told him to get up for a press junket, he didn't care who it was. He'd superman punch a bitch if he had to.
After a couple of moments breathing in and out deeply, still racked with pain, he looked down at the table at his phone. He was waiting for his…err… the Lunatic Fringe. Usually after Raws or Smackdowns were done tapping, Roman would come back to his dressing room and find on his phone some variation of a Ready to go back text waiting for him.
Yo, Ro, where are you? I'm in the car. Its late & my bck is killing me.
Bitch, if ur not out here in 10 min, u bttr call a cab.
Wanna swing by a waffle house? Im hungry.
You know how he can get.
When the traveled from city to city for tapings, they always shared a hotel room. Started back in their Shield days, where they would usually get two adjoining rooms and would alternate who was stuck with whom and who had a whole second bed for their shit. Somehow, their former brother and the poster child for male prima donnas everywhere would usually get the second room all to himself.
It didn't bother Roman and Dean much, however. At first Roman couldn't stand Dean's incessant snoring and Dean more times than not would have to beg Seth to use his bathroom since Roman took way too long to shower and freshen up for the day, but both men eventually grew to know each other's rhythms. Grew to know and appreciate… and miss. Got the point where when Roman would head back home for a few days break, he would have a hard time falling asleep in the silence. Almost as if Dean's chainsaw/wild boar hybrid snores had become the soothing white noise that Roman couldn't peacefully sleep without.
But tonight… no text. No missed called. Nothing from Dean. To most people they wouldn't look two ways about it. For Roman, however, he knew it was bad. Even on some of Dean's most backbreaking days where he went to hell and back in the ring, there would always be a sarcastic, condescending text awaiting Roman that more than half the time would have Dean referring to Roman as "bitch" (and its variations). He would smile, get his stuff ready in his large duffle bag and head to the parking garage, finding Dean sitting in the driver's side of the car playing some Smartphone game and when Roman would knock on the window to get his attention, Dean would rolls his eyes and unlock the door, always with an attitude infused "Took you long enough, Big Dog."
Roman knew that Dean put up a face when he would act tough and ornery, but he knew the truth. He knew the real Dean. The Dean that would blush at hotel rooms when Roman stepped out of the bathroom and flash his bright smile was not the Dean that hosted Ambrose Asylum or sprayed Seth in the face with green gunk after booby trapping his briefcase. Well, in a way they were the same, of course. What you saw with Dean in the ring and in interviews was the Dean that Roman had grown to know outside of the ring and away from the cameras. That much is true.
However, there was a sensitive side to Ambrose that Roman had slowly uncovered after they came together for The Shield. A side of himself that Dean kept under wraps from almost everyone (not even Seth knew the depths that Dean was walling himself up), but time and time again, usually through a combination of his own drunken actions and Roman's firm, stern but persistent compassion, those walls would break and so would Roman's heart when he saw his friend, his best friend, his partner collapse in on himself. It was hard, still to this day, to believe that the crazy, go fuck yourself attitude Lunatic in the ring and the crying, whimpering man Roman would hold, cuddle and care for were one and the same.
Roman waited another moment, his breathing finally having some semblance of normalcy and he checked his phone a third time. Still nothing. Now Roman was worried. Fifteen minutes had passed since he had gotten back and he still hadn't heard from Dean. The last time Dean had gone AWOL on Roman after a taping was that night in June of 2014 when Seth sold himself out, further his own self interests over those of his brothers. Roman and Dean had both seen it coming for sometime but Dean took it the hardest that night. Roman had found him sitting in the car, but just staring out through the front window. Roman had knocked and startled Dean, who reflexively and viciously began to wipe his face clean of the drying snot and tears that had escaped. The following day, during the Smackdown taping, Roman noticed in the tone of his voice that Dean's threats of retaliation against Seth were far more personal that the words ever could convey.
Roman stood up, still sore like a son of a bitch but sucked it all in, pushing the fading pain to the back of his mind as he grabbed the belt, carefully placed in the special case, grabbing his phone and duffle bags and walked out of the room.
Roman made it to the parking garage and found their rental car, but no sign of Dean. Roman wished he had a spare key fob with him so that he could at the very least dump all his crap in the car before going back inside.
Dean, where the fuck are you?
It was past midnight and the arena was almost completely cleared out by now. It would still be another two to three hours before the doors were locked and Roman wasn't in the mood to get trapped inside again. It had happened once, Dean had pulled Roman into his back room, locked the door and both guys, still filled to the brim with testosterone after winning their matches that night, decided to celebrate it a little. Boy oh boy did Dean love it when Roman would bite down on his neck and lick the teeth marks during their aggressive love making and Roman craved Dean's fingers digging into his shoulders, leaving crescent shaped indents on his bronze skin.
However, after both had reached their respective climaxes and got cleaned up and dressed, they found it to be almost two in the morning and no one around. Dark, except for some hallways that had their lights run 24/7. Alone. Locked in. Obviously the cleaning crews didn't give a damn for checking to make sure they had the place emptied.
Roman had gotten furious and was about to call for the cops when Dean, still high on life after his encounter with his… err… The Samoan Badass, grabbed his phone and tossed it away.
"Come on Rome. We have the whole place to ourselves. It'll be like being locked in the gym with your crush from high school. Let's have some fun." And with that, Dean had run off. There was an infectious hint of a childlike carefree nature to Dean when he was at his happiest that Roman loved more than anything to indulge in himself and enable immensely in Dean. He loved making Dean laugh and smile. I mean, who wouldn't? Have you seen Dean's dimples?
They climbed around, goofed off, spent an hour pretending to be the crew members of a ghost hunting show, embraced their inner ten year olds for several more hours before calling it quits due to Roman almost breaking his ankle while walking around the crosswalks high above the floor below.
They were lucky that the only thing they had broken that night was the chair in Dean's room.
Roman headed straight for Dean's back room. The door was just barely open, but what made Roman pause more than that was see the clumps of dirt on the ground around the door. He had seen what happened earlier, Stephanie giving away the Asylum segment and Jericho going ape-shit, but he had to turn it off after being called out of his room. Where the hell did the dirt come from?
Roman slowly pushed the door open and found Dean, sitting on the ground in front of the table, his back to the door. Still more clumps of dirt here and there, on his jacket and in his hair. On the table in front of him was the plant that he always carried with him out to the Ambrose Asylum segments. "Mitch", Roman remembered. The plant had been his idea, and both guys had gone to a local gardening center to pick it out (bless Roman's heart, he paid for the thing and on the way back to the hotel Dean smiled like a kid with a new puppy).
"Dean? What happened, bro?"
Mitch seemed battered, torn up, dried out. Dirt covered the thing, and therefore the table. A lump formed in Roman's throat when he heard the soft hiccup associated with someone trying to catch their breath. Dean just slowly shook his head. Roman took enough steps into the room to close the door behind him, but stay close by.
"Dean… come on, talk to me." Roman said softly, soothingly.
Dean lifted his head up, sniffled and used his dirty leather jack sleeve to wipe away the tears and snot. He briefly looked at Roman but then looked back down to the ground just as quickly. Even with his honey colored hair curls (that Roman strongly believed looked reddish when hit just right by the light) down over his eyes, Roman could still see the redness in them. Dean had been crying for a long while.
Roman knelt beside Dean, wrapped his arm around his partner's shoulder and pulled him in close. Without missing a beat, Dean turned and buried his face into Roman's neck, letting some more quiet tears and sniffles escape him. Roma reached up and ran his fingers through Dean's dirty hair. Two years ago, Dean would just push him away, wipe away the mess and tell Roman to fuck off. But now, Roman was the only one who he let his guard down for. That alone terrified Dean more than he would ever admit to anyone.
"Come on, Dean. Tell me what happened." Roman said softly again, almost in a total whisper. The way Roman talked to him was like someone successfully taming the Hulk. Dean could be outraged and ready to throw a fist at anyone, but if Roman showed up and spoke to him quietly and softly, the Hulk that was the Lunatic Fringe shriveled back down into the Bruce Banner that was Dean.
Dean turned his head, still resting it in the crevice of Roman's neck, so that he could speak and be heard.
"Mitch… It's Mitch, Ro." Dean stuttered, now in the presence of Roman, he was trying to hold back his tears.
"I know, I saw. What happened? Did this happen after your fight with Jericho?"
"Ye… yeah. I was on the ramp and Chris grabbed… Mitch and just threw him at my back. The pot just… exploded and I was lying there… I don't c… care that it hurt or that I don't h… have the Asylum but… Rome… I just…" Dean got out before another wave of tears hit him all at once. He turned his head back into Roman's neck, wrapping his arms around the big Samoan next to him and held onto him so tightly, as if Roman was the last life preserver in the ocean of the world.
Roman rested his cheek against Dean's head, not even caring about the clumps of dirt anymore. After a moment he found himself catching the lump in his throat again and listening to his partner fall apart next to him broke his heart just as much as it did the first time he found Dean crying. The first night they were even "intimate" with one another. Roman had been "compassionate" before that night, but that was the first time that Dean intertwined his fingers with Roman's as his hand rested on Dean's stomach.
A tear somehow managed to escape his left eye and Roman closed it, holding back his own wave of emotions that he knew was approaching. Out in the ring and in public, both men gave off strong, victorious, championship worthy personas but behind closed doors, Roman knew that for as strong as Dean's mask was, when it did break, Roman had to be that strong pillar for his partner.
Roman opened his eyes, both now glistening with tears of their own and turned his attention to the dying plant on the table. Really? This is what is happening tonight? We're both getting worked up and emotional over Mitch? A plant.
We're crying over a plant.
In normal circumstances Roman would just laugh it off as Dean being overly dramatic and silly (which in most cases was the truth). But Roman knew how much the Ambrose Asylum meant to his friend. Finally getting a little bit more of a push into the starlight by getting his own "interview" segment each week, but only after just starting what felt like only a month ago, he had lost it because of edicts from up on high from the McMahon offices.
But really, here, the tears were being spilled not over that, but over Mitch.
A plant.
A plant.
Roman had seen Dean collapse and cry enough times before to know when and what could even potentially trigger another episode, but never once did Roman think that a plant would be involved and even rarer than, um, never, did Roman ever imagine that he would be getting choked up over said plant himself.
Roman did know one way to help calm Dean down when he got himself worked up like this. It was the same thing Roman's father would do when he got upset or hurt as a child and Sika Reigns would sing to his son in a gentle voice to help his son fall asleep. Roman turned his head, kissed Dean gently on the top of his head (again, with what's going on, he didn't give a damn about the dirt clumps) and proceeded to rest his cheek on Dean's forehead again.
Roman, in his most gentle and soothing voice, began to lightly sing to Dean.
"Blackbird singing in the dead of night,
Take this pair of broken wings and learn to fly,
All your life,
You were only waiting for this moment to arise.
Blackbird singing in the dead of night,
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life,
You were only waiting for this moment to be free.
Blackbird fly. Blackbird fly.
Into the light of the dark black night.
Blackbird fly. Blackbird fly.
Into the light of the dark black night.
Blackbird singing in the dead of night,
Take this pair of broken wings and learn to fly,
All your life.
You were only waiting for this moment to arise,
You were only waiting for this moment to arise,
You were only waiting for this moment to arise."
Roman knew it sounded childish (hell, it's what helped him as a child) but Dean had told him, one time after a bad binge drinking, barfapalooza night that ended with Roman and Dean sharing their first kiss (unfortunately Dean couldn't remember it but it still meant something to Roman) that just listening to Roman's calming voice sing in almost a whisper tone just seemed "too perfect to be real" His words, not mine
Roman turned his head again and Dean had closed his eyes. Poor thing, cried himself out for several hours tonight that he was so tired he had fallen asleep in Roman's protective hold. Even though he was asleep, his grip on Roman was still tight as ever… like a scared child with a teddy bear in bed.
Roman knew they were closing up shop, knew they had to leave soon after cleaning the place up, but a couple more minutes here wouldn't hurt. A couple more minutes holding Dean in this fragile state. A couple more minutes of Roman being Dean's Big Dog teddy bear, keeping him safe from the world outside their door.
I should make Dean a stuffed bear from Build-a-Bear, Roman said silently to himself and smiled at the thought, knowing he would want a Lunatic Fringe bear for his nights alone as well.