The discovery that the gym also had locker rooms was a relief to Heidi, who promptly moved her things from the closet to there, finding a locker for herself (number 673) and showering to her heart's content. Sure, there wasn't much to her toiletry collection; a bar of soap and some two-in-one shampoo/conditioner, but after a night with Pine-Sol and mops and rat-traps, the clean, steamy locker room was a welcome sight indeed.
The day had passed her almost completely and by the time Heidi was dressed and ready to leave the arena it was already 7 o'clock. She could hardly believe how much time she'd spent talking and practicing. It was lucky for her that few other wrestlers came in to use the gym, most of whom where nobodies, no one she cared about. Just like she'd told that stuffed peacock Jack Swagger: if they weren't Nexus then she didn't care.
Making sure that she remembered the combination to her locker before she left, Heidi stuffed her cell phone, clinging to life on its last bar, into her pocket. It was a long shot but if Husky wanted to get a hold of her then she should be prepared.
Kicking at a bit of spare paper in the hall, Heidi put her hands into her pockets and strolled towards the door, her eared hood up to keep her frown mostly hidden. Husky wasn't going to call her and she knew it. In fact, according to last night he didn't even see the connection between losing one family only to jump into a substitute one.
"How stupid do you have to BE?" she asked loudly in the middle of the hall, falling to her knees in anguish, her fists shaking towards the sky. "I will help you see the light Husky, I won't give up on yooooooooooooooouuuuuuuuuu!" she vowed solemnly, making a promise with the plaques on the wall and the freshly cleaned tile.
"Uh, Heidi?"
The young woman's eyes shot open and she looked up from her mid-hall crisis to see none other than John Cena standing at the other end of the hall.
Her face went red. He'd heard her! How embarrassing…
"It is Heidi, right?" Cena asked, walking closer with that casual air that suggested everything he did was as smooth as butter.
Getting to her feet, she nodded. "Yeah, it is." What luck! Just the person she wanted to see and it couldn't have come at a better time. Not only were they alone, which saved Heidi the trouble of stalking him, but he had also remembered her name!
"You're just the person I wanted to run into, Cena," she said cheerily, as if the world was shining on her. She brought her hand in front of her face and waved it to mimic his hallmark move and laughed a bit as Cena grinned and did it back. She then stopped and brought her hand down. "This is totally off topic, but I don't really get that whole thing," she said, waving the hand in front of her face again so the enormous man knew what she was talking about. "I mean, I can still see you, its not like all your 240 pounds just disappeared… wicka wicka…" she said, entertaining herself some more with the hand wave in front of her face.
John Cena folded his arms over his chest with a slightly amused smile and planted his feet firmly on the ground.
"Oh really? You don't like my hand thing?" he asked in a rhetorical voice that said, "you amuse me," and, "it doesn't matter" all at once.
Realizing that she had perhaps insulted the 240-pound man she had hoped to win to her side, Heidi promptly pulled her lips into her mouth and shut up, her face going a little pink as she smiled sheepishly to him.
Cena, who himself was a baby face, could not resist laughing a bit at Heidi's behavior and he gave her a smile that put her heart at ease.
"What did you want, Hellcat?" he asked, looking down at her with his big blue eyes.
"I need an ally!" she blurted out without preamble, stepping closer to Cena and holding her hands out to emphasize her point. "I've got a lot to work on here and I'm not asking you to help me fight matches or get involved in my family mess, I just want to know that there's someone here I can trust." With earnest eyes, Heidi looked at him, hoping he would believe her.
A hand came to John Cena's chin and he rubbed the blonde stubble there for a moment, gazing to the floor as he contemplated Heidi's request. The kid certainly had made quite the spectacle the night before what with her light and sound trick, then stomping Wade into the ground.
"Last night Nexus interrupted me in the middle of settling a score I need to deal with Wade Barrett alone. You know, there are a lot of guys here who don't like the Nexus," he reminded sagely, making eye contact with Heidi, who interpreted his reply to mean 'ask someone else, kid.'
Her shoulders drooped and her mouth hung open wide right before snapping shut so that she didn't further insult Cena. Even if he wasn't going to be her ally, he deserved some respect.
Cena chuckled again and reached out a big hand to tousle the top of Heidi's head between her 'ears,' her head rattling and eyes rolling in her skull until he pulled his hand away.
"But… I can't stand Barrett or Nexus. I'll keep an eye on you, Hellcat. Barrett has a match against Sheamus next week. I'll see you there," he said with a wink. Then, tipping his hat a bit to her, Cena walked down the hall and took a left, disappearing out of sight.
Heidi stood with her mouth open for a moment, following Cena's form with her slowly nodding head as he departed. She'd done it! She had someone she could trust in the organization, and so soon after her debut! With Cena on her side, the matches against Nexus and Barrett didn't seem like such insurmountable tasks. Sure, she would have stuck it through to the bitter end, but now she had made arrangements for that end to be not quite so bitter.
With an added bounce in her step, Heidi crossed a bulletin board and stopped dead in her tracks as she saw what was posted. She did a double take at the many sheets of paper that were tacked to the wall, but mostly a large packet caught her interest. Screaming across the front in lurid red ink were the words TOUR SCHEDULE and MATCHUPS. Whistling a little bit so as not to look any more suspicious than a girl with ears on her hoodie already did, Heidi pulled down the packet and hastily rolled it up like a newspaper and jammed it in her pocket. Any good sneak knew that the more information she had, the better.
Her stomach growled again and Heidi put her hands over it, her legs going a bit wobbly for a moment as she let the hunger pang live out its short life. She needed food, NOW.
It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that there was likely nothing nutritious for her to swipe in the arena, so Heidi set off towards the front entrance, hoping that perhaps some vendor would take pity on her, or something. She knew a few songs she could sing and a few dances she could dance, but there were probably very few vendors who would sell her a hotdog for a song or dance.
Once the doors were closer, Heidi jogged a bit so she was that much nearer to somewhere she could fill her stomach when all of a sudden she collided with a very large white wall.
After Cena's head rattling hair tousle, Heidi's eyes rolled around in her head a bit longer than usual, forcing her to shake her head a bit with her eyes shut to steady herself.
"Make way far the king, yeh runty snapper!" a gruff voice barked down at her.
When her eyes focused Heidi saw that she had not run into a wall, but instead had smacked right into Sheamus, who was wandering around in his black and green Celtic panties and his fluorescent skin, his red hair screaming at people as loudly as his complexion.
"Shut up, Patrick!" Heidi rebutted hotly, using the most generic Irish name that came to mind. She tried to brush by Sheamus to get to the doors since it was apparent that she had been leaving when all of a sudden she wasn't leaving anymore. Her feet were still trying to go forward but she remained quite in place and as she looked over her shoulder she saw that Sheamus was holding onto the back of her hoodie with his thumb and index.
She scowled at him and he got right in her face with his enormous head, his nose barely inches from her own.
"Yeh will larn the king's name, little garl. Yeh will larn respect far the king!"
Putting a hand on her hip, Heidi made to smack his hand over her shoulder but before she connected, she was spun around to face Sheamus. And then, she was airborne, again. Sheamus hoisted with a huge handful of her hoodie so that he could look her in the eyes, her toes dangling far off the floor.
"Yeh have fire but that won't do yeh no good unless yeh want to get tossed out, see?" he said, throwing his eyes wide and tilting his head to the side as he said the last word, again putting his face dangerously close to Heidi's.
Though Hellcat was a spirited woman, the toils of the day made it impossible for her to try much of anything on someone who had120 pounds on her and was holding her in the air like a puppet. Her eyes were wide open as Sheamus got in her face with his big orange beard and his smug accent.
Then, with a thrust of his hand, Sheamus chucked Heidi, her back sailing through the entrance doors and still she flew, watching the doors close on the back of Sheamus who was still stomping around inside like an oaf.
Heidi came to a bouncing, skidding, and painful halt on her bottom and sat still for a moment as she rubbed her back and shook her fist at the now-shut front doors.
"YOU'LL PAY FOR THAT!" she threatened futilely, embarrassed but otherwise undamaged. Her pride had been injured a little and she stewed for a moment on the ground, glaring daggers at the front door. Now she had two people to hate: the stuffed shirt Swagger and the overgrown leprechaun.
"Heidi?"
Hellcat Harris looked up as she got to her feet and saw that Lily was standing by her car, this time dressed in white slacks and a purple shirt, dangling gold earrings hanging in front of her straight brown hair.
"Are you all right?" she asked, clicking up to the blonde who was bending over backward to try and work out the kink in her back after having landed hard on her buttocks, the worst injury of her day.
"Yeah, yeah, just fine," she lied through gritted teeth. It was not her intent to sound as irritable as she did but Lily knew Heidi better than that and she put an arm around her surrogate sister's shoulder to help steady the girl, who look considerably worse for wear.
"How did that happen?" Lily asked curiously, looking from the door to the place where Heidi had landed unceremoniously on her rump.
"Sheamus!" she answered angrily, scowling once more at the entrance. "Jeez, run into the guy once and he's all 'don't mess with the king, yarrr!'" Heidi explained in a poor imitation of an Irish accent, but managed to mimic the mean face of Sheamus quite well. "He actually threw me. Through the doors! What a jerk!"
Lily Stark actually winced as Heidi told her story but laughed with her head thrown back at the blonde's imitation.
"All I saw was you come flying out backwards and then bounce about five feet. I kind of figured you had managed to hack someone off," Lily said with a poorly concealed smile. She patted Heidi's shoulder and started to steer her towards the street, where the shiny green sedan was idling. "Come on, I'll take you to dinner to celebrate such a successful first day."
Heidi allowed herself to be led to the car and then, once inside, buckled up her seat and looked around the cab. There was an mp3 jack in the cigarette lighter and she instantly grabbed Lily's player to surf through her available bards.
A few seconds later, Lily got into the car and then shifted into drive and pulled away from the curb.
"You have Flyleaf? Awesome!" Heidi said, setting it to play.
Lily nodded and pushed a few buttons on the stereo so that soon they were both listening to familiar songs. The two of them cranked up the volume and were soon singing at the tops of their voices to every lyric they knew, heads thrashing from side to side, blonde and brown hair flying around the cab of the sedan at every stop sign, light, and traffic jam.
By the time Lily pulled in front of a rather expensive looking restaurant her hair was unkempt, a stark contrast to Stark's usually impeccable appearance. However, she pulled down the visor and flipped up the mirror and after a few minutes of combing with a brush from her purse her sleek brown hair lay flat again and you never would have known that she'd spent the whole ride there head-banging and wailing.
"OH! Here's your badge. Thanks for letting me use it," Heidi said as she pulled the badge over her head and wrapped it around the rearview mirror. Heidi, who was lucky to have a change of clothes, looked rather out of place as the valet came up and took Lily's car keys.
"No problem, I certainly don't hang around there on my days off so its not big deal. Come on, let's eat!" she said, offering her arm to Heidi, who took it as they entered the restaurant.
Two expensive meals later, Heidi and Lily came out of the restaurant to see Lily's car waiting for them, already started, with the valet standing in front of it so that he could open their doors. Lily tipped him and then both ladies climbed into the vehicles, Heidi with her hands appreciatively resting on her tummy, which was pleasantly full.
"So where are you staying? I can drop you off," Lily offered as they pulled away from the restaurant and merged into the light traffic around the city that night.
Heidi opened her mouth to say something but then closed it immediately. She couldn't exactly tell Lily that she was sleeping in a broom closet at the arena, but without her badge she didn't have any way of even getting to her broom closet.
"Uhh… " she stammered for a moment and then cleared her throat and looked out the window, clearly avoiding the subject.
Lily, who was perceptive enough to know when Heidi was skirting around issues, suddenly pulled over, and stopped the car. She looked over at Heidi, who seemed to know she was in trouble because she glanced over bashfully to the older woman.
"Heidi, where are you staying?"
Heidi groaned and gave up.
"I kind of don't have anywhere to stay. I spent all my money getting out here so last night I slept in the arena and that's where my suitcase is." Heidi explained.
Lily looked affronted and narrowed her eyes at Heidi.
"You doofus! You could have stayed with me, you know? Do you have clothes with you? Something other than your practice uniform and your Hellcat hoodie?" she added, not wanting to give Heidi any loopholes.
Heidi sighed.
"This is it," she answered, gesturing down to her current attire.
Lily glared once more and then merged into traffic.
"You can grab your suitcase later. I have extra toothbrushes and all the toiletries a girl like you could ever need." Lily said with gentle sternness. She couldn't believe Heidi sometimes, so reckless and unprepared! She probably didn't want to put anyone out so she thought the next best conclusion was to sleep in a closet?
"But what about my clothes?"
"You can wear some of mine to bed. We'll get you checked in to the hotel we're staying at and then we can hit a store or two." Lily then looked over at Hellcat and shook her head. "We can't have you running around in that all the time."
Soon, the two were at the hotel and riding the grand elevator up to the 25th floor, where Lily Stark's room was. Lily's heels clicked on the shining marble floors, Heidi's black sneakers made hardly a sound. The two women wove through the halls until the taller of the two, Lily, inserted a key into the door and pulled on the golden handle to show the room beyond.
Dashing in, Heidi looked around, throwing the curtains open so that she could see the lights in the city and the moon, which was no fuller than a quarter.
"Nice digs!" Heidi said in awe as she looked at the two big beds and then the enormous tub in the bathroom, running around like she'd never seen anything so fancy before. "A DVD player, PS3, XBOX, and a Wii?" she asked as she threw open the doors of the entertainment center. "Wow…
Lily laughed and took off her earrings, putting them into their appropriate box.
"Yeah, we do all right here. I figure you can just stay with me. I drive everywhere we go anyway, I hate taking that bus with all of them, so you can just stick it out with me. I'll see what I can do about getting you some new clothes… " Lily's face turned very grim and she sat on the edge of the bed, facing Heidi as if she had terrible news. "You might have to come shopping with me."
Heidi shrugged her shoulder, grinning as she hopped onto her bed and bounced a bit but then winced as she struck a bruise on her butt that Sheamus was responsible for.
"I'm not as tomboyish as I used to be. You can even get me in pink these days," Heidi confided, elbowing the air to her right and winking as if she were sharing top-notch information.
"All right then, it's a deal."
The two girls then got ready for bed, taking turns in the bathroom, though Lily let Heidi go first since she knew there wouldn't be much to her nighttime routine. It was true, after brushing her teeth with a fresh toothbrush, coming her hair, and washing her face, Heidi emerged from the bathroom in a pair of pink pajamas with little sheep on them that looked like fat cotton balls with black stumpy legs. Her hair was down and she looked her age for once, minus the pink sheep pajamas.
Lily, however, spent about 30 minutes in the bathroom doing god knows what, and by the time she came out Heidi was busily playing Wii boxing, knocking the pixilated stuffing out of an avatar with a purple shirt, doing a little dance when she KO'd him.
Climbing into her bed in her green silk nightgown, Lily pulled the covers over herself and stuck a few pillows behind her back so she could sit up.
"So, when can we expect you to interrupt Nexus again?"
Heidi looked over her shoulder and then stepped into the space between the beds so that Lily didn't have to talk to her backside.
"I grabbed a schedule of upcoming matches and Cena told me himself that he'd expect to see me on Monday night when Barrett faces off with Sheamus," she replied, giving a new avatar with black glasses an uppercut that had him staggering.
Lily gawked for a moment and laughed in disbelief.
"You've already spoken to Cena?"
"Yup! I ran into him in the hall and told him I needed someone I could trust and he said he'd keep an eye out for me. Pretty cool, right?" Heidi asked, chancing a moment to look away from the television screen and grin to Lily.
"Wow, Cena and Sheamus all in one day? You're onto something big here, Heidi." Lily leaned and turned on the lamp beside her bed and then clapped her hands twice so that the overhead lights went out, leaving a softer light and giving Heidi less glare for her boxing match.
"More than that, I ran into Mysterio in the gym. He's awesome, he showed me a bunch of moves and even sparred with me! I like him a lot," Heidi said with a distant smile on her face. Then her face darkened and she knocked out the avatar with black glasses with a ruthless uppercut. "But then Jack Thwagger stopped by and starting smack talking and just being a jerk. Then he interrupted me again later to brag about how great he is and try to show me some moves but just being a total dick about it…" While she was explaining her interaction with Swagger, two more avatars had fallen to her, simply mauling them down as she spoke of her current least favorite person.
Wiping her forehead a bit, Heidi waited for her next avatar opponent.
"Well at least you ran into Mysterio first, he always was a nice guy," Lily said optimistically, since it wasn't necessary for either of them to waste their time bashing Swagger and Sheamus. "So you're going to interrupt Barrett's match against Sheamus?" Lily asked, her tone suggesting she thought this was a poor idea.
Heidi did not relent and sent another round of jabs to a new avatar.
"Yup."
"Even though you've already made a bit of an enemy with Sheamus, and Wade Barrett wants nothing more than to kill you?"
"Yup."
Lily sighed.
"All right then." She wished there were talking sense into the girl but, in Heidi's defense, if she had sense then she probably wouldn't have made it as far as she already had. Cena was the toughest and most successful wrestler in the entire franchise. If Heidi had already gotten him on her side then things boded well for her, even if Lily did think that hopping between two people who weighed over 100 pounds more than Heidi did was stupid.
"Well I'm turning in, Heidi. Get some sleep, will you? We'll tackle shopping tomorrow," she said with a grin.
And with that, Lily turned off her lamp and left Heidi to the darkness.
Heidi moved closer to the TV, not wanting to disturb Lily as she tried to go to sleep, and kept jabbing and crossing, throwing uppercuts and body shots to the avatars, however they looked. But Heidi saw only one thing. Wade Barrett's face going down time and time and time again.