"Okay, taste."
Briley leaned over and tasted the sauce on the spoon, "Okay, that's really good."
"Awesome, I can follow a recipe, I'm such a great cook," AJ crowed, putting the spoon back in the sink. "At least I haven't managed to ruin it or else we'd be having take-out again, and I am getting a little sick of take-out. You'd think between the three of us we could have a home-cooked meal almost every night, but we're like college students."
"Nothing wrong with reliving the glory days," Briley said, "you do know I have a Master's, right? I mean, if you were looking for someone a little more intelligent than what you've got right now, you know where to find me…just down the hall."
"Oh, the offer is so tempting, Briles," AJ reached up to pat his cheek, "but you're just not my type."
"If my brother is your type, I'm definitely your type."
"Not cocky enough though, I mean, you are cocky—"
"You have no idea how cocky I am," he told her, winking at her, and she groaned. "Don't tell me, my brother has used that line on you?"
"Yes, but he said that I do know how cocky he is, before we slept together, he was very much the gentleman actually," AJ told him, but she figured that was something Briley would know. Dolph, for all his bravado, was very patient with her in the beginning, taking things at her pace, letting her dictate the pace of their relationship. Looking back, he treated her like a spooked horse that he had to train.
"Not surprising," Briley nodded, lifting himself onto the counter and sitting where he could watch AJ. "So, speaking of my brother, that interview after his loss on SmackDown, that was as intense as I've seen him in a really long time."
AJ thought back to that interview. She'd come up on the tail end of it. She'd been looking for him after his match. It was one of the rare times she wasn't at the gorilla waiting for him, and by the time she got there, he was nowhere to be found. She eventually found him in a hallway, talking to one of the interviewers, one of the new guys, and she heard him yelling. She stopped, listening to him, and she could tell he was impassioned. He stormed off, not even seeing her as he went the other direction.
She had to jog to catch up with him, and when she touched his arm, he jumped like he was burned, and only when he turned and saw her did he soften considerably. She simply hugged him around the waist. She didn't need to hear the entire interview to know what he was saying, to know the frustrations that plagued him week in and week out. That concussion last year, the first one, it ruined him in a lot of ways, none of which were his fault. It threw him off track, so far off track that sometimes it was like he couldn't see it. But she believed, she would always believe that he would get back to where he belonged. She saw him work too hard not to get back there. And when he did, there wasn't going to be another concussion to stop his momentum.
She eventually did watch the entire thing when she got home, and she was proud of him for venting his frustrations, for getting it out there. It needed to be said, and he needed to let it out. He deserved the opportunities and nobody outshone him, certainly not in her universe. The interview picked up steam though, and a lot of people were buzzing about it, and that could only be a good thing. If more people watched it then more people would know how he wanted to be the best, and eventually, he'd get his chances, they would put him in matches that he wanted.
Dolph also told her about his conversation with Stephanie. It would be easy for Stephanie to just give him the matches he wanted. He'd earned enough clout with her that it probably wouldn't be impossible to ask her if he could have some title matches, hell, maybe even for the WWE World Heavyweight title, but that wasn't how he wanted to do things. He wanted them fair and square, and she admired him for that. He wanted to earn what he got, and that was the only way he could ever be satisfied.
"He's angry and he's hungry," AJ said, staring down at her sauce as she took it off the heat. "He knows he can get in the ring with Randy or John or Daniel, and he knows he can beat them, he has beaten them. He just needs the opportunity to do so."
"He's too talented not to be there," Briley said. He knew how hard his brother worked before, but living with him now, he saw it even more. Even right now, his brother was at the gym.
"I know that, and you know that, but people like Hunter don't know that, and Brad Maddox doesn't know that, and Vickie does know that, but she hates him so that's another obstacle in his way."
"Is she still hung up about what happened?"
"If it were anyone else Dolph started dating, I don't think Vickie would have had half the problem she has with us dating," AJ answered. "Vickie hates it because it's me. She would rather he date Nacho over me. She's never going to get over the fact that the person she hated the most was dating Dolph behind her back. Vickie and Dolph were never…well, you know—"
"Yes, and my mother thanks the Lord for that everyday. When we still thought they were, you know, together, my mom actually told Dolph she could invite Vickie for Thanksgiving, but thankfully my brother said that she already had plans. If he brought her home, I don't even know how that would have gone."
"With Vickie, I'm guessing it would have ended in a food fight or something. Still, Vickie isn't going to give him what he wants unless she wants to make me jealous. He'll get there though, this is a start, people saw it, and they're talking about it, and that's great for him. It gets people on board with him. Kind of like Daniel, he should really be in Daniel's spot, Daniel is nothing to write home about."
"What did you ever see in him?"
"He was nice at first, now everyone think he's some great guy," AJ scoffed, "if they only remembered that he was a jerk to me. He broke me, he broke me so many times, but people are so willing to overlook that because they want to join the 'Yes movement' or whatever he's calling it. But it's fine, I'm over it, I've obviously moved on."
"Speaking of moving on, what's with the Punk situation? I thought I'd ask you now while your overprotective, crazy boyfriend isn't here."
"He's not crazy, he just doesn't like those guys."
"He seemed happy enough to say that he was gone," Briley recalled his brother's rather chipper reaction when Briley asked about it. Dolph didn't know anything though, just said he saw Punk leave. It was really all anyone was talking about right now, in any company. He figured AJ might know a little more since she was Punk's friend.
"If Dolph could, he would kick Daniel and Cena out of the company too," AJ rolled her eyes. While she was over things, her boyfriend seemed to file away grudges in some circular file in his mind. "I don't really know to be honest. I mean, I heard rumors of course—"
"Of course," Briley said, knowing that wrestlers were gossips so naturally people talked about it.
"Dolph said he saw him leave, alone, and Britt was still there when he left, so he left her," AJ said, thinking to the other petite brunette that made AJ feel slightly better because she was actually taller than Britt.
"So you have no clue what the hell happened?"
"I heard that it had to do with Hunter," AJ said, "but you can't really trust anyone. I suppose I could ask Stephanie, but I'd feel weird about it."
"Hunter? Wait, didn't he date Britt before Punk?"
"Yeah, and Punk is convinced that Hunter is going to take Britt away again or something like that, so if it was him, I wouldn't be surprised. It's a little bit of an overreaction if you ask me, but I'm not him. Maybe he was just burnt out and this was his excuse to leave because he likes Stephanie, so I don't think he'd really want to hurt her."
"You have yourself mixed up in some crazy stuff."
"Briley, look at your life, you're right in the thick of all this too," she told him, checking the chicken in the oven. Dolph should be home fairly soon then they could have dinner. He said he'd take a shower at the gym so they wouldn't have to sit and wait here for him.
"But I'm not in the company anymore, remember, I wasn't good enough."
"You are good enough, you should keep at it, like your brother, you both are really good, of course, you both are also really multi-talented, so you could do anything you set your mind to," she pat him on the knee.
"Have you tried calling Punk?"
"I texted him, but nothing," AJ said, "I just said that if he wanted to talk, I was here. He was there for me when I was going through that rough patch with Dolph, when I thought I wasn't good enough for him, so I thought I'd return the favor."
"Then you found out if anyone's not good enough for anyone, it's Dolph for you."
"No, he's still way too good for me," AJ said, "but that doesn't mean I don't deserve him. I think Punk is just really afraid of losing Britt. I know the feeling—"
"You're really afraid of losing Britt too?"
This time, AJ smacked him on the knee. "You know, you and your brother think you're so funny, and most of the time, you're really just lame. Just so you know."
"I thought it was funny," he told her, trying to act innocent about it. "Sorry, sorry, go on."
"There's nothing to go on to," she told him, "I just think the guy is really afraid of losing Britt, and it's driving him crazy, like my old levels of crazy. I mean, wouldn't you have to be to walk out of the company? That part just doesn't make sense to me. It's like, why would you ever do that? Especially Punk because he has friends here, and he has all the opportunities in the world. Like if he challenged for the title, he would probably get a shot like that. Working for the WWE was always my dream, I could never just walk away."
"Neither could I," Dolph said, walking into the kitchen. "We're talking about the jerk, right?"
"He's not a jerk, baby."
"Are you kidding me?" Dolph asked, leaning down to pet Nacho, who came into the room when he heard Dolph's voice. He picked him up and held him in one of his arms. "He left the show half an hour before it started, who does that? First, he's a jerk to you—"
"Baby, that was almost two years ago," AJ reminded him.
"Don't care, will never care."
"He still hates the third grade teacher who gave him detention for throwing a paper airplane."
"I was framed!" Dolph argued. "That was completely not me, that was Jonathan Wingels who threw it, not me."
"See what I mean," Briley jerked his thumb towards his brother, "and that was over a paper airplane, Punk hurt you, which is pretty on par with him committing murder as far as Dolph is concerned, so yeah, good luck with that one."
"Besides, he left the company after he was champion for 434 days, like, come on, he's one of the tops guys, he actually is one of the faces of the company, which is stupid because so's his face." Dolph put Nacho down so he could grab a water from the fridge, but he was intercepted by his girlfriend, who hugged him around the waist.
"Okay, calm down there before we get to the big insults," AJ said, "come on, dinner's ready, we'll leave the Punk talk for later, or never, and we'll talk about how you are going to be doing your stand-up in a couple of weeks."
"Dude, you're going to bomb so hard."
"Shut up," Dolph said, grabbing the plates from the cupboard. "If you even so much as think about heckling me during one of my sets, I'm going to come out into the audience and body slam you through a table."
"What? You'll need the practice," Briley joked, "you can't possibly think you're never going to be heckled, I'm preparing you for the real world, bro, you should think of it as me helping you become a real comedian."
"Don't worry, Ziggy, I will make sure that Briley is in check, I may have to break out the child leash for him, but I'm sure they come in adult sizes too for when you have a big baby on your hands."
"I'll behave, I'll even laugh the loudest," Briley said, hopping off the counter and helping to grab the chicken out of the oven while AJ grabbed the mashed potatoes she'd made earlier. The three of them worked like a well-oiled unit at this point, all maneuvering around each other in the kitchen like a kind of ballet.
"I don't think that's possible with my babycakes in the audience."
"Oh yeah, sometimes at night, I hear her laughing all the way down the hallway, I figure it's because she's looking at you naked."
"I'm not sure I want my brother picturing me naked," Dolph said, turning it back on his brother, "but believe me, she's not laughing when I'm naked."
"This conversation just turned extremely weird and awkward," AJ interjected, "how about we stuff our faces full of food so this conversation can end?"
"Okay, sounds good to me," Briley said, "I'm starved."
"Me too," Dolph said.
AJ thanked God.
There was a weird buzz when they got to Raw. Dolph grabbed AJ's hand as they walked inside, leaning over to kiss her cheek impulsively. She smiled up at him, but she could feel it too. It was subdued somehow, and it was strange. The hustle and bustle seemed slow, and she could see groups of people talking, all probably about Punk. She couldn't imagine anything else that would require this level of gossip, unless someone secretly got married or something. She resisted the urge to check her ring finger to make sure it wasn't her that got secretly married.
"Weird in here," Dolph whispered to her.
"You're telling me."
"Different vibe, that's for sure," Dolph said, again stating the obvious. "Not that I care or anything, but if Punk's not here, maybe that means another guy can step in, maybe I could, that would be pretty cool."
AJ admired him for trying to turn this into an opportunity. "If anyone can take his place, I think it could be you, you're both jerks, just very different kinds of jerk. He's more of an overall jerk, and you're a jerk on certain occasions with certain people."
"Okay, I'm going to go ahead and cancel our Valentine's Day plans since you think I'm a jerk," Dolph told her.
"What plans? We don't even really celebrate that because I'm not some girly girl who wants flowers and candy and jewelry," she stuck out her tongue at the thought. Although she knew they were going to be doing something, she also knew it would be subtle and subdued, and knowing their life now, it would probably include Briley.
"I was just going to take you out to dinner actually, since we're not big on fake holidays, plus I'm probably going to have a set that night…" He paused, and AJ waited for him to finish his sentence, but it wasn't forthcoming so she just poked him in the side. "I just had a thought."
"Okay, good, I thought you had the sudden urge to pee or something, so what's the thought?"
"Valentine's Day, we're going to be in LA, right?"
"Yeah, because you're going to be doing your stand up, it'll be cool to go out to dinner in LA, are you going to take me to one of those restaurants that the paparazzi stalk, ooh, and then we'll walk out, and they'll take pictures of us, and we can shove them out of the way, and you can Zig Zag them, and I can put a photographer in the Black Widow, now that's how you spend Valentine's Day."
"While that does actually sound kind of fun, I was thinking, we're in LA, and do you know who lives in LA?"
"Ziggy, does it have to be a guessing…wait, are you thinking of who I think you're thinking?" AJ's eyes widened, and her smile grew as she gleaned onto what her boyfriend was trying to say. "You want to set up your brother while we're all in LA with Serena."
"I figure, you know what, let them go on one date, you never know, my brother likes her, she probably likes him, and if they try once, at least if it doesn't work out, it's out of his system," Dolph thought it was a great plan. If they ended up not wanting to date, they gave it a shot, and that was that. "That's what we did. We didn't now if we'd be anything, if the circumstances of that night where I found you were just an isolated incident, so we tried the one date, and it went well, I think."
"I never would have guessed," AJ said, "but okay, I'm in, Briley is like one of my best friends now, and I want him to be happy."
"Hey, you two," E said as he happened upon them as he arrived as well. "Whoa, feels different in here, like the air is thick, but not with the rich smells of down-home cooking, I can't even eat this tension."
AJ laughed and gave her best friend a giant hug, "We said the same thing when we walked in. I think everyone is a little wary because Punk is gone. Do you know what happened?"
"Not a clue, just heard he walked, but I've read all the dirt sheets, about a million different stories going on out there."
"Yeah, so we've heard," Dolph said, grabbing a schedule. "Not that I care that he's gone, good riddance, I think."
"Is he still mad at him?" E asked. "Dude, get over it, you got the girl, trust me, I've spent enough nights in the hotel room next to yours knowing just how much you've got the girl, and I've had to be around you two in the mornings after knowing how much you got the girl, let it go."
"I'm not an object, geez," AJ punched E in the arm. "I'm not just gotten."
"Girl, you got," E pursed his lips together, and gave her the once over. "You sound sick though, you good?"
"She's hoarse from all the screaming," Dolph said idly, not even really paying attention, but he was never one to pass up on a dirty joke when the opportunity presented itself.
"I'm not great, but I'm okay to go."
"Well, you don't have to, babe, you're on commentary," Dolph told her.
"Again? Sometimes I feel like I do more commentating than I do actual wrestling, it's like they don't want me to actually be a fighting champion or something, and that falls on Brad, who was influenced by Vickie, who hates me. She never wants me to have any matches, I practically have to beg Britt to fit me in most of the time, hey, do you think I should talk to her?"
"If you want," Dolph said distractedly as he looked at the schedule.
"What do I have, Dolph?" E asked.
"You're on early, E, first match, 6 man tag, you, Rey, and Kofi against The Shield."
"Damn, they're good, I better go start warming up now, I'll catch you both later, we should have lunch tomorrow or something, catch me up because I heard you're going to do comedy or something, and I want to hear your material. I can make sure that you're hitting all the demographics, you know, black bodybuilder types are way into comedy."
"That's who I totally want to target too," Dolph nodded. "I think that could work."
"Cool, check you guys later," E waved to them.
AJ looked over at her boyfriend. She could tell something was wrong, but he didn't want to say it in front of E. She was so familiar with his face now that it felt like his emotions were written on his forehead for her to see. She'd never been this close with another person before. Everyday surprised her with something new she realized about her relationship with Dolph. After hearing all the gossip regarding Punk, Britt, and Hunter, she was so thankful she had Dolph. One summer of being a crazy chick was enough for her.
"What's wrong?"
"Hmm?" he looked over at her, and his one word answers gave him away.
"Something's up, you're not on the show?" she asked, knowing that after his impassioned speech last week, not being put on the show this week would probably be Hunter's doing. Hunter probably saw the interview and decided that Dolph needed to be put in his place. They knew Stephanie was in charge, but Hunter had such considerable influence, and if he whispered in Brad's ear about the schedule, Brad, the suck-up, would fold like a high card king.
"No, I'm on the show."
"But…" She prompted him to finish his thought because she could tell there was a butt on the end of that sentence.
"I'm also in a six man tag match against the Wyatts."
"Who are your partners?" she asked.
"R-Truth and Xavier."
AJ understood immediately. It wasn't that he hated the other two men, although he thought that R-Truth was really weird, but it was because he was stuck in a six man tag match when he was primed and ready for singles competition. He thought that maybe, just maybe after showing people the passion he had for this business and his desire to be the best that Hunter wouldn't try to hold him down like this. Stephanie was not going to interfere, he knew that, he'd asked for that, but that didn't mean Hunter wouldn't deliberately hold him down and request that he be put in matches like this. Hunter clearly didn't like him, and without Stephanie's influence, this kind of thing happened, but he couldn't go crawling to her to beg him to give him better matches. That went against everything in him.
"Xavier is a good guy," AJ said. "I knew him when I was with Jay. They were partners over in TNA."
"First of all, thanks for bringing up your ex, really appreciate that."
"Oh come on, do we need to go down that route?" she asked. "Besides, that was before I was even in this company, way before I met you, and I believe at the time you were a cheerleader so you didn't even have any appeal for me."
"Second of all, I never said he wasn't a good guy, but a 6 man tag being paired with two random guys is not how I envisioned my night going. I had hoped, stupidly obviously, that my interview might have shown Hunter that I had the fire lit under me since he's the guy who doesn't think I have it, but it didn't."
"So go prove that tonight, you're going against the Wyatts, prove that you can do what you have to do. You are the show stealer, you are the one that goes out there and proves how great you are, how much better you are. Don't let that interview be in vain. You may feel like you're stuck in this match, but there are 5 other guys in it, and this is your chance to shine. It takes a lot to be able to outshine five other guys in a match, but you can do that because of how you operate."
She was right, and he took that to heart, even saying it in another interview before his match. He just had to do what he did, and everything would hopefully fall into place. Unfortunately for him, it proved that being together for a while made a better team when the Wyatts were their cult-like cohesive unit, and he was stuck with two guys he barely talked to at all. There was no communication, well, there was, but it wasn't cohesive in any sense of the word.
Despite having met up with them beforehand, he didn't know their styles well enough to feel like he could trust either of them to have his back. It wasn't like when he was with E, and he knew that come hell or high water, E would have his back. Sometimes that didn't help, but at the very least, he knew that he and E could work together. After seeing E's match earlier, and seeing him lose and get pinned, he knew E would feel the same way. Sometimes, all he wanted to do was get the gang back together. Maybe then he could actually get back on track instead of floundering.
He couldn't even seek the comfort of his girlfriend's arms because as soon as he was backstage, dejected and beaten, AJ had to go out for commentary, Aksana and Naomi's match right after his. She cupped his cheeks briefly, leaning up to give him a kiss, a show of support. When all else failed, when he failed, she was right there to pick him up. He didn't know what he'd do without her. Some days he felt like she was the only good thing going in his life. Waking up next to her gave him the confidence to be who he was because AJ never compromised who she was.
And the AJ that she was, well, when she was on commentary, she gave the people herself, and she didn't censor herself either. When she wanted to say something, she said it, and sometimes it was at the expense of the other divas. If they wanted to hang with her, they had to take the criticism. She knew the Bellas especially hated her candor, which just made it all the more fun being critical of them. She was the rare combination of being able to dish it and take it. This was the wrestling business, you had to have thick skin. Some of these other divas had too much handed to them. She didn't, and that gave her the edge, she believed.
Naomi eventually won the match, and AJ stood up, facing her down. She knew Naomi wanted her title, she knew Naomi would probably challenge her for the title, and she knew that she could beat Naomi. The title wasn't going to leave her, no matter how many times Naomi's butt hit her in the face.
While Dolph was struggling, AJ was thriving, and sometimes, she felt like he would come to resent her. That scared her, but when she walked backstage, he was there, still waiting, still sweaty and rumpled from his match, and she walked up to him, kissing his cheek. "You okay?" she asked, finally having a moment to check up on him.
"After hearing you on commentary, yes, of course," she could always make him smile when she was humiliating the announcers, "and you do have experience with me, plenty of it."
"Oh, get over yourself," she told him as he enveloped her in a hug.
"AJ," AJ looked over and saw Britt coming over to her.
"Hey, Britt, what's up?"
"I need to ask you a favor."