Sabella McCann
I sat alone at the island counter and drank my morning coffee, taking in the stack of boxes through the arch in the living room. It's going to be a beautiful day, and I don't have any real plans. I finally moved in here last night, but Kurt's still on the road until tomorrow night. It felt strange, moving into his home when he's not here. There's part of me that wants to get everything unpacked today, but another part of me wants to go out and take in my new surroundings. I'm sure I could do both, but there's a lot to unpack, and I'm hoping to have it all done by the time Kurt gets home tomorrow.
Sipping my coffee, I looked at the cordless phone on the counter. I thought about calling Adriana, but I already talked to her for an hour and a half this morning. She's on the hunt for centerpieces today with Rene's mother. I thought about calling Natalie, to see what she's up to, but she's been throwing herself into work since splitting with John. Jessa's not home; Randy talked her into staying with him while she works through the grief of losing her father. It's for the best; I don't know if Jessa should be alone right now.
It's a beautiful home Kurt has, newly renovated in the past year. The kitchen is done in neutral shades, with granite counters and earthy linoleum. It's so beautiful I'm almost afraid to do anything in here. Since Kurt hardly spends any time here, the place is like a museum. For the first time in a long time, I woke up this morning and made the bed, feeling anxious to leave everything in the house the way that I found it. There's still a lot of discomfort. I'm hoping I'll feel at home quickly. Kurt called last night to make sure I was settled in okay. He wishes he could be here with me right now while I'm getting settled, but it's the nature of the business. I don't know if I could ever go back to it; I don't know how anyone can handle being away from home so much. Jessa seems built for it, but looking back on things, I don't know how I did it for as long as I did, and I haven't been doing it as long as Jessa or Callie have.
Once my coffee was finished, I cleaned the mug and put it in the dish rack. I leaned against the counter and crossed my arms over my chest. I'm back to square one. I need to make some new friends and to figure out a new routine. I still have two weeks before classes begin. So it's my job now to find things to do to keep me occupied for the next two weeks while Kurt is out on the road. Once classes begin, it'll be practice and late nights. But for the next two weeks, the goal is to keep my days eventful. Tonight, the SmackDown roster is in Green Bay, Wisconsin, a long way from here.
I grabbed a box from the foyer. Opening the top, I saw the things I usually keep in my nightstand in the box. Pulling it off the top of the pile, I went upstairs to the bedroom. Kurt mentioned that he had cleared out the left nightstand for me, moving everything over to the right. I sat down on what was going to be my side of the bed, the small box on the mattress beside me. I readjusted myself so I was sitting cross-legged on the bed and began going through the box. I put my journal and my toys in the drawer, along with my birth certificate and a few small charms I picked up on my travels around the world. At the bottom of the box, I found a photo album. It had all the pictures taken during my WWE tenure. I opened the photo album to a random page, coming across a photograph of the entire crew before Vengeance. Shane, Natalie, John, Brock, Jessa, Kurt, Adriana, Rene and I all gathered around before Jessa's match to get a picture. We had Jane the makeup lady take the photograph for us. On the next page was a photograph of all of us holding the Women's title together, the four of us. Brock had taken the picture at Jessa's insistence. She was so happy to have the Divas Championship. It wasn't the Women's Championship, but it was still something for her on the SmackDown brand. I was long gone when she had to give it up to move to Raw, but I could only imagine how devastating it must have been for her. In the span of a few months, she lost her boyfriend and her title. I never understood what she saw in Brock, but she saw something. No matter how close he stayed behind her, she always seemed to be alone.
I turned the page. There was a picture of Adriana and I in high school, the two of us on the cheer-leading squad. We have no idea why there was a cheer-leading team to this day; our school didn't really have any sports teams. But Adriana and I decided to try out for fun and we got on the team. I smiled at the little red, black and white uniforms we were wearing, the red and black pompoms in our hands. I was a bad influence on Adriana; she practically dragged me kicking and screaming to graduation. I was always talking her into ditching classes to go get coffee or to go hang with this guy I hooked up with until just after I signed with WWE. He was a bad boy, the kind of guy that every girl wants to be with but doesn't want to take home. He liked to hang out in the back parking lot and smoke pot with his buddies. I tried it a time or two, but I didn't like it – it made me so paranoid. Adriana always knew; after a week or two, she started carrying body spray in her purse to keep me covered. There was another picture of the two of us on our first day at WWE. Callie took the picture. We all had rabbit ears behind each other's heads. We were all so much happier then. Things seemed simple; we had no idea what was lurking in the shadows for us back in those days.
The most recent picture in the book is a photo I took the last time I was at the show and we all went out at the end of the night. Kurt was nursing a cranberry juice, leaned against the bar with a wry smile. Adriana and Rene weren't in the picture; they'd left us early. Randy had his lips on Jessa's cheek; she looked a little embarrassed that I had taken the photo. He had his lips on her cheek but his eyes on the camera. Despite the embarrassment, it's obvious in the photo that she's relaxed and she's happy, an emotional state that is few and far between for her. Natalie and Shane were almost out of frame, but Shane and Natalie's arms were in the picture, holding up their drinks. I can't even remember the bar we were at or where we were, but it had been one of the best nights I've had in a long time.
Closing the photo album I put it into the nightstand and shut the drawer. I looked around my new surroundings, at the newest chapter of my life. It feels weird; I always thought I'd have Adriana close by all the time. I never thought we'd be separated like this. I didn't foresee any of this, but I'm not surprised she's the first of us to get married. Adriana's always had it together. She's kept me together for years. That's why it's so weird not having her close by now. I flattened the box and put it down beside me. I don't know how I'm going to adapt in Pittsburgh, but I'm hoping I can make friends quickly.