"I had a great time!" Stephanie exclaimed, embracing Randy tightly. "You should've seen me, I was riding the waves like you wouldn't believe. If the Beach Boys had been there, they definitely would've done a song about me."

"That's great," Randy answered, his voice tight and his face impassable.

Stephanie took notice of his expression almost immediately. She put her hands on his arms and stared at his face for a moment. "What's wrong?"

"Can we talk?"

"Uh oh. That's how all romantic comedies go. Am I suddenly going to find myself on a romantic journey, with a modern-day Prince Charming waiting for me at the end? Because if that's the plot for this one, I want it to be in England, I don't know why, but England seems like a good place. It must be all the accents."

She knew he was being serious, but she was Stephanie and seriousness wasn't exactly her strong suit. He place his hand on the small of her back and led her to his locker room. As soon as she and Chris had gotten to their destination, they had headed straight for the arena, despite the fact that she had wanted to stop at every single fast food place on the way to get some kid's meals so she would have toys for her car in case she got stuck in traffic. Chris refused every time.

Randy opened the door for her and she walked in before him, since Randy was ever the gentleman. She was not one to be awkward and simply fell against the couch, her back hitting the back of the couch with a thud. Randy sat next to her, much more quietly, and not as casually, and gave her a small, wary smile.

"let's try to make this breakup as nice as possible," Stephanie said, "I'll try not to cry, but if you see my lip quivering, watch out for the water, I'm talking Hoover Dam potential. One time, Chris had to have me fifteen tissues just to dry my eyes. Then he refused to throw them away, claiming they were too disgusting. Coming from the guy that eats food that I've spit on, and shares gum with me. Yeah, I've just about sufficiently grossed myself out. I must stop doing that."

"Huh? I'm not breaking up with you," Randy told her.

"Ok, that's a huge weight. I thought that was it. You were starting with the speech, and I thought to myself, 'Man, he can't even come up with a unique speech, like he suddenly found out he had a clown fetish and needed to join the circus,' but nothing that good ever happens to me. I can never tell someone that my ex ran off to the circus. Kind of tragic, don't you think?"

"Yeah…tragic," Randy said, his eyebrows creasing as he regarded her. "I just wanted to tell you how much I missed you while you were away."

"Oh, aren't you just buttered toast!"

"Buttered toast?" Randy queried, his face now more confused than ever.

"Well, everyone says, 'You're so sweet,' and that's not fair to the non-sweet food, so buttered toast means 'You're really nice and non-sweet.' Sugar gives you cavities after all. And nobody wants a mouth full of rotting teeth."

"Ok, I guess I'm buttered toast then," Randy snickered.

"Don't laugh, it makes perfect sense," she said, exaggerating a pout for his benefit.

"To you, and Chris, I'm sure it makes a ton of sense, but to a simple mind like myself, it sounds like a ton of gibberish."

"No, gibberish would be the language that Chris and I made up. For no real particular reason, simply because we had too much time on our hands and way too much food in our stomachs to do anything productive whatsoever."

"That's not all I wanted to tell you."

"Oh, you've got a watermelon then?" she said happily, clapping her hands.

"Dare I ask?"

"A watermelon means you have more than one topic, like watermelons have more than one seed, and you need to spit them out, like you need to spit out what you say. Unless you get seedless watermelons, but those are unnatural, or at least that's what I think. Is that called genetically altered fruit? My subscription to Science Today ran out a few months ago and I'll be damned if I don't know anything going on in the scientific community. I totally made up that watermelon thing though, because you seemed to genuinely like the way that I explained things."

"Oh yeah, they're great," Randy said, then added, "If I could understand you half the time. You talk faster than anyone I've ever known."

"I will see that compliment, and raise you, me shutting up so you may speak, so speak."

"Fine…I missed you and--"

"Psst," Stephanie said with a loud whisper. "You told me that already. Don't repeat what the audience knows."

"Fine, and that missing you made me realize that I, Randy Orton, love you, Stephanie McMahon. Or to put it in simpler terms, I'm in love with you. Or to put it in terms that you might understand, you are the Kelly Kapowski to my Zack Morris. Did that reference go over well, I've been wracking my brain for days thinking of an appropriate reference."

Stephanie sat there, and for the first time in her life, she didn't have a thing to say. Oh sure, in her mind, she was going over every second that led up to this, but outside, no words. It was like that episode of the Twilight Zone where the guy made a bet that he could keep silent for one year and had his vocal chords cut in order to win. Stephanie felt like she had had her vocal chords cut.

She finally choked out a response, "That's a perfect reference. I would've also accepted the Juliet to my Romeo, or the Marvin Harrison to my Peyton Manning."

"A football reference, see, I knew I should've thought broader."

"It was perfect," Stephanie said, "Absolutely perfect. Do you want me to say it back?"

"It would be nice."

"Well, can I think about it? You dumped it on me like you wanted to get rid of it, and it's like a dead fish that you haven't yet gutted. I just need time to gut the fish and see if there's something that I can cook with it."

"So you're saying you just want to think about what I said, time to process it."

"Isn't that what I said?"

"Not in so many words, no."

"Oh, well, the intent was there."

"I'm sure it was, but go ahead, process it, and get back to me."

"Yeah, I'll run it through the old processor. She hasn't let me down yet. Actually, no, that's not right. She hasn't gotten anything correct yet, which explains the fact of why I'm not married, and why I have no kids, although, I'm like a big kid, but I can hardly ground myself without letting myself go do something I'm not allowed to do because I'm such a sucker for myself."

"If you decide you DO love me, just tell me, you don't have to take the scenic route to get there," Randy told her, pushing her out the door.

"But what's the fun if you don't see the sites. I mean, can't I even go see the prehistoric forest if I tell you that I love you. You really can't miss that classic stop."

"Nope, straightforward."

"No fun!" Stephanie said, as Randy closed the door on her. "You'll regret that buddy, regret!"

"No, I won't," Randy called back.

Stephanie laughed and walked to her office for the evening. She had yet to run into her parents so tonight had already been going well, and then Randy had told her that he loved her. That was pretty big, that was really, really big. That was Mt. Everest big, and she didn't know if she could get a sherpa for this kind of exploration.

She pushed open the door to her office and went inside, sitting behind her desk. The leather felt cool against the part of her back that was exposed. She sighed and leaned back and suddenly, without warning, she found that she was crying. They were decidedly happy tears, but they were mixed in with a few sad ones as well. Her tears weren't discriminatory, they socialized with each other.

The last time a man had told her they loved her, it was Hunter. Chris didn't count, because he loved her as a best friend, and he told her he loved her all the time. But Hunter had been the last man that she dated that had told her, he loved her, and that had turned out so badly. The sting of that relationship had left her permanently bruised. She wouldn't say scarred, because she didn't really care about it, but it still bruised her ego a little bit, that she had allowed herself to be duped like that.

It was this scene that Chris walked in on. He didn't announce his presence, as he never had, and never felt the wont to do. He had just come back from greeting his girlfriend hello, and what was the second thing he had to do? Why, go talk to Stephanie of course. Because he could barely go five minutes without talking to her. Such was the folly of having someone so close to you.

"Stephanie, why are you crying?" Chris asked, sitting on the desk. "Don't you even tell me something like the stopped making marshmallows or something. My poor heart couldn't take that."

"Randy…" Stephanie said, then sniffled loudly, starting a fresh round of tears.

"I'm going to need more than that, because I can come up with a hundred different scenarios, and for some reason, none of them are good. It's like my brain has turned off the optimism switch and turned on the pessimism switch. It's not really working for me."

"He said…oh God…he said…"

"What?"

"He said it…he said we had to talk, and you know what that means, and--" She didn't get to finish her sentence because in a flash, Chris was gone. Stephanie looked around for a moment. "Snooks, if you pulled the Invisible Man thing on me, now is not the time."

But Chris was halfway down the hallway and storming into Randy's locker room. Randy, thinking it was Stephanie, stood up, only to be speared to the ground by Chris. Randy barely had a moment's notice before a rain of punches landed on him. Randy tried to push Chris off, but he seemed to have super-strength at the moment.

"I told you not to hurt her! I told you!"

"What!" Randy screamed, trying to block Chris's fist.

"You hurt her, and you broke up with her, and she was crying, nobody makes her cry. NOBODY! I'm going to pound your face in so much that people are going to think that your face is a steak, and then some dog is going to come after you and try to eat your face because it'll look like a treat," Chris yelled, even when he was fighting, he still have a way with words.

Stephanie rushed into the room and was shocked to see the two of them fighting, or rather, Chris fighting and Randy trying in vain to defend himself. Stephanie gasped as Chris's punch his Randy in the mouth as she could hear Chris mutter something to Randy. She went over and tried to assess the situation.

"Snooks, would you stop! Stop!"

"No! This bastard hurt you, he must pay!"

"We're not in a freaking movie, this isn't the big scene where you get to punch out the guy for my honor. God, this is like a bad Three's Company episode. Damn the mix-up."

Stephanie attempted to grab Chris's arm and accidentally hit her boyfriend. She looked away quickly, hoping that Randy hadn't noticed and pulled Chris's arm back and away from Randy. Chris was panting from anger, and he stood up, wrapping a protective arm around Stephanie.

"Come on Stephers, let's go," he said. "We won't let Randy get in our way."

She shoved his arm off. "You idiot! Why did you hit him!"

"He broke up with you!"

"No, he didn't, God Snooks, how about you let me finish a sentence before you go running out of the room like you're late for the triathlon. I'd hate to see you attack the swimming and biking parts of it."

"He didn't break up with you."

"He told me he loved me, and I needed to process it before I told him I loved him, and I do love him, and you beat him up! Snooks, this is unforgivable!"

"Well, I didn't know."

"Well, how about you listen to me next time. Get a hearing aid if it'll help, if the sound of my voice is just too damn low. You don't go running around hitting people."

"I thought that it was like Hunter…"

"You need to STOP protecting me, I have Randy now, and Randy is here to protect me, and he does a damn good job of it too. He's like Kevin Costner in "The Bodyguard," except cuter, younger, and not suffering from a series of box-office flops."

"Look, I'm--"

"I don't care, you know, have you noticed that since Randy stood up for me with my parents, they've laid off of me. That's how good a boyfriend he is. Even though my parents hate me, they know that Randy is a good catch, and they don't bother me anymore, they don't bother me! Which is more than I can say for when I was hanging around you!"

The words were said and they couldn't be taken back. Stephanie had a temper, but the temper had always been directed towards her parents, or towards Shane. Never had serious, hurtful anger been directed towards Chris. He didn't know what to make of it, and felt like a fool standing there, looking as Stephanie wrapped her arm around Randy's waist and inspected the damage done on his face. He felt like a third-wheel for the first time since he and Stephanie had become friends.

"I'm sorry I intruded. I didn't think it would be so ill-received."

"Well it was. It was like if you tried to pawn off Coco Krispies as Coco Pebbles, it's just a cheap knock-off."

"Fine, I get it Stephers," Chris said, feeling the hurt creep into him. She hadn't even regretted what she said. She hadn't regretted it. His world was reeling.

"Well good, I'm glad, now why don't you get the hell away from my boyfriend before you end up knocking some of his teeth out."

"Ok," Chris said, shell-shocked by Stephanie's behavior. He was hurt, he was more than hurt…he was downright devastated. "I should've sued you when you spilled that hot chocolate on me. I should've taken your money and then bought a boat with it, and then I could've fished a fish out of the water and kept it out in the sun and then sent it to you, so you would smell."

"Well, I would've put a dead horse-head in your bed with you!" Stephanie yelled back.

"You really hurt me Stephers," Chris said quietly. "And this time, I'm not joking."

Chris turned around and walked sullenly out of the room. Stephanie held her chin high and didn't react to what Chris was doing, or the things that had been said. Randy looked at her though and he caught the beginning of a tear that she quickly blinked back. She turned to him with a forced smile.

"I do love you Randy."

"Why did you do that Steph?" Randy asked, rubbing his aching jaw.

"If you saw your face right now, you'd do it too."

"He didn't know."

"Forget him…just forget him."

But as Stephanie turned away, seemingly looking for a first-aid kit, Randy saw that beginning of a tear reach its breaking point and slither its way down her face. She grabbed something before wiping away her tear and turning to him, the terse smile one he had only seen at the behest of her parents.

She wasn't going to forget.