It was a long couple minutes for CJ while she stared at the oven waiting for the last thirty seconds on her frozen pizza to go by. She was hungry and nervous, Dean's silence wasn't making her feel any better. He hadn't resurfaced from the bathroom and she was beginning to suspect that he had either passed out(even though he didn't seem like the type to pass out because he knocked somebody up), or left using the fire escape connected to her bedroom window. She wouldn't be surprised if she never heard from him again, but she worried that it would hurt the Shield dynamic between the guys if she ran to Seth and Seth took it out on Dean.
She didn't give the oven a chance to ring out the first round of beeping, having the timer and the oven itself shut off as soon as the timer reached zero. Once she had the pizza out of the oven and sliced using the pizza cutter that she didn't even know she had until she opened a the cabinet where the paper plates were, CJ took a seat on the couch and turned on the TV. It wasn't until five minutes later that Dean sat beside her and took one of her pizza slices.
"Stealing from the pregnant bitch. Classy." CJ tried lightening the obvious tension with a joke, but Dean only nodded and continued eating. She noticed that he had taken off his jacket, which told her that he intended on hanging around, which was good.
"I'm the classiest motherfucker alive." Dean spoke with a full mouth, waiting until he had finished his pizza slice to smile down at her. "So you're going to keep it?"
"That's the plan. Your thoughts?"
"I wish you wouldn't." Dean mumbled, looking away when she shut off the TV and put her plate down.
"I'm sorry, I think I misheard you. Repeat that?"
"I wish you weren't keeping it. But don't think it's me not wanting to be a father, because I do. I just don't think that we're ready for such a huge responsibility."
"So because you're unsure, I have to kill my baby?" CJ asked, doing her best to keep her tone even.
"I thought it was ours?"
"Well when you call 'our'-" she made air quotation marks. "-baby an 'it', I kind of her the feel that you don't want to claim him or her as your child. Therefore, the baby is mine." CJ explained, keeping her icy blue gaze on his glacier-like eyes. They were both obviously furious with one another, and now CJ just wanted him gone.
"What about your career? Wrestling is the one thing that you know you love, and you're going to give it up?"
"It's not my fault you wouldn't use a condom." She argued, poking Dean's chest hard enough to make him wince. "So, if you think about it, you forced me to give it up when you knocked me up."
"Don't poke me like that again, and don't blame this-" He pointed at her stomach "-all on me. It takes two to tango, sweetheart."
"Well good thing it only takes one to give birth." CJ muttered, looking away from Dean and crossing her arms.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Dean asked, eyes wide with offense.
"I don't need you, Dean. In case you haven't noticed, I've done just fine on my own in the past."
"That's a damn lie and you know it." He argued, standing and grabbing his coat off the back of the couch. "But if you believe that, then don't call me when you need my help."
"I won't!" CJ called as the door slammed shut behind Dean, then she took a deep breath as she rubbed her stomach. "We don't need him, because we have Seth."
But why did him leaving hurt so much?
"Wait, CJ, calm down." Adam tried consoling her, but CJ was hysterical. He didn't like hearing her like this, either. It hurt his heart that she was out of sorts and he couldn't hold her in his arms and make it all better. "I can't help you if you don't take a couple deep breaths and start from the beginning."
"The beginning?" CJ asked and Adam nodded, flashing an apologetic smile to a couple of his cast members who were looking at him quizzically.
"Yes, kiddo, the beginning. That's where stories start, right?" He heard her sniffle and felt his frown deepen. This was obviously too important that it couldn't wait, CJ was hurting and he knew that this was emotional pain. She wouldn't cry this hard if it was purely physical. "Deep breaths, Chrissie."
"I'm pregnant, Adam."
"Honey, that's great." He didn't understand how getting pregnant would spark such an emotional pain, but he knew that it wasn't good for the baby. "Isn't it?"
"Dean left me. We argued and he left me."
"Did he doubt that it was his?"
"He wanted me to get rid of it because we weren't ready, I guess. He tried saying it was because he didn't want me to throw away my career, but I think he was just trying not to be a bigger dick." She explained, and Adam felt himself go for the fake gun on his hip. He was so pissed off with Dean Ambrose, it was unbelievable. It was bad enough that he had to spend his next off days hunting down Chris, but now he got to call Dean and verbally tear him a new asshole. Nobody made his little girl cry and got away with it. "I don't know what to-"
"Kiddo, everything is going to be fine. You're on good terms with Seth, right?" Adam asked, looking around the set to avoid glaring a hole through the back of Emily's head.
"Yeah."
"Call him. Go to Iowa if you have to. You have to calm down, though, Chrissie. It's not healthy for you or the baby to be all hysterical."
"Okay. I'm sorry for-"
"No, don't be sorry. You'll come before work every time. Call Seth, get into a good mindset, and get some sleep. I love you, kiddo."
"Love you, too, dad. Thank you."
"Don't thank me. Just do what I said and call me in the morning."
"You got it. Goodnight."
"G'night, Chrissie." Adam spoke before hanging up and tucking his phone into his pocket as Beth walked up cradling Lyric.
"Is CJ okay?" She asked in a hushed tone, concern obvious in her eyes.
"She going to be. We're going to be grandparents and I'm going to kill Dean Ambrose." Adam informed before kissing Beth's forehead and then Lyric's head.
"Wait, what?"
After talking to Seth for two hours about everything but Dean, CJ was feeling better. Not completely healed, but knowing that she had Seth and Adam supporting her made everything better.
"...and then Roman looks at the kid and she starts crying. Like, bawling her eyes out and it looked like she had little rivers on her face. The big man had no idea what to do and he looked so uncomfortable, you couldn't not laugh." Seth finished his story and CJ smiled, grateful that she and Seth were FaceTiming so he could see that she was attentively listening and she didn't have to talk much.
"Such a jerk. Did the big man beat you up for laughing?"
"I bet you wish he did."
"Eh. Maybe." CJ shrugged to the best of her ability, giggling when Seth sighed exaggeratedly.
"Are you joining me in Iowa?" He asked, pushing his hair back.
"Do you want me in Iowa?" She answered his question with a question, biting her lip in slight uncertainty.
"If I didn't want you here, I wouldn't have asked. We can switch out my bed with your fancy one and you're a dog person, so that's all good. You won't be alone while I'm on the road, and my parents are just down the street." Seth rambled, smile on his face as he spoke. As strong as her feelings were for Dean, Seth was the most adorable man she'd ever met, and the fact that he was so excited about her being in Iowa with him made her heart sing.
"You've thought this all through."
"Very throughly."
"I've got to get my physical therapy stuff transferred, hire movers-"
"I'll hire the movers. I want you here before I go to Europe next week." Seth demanded, and CJ nodded. "Thank you, babe. One more thing?"
"Yes, Seth?"
"Girlfriend?" He asked and she playfully pointed at herself before pointing at him on the screen.
"Boyfriend?"
"Yes, babe. That means I can tweet one of the many screenshots I took."
"Hopefully I'm not all gross and crying." CJ mumbled, avoiding eye contact with Seth while he made a face at her.
"You're beautiful, no matter what."
"As my boyfriend, you're obligated to say that." She laughed and Seth chuckled before Kevin got in front of his face. "Hi, Kevin."
Instead of flying back to Vegas they night, Dean booked a flight for the morning and got a hotel room in Syracuse. He couldn't believe that CJ would pick a kid who wasn't even born yet over him and her career, but she did. It hurt him to have to do it, but he had to make her realize that she wasn't getting everything she wanted anymore. Not from him.
He knew that she was probably beyond hurt, and she was probably going to call Adam in tears, but it had to be done. He wanted to have kids with CJ one day, but never this soon. He wanted to give the whole "All-American", white picket fence, thing a try; even though that wasn't what he was raised around. He ultimately wanted his kids to have what he didn't: an active father figure. How active would he be if he's on the road two hundred nights a year? Not very.
But through everything he told himself to justify what he wanted, he couldn't stop the guilty feelings from flooding his system. He just walked out on the woman he loved while she was carrying his child, all because she wanted to keep it. She wanted to have his child, and he pushed her away like a real douche. Everyone is going to say its because he was scared and, frankly, he didn't mind that. He'd go as far as to say that he didn't believe it was his, even though he knew in his heart that it was, to get the media off his back about. Should this pregnancy become a big deal, he had a plan. Even if it destroyed her image, the media would stay away from him if the attention was directed to him. She didn't have a career image to uphold anymore, but he did. He wasn't going to let anyone take away what he worked so hard to achieve. Even if he loved her more than he loved himself.
He only assumed that his heart hurt so much because doing the right thing had a habit of hurting all parties involved.
If you were rioting for Seth, then this was definitely the chapter for you. Sethie's winning the race at this moment in time.
How about Raw last night? I had a good time watching after a long day of work.
Thank you to ArtisticLullaby, ChelleLew, UntilNeverDawns, angelsdee327, Britney-xx, Sarcastic Nightmare, TaijiaK, and Dixiewinxwrites12 for reviewing the last chapter!