With only one televised appearance under their belts, Sonya and Mandy obviously had not been in contention to appear at the Takeover event the night before Summerslam. As they were not booked, they had been allowed to stay home in Orlando. They knew that, all being well, this weekend would be the last time they watched pay-per-view events in their rented apartment. By the end of the following month, the purchase of their new place was expected to be completed, and they would have moved into it.
To mark the occasion, Sonya had decreed that they ought to enjoy to enjoy a night off their diets while watching Takeover. Persuading Mandy hadn't exactly been the most difficult task in the world, and they had ordered in an enormous pizza from their favourite local place, with a large tub of ice cream each for dessert.
By the time the main event of the night had come around, they had both felt too stuffed to move. Sprawling together on the couch, they had watched Lacey Evans and Elena D'Agostino tear the house down for nearly half an hour before Elena was eventually able to retain her championship, getting a three count after damn near kicking Lacey's head off her shoulders with her superkick finishing move.
The show had ended with both women receiving a standing ovation from the crowd, along with 'women's wrestling' and 'NXT' chants as Elena left the ring, with the closing shot being her standing in front of the stage, holding up her championship belt.
With the show over with, Mandy had flicked through the channels until she found one airing episodes of one of their favourite sitcoms. A few laughs felt like the ideal way to end the night.
An hour later, Sonya was considering suggesting going to bed after the episode they were currently watching. A good feed usually made her sleepy, and tonight was no exception, so much so that she began to drift off, leaning against Mandy as they cuddled.
The sound of Mandy's phone ringing startled Sonya to the point where she literally jumped out of her girlfriend's arms. "Fucking hell. Who's that at this time of night?" she grumbled as she sat up.
"I don't know," Mandy said in a puzzled tone, leaning forward to pick the phone up off the coffee table. "It's Lacey," she announced once she saw the name on the screen.
Sonya raised her eyebrows, wondering if her instinct on what the call might be about was right. She figured she would soon find out enough, as Mandy answered the call on speaker phone.
"Hey, Lacey. Amazing match tonight," Mandy said to her friend.
"Mandy, is Sonya with you?" Lacey asked, sounding excited.
"Of course she is. You're on speaker. What's going on?" Mandy asked, picking up on the excitement.
"Hunter just told me I'm getting called up! I'm going to be on Raw Monday night!"
Mandy squealed in delight, while a broad smile spread across Sonya's face.
"Congrats, girl! You deserve it!" Sonya said loudly, making sure the phone picked her up properly.
"Thank you! I can't believe it. I'm so happy right now," Lacey said.
"You're going to be such a star on Raw," Mandy said. "But what are we going to do without you?"
"Oh god, I know," Lacey said. "I'm going to miss you guys so much. I was so looking forward to being there while you guys started taking NXT by storm."
"Aww," Mandy cried. "While we do that, you'll be doing the same on Raw. You'll be champion within a year, I'm calling it now."
"Well, I don't know about that, but we live in hope, right?" Lacey said.
"Do you know what you're going to be doing Monday night?" Sonya asked.
"No. No idea at all. Hunter and Coach Paige were there when I got backstage after the match. Hunter told me he needed a word, dead serious like. I thought I must have fucked up somehow in the ring and they were about to lay into me for it. Then Paige said if I had any plans to head home, I'd better change them. I asked what she meant, and Hunter said he would see me at Raw Monday night. I felt like my legs were going to buckle under me. I couldn't believe it."
"That's such an amazing story," Mandy said with teary eyes.
"I honestly am so happy for you," Sonya said.
"Thanks guys," Lacey said emotionally. "Listen, I'd better go. I've got plenty more calls I want to make."
Mandy chuckled. "I'm sure you have. Congrats again. We'll speak to you soon, and we'll be watching you on Monday Night!"
Lacey and Sonya said their goodbyes, then the call was ended.
"Bless her, she really does deserve it," Sonya said.
"Absolutely," Mandy nodded as she put her phone back on the coffee table. "I'm so sad to see her go, though. Apart from you, obviously, Lacey is my best friend in WWE. I feel like I'm hardly going to see her now."
"I know you're close," Sonya said sympathetically. "Realistically, yeah, we'll see less of her, but that doesn't mean we have to lose touch with her. Once we're in our apartment, we'll have a housewarming party and we'll be sure to invite Lacey."
Mandy smiled. "That sounds like a nice idea. We should definitely do that. We can have Z, Bay, Charlotte, all of our friends over."
"Sounds like a plan," Sonya said, looking forward to it already.
"It's a shame we can't be at Raw with Lacey," Mandy said. "I'd love to be able to see her having the time of her life on her first night."
"Me too," Sonya said. "But instead we get to spend all day Monday furniture and appliance shopping. What could be better than that?" she said with an eye roll.
Mandy laughed. "You're not selling it to me. At least we'll get to watch Raw when we're done."
After a long day of shopping, Sonya and Mandy had arrived home with just enough time to get comfortable on the couch before Raw went on air. They were both feeling exhausted, but they could reflect on the fact that they had at least ordered the majority of the furnishings they were going to need for their new apartment. They had also stopped for dinner on the way home, saving Mandy the trouble of cooking anything.
Understandably, the highlight of the Raw episode for them was going to be seeing how their friend Lacey Evans made her debut. They hadn't spoken to her since the call where they had learned about her call up, so they were totally in the dark as to what was going to happen.
It turned out that they had to wait for more than hour to see Lacey on-screen. When her appearance came, it did so as a surprise, particularly for the audience, who knew nothing about the call up ahead of time.
The segment in question began with Kurt Angle, Raw's General Manager, being interviewed by Charly Caruso. As Kurt finished speaking and walked away, the camera panned around to follow him. Coming in the opposite direction was Lacey, dressed, as ever, in one of her classy vintage outfits. This one was a red dress, complimented by a white wide brimmed hat and white velvet gloves. The audience in the arena cheered her appearance on the big screen.
"There she is! Look at her!" Sonya exclaimed, delighted for her friend.
"That pop though," Mandy said. "Son, I'm so happy for her."
Lacey looked at Kurt as she elegantly walked by him, appearing less than impressed with what she saw. It appeared that he was considered a nasty. She continued along the hallway, with the camera panning around to follow her.
A short distance away, a dark haired woman was standing with her back to Lacey and the camera, talking to a group of backstage officials. The dark haired woman was also wearing a vintage style outfit, consisting of a dark grey dress with a matching fascinator style hat. The look was complimented by elbow length black leather gloves. Sensing someone approaching, the woman turned around, revealing herself to be Lucy Thorne.
"Oh shit!" Mandy exclaimed as the crowd went off again. In the eighteen months that Thorne had been the Chairwoman of WWE, she had never made an appearance as a character on TV.
"I've seen her wearing vintage outfits like that on Instagram before," Sonya said. "I never even considered it in relation to Lacey's character though."
Lacey approached the boss, and for once the look of disapproval wasn't present on her face. She actually seemed to like what she saw. "Classy outfit," she commented.
"You too," Lucy said, slightly nodding her approval. "Good luck in your match tonight. I'll be watching."
"A lady makes her own luck. I'm sure you know that," Lacey said.
"Very true," Lucy said, looking like she appreciated the response.
Lacey continued along the hallway, and the shot changed to show the commentary team.
"Holy shit, Mand. They're giving her an angle with Lucy Thorne?" Sonya speculated.
"It sure looks like it! I can't believe it. This is going to be huge for her. Like, is Lucy going to manage her or something? Surely there's no way she was dressed up like that just to do that little segment, with nothing more coming of it?"
"You wouldn't imagine so, would you?" Sonya agreed. "This has to be a huge push. As far as I know, Lucy has never been on a WWE show before. For her to decide this is the right moment to do it has to mean she sees something in Lacey."
"I told her she would be champion within a year. I'm changing my prediction," Mandy said. "I'm saying she'll be champion by the end of this year."
That gave Lacey four months to get the job done. Even with that timescale, Sonya couldn't argue with Mandy, assuming that Lucy Thorne was going to have some kind of on-screen relationship with Lacey. She couldn't imagine that WWE would have pulled the trigger on that merely to have her jobbing every week.
Later in the show, Lacey had her debut main roster match, making quick work of a local wrestler in a squash match. After the three count, Lucy Thorne was shown watching on a monitor backstage, nodding her appreciation for what she had just witnessed.
"Oh my, I'm so here for this," Mandy said.
Sonya laughed. "I know, right? I feel more excited about Lacey's debut than ours."
Now it was Mandy's turn to laugh. "You won't be saying that when we show up for the TV taping on Wednesday. The Golden Gloves are here, baby."
"Hell yeah we are," Sonya said, leaning in for a kiss.
A/N: Special thanks to everyone who left a review on the previous chapter. You guys are awesome.
What did you think of Lacey's Raw debut? I had to put this chapter in, as I'm considering a future spin-off story in this world with Lacey as the main character. Who would like to see that one day? Let me know!
Next time, as Mandy just said, it'll be time for the Golden Gloves to debut on NXT TV. What do you think they will do on their first appearance?