Class for her had started at 7:45 in the morning, of course she didn't go to sleep the night before. She had always had an issue with insomnia and after Christine's death it only got worse. Being pissed didn't help her case either. She had taken a shower at around five, and had breakfast thirty minutes afterwards. Sporting her tight, black and purple leggings and a dark purple dance shirt with a black sports bra and her ring boots, she planned to take some hits. She stood in the corner, watching people grapple at each other on a blue mat. She was stretching, keeping her head down. She'd already gotten into a few conversations, all of them seemed nice, though a red headed girl named Amber seemed extra nice. She had made a mental note to talk to Amber more later on during break.
She was doing calf stretches, feeling her muscles tense but give way to the pulling. It was truly reviving to her.
"Hey, that's some nice stretching you're doing." A deep voice came from overhead. She paused and glanced up to see their instructor, Bret, standing over her. She stood up immediately, smiling up at him.
"Thank you, sir."
"You ready to do some grappling?" He asked her and she grinned almost evilly. Though dancing was in her blood, she used to grapple with her father and her brother. When they were teenagers, Christine had showed her a few moves. She only hoped she could remember them all.
"Yeah, let's do this!" She began to bounce back and forth, warming her muscles up some more before hoping over to the mat. A blonde haired beauty she hadn't spoken to yet stepped up. She was thin, sporting a matching PINK sweat set and extremely tall. She stood at almost 6 feet, Auburn was sure of it. She looked up being dazzled enough to be caught off guard. She was easily tossed off the mat, grunting as she hit the floor with a hard thud.
"I thought you said you were ready?" The blonde taunted, smirking at Auburn who gave a growl in response. She staggered to her feet, stepping back onto the mat and crouching slightly. Her muscles tensed and prepared to step out of the way. The blonde lurched forward, bending to meet Auburn's height. She took the chance, charging forward and leaping over her, pushing on the blonde's head for more momentum and sending the blonde stumbling forward. There was a bunch of cheering as Auburn hit the ground in a crouch before she turned and noticed the advancing woman.
They met head on this time, colliding into one another. For being as thin as the blonde was, she was certainly heavy and almost overpowered Auburn just by simply leaning on her. Auburn watched the ground, straining to push the blonde back before she found herself off the mat. In a quick move she charged forward, crashing her shoulder into her opponents gut and reared up slightly before slamming her down on her back. The blonde woman seemed to be dazed as she groaned. Bret counted down, claiming Auburn as the winner.
Auburn helped the blonde stand, only to be pushed away and glared at. Bret clapped his hands together loudly, making Auburn jump slightly.
"Okay, everybody! Round it up, group in," he said, moving his hand in a clock wise motion above his head. A light dip in the mat rippled beside her and she looked to find a choppy headed red head beside her, smirking and sizing her up.
"What do you think is happening?" She asked, resting her elbow on Auburn's shoulder. Auburn shrugged slightly, her shoulder being weighed down.
"Eh, it's probably just another lecture or maybe he's going over the rules of break? By the way, you did amazing on the mat, Amber," Auburn said, her brows arching as she smiled at her. Though Amber was about an inch taller than her, she was also thinner with little to no muscle definition. She had to admit, she was impressed.
"Don't doubt the Irish, sister." Amber winked, pulling a fake Irish accent and started walking forward. Auburn followed closely behind her new found friend and hiding in the back.
"Alright, as you all should have noticed in today's series of paperwork, it said that out exercise sessions are often taught by another teacher, most likely a hard core trainer of the WWE itself, right? Well I think you are in for a treat. For the next month your own personal trainer is goin to be the Lunatic Fringe himself, Dean Ambrose!" Bret announced as if he were a ring-side announcer. Auburn's smile all but vanished, her milky skin paling even more as she saw a disheveled crop of brown hair falling messily over a blue eyed, 6'4" man who spotted a black wife beater and blue basket ball shorts. She swallowed back her mortification enough to slink back even more. Amber noticed, her nose crinkling in confusion.
"What's gotten into you?"
"It's him." Auburn groaned, a few fake sobs escaping and became masked by the echoing of excited whoops and cheers.
"Yeah, I know right! It's amazing,"
"No. No, you don't understand,"
"What am I not understanding here?"
"I threw my drink on him last night." She whispered into Amber's ear. Amber's jaw dropped, her head slowly turning.
"What?!" She squealed, the echo of her high pitched voice making Auburn wince as she noticed Dean's head turn towards the sound. Her eyes met his briefly, and she quickly ducked out of sight.
"Shut your mouth!" She hissed, opening her mouth to speak again when their conversation became interrupted by his gruff voice.
"Thank you, Mr. Hart for that honorable introduction. Now, before we get started on our session I'd like to do an...orientation...of sorts. I'm gonna go around the room, and ask you to tell me a bit about yourself and why you are here. Firstly, my name is Dean Ambrose, then again you all probably knew that. I came to the WWE to make something of myself, from a very young age I wanted to be a wrestler and make it big and with a lot of hard work and determination that's what I became; one of the baddest superstars of the WWE, now let's start with you." He said, pointing to the blonde that had just lost to the grappling match. Auburn noticed that she was practically pouring her breasts out for him. Rolling her eyes she decided not to listen to any of this, or at least not really.
She'd listen enough to learn everyone's names, but not their stories. Everyone had a story and no one really cared about it. She had discovered that the blonde's name was Brooke, she was evidently joining with her boyfriend in order to be the baddest power couple of the WWE universe. Dean didn't seem impressed by that answer, but he did accepted it. She noticed as the stories droned on and on he kept glancing her way and his hands got more antsy. She raised a curious brow, seeing the way he was barely able to control his attention span. It was almost cute in a way. It was Amber's turn, the crowd parted so they could see her and suddenly Auburn found herself exposed.
"Hi, I'm Amber Davies, I'm from Rhode Island. I don't know what to say, really, besides I've been a huge fan of wrestling ever since I was a little girl. My uncle was in NXT before he found out he had cancer and passed away and I really looked up to him, so I guess I'm just following in his footsteps." She said, her voice wavering at the end, becoming thicker with each word, Auburn touched her shoulder and offered her an empathetic smile.
All eyes fell on her in that moment. She blushed slightly, wishing she could sink into the darkness. She cleared her throat before gathering up the courage to speak.
"Hi everyone. I'm Auburn Helsic..." she paused for a second, her mind drawing a blank. "I'm sorry, I guess I don't have that much to say about myself," she looked down nervously, suddenly feeling overly aware of herself. She heard a cocky giggle and glared in the direction of it.
"Oh, come on Auburn. Surely you have a reason for being here? After all, you're surrounded by people who are prepared to put their blood, sweat and tears into this path that they chose. So what's your story?" Dean goaded her, mocking her slyly. He was smirking halfway at her but his eyes were filled with a raging accusation. She looked at him, not even bothering to hide the hurt she was feeling.
"Fine. I'm from a small town in West Virginia called Charles Town. It's quaint, and quiet and boring, but it's a community. A community where I and my best friend grew up together. I guess you could say she and I were theatrical people, I loved to perform, but in a more alternative way. She was the wrestling fan, like she had everyone's merchandise and she knew every move from her favorite superstars. Unfortunately she developed a lung disease when she was very, very young called Sarcoidosis. Originally the doctors thought it was lung cancer, they only gave her a month to live and that day that she was given the actual diagnosis she called me. June of last year, her diagnosis changed, but not her expiration date," she paused, taking a deep breath in to steady the shaking in her voice. She stared into Dean's intense gaze as he waited to hear the rest. If he had any sympathy for her, he didn't show it.
"Anyway, she called me the day she found out the diagnosis and asked me to come over. I did,
And I even brought her favorite Randy Orton blanket. We were watching the pay-per-view when she suddenly turned to me and started talking about how she always wanted to be a wrestler, and how she had always hoped that I would have joined her in the wrestling world as her tag team partner. I told her that I would, because for her I would have done anything. So she made me promise that even though she was dying, I had to join. She said that even though she couldn't be here to fight by my side in person, she could always be there in spirit. So I promised her. July of last year she died. After her funeral I was given a package with a pamphlet, and a congratulatory letter. She made it work, she bought a way for me into this place. I guess you could say that I'm here for a promise, a promise I couldn't get out of for a few reasons, but honestly my heart is just as into this—if not, more so—as everybody else's. I'm here to see Christine's dream through, because she deserved it."
The room was quiet, nobody made eye contact with her besides Dean, and even his gaze softened after hearing the story. Not by much, but there was some softness there. She bit the inside of her cheek, stopping the tears from wrinkling in her eyes. She could hear Amber sniffle beside her.
"Well, that's a face story if ever I've heard one," Bret broke the silence first. The room slowly melted back into a more normal flow as everyone nodded and loudly agreed. The gap closed, she sunk behind everyone. "Alright, well, it's time for their work out session. Dean, everyone, get ready to sweat!" He said cheerfully, bringing morale up as best as he could. Dean threw his head to the side, the universal sign for "this way" directing everyone to follow him. She did as she was told but dragged behind. She needed to get her mind off of things before she completely broke down.
