The last few months had been really eventful for both John Cena and Kate Jackson.
Since his return to the Royal Rumble in January, John had gone on to Main Event at No Way Out and Wrestlemania and was content with his career, even though he was not scheduled for a championship run. Not yet, anyway.
And for Kate, things were going pretty well. After a few months to think it over, she had decided on Rutgers University as her choice for college in the fall. It was in-state, a good school, and only a half an hour from home. Not to mention, only an hour and a half from Justin's choice of college, though it hadn't really been a deciding factor. A girl didn't choose her place of study based on where her boyfriend would be attending, now did she?
But still, for each one, there were downsides to their lives.
On John's end, his relationship with his fiancée, Liz, was severely strained by his travel schedule, which had picked up its pace again, not to mention included a filming schedule for his upcoming movie, "12 Rounds." Then again, his friendship with Kate wasn't exactly helping either.
Kate's family life wasn't nearly as flawless as her personal life, as of late. Her father was doing his best to tie up divorce proceedings in the state courts as long as he could and at the rate things were going, Kate would have her law degree by the time a hearing date was actually set.
For now, though, each was doing what they did best…
Throwing themselves into work, school, and each other, trying as hard as they could to ignore their problems at home.
Kate tried to stifle her laughter as she heard a shatter against the wall, "Was that a vase?"
"Mhmm," John concurred as more muffled screaming could be heard behind the closed door of his bedroom. "And I believe some dinnerware might have been mixed in there too."
"As long as it's not Grandma Catherine's china, I think you're okay," she mused at her friend's plight.
"Are you kidding me?" the wrestler scoffed. "Do you think I'd be stupid enough to leave that shit lying around for her to get her hands on? Pssh… that's at my mom's house."
This time, she couldn't help but laugh, "I don't give you nearly enough credit sometimes, Cena."
"Damn right," he agreed over the yelling. "How's your boyfriend doing?"
"Pretty good. I spoke to him a few days ago and he's feeling a little under the weather. Probably the virus that's been going around lately, but he'll be fine. He always is," she replied nonchalantly. "The doctor said to take it easy with working out the next few days, but God forbid he should do that."
"Please, Kate. You don't mess with a man's weights."
"As I am learning…"
Suddenly, there was another large crash on John's end of the line, followed by a multitude of much smaller ones.
"Shit…" John trailed off as the yelling began once more. "I have to go preserve what's left of my house. You're coming to the show in April in East Rutherford, right?"
"Yeah, wouldn't miss it."
"Good, because not seeing you in three months is killing me… and listening to this BITCH BREAKING MY SHIT IS KILLING ME TOO!" he yelled loudly so that his fiancée could hear him, which in Kate's book, was not a good move on the Massachusetts native's part. "And I'm sure you've lost even more weight since the last time I saw you, despite the fact you're always beautiful in my eyes."
"You're such a charmer. Why do you put up with her bullshit?" she sighed, flopping down on her bed.
"Because I love her," he sighed, as well. "When you're older, you'll understand what I mean…" he curtailed as something else smashed.
Kate winced, "Shit, that sounded like a window."
"Probably was. I'll talk to you later. Bye, Kate."
"Bye, John," Kate laughed as she hit the red button on her phone.
"Shit, Liz…" John marveled at the damage his living room had incurred as a result of her temper tantrum. "Did you leave anything whole in this house?"
"What does it matter?" the brunette-turned-blonde leered at him from the other side of the room. "It took all of this shattered glass to get your attention in the first place."
His jaw locked in place, "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"You're never home anymore, John," she complained, her feet crunching over shattered pieces of a light blue vase. "And even when you call from the road, we rarely talk for more than five minutes. But for the last hour, you've been on the phone with Kate… and I'm sure that's who you call every night too."
"What exactly are you getting at, Liz?" he crossed his arms over his chest.
"It's enough that I have to share your time with millions of other people," she explained with a huff. "But it's not fair that I have to share your time with some eighteen year old Jersey-girl you've known for less than a year now too."
"Since she's a fan of the WWE, you were already sharing time with her to begin with."
Her teeth ground together in anger, "Don't be a smartass."
"Or what?" John challenged her with cold, blue-gray eyes as he advanced towards her. "You're going to break some more of my shit? You think I don't know the routine by now, Liz?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about…"
"The hell you don't," he curled his lip in disgust. "You think you can get revenge on me by shattering vases, breaking windows, but you can't. Those can be replaced, those can be fixed… all of the important things I have aren't necessarily possessions, Liz. And the possessions I do have some attachment to aren't even in this house," he added, grabbing his car keys off of the kitchen counter and heading for the door. "So do what you want, break everything in sight, scream at the top of your lungs… blow the house up for all I care. I've got insurance. But nothing's going to change, Liz. I'm still going to be employed by the WWE. I'm still going to be on the road for the majority of the year. Most importantly, I'm still going to be friends with Kate. And there's nothing you can do about it."
After knocking on the white maple door of her daughter's bedroom, Natalie Jackson's feet began striding against the dark pink shag carpeting.
"Hey, Mom," the eighteen-year-old greeted her, barely even moving on her bed.
"Hey, Kate," the elder woman replied with a smile, eying the cell phone on her dresser. "Did you finally get a hold of John?"
She nodded, rising to a sitting position, "I did. We didn't get to talk as long as we normally do, though."
Natalie sat down on the end of her gold-brushed rose-colored comforter, "Why not?"
"Liz turned into a one-woman-wrecking crew again," Kate laughed
"Dear God, that woman needs a psychiatrist," Natalie shook her head at the thought of John's fiancée.
"You try telling John that… and see how far you get."
"No thanks. I've already got one man who is out of his mind in my life. I do not need two, thank you very much," she waved her daughter off. "Speaking of your father, he's actually agreed to sign over his fishing car to you, the Element, and will drop it off tomorrow morning, papers and all."
"The Honda Element?" Kate's eyebrows rose. "That's the car of his I actually wanted. How did you get him to…?"
Her mother smiled at her, "Easy. I just politely explained to him that we could get an injunction over this matter immediately, as it was a pressing issue, and if it got to the courts, there was a good chance he'd have to sign over one of his BMW's or Mercedes or purchase you a new car of your choosing altogether. And, well, I thought he'd see it my way."
"Way to go, Mom!" she exclaimed, clearly impressed by her mother's tactics, and high-fived her enthusiastically.
"This old dog still has a few tricks left in her," Natalie winked at her daughter. "Listen, dinner's going to be at seven tonight and your aunt's coming over. Is Justin feeling any better?"
"Last time I texted him, he was in the middle of a lengthy nap. It's pretty safe to say he'll be sleeping for a while."
She clicked her tongue, "Poor boy. I'll make him some of your grandmother's chicken soup to bring him tomorrow. He'll like that."
A smile spread across the teenager's face.
John's mother and father, not to mention siblings, couldn't stand his fiancée. In fact, the mutual disdain had extended for over a decade.
Yet she was fortunate enough to have a boyfriend her mother adored… and she couldn't blame her.
"Thanks, Mom. He will."
The following day was Saturday and that normally meant that Kate and Justin would be heading somewhere around the Monmouth, Middlesex, Ocean, or Mercer counties to bowl for travel league.
But with Justin sick, she had to make the unpleasant trek to Sea Girt all by herself. On the way back, however, she picked up her mother's homemade soup and headed for her boyfriend's house.
Despite the month being early April, the weather had remained slightly chilly, with temperatures seeming to peak around 55 degrees. The flu season had apparently carried over into the spring months, as well.
The gravel beneath the Honda Element's tires crunched as she pulled into the small house's driveway.
Justin lived with his mother, two brothers, and stepfather, whose family had owned the land, the site of a former chicken farm, for generations. In fact, the barn still existed and was home to his motorcycle storage garage.
As soon as she had settled the car into park, a woman with dark red hair waved at her from the open side door to the house.
Kate smiled. It was his mother.
His mother, Jeanine, was around her height with dark red hair and blue eyes that her oldest son had inherited. Although, he had also inherited her blue-yellow colorblindness, as well.
"Hey, Kate," she smiled from the door as Kate walked around the car. "How'd you do at travel?"
"Pretty good, but not my best," the young woman admitted. "My head's been elsewhere this week."
Jeanine nodded in understanding. Like Natalie Jackson, her divorce from her first husband had been a rough one. Justin was only nine, but her youngest son was barely three, not to mention the fact that her husband at the time was currently serving the second of ten months in prison and he was twelve years older than the twenty-nine year old mother of his children.
Plus, she also worked as the secretary for a firm of well-known divorce attorneys.
"Well, please tell your mother that I'm here to talk if she ever needs anything," she assured her son's girlfriend. "Come in, it's kind of cold out here. Justin's upstairs, in bed."
"If he's sleeping, I don't want to wake him…" Kate trailed off as the screen door shut behind her. "He can have the soup I brought later."
"You brought him soup?" Jeanine asked as she shut the other door, as well. "That's so sweet of you."
"Not me, my mom."
"What a sweet woman. Honey, your father is an idiot. But I suppose you already knew that."
Kate couldn't help but laugh, "I did."
"Here…" her boyfriend's mother took the paper bag from her hands and scurried into the kitchen. "I'll get this warmed up on the stove and then you can take it up to him yourself. He's been asking if you called all day."
"Really?"
"Yep," Jeanine nodded as she poured the contents of the Tupperware into a pot. "That boy misses you something fierce. He'll be glad to see you."
"Good… because I missed him."
"Knock, knock…" the blonde whispered, balancing a plastic tray in her hands in the doorway of her boyfriend's bedroom.
"Hey," he smiled through his raspy voice, using his elbows to prop himself up against his headboard.
"I would have knocked," she began as she approached his bedside, "But it's pretty difficult to balance this tray."
Justin managed a weak laugh, "I appreciate the effort. You did just fine."
"I come baring presents," Kate wiggled her eyebrows, placing the tray in his lap. "My mom's chicken soup… well, actually, it's my grandmother's recipe. So… my mom's version of my grandmother's chicken soup. Kind of. I think."
The sick teenager couldn't help but chuckle as he reached for the spoon, "Thank you… and your mom… and your grandmother."
"You're welcome… from all of us."
Despite the fact that his normally-gelled hair was matted to his face by a light sweat and his illness had left him paler than usual, it was easy to see why she had been physically attracted to him in the first place.
"I'm glad you're here, Kate," he noted as she pulled his desk chair to his bedside and sat down.
And in that moment, Kate understood exactly what John had been talking about the day before.
The blonde placed her hand lightly on his arm and smiled, "Me too."
A/N: So it was totally NOT COOL of me to wait over two months to update this story. But now that I'm back to my normal routine, work and vacation aside, expect more updates in the near future. I plan on having this story end around September 2008 in terms of the timeframe. I don't know when I'm actually going to finish the story though. That's up in the air. I kind of know what I want to happen though.
But as part of my triple update, I had to get MTW done. I just had to.
Shameless plug for my newest one-shot. It's Jeff/OC. It's called Hollywood's Not America. I like it. I think you will too. Read, review... you know the deal! :-)
Shout outs:
Inday, Enigmatic Lotus Leaf, Fozzy-Floozy, Fighter37, JCJF.lover, Johnny, Simply Priceless, xtobelovedx, nobody knows cig, Queen Chaos-Hardy, goddessofthenite, Orton Addict, dj-ssdd, Cena-holic8, jada951, giftiebee, cassymae, purplefeather21, AngelsDestiny22, Pink Sugar Lips, lauraxxx, w8ing4rain, kymb92, xxHungryeyesxx, NikMick, ThatGirl54, aphotshot, and AzMiGu.
Wow, thank God I didn't try that all in one breath!
You guys are awesome. I hope you liked this chapter. I think it's a better one than I've written in a while.
Read and review, people!
Danielle