The next six weeks flew by for both John and Charlie. John was busy with all the work necessary to get ready for the biggest show of the year and Charlie continued the kind of schedule she always kept. She watched WWE tv, and tried to catch Raw live.

When John looked into the camera, it always felt personal and she got mad at herself every time it happened. She hadn't told a soul except Gunnar about the whole thing, and she was beginning to wonder if it wasn't a figment of exhaustion. He didn't call, and she didn't blame him, given how she'd left it.

Two weeks before Wrestlemania, she got a call from a member of her bowling league. His wife, who was pregnant, was having some complications in her pregnancy. "I'm going to back out of the trip to 'mania and I know you didn't buy into the group trip. I was wondering if you wanted to buy my package. It has a decent ticket to the show, a ticket to Axxess and to the Hall of Fame ceremony." I'll even discount it because I know you're going to have to pay a little more for a plane ticket, and to make it an offer you can't refuse, I will dogsit.

Charlie looked at her schedule. She could trade off some work, and had a few people who owed her favors. There was no reason to say no. She wouldn't be wandering around alone, a bunch of her bowling friends would be there. "You know what, I could do with a few days away. If you'll really watch the dog, I'll pay full price for your tickets, because I'd have to pay to board him."

"Deal. Thanks Charlie, you saved my butt." He hung up.

She logged onto a travel website, to see how far she was going to be made to bend over for a seat on a plane. Pretty far, it turns out-but honestly-she didn't care. It was time she got away. It was just money.

She checked into her hotel, dropped off her bags, and met her friends at the bar. One of the girls waved her over. "We're in the hotel that the wrestlers are staying at!" She was positively giddy about it.

Charlie was less giddy. Of course they were at the wrestlers hotel. Who wouldn't love barely dressed teens and twenty-somethings skulking around the halls and screaming when they saw someone?

"Let's go over to Axxess!", one of the other girls yanked on her husband's arm. It was about that time anyway, so they grabbed a cab and went over to the arena.

She'd relaxed considerably after a couple of hours. Her friends were goofs and she was really enjoying watching them mug for the camera and get pictures with all their favorites. When they decided to get in John's line for pictures, Charlie decided it was time for a visit to the rest room, because..how weird would that be? She didn't really want to see him next in this huge space, in front of all these people, especially how she left it with him. With a lot of time to think on it,
she'd realized she'd a) been a bitch without reason and b) had judged him guilty of being shallow without knowing that was the case.

She stood back against the wall, and waited for the rest of the group to get done seeing him. She watched him flirt and flex and smile and took note of how his face lit up when a child came to him.

Then she heard a scream. Charlie looked over and saw an older man lying on the floor and a woman kneeling next to him, looking around frantically, yelling "Please, someone help my husband!"

She ran to the man, and asked the wife if she knew what was wrong, while making an initial assessment of the man who had in the blink of an eye turned into her patient. He did not have a heartbeat. The man's wife said he had a pacemaker and hadn't felt well this morning, but he'd promised his grandson they were coming, so they were here. Charlie looked up at the people who were surrounding the situation and caught the eye of one of her friends. She threw her bag to her and said "Purse patrol! Find me the AED, they've got to have one here. Call an ambulance." She rolled the man over and started CPR. The next 15 minutes were kind a blur. An AED arrived, and she was able to regain a heartbeat, but he still wasn't breathing so she was doing mouth-to-mouth until the ambulance came and took him away, along with his wife and grandson.
The crowd disbursed, and Charlie was giving her contact information to the police for their report. When she finally looked up to find her friends and her purse, she heard a voice behind her "Well, well, well. This is a surprise."

"Hey there. I promise I'm not stalking you."

"If you're stalking me, you suck at stalking."

"Your public is waiting over there..SuperCena needs to sign pictures and boobs."

He laughed. "Saw that,huh?"

"Saw it hell, that's my roommate. I'm going to get to hear all about it the rest of the weekend."

"Are you coming to the show?", he asked.

"Nope. Swooped in just for the CPR practice."

"Damn you're a smart ass. Good thing I find that endearing. I'm going to lose Sunday. Don't think poorly of me."

"Hey. Just so you know. I was wrong to act the way I acted the last time we talked and I'm sorry."

He smiled and looked her directly in the eyes and said "You WILL hear from me, I promise." and then turned to his autograph table. When he finished, she was gone.

She skipped the Hall of Fame show, and stayed in her room and John Cena lost to Miz on Sunday.

Later that night, she was watching Netflix on her tablet while everyone else snored, when her phone announced that she had a new text message. She almost didn't look at it,
because she assumed it was an advertisement, or the weather report from home, or one of the other automated texts she got regularly. She checked it, and didn't know the number it came from. It read: "did you know Atlanta is the only city in America to be destroyed by fire as an act of war?".

She texted back "yeah, I did...and who is this?"

"I told you that you'd hear from me later."

"Um, you're not narrowing it down as much as I'd like. Can I buy a vowel?"

"Seriously, Charlie..you don't know who this is? I could smear some frosting in your hair, Miss Charlotte. Then you might recollect."

"LOL. Hiya. Nice job tonight. You okay?"

"Sore, but I've certainly been worse. Where are you?"

"My hotel room?"

"I figured that. What hotel?"

"Same as you, I hear. Or at least that's what I heard in the bar yesterday, that all the wrestlers were here."

"Come hang out and watch tv? I'm wide awake and restless. Room 1410."

Charlie gave it some thought. She certainly owed him a real apology. Now was as good a time as any. "Okay. I need about 10 to get dressed and get there."

"Awesome. I'm going to get some food from room service. See you shortly."