Okay, I hate to work on this (everyone knows that's a lie)…I feel tired and hungry and that's why I'm working on this. It's supposedly my new distraction! Yay! Go John and Randy! Yes, I'm hyper, okay?

Again, bold lines are Randy. Italic lines are John.

Love

Randy Orton doesn't know what love feels like.

Randy Orton knows that heartbreak tastes like a freezing storm of snowflakes on a Monday morning, bitter and tasteless. Randy knows that heartbreak feels like a collision of dark and cold, of need and want, of suffocating and drowning, of bitter and thick. He knows that heartbreak's the sound of his screams at night when he wakes up to find himself all dazed up all confused all playing the wrong game in his supposedly perfect marriage with Samantha Orton.

Their daughter has a beautiful voice, and her voice becomes screams, constant screams, inside of his head when he falls asleep and he doesn't know how to sleep anymore as he snuggles into his wife's sleeping body and he's always awake to feed the baby but when Randy goes away, into the ring, jumping from country to country, from state to state, her screams still fill the air and he finds himself picking up a pillow and rocking it sleep from the fear of hearing such a scream coming from such a beautiful little girl.

He envies Hunter the most. He envies his perfect family and he envies how he knows how love feels like, and he knows how a baby's laughter sounds like and he knows how to have just the perfect little family while Randy lies in bed, waiting to drown in his so far away daughter's screams and cries and tears and he waits to go back home and hold his daughter and shuffle her screams and hold his wife next to him. Why doesn't that feel like love? Why isn't it enough? questions that spiral through his head, spinning and spinning and spinning but all he can taste is bitter heartbreak and all he can hear is screaming and all he can see are sunny snowflakes melting on the floor.

It's all fading.

And he knows that it's fading. He just doesn't know how to stop it from fading. He wakes up one night, and he knows that he really doesn't love Samantha and all he wants to do is snuggle to a person he really loves but he knows that no one can love someone so scarred and so dark and so evil and so like him so he stays in bed until he finds himself staring out the window to see the invisible snowflakes falling as watery rain and he feels like crying but he really doesn't know how to let the tears fall because he's been holding them back for so long that they're almost always filling but never falling.

Randy walks towards the Legacy locker room, early, very early in fact, and he knows that Ted and Cody aren't going to show up for hours but he doesn't really care that he's early or that he has no company and he turns to face his locker but his eyes almost pop out of his face when he realizes that there is a creamy envelope, tape stuck, on his locker of all people.

Nausea rolls in his stomach and he suddenly feels as if a bad piece of paper but he can't be too sure as he takes the envelope and with a hand barely steady, he rips it open and holds in the note but he doesn't read any of the words because bile rises up his throat and dizziness engulfs him and he doesn't know why anyone would send him a love letter because face it, Randy, you don't know what love is and he doesn't know if he should read it or not.

This is going to sound sappy and corny and all but hey, Randy, we're buddies, aren't we? Look, I did something that I shouldn't have and I know that it might shock you to know that I always think about you. Yes, I like you. I like you more than I should've and—meet me in Applebee's tonight at seven. I'm the one in the sunglasses and in the hat.

From:

Respect's Affection

He wants to tear it and he wants to keep it and he wants to laugh and he wants to smile and he throws the letter inside of his locker because he knows that he's not single and that he's not going why not? You'll learn how to love. Randy's heart stops at the possibility but he shakes his head and he knows that if he goes, he might risk watching sunshine snowflake and tasting bitter honey and hearing his daughter's screams.

He might risk losing his heart again.

And the pieces that broke aren't enough to support Randy. Not at all. But he decides to go anyways because he wants to see and hear and feel love and he doesn't know what could happen and something could pretty much happen and he tries to push away thoughts of Samantha.

It's seven o'clock and Randy's body is shaking inside but he seems so calm and so steady and so open-minded as he pushes the door of the restaurant and smells the familiar food and feels the oxygen wrap around his body so sweetly but his eyes are looking for a description.

He finds a healthy looking man with a black hat and big pair of orange sunglasses and Randy's eyes light up as he walks towards the man and gives off a sweet smile and sits beside him. The man raises his eyebrow.

"Hey, so what's up with the entire Respect's Love letter thing? I mean, if you liked me, you could've just said it in person. Why need this entire love thing?" the words that are barreling through Randy's head are slipping out of his mouth and he feels himself flush into a bright pink but it doesn't show because of the darkness of his flesh.

"Pardon?"

"You know this entire love charade, if you had a thing for me, you could've just told me. You didn't have to write a note saying that you dig me. It's so—out of a movie." Randy gives a smile, 'but that for the effort—"and at that moment, the man punches Randy in the face and Randy's eyes turn confused and bewildered as he feels the pain throb in his cheek.

Another man, with black shades and a black hat, holds onto Randy's body and growls at the man. He looks at Randy as the manager comes and shouts at them both "Out! Out of my restaurant!" and they both find themselves running towards the door and when they get out, they both hold onto their knees from exhaustion but laughter fills the air as they look at each other.

"Did you see his face?" Randy asks the man who seems to be his 'Respect's Love' and the man nods his head.

"His eyes were going to pop out of his head! It's like the first time he saw anyone fight," and then the man took off his shades and glasses and Randy sees his enemy, the person that always thinks he's all that, with his 'Hustle. Loyalty. Respect' t-shirts and his 'My Time is Now' theme song—

"Cena!" Randy realizes as his head spins in confusion and his face feels like paling and he doesn't know if he's standing or if he's just on the floor and watching this all so clearly and he just wants to know what the hell is going on. You know that no one really wants to love you, Randy. His hands barrel into fists and he stares at him with a tightened jaw and a rigid face and he feels his blood boiling in his skin. "Is this some kind of joke?!"

"No," John says in certain voice and his eyes confirm it but Randy's too angry and too hurt to see John's eyes and he just wants someone to take his pain seriously but no one does because no one really cares and no one really thinks that Randy Orton can break because he's suddenly all made of steel.

"You really like me? Swear, John?"

John's face drains out of color and he knows he can't lie to Randy and say he really likes him. After all, this is all a silly little bet and John knows it and he bites his lower lip as he tries to find out what to say but he can't so he turns around and he takes a deep breath. "No, I don't like you, Orton." His voice's again filled with honesty and certainty and this makes Randy's blood boil even more and his heart rip into two pieces.

"I'm not your game, Cena! I'm a human being and I won't stand here and take this crap from you! Understand?! Where's the loyalty, Cena?! I can never rely on you. You play with my feelings. You know that I can feel, right, Cena?!" Randy's so tired of shouting but the rage makes him shout and the darkness in his eyes hides the pain very well.

John opens his mouth to protest but his words don't flow out. "Yeah, okay?" he spits out. "I've been playing with you, okay, Orton? Is that what you want to hear? That I put the note in your locker so I can bring you here and make a fool of yourself? Is that what you want to hear?"

"I don't want to hear it," Randy says and he knows that he doesn't want to hear pain dripped in his words but they're there and John fails to misses it because he's just blazing with the same fury that lights up Randy's fire, 'no, okay? I don't want to hear that you're playing with me. Why? Why the hell are you playing with me, John? You think that I won't care?!"

"I wished that you won't care. I just thought that with all Hunter did to you, this wouldn't matter." John says sternly and Randy steps back, feeling as if though he's just an object that can take pain at any level and at any time and he feels a mass of pain finally show in his little eyes. John, you know that you're both hiding behind masks. And he takes a short breath, feeling as if though he's going to start sobbing but he doesn't.

"Doesn't matter, huh, John? You know what doesn't matter? I don't matter. Of course, I don't." Randy's voice strains pain and John suddenly steps back at the impact of the words even if they're the softest words that Randy's spoken. "I'm just a tool that takes in pain. I get it now. Well, go ahead, John, hit all you want but you know? No one's going to get anything in the end and you know it."

"Hey…" John starts but Randy already walks away with a sad smile on his face that tries to hide the pain of the invisible dark rain that falls onto the ground and the sounds of his cries when Hunter had fought with him and with the scent of bitter honey and sweet coffee washing over him.

Randy Orton knows that if you get your heart broken by John Cena, it tastes like dark rain and sounds like his shuffling screams and smells like bitter honey and sweet coffee.

And it feels like a mask plastered on your face.

We're not so different after all, Cena.

Man, did that hurt to write and now, it hurts to read (well, I read when I write, right?) and I hope that you feel Randy's pain as much as you feel John's. I hope that this was okay.

;) Sam

PS. Next one-shot: 'Light'.

Here's the full summary for the next one: During a match with John Cena and the Miz, the lights go out and when they turn back on, they find Randy Orton in the ring, giving an RKO to the Miz before having the ring to him and Cena only. Randy speaks out of what Cena did to him the night before. What happens when Vince McMahon steps in the picture?

Does it appeal to you or not?

Here goes nothing…