Chapter 16

Before she knew it, the time had arrived for Zelia to make her WWE debut as WWE Diva Z, Kane's love interest. Her stomach twisted violently and Zelia was pretty sure she'd either wretch or pass out before the match even ended. Luckily, she managed to fight her intense nausea and saw her cue come up when the Prime Time Players had gotten the upper hand. Taking a deep breath, Zelia headed through the black curtain up the few stairs and could hear the buzz of the crowd as soon as she made an appearance. She wasn't supposed to run down the ramp like an idiot, just gradually make her way down surveying the competition. If she tripped and fell flat on her face, Zelia was sure she'd die of embarrassment.

Valisa was in the Shield locker room hanging out with Joe, both of them quietly talking to each other. It seemed as though they could always find something to talk about, no matter how stupid the subject was. Valisa already knew she was falling in love with the Shield's powerhouse, especially when his arm wrapped around her shoulders and she leaned against his side. If she could stay in this man's arms for the rest of her life, Valisa would die a very happy woman. Of course, she refused to admit that to Joe and would enjoy the time they had together however long it lasted. Jon minded his business thankfully and was in the corner of the room taping his hands and wrists while Colby did upside down pushups against the other wall near the door. All their eyes were glued to the monitor.

"WHAT THE HELL?" Valisa erupted the second Zelia came on the television, bolting up from Joe's arms and the couch, blue eyes wide. "What the FUCK is she doing out there?!"

Jon's eyes remained focused on the monitor, his jaw tightened as he continued taping up, not saying a single word.

"I don't know, but she looks…" Colby immediately trailed off when Jon shot him a deadly glare, swallowing hard. "Different." He was going to say smoking hot, but didn't feel like having his jaw dislodged by Jon's fist.

"That's an understatement." Joe grunted, shaking his head and watched as Zelia arrived at ringside on the monitor, grey eyes narrowed. "Is she…?"

"She just low-blowed Fred!" Colby squawked, his jaw hitting the floor right along with Valisa, now standing upright on his feet. "Oh my god…"

"Oh fuck…" Valisa muttered, watching as Zelia slid through the ring ropes after Team Hell No picked up the victory and raised both of their arms in the air.

Bryan looked confused while Glen just had a smirk on his face, both of them coated in sweat. Zelia released Bryan's arm and turned to fully face Glen, bracing herself for what was coming next. A second later, Glen's mouth had lowered to hers as they softly kissed in the middle of the ring. Zelia felt her entire face burn, her cheeks turning crimson red and couldn't believe this was happening. Thankfully, her interference had gone smoothly and she even managed not to fall on her face. Glen held open the ring ropes for her, letting her jump down on the mats and felt him grab her hand, a perplexed Bryan following them up the ramp to end the segment.

The second Zelia kissed Glen, Jon had lost it and took the folding steel chair he sat on, hurling it across the room to crash against the wall. The force and velocity had left a rather large dent and nobody said a single word. What could be said? Valisa was in too much shock along with Joe and Colby had lowered his eyes to the floor, everyone in that room knowing just how hard that had to be for Jon to witness. Snarling angrily, Jon stormed out of the locker room without a single word and headed for the nearest exit, desperately needing a cigarette. That and he needed fresh air to breathe through the current pulsating heartache he felt.

"I'll be back." Valisa refused to stand by and let this happen without finding out the story from Zelia, pecking Joe quickly on the lips before taking off out the door.

The second Zelia stepped through the curtain with Glen and Bryan, she immediately released Glen's hand, trying to fight back tears. "Go away, I want to be alone." She whispered when Glen tried comforting her, stalking past him down the hallway and ripped the choker from her neck, sniffling.

"Leave her alone right now, Big Red." Bryan stated, stopping Glen by grabbing his arm when the big man looked as though he might go after her, shaking his head. "She'll be alright."

Glen could only hope Bryan was right and reluctantly headed back to the dressing room, ripping his mask off.

Zelia didn't make it outside because Valisa stopped her. "You've got some SERIOUS explaining to do right now." She demanded, folding her arms in front of her chest and would not let Zelia brush her off.

All at once, everything came crashing down on Zelia in one heaping wave and her knees buckled, her entire body crumbling to the floor. Valisa barely caught her, lowering to the floor with Zelia and felt her heart shatter at the broken sobs that instantly followed. She held Zelia close, running her fingers through her loose banana curled hair and tried calming her down somehow. Clearly, Zelia wasn't happy about whatever was going on and Valisa had to wait for her to calm down to find out what happened.

"Sorry." Zelia whispered, pulling back from Valisa and looked up at her with a makeup streaked face, mostly black. "I wanted to tell you, b-but there wasn't enough t-time…"

Valisa frowned and nodded, the anger vanishing instantly. "Come on, let's go outside so you can get some air and you can tell me just what the hell is going on."

Zelia followed without argument, wrapping her arms around herself and couldn't stop shivering to save her life. It was the adrenaline. She got such a rush being in front of all those people and now her body was slowly calming down. It wasn't a necessarily bad feeling, but definitely something Zelia would have to get used to. Before they made it outside, they ran into Joe and Colby. These were the last people Zelia wanted to see right now and she made it clear, pulling away from Valisa.

"Zel, wait…" Valisa tried stopping her friend, but it wasn't happening.

"I can't, Vali. I'm sorry." Zelia avoided eye contact with both of them as much as she could and took off down the hallway, heading straight for the exit.

Valisa started going after her, but Colby held his hand up, shocking both her and Joe. "I'll go talk to her. Just stay here with big guy and calm down. I got this." His voice was low and calm, which was very uncharacteristic of Colby since he was normally bouncing off the walls.

"Are you sure?" Valisa asked quietly, chewing her bottom lip. "She's very fragile right now…"

Colby smiled, nodding. "I got it covered." He took off after Zelia and knew she'd head toward the parking lot, having caught her out there sitting on one of the equipment trunks a time or two.

"What happened?" Joe asked, watching Colby fly down the hallway and turned his eyes back to Valisa. "What did she say?"

"The only thing I got out of her besides sobbing was she wanted to tell me, but there wasn't enough time…" Valisa felt tears sting her eyes and knew why Zelia had run away from Joe and Colby, feeling her heart break for her friend. "Your asshole friend really needs to get his head out of his ass before he loses her for good."

Joe couldn't agree more, but Jon was incredibly stubborn and refused to listen to anything anyone had to say, himself included. "Come on, let's go get something to drink and get you calmed down."

"I hope she doesn't hate me for letting Colby go after her." Valisa sniffled, feeling completely helpless right now and walked down the hallway with Joe away from the exit.

Sure enough, Zelia had gone outside and currently sat on an equipment trunk with her knees drawn up, face buried in them and her arms wrapped around her legs. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't stop crying and felt awful about everything that happened lately. It was bad enough she was in love with a man who thought she was nothing more than a common whore. Now she had to flaunt her accused affair with the main man Jon thought she was screwing behind closed doors on national television.

"Zelia?"

Her head slowly rose when she heard a voice at her side and stared back at a concerned looking Colby, immediately shaking her head. "Go away." She muttered, not caring that her voice sounded broken.

It broke Colby's heart to hear her crying and all he wanted to do was hug her, refusing to leave her right now. "Look, I know you don't like me and I get it, but…Valisa's really worried about you and so are we. We're not the douchebags you think."

"No offense, but I really don't need a fucking lecture right now." Zelia shot back, a little anger entering her voice. "I want to be left ALONE."

"Well tough, I'm not leaving you alone." Colby could be stubborn when he wanted to be and hopped up on the equipment trunk beside her, swinging his legs back and forth.

"What the hell do you want?" Zelia snapped, trying to lace her voice with malice, but all that came out was pure pain.

"Look, you can't hate me just because you and Jon aren't getting along right now. He's a stubborn jackass, but that's not me. That's not Joe either. Valisa makes Joe extremely happy and I know you two are friends, so that makes you a friend of ours automatically. I don't care what Jon says about it. You are a friend and when a friend is in pain, we're gonna do what we can to comfort them. Like it or not sister, I'm your friend. So you can either take it with a grain of salt or sit there sulking some more and tell me to go away. It's not happening though." Colby explained, being completely serious and looked out in the parking lot, the air blowing through his hair. "So, being as I'm your friend, mind telling me what the hell is going on with you being on television?"

Zelia knew everything Colby said was truthful and had no idea how to respond to any of it, wiping tears away. "My job title has changed. Nothing more to say."

There was no way she could tell Colby the truth about being given an ultimatum with this situation. It was nearly like déjà vu all over again with HWA, but the only difference was the WWE actually gave her a choice on what she wanted to do. Still, it wasn't fair and Zelia hated her new job title, wanting to be back on the ring crew in the worst way. Sure, the hours were brutal and sometimes she only got 2 hours of sleep a night, but it beat being in front of thousands of people that were ready to criticize and judge.

"You suuuure?" Colby dragged that word out, scooting closer to nudge her knees playfully and watched as her eyebrow rose, a grin crossing his face. "Because I have a hard time believing that. Jon told me how passionate you are about what you do on the ring crew. So for you to abruptly change your job title is a little…unbelievable."

"Are you always this pushy with complete strangers?" Zelia demanded, moving to where her legs dangled over the side of the equipment trunk like Colby's was and kept her eyes averted. "I can't tell you the real reasoning this happening. Nobody can ever know, not even Valisa." Granted, Bryan had pinpointed it straightaway, but he'd kept his word and hadn't told anyone, thankfully.

Colby chuckled, shaking his head. "I'm not a complete stranger. We've met, we've crossed paths in the hallway and now we're talking a little more. And I've heard a little about you from the stubborn ass."

"Don't you believe him?" Zelia sniffled, slowly chancing a peek up at Colby and kept her hands clasped in her lap.

"About?" It took a moment for Colby to realize what Zelia was talking about and immediately shook his head. "Nope, not a bit. I just think he's hurt because of how you two parted ways back in the Indy's and he's expressing his anger the only way he knows how."

"By accusing me of sleeping with married men?" Zelia growled, shaking her head and hopped off of the equipment trunk. "How nice."

Colby hopped off as well and stopped her, gently grabbing her arm so Zelia had to turn to face him. "I'm not making excuses for him, not at all. I'm just saying that's what his mindset probably is. He's like a brother to me and I've dealt with his ass for a while now. Hey now, don't cry."

"I can't help it." Zelia felt the hot tears course down her cheeks instantly, hating showing emotions in front of Jon's friend, but she couldn't help it. "I hate him for what he's doing to me. I know I made a mistake, but it was only because I didn't know how to tell him HWA fired me. I lost my job. I was distraught and he was on top of the world with his career. I didn't want him to do something reckless like killing the boss and I know he would've because that's how protective he was of me. He just never…he never showed me he was interested in anything with me other than friendship. And now all of a sudden we run into each other here after nearly 7 years and he wants more than friendship? It makes no sense to me and…I guess I did run away from him, but it freaked me out. I mean…fuck, I don't know…"

Zelia looked and sounded just as frustrated as Jon had over the past couple months and Colby had to fight back laughter. "Wow, you two are one in the same. But I don't blame you for feeling the way you do. I would be suspicious too, but Jon is a good guy. He's caring when he wants to be. I just think you two have to sit down and talk everything out. Your communication is fucked right now."

"I don't see that happening anytime soon as long as he's going to continue to accuse me of sleeping with married men." Zelia stated, folding her arms in front of her chest and blinked when Colby suddenly pulled her against him, hugging her.

"Don't fight me off. You need a hug right now and I'm a huggable guy." Colby murmured in her ear, being completely platonic about it and closed his eyes when she started crying again. He kissed the top of her head and felt Zelia squeeze him tighter.

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?"