I Can't Get Over You
-April 5, 2014, New Orleans, Louisiana-
The lines were absolutely ridiculous. Never had she imagined that anyone would be lining up to get her autograph. She had been assigned a table alongside Cesaro – she vaguely recalled an explanation but had trouble remembering what it was – so a lot of people in the line were probably there to see the Swiss Superman but it did nothing to dampen her mood.
"You ready, Champ?"
"Couldn't be more."
Applause broke out as the two walked out onto the raised platform. Tessa waved somewhat timidly as she tried to wrap her head around just how many people were waiting whereas Claudio's wave was largely exaggerated to ensure that that those in the back could see it.
Tessa positioned the Diva's Championship at the front of the table before taking her seat behind it. She smiled at Claudio, who was sitting on her left, a little nervously but managed to push it away when the first people were brought up the stage.
An 8 x 10 photo was slid onto the table in front of her by a young boy, perhaps 8 or 9 years old, his father closely by his side.
"Hey, how are you?" Tessa asked, watching as the boy's face dropped a little and he froze, suddenly at a loss for words. "Oh, come on! I don't bite! I promise!"
"I've heard otherwise," Claudio interjected casually. Tessa looked at him just as casually before looking up to the boy's father who was obviously trying to fight back a laugh.
"Don't listen to him," Tessa said to the boy in a soft voice. "What's your name?"
"Justin."
Tessa beamed and wrote a quick little message on the photo before picking it up and putting it in front of Claudio.
Another person appeared in front of her and the day was officially started. Most of the kids were a lot like Justin – timid, nervous and star struck – and they all had Tessa cooing and trying her hardest to be calm so she wouldn't make them any more nervous than they were.
The adults who walked through without any kids were a different story entirely. Claudio didn't seem too bothered by the women – and occasional man – who were flirting shamelessly with them; he appeared to find it amusing. On the other hand, the brazen comments were throwing Tessa off. To make things even more uncomfortable Claudio didn't have any problem in encouraging the behaviour.
Tia had just finished talking to one man who assured her that he had seen every match she'd ever wrestled in and she had never ever looked better than she did now that she was in the WWE – if he hadn't been staring at her breasts the entire time she might have taken it as a compliment – when an assistant tapped her on the shoulder.
"I just wanted to let you know that your brother is in the line."
"Brother?" Tessa asked quickly, trying to keep her voice down. "Which brother?"
"Jimmy Jacobs. I have permission to let him wait back here if you'd like-"
"No," she cut off the assistant. "It's fine. He probably has stuff to do anyway."
Claudio stopped halfway through is conversation with the man to turn to Tessa and raise his eyebrow at her.
"Don't look at me like that!" She said in complete exasperation before trying to search the crowd for the familiar face. She spotted him, not too far down and she groaned quietly. A sick feeling was building up in her stomach.
It took a lot of concentration to return to character, to smile at everyone who was coming to see her. Every person that walked towards her was a person closer to Jimmy and by the time he was roughly 10 people from the stairs other people had begun to tell her that he was waiting in line.
"Yeah," Tessa nodded with a forced smile. "I can see him just down there."
"Do you know why he's lining up for? You can get him in anywhere, can't you?"
"Do we know why Jimmy does anything?"
When he walked onto the stage she tried her hardest to maintain her happy facade – the fans did not need to know that she and her brother weren't talking – it was actually helped by the smile that was on his face and the spring that was in his step.
Jimmy greeted Claudio first; they hugged and expressed how good it was to see each other. Tessa stood up and waited for Jimmy to look to her, when he hugged her, too, she wasn't all that surprised. However, the realness of the hug – the tightness, the length – sent a quiver to her bottom lip.
"Can't say I ever expected you two to be together at a WWE signing," Jimmy remarked as he stood back, looking at them both sitting at the table side by side. "Always pictured me sitting beside her to be perfectly honest."
"We all did, J," Claudio responded, sad for his friend. "Next year?"
"That'd be great," Jimmy agreed wholeheartedly before turning to Tessa, "wouldn't it, June?"
Tessa nodded quickly, unsure how else to respond. He was acting so casually.
Jimmy waited for their signatures – he had paid his money, after all – before exiting the stage with no fuss or argument, instead he was cheering loudly about how he had gotten Tia's autograph. Tessa had to turn to Claudio to make sure that it had in fact happened and it hadn't been entirely in her imagination.
She was so dumbfounded that she forgot to ask him to stop posting photos.
"Jimmy did show up, didn't he?"
"He was there, yes. You look upset?"
"Confused, actually," she exhaled, still struggling to believe what had happened – or what had not happened. "Why didn't he say anything?"
"I get the impression that you think a lot worse of yourself than everybody else does," Claudio commented, walking them away from the small behind the scenes area and further from prying eyes and ears.
Tessa sighed, "Nattie won't look at me."
"Okay, so she's one person."
"Punk hates me," she said, slightly exasperated.
"There are a lot of people Punk doesn't like. Besides, you were never exactly his favourite person," Claudio reminded her, she rolled her eyes. "It has literally nothing to do with what happened. If you stopped over thinking this you would realise that no one cares. People were worried that you coming in was going to cause trouble for everyone but nothing has changed so no one cares."
Tessa went quiet. It made a certain amount of sense but it shouldn't have. She didn't want it to. Somewhere in her mind she always knew that people couldn't be mad at her forever but the thought of it was always quickly squashed – she took the job in Japan to get away from everything, if she was running from nothing...
"Have you got a date for tonight?" Tessa asked abruptly, getting her head way from the subject of her past transgressions.
"Pardon?" Claudio asked, clearly confused by the sudden subject change.
"It's childish and silly but I don't want to walk out in front of everyone by myself so I was hoping that you would be my date."
The clarification caused Claudio to grin and laugh under his breath.
"I'm flattered," he said as he held his hand up to his heart, "but you really should buy me dinner first."
Tessa rolled her eyes and started to walk away, "Forget I said anything."
"I'm joking, T. It would be an honour to have you as my date. It might confuse the fans, though," he said with a sarcastically sad shake of his head. "They think you and Rollins are together. Especially since he broke up with Leighla."
"People will believe anything, huh?" Tessa asked, making sure to have a laugh in her voice. "A couple photos in the same vicinity and we're apparently dating. By tomorrow you and me will be married."
Tessa opted to get ready by herself before the Hall of Fame. Most of the girls would be getting ready with their partners anyway so it wasn't like she was missing out on any gossip. She had already heard people talking about Jimmy showing up to her signing table and she would be avoiding that topic of conversation while she could.
She and Claudio decided to meet each other in the hotel lobby at 7 and they would walk to Smoothie King Center together – it seemed silly to take a taxi to when it was so close. Tessa was sure that ten minutes of walking – even in her nicest dress and heels – would be nothing and she had to do something to make up for the amount of time she was spending in cars.
Tessa was smiling when she walked out of the elevator and saw that Claudio was waiting for her.
"I definitely could have done worse," Claudio commented, looking up and down her black dress, pink shoes and handbag.
"Yeah," Tessa nodded, looking him up and down too, "so could I. You look good, C."
"Beautiful," he said to her. "Rami's not going to be very happy with me."
Tessa frowned, "What does he have to do with anything?"
"He might not take too kindly to the idea of me going to the Hall of Fame with his very attractive ex-girlfriend."
"You're my impromptu date-" Tessa started to defend herself, wanting to make sure that he knew that she had meant nothing romantic by asking him. He was quick to cut her off.
"I'm just playing. Though, he's probably going to be jealous. Everyone will be."
Tessa rolled her eyes and gestured towards the doors. If she were being totally honest, she was getting sick of cutting conversations shirt so abruptly but she found it necessary to avoid any of them becoming awkward.
"Did I miss the memo?" Tessa questioned, holding her purse in front of her stomach self-consciously.
"What memo?" Nikki asked, pulling them towards the photobooth that had been set up for the evening.
"The evening gown memo... You clearly all decided on floor length and now I look out of place and like a hooker-"
"Tess, calm down," Brie laughed, putting her hands on her friend's shoulders. "You look great and if anything now you stand out. The champion has to stand out. You did a great job of your make-up, by the way. You can barely see a bruise and that cut is hardly even noticeable."
Tessa smiled but couldn't shake the slight awkward feeling. She honestly felt that she looked out of place. She knew that she would have been told if short dresses weren't allowed at the Hall of Fame but standing in a room wearing a dress that barely hit the knee when everyone else's hit the floor was unnerving.
The twins pulled her into the booth and they all pulled funny faces. They had been told that there was a good chance that the photos would be put up on the website but that hardly bothered them.
"Why are you here with Cesaro?" Nikki asked when they were waiting for the photos to develop. "I don't want to tell you how to live but that doesn't sound like a smart thing for you to be doing. And you also just about ripped Trin's head off when she suggested it."
"It's not anything like that, I swear. I didn't want to be the loser who showed up alone so I recruited Claudio to save myself the embarrassment."
Nikki laughed rather wholeheartedly at the explanation while Brie managed to suppress hers into a more respectful, short giggle. Tessa shook her head and rolled her eyes.
"Good," Brie said as Nikki took time to regain her breath, "because Sami Zayn has been looking at you since you walked in and I really think that you should go over and say hi."
Tessa felt two hands on her shoulders and before she knew it she was being pushed in the direction of her ex-boyfriend. When she tried to plant her feet and stop any forward movement, Tessa found that another set of hands were placed onto her shoulders and any efforts she had at stopping were futile.
"Guys, please. Don't do this," Tessa pleaded, trying to turn her head so they can see exactly how much she did not want to speak to him. How scared she was.
"It'll be better for everyone if you just get this out of the way," Nikki said calmly.
"I spoke to him last week at Raw!"
"Hardly! He spoke to Bryan about it and apparently you were very rude." Brie's tone was scolding, like that of a mother talking to a child. Tessa sighed.
"I don't want to do this in front of people! What if it ends badly?"
"If that happens we'll deal with it then. Now, take a deep breath and try not to look like you're about to wet yourself."
Tessa wanted to make a witty retort to Nikki's cheap shot but found herself at a loss for words. The twins let her go and she realised that she was standing 3 feet from Rami Sebei.
"Hi," he said uncertainly, his eyes following the twins as they walked away with their most innocent smiles plastered on her face.
"Hi," she said back in a whisper, keeping her eyes trained on whatever happened to be behind him.
"Your eye looks good," he commented. She knew him well enough to know that he felt awkward, she did too, and she felt her heart constrict.
She nodded, "Thankfully."
She had just opened her mouth to speak again, to tell him that she needed to speak to Claudio again when he beat her to it.
"You look fantastic, T."
Tessa blinked slowly, once and then twice, finally shifting her gaze so that that they were making eye contact. She hesitated, her mouth opening and closing as she tried to think of something to say. Nothing would come out.
Without a word, Tessa turned around and walked away from him. She heard him sigh as she moved away but nothing was going to make her turn back around. She had so much she wanted to say and no way of putting it into words.
"Well, that was a disaster."
"Thank you, Claudio, your input is always much appreciated," Tessa muttered, walking into a completely different room. As far away from Rami as possible was where she wanted to be.
"You need to speak to him, Tessa. Properly," Claudio said to her, watching as she tried to calm herself down. She had started to shake a little because of how nervous the interaction had made her.
"I'll speak to him," she told him firmly. She opened up her handbag and pulled out her phone. It was about time for Jimmy to post another photo of her and after seeing him earlier that morning she was very interested to see what he would do.
"When will you?"
"'When will you?' he asks in his gorgeous Swiss accent," Tessa said, looking at him. She had repeated what he said in a near perfect Swiss accent causing him to laugh despite the conversation. "Oh, you think that's funny? I can also do Japanese and French-Canadian."
He sighed at her, "You can't put it off forever."
"Oh, sorry, I don't know that one."
Tessa was nearly blown away when she walked out onto the red carpet for the pre-show. With Claudio by her side, she had put her hand over her heart with him and everyone in attendance. When 'We The People!' was shouted back at them, Tessa could hardly believe it.
Playing into Tia as much as she could, she needed to assure Byron Saxton that she and Cesaro were only friends and they had come as friends. The interviewer was quick to ask about Tia's date with Sami Zayn but she simply blushed and changed the topic. When he asked her if it was because she didn't kiss and tell she responded with a simple "That's for me and Sami to know."
As exciting as the night was, her favourite moment would have to be meeting the Legends of the WWE.
Standing in front of The Ultimate Warrior nearly sent her into hysterics. She wasn't old enough to remember watching him when he was in his prime but that didn't take away from the hours and hours of videos she had watched where she'd come to love him just like so many others.
When Razor Ramon winked at her and told her to keep up the good work, Tessa had blushed more than she had in recent memory. All Tessa could see in her mind was a 1998 Scott Hall. He had – as much as it embarrassed her to admit – been her first crush as a 12 year old starting to go through puberty.
"We should probably get out of here before you drool anymore," Claudio said, raising his hand to her chin and wiping away the nonexistent drool.
"You don't have to be mean about it," Tessa said defensively, crossing her arms. "I wasn't the only girl to have a crush on Scott Hall, okay? I don't even care that he was 40."
"Oh, I know you don't. I think you have a thing for guys with chest hair." Claudio made the statement with a look of pride at his revelation. "Scott Hall, Shawn Michaels – I bet you loved AJ Styles and we all know that you asked me to be your date because of my chest hair."
"Okay, I get it." Tessa relented, rolling her eyes at him. There was a definite truth to the theory. "Speaking of chest hair, I didn't see Colby anywhere in there."
Claudio laughed, "Nice segue. He had a signing."
Tessa raised an eyebrow. It wasn't fair that people had to miss out on such a great evening for anything – even their fans – but if it saved her from any more awkward situations then she couldn't complain.
a/n As always, thanks go to nmoxracha, UntilNeverDawns, Imagineer1392, ajroleplays, CarolReigns, deanambooty, Straight Edge Queen and naive melody for taking the time to review! :D
So, Survivor Series! Who's proud of Dolph? I am proud of Dolph. And also holy shit Sting. So much PPV goodness!