We Are Fighting to Survive

-June 1, 2014; Chicago, Illinois-

"June!"

Tessa sighed at the voice that filled her ears. Despite the size of Chicago she should have expected to run into him. She turned her back to the coffee counter expecting to see him and his fiancée sitting at a table – his fiancée was nowhere to be seen. Instead, he was accompanied by the one person she really did not want to see.

"I didn't know you two were such good friends," she said hesitantly as she walked towards Punk and Colby. Even if she wanted to completely ignore the two of them, she couldn't have. How obvious would it have been if she gave the two of them the cold shoulder? Punk seemed to understand every small action that anyone ever did, he would surely pick up on that. "Cute little coffee date?"

"Yeah, we were just talking about the Pay Per View," Colby answered. Tessa avoided looking at him, keeping her attention firmly on Punk.

With the usual bite that came to her voice where Punk was concerned, Tessa responded, "Because you care so much about wrestling."

"Naw," Punk cooed with a smirk, "I haven't missed you at all."

"The feeling's mutual," Tessa responded coolly, looking back over her shoulder to see how long her order would take. "What can I do for you today? Last time we spoke you called me a pushover and we got into a little argument about your fiancée but I haven't seen her since Mania so it can't possibly be anything to do with her."

Punk relaxed back into his seat with an arrogant smile. "You took into account my pushover comments, then? You've got an attitude."

"What can I say?" she asked rhetorically, shifting her bag on her shoulder as she crossed her arms. "You bring out the best in me."

"What happened between you two?" Punk asked, looking between Tessa and Colby with a bemused smirk. "You're not even acknowledging him."

Tessa's eyes drifted over to Colby before quickly snapping back to Punk. She huffed, "Even you know what happened."

Punk hadn't been at ROH when it all went down – he had already been World Heavyweight Champion at that point – but he knew. He had friends in the independents so he would have known within hours and it might not have even taken that long. She had, at the time, a worse reputation than anybody else in the business.

"Yeah, sure, everyone does," Punk stated with a firm nod. Everyone does. "I also know that every other photo he posted on Twitter for a good two months featured you and the dumbass peace sign you stole from Bourne."

"It takes all my energy and focus to not punch you in the face," Tessa responded before Colby could say anything. "As for the peace sign – I know how everything works backstage, okay? I spoke to Sydal about it and we both agreed that I had perfected the MySpace peace sign while he was still giving cameras the finger. He said that I could use it because he hasn't been on television in forever."

"You've got it all sorted, haven't you?"

Relief washed over her when her name was called out by someone behind the counter before she had to continue their conversation. She sent a brief, forced smile Punk's way and only glanced at Colby for a second before she turned around and collected hers and Rami's drinks. She picked up the tray that had kindly been provided for her and made sure to put up a peace sign just for Punk's benefit as she left the café.

As soon as she stepped outside, her stomach dropped and it wasn't made any better by Rami being right there waiting for her.

"Habibti?" he asked cautiously, watching the colour drain from her face. "What's wrong?"

"No," she said quickly, looking up at him like a stunned deer. "Nothing. I'm fine."

"Colby say something?" Rami asked, looking behind her through the café's glass windows to where his co-worker was sitting. "Punk?"

Tessa turned her head around, her eyes following his gaze before she snapped her attention back to him. "Just Punk being Punk," she told him with a shaky breath. "It's nothing to worry about, I'll be fine."

Rami's eyes fell on her face and he looked at her uncertainly, trying to decide whether or not she as telling the truth. His voice lowered into a small growl, "What did he say?"

"Punk stuff," Tessa responded, using her free hand to softly touch his forearm. "Honestly."

Rami looked back into the café and Tessa had to squeeze his arm to stop him from walking in there. She wouldn't put it past him to have words with Punk – they would be quiet and draw no attention from bystanders but they would be stern and protective – but that was the last thing she wanted. For him to go in there, where Colby was no doubt relaying to Punk all the gritty details of their most recent affair, would mean the end of everything.

The thought made her stomach churn.

He hadn't said anything, as far as she knew. The lack of backlash she was facing had to mean that Colby had kept his mouth shut. He hadn't even come to find her at the house show the night before which was what surprised her most. Even after she had completely ignored him during her run-in with Punk he had made no effort to spread what had happened between them.

For the most part Tessa had been able to maintain an aura of confidence. Rami hadn't said anything about odd behaviour so she had been successful. That was all likely to change as, with every passing minute, the idea of Colby talking with Punk became more terrifying.

"Thinking about your match?"

Tessa looked up and smiled at the sight of Rami sitting down beside her. "Yeah, I just want it to be good for Summer."

"I was watching your run-through on the monitors, you both look really good. You work well together."

"What if I'm still not at 100%?" she asked him quietly. "What if I botch this match and Summer gets blamed for it?"

"You need to stop going on in the internet."

Tessa sighed and shifted her chair closer to Rami's so that she could lean her head on his shoulder comfortably. She closed her eyes and tried to push any thoughts about her match out of her head but whenever she did so Colby was right there. All she could see were his eyes – he was right in her face just like he was when she realised that he had kissed her.

The chair scraped against concrete as she stood up, announcing that she just had an idea that she needed to share with Summer. As she walked down the hall she didn't even look back over her shoulder.

"Where's the fire?"

Tessa jumped when she heard Nikki's voice in her ear. She turned around and quickly shoved Nikki's shoulder back.

"Don't do that," Tessa scolded.

"I wouldn't have to if you would stop looking so stressed all the damn time," Nikki retorted, falling into step with Tessa as she continued on her path to nowhere. "But really, where's the fire?"

"Nowhere, I just wanted to go for a walk." Tessa knew, just from the sound Nikki made, that her lie wasn't believed.

They stopped nearer to the evening's make-shift offices, Nikki asking Tessa to wait as she picked up her next house show schedule. Tessa knew that she was due for a talk with creative and Stephanie McMahon in ten minutes so she had no issue hanging around. At least she didn't until she saw Colby talking with Mark Carano. He seemed to sense her presence – though he might have just felt someone staring at him – because he looked up at her over Mark's shoulder. He immediately averted his gaze. Tessa's eyebrow quirked at his reaction.

"What does yours look like?" Nikki asked, holding a piece of paper in front of Tessa.

"That's my name right there," Tessa said cheekily, pointing out her name on the sheet. "So mine is identical."

"Yeah, okay," Nikki responded, drawing out her words to show her annoyance.

"We can't all be geniuses," Tessa grinned as Nikki rolled her eyes. "I have to stay here for a creative meeting – we're getting a new storyline and I think it might involve Ziggler so I'm excited about that."

"Yeah," Nikki smiled enthusiastically. "He's always good to watch so I can only imagine how good it would be to work with him."

Tessa nodded, "I'm anticipating a romance, though, so I don't know about that."

"He's a great kisser," Nikki told her with a knowing smile.

"I guess that's good to know." Tessa's sentence trailed off as she again caught Colby's eye, this time over Nikki's shoulder.

Nikki noticed and looked over her shoulder before turning back to Tessa with narrowed eyes, "What happened between you two?"

"I've told you that story-" Tessa said as she looked back to Nikki.

"No, recently. You just stopped talking to each other.

"Rami got called up. We stopped talking. I was asked the same question literally just this morning by one, CM Punk."

Nikki visibly cringed, "Ugh, we're in Chicago. I just decided that I don't envy your spot on tonight's card."

The groan Tessa emitted clearly meant that she hadn't even thought about how the crowd might react. There were sure to be 'CM Punk' chants – whether or not they were frequent or loud remained to be seen but the idea was enough to get her frustrated.

The whole day had been nothing but frustrating.

When Rami met up with them he told her that Summer had walked into catering a couple minutes after Tessa left and that he had let Summer know she was wanted. Tessa thanked him by smiling and leaning into his side.

Nikki left them when Dolph arrived and the three were called into the office. As they all sat down on a couch facing the creative team, Tessa found herself sitting snugly in between the two men. She pushed herself as close to Rami as she could manage but the couch was too small for the three of them.

The meeting went as she expected and was much more focused on the characters of Sami Zayn and Dolph Ziggler and Tessa began to wonder why her presence was even required. Until Stephanie directed her attention solely to Tessa.

"We wanted to turn Tia heel and align her with Dolph," Stephanie stated as Tessa had been expecting. "Do you think you're up to that?"

"Yes," Tessa answered after a moment of hesitation – she was trying to work out whether or not that question was rhetorical. She had spent most of her career as a heel, after all.

"Fantastic!" Stephanie grinned. "We'll start teasing the turn over the next few weeks. Dolph Ziggler and Tia will be wonderful together, don't you think?"

"Am I-" Tessa stumbled over her words, her hand finding Rami's without even meaning to. "Am I supposed to be – um, with-? While-?"

Sensing the desperation that was entering Tessa's voice, Stephanie was quick to interrupt her. "Tia will break up with Sami and then a few weeks later she will properly align with Dolph."

"Okay," Tessa nodded, sighing to herself with relief. "That sounds good. Great, even."

"I'm really sorry, girls," Mark said and Summer sighed audibly. "There's not going to be enough time for your match."

"I beg your pardon?" Tessa asked quickly, pushing her head forward in the hopes that she had heard him incorrectly.

Mark, in his calmest, most professional voice, explained, "A few of the segments went over their allotted time and we have to rearrange the card and that means that your match isn't going to be on the Pay Per View."

"No, it's going to be next," Tessa said firmly, gripping the championship tighter. "We have five minutes after Wyatt-Cena."

"You'll have ten minutes tomorrow night," Mark said, clearly trying to appease Tessa.

"Great," Tessa said with an enthusiastic nod. "Five minutes tonight and ten tomorrow, fantastic."

"There will be no Divas match tonight. You can go get changed."

Mark turned around, ensuring that Tessa couldn't argue with him any further, and Tessa stared at him as he walked away. She slowly turned to Summer who didn't look half as surprised by the announcement and raised her eyebrows, silently asking what had just happened.

"You didn't think to help me get the match back?"

"I appreciate the fight, T, but it's not worth the repercussions."

Tessa pouted, "Of course it is. We've worked so hard for this match. You've worked so hard for this title shot, for a title shot on a Pay Per View, and you're just going to let them take it away from you?"

"Yeah," Summer said with a self-deprecating laugh. "What else can I do? I can go yell at Triple H about how every match went longer they should have but that's not going to get us our match, it's going to get me fired."

"I'm not going to lie; I absolutely miss all-women promotions."

"What lit a fire under your ass? I won't lie, it was great and I was a little turned on," Summer said, earning a slap on the arm, "but that wasn't at all anything I expected from you."

"I ran into CM Punk this morning," Tessa answered with sarcastic joviality. "He really just makes my day."

Summer and Tessa parted ways, neither of them particularly happy with what they had been told, but Summer had every intention of changing out of her unnecessary ring gear whereas Tessa wanted to find somewhere in the arena where she could calm herself down.

The hunt for a quiet space was in vain, as hopeful as she might have been, with every other nook or cranny being occupied by someone else trying to wind down after or warm up for their match – she even overheard an argument taking place but decided that it was better to get out quickly rather than find out the involved parties. After a longer search than intended, Tessa was ready to give up, return to the locker room and change out of her ring gear until she came face-to-face with Colby.

"You don't get ready with the other two?" she asked conversationally when he looked up at her. The question left her mouth before she was even able to really think about it – somewhere in her mind, even after everything, Colby would always be one of her closest friends.

"We warm up separately first," he answered tightly. "What're you doing back here?"

Opening her mouth to explain that her match had been cut, Tessa had a realisation and she crossed her arms. "Did you tell anybody?"

"I don't know if you know this, Tessy, but if I tell anybody then I'm just as much of a bad guy as you."

"I'm not a bad guy," Tessa said defensively. "I didn't do anything wrong."

"Have you told him? If you haven't done anything wrong then there's nothing you need to be worried about, right?" he said as went back to his stretching. "But no, I haven't. What makes you think I did?"

"My match was cut and I saw you talking to Carano earlier, so... I don't know."

Colby shrugged, still not looking up at her. "It happens all the time, I'm sure it's nothing personal."

Tessa stayed in place for half a moment before she turned around and left Colby to his warm up. It would have been much easier for her to understand being cut from the card had there been a reason other than 'timing'. 'Timing' was too vague, in her opinion. It meant they didn't care enough about the match to ensure that it took place.

She stopped not far around the corner, another thought forming in her mind. Maybe Punk had said something – if Colby had told him. All it would take was a conversation with AJ and it would be around the Divas locker room in a heartbeat.

"Hey," Rami said softly, taking a seat beside Tessa who was sat opposite a monitor. "I'm sorry about your match."

"I've been told that I'm lucky to have gone this long without it happening," she said, repeating what Brie had told her as she was changing. "God, this is the first time one of my matches as ever been cut. Even back on the indies I was never pulled."

"It's crazy, isn't it?" he asked, smiling sadly. "You've been in this business for so long and new things are still happening."

"I'd much prefer it if the new things were good," Tessa stated, barely blinking as John Cena was declared winner of his Last Man Standing match against Bray Wyatt.

"Learning isn't always fun, habibti, you know that."

Tessa turned her head to the side, her eyes softening as her heart started to get heavier. "I really love you."

"I love you, too."

He leaned in to kiss her softly on the lips and Tessa's heart almost dropped into her stomach as she kissed him back.

-Monday Night Raw, June 2-

Tia was made to defend her title against Summer Rae tonight after their match was cancelled yesterday at Payback. Tia made quick work of Summer Rae in what was the throw away match of all throw away matches. Just when you think they're building up other Divas they cut them straight back down. It looks like we have seen the end of the Sami Zayn/Tia against Fandango/Summer feud, though, as Dolph Ziggler made it known that he wants he to be IC champion again. That I'm looking forward to.

a/n: thanks to starsxhearts23, Straight Edge Queen, DanniChappel, Imagineer1392, Bella315, Star-Moonlight1, UntilNeverDawns and lookitsria for reviewing! And thanks to AeonBlue for helping me out :D

Jimmy Jacobs is now part of the WWE creative team. HOW COOL IS THAT?!

I want to include Tessa answering questions for WWE Inbox in the next chapter so if you have any silly little questions you want her to answer you can put them in a review or shoot me a pm!