Author's note: UntilNeverDawns, thank you so much for your help with this chapter. I hope I've managed to take care of those 'Huh?'-moments. ;-)
I apologize in advance for being mean to my characters (and also to you, my dear readers), but I've been exposed to the works of one Mr. Whedon and one Mr. Moffat for too long apparently... I'm going to blame this on them. Yeah, sounds like a good plan...
She saw McMahon take a deep breath. Perhaps he was going to reprimand them for their behavior, but honestly, they hadn't done anything to merit it, so she started talking before he could. "Before you say anything, we have always kept it hushed. Only a handful of people know. My brother, Stuart here and Chris Jericho. That's it. As for my duties as a writer, I have always kept the company's best interests at heart. I haven't gone about my job any differently since our private relationship changed, in fact if I may say so myself, it only made me aspire to do a better job."
McMahon sat down on the edge of his desk with a sigh. He pinched the bridge of his nose. "So one of my superstars starts dating a girl from creative and suddenly all hell breaks loose... You're aware that Dickson was going to fire your ass later, right?"
Nina's posture stiffened a little. "No, I wasn't. May I at least ask why?"
"Of course." McMahon crossed his arms over his massive chest. "He told me something about your promiscious behaviour being no longer tolerable. He also complained about it being an affront to the image of our company... Wrestling has turned into a family friendly form of entertainment after all and if word of this ever leaked to the press, we'd be done for. So you see, his wish to fire you is really understandable ."
"I get that," Nina said in a deceptively calm voice. "But since those allegiations were nothing but a bunch of lies fabricated by some bully, wouldn't it be even less pretty if word got out? Whatever happened to the Be a STAR campaign? Wasn't that something about anti-bullying? For some reason Mike's behavior strikes me as that of a bully..."
McMahon grinned. "Touché, Miss Stewart. I agree with you. Tell me, how much do you want to keep your job?"
For the first time in an hour or so Nina looked over at Stephen. His face was tense, which wasn't very helpful, because that was exactly how she was feeling.
"What's that supposed to mean?" she asked, unable to comprehend what McMahon was trying to tell her.
"It means when it comes down to having to choose, what would you choose? Your job? Or love?" A lot of sarcasm was dripping off that single word 'love'.
Nina inclined her head to the left as she regarded the chairman of the WWE. She felt the air around her crackle with tension because all of the eyes in the room were on her. She did the last thing anyone expected her to in a situation like that. She threw back her head and laughed.
"Do you honestly think this is a difficult choice for me? Oh, God this is funny! Even if those two," she gestured at Stephen and Stuart, "sue Mike and win, my name will never be washed clean of those allegations. So working this job will be a continuous struggle. My parents taught me to always work hard and give my best, which is a valuable lesson to learn. But you know what? A job doesn't hug you when you come home at night. It pays the bills, on occasion it consumes your every waking moment, but it's just a job after all. Nothing more and nothing less. It's not a person, it's not necessarily happiness. It's a means to an end. I work to live, but I don't live to work." McMahon was about to say something, but she quickly continued talking, holding up her index finger admonishingly. "I know how this may sound like I'm making a choice, but I just wanted you to know how I feel, because I'm not going to choose. At least, not under your terms. I'm going to quit."
"What?" Stephen's outraged voice resounded through the office. "You are not going to bloody quit!"
"Don't you fucking tell me what to do, Stephen! If I want to quit, I'll quit and there is nothing you can do about it," she hissed at him. So now she was going to acknowledge his presence? This was just marvelous!
"The hell you will! I can't do anything about it?! Do you really think so? What if I quit, too?" He took a step closer to her, sticking out his chin challengingly as he towered over her.
"Don't be an absolute moron, Farrelly!" She told him, throwing him an incredulous and thoroughly unimpressed stare. "This might seem like a noble gesture right now, but use your head! Your contract is worth what? A couple of million dollars?! Are you fucking out of your mind?"
"You should listen to your girlfriend, Stephen. She does have a point. Or should I say soon to be ex-girlfriend?" McMahon inquired.
"Why shouldn't I go ahead and quit too?" Stephen asked, completely ignoring his boss. All he was interested in right now was Nina and the argument they were having at present.
"Because, to use your own words, this is something you love, something you always wanted to do. And if you quit your job over me and some idiotic notion of chivalry, we're through, understood?" Despite her harsh words her voice was imploring. But for the life of him he couldn't find it in his heart to agree with her.
"As you said before, a job alone isn't enough to make you happy...," he repeated her earlier words.
"Oh my God!" She actually pulled at her hair when she said those words. "You are such an idiot! Don't be so stupid! Are you occasionally listening in on what you're saying? If you do this, you're probably going to hate me for the rest of your life. Do you think I want that? I want you to be happy! Don't you get that, you stupid, stubborn Irishman?" She took a step closer and reached up to clasp his face with both of her hands. "Now you listen, you big old lug, you'll stay here and don't do anything stupid. I'm going to pack my things and go find myself another job."
"I don't think so," McMahon decided to interrupt the heart-wrenching scene. The three other occupants of the room looked at him in puzzlement. He apparently had to spell everything out for them. "You don't have to quit, Miss Stewart."
"I don't?" Her hands sank down from Stephen's face.
"No. I've a soft spot for women with spunk. Though it's obvious you can't keep writing for Stephen here."
"Why not?" she challenged and was immediately nudged in the ribs by Stephen because of it. It was his way of signaling her to shut up, but she just glared at him. "Who do you think you are? My legal guardian?"
Behind them Stuart flinched at her sharp tone. Apparently Stephen had pissed her off more than she let on and she had already let on that she was extremely angry.
"I don't think you have it in you to knowingly send him into situations that might be dangerous for him. After all, this job isn't completely risk free... Or do you want to tell me this has never given you any pause?"
Nina made a face. Involuntarily her thoughts drifted back to the match between Stephen and Mark Henry a couple of weeks back. If she was honest with herself, she did have a problem being the one to send him into those kind of situations. "It has," she finally admitted begrudgingly. And after a brief pause she immediately asked: "So if I lose Sheamus, do I at least get to keep Wade Barrett?"
Her boss smirked. "I don't see any reason why you shouldn't," McMahon told her.
"Who will I be assigned to then?"
"We'll see about that," McMahon told her.
"What about Mike?" Stephen decided to speak up once again. After all that's what they had come here for originally - they had wanted to take care of their little Mike problem.
"Leave that to me," McMahon reassured them. His affirmation sounded ominous. For some reason Stephen felt less than satisfied with the outcome of this meeting. "So what exactly does that mean?" he asked.
"I promise the problem will be taken care of."
Though currently Stephen and Nina didn't seem to see eye to eye on a whole lot of things, they at least appeared to be on the same wave length concerning Mike. "Maybe you can give us a bit more information," Nina tried to appeal to McMahon.
"Yeah, that's not much to go on," Stuart said, finally speaking up again after a long while.
"You are really a tough crowd, you know that right?" McMahon narrowed his eyes at them and rubbed his chin. "All right. We're talking temporary payment suspension or possibly even dismissal."
"Now that sounds a little more reassuring," Stuart nodded his approval.
A brief smile of relief appeared on Nina's face and then quickly disappeared again. The fact that Stephen had wanted to do this behind her back still stung. She needed to get away from him before she did something stupid. "Mr. McMahon, do you mind if I...?" she gestured towards the door.
"Not at all, I'm sure you and Stephen have a lot to talk about," McMahon gave her a knowing look which left Nina with the unpleasant aftertaste of pity. Pity always got the same reaction out of her: aggression. That feeling intensified when she thought of the prospect of having to talk to Stephen.
Upon hearing his name, Nina inevitably shot Stephen a reproachful look which seemed to say "Just don't follow me!" He didn't merit the artificial smile she threw the other two men. Unfortunately it would need much more than a nasty look to discourage him from going after her; he was quite stubborn after all.
She left McMahon's office and as was to be expected, he followed right behind. "We need to talk," he announced as soon as they were out of that door.
"Do we? I have a feeling now is not good time for that," she shot him another dirty look.
"You can glare at me all you want, luv. I won't go away," he told her, crossing his arms over his chest.
"So you want to talk to me when I'm angry enough to kick you in the balls? That's a brilliant strategy! Very clever! Let me compliment you on that stellar idea, Farrelly," her voice was snide and he probably deserved that, but McMahon's secretary was already perking her ears, so he thought it would be wise to take this somewhere a little more private.
"Can we talk in your office?" he asked, trying to bite back the retort that was lying on the tip of his tongue. As he had mentioned to her countless times, he had a temper. How could it be she had forgotten that? He could only take so much until he snapped. He only hoped and prayed that he would be able to calm down somewhat on their way to her office.
She shook her head. "Thin walls. Also I'm sharing it with two other colleagues. Not a lot of privacy. I've got a better idea..."
He just nodded and followed her as she turned around abruptly and marched off to the elevator. She pressed the button for the basement with a little extra force, doubtlessly channeling some of her frustration into that simple gesture.
They passed the elevator ride down in terse silence. The basement of the building housed a subterranean garage for the employees of the WWE. The architect, apparently rather mindful of safety precautions, had thought ahead and divided the garage from the main building with a couple of heavy fire proof doors. She stepped through the first of two doors leading to the garage and came to an abrupt stop. The door slammed shut behind them with a final bang. Those two door were supposed to keep a fire from spreading; they would probably also do a good job at containing the noise of a heated discussion.
"So what did you want to talk about?" she asked defiantly. "I've already told you it's not smart talking to me now, right?"
"Yes, you have. But how smart do you think it would be to put off this conversation? I'm not even sure you'll talk to me later if I don't explain now...," he pointed out to her. The elevator ride had at least partially done the trick. He was relatively calm again and able to have a rational conversation.
"What's there to talk about?"
"You tell me. You're the one who's all riled up." It struck him only after he had said those words that they were the verbal equivalent of waving a red flag in front of a bull's eyes. He immediately wished he could take them back, but it was too late now.
"All riled up?" she echoed. "Oh, trust me! It's nothing major. Just that you seem to think it's you who takes all the decisions in this relationship...," Nina drawled sarcastically.
"What? Are you completely off your fucking nut?" his eyes widened in surprise. Subconsciously he took a step closer to her, which would have been intimidating to every other woman except her. She in turn also took a step closer to him and jabbed her index finger into his chest.
"Off my nut? Are you trying to tell me you think I'm crazy?!" she screeched. He captured her wrist with his hand and pulled her finger away from his chest. She wrenched her hand out of his grasp with an angry snarl.
"You sure act like you're crazy...," he told her in a barely contained low voice that reminded her a bit of a growling dog.
"I'm beginning to think you don't have the slightest idea how relationships work. Let me explain this to you. We are supposed to be a team now, you and I," she spoke slowly and in a patronizing way as if she was talking to a spoiled child. Her superior attitude was making his blood boil and his hands curled into fists at his sides; nevertheless he remained quiet and listened. "That means that you don't get to go to McMahon behind my back and try to fucking sue Mike! You don't get to tell me what to do! And much less do you get to decide how I live my fucking life!" At this point of their argument she had raised her voice to a loud scream. It bounced off the walls of the small enclosed space, created by the two fire proof doors and resounded in his ears long after she was done screaming at him.
He had never been able to stand it when someone screamed at him. It always had the same result. He got mad. He turned around and hit his flat hand against the metal door with a roar. The noise of his hand hitting the door was comparable to someone hitting the hood of a car with a sledge hammer.
This woman! This bleeding thrice damned woman made him angrier than any other person he had ever met. And he had met a lot of irritating bastards in his time. She made his blood boil and his skin crawl. He was not even sure he was able to express his anger in words. He turned around and glared at her, his chest heaving.
And still she was not afraid of him. He had seen grown men run in the other direction when he got like that. Some fellas back in Ireland would have sprinted barefoot all the way to London to get away from him when he was in this sort of mood. She, however, just stood there and glared at him.
"Aaaah!" A scream of frustration broke out of him. "Why the fuck can't you let anyone take care of you?! Why do you have to be so bloody stubborn, woman?! All I wanted was to help you... Can't you see that?"
"I don't need your help. In fact, come to think of it, I don't even need this conversation right now. It's pointless. You're angry, I'm angry. Pointless! I'm going to leave now," she told him already walking towards the door.
"Yeah, you do that!" he told her.
"Fine!" she told him with a little extra venom in her voice.
"Fine!" he shot back and she let the door slam shut behind her to make a point. He stood there for a while longer. His breathing eventually slowed down. He became aware of a dull throbbing in the heel of his hand and when he looked down at it, it was red and hurt when he touched it. The pain let his anger slowly dissipate and as he started to gradually regain the ability to think clearly, a deep feeling of remorse came over him. What the hell had just happened? And more importantly why had he let it happen? Had he really just screwed everything up?
Nina sat at her couch staring at the TV. Some movie was on, but she didn't pay any attention to it. In her thoughts she was reliving the happenings of today for the umpteenth time. Her throat felt very tight and her stomach was queasy, even though it was empty.
Funny, how the TV-screen casts a bluish light on everything, despite the pictures on it being multi-color. She picked at the threads protruding from the hole in the fabric of her jeans that left her right knee uncovered. "I'm not going to cry over him," she repeated the day's mantra in her head. Up until now she had succeeded. She grabbed a cushion from next to her and hugged it to her chest like a teddy bear. "I'm not going to cry over him." One more time, all together now!
God, how she missed him! God, how she hated him right now! Her vision started fogging up and she hurled the pillow across the living room with a frustrated groan. No! No! No!
She got to her feet and started pacing. Suddenly she felt the overwhelming urge to see him and talk to him just to set things right, but that wasn't possible anymore. He was probably already several hundred miles away. Too far away. And what did she want to talk about? He had behaved like a caveman. Now that she had had a chance to think about it she could understand that he done it out of some misguided attempt of saving her and playing her knight in shining armor. But she didn't need saving. She needed a partner, not something stupid like a guy who sat on a horse and wore an ugly, impractical, and disproportionately large tin can.
Right from the start things had been so easy, so uncomplicated between them, she couldn't help but wonder how everything had gotten so messy so fast. Perhaps she shouldn't have slept with him... Perhaps it was simply not meant to be.
"Stop it! Stop this bullshit!" she admonished herself. "You love him. You might hate his guts right now, but you still love him. What does that tell you?" Her thoughts were getting her nowhere. Or maybe not nowhere. Just nowhere comfortable. Because if she followed that line of thought right to the end, she might find out that she was going to forgive him, just as soon as the word 'sorry' would leave his stupid mouth. But what if that 'sorry' never came? What if they had blown their one and only chance to be together? They had not even really started their relationship properly and they had already messed it up. Now if that wasn't depressing, what was?
She raked her hand through her hair and let out a sad chuckle, because it made her think of his unruly hair which he nearly always hid under a flat cap. This was too much! She needed to forget.
Nina got to her feet and padded to the kitchen. She was determined to get shit-faced. There was a bottle of Scotch in the kitchen cupboard with her name on it. She ripped open the cupboard. The bottle was standing on the topmost shelf. It was clear as day who had put it there, because she was too small to reach it. So she stood there looking up at it incredulously as tears started streaming down her face. Actually she was alternating between laughing hysterically and crying. Anyone who saw her like that would probably mistake her for a madwoman. Well, perhaps that judgment wasn't too far off. She was pretty crazy.
Great! An inner voice started mocking her for wallowing in self-pity. Her nose was about to start dripping from all that crying she had been doing, so she went in search of a tissue. She noisily blew her nose when her cellphone started ringing. It was the middle of the night, around eleven. Who could be calling her so late? Her eyes fell on the display and read his name. She was torn between answering it and flushing the cellphone down the toilet in order to keep herself from picking it up. More ringing. She wasn't that strong. She reached for the phone.
"'ello?" Her nose was completely blocked and tears were still running down her cheeks, but hopefully he wouldn't hear that. She was a pathetic sight. A pathetic human individual. Why couldn't she just have let the phone ring?
"Hello," he said softly. The remorse in his voice was hard to miss. It got even more prominent when he asked the next question: "Are you crying?"
"No, no, I've just got a runny nose" she lied, but it was pretty useless, because her voice was really nasal and no matter how much she protested there was also a pathetic little quiver in it.
"Nina...," he sighed. "Stop crying, luv."
His voice right then and there was enough for her to fully break out crying. It was like the flood gates had opened. All the tension of the last couple of months, all those moments she had pretended she was stronger than she actually was, were finally taking their toll. There was only so much she could take. Today she had almost been fired and on top of things, she had a spectacular fight with Stephen, which might or might not have resulted in their break-up. She wasn't too sure about the current status of their relationship.
Nina threw the phone on the couch. She was disgusted with herself. She was not weak. She did not cry. The hand she pressed to her mouth managed stifling the sob that was threatening to break out of her.
She heard him calling out to her. Over and over again. His voice grew louder and louder when she didn't answer. He was worried. She took a deep breath and tried to fight down the tears. She pressed the phone to her ear again. "I'm still here. I'm sorry I think I'm having some sort of meltdown right now. Can we talk later?" Those three sentences were just about as much as she managed to get out in a comparatively normal tone of voice. Her throat tightened again as another sob wanted to force its way out.
"No, please don't hang up," his voice was soft, imploring even. She had never heard him talk to her like that. Then again she had never cried hysterically while talking to him on the phone. Why he wanted to witness her humiliation was beyond her. It meant letting him glance into the abyss of her own personal madness. She'd be surprised if that didn't make him feel like throwing in the towel on their relationship once and for all.
"This is humiliating," she said with a quivering voice. "Don't make me talk to you when I'm like this."
"Calm down, luv. You don't need to talk if you don't want to. You only need to listen," he told her with a voice so gentle it made her heart ache.
"Where are you?" she choked out.
"Missouri," he said darkly. "Miles and miles away. I'd give me right arm about now to just to hold you. This is all my fault... I'm such a world class arsehole!"
"You're not," Nina protested through her tears.
"I am too," he corrected her gently. "I've had some time to think this through on the flight over here and trust me I am a world class arsehole. No use arguing about it. You deserve better than this."
He heard her sniffle over the line. "Please, stop crying."
"I can't. Every time someone says something nice to me, I start bawling again. I can't help myself."
"Nina, darling, what am I going to do with you?" he sighed in exasperation. She had to laugh at his stupid choice of endearment, because it made her think of tea parties and clotted tea and scones. Her chuckle had something heart wrenching to it because it almost sounded like a sob.
"Shhh, it's going to be okay. I promise."
"I'm going to die of embarrassment," she managed to get out in between snivels.
"No, don't talk like that. It's bad enough I can't be there to hold you, the least I can do is stay on the phone while you're crying."
"I'm sorry about today," she told him.
"I'm sorry too," he replied. "And I'm sorry we have to do this over the phone. It doesn't feel like saying it is enough. I want to look in your eyes when I say it. I want to make it up to you. I want to... Christ! I want to kiss you, but you know what? This is all bolloxed up! I'm in some fecking hotel room I shouldn't be in and there is no chance in hell of me getting away to see you because we've got a show coming up tomorrow." She could tell he was growing more and more frustrated with the situation.
"It's okay," she told him gently. Her tears were starting to dry.
"No, it's not, but thanks for saying it. If I was less of a selfish prick, I would tell you to break the hell up with me. If we take the last 24 hours into account, one's got to admit I'm not really boyfriend material..."
"I thought you wanted to console me, not make me cry harder."
He sighed and his affection for her shone through in the way he softly said the next words: "I'm just wondering how long you are going to be able to put up with me, is all."
"I don't have to put up with you. I want to," she said softly. "Big difference."
"Nina, it's killing me to know you're crying because of me and I can't do anything about it except to say I am sorry."
"Make it up to me when you get back?"
"In three weeks?"
"Three weeks?" she repeated incredulously.
"Too long, right?" he asked.
"Yes?" she said cautiously. Something about the tone of his voice was strange.
"Maybe that's a good thing," there was a long pause during which she was asking herself whether he had gone completely crazy now.
"How is that a good thing?" she asked finally.
"Because it gives you time to think about whether you really want to have a relationship with me." She could tell by the tone of his voice that making that proposal wasn't easy for him.
"Do you really think three weeks will change anything about the way I feel for you?"
"I don't know. I hope not," he sounded unsure. "You got into this without being prepared for what it would be like. Now that you do, the only fair thing, the only decent thing to do, would be to give you some time to think about it, even though it's killing me."
His suggestion was very rational and level-headed, but something inside of her screamed not to even consider what he was proposing. Then again this situation right here sucked. If she was honest with herself, she needed him right now. She didn't need to talk to him on the phone. She needed him right here in the flesh, even if this was just some minor thing, a stupid fight in which they had both been able to beautifully showcase their respective tempers.
She couldn't help but wonder what it would be like if they ever had serious problems. They had their relationship in episodes, like some stupid soap opera. She got to spend a couple of days with him and then he would be on the road again. What if something serious ever came up? What if he really needed her or she needed him? Sometimes planes were not fast enough and as much as her nerdy heart regretted it, something fancy and science-fictiony like beaming was yet to be invented.
"What's that long silence got to mean?" Stephen's voice eventually brought her back to the present.
"I'm considering your proposal..."
"Shite! I was hoping you wouldn't. I shouldn't have made it in the first place. Forget that! I should never have said anything! I always manage to banjax everything...," he seemed to be in a rather depressive mood as well if he, who was usually so cocky and full of himself, said things like that.
"Steve, stop being angry at yourself for a minute here! It's not your fault," she scolded him gently.
"You wanna tell me how this is not me fault? I must have scared the crap out of you this morning the way I was acting... I was behaving like a madman."
"I wasn't scared of you," she answered without hesitation. "I know you would never hurt me."
"Thank you," he said after a while. His voice sounded thick and she could tell just by listening to him that he was moved by her words and the trust she put in him.
"You're welcome," she said softly.
"So is this only about this morning? Because if it was, consider the air cleared," she added after a while.
"It's not just about this morning..."
"Is it me? Have I done something wrong?" she asked inevitably.
"No!" he said quickly and vehemently.
"I swear if you say the words 'it's not you, it's me' now, I'm going to rip you a new one..."
She heard him chuckle weakly over the line. "So this is you breaking up with me then…," she concluded finally.
"I don't want to break up with you."
"So why does it feel like you're doing it now?"
"Nina, darling, believe me, the last thing I want is to break up with you...," he tried to explain.
"Okay," she said.
"Do you want me to explain?" There was a certain hesitance in his voice, like he was asking himself whether he was crazy for going through with this.
"Please, by all means," was her almost mechanical reply. Her mother had been very adamant about teaching her children some manners. Unlike most people, whenever Nina was particularly overwhelmed by a situation she lapsed into politeness, almost like a defense mechanism. After all, it created a certain detachment.
"I'll be gone for the next three weeks with no chance to just hop on a plane and see you. What if something happened to you during that time?" She heard him falter; apparently even talking about that imaginary scenario was difficult for him. "What if you broke your leg? I wouldn't be able to take care of you. I would only be back when the worst would be through. You have to admit that is a pretty crappy scenario. And while I know that you're independent and you can manage on your own, the question is: Should you have to? I mean, call me old-fashioned, but sometimes a phone call just isn't enough... I've always liked to think the words 'I love you' were something absolute, like a promise. Like through thick and thin… that sorta thing."
"Well, some of us Americans must have you confused then. Certain people like to throw around that word 'love' like it's just a normal average run-of-the-mill word...," she joked, unsuccessfully trying to make an utterly depressing conversation less depressing.
"Yeah, but you're not one of those people, are you?" he asked and completely ignored her pathetic attempt at levity.
"No, I'm not."
"Me neither."
"So what now?" she finally asked.
"That's entirely up to you," he said quietly.
There was a long silence. His words started to sink in and she started to comprehend their meaning. He was granting her a way out of this, of a situation she had not been prepared for. How should she have? If someone had told her about a year ago, she would be dating a wrestling superstar she would have laughed in their faces. But right now she surely didn't feel like laughing. Actually her vision was going hazy again as her eyes filled with fresh tears.
"I love you," she told him crying again. "You know that, right?"
"I love you," he replied and there was also the slightest quiver in his voice. He let out a long breath. "So do you want to go through with this then?"
"I don't know. You haven't been all that clear on what I would be agreeing to...," she said hesitantly.
"We're talking three weeks of no contact. Three weeks in which you and I can make up our minds about whether we really want to try and make this work..."
"And after those three weeks?"
"We meet up and talk."
After his answer there was a long silence. There was nothing more to say except for the inevitable and for some reason she wanted to postpone that as long as possible. Again she started picking at the hole in her jeans. In her frustration she actually tugged rather vigorously at those threads sticking out of it. Tears were welling up in her eyes. She was frustrated with herself and this situation and what she was about to say.
"Ok, let's do this," she finally said and those few words felt like a punch in the gut. They made her stomach lurch. They ruined her evening. They ruined the next three weeks. They made her cry harder.
