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The entirety of catering dropped into edgy silence the next morning as Joe stalked through, phone pressed to his ear. The sole audible part of the conversation consisted of, "You're the lawyer! YOU figure it out!"
Randy took that as a cue to perform a mental ten-count and then trail after Joe in the hopes of keeping the damage to a minimum. 'For the guy who's supposed to be the calm one, you have one hell of a temper. Control issues, man.'
Finding Joe turned out to be an easier endeavor than Randy expected. He only had to follow the continuing echo of pounding and banging to a small office in a distant part of the door, Randy simply leaned against its frame, folded his arms, and watched Joe heave punch after punch into the walls and table.
"You might want to stop hitting shit, since I know you don't want to go to triage." Tone cool and facial expression bored, Randy tried to start the conversation somewhere near 'disinterested' and see what happened as he went.
"What...the fuck...is that...supposed to mean?" Joe was panting, dust from broken plaster thick in the air.
"Well, Meg works in triage, and you avoid her like she's got a disease. Unless you really want to see Dave, or something. Maybe his flavor of Tylenol is more your style, y'know?"
Joe was looming in front of Randy in a flash, fists clenched, chest braced, shoulders locked broadly forward. "What does that mean?"
"Gotcha." Randy hadn't moved an inch, other than to crinkle a smirk across his face. 'And why I'm helping you with this, I don't know. It's not helping me any.'
'Fuck! Fuckfuckfuck...I had to say something, didn't I? Fuck!' Time felt like it slowed down; Joe held still for what felt like hours before his resolve cracked. Still trying to catch his breath, he reached for a chair, turned it backwards in front of him, and sat heavily, waiting for Randy to make his point.
"So," Randy continued, "Unless you jacked up your hand and you really do have to go to triage, you've got time to talk. Your workout's done, there's no promos to shoot for another 45 minutes, and costuming isn't here yet. Do you want to tell me what's really going on?"
"The engagement's off."
"Well, no shit." Randy's deadpan was terrifying in its complete flatness, though the smirk never left.
"Was it that obvious?"
The smirk broadened to a smile. "Can I be a douche for a second?"
"Could I stop you if I wanted to?"
"I'm glad the bitch is gone. Get yourself a really expensive lawyer. Then, get yourself back together. I hear they make rebound fucks for that."
Joe felt his heart catch, trip, stop. 'I can't. She's...I…'
That was all it took. Staring up at the ceiling, Joe recounted the whole thing, jumbled as it was, from the ice chips to whispering to her, holding her on the floor, falling on her in bed, pulling her down into that glittering kiss, trying to explain how she tasted like roses, caramel, her fingers on his lips, even the tiny medallion on her necklace.
"That's Saint Julian," Randy cut in, "Maybe you could have, I dunno, asked her about it?" Randy rolled his eyes.
Joe sighed quietly, then explained how she froze up after he talked about his fiancee the night of his injury, then that he let her hands linger on his face before she left that morning. All of it sweetness and confusion that he couldn't get out of his head.
"Joe, you really don't hear yourself? I mean, I know what you did, but you don't...really? I mean, okay, I knocked your ass out-"
"No, you didn't." Immediately defensive, Joe felt himself bristle but had no idea why it was important to make the point Randy hadn't gotten one over on him.
"Like I was saying, you got fucked up that night. But you looked at Meg, told her you knew exactly who she was and exactly what you were doing. You kissed her, then you told her it was no big deal because hey, everything with you and your stupid bitch was A-Fucking-Okay and she shouldn't worry about it. You really expected her not to worry about you?"
"When did you get so fucking emotional?" The edge in Joe's voice was dangerous.
"Because what you did killed her." Randy, equally steely, fired back almost immediately, but felt something in him demand that he hold back, not tip his emotional hand to Joe any more than he already had. "Jackson is a worthless, useless shitheel to her, and Meg's always had a soft spot for you. Do you really think she takes the time to argue with anyone else about stupid shit like kneepads? Even Dave gave her shit about how she was always a hardass to everyone except you. You scared the absolute fuck out of her that night, crawled under her skin, made her give a fuck about you and then basically said, 'Nah, trick, my boo is just out for the night, but thanks anyway!'"
Joe glared. "You can shut the fuck up now."
"No, you can shut the fuck up now. You need to leave Meg alone, period. She doesn't know you and your she-beast are over with; don't expect me to be the one to tell her. If it was up to me, I'd tell her to kick you in the nuts." 'I'd tell her a lot of things, none of them involving you.'
"So, what, you're her overprotective big brother?"
"Don't put yourself in the position to find out, asshole. Leave. Her. Alone." Randy rolled off the doorframe and back out into the hallway. Joe stood, tilting the chair from one leg to another, finally throwing it across the room and sending up a howl of frustration.
Meg trudged through catering about 20 minutes later, snagging a bottle of Diet Dr. Pepper from a cooler and ignoring everything else on the tables, much to Dave's dismay.
"You need to eat. I'm bringing you a plate for triage."Dave grabbed Meg by the arm, barely managing to hide a snarl of revulsion at how far around her arm his hand wrapped.
"No. Unless it's for the people who end up in triage, in which case I need dry crackers and ginger soda." Meg looked bored and distant.
"You're a stubborn thing when you want to be."
"Whatever." Meg pulled out her script and schedule and wandered off in the general direction of triage, looking at the floor, as she went. She brushed past Randy after two or three hallways, not realizing he'd been looking for her all along, and she ignored him as she moved. He had to change direction and jog a bit to catch back up to her; he'd thought she'd stop once they crossed paths.
"Hold up a sec, Meg." Randy touched her arm, hoping to slow her down.
"I don't really-," she mumbled, not looking up.
"Look at me. Make the time." Randy's voice was icy, and Meg knew she didn't have a choice.
Meg forced herself to lift her eyes from the ground. "Okay," she sighed, "What-?"
"C'mere. We should talk for a second. I have a favor to ask you."
"Randy, really, I-"
"It's simple. All I want you to do is hold on to my room key." Randy rummaged through the pockets of his track pants, then the side pockets of his gym bag, making a much bigger show than was necessary of finding the key he already knew was in his wallet.
"Uh, I'm not staying with-"
"Well, you are now. I keep losing my keys, anyway, and I'm fucking tired of paying for new ones." Producing his wallet, Randy exaggerated an 'a-ha' moment and passed his keycard to Meg, who held it like it was on fire.
Meg wrinkled her nose. "Can I finish one fucking sentence?"
"I'm sorry. Go ahead." He smiled, waving his hands in front of her generously, to indicate the floor was hers. 'I won this one, so whatever else you wanna argue about, go ahead.'
"I'm not staying with you. And you've never lost a room key in the entire time I've known you. What is this really about?"
"Remember how you never told me who ordered the movie, but I trusted you and I let it go?"
Meg's face became instantly unreadable. "I remember."
"Okay. This is one of those things. I trusted you then. I just need you to trust me now. I'm not doing this to get you into bed and I'm not doing this because Dave is telling me to do it. I just need you to trust me and hold on to my room key. You don't have to stay with me. Just hold on to it. Use it if you need it."
"What am I hiding from?" The skepticism in Meg's voice was nearly dripping.
"Nothing, kiddo. Just use it if you need it." Randy squeezed her arm - 'She's still so goddamn bony. If she does show up, I'm force-feeding her a pizza. Or three.' - and walked back to the locker area.
Meg shrugged and pocketed the key. She told Dave about it once she was in triage, but he was believable when he said he had no idea why Randy would offer it to her. 'Strange. Just strange, all the way around. I wonder if it's just for this show, or if this is the new normal.' Wandering back out to the triage monitors, she took a seat and tried to melt into the chair until the end of the show.
Dave, however, lumbered off to find Randy as fast as his middle-aged legs would carry him, knowing something wasn't quite right. Rounding a corner near gorilla, he spotted Randy bouncing through a pre-match warmup while an intern held a clipboard up in front of him.
"What serial killer is on the loose that anorexic, sleep-deprived, LPN-interns are suddenly at a high murder risk?" Dave's voice was half-serious and half-concerned, a combination odd for him. To get Dave to truly worry about anything was like getting blood from a stone.
Randy snorted and waved the intern away. "Dude. Try more like an angry, desperate, heartbroken Samoan man."
"Oh, shit. That's an actual problem." Dave rubbed at the back of his neck, wondering why Meg always seemed to be where Joe was, literally or metaphorically. "What happened?"
"On the upside, he finally got rid of the dead weight and dumped that bitch. On the downside, it apparently took nearly an entire bottle of bourbon, a dream where he nearly killed Meg, and months of obsessive-compulsive...compulsion...to do it. Meg really got under his skin. And you know he's been under hers from the get-go." 'And she's been under mine, but that's a whole fucking other mess.'
"Yeah, no kidding. And what do you want her to do with your room key, exactly?"
Randy sighed. "Honestly? I don't know. I told Joe to stay away from her. He's a train wreck right now. I don't want him to do anything impulsive. You and Meg room together, but if he shows up at your hotel, she needs a place to go so he doesn't..." he trailed off, unsure where to go with his thoughts.
"You don't think he would hurt her?" Dave's eyebrows knit together at the notion.
Randy furrowed his brow. "No! No. Nothing like that. But they don't need to be each others' drinking buddies, put it that way." Dave chuckled at the notion. "Joe needs time, and he doesn't realize it. It hasn't even occurred to him that Meg is still seeing Jackson. So I was thinking, if you needed somewhere to put Meg, someone who might have an easy time telling Joe to go fuck off, and someone to be able to get Meg to stay put…"
"...Then you might be that guy?" Dave finished.
"Exactly." Randy was smug in his confidence.
"Well, great. But how am I supposed to get her there? We stay at Chateau de Motel Six, remember?"
"I can fake whatever you need me to fake. You guys are obligated to show up to our hotel once I call. I'm obligated to be a pain in the ass and keep her there."
"Randy...it's not that easy." His eyes had widened; Randy suddenly sounded like he'd forgotten all about Meg's stubborn streak.
"Whatever, Dave. It will be. And she's going to get my room card, every show, until things settle down for her. Maybe she'll even show up out of boredom. It'll be good for her to be social. I might even get her to, y'know, have an actual meal. Talk about Jackson. Sort her shit out." 'Hers, mine, whatever.'
Randy shook out his shoulders one last time, clapped the older man on the arm, and trotted off toward gorilla. Dave just shook his head. "Optimism of youth," he muttered under his breath, and slowly walked back to triage. Jackson was no low hurdle, and neither were the upcoming contractual issues, but there was still time. Not much, where the contract was concerned, but Randy knew more about managerial politics than did Dave. As for Jackson, well – Dave just shook his head.