Next Day, Shane's House, 5:45 PM…
"Paige, come on! We gotta meet Liv on 34th Street in like an hour and a half!" Price called out, anxious to depart.
The boy had been ready for the last 45 minutes, opting to go the simple route with his chosen outfit for the night. Plain white t-shirt, blue jeans, Timberland boots. Oh, and a black North Face coat to top it off. He's really made a point to immerse himself in New York culture if you couldn't tell. However, Paige was taking her sweet time it seemed.
"Calm your tits, I'm coming out right now!" She yelled from behind the door of Shane's bedroom.
Like 10 seconds had passed, and the door swung open to reveal the girl in her typical all black attire. A black puffer jacket with a borrowed zip up hoodie from Shane's closet underneath, black skinny jeans, black gloves and black snow boots. Her eyeliner and lipstick were expertly applied, and her hair showed signs of being recently tended to with a straightening iron.
"Did you really have to do all that stuff in my room? It's gonna take forever to get the smell of perfume outta there." Price complained.
"I didn't even use that much. And I reckon that my perfume smells a lot nicer than the regular dirty gym sock stench." She hit back.
He was about to fire back with a rebuttal, but he quickly realized that doing so would be futile. She was right after all.
"Man, I need to clean my room more often… Anyway, let's hit the road. Don't wanna keep Liv waiting." He said while heading to the front door.
"Wait!" Paige exclaimed.
Price stopped dead in his tracks and turned back.
"I said I didn't want to keep her waiting, but okay. What's up?"
"You didn't say anything about my appearance, dick. I put a lot of effort into looking good today." She complained with her hands on her hips.
"Oh… my bad. I didn't think you cared that much…. Are you messing with me?" He asked confused.
"No! Well, not entirely. Normally I wouldn't care, but after I saw how you reacted to how I was dressed for the party, I realized… it wouldn't hurt if you acknowledged me as a girl instead of just your mate sometimes. It felt nice to be seen in that way for once. It's stupid, I know." She awkwardly explained, looking down at her feet as she did so.
"No, no it's not stupid. I didn't realize you felt that way is all. That being said, you look beautiful today, Midnight. You should wear red lipstick more often, cause I think you pull it off perfectly."
Paige beamed at his words, and could even feel her cheeks start to get warm as a small blush slowly appeared.
"Thank you, Love." She responded.
Shane then held the door open, revealing the snowy environment brought on by the winter.
"After you." He said with a smile of his own.
As she walked passed him, she gave him a little love tap on the shoulder.
"Don't get too sweet on me, bruv." The pale girl joked.
Price decided to simply nod and follow.
7:10 PM…
The two teens now found themselves in the heart of Manhattan. The hustle and bustle of the city had amplified due to it still being holiday season. New Years was only a few days away, and people were out taking care of business, even with the snowy weather making it a bit more difficult to maneuver around.
"Ooh, I wanna get a hot dog from that stand over there. How much is it?" Knight asked.
"That's Ahmed's stand so… Probably like $5.50." He estimated.
"What? For a bloody hot dog? Ahmed must be takin' the piss with those prices! Wow, never mind then."
"Dude, you're in New York City. In case you missed it, everything here costs too much, not just food. I'll just buy you the frank, don't worry." Shane stated.
"You're sure? I can just wait until we get back home to eat."
"Absolutely not. Midnight wants a hot dog, so Midnight is getting a goddamn hot dog. Plain and simple."
A response came, but not from the pale girl.
"If Liv wants a hot dog does she get one also?"
Paige and Shane both turned around to see the reason they were there in the first place, Ms. Liv Morgan herself.
"Hey, you didn't say your friend was coming. Just couldn't resist having two hotties with you out on the town, could ya? By the way babe, you look amazing." She said, referring to Paige at the end.
"See how I didn't have to ask her? She noticed quicker than you did, and she's not even into girls.. I think. Are you?"
"Honey, if they all looked like you, there's no way I wouldn't be." Morgan answered with a wink.
"I like this one." Knight told her best friend.
"I admit, she's great. But let me nip this in the bud before it turns into, "Let's all gang up on Shane", time. Come here, Morgan." He ordered, hugging the cheerleader in the process.
"I love how even when it's 25 degrees outside, you're still really warm."
"Yup, they call me the human furnace."
"I called you that, silly."
"Yeah, and you fall under the category of "they" don't you?"
Price released her from the hug and softly tapped her on the right cheek with his knuckles.
"Okay Pricey, what's the plan?" Liv asked.
"We've got a few options actually since the night's still young. If you guys really want something to eat, we could hit up Koreatown and get some chicken, but the store closes relatively soon so we gotta be quick. Liv, I see you eyeing the Macy's across the street, so yeah, we can head in there if we end up with enough time. Let's see… Oh yeah, there's an AMC a few avenues away so we can catch a movie. I'm not sure what they're running though. It's up to you, ladies."
Liv and Paige shared a knowing look before laughing and rolling their eyes at the boy, which greatly confused him.
"What, did I say something weird?" He asked.
"No, you're just acting like a donut. If I can recall correctly, YOU are the one that asked Liv to hang out, yeah?" Paige responded using a question of her own.
"Um… yeah, I did."
Morgan took the second part.
"So, honey… don't you think that it would've been a good idea to actually come up with exactly what you wanted us to do?"
"…You know, you make a solid point." Shane admitted.
"Fuckin' hell, this boy is hopeless. That Korean chicken place sounds like a good first step. How about we start there?" Paige suggested.
"Yeah, that sounds fine to me. Let's go."
Price walked ahead of the two girls to lead, while they once again shared a look.
"How does someone so inept at talking to women manage to constantly have them around him?" The snarky Brit inquired aloud.
Liv just shrugged.
"Me and the girls think it's adorable."
Paige silently agreed with a nod, and they began to follow the, at times, clueless kid to the restaurant. They ate and they joked around. Liv and Paige both chastised Shane for his inability to use chopsticks correctly.
"Love, I'm from the bloody UK and even I know how to use these things better than you. How does that even happen?"
"Hey, Midnight… I am a white guy from Phoenix goddamn Arizona. In what universe would anyone expect me to have an understanding of how to properly use chopsticks?"
"Ah, ah, ah.. excuses, excuses." Morgan playfully teased.
"Wow, you two must not want me to pay for you food or somethin." Price threatened.
Yeah, that shut those two up at least momentarily. They decided to drop the subject and focus on the free food in front of them. As they chowed down on the dinner, Shane's mind drifted off to the main reason he was there in the first place. His original plan was to drag it out and have as much fun as possible with the girl before he lowered the boom. However, he decided that it would be better to rip the band aid off and just get it over with.
"Hey, Liv?"
"What's up, Shane?"
"Um.. Yeah, I can't really think of a way to sugarcoat this, so I'm just gonna come right out and say it. We gotta talk about what happened."
2 Hours Later, Alexa's House…
The last 72 hours of the life of one Alexa Bliss had been, in a word, tumultuous. From the meltdown, to the walkout, one thing was made abundantly clear… Little Miss Bliss was pissed. Christmas Day for her was not the holly, jolly extravaganza that she hoped to have been part of. Instead, it was spent mostly alone. Her parents managed to get her downstairs for gifts, but even that was short lived.
Tyler, her dad, made the mistake of questioning why she hadn't invited her boyfriend over. In his defense, there's absolutely no way he could've known what had gone down the night prior, but that comment was enough to make his daughter storm out of the living room and retreat back into her quarters. He was going to try and follow her to see what the problem was, but his wife knew better and held him back.
To make matters worse, it looked like she was spending New Year's alone as well. Earlier today, her parents had left on a surprise business trip. Something about investors wanting to capitalize on holiday sales, or whatever. Princess wasn't really paying attention when they were explaining the whole thing to her. All she heard was, "Sorry, kid. We gotta bounce because money's way more important to us than our only daughter. See ya in a month!"
Now, in this empty house, all she was able to do was lay in her bed and sulk. If it wasn't for her commitment to cleanliness, she probably wouldn't have even bathed. She scrolled through Instagram for a while, but gave up on it after seeing posts from girls on the cheer team where they're celebrating the holidays with their boyfriends.
Big E and Sasha were spending Christmas in Florida, Emma and Xavier were at what seemed to be Xavier's house. They were in matching Naruto footie pajamas, which was completely on brand for Woods. Bayley posted a video of her and Seth doing snow angels while the Rollins fam looked on and laughed. Suffice to say, all this Christmas cheer was really turning Bliss into the Grinch.
"Fuck it, I'll just keep laying here then." She grumbled aloud.
Her mind then drifted off into nothingness until she heard the buzz of the doorbell.
"No fucking way." She groaned.
In response, she took a pillow and put it over her face, not wanting to answer. After 5 more buzzes, she reluctantly left her bed and trudged her way downstairs.
"I'm gonna kill whoever this is." She grumbled.
Little Miss Bliss swung open the door with disdain.
"What?!"
"Mate, I recommend you calm down."
Alexa froze as soon as she realized who was standing in front of her. It was none other than the rambunctious Aussie known as Rhea Ripley, and she did not look happy.
"W-What the hell are you doing here?" She stammered.
"To talk to you, genius. Now move, It's bloody freezing out here."
Ripley more or less invited herself in, and Lexi sure wasn't going to block her path. Not many things scared her, but a pissed off Rhea was definitely not something she had any desire to deal with.
"Can you at least take your boots off? You're gonna track the floor." She meekly requested.
The guitarist either didn't hear her or just flat out ignored her as she continued walking until she reached the sofa and took a seat.
"Sit."
Being careful to avoid the wet spots, Alexa obeyed and found herself next to Ripley, who was staring a hole through the petite princess.
"Look, whatever this is… please don't hurt me." She practically begged.
"That's rich, comin' from your ass. You had no problem with hurting Liv. You had no problem with hurting Shane. Why shouldn't I do the same to you?"
Alexa found herself angered by that, and suddenly she didn't care whether or not she was about to be pummeled.
"So everyone's just gonna take her side?! No one can stop for a second and put themselves in my shoes?! Rhea, how would you feel if one of your friends flirted with your fucking boyfriend on a daily basis?! Did I go too far when I put my hands on Liv? Sure, I'll admit that. I shouldn't have hit her. But is it really that hard to see how one would get to that point?"
At first, Ripley was enraged by Bliss raising her voice at her, but seeing visible tears as Alexa made her case caused her to soften up a little.
"Look, I don't know you that well and I'm pretty sure this is the first time we've interacted one on one. But I do know this. That boy loves you with all his heart, and the last thing he ever wanted to do was upset you. At the same time, Liv always had nice things to say about you whenever your name popped up in a conversation. She saw you as a true friend. And now what? You're gonna throw all of that away because of jealousy? Doesn't seem too smart to me."
Bliss sighed.
"You think I don't know that?"
"Well, if you knew, then why do what you did?"
"Rhea… I have a hard time trusting people. Outside of a few friends I've had forever, my circle has always been small, and I've made sure to keep it that way. When Shane came out of nowhere and started being the sweetest guy ever, I immediately thought he was up to something. I come from a rich family, maybe he saw what my last name was and decided he was going to try and get friendly with me for his own personal gain. That's the kind of stuff that goes through my head all the time. But Price somehow broke through all that and now we're.. well, I don't know what we are right now exactly, but we became a couple. He's the first genuine guy I've ever dated, so I can't help but be possessive over him. And Liv… fuck."
"What about Liv?" Rhea asked.
"Me and her have been friends for a while and I know exactly how she operates. She's a flirt, and up until recently, I've never had a problem with that."
"What changed then?"
"I already told you. I really like this one. Plus… I'm not blind. If you push our personalities aside, the similarities are there. If he thinks I'm pretty, no way he doesn't think the same about her. That and the flirting combined started to really bother me. But again, I feel like that's not that hard to understand."
Her explanation gave the Aussie something to think about, leading to her pausing for a moment before responding.
"Okay… You have a point and I definitely see where you're coming from. Still, you crossed a line when you put your hands on Liv."
"Well, what am I supposed to do? No way she wants anything to do with me right now."
"I don't know what you can do right this second, but I know that the second you get a chance to say sorry, you should do it. Same thing goes for Shane."
Alexa nodded in agreement.
"You're right, you're right. Are we cool though?"
"As long as you actually apologize and try to make things right, yeah, we're cool."
Ripley then stood up.
"Alright then, time to head home. Hopefully I get back before it starts snowing hard."
Bliss also got up to get the door for the girl. Ripley chuckled at the act.
"You're ready for me to leave your house, huh girl?"
"I was- No, it's not like that! I was just trying to be nice." Bliss nervously explained.
"Easy, princess. I was just messin' around. But remember what I said. I expect things to at least be somewhat normal again by the time we're all back in school."
Lexi nodded, and the Aussie fully left the premises. Letting out a slight sigh of relief, Alexa went to sit back down on the couch and think about what had just transpired.
"No, she's actually right…. What do I do though?"
AN: Aaaaay, I hated writing this, can't lie. Honestly don't feel like it's my best work, but I didn't wanna make you guys wait any longer. Sorry if it's not up to par. I appreciate you still following the story though. Any feedback, throw it in the reviews. See y'all in the next chapter.
