"Hey," Mike greets his wife on Wednesday night, holding her close. He had just finished the last day of filming for Marine 4, and he's feeling pretty good. "Fancy meeting you here." She giggles against him and nuzzles closer, staring up at him. "So I guess we're done here professionally
She nods, breathing softly. "Yeah, I guess we are." She glances behind him. "Any reason you wanted to meet outside of the hotel sauna?"
"Mm hmm," he nods. "I have a couple of ideas, yeah." He runs his fingers over her knuckles, grinning down at her. "Come on." He leads her into the room off to the side of the sauna and watches her as she looks around at the towels stacked up by the benches, grinning.
"Mike, why are we here? Isn't the sauna closed for the night?" He smirks and pushes her towards the towels, grabbing one himself. "Mike-" Before she can finish speaking, he leans in and kisses her before pulling away and moving to slip out of his clothes, wrapping up in the towel. She frowns at him but hesitantly follows suit, holding the towel tightly as he grips her hand and guides her back towards the sauna, his hand warm on her side.
"The hotel staff agreed to leave the sauna open a little later for us," he tells her softly, opening the door for her. Steam pours out of the room, brushing against their bare skin, and AJ gapes up at him, grinning for a moment before slipping inside. Mike follows and the door slams shut behind them, AJ looking around the room happily. "Feels nice, huh?"
"Yes," she nods, settling down on a bench and stretching her legs out. "It's all I could think about since you mentioned it in the pool, but I didn't want to come here alone." He joins her, resting his hand on her ankle and rubbing lightly. "I know you enjoyed filming the movie, but I'm glad you're done. I missed you."
He grins at her through the steam and massages a little higher up her leg, watching as she sighs. "I missed you too, sweetheart. But you know, we have another couple days here before we actually have to leave." She sits up and rests against him, humming lightly. He smiles, kissing the top of her head. "Of course tomorrow we have the wrap party, but on Friday, we can spend time doing whatever you might have left on your list of things you wanted to do."
She looks up at him, her lips twisting thoughtfully. "Well, there is something I wanted to do, but..."
"But what?" he asks, his fingertips teasing along the edges of her towel.
"Have you heard about lovelocks?" When he nods, looking somewhat confused, she smiles a little. "There's a bridge not far from here where people have put locks with their initials, but the city has been cutting them down... so it seems pointless... I wouldn't want to put a lock on a bridge just for it to lay, broken, in a trash dump weeks later." He hums, smiling into her hair. "Oh well, we'll know we were here, that's what matters." She curls up against him and sighs, shivering as he trails his hands against her flesh. She fails to notice the thoughtful glint in his eye as he settles in closer to her.
The next day, he watches from outside of a dressing room as she tries on dress after dress, gauging his reaction to each one, looking for just the perfect one to wear to the wrap party and, ultimately, bring home with her to California. It's a pale blue dress that catches his attention, his head tilting as he eyes her, spinning his finger in a circle until she twirls for him, the skirt flowing perfectly against her tanned legs. "Is this the one?" she asks softly, skipping up to him as he rests his hands on her hips and nods slowly, overwhelmed by how good the color looks on her. "Great, I was running out of options." She leans up to kiss him and he chuckles, lifting her up and spinning her around until he settles her back on the ground.
"They all looked amazing on you, but something about this one..." He trails his hands along the pleats of the skirt, eyes fixed on her. "It just suits you." She giggles and shivers, her eyes slipping closed as he finds the zipper in the back, tracing his fingers along it teasingly. "Sweetheart?"
"Hmm?" she murmurs, almost expecting him to drag her into the dressing room and do more than just playing with the zipper of her new dress.
"I have a surprise for you." This begins early when, instead of guiding her backwards, he grips her hand and leads her to the cash register, where he quickly pays for the dress and whatever accessories she'd already picked out before dragging her out of the shop. She follows him, muted and trying to calm her racing heart as she's distracted from the need that had been coursing through her veins just a minute ago.
"Mike!" Her shout goes on deaf ears as he leads her through the streets, AJ gasping when she realizes that they're outside of the studio that the wrap party will be held in in a few hours. "Um... Mike," she tries again, meeker this time.
He smiles, holding the door open for her and waiting patiently until she ventures inside, looking around. As she ventures further inside, he wraps his arms around her waist and kisses her throat. "Come on," he breathes against her, making her shiver. He leads her deeper into the studio, where they can see the now-empty trailers parked outside of the window. He tilts her head up and kisses her softly, humming into her mouth as his hands sprawl across her stomach, absorbing each of her sharp breaths quivering through her petite body. He pulls away far enough that he can speak while still feeling every inch of her against him. "I was thinking about what you said about love-locks..." AJ's dark eyes focus on his as he removes his hand, digging something out of his pocket. She gasps, tears filling her eyes, as he holds up a padlock, his teeth lightly teasing down her neck. "I discussed it with the studio manager and he agreed that we could put this up in the break room, with all of the other momentos from prior shoots."
She closes her eyes, clinging to the lock as he explores her further, smiling at the response. "You mean- no one will break it, or...?"
"No," he tells her. "It'd be safe wherever we leave it... the manager tells me a lot of things left behind have been there, undisturbed by others, for years, even decades..."
She shivers again, digging the fingers of her free hand into his hair. "I love it."
He smiles. "And I love you."
She mutters the affection back to him as he guides her into the break room, the two of them working on scraping their initials into the surface of the lock before snapping it into place on a vertical bar holding together a coat stand. "This way, everyone can see it," he tells her with a soft smile as he turns her around to face him, resting his hand on the small of her back as he toys with her zipper once more. "Well now, we have a few hours before the big party, so..."
She sighs faintly, staring up at their lock with soft, adoring eyes. "Well, we really haven't spent a lot of time in your trailer yet. Do you want to give me a more thorough tour of it?"
His eyes darken as he nods. "Let's do this thing."
They return in time for the party, Mike greeting his costars smoothly, AJ smiling obligingly from his side, raising her eyebrows when Summer Rae flounces past, barely looking twice at them. She mutters in Spanish as he strokes her hand, lifting it to kiss her knuckles. "One last night," he reminds her softly, kissing the side of her head. "Come on, dance with me." She grins up at him and he rests his arm around her shoulders, leading her to the dancefloor. "We haven't really danced since the wedding."
"I know," she sighs. "That was a perfect night." He nods and spins her around, ignoring the jealous, bitter look on Summer Rae's face that he spots sometimes, humming softly as he focuses entirely on his bride. "Mike?" she asks a few minutes later, when they've moving languidly to a slow song.
"Yeah, sweetheart?"
"I'm going to miss you so much when you go on the European tour. I know you're looking forward to seeing Ricardo and Alex and everyone else, but..." She trails her hands against his back, trying not to drown in her glumness too much. "I've gotten used to having you all to myself at least a few hours a day this past month, and now we're just... we're going to be thousands of miles away from each other and I don't..." Her lip starts to tremble and he groans, kissing her. "I'm sorry, I don't want to make you feel bad, but..."
The song grows faster, distracting them both as he twirls her around and brings her back in closer, dipping her. "Hey, sweetheart, I was actually just thinking... I've been hearing more worrying things from Del Rio, and as much as we were planning on my going to Europe and you going to California, what do you think we alter our plans a little bit?" He kisses her softly, staring adoringly into her eyes. "Let's go to Florida. I can smack some sense into Alex personally and we can take a few more days to relax, then I'll return with you to California and we can work together on getting the house together. WWE barely uses me at it is outside of movies and media, so they can wait another week. Me personally, I want to spend more time with my bride when I'm not abiding by a ridiculous film schedule, and make sure that Alex isn't about to do something beyond stupid."
She swallows and throws her arms around him, breaking up the dance entirely as he stumbles back a few steps, laughing softly. "Yes, yes, yes," she gasps, kissing him all over his face. "That sounds perfect." He beams down at her and pulls her closer, nuzzling into her. "I'm so happy."
"Then I'm happy," he tells her, brushing his finger against her lips before he kisses her deeply, everything and everyone around them becoming insignificant.
The next day is spent packing and preparing their flights from Vancouver to Florida, AJ then dragging Mike out to do some last minute sightseeing before they need to get some sleep for their early morning flight. "I'm going to miss this place," she admits, leaning against him as they walk through the park that they had spent Easter at.
"Me too," he sighs. "But we'll come back here as often as we can... heck maybe it can be our anniversary thing, every March, just come back here and retrace our steps, do everything we did here all over again..."
"Make sure our lock is still at the studio, safe and sound..." She grins, eyes shining happily as he tangles his fingers in hers.
"Definitely." He stops, waiting patiently as she leans up on her tippytoes to kiss him by the lake, sighing into her mouth as he cups her jaw and holds her in place, not wanting this moment to end, the sun setting behind them only adding to the ambience. "I love you, sweetheart."
"I love you too."
And so, early the next morning, they reluctantly leave Canada. They fly to Tampa and Mike sighs as deliciously hot weather greets them, AJ immediately peeling off the jacket she'd put on in Vancouver because the airport was a little chilly, leaving her in a tank top. He smiles down at her and rests his arm around her shoulders, pulling her close as they go to get a taxi to take them to Alex and Ricardo's. Unlike him, Ricardo had decided to fly on out to London despite more likely than not not getting used, but Alex was going to stay, handle pre-and-post show business from a studio in the performance center. Which is fine with Mike, the conversation he wants to have with his former protege would probably go over better without Ricardo nearby, and besides, he knows that the younger man loves traveling overseas, visiting foreign cities with Del Rio.
AJ enjoys the Florida beaches though he knows nothing will best California for either of them, especially since being the site of their wedding, but he thinks it'll tide her over until he finishes trying to figure out what's going on with Alex. His first opportunity comes while AJ is sleeping off the flight, the two of them walking around the beaches, staring at the sun as it lazily sets. So different from Vancouver's sunset, but so similar. Mike sighs and, a few steps ahead of Alex, stops, cutting off his forward motion as well. "Alright, man. Talk to me."
Alex shakes his head and shrugs. "What about?" But Mike merely needs to stare at him and he knows, his eyes sinking down to the golden brown sand between his toes. "How I've been treating Ricardo lately, huh?" He grimaces and turns to look out at the sea. "It's no big deal."
"No big deal," he repeats, more than a little incredulous. "Alex-"
"Listen, it's just something I'm working through. It's none of your business, Mike."
He turns to step away but Mike grabs him, forcing him to look him in the eye. "Oh, yes it is, kid. It's you, and it's Ricardo, and it's my damn business, because I connected you two, I helped you to become friends, and I encouraged it when you decided to become roommates. So don't you dare say it's not my business. Now talk to me." He even pushes him down into the sand, the vast differences in their height meaningless as Alex looks up at him, floored. He sits down and looks grimly away, arms crossed over his chest until finally, finally, he gives in, his shoulders slumping.
"I guess I'm jealous, alright?" he mutters, tracing the sand with his finger. Somehow, whereas telling Alicia this had done next to nothing for him, explaining it to Mike feels almost... freeing... Perhaps because Mike is his best friend, and he's not pressured to impress him or try to seem at least a little put together as he had for the girl, but either way. "I take him in, I help him through the Alberto thing, and... then, what... he starts getting booked on NXT TV, and all I can get booked on is houseshows, and he actually manages to win his matches. Not me, though. I just lose, and lose, and lose..."
Mike listens to him, taking in the tone of his voice, the look in his eyes, and something other than what he's actually saying leaves an impression on him, but he waits until Alex finishes talking everything that he feels is current through. "Alex?" he finally asks, words coming out slowly, carefully. "I don't think your problem is the matches, and who gets booked where... Not entirely, anyway."
"Then what is it?" he asks dully, staring at him. "What else could it possibly be?"
"You're jealous of Ricardo's renewed friendship with Del Rio, probably subconsciously," he says simply. "You took a lot of time and effort to help him, and all of a sudden, he's just... friends with the man who almost destroyed him all over again, and it's like what you did for him didn't matter, huh?"
Alex looks like he's been slapped, a horrified flush overwhelming his face as he stares at Mike. "I... God, is that... I was always so focused on the career aspect and how long it's been since I was in a match, I didn't even consider..." He looks down at his hands. "How do you figure-?"
"It was the way you sounded when you mentioned Del Rio," Mike answers when Alex seems unable to finish his sentence. "I don't think you even realized. You sounded so bitter and sad... You forget, Alex, I've known you longer than most in this business. And we spent a lot of time together when we were paired up in NXT. I know you like the back of my hand, kid." He reaches over and squeezes Alex's neck. "I know you're worried, and you probably miss spending time with Ricardo like you used to, but I don't think it's a bad thing if he's friends with Del Rio again. And we've all wanted him to find happiness in his career, right?"
"Of course," Alex mutters, subdued. "I just... what if it's a mistake? What if something goes wrong again? It's never felt like it's my place to say something, and Ricardo seems so happy... but he was happy before and look what Del Rio did..." His uncertainty towards his own feelings had seemed to dissipate in the face of Mike vocalizing what he thinks is going on, helping Alex to face it, find the words to describe it as well. "I just don't know what to do."
"You don't really need to do anything," Mike tells him. "He's a grown man, he'll figure it out on his own, in his own time. Besides, by what I've seen, I don't think Del Rio will hurt him like that again, at least not intentionally. And if he does, somehow, you and I, we'll be here to help him like before. Just... try to take it easy on him, and on yourself. You both are actually in the exact same spot in this business; neither of you have competed in awhile, and now you both are just starting to get back into that groove. Instead of pushing him away, you should try to be supportive of him. And don't ever tweet Colter again, it's not worth it. You don't really want to work with such a hateful, xenophobic group, do you?"
Alex groans softly, kneading his forehead. "I still don't know what I was thinking with that... it was so stupid, and I was so desperate when I realized it was approaching a full year since I last competed. That's what started Ricardo distancing himself from me, and... I don't even know, everything just snowballed from there, and you're right... the more time he started spending with Del Rio, the more cast aside I began to feel..." He sniffs vaguely, staring once more out at the sea. "So that's settled, Mike. You can't leave for Canada ever again, I just act like a complete idiot when you're gone."
Mike laughs softly and wraps an arm around his shoulders, hugging him. "Yeah, I'll see what I can do about that, kid."