The Rivals

||Anita||
As I stood backstage with Paul we just looked at each other for the longest time. He had told Teddy that he didn’t want to be in a match against me, but Teddy said that since we weren’t dating in a storyline he would have to, because what creative wanted, creative got. They actually wanted to set up an on screen romance between Cody and I if we won tonight, so I of course wanted Paul to win so that wouldn’t happen. Creative’s idiotic reasoning was that since Paul and I had been dating so long it shouldn’t be a problem and our relationship would come out fine in the end.
“I just can’t get over the feeling this is a trap.” He whispered. “Especially with Quinn and Barbra involved. Besides,” He said, tucking a piece of hair behind my ear, “What if I accidently hurt you?”
“I’ll be fine. I’m a tough girl Paul.” I said, mimicking having his enormous biceps. His frown didn’t budge.
“So who do you think paid off creative to pull this shit?” He asked, clearly upset. I shrugged.
“With my mile long list of enemies, who knows? Maybe they all chipped in a hundred bucks.” Paul kissed the top of my head as a techie came and got us.
“Please be careful.” He asked, concern written all over his face.
“I will.” I said as we got backstage. “You too.”
“I promise, I love you, never forget that.” He whispered so no one else would hear us.
“I love you too; now let’s go kick each other’s asses.” He chuckled as Barbra’s music hit and she walked out with Quinn. Paul kissed my forehead before he walked out, the crowd cheering for him so loudly I’m pretty sure all of Austin, Texas heard it. The moment Paul was gone Cody smiled at me.
“I’ll try not to beat him up too badly.” Cody said with a smirk. Before I could tell him I would kill him in the night if he actually hurt Paul his music started and he sauntered out to the ring. Then it was my turn. As the whole audience erupted in boos I tried my best to not look half as worried as I was. As I slipped into the ring I came face to face with Barbra, who, to my endless glee, I was at least two inches taller than, but she did her best to look me in the eyes as I waited for the bell to ring. The second I heard that ding I lunged at Barbra, putting her in a headlock and running up the ropes, slamming her head into the ground. The crowd booed so loudly it was near deafening. So I let Barbra get a few swings at me before I Irish whipped her into the ropes and when she bounced back gave her a huge boot to the face. In true heel style I paraded around the ring as she got up, blowing a kiss to Paul. This was obviously a mistake, because Barbra snapped and grabbed the back of my tights and flipping me over on my back and going for the pin. I kicked out before the ref even said two. If she thought she was going to win that easily she was dead wrong. I stood up and roundhouse kicked her in her pretty little face. Taking time to smile at her as she slowly got up, making sure I didn’t take my eyes off her as I made my way to the top of the turnbuckle, hitting her with a drop kick the second she got up, but landing on my side wrong and hurting my ribs. But hey, no guts no glory, right? We both slowly crawled to our partners in true dramatic style. I lifted myself up just enough to tag Cody and then slid out of the ring, taking a moment to make sure nothing was badly damaged before I hopped back onto the apron.
As I watched them fight each other I felt sick as Cody just kept beating up on Paul, and I was not apparently doing a very good job at hiding it as I heard Cole ask Josh if something had happened between Paul and I. I bit my lip as I watched how viciously Cody attacked him. When I saw he was going to go for the Cross Rhodes I threw out my hand, there was no way I was going to be in a storyline relationship with him. He looked at me forever, but I insisted, saying I wasn’t done with Barbra. He looked at me, then at Paul, then back to me with this sick little smile and did the Cross Rhodes, slamming Paul into the mat so hard that it shook. He then walked over to me and smacked my shoulder, hopping out of the ring and gesturing for me to go in.
I looked at Paul and then back to Cody. I wasn’t going to pin him and be in a story line with that creep. I hopped in the ring and looked back to Cody who gestured to me like I was an idiot to go for the pin. And if we did win, it wasn’t going to be because I pinned Paul, it’d be because I beat Barbra into a near coma. I suddenly heard the crowd begin to chant my name. That had never happened to me before, but it felt great. Suddenly Cody yelling at me faded back in.
That’s when I clotheslined Cody right off the apron and to the floor. I smiled as the crowd went crazy. But as I turned around Barbra clotheslined me and sent me down, she must have tagged Paul when I was distracted. As I started to get up she grabbed my face and smashed it over and over into the mat. I felt dizzy when she finally stopped she stepped off my back and pulled me up, hitting me with the Kelly kick. I knew that this was what I’d wanted to happen, but I’d hoped that Paul would pin Cody, not Barbra beating me. But as long as things would get to stay the way they were I was happy. I laid there as Barbra got the pin but when I opened my eyes I saw her run over to Paul and lock her lips to his. He looked shocked and tried to get her off him, but not before I went over there and ripped her off giving her a giant left hook that looked like it knocked her out cold.
No one touches my man.
As I stood there huffing and puffing from my fight Paul tried not to smile, the crowd booed again, my moment was gone as the refs tried to pull me away from Barbra as she got up. Then I saw her smiling and knew some serious shit was about to go down. She asked for a mike and got straight in my face, playing up her punched in face.
“Look Bobbie, I know you’re sad about Paul and you breaking up, but don’t take it out on me. He’s mine now!” I just stared at her, then I looked at Paul, who was as confused as I was. The crowd immediately started cheering for Paul and Barbra to kiss again, when I was about to lunge for her again I felt my arms get pinned behind my back.
“You should start reading the script Ani.” Cody whispered. “If we won we got a storyline relationship, but if they won they got one.” All I saw was red as I kicked my legs out and knocked Barbra square in the back of the head, dropping her like a sack of bricks. Paul, having to go with the storyline, kneeled by her side. His face was concerned, but his eyes were smiling. I ripped myself away from Cody, but as I turned around to face him I saw Quinn.
“You have made a big mistake Anita, you’ve crossed the line. You are going to pay dearly for it.”
I remembered Quinn’s words. I should have known all along. Barbra was too stupid to plan something like this by herself. I slid out of the ring and made a beeline for her.
“YOU!” I screamed. “YOU DID THIS!” I was ready to rip her eyes out and shove them down her throat so she could see her shriveled black heart for herself. I was about to lunge at her when I felt myself get grabbed from behind again. “LET GO OF ME!” I screamed, trying to pull myself away. “She planned this! All of it! I said I was sorry Quinn, I apologized and was ready to put this behind us and THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY ME?!” I could feel my eyes sting with tears. “I’LL KILL YOU!” I tried to wriggle lose but failed. “Get off of me!” I finally ripped myself away from whoever had grabbed me, I turned around to see Phil. I looked back to Quinn, who looked shocked. “You are going to suffer for this, dearly. That I promise you.” I wiped my eyes and walked backstage, shoving a camera out of my face. As I was headed for the locker room I could see the looks of sympathy but I ignored them. I hated it when people saw me cry. Luckily I composed myself as Matt Striker walked up to me.
“Bobbie, do you have a minute?” I glared at him.
“What do you want?” I saw him back up the slightest bit.
“Well, people want to know what happened between you and Justin! The web is buzzing over how you wanted to save him from Cody and then attacked Kelly Kelly when she kissed him.” Matt could see that he pushed the wrong buttons as I got right in his face.
“Listen to me. Justin loved me until that skank Kelly and her evil little sidekick Quinn took him from me. And trust me, I will make sure they both regret that decision for the rest of time itself.” I glared at Matt for a few more seconds before I stormed off, listening to him try to keep his voice from shaking as I found my way to the locker room to see A.J. and Natalie. They both tried to console me, but I didn’t want to hear it as I changed and grabbed my things. I stepped out of the locker room to see Teddy and felt my face turn hot with anger.
“What the Hell was that?!” I demanded. “You told me that if Cody and I won then we got a storyline relationship. You didn’t say anything about that blood sucking bitch helping Barbra steal Paul away from me!”
“I didn’t know! All creative told me was that if you and Cody won, you got a storyline, they never said a thing about Barbra.”
“That’s because Barbra isn’t on your show.” John Laurinaitis said as he walked up.
“You planned this?” I demanded.
“It makes for a good storyline, and now that you and Barbra will be fighting over Paul, it will make for an even better one.”
“You can’t do this.” I heard Paul hiss as he walked up wrapping his arm around me. “You have to tell us about shit like that!”
“But then I wouldn’t get to have two of my divas be part of such a great rivalry. Besides,” John continued. “It was Quinn’s idea.”
“What?!” I demanded. I looked at Paul, we had known this had to be a trap.
“She said she thought it would be a good little revenge plot since you made Jericho kiss her last week. Why do you think she accompanied Barbra out there? She wanted to make sure Barbra won. She said the crowd would love it and she was right, everyone wants Barbra and Paul to get together. Have you not read all the fan fiction? They’re the legendary couple. You’re the heel, people want to see her win him and see you suffer.”
“I’ll tell you right where to shove your little ‘legendary couple’-” I started, but Paul clamped his hand over my mouth while I threw out ever obscenity known to man at John.
“We’re not going to stand for this.” Paul swore. John just chuckled at him.
“Have fun then, if you don’t remember right, I’m the GM. I can put your little girlfriend in a match against Kane and Mason Ryan if I want to, so I’d watch my mouth if I were you.”
“Vince will be hearing about this John.” Teddy swore. But John just laughed at him.
“All Vince cares about is ratings, which is exactly what this match has given him. Just be glad it was on your sad little show.” And then he walked away.
That night I just stood, looking out the window with my hands leaned against it for almost an hour, just thinking about how I’d get Quinn back for this. Paul, who’d just gotten out of the shower, came over and hugged me from behind. He didn’t even have to say anything, we just stood together, watching the sun set on Austin.
“I just can’t believe it.” I said finally. “I mean, she was so nice the other day…”
“Look, the bright side is, you still get me for when we’re off camera, which is a Hell of a lot more than when we are on camera.” I sighed.
“I know it’s just, you know Barbra is going to take serious advantage of this. She’ll never get her mitts off of you when you are on camera.”
“Well, that was a nice addition with the ‘he loved me until they took him away’ angle, then maybe you’ll get to break us up a lot.” I turned around and looked at Paul, his beautiful brown eyes, his cheeks, his beard, and his adorable punkish haircut. I bit my lip.
“Which will just make them hate me even more.”
“They cheered for you when you knocked Cody’s block off. That was awesome.” He tried. I just kissed him softly.
“Thanks for trying, but I don’t think that’s going to work this time. I’m just so sick of everyone but you hating me.”
“New Orleans doesn’t hate you. After all you did for that city Ani? You’re they’re hero. Just wait two more weeks, then you’ll be back home and I’ll prove that these people love you.” He looked so deeply into my eyes I felt my knees start to go weak. “Just like how much I love you.” He said, kissing me so lovingly that my stomach lit on fire. He pulled away and smiled.
“Thanks Paul.” I said softly.
“That’s what I’m here for.” He teased. But while he slept soundly next to me that night I just stared at the ceiling. Quinn and Barbra would pay dearly for this, that I would make sure of if it killed me. But how? As badly as I wanted to hurt her I didn’t really have anything against Phil big enough to take his girlfriend away from him.
I wasn’t that low.
But I knew that I wouldn’t let those two bimbos off easily. I turned over and looked at Paul, fast asleep with his arm draped over me. Because of them I would have to watch that little hoe strut around with him like her arm candy for god knows how long. I don’t think I could get away with just ripping their faces off, but I would have to think of something just as humiliating. The next time I saw those two,
The gloves were off.