WCW

Renee and May had hit it off back when May was at NXT. May had a deep admiration for Renee, admiring how hard she worked, and how she had managed to earn the respect of almost everyone, from wrestlers to management. Renee, in return admired May for her dedication to wrestling and her determination not to be typecast into the "woman-child" role that was originally pushed onto her, due to her small stature. At five feet tall, May was two inches shorter than AJ, and it seemed like everyone thought she should become AJ 2.0, right down to suggesting she should remove the tiny braids she wore her hair in and wear pigtails instead.

When talent relations and everyone else who had a say, kept trying to push her into the roll of "Cute little thing, how does she do it?" May was devastated. She wanted so hard to be a team player, wanted to be willing to take on any roll they wanted her to be in, but this was too much.

It was Renee who had noticed how unhappy May was in this role, Renee who stepped forward and bucked popular opinion by saying that to make May the new AJ was just a bad idea. "She's tiny, but everything tiny isn't cute and immature," Renee argued. "Look at her! She's got high flying moves thanks to the gymnastics, but she's also got some serious muscle. She's a tiny little powerhouse. She's like a little ferret or a shrew or something. Small, but powerful. We should run with that. This little thing who can wipe the floor with anyone you throw at her. "

When it was pointed out that on the microphone, May's voice and attitude was pleasant, even nice, Renee agreed. "That's part of the beauty of it all," she explained. "You've got this little... badger of a girl, in the ring. She doesn't take it from anyone, and gives until her and her opponent have nothing left. Yet, outside the ring, she's just this really nice woman. She's a custom made role model for kids and the beauty is that thanks to her huge family, she's very comfortable around kids. Since kids are the future audience, I'd be promoting that. We've got Cena for the boys to emulate, why not May for the girls? Let the other girls be the bitchy divas, let May be the one that only cares about the wrestling. Not the games, the wrestling."

She kept fighting for May until they listened and it worked. May had always been pretty much a face, but no one ever suggested pigtails or pretty little outfits ever again. May had been grateful to Renee for going to bat for her, and gratitude had turned to friendship as the two of them worked together and got to know each other better.

So, it was not surprising to find the four of them, May, Dolph, Renee and Dean sitting in catering together one late afternoon, before a house show. Dean and Dolph were discussing their upcoming match that night. Since Dean was now a heel, he was in a rather heated rivalry with Dolph, so the four of them had been spending more time together.

May was alternating between talking to Renee and studying the schedule for the show that night. "I'm doing the meet and greet," May said, frowning. "We have a huge group of kids coming from a local military support group. Kids who have either lost a parent or close family member in active service, or kids who have a parent serving out of the country."

"Why are you frowning?" Dolph asked, focusing his attention away from Dean for a moment. "That's right up your alley."

"I know," May said, her frown lessening, but not fading away completely. "It's not being with the kids, it's the fact that I'm not in the show tonight." She paused and sighed. "I'm not even in the back up group." Certain wrestlers were always expected to stick around for the show, just in case of an emergency that would involve changing around matches.

Dolph and Dean said nothing, knowing there wasn't much they could say. It was a fact that there was limited time for Divas even in the house shows, compared to the guys. While things had gotten better in the last few years, there still seemed to be too many times when Divas were just doing good will and PR work instead of wrestling. And while May didn't mind doing those things, her love was wrestling and she was always disappointed when she wasn't in the show.

"You aren't the only one with the night off," Renee said, smiling. "I've got a couple interviews to do that will be shown on the titantron tonight, but that'll be done before the show starts. After that, I'm going to be free."

May's slight frown quickly turned up into a grin, a mischievous look coming to her eyes. "Are you thinking-" she began.

"WCW!" both women finished in unison.

Dolph and Dean looked at each other, then back at the women, puzzled expressions on their face.

"Do we do room service or go out?" May asked.

"Oh, let's go all the way!" Renee suggested. "There's got to be a place around here that will have what we want." She picked up her phone and began tapping the screen. May did the same. "And the nice thing is that odds are, anyone who recognizes us will be at the show, so we won't have to worry about fans mobbing us."

"Perfect," May agreed.

Again, Dolph and Dean looked at each other. "WCW?" Dolph questioned to Dean.

Dean shrugged. "Maybe they're going to watch the old Pay Per Views?" he suggested. "We all have the network, they're all there."

"Yeah, and we don't even have to pay nine ninety-nine a month," Dolph said, his voice deadpan. When the network first came out, everyone quickly got bored with how often they had been expected to shill it, that it had become almost a joke. "But, how are they going to watch it if they go out?"

"Renee has a lap top and they both have tablets," Dean said. "Maybe they'll bring them along?"

"If the point is to watch WCW, why would they want to go out?" Dolph pondered. He looked over at May and Renee who were swapping their phones back and forth, comparing bars. "Hey," he interrupted, "Why are you going to go out if you're going to watch World Championship Wrestling?"

That earned him a look of puzzlement from both women, then May laughed. God, I love her laugh, Dolph thought. They had been dating for two months now, if you could call getting together at catering, watching movies in their hotel rooms after shows, and trying to duck out for the occasional restaurant meal, dating. But they were making it work. Dolph wasn't sure if it was because the relationship was still so new that it had that fresh feeling to it, or if it was because it was on its way to becoming serious. He had been fairly friendly with May since she had been brought up from NXT, even when she was dating Seth Rollins, but he still found so many of things about her charming. Her smile, her laugh, the way she wore her waist length black hair in hundreds, maybe even thousands of tiny braids, all with tiny beads at the end that clicked together whenever she shook her head.

"WCW doesn't stand for World Championship Wrestling," May said, still laughing.

"Yes it does," Dean disagreed, looking at her.

"Not in our case," Renee said, grinning at Dean. "In our case it stands for-"

"Wine, Cheese, and Whine!" both woman said, in unison.

As was becoming way too common this afternoon, Dolph and Dean looked at each other again, then back to the women. "Wine, cheese and wine?" Dean asked. "Are you ladies saying you're going to get drunk, eat cheese and then get even more drunk?" His head tipped slightly to one side as he asked, looking as if he might not mind the idea of Renee getting completely hammered. He had seen her tipsy more than once, and often those tipsy times had ended up being pretty interesting for both of them, including one time where, at her suggestion, they decided to watch one of the adult only channels available in their hotel room.

Upon seeing a particularly athletic performance from the lead actor and actress, also involving a hotel room and a coat rack bolted to the wall, Renee rolled her eyes and scornfully shouted at the TV in a slightly slurred, drunk voice, "big deal, I could do that!"

"Really?" Dean asked, immediately interested.

"Sure!" Renee said, nodding to bring further emphasis to her words. "Easy! C'mon, I'll prove it!"

And she did. Twice as a matter of fact. The next day, when she was sober, she had been mortified, she and Dean hadn't been dating that long, and she was still a little shy about things, but Dean assured her that any time she wanted to try it again, he would guarantee, beyond the shadow of doubt, that he would be up for it, in more ways than one.

"Well, alcohol is part of it, and a big part at that," Renee said, "But the second whine isn't the drink."

"W-H-I-N-E," May spelled out, grinning.

"We get some good wine, order horrible, cheese filled appetizers and then bitch and complain about everything that's bothering us," Renee explained. "Think of it as therapy, but our co-pays go to bartenders and waitresses because we're take the DIY approach."

Dolph and Dean looked at each other for a moment, as was becoming way too much of a habit during this conversation, then back at the women. "I have the feeling our ears are going to be burning all night," Dolph said, grinning. Dean nodded in agreement with him.

"Nah, not burning," May said, her eyes glittering in amusement, "but I can't guarantee they won't itch a bit."

"Figures," Dean said, snorting. "While we're out earning the bread, the ladies are going to be spending it and complaining about us."

"Hey, I earn my own money, hotshot," Renee said, a look of mock-upset on her face. "And if I want to spend it on wine and nachos, I will!"

"Er, do you have any complaints?" Dolph asked, looking at May, surprised at how nervous he felt, asking the question.

May smiled. "You worry too much," she said, which really wasn't a direct answer. Dolph also noticed her smile was rather enigmatic.

The bar the two women chose was called Sunset Cypress, and they chose it for two reasons. First, the name indicated that this was not the type of place WWE fans were likely to hang out. The second was that the place had excellent Yelp reviews, many of them raving about the bar appetizers, the loaded nachos in particular. A look at their website told them the place was nice, without being fancy, and looked to be more of a place where people might meet for drinks and conversations, not a place where people went to try to hook up, or to listen to loud music. They did have live music on the weekends, but during the week the only music came from a Jukebox that was at a volume where you could still have a conversation with the people you were with.

The place had nice, semicircle booths, large enough for four people, five if you all loved each other very much, and tables big enough to hold drinks, tiny plates, and at least one majorly huge appetizer in the middle. But the semicircular structure also meant that two people could sit at the ends and not feel like they were taking up major real estate.

Being a Thursday, the place was quiet, but not dead. A few other groups of people were there, coworkers at local office buildings from the looks of it. They had gone early to the place, wanting to make sure they would be finished by early too, just in case the place attracted a later party crowd. Also, Renee wanted to make sure she would be back around the same time Dean was done with the show. Normally, if they had both done the show, she and Dean, possibly even the four of them, might have gone out together, but Dean told her that she could be the party animal tonight, and he would go back to their hotel room and wait for her.

"I think Dean wants me to know he's a good boyfriend," Renee said, as they settled into their table. "So I don't talk about him too much."

"You rarely do complain about him," May observed, "More about his fans."

Renee sighed and was about to answer, when the waitress, a wholesome, blonde hair, blue eye college girl from the looks of her, her long hair skimmed back in a high ponytail, came over to take their order. If she recognized either of them, she gave no sign. She earned even extra brownie points with both women, by enthusiastically letting them know that their liquor distributor was heavily pushing a new and delicious Cava, and they could get an entire bottle for less than the price of three glasses of their normal white wine.

While sparkling wine wasn't something May usually thought of going with loaded nachos, she figured it was worth a try. "You know we'll drink it," she remarked to Renee.

"Oh yes," Renee said, nodding, "We certainly will."

When their waitress ("I'm Mandy, and I'll be taking care of you, tonight!") left to place their order, May looked at Renee. "I don't know why some of Dean's fans are so nasty to you," she remarked, going back to the subject they'd been discussing before Mandy came along. "You and Dean are so cute together and it's so obvious you're happy."

Renee sighed. "Yeah, a lot of fans are happy for us, that's true, but the ones that aren't? Really aren't. And they've said some pretty horrible things to me."

"I know," May said, nodding in sympathy. "It's nasty, it's like they think they own Dean or something."

"They really do," Renee agreed. "And a few of them aren't playing with a full deck. I mean, I'm not making fun of mental illness, I'm really not, but some of them..." her voice trailed off, preferring not to say.

"That might be why they're attracted to Dean in the first place," May pondered. She didn't get a chance to finish her through right away, because Mandy had returned with an ice bucket on a stand, their Cava, and two glasses. With brisk, perky, efficiency, she used a towel to safely pop the cork, then poured each of them a glass.

"Fancy," May remarked.

Mandy grinned, showing a set of perfectly sized, perfectly straight, perfectly white teeth. "If you're going to do it, do it right," she told them, as she poured them each a glass. Both women took a sip and told her it was fine. Mandy's grin broadened and she told them their nachos would be up soon. Then she left to take care of her other tables.

"They're attracted to Dean because they're crazy?" Renee asked, going back to the subject.

"Yeah," May nodded, taking another sip of the Cava. It was actually rather tasty. "Dean's the lunatic fringe, maybe they think he'll understand them."

"He's not crazy," Renee muttered. "He's sweet, he's nice, he's enthusiastic about things, but he's not crazy. That's just an act."

"I'm not saying he is crazy," May said gently. "I'm just saying that perhaps they think he is and therefore, they'll understand them better." She shook her head, "think about it, Renee, a balanced person wouldn't say some of the things they've said to you, tweeted to you and about you. I don't think it's you they have an objection to, it's that you are dating Dean."

"Yeah, I agree," Renee said. "Although some folks are way too in to our relationship and constantly want me to post pictures of Dean and I." She picked up her glass and drained about half of it in one gulp. "Hey, this is good!"

"Careful, girlfriend, that ain't soda-pop," May said, grinning.

"We're not driving, are we?" Renee retorted and both girls laughed. They could have taken a rental car, but on the off chance that they did get a little too intoxicated, it had seemed easier to just get a cab.

May took the bottle out of the ice bucket and topped off their glasses. "Good point." She put the bottle back and took a sip, "I hope those nachos come soon. We're doing the whine and the wine, but we need the cheese!"

Almost as if May's words were magic, Mandy came over to the table with a huge plate, a literal tower of corn chips, covered with taco beef, jalapeno peppers, re-fried beans, lettuce, and black olives. She placed it on the table with a fluorish, also putting down individual plates and two ramekin cups, one containing sour cream, the other, salsa. "Enjoy!" she said. "Can I get you anything else?"

"We'll probably need another bottle of Cava in a bit," May said, eying the nachos hungrily.

Renee laughed. "You and your nachos," She commented, as Mandy left and May helped herself to a chip smothered with cheese, beef and re-fried beans.

"They are so good," May said, taking a bite, then closing her eyes as if in total bliss. "How could anyone not love nachos? Seriously?"

"Not exactly the healthiest thing for you," Renee said, grinning, as she helped herself to a chip that wasn't nearly as loaded as May's was.

"Sure they are!" May said. "Look, we have grains in the chips, protein in the beef and the beans. Calcium in the cheese, veggie stuff in the lettuce. This might be natures perfect food!"

At this both women laughed. May reached for the sour cream and scooped a generous portion on her plate. "Hey, even more calcium!"

The serious talking stopped after that, in favor of making a dent in the pile of loaded nachos in front of them and both women came to the agreement that every five star Yelp review was well earned, just for the nachos. They had another bottle of Cava brought to the table and for a bit, talked about casual things.

It wasn't until they were half way into their second bottle and the nacho tower was half way finished that May frowned and bit her lower lip. "Uh-oh," Renee said, feeling the effects of the sparkling wine, "you have that look on your face."

"What look?" May asked, tipping her head to the side.

"Like you want to take advantage of the whine part of the night," Renee said, lifting her glass, "And not this wine."

May smiled briefly, then frowned again. "Renee, honest opinion here, am I attractive?"

Renee stared at her. "Are you asking me out?" she said, which caused the two girls to burst into laughter. "Because I think Dean would object."

"What if we let him watch?" May wiggled her eyebrows.

"He'd want to do more than watch," Renee said with a smirk, "Dean's a hands-on type of guy. Besides, wouldn't Dolph object?"

"I don't know," May said, her voice suddenly becoming serious.

Renee's expression grew serious as well. "May, what's that supposed to mean?" she asked. "You and Dolph have been practically inseparable the last couple months, or at least as inseparable as you can be in this business. Everyone has you marked as a couple."

"No one has written any fanfiction about us," May said, suddenly grinning again. "You're never officially a couple until people write fanfiction about you."

Renee laughed. "It's no big thrill. Most of the fanfiction where Dean and I are a couple, I end up being a horrible witch who gets dumped for some girl the author made up, who is just perfect."

"Yeah, I never got that," May said, frowning. "Why bother with having Dean or Roman or whoever with a girl if the plan is to dump her like a rock for the author's made up woman? Why not just make him single from the get go? It's all supposed to be fiction, right?"

"I think they think it makes the story more authentic," Renee said, taking a sip of her wine. "I'm sure there were stories where Seth broke up with you."

May shook her head. "Nope." She took a gulp of her wine. "At least as far as I know, there's never been a fanfic with me and Seth, even one where he dumped me. There are hundreds with Seth and Ronda. Some she gets dumped, some he gets dumped. Sometimes they stay together for a bazillion years and have a hundred babies. But me? Meh, they ignore me."

"I don't believe that!" Renee said, shaking her head.

"I saw one fanfiction with me," May said, grinning. "Daniel Bryan didn't die in it. It was his unknown twin brother who did. It got complicated. But, it turned out that Daniel and I were secretly, madly in love with each other, so we ran off to live in the mountains and raise Llamas."

"You're making that up!" Renee said, bursting out laughing. "You have to be making that up!"

"No!" May said, unable to resist laughing, "I swear to god, we raise llamas and I make 100% llama yarn sweaters and sell them on the internet!"

"No!" Renee coughed she was laughing so hard and took a swallow of wine to stop it. "I don't believe you!"

"It's true!" May protested. "It's called Love and Llamas! I'm not kidding! It's almost 200 chapters of me, Daniel, and a bunch of llamas!"

"Oh, don't tell me you and Daniel Bryan are getting freaky with the llamas!" Renee said, bursting into a fresh round of laughter.

"No!" May shook her head mock fiercely. "We love our llamas! We're not perverts! Although we did have a sweet, romantic session of love making in some freshly shorn llama fleeces."

"Oh my god!" Renee shrieked with laughter. "Was it gross?"

May shook her head. "Actually, for getting it on in a bunch of likely filthy llama fleeces, it was pretty romantic. Nothing pushing past the teen rating, to be honest." She took a sip of her wine, then her eyes went wide and she started speaking in a high, young girlish voice, "we had worked so hard sheering the llamas all afternoon and we just looked at each other, the love we had for each other just...spilling out of our eyes! The next thing we knew it, our passion would not be denied, so we wrapped our arms around each other, kissed and fell into the fleece! Then the scene changed, it's six months later, I'm pregnant with twins and Danny and I know that was when they were conceived. I guess our sex life is so sparse that it wasn't hard to do the math."

By this point, Renee was slamming her hand on the table, she was laughing so hard. May was giggling, but obviously didn't find it quite as funny as Renee did. She took the bottle of wine out of the ice bucket and topped off their glasses. "Honestly, except that it's ridiculous, it's almost sweet in a way. I get the sense that Daniel's death really hurt this fan, maybe as much as it hurt all of us. And that this story was her round about way of working through it. But nope, we never got down and dirty, it was always so romantic."

"No down and dirty sex for May!" Renee said, through giggles, picturing the scene in her mind, even though she wasn't sure she even wanted to. "Instead, you get to make sweet, beautiful, love, in llama fleece!"

"Yeah," May said, and then abruptly, her laughter stopped completely.

Renee choked back her laughter and looked at May. "This is bothering you, isn't it?" she asked, taking a sip of her drink. "It's only fanfiction!"

"No, the fanfiction doesn't bother me," May admitted, taking a swallow of her own drink. "Heck, I wrote one myself when I was younger and I think Grace and Kim, two of my sister write it, or at least they did at one point. It's not the idea of fanfiction that bothers me. I mean, it makes the product more enjoyable to some, and in the long run, that's a good thing for us."

"Then what is bothering you?"

May took a drink from her glass. "I think what bothers me is that I project some image to people of a perpetual virgin or something. Or, the worst I'd ever do is make sweet love to my husband, only after being legally wed, that I'd never be the type to get my freak on."

Renee smiled and patted May's arm sympathetically. "There are far worse fates," she commented. "There's nothing wrong with being seen as a good girl."

"Oh, I don't mind if my mother thinks I'm a sweet, innocent girl. I don't mind if the fans think I'd only have sex with my husband." She drained her glass and grabbed for the bottle, pouring herself another glass and topping off Renee's. "What I do mind is that Dolph seems to see me the same way."

"There's nothing wrong with-" Renee begain, then stopped as she realized the implication of the words. "Are you saying..."

May nodded, taking a gulp from her glass, "We've been dating for two months, and I'm no closer to knowing him in the biblical sense, then I was the first night we went out."

End of Part One

Very special thanks to AeonBlue for her help with this story. From giving me the name of the bar, to general hand-holding and butt kicking ("I don't wanna write!" "Yes you do!" "No, I wanna play Candy Crush and look up weird articles on the net!" "No, you don't, you want to write!" "Fine, I'll write!") she's been a major source of inspiration for this story. If you like this story and want to show appreciation for her efforts? Go check out her stuff. I highly recommend The Tau Hypothesis, it's an awesome story. And if you like it (which, if you give it a chance, you will) show the lady some love and leave a review, so she's inspired.

Until Next Time

Peace Out

Willow