WrestlePrompts Stories

13. Want You to Notice

Characters: Becky Lynch/Seth Rollins

Prompt: "Do you miss me when I'm not around?" *the other person admits that sometimes, under certain circumstances, they do* "Do you think, realistically, we could be lovers?"

When Becky heard the gym door open, her first instinct was to call Joshy over. It was supposed to be a private session, after all, just them and Sheamus and Cesaro so they didn't have to worry about people taking pictures or videos. Then she heard a familiar laugh and turned to see Seth walking in, his gym bag dangling from his shoulder. "Hey!" She grabbed the nearest towel and dried off her face. "You haven't dropped in for a while."

Seth smiled, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Yeah. I've had a lot going on with Black & Brave and... well, you know." He set down his bag and stretched out his shoulders. "So... do you miss me when I'm not around?"

Becky laughed at first. "You know I'm more of a Pearl Jam girl than Radiohead." When Seth just looked confused, she added, "Sorry. Thought it was a song reference. Yeah, of course we miss you."

Seth's eyes seemed even darker than normal, and Becky struggled to see where the pupil ended and the iris began—and then quickly realized that meant she had been looking for too long. "I wasn't asking about them," he said, tilting his head towards where Cesaro had resumed spotting for Sheamus. "I asked if you did."

It felt like far deeper waters than conversations with Seth had gone as of late. Whenever she did manage to run into him backstage, he had always seemed preoccupied, looking down at his phone as if expecting a call—or trying to muster up the energy to make one. I should have asked him if he was okay, she thought. Many wrestlers had business interests outside of their WWE careers, but Seth's demanded a lot of time and energy; he wasn't some passive investor behind the scenes, throwing money at a project and doing little more than talking it up during interviews. He was devoted to his Black & Brave students and their success; he always said he wanted to leave the business—and more importantly, the mentality in the locker room—better than he found it, and he was working on that from multiple angles, from inside WWE and outside. "Yeah, of course I do." Struggling to lighten the mood, she added, "I mean, who else could I possibly borrow shampoo from here if I forgot mine at home?"

Sighing softly, Seth pulled her off to the side, around a corner so Cesaro and Sheamus were out of her line of sight. "Becky, I'm being serious."

"Okay." Becky took a moment to focus. She certainly didn't want to add to Seth's stress or belittle him, but she didn't understand what was going on at all. The gym was normally his happy place, his refuge; if someone else brought up a serious topic, he'd suggest leaving it until they went out for coffee or ice cream later. "What's going on? Is something wrong?"

"Can... would you just answer the question?" Seth shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Please? I'm... I'm trying to figure something out."

The pause before the Please made Becky's heart twinge and she clasped her hands behind her back so she wouldn't try to pat his arm. Seth was never one for polite sympathy and she didn't want him to feel like she was being condescending, especially since she had just been cracking jokes. "Of course I miss you. You were one of the first people I knew who was into CrossFit. You've always been great with advice and helping me figure out my reps. You've stayed late so I could finish a workout. You've let me vent to you for... oh, years now, back since NXT, back when I was... was no one, really—"

"You've never been no one."

Becky would have been able to rally better if his interjection had been sharp or annoyed, but the tenderness in his tone made her falter. Had he stopped looking at her even once since he came in the gym? She didn't want to argue with him, so she just shrugged. "You know what I mean. You had absolutely no reason to be nice to me back then, but you were. I wasn't a champion. I didn't have connections like Charlotte. I was just ... me." Before he could correct her on that too, she forged on. "Not everyone would listen to the life story of some rambling Irish woman for an hour, you know?"

"Forty-five minutes," Seth replied. "It was only forty-five minutes."

"Really?" Becky could feel herself blushing and hoped it wasn't too obvious. "I guess I gave you the abridged version then. Anyway, yeah... you've always been there for me, even when it wasn't easy or we were on different rosters or whatever. I've cried on your shoulder often enough that I've probably eroded it and yet you still answer my calls." She paused to let a pang of guilt pass—Haven't been calling to check on HIM lately, have you?—and reached back to tighten her ponytail. "You're a great friend. You're one of my best friends. Of course I miss you when you're not around. Why? What's going on? What's wrong?" She knew he and his girlfriend had been going through a rocky patch, but she couldn't remember Seth saying anything more about it, so she had assumed they worked things out. Another mistake.

Clearing his throat, Seth finally looked away, glancing over at Cesaro and Sheamus. Both seemed oblivious to the discussion, so he turned back to Becky. "Do you think," he started slowly, jamming his hands in his pockets, "realistically, that we could be lovers?"

Lovers? The term had always felt awkward to Becky, but Seth was so gravely earnest that she didn't dare question his wording. "Are you...?" She stopped just short of asking if he was serious. "I... don't know," she said slowly. "I mean, I'm nothing like the girls you've dated, so...."

"Maybe that's a good thing. I've been doing a lot of thinking and a friend suggested that what I need and what I want—or at least what I thought I wanted—aren't the same," Seth explained, voice so low Becky had to lean forward to hear him over the clank of weights being moved in and out of the racks. "So I tried thinking more about what I needed, and I need to be around people who make me feel the way you do. I... always feel right when I'm around you. Like I'm where I belong."

"I'm... I'm glad." Becky was almost speechless. Her friends were dear to her and she loved them like family—considered them family—but the last time she had tried to turn that into something more, it hadn't worked out. "But you don't need to... date someone to feel that way."

"I know. But... I just kept thinking that if you could make me feel like that just as a friend, maybe... maybe that's a sign that we could be more." The look in his eyes was so vulnerable, so genuine, that Becky's breath caught. "I know it might not work, but I'd rather try and know than not try and always wonder," Seth declared. His words held far more surety than his gaze. "So I wanted to ask you out on a date for sometime next week. Just something casual. Just... just to see."

We shouldn't. There were so many wrestling couples that hadn't worked out and it always seemed to get messy. But... what if we did? She had never really thought of Seth that way, but now that he had raised the possibility, she had to wonder. They already spent so much time together and knew so much about each other and liked so many of the same things; so much of the awkward early-stage relationship groundwork was done. That phase of discovery could be fun, but she also knew how difficult it could be, especially with their schedules. "Sure," she said at last. "Just casual."

"Oi! Rollins!" Sheamus's voice rang out a second before a balled-up towel hit Seth's arm and fell to the floor. "You done talking Becky's ear off yet? Swiss here needs a spotter and I have to take a piss!"

Seth glanced down at himself. The shirt and shorts he was wearing weren't that different from his workout gear, so he shrugged. "Sure. Be right over." Picking up his bag, he turned so his back was to Cesaro and Sheamus. "I'll call you later."

"Okay." Becky went over to the fridge and grabbed a bottle of water. Seth's question seemed to have come out of nowhere, and yet after he'd asked it, the answer seemed like a given. She wasn't entirely convinced he would follow through and try to set up a date, but just in case he did, she would have to make sure that her voice mail wasn't full. That was a message she wouldn't want to miss.