THE IMPOSSIBLE DREAM
SUNDAY NIGHT HEAT, APRIL 22ND, 2001
Angel was not in a good mood. Like it wasn’t enough that Test had refused to sleep with her – Test, who hit on anything in a skirt. It wasn’t even enough that Benoit kept kicking the crap out of her in training – always legal, didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. He punished her relentlessly. Well, accusing a guy of having no balls would do that. But now, sitting across from him in the hotel restaurant, she found she couldn’t even look at him. Not that looking at him was usually a pleasurable experience, but now it was an impossibility. She’d known it would happen sooner or later, hoped to God it wouldn’t, but it was inevitable and had been since the time of Boyd in high school.
Last night, she’d had what could only be described as an incredibly raunchy sex dream. One of those ones where you woke up flushed, breathing heavily, with all your senses on overload. Goosebumps, man. Goosebumps. The type of dream that made you feel goood, helped you get your day off to the right start. That was, of course, unless said sex dream starred Chris Benoit. Then it wasn’t good. Not good at all.
So she just sat there, staring at the table, refusing to look up, refusing to speak until those horrible mental images could be erased forever. And because she wasn’t talking, he wasn’t talking and there was silence. Pure, cold silence. The type of silence Angel usually couldn’t stand; she had to break it, but not this time. She had other things on her mind. Awful, nauseating, unbearable things. So it was silent.
"Angel!" Suddenly a set of arms were around her. "How are you?"
"Hey Trish," Angel said sullenly.
"Hi Chris!" Trish cried cheerfully. "Hey, can I join you guys?"
"Sure," Angel replied before Benoit could respond. Anything to take her mind off what was making it hard to even consider eating.
"Great! I’ll be right back. I’ll just go order and make sure my food comes out the same time as yours." She walked off with that self-confident swagger knowing she had the eye of every man in the place. Every man except Benoit. He was glaring at Angel.
Angel finally looked up and revulsion coursed through her veins. He was such an ugly, evil, putrid piece of shit. Why the hell did her subconscious have to mock her that way? It was just…just wrong.
"I have to put up with Jericho," she said simply, before looking at the table again.
Benoit said nothing. He just kept glaring at her.
Soon, Trish returned, pulled up a chair and seated herself, all with calculated dramatic flair. She turned straight to Benoit.
"Hi Chris! Oh wait, I already said that, didn’t I? Sometimes I can be such a ditz. You know what? I just love that you and Chris Jericho have decided to team up and fly the Canadian flag. On behalf of all the women fans, I’d just like to thank you, because you know what it’s got us all thinking?"
"What?" Benoit asked impatiently.
Trish grinned, leaned over and delicately whispered in his ear.
Benoit’s eyebrows shot up; then he blinked heavily and glared over at Angel again.
Trish giggled. "And that can’t be a bad thing, can it?" Her hand slipped from in front of his ear to his shoulder. "Ooh! You’re just like a rock, aren’t you? Wow! Can you flex your bicep for me? I just want to touch it, to feel it. Please?"
Benoit slowly swiveled his head to stare at Trish. Then he carefully, deliberately reached over and removed her hand from his shoulder before getting to his feet. He reached for his wallet and pulled out a few notes, then slammed them down on the table in front of Angel.
"Get mine to go," he ordered, before leaving without another word.
"Bye Chris!" Trish cried, giving a little wave and watching him go. She slightly tilted her head. "Hey, Angel. Look at this! He has a really fine ass!"
Angel frowned at her. Trish was a mixed blessing. She’d gotten rid of Benoit beautifully, but now she had Angel thinking about Benoit’s ass. Not good, not good at all.
Trish grinned over at Angel. "Chris is a little moody, isn’t he?"
"A little?" Angel asked, eyebrows raised.
"Oh," Trish frowned. "I know that was meant to be a joke, but you look so sad. Also, your hair’s kind of flat. What’s the matter?"
Angel sighed. "Nothing."
"It’s a man, isn’t it?" Trish asked sympathetically. "Did something happen with your mystery man?"
Angel nodded solemnly. "It didn’t work out."
"Oh," Trish pouted. "Who was he?"
Angel shook her head. "No one important. We just…he didn’t understand me."
Trish stared at her despairingly. "Okay, we need to cheer you right up. You should come with me tonight."
Angel frowned. "What’s going on tonight?"
"I’m hosting Heat! Isn’t that cool? It’s gonna be so much fun. We’re gonna play a dating game and the winner gets a date with me and some guaranteed Stratus-faction. Hey, you could have like…the runner up. I’m sure he wouldn’t be too upset and it’d help take your mind off…whoever that loser was who dumped you."
Angel slammed her face down on the table.
"Oh, Angel, no!" Trish cried, putting an arm around her. "I’m so sorry. Come on, come watch me host Heat. It’s my first time doing it alone. It’d mean a lot to me if you’d come…and if you don’t like any of the dating game guys then I’m sure there’ll be plenty in the club who want to meet you. You might even find the man of your dreams. Come on. Please?"
Angel looked up at her and gave a small smile. "Can I say…probably?"
"Probably?" Trish frowned.
"Well, I have to see if Benoit wants a match and if he does, I have to set it up and then valet for him. But since I have a Backlash match for him now he’ll probably just want to watch videos, so I’ll be able to go."
"Videos, huh?" Trish grinned.
"I know," Angel sighed. "Tapes of Kurt Angle’s old matches. He watches them all day. I swear they’re his version of porn."
Trish giggled. "Does he wear pants when he watches them?"
"I’ve never really looked," Angel replied sharply, cringing because now she was picturing Benoit without pants. "But he broke a hotel TV the other day, so I don’t know what that means."
"Intense!" Trish cried. "Oh, thank you!" She gave the waiter a broad grin as he set out the meals.
"Can I have that one to go?" Angel asked as he puzzled over Benoit’s plate.
"Sure," he nodded, taking it back to the kitchen.
"Tonight’ll be fun, I swear," Trish said to Angel. "You should come by and borrow one of my outfits. We’ll have you looking so hot no man will resist you."
Angel raised her eyebrows. When Trish said hot, you had to hear skanky. But oh well, it would just be for one night. Give Test a little shot of what he was missing. Let him eat his damn heart out.
* * * *
"Your food, master," Angel said, setting his bag down on the bed.
"Thank you," Benoit replied absently, without turning around.
"You really should give Trish a chance," Angel told him. "She’s a lot of fun."
"So I’ve heard."
Angel grinned. "So, you want a match tonight or are you just gonna watch your tapes?"
"Tapes."
"So I can go out then?"
"I don’t care what you do, so long as you shut up."
"Cool, ‘cause Trish is hosting Heat and she wants me to go with her."
Benoit turned around with a frown on his face. "Trish Stratus is hosting Heat? What the hell is she? She gets asked? What is that?"
Angel gave a grin. "Aw, you wanna host Heat, Benoit?"
"No," Benoit replied coldly. "It’d just be nice to know what qualifies you as a host."
"A personality, I believe," Angel said with a thoughtful nod. "So you’re doomed forever."
Benoit glared at her. "Princess?"
"What?"
"Get out of my sight."
Angel grinned. "See you later. Oh, and don’t wait up."
Her smart-ass façade began to crumble as she collected a few things from her room, then headed off to meet Trish. Snappy comebacks could only get you so far when you were picturing someone naked.
"I’ll hang out with Trish some more," Angel decided. "And possibly even Jericho. Anything to stop the recurring curse of the too much time together sex dream."
She knocked on Trish’s hotel room door.
"Just a minute!" cried the cheerful voice. The door opened. "Angel!" Trish looked her up and down. "Can I ask you a question?"
"Why don’t you ever wear short skirts? If we got you in one of those and a killer set of shoes, you would be totally hot! What do you think?"
Angel couldn’t help but smile. "Sure."
"Great!" Trish grinned. "You can borrow one of mine. You’re taller than me so it’ll be so short on you!" She clapped her hands together and eyed Angel thoughtfully. "I think I have a smaller waist than you, but you don’t have the hips, so it should work just fine. Come on in. When I’m done with you, you won’t even recognize yourself!"
Angel nodded. At this stage in her life, that sounded like a pretty great idea.
* * * *
Angel sat alone in a booth in WWF New York, nonchalantly sipping a Coke and watching Trish onstage trying to choose between three dating game contestants. Well, at least one of them seemed to be having a good time.
Angel wondered whether Trish would still be smiling once she saw the specimens of mankind the powers that be had selected for the game. They were all cute enough, just not anything special – not considering the competition constantly inhabiting the WWF locker rooms. Three young studs. A skinny black guy, a chubby white guy and another white guy – burly, not chubby, with a well-kept goatee. No prizes for guessing which one Trish would choose.
Angel was just sipping her Coke – damn WWF New York for carding and her being nine months shy of twenty-one – and deciding whether skinny black guy or chubby white guy was more her scene, when she heard a low, alcohol affected voice.
"Hey baby, you look like you could use some company."
‘And you look like you could use some coffee and a couple of decent lines,’ Angel thought, but instead she looked up at the guy and said, "I’m fine. Thanks."
"You bet you’re fine, baby," he replied, gazing at her lecherously, pushing her down the booth and squeezing in next to her. He was twenty-something, possibly thirty-something, normal build, no muscles, big ears, balding. She logged this description in her mind and decided she could take him.
"Actually, I’m just holding this booth for my friends."
The guy kept moving in on her. "You say that, but what I see is one drink and one you. I’m not that bad at math."
"They’ve gone to get drinks," Angel insisted.
"Oh well," the guy shrugged, putting an arm around her. "I’ll just have to look after you until they get back. I’m Dave," he said softly.
Angel reached for her drink, ready to throw it in his face if he tried anything. She said nothing, she just started praying he’d leave.
"And you are?" he prompted.
Angel slowly turned to face him, a superior smirk on her face. Oh yeah, she could take him.
"Way out of your league," she said sweetly.
He looked taken aback. "Out of my league? Baby, I could show you a few things you’ve only dreamed about."
"Oh really?" Angel asked. "Tell me, you’re a wrestling fan, right?"
"Well, sure. Isn’t everybody?"
Angel nodded and stared deep into his eyes. "Then you’ve heard of Chris Benoit and Steve Blackman, right?"
"Sure. They’re the bomb."
"Dangerous, too, huh? Let me tell you something, Dave. I spend about four hours in the gym with the two of them every morning. Do you know what that means?"
Dave eyed her incredulously. "You’re full of shit, bitch."
"Actually, no. It means I can and will kick your ass if you don’t remove it from this booth in the next five seconds." She glared at him threateningly.
"You’re bluffing," he shrugged. "You want me."
"Five, four, three…"
"We both know you’re just playing hard to get. Look at how you’re dressed. You want it, baby."
"Two, one. Okay, don’t say I didn’t warn you."
Dave leaned right into her. "What are you gonna do, baby? Whip me?"
"No. I only whip people I like." With those words and a saccharine sweet smile, she hit Dave with a knife-edge chop to his chest. He fell back, clutching his chest and trying to reinflate his lungs. Angel leaned back over the next both and kicked out, forcing Dave off his seat and onto the ground. He clumsily found his feet and glared at her as she stared back expressionless, lips twitching slightly.
"Want some more?" she asked, only slightly ruing the fact that Trish’s ‘I wanna be screwed’ outfit had no space to conceal her fighting sticks so she was going in unarmed. It didn’t matter. Benoit didn’t like her carrying the sticks anyway.
"First thing you gotta learn. Your body is a weapon. All these guys think they’re so damn hardcore. Real fighters don’t need weapons."
Occasionally, very occasionally, Benoit was right.
Dave leaped at her, fists flying, but she was ready, ducking forward, then flipping her back upwards so he flew through the air, over her booth and into the next one. Angel heaved in a huge breath and peered over the partition. Dave was facedown in some dude’s prime rib while dude screamed at him and dude’s date wailed about getting ketchup on her sparkly halter-top. Angel grinned to herself, clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and ducked back down into her own booth. She had a feeling Dave wouldn’t be back, but if he was, she’d take him again, no problem.
Suddenly famished, she tracked down a waiter and ordered, of all things, pasta with a side salad.
"Goddamn Benoit," she muttered, tuning back into the show again. Surely Trish had chosen by now and was well on the way to giving Mr. Goatee man the night of his life. She raised her eyebrows. Apparently Trish hadn’t wanted to disappoint anyone, so all three were getting Stratusfaction guaranteed. Angel had a feeling that, while the show was officially done, it’d be a long time before Trish was ready to go back to the hotel.
"Great," Angel sighed. "Now I don’t even get the rejects and the best I can do for myself is delightful Dave. It’s all good."
She stirred her Coke gloomily and waited for her food to arrive.
‘You know your life sucks when all you have to hope for is a damn cooked meal.’
Suddenly, she heard another male voice with a New York accent.
"Hey, is this seat taken?"
Angel scowled. "Hell yes, it’s taken. It’s taken by me and if you try to even sit your ass down I won’t even hesitate before I put my stiletto up it. Kapiche?"
He let out a chuckle. "You think you can kick my ass? Boy, have you got yourself an attitude since we met in the dead of winter."
Angel smiled sheepishly. "Hey Tazz. Take a seat."
Tazz grinned back. "Well, I dunno about that. You sure you ain’t gonna turn and kick my ass?"
"Sorry," Angel shrugged. "Thought you were someone else."
Tazz frowned. "Oh Devil. Some guys round here been giving you trouble? Just point 'em out, and me and a couple guys’ll make sure they ain’t gonna trouble you or anyone else again."
Angel grinned. "It’s okay. I can take care of myself." She shrugged her shoulders, showing off her toned arms.
Tazz nodded approvingly. "You been working hard, little Devil. I don’t doubt you can hold your own."
Angel held his gaze and spoke softly. "Anywhere, anytime."
Tazz gave a little laugh. "See, there’s the sassy little Devil I know. There is something different about you now. You’re harder now, tougher."
Angel nodded. "You know it."
"So Devil, why you sitting down here all on your own?"
"I’m not alone," Angel shrugged, slowly moving her hand along the table towards Tazz’s, which were clasped in front of him. "You’re here."
"Well, yeah, Little Devil. You got that straight." He cocked his head and studied her profile for a while as she set her gaze straight ahead, knowing he was staring and hoping he liked what he saw.
"You don’t give nothing away, do you?" Tazz asked, somewhat admiringly.
Angel formed a wistful smile. "Nothing’s for free."
"Yeah, you got that right," Tazz frowned and watched her some more.
Angel kept cool, figuring that dark and mysterious hardcore bitch would win Tazz more than any of her alternate personalities.
"Hey," Tazz said at last. "You want me to leave?"
Angel spun quickly. "No. Stay. Please. I mean, I know I’m not the best company right now, but it’s good to see a friendly face."
Tazz gave an ironic smile. "Friendly? You’ve been in the WWF for months and you still got your heart set on making friends? Little Devil, you should know, there ain’t no friends in wrestling."
Angel raised her eyebrows and held his gaze.
"Well," she said softly, running a single finger down Tazz’s cheek and blinking languidly. "We don’t have to be friends."
Suddenly, Tazz burst out laughing, startling Angel. Humiliated, she jumped back into the corner of the booth and folded her arms protectively across her chest.
"Little Devil," Tazz chuckled. "What are you doing?"
Angel scowled and refused to meet his gaze. "Nothing, just forget it. Forget it. Forget it."
Tazz still laughed, his face filled with confusion. "Why are you hitting on me?"
Angel took a deep breath. "I wasn’t hitting on you, I was trying…look, forget it. Forget I said anything. Forget I said you could sit down. Forget it all." She slammed her head down on the table and waited for the humiliation to flow away.
"Don’t get me wrong," Tazz told her. "I’m flattered, but I don’t get it, Devil. This ain’t you."
"You don’t know me," Angel murmured, head still down.
"No, I don’t, but right now I don’t think even you know you."
Bam. It hit home. "Look, I said forget it, okay?"
Tazz frowned down at her. "Devil, what’s happened to you?"
Angel sighed. "It’s called rock bottom and it’s not a wrestling move."
"Yeah, I see that, but why?"
"I have no friends…"
"No friends in wrestling," Tazz reminded her.
"I have no life…"
"Wrestling’s your life, right?" Tazz asked.
"I’m stuck with Benoit…"
"Benoit’s a cool guy."
Angel raised her head long enough to give Tazz a sharp glare before lowering it again. "I’m a prisoner."
"Only if you think you are."
"What?" Angel cried, giving him the full version of her glare. "What the hell do you know?"
Tazz wasn’t intimidated. "I know this. I know I came over here and sat down, wanting to talk to the sassy little Devil I ain’t talked to in some time. And we were talking nice, right, talking normal. But then you got this look in your eyes like something clicked. And the next thing I know you’re hitting on me. So, tell me, Devil. What’s the deal? I ain’t gonna hurt you or nothing. I just wanna know."
Angel sighed. This time she was going to have to be open.
"I need your help," she said solemnly. "I need you to fight Benoit. I need you to set me free."
"Fight Benoit?" Tazz cried. "I got no issues with Benoit."
Angel gripped Tazz’s hands.
"Tazz," she pleaded. "I need your help."
Tazz was quiet for a moment. "No. No, you don’t need my help, Devil."
"I wouldn’t be asking if I didn’t," Angel said evenly.
Tazz sighed sympathetically and put a heavy arm around her. "When I was growing up in Red Hook, if there was one thing I learned it’s this. You are the only person you can count on. Don’t stick your neck out for no one else, and don’t expect them to do the same for you. If you can’t look after yourself, you got no place being on the streets in the first place. The WWF’s just the same as Red Hook, Devil. Alliances, hell, I know they happen. I just had me a good one with the APA, you know. But they don’t last. So you gotta be sure of you. You gotta have your own back. If people know you don’t need no help, they’ll usually help you, see what I mean?"
Angel sighed. "I have tried to do this alone. But I’m starting to learn that I can’t."
"Then maybe it’s time for you to go home," Tazz said.
"Home?" Angel frowned.
"Yeah. I don’t wanna act like a jerk, but if you can’t take it, you shouldn’t be here. It’s a tough business and if you’re not tough enough, that’s okay, but you shouldn’t stick around."
"I’m tough," Angel told him.
"Yeah, I know. But you have to tell yourself that until you got yourself believing it. And then you’ll realize you don’t need me. You don’t need no one. You think Chyna runs around asking people for help? Never! So you don’t need it either. Okay, Devil?"
Angel sighed. He didn’t get it, but there was just no getting through to some people.
"Okay," she replied sullenly.
Tazz smiled and pressed his hand against her chin. "We’re tight, right, Little Devil? I mean, we ain’t friends or nothing, but we’re tight."
Angel gave a small smile. "You bet."
Tazz smiled back. "Hang in there, kid. We need a whole lot more of you around. I’ll catch you later, okay?"
"Okay," Angel nodded as Tazz stood and left the booth.
Angel watched him go, shaking her head slowly. Another one had bitten the dust. She was running out of options. But still, in the back of her mind were her three friends, Edge, Christian and Rhyno. They could make it okay. They had never, ever tried to cross her or tried to put one over on her. Since day one, Edge had been sweet to her and had wanted to be a part of her life. She knew she could count on the three of them. And somewhere, amongst them, there had to be a winner. The tag champs and the hardcore champ. She was sure they’d fight for her. All she had to do was ask.
