Chapter Text
The door slammed so hard it rattled the hinges.
Cody flinched as he slipped inside Randy’s locker room, careful to wedge himself between the closing door and Randy’s dangerous orbit. The man was a caged animal, muscles bunched tight under his ruined gear. He was pacing like a panther, jaw clenching and unclenching like it was trying to crack itself.
His dream was dead. Murdered in his hometown. All because of John Cena, a blind referee, and a handful of tights the cameras somehow missed.
Cody had watched it all, helpless from backstage. Watching history repeat at the cost of his friend’s success.
"Hey," Cody said softly, shutting the door behind him. The noise of the arena, the celebrations in the halls, the victory speeches all muted once he was inside Randy’s suffocating fury.
"Get out," Randy growled, voice low and trembling with restraint.
Cody didn’t move. Hell, he stepped even closer. Suicidal, really. Every rational part of him screamed abort mission, but he ignored it.
"I know you're pissed. And you have every right to be. Just try not to burn the building down tonight, okay?"
Randy turned then, a slow, sharp movement. His eyes, wild and bright with rage pinned Cody where he stood.
For a second, Cody wondered if he’d miscalculated. Maybe Randy wasn't in the mood for friendly advice, and was instead poised to tear Cody apart.
"You think this is just about the title?" Randy hissed. He was too close now, heat rolling off him in waves. "It’s about respect. It’s about being stabbed in the back in front of my own city. My people. I should’ve—"
"Trust me, I know, I've been through this exact same scenario, remember?" Cody interrupted, reaching out before he could stop himself. His hand landed recklessly on Randy’s bicep, trying to anchor him.
Randy stared down at the point of contact like it personally offended him. Then his gaze dragged back up to Cody’s face, unreadable.
The air between them snapped tense, thick enough to choke on.
Cody opened his mouth to say something else, perhaps something containing his stupid and soothing trademark optimism, when Randy pounced.
There was nothing graceful about the kiss. No slow, tentative lean like some cheesy rom-com. It was violent and sudden. A detonation of all the things Randy wanted to but couldn’t say.
His mouth crashed onto Cody’s, furious and unrelenting.
Cody froze. For a half second, the world stopped.
Randy's hands gripped his jaw, rough, almost bruising, like Cody was the only thing holding him together. The kiss was all teeth and anger and heartbreak, messy and wrong.
And for three heartbeats, Cody let it happen.
Three heartbeats of bad decisions. Of fire in his veins. Of forgetting everything.
Forgetting Roman.
The thought hit like a slap.
Cody shoved Randy back, chest heaving, lips bruised, shame crashing down so fast it left him dizzy.
"Oh God, no," he croaked, voice cracking humiliatingly high.
But Randy wasn’t seeing him anymore, his eyes glazed over, circling like a wounded predator.
Cody wiped his mouth, shaking. His heart hammered against his ribs like a drumbeat of guilt. This was not good.
He shouldn’t have even been here.
And then Randy lunged again, some broken determination fueling his movements.
Cody jerked away, backpedaling until he hit the far wall.
"No! Randy, stay right there!" he barked, panic shredding his voice.
Randy hesitated, confusion flickering across his stormy face.
"Cody—" Randy tried again, reaching.
"I'm seeing someone!" Cody blurted out, desperation cracking his voice.
It was like hitting a switch. Randy froze mid-step, suspicion immediately darkening his gaze.
"Who?" he demanded low and terrifyingly familiar. Roman could burn holes through people with that same glacial, annihilating tone.
And therein lay the problem.
Roman, who was the first stable, real thing Cody had ever had. Roman, who was devastatingly soft behind closed doors, who trusted Cody enough to hand him all the sharp, breakable pieces without question.
But these were things that only Cody and a select few were privy to. Things that he had convinced Roman that they needed to keep to themselves and not broadcast to the world.
“Someone,” Cody said, hand flailing wildly between them. “who is going to be extremely pissed about this particular situation.“
Understatement of the fucking millennium.
Randy’s eyes narrowed. "Cody," he said, like he was trying to be gentle but failing miserably. "Are you lying to me?"
"Why would you think that?" Cody said, voice high and wobbly, praying for a meteor to just crush him on the spot.
"If you don't want to kiss me, you could just—"
“Roman.“ Cody interrupted before Randy could divest himself of whatever self esteem had survived the earlier attack from Cena.
“I'm with Roman.“
The room dropped into a frozen silence.
Randy's face went through a flurry of emotions. First disbelief, then dark amusement, fury, before settling into something truly dangerous: icy, betrayed rage.
"...What?" he spat, incredulous.
"You're with Roman?" Randy asked, low and sharp. "Roman Reigns? The asshole who put you through the wringer last year? The lunatic who whipped you publicly in front of your family? That Roman?"
Cody winced and nodded miserably, still glued to the wall like it might sprout arms and save him.
Well. When Randy said it like that, it sounded like Cody was living in a Stockholm Syndrome romance novel. Which he wasn’t.
Definitely.
Roman had been nothing but a perfect gentleman, that Cody wondered if he was the one taking advantage of the man by convincing him to keep their relationship a secret.
"Yes. That Roman." He responded weakly.
"Tribal Chief Roman? Acknowledge-me-or-die Roman?" Randy was advancing now, slow and predatory with every word.
Cody sighed. "It’s... complicated."
"You think?!" Randy snapped. "You’re in here kissing me like you own me, meanwhile you're shacked up with the king of the bloodline?!"
"I didn’t kiss you," Cody protested weakly, even though his still-burning lips said otherwise.
"Oh, right," Randy sneered, closing the space in two angry strides. "You just stood there while I tried to crawl inside your mouth.
Cody opened his mouth, then shut it again. Because... Well. Facts.
"I panicked," Cody offered lamely. "And... I didn’t want to hurt you. You've been through enough tonight already."
Randy scoffed sharp and ugly. He stepped back, raking Cody up and down with a look that made him feel about an inch tall.
"Don't patronize me, Cody,“ he barked, voice rising dangerously. "You didn’t want to hurt me? Newsflash, Pretty Boy, you just did."
The words landed harder than any RKO. Cody physically recoiled, stomach twisting in unease.
"I didn’t plan this, Randy," Cody said tightly. "I came to stop you from doing something stupid. I came because I care."
"And yet," Randy said, bitter and ice-cold," You're gonna slink back to him. To Roman. Back to whatever sinister den he crawls out of to instill anguish upon us mere mortals."
Cody exhaled sharply, feeling like he was trying to hold together a sandcastle in a hurricane.
"You don’t know what you're talking about," he muttered.
"I know enough," Randy snarled. "You’re scared. Scared to want something messy. Something real."
"That’s not fair," Cody shot back, angry now too, because he didn’t deserve this.
"Life’s not fair," Randy snarled, pointing at the door like it was a death sentence. "Just ask me. Ask anyone who’s ever had something good ripped away from them by your psychotic boyfriend. Ask yourself, Cody, why anyone would ever give a damn about Roman Reigns."
The words cut deep, threading through Cody’s chest like barbed wire.
Randy turned away, fists clenching so tight they shook.
Cody lingered for one more second, throat burning, guilt swallowing him whole.
Then he fled as quickly as he could, slipping through the door and shutting it behind him with a soft click.
The sound echoed like a gunshot down the empty hallway.
Inside, Randy didn’t scream. Didn’t smash anything.
He just stood there. Trembling from the effort not to break apart completely.