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THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE EXCITING. Fun. Summer Games. But all Angela could think as she stood at the top of the half-pipe, was that it was maybe more, Summer Exhaustion Challenge or Summer I Killed All My Employees.
To be fair, the whole cast and crew were out here. Well, except for Chanse, who had pitched, pioneered, and scheduled everything for this, the absolute bastard. He was set up to be the director/producer, and was mostly just watching both teams. She technically wasn’t being singled out. The cast were split into groups of two, one nerd per one athlete. It was just her dumb luck that she ended up on the athlete side of that equation.
She watched as Shayne easily ran up the half-pipe in front of her and pulled up onto the platform. Like it was easy. Like doing that hadn’t almost killed her.
“Gotta keep moving,” he said with a grin and a small punch to her arm. She pushed him, and he kept going through the course.
It was day one of their SSG trip. Today and tomorrow were dedicated to training for both halves of the team, and then the filming of the actual games would begin. Her counterpart, Olivia, was sitting in the far corner of the gymnasium with the other “nerds”, going through random trivia quizzes. She longed to be there sitting cross-legged and happy, probably with a snack and a water at her fingertips. Comfortable. Not hot.
Damien sprinted up the half-pipe and used one hand to vault himself up. Jesus, she was never going to win this thing.
“Need help?” he asked, jogging in place to keep his muscles hot. He had been wearing his ring around a chain lately, and it had fallen out of his shirt and was bouncing off his chest.
“I’m good,” she said. He nodded and then kept going on the course. She hung her head for just a second more, blew a kiss at the dream of being on the nerd team, and followed Damien.
The next obstacle was a braided net, and she watched in genuine awe as Damien scurried up it like a wild cat. “I’m never gonna fucking win this,” she murmured to herself as she tugged on the rope.
She just had to remind herself — falling didn’t disqualify her like in real ninja warrior, she just had to get to the other side in any way possible. And it would be harder if she didn’t use the course as intended during the real games.
Past the climb was yet another obstacle that took her up — monkey bars that swung, each a little higher than the last.
That's when Spencer passed her, on the left set of swinging bars.
It was starting to feel like a humiliation ritual, making her go first.
After that was a steep set of spiral stairs up that she hopped her way quickly through, ending at the most horrifying part ever.
This slide had to be at least 40 feet. When she looked up to the ceiling in despair, she realized she was so close to the rafters that she could jump up and swing on one.
“Come on Ang, you've got this!”
She put both hands on the frame before she looked down the dark green slide. Damien and Shayne were at the bottom, gesturing for her to come down, encouraging smiles on their faces.
“This is fucked,” a voice quipped from behind her, and when she looked, Courtney was looking straight down the slide. “I knew eventually we'd have to come down, but for some reason, I hate this in particular.”
“Me too,” she said as a new wave of cheers erupted from below. She eyed the slide again before she sat, scooting as far to the right as she could. “I think it can fit both of us.”
Court gave her a small smile, took a deep breath, and nodded. They sat next to her and they locked arms.
“Three,” she said, squeezing their arms tight. “Two,” she looked ahead, below, at Damien standing right in front of where she would land, like he was waiting for her. “One.”
They both pushed, and she screamed the whole way down. Half way, they started bumping against the sides and crashing into each other. They let go of each other— Courtney straightened like an arrow down the slide, which left Angela a sideways screaming mess.
She tumbled into Damien, who caught her and stopped her from busting her head on the concrete floor.
“You did it, Anghula, congrats!”
Dinner that night had been her pleading with each member of Team Nerd to please, please, please switch places with her, but they all knew they had the cushy gig here.
“I just don't understand how I ended up on the athletic team,” she whined into her lunch. Today was barbecue day, and she honestly couldn't think of anything better, she was so hungry.
“I don't know if you've noticed, but you've gotten pretty ripped in the last year,” Damien said from her left. She felt her cheeks get hot, but played into comedy, flexing her arms over his plate until he playfully pushed her away.
“If that's the only reason, I'll never work out another day in my life.”
Laughs were had, and she let the conversation move on, but she was still down. Anxious and exhausted, it was hard to see how the next seven days could go any better for her.
“Hey,” Chanse whispered to her as he slid into the chair on her right. “I have a cutie on the line for you. I should give them your info, right?”
Panic shivered over her skin and she glanced to her left to see if anyone was listening, but Damien was engrossed in a conversation with Spence. Neither should hear her talk with Chanse.
“No, you shouldn't. Don't I have enough to deal with?”
“This week sure, but what about next week? Girl you haven't been with anyone in like months.”
Poor Chanse, he was just trying to help her, and it was her own fault for keeping secrets. But the very last thing she needed was for Chanse to try to hook her up with someone when she was desperately in love with someone else.
“I know, I know, I'm just…” She glanced at the whole table, now wishing someone would interrupt them. “I just don't want to, just yet,”she said with a small smile for her friend. “But thank you.”
“Mmhmm, whatever, keep those cobwebs in your pussy then.”
Damien spit out his drink, which was objectively funny, if only she didn't feel so humiliated. “Chanse,” she said and smacked his arm with a shocked laugh. “I don't deserve this, I'm leaving!” She announced dramatically before filing up her plate again to take with her to her room.
There were downsides to officially partnering with the Ninja Warrior name; mostly the hugely physical obstacle course. But, there were very big perks as well.
First, was the food. Big names brought big benefits in that regard. Breakfast and lunch were big catered affairs, and dinner was left up to the individual, but with a prepaid meal debit card.
The other benefit, which Angela took full advantage of as she swiped her key card, was private rooms in the hotel attached to the gymnasium.
She swept into her room, turned the tv onto the forever loop that Forensic Files seemed to always have in hotels, and finished her second serving of lunch in the peace of her own room.
Thankfully, the second half of their day was so up as a lecture, discussing strategies and watching videos of past contestants of their show. Before she knew it, she was back in the peace of her private room.
Even though she was “on set”, she still followed her same night routine. Shower, face routine, lightly dry her hair, slip her ring on, and call her husband to talk about their days. She did miss cuddling with him, but also, the hotel bed was really comfortable.
The next day was much the same, except they were being filmed for training montages. Perk number three for the big name brand deal — they got the cutest uniforms made up. Each pair had their own color, and she and Olivia were scarlet. Angela's uniform was a fancy workout set in deep red with a Smosh Ninja oversized tee shirt in a slightly more heathered color. Olivia was in a scarlet power suit with heels, and suddenly, being a jock didn't seem so bad to Angela.
Now that they were all in team colors, it was easier to tell the teams. Spencer and Amanda were chatting by the muffins in deep purple. Shayne and Noah wore dark blue, joking around with Damien and Keith who were in dark green. Trevor and Arasha were in a dark, royal looking yellow, filming TikToks with Courtney and Tommy who wore a flattering pumpkin-y orange. And finally the bosses, Ian and Anthony were paired, dressed up in the prettiest magenta she'd ever seen.
Breakfast, physical training, lunch, lecture, free time.
Day three was the first day of actual competition, and to say it kicked her ass was an understatement.
For the real competition, all of their jungle gym sets were above pools of six-foot deep water. She fell into that cold water at least four times, each time having to shake off the stun of its icy depths so she could swim through and get back on track. Which, of course, was harder since she was fully wet and slippery.
The only reason they got third was because Olivia was some kind of trivia god. Every piece of the obstacle course was unlocked by Olivia answering first in the nerd group, and tragically, every time she reached a checkpoint, the next leg was already unlocked for her.
If Olivia had been paired with, say, Damien, they would've been first. As it was, Angela barely clawed her way to the podium as other jock members cleared the courses above her.
She wasn't the only one to fall in, which did make her feel better. Shayne had a mis-grip on one of the spinning wheels that had felled her too, and fell in behind her. Spencer had slipped on a rolling balance beam, and Trevor had straight brained himself on one of the swinging monkey bars.
That one, she was ashamed to admit, was her favorite, because they paused filming to make sure he was okay and she got to catch her breath.
All she could do was play up the comedy aspect of her performance, but spitting jokes while going through the most intense obstacle course ever took up three times the energy.
But she was getting good at falling into the pool, and shooting back up. Swimming fully dressed with sneakers. Joking while doing so.
The only real danger she'd encountered was when she hit the half pipe at the end. She ran up and caught the edge, but her wet sneakers slipped, and she knew it was going to hurt on the way down because of the sideways angle she had used to get up there.
But at the last second, Damien came out of nowhere and caught her forearm, pulling her up and over with his sheer strength.
She could feel the crowd of their coworkers go crazy on the commentary, but her mind had whited out to a shocked static ringing.
When Damien pulled her all the way up, she had fallen into him, and let herself stay there for maybe longer than strictly necessary. But that had been such a close call that she couldn't move. Damien wrapped his arms around her, his breath shaking against her hair. “You're okay, I've got you.”
In reality, it was only a few seconds of grounding herself before Shayne clapped Damien on the shoulder and shook them out of their reverie.
That night, while she soaked in an Epsom salt bath, she talked to her husband on the phone for a bit, using the private room to her advantage.
She almost cried to him about how poorly she was doing, and how scared she had been when she almost fell off the half pipe. He talked her through it, reassured her.
“You're definitely doing better than you think. You just have to find a way to play up to your strengths. Take your time on the intense challenges, and hit the agility bits like the wind.”
“I can do that,” she splashed her bath around a little, thinking of his advice. “Tell me how you're doing.”
They chatted throughout her short bath, through her putting on lotion at his insistence (it'll help you feel more like yourself, he'd said, and he was right), and kept talking all the way until she was tucked into her soft hotel bed.
“I wish you were right here,” she said, smacking the pillow where his head should be, but he just laughed.
“Then you really wouldn't have the energy for your day tomorrow.”
She hummed suggestively at him, thinking seriously about taking him up on his insinuation before she let out a huge yawn, and he laughed again.
“Go to bed sweetheart, I'll see you soon. And remember, you've got this.”
Now, over a month ago, Angela had signed all of the contracts for the games. Every. Last. Page. Even if she didn't exactly read it.
After the fourth day, the second day of actual competition, she's woken up in the middle of the night, sorority-style. Official SSG pajamas were shoved at her, and she threw them on, so tired she could barely think.
Good news, the other half of her team had to do the thinking for the challenges.
Bad news, as soon as she got teed up for her run, Chanse screamed CUT into the megaphone immediately.
“What? What? What happened?”
“Bitch, are you MARRIED?”
She froze, like a deer in headlights, for at least a good thirty seconds before she looked down at her incriminating ring. The one she wore to sleep every night, because they didn't wear them to work.
It was a platinum band, soft and smooth against her skin, inlaid with crushed opal and topaz pieces. Her hand shook a little, the golden pink flecks shimmering at her in mockery of her nightly habit.
Shayne, still on her side of the course, snatched up her hand and pulled it comically close to his face. His inspection was brief before he turned to glare at the platform across the course from them.
There stood Damien, frozen in the thrall of his best friend's glare. And from his neck, glinting in the bright obstacle course lighting, was the chain he'd been wearing for the past six months straight, threaded through the ring that matched hers perfectly.