"What are you doing?" Lily asked watching Finn stare down into his packed suitcase early Friday morning.
"I know I packed everything but for some reason it feels like something is missing," Finn answered.
"Gear for four days?"
"Yep."
"Clean underwear?"
"Yep."
"Wallet, phone and charger?"
"Yep."
"Well if you have all of those items, that's all you really need," she replied, grabbing her phone. "So this person on Instagram has been spamming the comments of every picture that I've ever posted of us together with Cathy related crap."
"Just block it," Finn suggested.
"I have...4 times already. They just make new pages," Lily huffed in frustration.
"The way things have been going lately it's probably Cathy herself..."
"She would've been my first suspect but the page that began the harassment was created years ago and has over 1000 posts. The fake profiles have username variations of the original page. It's not Cathy this time," Lily said. "Ever since that backstage interview with the 3 of us, 'the Finthy' 'CatFinn' fans have been enraged."
"If blocking doesn't work, just ignore it. Your 'Fertilizers' or whatever your fanbase calls themselves will handle it," he replied.
"I would've preferred 'Flowers' if they wanted to based themselves off of Lily. When I hear fertilize I think of eggs and sperm instead of plant food but get the sentiment," Lily laughed. "This is not a drill. The page has slid into my DMs."
"What does it say?"
"Now that you look like a blonde rooster by the head, it's only a matter of time before he runs back to Cathy. She's been glowing since the breakup meanwhile he's slumming it with you," Lily read aloud.
"Never thought I'd actively want to slum," he snorted in reply.
"She just sent another. Listen at this: you'll never be enough for him. He likes intelligent women like Cathy. She's a member of Mensa International. You're just a dumb little girl."
Finn rolled his eyes. "Babe, do not engage."
"Too late..."
Lily: A dumb little girl who graduated 1st in the most academically competitive high school in Texas and had multiple full ride scholarship offers to the best universities in America.
Troll: We adore Cathy, a WOMAN and Finn did too until you stole him.
Lily: FYI, I'm blocking...again. If you want to send any further DMs to vent that's fine but I won't accept them.
"Lily don't tell me you're going back and forth with that troll are you?" Finn questioned.
"No, I just blocked her."
"Good, you should've said nothing in the first place. When you give trolls a reaction they win. You weren't engaging with her when she was commenting which is why she kept creating pages after being blocked. That DM was bait."
"And I took it," she shook her head.
"Are you ready to head to the airport?"
"Yeah, I need to walk down the hall to my place to get my bags and we can go," Lily replied. Finn's apartment was still pretty empty besides the boxes that he shipped from Brooklyn.
Lily stepped off of her flight and finally checked her phone when they made it to the hotel. "Oh shit!"
"What?"
"So apparently that fan decided to post screenshots of our conversation but not before photoshopping it with fake responses from me and now it's trending and wrestling Twitter is on fire," Lily announced.
"What do the messages say?"
"I don't even want to repeat most of it but one says, 'He'll never want Cathy again because she is old and ugly.' Really? Cathy is a lot of things but ugly is not a word I'd used to describe her. Old either considering you're older. Here's another: 'Cathy is disposable but I'll have a job for life thanks to my dad, Shawn Michaels. All of you fans might as well get over it because Finn Balor and I are going to be together forever.' Like, why would I be dropping the full name of my father like everyone doesn't know who I am and why would I need to use my own boyfriend's character name? This is crazy and some people are actually believing it. My mentions are in shambles right now."
"I'll take care of it," he said pulling out his phone.
FinnBalor: Can the harassment of LilyMichaelsWWE over photoshopped images stop? I've never lied to you guys before so believe me when I say that Lily didn't and wouldn't send out any msgs like those.
"Thank you! You were so right about her baiting me and I should've continued to ignore and block her," Lily admitted.
"Exactly, what's the point of having an older, wiser and handsome boyfriend if you don't take his advice?"
Lily saw herself come into focus on Alexa's phone as she took a selfie. "Is this an invitation to join or what? And if so, I find it funny that you didn't want to take one before I chopped my hair off."
"No, I never wanted to take a selfie with you because you were a face and I was heel. Kayfabe dear," Alexa replied.
"Yeah, sure. Kayfabe died with social media. Some of you literally are photed together during feuds," Lily rolled her eyes before smiling for the picture.
It felt weird being on the heel side in a 3 on 3 with her, Alexa and Alicia Fox vs Sasha, Bayley and Natalya. She spent most of the match avoiding Nattie. It was eventually Alicia who took the pin giving the win to the face team.
******
"Are those screenshots floating around on Twitter real or photoshopped?" Hunter asked Monday afternoon in his office.
Lily stared at him incredulously. "Hunter, I know I can get a bit testy when it comes to Cathy but I've never gone on deranged rants such as those. This is your fault actually for making her interview him. You couldn't come up with a punishment better than that? I knew she had a pretty decent sized following but who new they were that invested in keeping her and Fergal together."
"Finn and Cathy were together for years and now they aren't. Some fans don't like change," Hunter reasoned. "In fact, 20 years from now if you two are still together you may still face it because I still get Chyna comments."
"Of course you do, look what you did to her," Lily mumbled under her breath. "Anyway, what am I doing tonight?"
"You will have two segments," Hunter said sliding an outline of tonight's show across the table to her.
Lily was filmed walking backstage until she was stopped by Nattie.
"Me and you, in the ring, tonight," Nattie said.
"No!" Lily replied. "It's like I told you, I'm not going to let you drag me down with a long, boring feud."
"I don't want a feud. I want a match to run your bratty ass back to your daddy, you know, since Shawn is still alive as you so eloquently pointed out," Nattie yelled.
Lily raked a hand through her short hair. "Well Nattie, as it turns out my self-elimination was very frown upon so I now have 29 women gunning for me. I took Bayley down the night after the Rumble so that leaves 28. I put them in order of relevance and you're dead last even behind the NXT and NXT UK women who I won't be running into again anytime soon so Nattie vs Lily is going to have to wait."
Several Superstars interrupted Alexa's Moment of Bliss segment and Lily was next. She cleared her throat on the mic to make her presence known as she walked out.
"Seriously?" Alexa blinked.
"Alexa, this will only take a minute. Nia, it's great that you're showing the world that women can hang with the big boys in the ring but on the other hand you brag about what you've done to men but your record against your fellow woman is questionable to say the least. It wasn't that long ago that Alexa, all 5 feet, 102 pounds of her had you crying last year?"
"Let's not live in the past..." Alexa replied.
"Anyway, Nia, you entered 2 royal rumbles and lost both while I could've won the women's if I hadn't walked out on my own terms," Lily boasted.
"I know this is a talk show Ellen DeGeneres but you should've stayed in the back," Nia said.
Lily fake laughed. "You're so funny. Can you at least give me an original hair insult instead of one that trended on Twitter after the wig came off?"
Nia took a few intimidating steps toward Lily. "I'll give you something alright."
"Neither of you are dressed for a fight," Alexa pointed out. "Where is a McMahon when you actually need them?"
"We don't need a GM," Nia shook her head. "Next week I'm going to give you a taste of what my opponents in the elimination chamber are going to get."
"Fine but there's something I have to do first," Lily replied, pulling her phone out of her back pocket, scrolling through her contacts and placing the phone to her ear. "Hey Dad? Is my health insurance active? Why you ask? Because I'm going to be stepping in the ring with Nia Jax next week and she has clumsily injured every other opponent that she faces and I don't want to take any chances. I know right? Are you guys watching? Hi mom!" Lily said, waving into the camera. "Alright, love you guys."
"Health insurance?" Nia questioned. "You should've been asking daddy about life insurance."