EPISODE 11 LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLE

While WWE may not have felt like I was the one yet, the lad I was seeing certainly did. When I got back to LA, he planned an evening out with me, taking me to the arcade on Santa Monica Pier.

“Let’s go on the Ferris wheel!” he suggested.

“I’m not really feeling it today,” I responded without admitting I’m a scared little baby when it comes to heights.

“Oh, come on! It’ll be fun!” he insisted, pulling me towards the rickety ride.

I climbed in reluctantly, terrified, clutching the edges with a death grip. When we reached the top, the Ferris wheel stopped.

“Oh no! It’s broken!” I yelled, fearing this would be the end of Rebecca Quin.

Just then he started to get up, shaking our capsule, petrifying me further, which only amplified as he got down on one knee and produced a small black box.

Oh no, I thought, how could we have such wildly different views of this relationship?

“Will you marry me?” he asked, opening the box and producing a pear-shaped diamond ring. Or, as I saw it, a teardrop.

“Yes,” I said, like a fucking coward. What’s one to do? Unless you’re ready to break up there and then, you say yes like the good person you are and then break their heart at a much more suitable, convenient time… for you.

As we embraced and I wondered how the hell I was going to get out of this one, the Ferris wheel started to move again.

I was ambushed by a photographer and a man popping a bottle of champagne and a giant bouquet of flowers as we stepped off.

At least I had said yes; otherwise this would have been purely mortifying.

I hid the ring from the public eye, embarrassed to wear it. I would ask my happily married friends ad nauseam, “How did you know they were the one?”

“I just knew,” they’d all inevitably respond like the clichés they were.

Surely that’s bullshit. Surely you go through the same painful doubt every single day of your life wondering how the hell you’re going to get out of this. Surely?

Surely it’s perfectly normal not to want to tell anyone about your engagement, especially not your mother. It’s not unusual to hide rings in photographs, or not to think for a single second that you will ever actually go through with it?

The few friends I admitted my condition to were all very nice about it. Realizing I would probably come to my own conclusions eventually, they gave me the standard “as long as you’re happy” spiel.

Colby was not one such friend and when he found out immediately texted me: “What the fuck are you doing? You were just in my room crying about this motherfucker a few months ago.”

Jeez, man. Don’t yell at me, I thought.

“I know, I know. Look, I’ll be honest. I don’t think I’ll go through with it. But if you’re not ready to break up, how are you supposed to respond?”

“Fair, fair.”

At least he understood. Unlike my mother, who wouldn’t talk to me for three weeks after I finally told her.

“I’m not going to marry him,” I insisted.

“You’re ruining your life. You just told me at Christmas he’s not right for you!” she scolded.

It was the worst when she was right.

The weight of all the guilt was crippling, making it hard to keep that “I’m a star” aura Shawn Michaels talked about.

But I would need to get my act together quickly. The dynamic of the women’s division was about to change due to two things.

Number one, for the first time in history, and from now on, there would also be a thirty-woman Royal Rumble at the namesake PPV. The winner would go on to get a championship match at WrestleMania.

As a person whose favorite PPV was The Royal Rumble, it was already monumental to compete at it, never mind competing in an actual Royal Rumble. Additionally, I was one of the first two people in the match, along with Sasha Banks.

I knew there was no hope of me winning—that was reserved for Asuka this year—but what really got the world talking brings me to:

Number two, the signing of MMA sensation and former UFC champion Ronda Rousey to WWE. Ronda, the catalyst for change in women’s MMA and the reason women were allowed to compete in UFC, had transcended the sport to become one of the most widely recognized names in popular culture, being on the cover of magazines, on TV shows, in movies. And now she was one of us.

The champions of each brand (now Charlotte for SmackDown and Alexa for Raw) entered the ring after Asuka won to give her a choice. Before anything else could happen and while the remainder of the fallen Royal Rumble participants were in gorilla watching, Ronda Rousey was ushered through the group of sweaty wrestlers as her signature entrance music, “Bad Reputation” by Joan Jett, blasted in the arena to the sheer delight of everyone in attendance. She stormed down to the ring and pointed at the WrestleMania sign.

But what did this mean? Was she going to get a title shot? Did she even know how to wrestle?

The whole world was abuzz with the same questions.

The monumental signing of one of the world’s biggest sports stars to WWE eclipsed the Royal Rumble.

But how did the women who had been grinding it out for years and years feel about this?

Personally, it made me both excited and nervous. It was an incredible show of how far we had come that someone of Ronda Rousey’s caliber wanted to be involved in our division.

Had we still been relegated to thirty-second matches and bikini contests, I highly doubt it would have been an intriguing proposition for her. Rousey signing with WWE had the potential to shine a light on women’s wrestling like never before and I loved that for all of us who worked so hard to be seen as equal stars to the men. But I was nervous, because in the last year I hadn’t been highlighted much. With the addition of this global star, I wasn’t sure if I’d be highlighted ever again.

We would be on different brands, but I was hopeful one day we might meet in the ring should she decide to stick with it.

Despite the title of her entrance music and several rumors I had heard about her temperament, she was lovely. She was excited to be there, smiling and introducing all of us to the giant entourage that surrounded her.

She also wasn’t used to the “competition” being so friendly and supportive. But this ain’t real, and it takes two to make money. And Ronda was money.

She wouldn’t be making her in-ring debut until WrestleMania, two months from now. Which was a wise decision. With so much content, it’s hard to reserve matches and make people or stories feel important. But Ronda was an anomaly, and someone who needed to be handled carefully.

Meanwhile, on SmackDown, I was doing… nothing. Okay, so maybe this whole coming-back-as-a-star thing was overrated. Or maybe not even, but it might take a second.

The build was on for WrestleMania, and I was in none of the conversations for big matches. Or any matches, really. While Asuka chose to challenge Charlotte for her title, I was relegated to the battle royal on the kickoff show. That’s where all the wrestlers who don’t get matches are sent. It serves mostly as a reward to the wrestlers who work their asses off every year that they’ll still get a spot on the card and a decent payday, even if it’s a token gesture and a match no one cares about.

I confided my disappointment to Sami.

“I feel like I work so hard, but I can’t seem to break through.”

“You know, man, enjoy it. WrestleMania feels like such pressure every year. But last year I was in the battle royal and it gives you a chance to really soak it in and look around. Try and do that.”

“That’s a really good way to look at it,” I admitted. And he was right.

I took his advice to heart. But my god, all I wanted to do was main event that show. It’s the ultimate goal of every wrestler, and it had never been done by a female. But hell, I could barely get on TV; how did I think I could main event?

I was trying to take Sami’s advice, but hanging out with Charlotte and hearing her talk about her match and the ideas they had, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t jealous. Which I felt horrible about. I should have felt happy for her. I should have felt inspired. That if it could happen for her, maybe one day it could happen for me. But darn it, at this point, after years of being the bridesmaid, I wanted to be the bride. But not actually the bride, ’cause that homelife situation was the shits.

When Mania came and I went out for the preshow battle royal, Sami was right: I could soak it in more. I got to look around at the stadium and watch everyone being so happy to be there and experience it.

There really is nothing like being in front of a crowd like that. And when you allow yourself to soak it in, you never want it to end.

Ultimately, however, I was thrown out so unceremoniously and with such little focus, most people had no idea I was no longer in the running.

I got to the back and cleaned up to watch the rest of the show.

Ronda’s match was excellent. She was in there with the greatest leaders she could have asked for in HHH, Kurt Angle, and Stephanie McMahon and they had gone over every part meticulously.

Charlotte and Asuka also had a barn burner.

My friend texted me: “How great were Ronda and Charlotte’s performances this year? It has to be them in the main event next year!”

I will be that main event, my gut insisted.

I was on the preshow, eliminated with no one giving a shit whatsoever. I had absolutely zero reason to ever believe that I could be the main event, but there was a teeny tiny voice that said I could, and I was mildly annoyed that this friend hadn’t recognized it.

But in the meantime I drowned my sorrows in copious amounts of free champagne at the after-party, annoying Colby with my drunkenness and crying about my tear-shaped engagement ring that I now dubbed my “ring of sadness.”