a massive fight," UFC president Dana White says. "People like Michelle will get more exposure in this one night than they will in their entire career." The stakes are higher than they've ever been for Waterson and Gomez. But for today, her job as one of the top UFC strawweights is over. Waterson, 33, needs to go to her other job, the one she never expected would elevate her career the way it has. Still dripping with sweat and breathing hard, Waterson turns to Araya and says, "Time for homework." WATERSON AND GOMEZ met at Hooters in 2008. Sort of. Gomez's parents had driven up from El Paso, Texas, to visit him at his Air Force base in Albuquerque and wanted to watch the Dallas Cowboys game. Theywere seated at a table underneath a full-size poster of Waterson sporting the restaurant's trademark uniform. Even though he had never met Waterson, Gomez told his mother, "That's going to be my wife, Mom." The whole family started laughing but quickly stopped when Waterson suddenly appeared to take an order. Gomez was too nervous and too shy to say a word. Little did he know that Waterson had never been completely comfortable with her looks. "I think I was an ugly duckling growing up," she says with her distinctive giggle, adding that she's always felt that she looks "like a 10-year-old Asian boy." She decided early on that if she wasn't going to make friends through her looks, "I'm going to make friends because I do cool stuff