Pride and Cowardice

"Wow, Adrian..." Taylor shook her head. It was like it was no big deal to either of them, and she couldn't decide if she was hurt by it or disgusted.

"Well, a while back when Rebecca was doing her look at me, I'm a douche thing, she humiliated Akashi's brother in like a bodyslam contest or whatever. Akashi's really Japanese, so that's like a really big deal for her.

"So Akashi said some stuff about how Rebecca is holding you back, and so Rebecca waited until after one of Akashi's matches and ambushed her in the ring. She beat her face in, man, like... Just pounded her bloody, and... Then Conway came out and beat her up some more..."

She sighed. It was hard to talk about.

"Then they had a match, and of course Rebecca, like..." She couldn't bring herself to say it. "Okay, how the fuck don't you know any of this? You don't see her matches? You don't know when she's got an appearance? You don't talk to her about her day or what's going on or what bothers her? What the fuck kind of relationship do you have?"

"I knew about the bodyslam contest thing!" Adrian snapped defensively, "I just..." she sighed. "Just let them two settle it out, it's not your problem, it's not my problem. It's their problem." The former cosplayer said harshly "It's been their problem since last year or whenever that stupid dojo gi fight thing was, and it's going to be their problem until it ends because they're both idiots who never know how to just let things go!" She was almost yelling down the phone, breathing hard before she snapped back to her senses. "...sorry."

"Fuck..."

Taylor closed her eyes and put a hand to her forehead. "Yeah, that's easy for you to say, because your girl is the Killer King-sized, world-eating monster. Why the fuck would you be worried? I... Look, I called because I thought maybe you had the same problem as me, and maybe you had something to say that would... I dunno, help. I was hoping we could do this without killing each other, too, but it'll probably eventually come down to that, as usual, and it's fucking bullshit. I am so fucking sick of grudge match after grudge match, man, I just want to do what I do the best I can. Why does everything have to be about who hates who? Fuck that. Fuck Rebecca, I hope she gets hit by a bus. It'll give her some time to think while they're pulling the bus off of her."

"Would you be calling me in the middle of the night if Rebecca was the one getting her ass kicked by Akashi? Hell no, you'd be laughing at her and celebrating with your 'sister'. And I wouldn't be crying to you to try and get you to pull Akashi off her or anything either. You always hated Becks, this is just another thing to justify it." Adrian said harshly. "You don't want a grudge match? You tell Akashi to keep her head down and her mouth shut, let Rebecca move on to something calmer without anyone setting her off, don't go demanding revenge and maybe this thing will all blow over before anyone gets really badly injured."

"Look, if you want to seriously sort this shit out, call me in the morning, meet me at the gym or anytime after I've had some juice and can actually think clearly about shit, just not when I'm trying to get my fucked up sleep schedule fixed, alright?"

"Okay..."

Taylor clenched her fist and squirmed on the carpet as her stomach knotted up. She tried to take a breath to stay calm, but it caught in her throat.

"Obviously this was a stupid idea," she growled. "You haven't changed at all. Fuck you, cunt."

She hung up.

What hurt the most was that she knew that defiant, rebellious Taylor wanted to tell Akashi to back down, just like Adrian said. She was ashamed of the thought. She hated Rebecca. She hated Adrian.

She put her palms to her face and quietly sobbed while Miss Spencer and Makoto remained frozen in time on the screen above her.

"Taylor?" Adrian called out as the blonde hung up on her, "Fuuck..." the brunette groaned, pulling the phone away. "No shit calling the girlfriend of your now hated enemy at night when you're strung up and just want to bitch about her was a bad idea you idiot." she thought out loud before moving the phone out in front of her.

Calling her back probably wouldn't do any good, maybe a text would be better. That way Taylor could read it when she was calmer... unless she deleted it right away. That would suck. Did Taylor even know how to delete texts? Whatever.

Sorry for being an ass on the phone, if you want to talk when I'm not being an idiot or just beat the crap outta me: 10am arena gym, k?

There, 10am was enough to actually watch what Taylor was going on about, despite her best efforts to distance her career away from Rebecca's it looked as though she was going to be brought into the whole mess. The least she could do was actually try to sort it out

Taylor wiped her eyes when ger phone dinged. She knew it was Adrian, but she wasn't going to look. She was not going to look.

She grabbed her phone and read the message and immediately began typing a reply.

I didn't want us to hate each other over this and I don't want to watch my sister die I don't think that makes me a bitch

and fuck you I'm not meeting u anywhere your a bitch in person too. You can go to hell