Talk With Me

It was a quiet end to a quiet day. One of those rare ‘nothing’ days for Blossom, when she didn’t have much of anything to do around the house. An off-day. Letting her body heal up from an intense workout the day before, no cleaning around the apartment, groceries all bought and paid for. She watched the news, she did the dishes, she played a few games on her iPhone and failed miserably since she didn’t want to buy any microtransactions. That sort of thing.

Death Bunny was around, too, enjoying the day as she recuperated for her hellish match. Blossom had been on hand to help with everything she needed, of course. Food? She got it. The washing? She got it. Taking out the trash, vacuuming, making sure their stereo played nice, easy music to relax with? She got it all. Management was giving her time off, wanting to make sure one of their most popular stars had all the time she needed to recover, and Blossom wanted to ensure Death Bunny made the most of it.

She was happy to spend time with her girlfriend. Happy to have this solitude. But she would’ve been even more happy if there wasn’t a certain pall over the whole scene, coming like the rain clouds outside, sifting through the evening air.

It was there every time they talked.

It was there when they went out.

It was there when they slept and spooned.

They were on the edge of saying something, something important, something that needed to come out, but neither of them were taking the plunge. So they just stood on the edge, biting nails and chewing lips. Waiting for a moment that would have to come, sooner rather than later.

Blossom wasn’t sure how much longer she could take the suspense, really. As the evening drew on, she found herself at the stove, putting the finishing touches on lasagna that she’d nearly messed up several times. She would get distracted and forget an ingredient, skip a step, almost leave it heating for way too long...what came out was salvageable, edible, but off. Wrong. Incorrect. She could sympathize.

She took a sampling with her spoon and sighed, deciding it was best to let it go - her Frosted Flakes t-shirt was already stained enough with the proof of cooking misadventure. She was just glad that was the only thing she had on aside from her panties, because she didn’t feel like throwing in another load just now. It could wait until the morning.

”Bunny!” Blossom called out as she began to fill their plates, summoning her girlfriend from the farthest reaches of their apartment. ”Food’s up, ready when you are!”

*Squeak*Squeak*Squeak*

The fogged up distortion of the bathroom cabinet mirror only became reflective once more after D.B. used a towel to wipe the glass surface clean. She stared into the dew-dropped surface and parted her hair so she could closely examine where her stitching had been recently removed from her forehead to see if any scars had been left behind...and it looks like she got lucky this time. A nick here or there, but nothing that some ointment and Vitamin oil couldn't mend with time.

Her post exercise shower had turned into an impromptu sauna treatment given how long she lingered in there, but she needed the extra few minutes to pause and reflect. She was beginning to feel somewhat stir-crazy since being barred from competing in AFW or even using their facilities until she was cleared for in-ring competition by their medical staff. Concussion testing mainly...which she guessed made sense considering all of those headbutts in the match with Alexia where they left the ring looking like a bloody murder scene.

Not that AFW was showing her all this TLC out of the kindness of their hearts...but more out of concern for their quarterly earnings. Ever since D.B. had returned to in-ring action since her loss to Cecilia and she started racking up the wins again, online sales for her merchandise went through the roof and started surpassing all the other big names in the business. Her extra large body pillows being nigh impossible to get your hands on...from what she heard anyway.

So of course...the company needed to protect their investment.

...it was all just so stupid. An obnoxious and maddening waste of time as far as far as she was concerned. She felt perfectly fine. But like a lot of things in her life right now...Blossom was making things easier. Bunny couldn't remember the last time she...well, had anyone around to care for her like this. It was kind of jarring at first, and Blossom had to battle her at times so D.B. could just sit down and relax while she shouldered the brunt of the chores. But watching Blossom scamper around and tend to her like this didn't make D.B. feel grateful...it made her feel...guilty.

A gargantuan elephant had been accompanying them in every room they shared together. The smatterings of small talk here and there only making the tenuous subject inflate like a balloon about to burst as they struggled to discuss any topic except the one that was on both of their minds.

”Food’s up, ready when you are!”

D.B.'s bunny ears perked up with hungered interest whenever Blossom called her over for dinner, and this time was no different. She took a deep breath, grabbed her towel, and opened the bathroom door. Her footsteps being heard from down the hallway as she approached their dining room, the bunny girl dressed in a Black Sabbath tank-top with an exposed midriff and purple lingerie that clung tightly to her curvaceous backside. She was feverishly drying up her hair with her towel before hanging it over her shoulders with a shake of her head and fluffy bounce to her bunny ears.

"Thanks...this, uh, looks fantastic. One of these days I gotta get you to teach me the recipe..." D.B. uttered before sitting at her side of the table...the forced small talk more obvious than ever at this point.

Even with everything that was going on, all the unspoken undercurrents and the words that went unsaid, Blossom couldn’t help but smile when her girlfriend came into view, wearing nothing but a shirt and her panties. It wasn’t that she looked sexy like that - though she did, without a doubt. Death Bunny could look sexy in just about anything, and that she could do it without even trying was part of the charm.

But just to see her walk into the room, to be reminded that they were living together, that this was where such an awesome woman chose to lay her head at night...it made Blossom a little happy. She couldn’t help herself.

She was quick to turn away, forcing her goofy smile down as she went to work on setting up their plates, cutting the lasagna into neat little squares and plopping them down. With a plate in each hand, she spun about and made her way to the table just as Death Bunny was settling into her chair, handing off her hard labor for consumption.

”Pfft, it’s nothing, really.” She dusted off her lap and sat down as well, easing into the chair. She wouldn’t be going anywhere for a bit, best to be comfortable. ”Just have to follow the steps. One, two, three…”

Blossom clapped her hands together, said a quick, silent prayer, then started to pick at her food with the fork, taking small bites. Slow. She was more into thinking at the moment, trying to figure out how best to broach the subject and finally speak the unspeakable. Maybe she just had to do it in a roundabout way? Work her way to it. Yeah. ”So,” She tapped her fork on the side of the plate for no reason in particular. ”How are you healing up? Your stiches, I mean.”

Uncomfortable silences. Mundane chatter brought up simply to fill the dead silence in the air and prevent more hurtful subjects to be brought up...so, this is what's like to be in a family. Bunny always wondered if what they said about dinnertime conversations were true, and now she has her answer. Even for someone who dabbles in the grimly macabre for a living and pounds women's faces in on a weekly basis, this was just brutal. D.B. never was one for small talk...and it showed by her bringing up cooking recipes...ugh, cooking recipes of all things. If there was an open grave around, she would have been sorely tempted to crawl into it for the remainder of the evening. Actually...there's a cemetery not too far from...

D.B. blinked that thought away with a slight shake of her bunny-eared head. Her mind wanders sometimes...

She wasn't lying about the lasagna though. It was layered perfectly and was the type of meal Bunny wished she knew how to cook, but her culinary knowledge was mostly based around utility, not taste. Stuff that could fill you up and keep you going, but not good for much else. So she was indeed ready to dig in with fork in hand, but almost forgot to stop herself to allow Blossom her prayer. A dinner time tradition that she still wasn't used to, mainly because she didn't have much to thank the man upstairs for...until recently, anyway. She knew she was supposed to pray as well...but she just used this as a chance to steal glances at Blossom. It was just her way of acknowledging what she was thankful for. The slight smile forming on the side of her mouth fading away once Blossom said her Amens and it was time to scarf down.

"Oh...uh, yeah it's healing up fine. The cut honestly wasn't all that deep, it just looked worse cause she nicked a vein. It shouldn't leave a scar...at least not as the bad as the one on my stomach." D.B. said while parting her hair back and leaning forward a little to allow Blossom a closer examination of the mending scar on her forehead. She than sat back down and started to take in forkfuls of food, slouching over herself with her other arm circled around her plate as if she was an inmate in a prison not wanting her food to get snatched. Her eyes centered on her disappearing plate of food with an echoing silence suffocating the room...

Maybe it  was just her imagination, but Blossom swore she could feel Death Bunny’s eyes on her whenever she said grace or did a little prayer before they went driving. She knew her lover was into this sort of thing, and religion was a topic they both seemed to silently agree on avoiding, but at the same time, she liked to have her along for this. It helped to have someone she was so thankful for right here, someone who made her so happy, in this relationship she saw as a daily gift.

It made her smile. Even now, it made her smile.

There was time, not too long ago, when Blossom would’ve blanched at the sight of that scar on Death Bunny’s head. She’d never had the best constitution for that sort of thing, and there was reason she’d avoided hardcore matches like the plague - aside from that fact that she had absolutely no aptitude or interest in them. She preferred blood when it stayed in the body it came from, and when it came out, she could get a wee bit on the quesy side.

So, somewhere in the back of her head, she couldn’t help but note that the reaction she had when Death Bunny leaned forward was pretty much the polar opposite to what it would’ve been in the pre-girlfriend era. Namely, she leaned forward, too, with her eyes widened. ”Ooooh, gnarly.”

After that, Blossom went back to picking at her food, as the encroaching silence once again started to seep in, hanging over things like a miasma that refused to dissipate. Needed to fill it. Keep the string going. So…

”Yeah, she seemed like a real...” Hussy. ”...tough opponent. You know, seriously…” Trampy. ”...intense. I know I wouldn’t want to fight her.” I would suplex her to the Moon. ”What’s your opinion of her? You know. As an opponent.”

Blossom looked at the plate, then at Death Bunny, then at the plate, at least several times during all of that. Subtle.

D.B. never...ever, considered herself much of a performer. But you would have never guessed that from the way both her and Blossom were masterfully  dancing around this subject. The shroud of discomforting unease continuing to loom over what was otherwise a pleasant evening together. D.B. becoming slightly squeamish despite the food tasting fantastic now that they were uncomfortably close to broaching the entire point of all of this. Continuing to ruminate on the chaotic, blood soaked barbarism of that Halloween match in such a serene setting was like adding a drop motor oil to a gallon of crystal clear water. D.B.'s flashing memories of that night starting to contaminate her thoughts and what was meant to be her time of inner peace.

Being baptized in blood while staring vacantly up at the heavens...the maddened euphoria that came with feeling like the harbinger of death of olde...the lush taste and soothing softness of Alexia's-...

D.B. jolted herself from her hazy-minded stupor, widening her eyes with a ghostly paleness to her face as she gazed up at Blossom after realizing she had just zoned out for who knows how long. She glanced down at the fork in her hand to notice with some shock that she had accidentally bent it at a right angle with her thumb from how tensed up she had gotten, just than dropping the crooked cutlery on the table.

“S-sorry…w-what’d you say about…were we just talking about…” D.B. frantically attempted to remember what Blossom had just asked her. Her bunny-eared head held low and her now emptied hand palming her forehead to feel the cold sweat she had worked up.

"Listen...I...I know we've had this discussion before...but...I still think you should consider...passing, on watching my matches. I don't, think they're going to get any less uncomfortable to watch...and... there’s some things I'd rather you didn't see..."

Thick. The awkwardness was so thick.

Blossom didn’t miss Bunny’s moment of zen, nor did she fail to have an idea or two on what led to it. It reminded her of the way she’d been in that match, the way she’d just sort of let herself be taken over, caught in this electric, violent haze. Could she even help it? Did she know when it happened? Could she stop it if she wanted to?

Did she want to?

Troubling questions, and ones that wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon. In the meantime, though, she had to address this little point. Yes, they had discussed this before, and Blossom had tried to brush it off, but there was no avoiding it now.

”Okay, see...” Blossom chewed her lip for a moment, before decided to just power her way through this at full speed. Down the medicine whole. ”It’s not just that I love seeing you wrestle and I want to watch, but I kind of...can’t NOT watch. Even if I wanted to.”

She reached over and took Death Bunny’s fork, keeping her hands occupied while she spoke by bending it back into shape. ”Like, okay, I could stop watching your match. I don’t want to, but I could stop. But even if I did you’re sort of all over the place, you know? See, me, I’m a small fry. They don’t put my matches on the Youtube channel, I don’t have merch, my autograph doesn’t sell for anything on Ebay, nothing like that. But you…”

Blossom sat back and waved the fork about. ”You’re popular. You’ve taken on champions. You’re a big deal. So even if I don’t watch your match, I still watch your matches, because everything big you do goes everywhere. People talk about you. I’d pretty much have to quit and stay locked up in the apartment with no internet to avoid when you do...things.”

She’d been on a roll, but now she had to hit the breaks for a second. Too fast. She reached over and handed the fixed fork back. ”Get what I mean?”

She never asked for any of that. All the hype and publicity just seemed to creep up on her like an encroaching tidal wave she could see looming in the distance but arrived far quicker than she could have ever fathomed. And it was all an overwhelming rush of merchandising, t-shirts, and a burgeoning fandom that finally decided whether they should embrace or shun an oddball such as her. All that attention and adoration...when she was still just a reclusive introvert who cherished her privacy and only allowed a scant few people into the weird world she calls her life. The price of losing her matches was suddenly far less burdensome than the price of winning...and she was only even winning by finally cutting loose and allowing her rage-fueled inner self to take the wheel...

D.B. steadied the breathing from her diaphragm with mantric meditation words whispered under her breath until the throbbing pulsations in her head faded away. Her regained calm now settling in, but now she felt like a jackass for ruining their dinner like this. It was stupid of her to even ask such a think of Blossom, and she regretted asking that question almost immediately after she uttered the words. It was just a...pathetic attempt, to keep both of her worlds apart...despite them so obviously being on a collision course. Blossom had seen everything...and would always know about everything D.B. had done in the ring, both the violent and the salacious. D.B. opened her hand to receive the straitened fork. Seeing how Blossom had mended what was broken suddenly compelled D.B. to say something she had been dying to say for a while now.

"...I'm sorry I kissed Alexia. I've wanted to tell you that almost as soon as I walked through that door...but I guess...I was...just.....afraid."

The bunny kept her half-lidded gaze fixated on the utensil for several more seconds before she placed it on the table and just hunched over herself, apparently incapable of looking Blossom in the eyes anymore and was instead fixated on the wooden floor at her feet. "I'm not gonna make any excuses for myself. It was just a stupid, heat of the fucking moment thing that I didn't even know I had in me. I'm...sorry you saw that, and...I..." The regretful despondency in D.B.'s voice started reaching new lows as she blinked and took a solid breath. "I...don't deserve, what you've given me, Blossom. All of this. Maybe...maybe this was all just a..."

This had to be the longest moment of Blossom’s life. She’d known this was coming for a while now, ever since Death Bunny walked through the door and they didn’t talk about the kiss and she kept not talking about it for day after day. The cloud hung over them, grew darker and darker. Sooner or later, it had to rain.

It was later, as it turned out, and that later was right now.

But this was good. This was the right way to go about it, the right track to follow, and it all started when Death Bunny said those two simple words: ”I’m sorry.”

Just hearing that lifted a weight off Blossom’s shoulders and made everything else to come so much simpler. She knew Death Bunny was sorry, she could read it in her eyes, hear in her voice, feel it in the air as the miasma hung above them. But to hear it out loud was a good step. Now they could talk. Now they could communicate.

She sat. She waited. She listened as Death Bunny poured out to her, fighting the urge to interrupt, but knowing it was important she get this off her chest. She had to cut in at the end, however. There was no way she was letting that two syllable word leave her mouth.

”It’s not.” She shook her head, then brought more force into her voice. It’s not. Look,” Blossom took a second to nibble on her fingernail, before fighting past her hangups. ”It wasn’t a happy feeling, seeing that. It made me feel a lot of things that I don’t want to feel. Like, maybe, I’d done something wrong. Or that I wasn’t enough for you, or…”

No, best not to go too far down that road. She had to get them both out of this ditch, and it was going to be hard enough already. ”But it’s important for you to know, you need to know, that whatever this is your going through? I want to work through it with you. I want to stay with you. I just...I guess I need to understand why. That’s probably the biggest thing.”

Feeling certain ways, that D.B. had never felt before, all just sort of came with the territory when it came to accepting how she felt about Blossom. Through sweat, toil, effort, and loving acceptance, their connection to one another only became that much stronger...but being in love meant sharing your feelings in a manner that went both ways. Hearing the sorrowful regret in Blossom's tone of voice as she muttered about how D.B.'s transgressions in the ring had made her feel like she was the cause...or that she wasn't enough for her...

...nothing had ever hurt D.B. quite as much as hearing that. Which meant something quite profound coming from someone who has dug shards of glass out of her forehead after getting blindsided in barroom brawl and was once ruthlessly powerbombed onto a bed of freshly scattered tacks. It was hearing those jagged words that restrained D.B. from broaching this subject at all when she first came home, as well as what it could mean for them if this conversation went in the worst possible direction...with one of them going down one path...and the other walking down another. Though one unexpected takeaway from all of this...is that sometimes...neither of them felt good enough for the other.

D.B. raised her head slightly to briefly glance in Blossom's direction before bringing her attention back towards the floor, now folding her hands together as she contemplated how best to explain what's been going on with her recently. About why she's been acting unhinged in the ring and indulging in...carnal, satisfactions. In the end, she decided that with any well-constructed story...their was no better place to start than the beginning. A deep breath taken through her nose and expelled through her mouth.

"Do...you remember how I was when we first met? Bitter...spiteful...thorny...glowering...prone to violent outbursts....well, more than I usually am..." D.B. somberly smirked as she reminisced about how much of a toxic person she could be, hoping that Blossom would be able to look back on those days darker days and laugh like D.B. was trying to do. "You haven't really seen much of her recently, have you? Not since I hugged you in that hallway, and I haven't really let go since. All that anger...that tension...I just didn't need it anymore. It melted away when I felt the first semblance of peace and happiness in who knows how long of a time..." D.B.'s pleasant smile than darkened back up...

"...but...something else came along with it. I...wasn't winning anymore. That Swedish muscle-head Cecilia knocked me unconscious in our match, and than a few weeks later she beat the snot out of me when I ran into her at a bar...and I was banged up, but you legit took me out in our spar. For a time there...I thought I lost my edge. Something was just...off. Eventually it got ot the point where I found myself contemplating a future where I couldn't do the one thing I knew I was good at. And it all kind of came to a head when I fought Alison. She put me down...laid me out...and I had another lose coming my way. I couldn't see or hear anything..." D.B.'s voice deepened and took on a more macabre tone...looking downward but only seeing that match play out in her mind.

"...and the next thing I remember, Alison was on the mat unconscious. And I had never felt so alive...I'm not totally in control of myself when I do this, but..." D.B. stopped herself, closing her eyes and concentrating on where she was going with all of this. "It's the reason I beat Alison. The reason how I took down two of those Heavenly White weirdos at once. The reason I outlasted Alexia and did...that. The reason why I'm suddenly AFW's golden goose. And it's the reason I've survived up until meeting you. For so long, I had been this other person, Blossom. And...she's just a much a part of me as the person you're speaking to now... D.B. paused for a few seconds to let what she said sink in...scratching the back of her bunny-eared head.

"...*sigh*...I don't know. I just said I wasn't gonna give you any excuses...but I just kinda feel like that's all I'm doing right now."