A tale of cheat day snacks and friendship(For Tai)

Hayasui couldn't help taking a glance over at Gallium as well, having no idea who the girl was and wondering what kind of confidence let her just step between them like that. She was glad the pinkette did, though, exposing the folly they'd nearly played out for what it was.

The raven-haired girl was shaken free of her contemplation when Riza spoke up, Hayasui taking the offered hand, shaking it, and returning the awkward smile.

"Hayasui Koridae. I'm from Friction. ...Or rather I will be once I start getting booked for matches again. In any case, my apologies, I shouldn't have pushed the matter like that," she said, glancing away briefly, "Let's just pay for each other's snacks and call it even then."

---

It didn't take them long to get to the mochi shop, decently sized store tucked a ways down the road, with paper lanterns hanging from the front and a display of the various treats available inside. It didn't take them long to find a seat, and not much longer to place their orders, Hayasui ordering more than one might have expected for someone like her at first glance.

"...So what brought you to the Friction facilities, if you don't mind me asking?" Hayasui said after a tense silence following their orders being placed.

The Mochi shop was a place Hawkeye had never been before in Tokyo, one of many places in the city she had never been. It was cute. Quaint.

The short walk to the shop had been...awkward. Mostly quiet, just brief comments about the weather and a brief explanation to Hawkeye on just what Mochi actually was.

It was a form of ice cream.

Go figure.

Once they had ordered and paid, they sat down, Hayasui breaking the silence with her question, Hawkeye pausing for a good twenty seconds, figuring out just what to say before speaking.

"It's...complicated. I just recently came back to Tension after a few years away. The guy I lost too in my last match before I left, I challenged him to a rematch and beat him.

Then he challenged me to this match series, a best of 5 type thing. He beat me in one match, and was allowed to pick the stipulation...and he picked a hentai match...which is...awkward, to say the least. Made even more awkward by the fact that he's like...super hot...and I might kinda like him."

She shook head, face palming herself as she blushed red before continuing.

"...Anyway, I thought a good work out could help clear my head, and since guys aren't allowed to work out at the Friction gym, seemed like a good place to think without risking running into him, you know what I mean?"

Hayasui sat there quietly, sipping on the free green tea as she listened to Hawkeye's story, her own face lighting up in a blush as she thought back to her own hentai matches. Her many such matches...embarrassing as it was to remember them...

Still, she could understand that kind of drive that had started this whole thing to begin with. She'd certainly felt it her fair share of times, seen it on other faces far more often still.

"A-ah...yeah, I know what you mean with the a-awkwardness," Hayasui said, "...Can't say I fault your reasoning. A-admittedly, I h-haven't had the best track record with h-hentai myself...What about you?"

Mmm. Green tea was nice. Especially free tea.

It felt a bit odd, just exposing her situation with someone she just met...but oddly a bit comforting as well, just mentioning her problem out loud to somebody else. She hadn't actually interacted with any of her fellow wrestlers other than Army since she came back to AFW.

Even better, Hayasui seemed to understand her issue, apparently having her own issues with hentai matches. She took a sip of her tea before responding.

It was good tea.

"I...have some experience. After I left AFW, the first time, I spent a couple years wrestling on the indy scene. I wanted to come back to AFW one day, and figured I should improve at all aspects of pro wrestling, including hentai matches. It wasn't a lot of them, and I lost more often than I won, but slowly, with time and experience, I got better at it, adjusted to it more...though you never fully get used to being exposed like that on a public stage, or hearing the crowd loudly yell things about your body..."

She blushed, remembering some of the various things fans had yelled during her previous hentai bouts, lewd catcalls that made things awkward.

"...Still...it's not all bad really. It's a unique form of competition, it requires skill...and, honestly, if you get the right kind of opponent...it can actually be kind of fun. You just...have to have an open mind about it...and no shame."

"Ah, yeah," Hayasui nodded, "M-maybe I should've tried something that when I took some time off. I just wound up going to martial arts tournaments to keep myself sharp in my time off."

The raven-haired girl glanced away, her blush spreading as she realized her error in not even looking for that kind of stuff to improve her chances at those kind of matches.

"Y-yeah, the shame is a-a bit of a problem for me," Hayasui admitted, "I never really had time for things like dating or that sort of stuff growing up so...those kinds of things are...tricky. C-come to think of it, my first time wound up being not too long after the first time I joined up here."

For once, Hayasui felt a bit thankful she got so focused on fights. She was sure she'd have a much harder time keeping focus if she had to contend with what the audience members were saying too.

"Of course, it wasn't like I didn't enjoy it," Hayasui said suddenly, "It was a competition all the same, just...embarrassing..."

The raven-haired girl battled the urge to hide her face in her hands after a few seconds, realizing she'd only dug herself deeper with that.

Hawkeye smiled as her new acquaintance got flustered, talking about her first time and their combined awkwardness about hentai in the ring, starting to relax as she sipped more tea. This was starting to feel nice. It was nice to finally have somebody to sit down and talk to, something lacking from both her last run and this current one.

She nodded in sympathy. "It can be a very unique and interesting form of competition, but yeah, very awkward at the same time. I couldn't imagine my first time being in the ring though...mine was when I was still in the military. I was 19, and naive...he was this...brash, charming...slightly arrogant officer...higher ranking than I was. I was his assistant, and there was heat between us...a lot of subtle looks and brief touches here and there...then one night we had his office to ourselves...and then we were on the desk, having my first sexual experience on top of orders from the president...."

She chuckled a little, memories rushing through her head as she sipped more tea. "Ah, it was stupid though. Two idiot kids not thinking. We got found out, of course, and I got discharged for it. American militaries take that kind of thing very seriously, you know? But that eventually led me to Japan."

Hayasui leaned in as her companion went through the story of her first time, unable to help noting that sounded much more exciting than hers.

"Huh, that sounds way more interesting than my first time," Hayasui noted, "Still, it sounds like you don't regret it. That's good."

The raven-haired girl soon thought back to Rachel, though, and watching her previous matches after first meeting her with a small frown.

"The girl I had my first time with...she left a while ago," Hayasui admitted, glancing away in embarassment and a little shame, "Went back home from what I heard. While I was away after my first run here. She was nice. Nicer than I'd expected in a place like this, you know? She was pretty quick to forgive me, even though I beat the stuffing out of her. Turned out she wasn't just like that with me, but the people she kept getting put up against...guess I can't really blame her for leaving when I think about it. Well, not that I did blame her for that to begin with."

"Say, you mentioned having practice with hentai matches," Hayasui said after a long moment, deciding to change the topic to something less disheartening, "Were you usually matched up with girls or guys for those?"

Riza stayed silent, as Hayasui spoke more about the girl she had her first time with, showing respect to the other woman as she spoke. In truth, she could completely understand what the girl was going through, given how, after she had been kicked out of the military, her former lover completely abandoned her and had no contact with her...a deeply painful feeling indeed.

Her focus however, was brought away from such memories, as Hayasui asked her a very interesting question, bringing the entire discussion back to a pro wrestling focus...of sorts. She put down her tea, rubbing her chin thoughtfully.

"Well...both, actually. At first it was just guys, since I knew I was coming back one day to Tension, but once I decided to fully commit to every aspect of what AFW had to offer, I decided to start training to fight women in hentai matches as well. The way I saw it, it's like like I have full control over my matches. Management could put me in a hentai match against a girl anytime. Plus, given the referee's are usually very lenient on calling dq's against such things, you always have to consider that some girl might just try and use hentai against you in a non-hentai match. To not train against both genders...well, I felt it gave me a weakness that others could easily exploit, you know what I mean? I felt I'd rather make that my strength instead, if I could."

Hayasui seemed to shrink a little, glancing away with an embarrassed blush as Hawkeye mentioned the lack of training being a weakness for others to exploit, the raven-haired girl far too familiar with how it could be exploited.

"A-Ah, yeah, I suppose it's something I should work on," Hayasui nodded quickly, reflex carrying her through before rational thought could catch up, "Say, do you think you could help me out there? I can't exactly shadowbox this kind of stuff, and-"

Whether Hayasui promptly shut up because the mochi arrived or because rational thought caught up with her, even she didn't know. What she did know, however, was that her face suddenly felt like it was on fire. A blur darted out for the martial-artist's plate as she plucked one of the mochi from her bowl and popped into her mouth in a vain attempt to cool the heat filling her face.

Well...that was unexpected.

The conversation had kept casual and friendly, Hawkeye starting to appreciate her newfound associate more and more during it. Despite the rather...insane way they had met, this was turning into a rather delightful encounter, and if this Mochi was any good, this would turn out to be a better day than she had imagined it would have been.

and then in a simple sentence, things got...awkward.

Hawkeye's eyes widened, not even noticing the bowl of Mochi placed right in front of her, just blinking, golden eyes bright with confusion as the waitress left and Hayasui tried to cover up by plopping an entire small mochi ball into her mouth.

"...Uh...are you...asking me to help you train for hentai matches?"

She asked slowly, blinking a few more times, before raising an eyebrow at the bowl of Mochi in front of the blushing Hayasui, reaching out and feeling the tempature of one.

"...isn't it cold to eat that whole thing at once?"