Bury the hatchet, bring out the knives

Adrian winced when she heard Taylor's voice, couldn't Cassie have arranged a meeting in person, then she'd actually could spend time making sure she wasn't making all these dumb faces and have some for of composure. "It's...it's Adrian." She said eventually, mouthing "What do I tell her?" to Cassie, was she just supposed to adlib it? IT had taken prep time just to ask Cassie to help out in the first place and now she was being thrown in the social deep end already.

For a moment, there was just silence on the other end of the line.

Taylor took the phone away from her ear and double checked the number. She shook her head. "Yeah, hey. Adrian. Um... what's up? Is your leg still fucked up?"

"So you, uh... heard about that whole thing." Adrian chuckled nervously "Yeah, my legs are fine now. Treatment actually worked and I can get back to full training in a few days and start taking matches again. Probably would have been ready sooner but you know... Britanny." She said making light talk "Which was still bullshit a bullshit call, who the hell's she sleeping with to get thrown the injured group? I mean, once is bullshit enough, but twice!? What the hell's that about?" She asked, hoping to really break the ice somewhat over something they would probably agree on.

"Yeah, man. It's fucked up." Taylor said. "But she did her job, ya know? I didn't, that's all. You didn't. Life goes on."

Taylor was well past the point of being able to get riled up over Brittany. Given the chance to fight her again, she... didn't know what she'd do. What would that prove? Would proving it even be a good thing?

"So like... where'd you get my number? You want something, right? You didn't just call to be nice and bury the hatchet."

Now they came to the difficult part, explaining this whole situation. "Cassie told me to phone you and gave me your number." Adrian said on reflex. "It's true!" She mouthed back to Cassie "It's not that important, she's fine." she quickly added "And I...kinda did want [size=85:3c206kb7]to...sort of" the cosplayer mumbled afterwards.

There was another silence, and Taylor moved the phone away from her mouth to sigh. She switched her phone to her other hand and slouched onto her couch.

"A'right, well... whatever. There's nothing left to bury. Consider the hatchet cremated or something, I dunno, but we're cool. Ish. Cool enough, anyway, and I live in Kyoto now so it's not like you have to keep planning your day to avoid me and pretending you don't see me and stuff. You're free."

Then the most obvious question: "Why exactly are you doing this now? Did Cassie just run you down and force you to do it?" She wouldn't be surprised at all, really.

"Okay, that's cool and stuff, kinda wanted to make sure. Not that I thought you were petty and small minded or anything but... you worked Tri-state too, you gotta know some people who seemed like they could hold a grudge forever. So you can't blame me for being just a little cautious about calling someone who last saw me in person swinging a chair at them out of the blue." She said, her voice gathering up steam as it almost hit her old levels of talking a mile a minute to Taylor. "No she didn't run me down or anything, I came to her so I....I kind of need your help." Adrian finally admitted, bracing herself for the inevitable mocking laughter.

Compared to Adrian, Taylor almost sounded sedated. Both girls were prone to talking way faster than was ever necessary for a human being, but since retiring and becoming a mostly unemployed housewife, Taylor had relaxed a great deal.

"Well, really I didn't have a lot of experience when I first came- oh, right, the chair... You did hit me with a chair." She felt a momentary urge to let the claws come out a little, but she fought it and it passed. She shrugged. "Whatever, it's cool."

She wasn't totally sure if she was surprised to hear that Adrian wanted her help. Maybe it made a lot of sense. She already knew what she was getting at.

"You want me to help you rehab and train since I know what it's like to be a gimp?" She said dryly. It was an interesting idea.

"Yes!" Adrian said quickly "I mean... well, I wouldn't have used the word gimp... but." she amended "You're the only trainer who uses really anything close to high speed style, everyone else is too power focused and completely shifting gears when I'm trying to reground the stuff I could already do. You got back from it and I need that experience" the cosplayer tried to explain. "I'm sorry for all the shit I pulled on you and if you want me to do something for you to make it up first then that's fine but I really need your help here."

Well, that was a little surprising. "Huh." Was all Taylor said at first.

Of course, Adrian was a little cheating trickster. Was she just trying to butter Taylor up so that she could take another cheap shot at her? Did it even matter? Taylor certainly wasn't afraid of her. She wasn't a wrestler anymore, so she didn't need to worry about a ref, or the honor of the ring or any of that shit. She could handle Adrian on the street.

"Um... Let me think about it. Okay? I'll, uh... I'll call you back later."