Post by Deleted on Oct 15, 2020 23:34:04 GMT -5
Collab between Jess and I, enjoy!
Chaos 100 had come and gone. There had been congratulatory hugs and even a little bit of champagne. There was a lot to unpack from this event. However, she wasn’t going to be rude about this.
By the time everything wound down, it was technically Tuesday. She had met Silvie Gould after the show. They exchanged some niceties, but there wasn’t anything said between the two despite pouring hours and hours into Discord. After all, with the knowledge that her invite had previously been in the same position as her, it wasn’t like just meeting a fan.
The small talk dwindled to silence between the two before Adrienne asked if she would accompany her to the talent lot.
Two pairs of sneakers squeaked against the concrete as they made through the back halls way towards Adrienne’s bike. Adrienne had already long since changed out of her ring gear, opting for a hoodie and leggings. The fake eyelashes wouldn’t go until she got back to the apartment. Her backpack contained the aforementioned ring gear and her newly acquired Baltimore City Championship.
“You okay?” Adrienne asked.
“Hmm? Oh, yeah.”
Silvia smiled, one hand brushing her mane of blonde hair out of her face. She was petite, pixie-like almost, her outfit featuring mostly pink and gold and a lot of glitter, right down to her sparkling gold Chuck Taylors. She favored one leg as she walked, just slightly.
“That was the wildest show I’ve seen in a long time. I hope everybody’s alright.”
“As for that,” she paused. Adrienne thought of a way to word this. She was in the wrong company if she wanted to avoid this sort of violence, but it was all she had. That was fine. “Those guys live for that stuff. They’ll be fine.”
Silvie paused, looking over with furrowed brows, “Are you okay?”
Adrienne nodded, “Sure. I didn’t mean to do that.”
She didn’t mean to cry in the ring. She wanted to chalk up to happiness or pure jubilation, but it was more complicated than that. The time since Danny’s passing had been tumultuous. This was one-moment Adrienne could claim as her own. However, instead of just smiling and hoisting the championship high, it all hit her like a sack of bricks.
Adrienne couldn’t claim to know Sylvia other than what the blonde had shared as of late. This was their first meeting in-person. The FaceTimes over the last month didn’t count. They only served to prove that they said who they said they were.
“No, I can get it. See, I… I know who you are. I dusted off my ridiculous regional indie archive collection and rewatched some old stuff out of Florida. I thought I remembered your name. And you were great, but the guy you were valeting for seemed like a total creep.” She huffed out a sigh, lacing her fingers behind her head idly.
“I can only imagine how it must be to shake off someone else’s shadow and stand in the light for yourself, free of anyone else’s demands or expectations.”
Biting her lip a bit, she looked over, hoping she wasn’t pulling wrong assumptions out of the air.
Adrienne’s cheeks flushed red, hesitating as she replied, “You watched that stuff?”
“Yeah. I mean, you don’t have to be embarrassed about it. You had a real ‘classic lady’ vibe going on, but… yeah, something tells me it was a lot uglier than it looked on the surface. But you’re past it now. Look at you. You’re a champion in your own right. That’s more than a lot of people even get in their careers. You should be proud of yourself.”
Silvie smiled brilliantly; her eyes were glittering a bit. She looked more vibrant than she had during the FaceTime sessions, and it seemed to be due to more than just low camera resolution.
“Oh, that. What’s funny is that I never really wanted to do that. I wanted to do this.”
And she had always been denied for one reason or another. One of the obstacles was simple; Adrienne was still fighting herself to keep upright. It has been a struggle to unlearn and learn so much stuff, and she wasn’t even close to what Adrienne saw in the other folks here.
“You know, maybe you can call it a coincidence, but I know who you are, too. After all, you were on national TV.”
Adrienne knew this to a possibly sore subject, but she pushed through.
“I watched a lot of people’s stuff, so I’m not trying to be weird. But when I was training, I tried to do your GlitterBomb once and instead fell off the top rope headfirst. Fortunately, into a foam pit.”
And probably make it worse.
“Silver Ann Gold. Way neater name than mine,” Adrienne said with a shy smile. She held the back door open for Silvie. The night air was cool and inviting.
“Thanks… Oh, gee.”
Giving a little, bell-like laugh, Silvie turned away a bit, hiding her blushing cheeks behind her hair, the breeze tousling the ends of it a bit..
“It’s… not that cool. It’s just my name spelled kinda different to make a pun. ‘Sylvia Anne Gould, Silver Ann Gold, Silver And Gold’. It was kinda dorky in retrospect.”
Sighing, her tone goes a bit sad, one hand unconsciously rubbing her leg.
“...glitterbomb, huh? I loved that move. It was so much fun. I loved being an aerialist in general, I always felt like I was… was really gonna start flying one day.”
Coughing oddly, Silvie looked up, offering a smile.
“Sorry about that, didn’t mean to get all gloomy on you.”
“It’s okay.”
Both of them approached a small bike rack in the front of the now mostly empty lot. There was Adrienne’s beat-up old Huffy. She had ridden the bike here before the show. However, it now seemed like a flawed idea. Her hand went into her hoodie pocket to collect her phone and bike lock key.
“Sometimes I have those days, too. I’m sorry it ended the way it did. But it doesn’t have to be like that.”
Kneeling down, she removed the lock and its chain.
“I can’t promise anything but stay in contact with me. You know more about this business than a lot of the folks here. There’s gotta be something for that.”
“I’d like that. I mean… I’d like to be friends if you would too.”
Her smile was a little shy but far less sad.
Adrienne chuckled as she put the cheap lock and chain into her pack, “We already are.”
The invisible line between the internet and real-life had become more blurred than ever. It was so easy to share your info over the internet. However, meeting Silvie had sparked something. Her friends here were special. The Tarot Reader was always sage with his unorthodox wisdom beyond his years. And as much as she struggled against that perception, the Raven had been her protector through and through. She had broken bread with The Dragon Lady and then had done battle. And through that, they were still allies.
“I could use your advice from time to time. Or honestly, just someone to talk to.”
Her arms and legs felt like spaghetti after her match and so she struggled a bit to lift the front tire out of the rack.
“That’d be really nice. I mean, I don’t really have a lot of friends anymore. I mean sometimes people just don’t call, and that’s okay, I guess, and…”
Silvie cut herself off. It was true, she’d been lonely, and a lot of the people she’d called friend just hadn’t seemed to bother contacting her after she’d gone. Some were harder to swallow than others. Unbidden, a brief flash of a young man with laughing eyes, a kind smile, and a dapper mustache popped into her mind. She shook it out fast.
“...do you want a hand with that? I mean, my rental car is a van- all they had left- and there’s plenty of room for a bike inside. I can give you a lift home if you want.”
“Are you sure? Your flight back is in just a few hours.”
“Mmm… I saved up. I can pay the fee to reschedule my flight until tomorrow morning.”
Adrienne canceled the call she was about to make.
“Alright,” She said as her foot lifted the kickstand of the bike, “I’ll take you up on that. I’m hungry. My friends here took me to this diner the other day. Open all the time. And dessert if you’re into that.”
Before Silvie could say anything about the invitation to the Silver Moon diner, Adrienne qualified that.
“My treat.”
Silvie beamed, bobbing her head in the affirmative.
“I’d love to.”
Chaos 100 had come and gone. There had been congratulatory hugs and even a little bit of champagne. There was a lot to unpack from this event. However, she wasn’t going to be rude about this.
By the time everything wound down, it was technically Tuesday. She had met Silvie Gould after the show. They exchanged some niceties, but there wasn’t anything said between the two despite pouring hours and hours into Discord. After all, with the knowledge that her invite had previously been in the same position as her, it wasn’t like just meeting a fan.
The small talk dwindled to silence between the two before Adrienne asked if she would accompany her to the talent lot.
Two pairs of sneakers squeaked against the concrete as they made through the back halls way towards Adrienne’s bike. Adrienne had already long since changed out of her ring gear, opting for a hoodie and leggings. The fake eyelashes wouldn’t go until she got back to the apartment. Her backpack contained the aforementioned ring gear and her newly acquired Baltimore City Championship.
“You okay?” Adrienne asked.
“Hmm? Oh, yeah.”
Silvia smiled, one hand brushing her mane of blonde hair out of her face. She was petite, pixie-like almost, her outfit featuring mostly pink and gold and a lot of glitter, right down to her sparkling gold Chuck Taylors. She favored one leg as she walked, just slightly.
“That was the wildest show I’ve seen in a long time. I hope everybody’s alright.”
“As for that,” she paused. Adrienne thought of a way to word this. She was in the wrong company if she wanted to avoid this sort of violence, but it was all she had. That was fine. “Those guys live for that stuff. They’ll be fine.”
Silvie paused, looking over with furrowed brows, “Are you okay?”
Adrienne nodded, “Sure. I didn’t mean to do that.”
She didn’t mean to cry in the ring. She wanted to chalk up to happiness or pure jubilation, but it was more complicated than that. The time since Danny’s passing had been tumultuous. This was one-moment Adrienne could claim as her own. However, instead of just smiling and hoisting the championship high, it all hit her like a sack of bricks.
Adrienne couldn’t claim to know Sylvia other than what the blonde had shared as of late. This was their first meeting in-person. The FaceTimes over the last month didn’t count. They only served to prove that they said who they said they were.
“No, I can get it. See, I… I know who you are. I dusted off my ridiculous regional indie archive collection and rewatched some old stuff out of Florida. I thought I remembered your name. And you were great, but the guy you were valeting for seemed like a total creep.” She huffed out a sigh, lacing her fingers behind her head idly.
“I can only imagine how it must be to shake off someone else’s shadow and stand in the light for yourself, free of anyone else’s demands or expectations.”
Biting her lip a bit, she looked over, hoping she wasn’t pulling wrong assumptions out of the air.
Adrienne’s cheeks flushed red, hesitating as she replied, “You watched that stuff?”
“Yeah. I mean, you don’t have to be embarrassed about it. You had a real ‘classic lady’ vibe going on, but… yeah, something tells me it was a lot uglier than it looked on the surface. But you’re past it now. Look at you. You’re a champion in your own right. That’s more than a lot of people even get in their careers. You should be proud of yourself.”
Silvie smiled brilliantly; her eyes were glittering a bit. She looked more vibrant than she had during the FaceTime sessions, and it seemed to be due to more than just low camera resolution.
“Oh, that. What’s funny is that I never really wanted to do that. I wanted to do this.”
And she had always been denied for one reason or another. One of the obstacles was simple; Adrienne was still fighting herself to keep upright. It has been a struggle to unlearn and learn so much stuff, and she wasn’t even close to what Adrienne saw in the other folks here.
“You know, maybe you can call it a coincidence, but I know who you are, too. After all, you were on national TV.”
Adrienne knew this to a possibly sore subject, but she pushed through.
“I watched a lot of people’s stuff, so I’m not trying to be weird. But when I was training, I tried to do your GlitterBomb once and instead fell off the top rope headfirst. Fortunately, into a foam pit.”
And probably make it worse.
“Silver Ann Gold. Way neater name than mine,” Adrienne said with a shy smile. She held the back door open for Silvie. The night air was cool and inviting.
“Thanks… Oh, gee.”
Giving a little, bell-like laugh, Silvie turned away a bit, hiding her blushing cheeks behind her hair, the breeze tousling the ends of it a bit..
“It’s… not that cool. It’s just my name spelled kinda different to make a pun. ‘Sylvia Anne Gould, Silver Ann Gold, Silver And Gold’. It was kinda dorky in retrospect.”
Sighing, her tone goes a bit sad, one hand unconsciously rubbing her leg.
“...glitterbomb, huh? I loved that move. It was so much fun. I loved being an aerialist in general, I always felt like I was… was really gonna start flying one day.”
Coughing oddly, Silvie looked up, offering a smile.
“Sorry about that, didn’t mean to get all gloomy on you.”
“It’s okay.”
Both of them approached a small bike rack in the front of the now mostly empty lot. There was Adrienne’s beat-up old Huffy. She had ridden the bike here before the show. However, it now seemed like a flawed idea. Her hand went into her hoodie pocket to collect her phone and bike lock key.
“Sometimes I have those days, too. I’m sorry it ended the way it did. But it doesn’t have to be like that.”
Kneeling down, she removed the lock and its chain.
“I can’t promise anything but stay in contact with me. You know more about this business than a lot of the folks here. There’s gotta be something for that.”
“I’d like that. I mean… I’d like to be friends if you would too.”
Her smile was a little shy but far less sad.
Adrienne chuckled as she put the cheap lock and chain into her pack, “We already are.”
The invisible line between the internet and real-life had become more blurred than ever. It was so easy to share your info over the internet. However, meeting Silvie had sparked something. Her friends here were special. The Tarot Reader was always sage with his unorthodox wisdom beyond his years. And as much as she struggled against that perception, the Raven had been her protector through and through. She had broken bread with The Dragon Lady and then had done battle. And through that, they were still allies.
“I could use your advice from time to time. Or honestly, just someone to talk to.”
Her arms and legs felt like spaghetti after her match and so she struggled a bit to lift the front tire out of the rack.
“That’d be really nice. I mean, I don’t really have a lot of friends anymore. I mean sometimes people just don’t call, and that’s okay, I guess, and…”
Silvie cut herself off. It was true, she’d been lonely, and a lot of the people she’d called friend just hadn’t seemed to bother contacting her after she’d gone. Some were harder to swallow than others. Unbidden, a brief flash of a young man with laughing eyes, a kind smile, and a dapper mustache popped into her mind. She shook it out fast.
“...do you want a hand with that? I mean, my rental car is a van- all they had left- and there’s plenty of room for a bike inside. I can give you a lift home if you want.”
“Are you sure? Your flight back is in just a few hours.”
“Mmm… I saved up. I can pay the fee to reschedule my flight until tomorrow morning.”
Adrienne canceled the call she was about to make.
“Alright,” She said as her foot lifted the kickstand of the bike, “I’ll take you up on that. I’m hungry. My friends here took me to this diner the other day. Open all the time. And dessert if you’re into that.”
Before Silvie could say anything about the invitation to the Silver Moon diner, Adrienne qualified that.
“My treat.”
Silvie beamed, bobbing her head in the affirmative.
“I’d love to.”