Post by dsb on Oct 22, 2019 5:16:29 GMT
One week prior…
“Y’know… Mania’s coming up real soon, and you’ve still got a whole bunch of fights to pick from…”
Camille Cosworth says the words as delicately as she can and pushes a stack of unsigned contracts across the breakfast table to her girlfriend. For her part, Yoona Park merely glances at the papers for a moment through dull, listless eyes, then resumes munching on her bowl of slightly soggy Cheerios, paying no mind to the subject at hand.
CAMILLE COSWORTH
YOONA PARK
Camille clenches her jaw, her eyebrows twitching slightly as she suppresses the urge to groan out loud. Ever since suffering a bizarre mental meltdown en route losing to Susannah Burlingame a month ago, Yoona had been stuck in a fugue. Normally so loud and boisterous, Park had suddenly become sullen and taciturn, and her daily routine had degenerated into a cycle of sleeping and eating, and sleeping and eating, and sleeping and eating, and not much more than that.
Through it all, Cosworth had tried to remain as supportive as she could, knowing that falling short on a World Title challenge would be hard for anyone to swallow, let alone someone as prideful as her Yoona. As the days turned into weeks and Yoona’s malaise lingered on and on and on, however, even Camille’s saintly patience was starting to give way to frustration. With the front office still adamantly refusing to give her medical clearance to get back in the ring -- despite her proving her physical condition by setting and resetting record after record at the FAWN Performance Center -- Cosworth had settled into the habit of living her wrestling dreams through her paramour, sharing in both the highs of victory and the lows of defeat.
But now even those vicarious thrills seem to be at an end, as it appears that Yoona Park had given up entirely.
“C’mon, Yoona. You gotta get back on the horse,” Camille softly pleads. “There’s like a dozen ladies on the roster who want a piece of you, anytime, anywhere. All you gotta do is put together another win streak, just three or four matches, and you’ll be back in the title picture by --”
“Whatever,” Yoona mutters through a mouthful of milk and cereal. “It doesn’t matter anyway.”
“It matters to ME!” Camille shouts, rising from her chair and pounding her fist into the table with enough force to upend the furniture and spill Park’s half-eaten bowl of breakfast. “Newsflash: They’re not gonna clear me to wrestle! All they want is for me to churn out workout videos so they can sell T-shirts! You’re all I have left! So every time you get in that ring, everytime you fight, you’re doing it for the both of us! And when I see you in there, it’s like I’m there with you… I feel every punch, every slam… God, it’s so real…! It’s like… like…”
Cosworth chokes on the words -- hateful, stinging words that she’d never given voice to until now.
“...like my career never ended,” she murmurs as she casts her gaze to the linoleum floor.
She’d expected a reaction to her emotional outburst, but evidently there’s none coming. Ten seconds pass in silence, then twenty, then thirty, then a full minute of Yoona silently staring at Camille who in turn silently stares at the mess on the floor. Finally, it’s Cosworth who speaks again.
“I’m sorry, that’s not fair to put everything on you, but I can’t help how I feel,” she sighs as she runs a hand over her face. “Yoona, can I… can I tell you something horrible? There’s a part of me… a tiny, itsy-bitsy part of me… that’s kinda, sorta, maybe… glad that you lost to Susan...”
Camille winces and squeezes her eyes shut when Yoona takes an audible sniff of air, anticipating the storm to come. Again her expectations are met with stone-faced silence, however, and after taking a moment to gather her thoughts, Cosworth elucidates.
“I know, I know… we had a plan. You get the World Title, then we go back to Korea. Meet your parents, get married, have a bunch of kids, open a gym in Gangnam, live happily ever after. And I want those things, Yoona, all of those things. I really, really do… it’s just that I’m not ready to settle down yet. I’m not ready to get off this crazy ride we’re on. So when I was at the airport, waiting to close the book on this chapter of my life, and then I heard you’d lost… well…”
Having just gushed out everything in one go, Camille takes a deep breath before she finishes.
“...I was relieved.”
Park furrows her brow and chews on her bottom lip, but doesn’t speak, leaving it to her girlfriend to break the silence once more.
“God, I’m such a big, fat jerk…” Cosworth sighs as she hangs her head. “You’re mad, I get it, you have every right to be, but Yoona, please just say something or--”
“I’m glad I lost too.”
“Wait, WHAT?” Camille blurts.
“If I’d won, I’d be out of excuses to not go home.”
“I -- I don’t understand. You’ve talked about this for, like, three years. How much you miss your family. How the World Title was your Everest and how you were gonna--”
“’--climb that mountain and shout my existence from the roof of the world,’” Yoona interrupts. “I remember, Cam. And I did it. I really fucking did it. I made that mountain my bitch. Everest was mine and mine alone. I had Burlingame dead to rights, and in that moment, I stood alone above all others. And do you know what I saw -- what I felt -- all around me?”
Cosworth merely shook her head.
“Nothing,” Park scoffs. “There was nothing there. I climbed all that way, trampled over all those people, and in the end, it’s all for nothing.”
“W-What were you expecting?”
“Ugh, I don’t fucking know, Cam,” Yoona groans in disgust as she slouches back in her chair. “Something else. Something different from what I’ve been doing the last seven years of my life. But no, ‘same shit, different day...’ just kicking another dumb bitch upside the head for shits and giggles. Oh sure, the names get bigger and the lights get brighter and the checks get fatter and I still hate myself.”
“Oh, Yoona, no. No, you can’t…” Camille murmurs before quickly trailing off, totally lost for words and left with her mouth gaping open like a fish out of water.
“And if even I hate myself, imagine how my mom and dad feel,” Park says, her voice quivering and cracking and more bitter than cyanide she curls up in her chair with her head buried between her drawn up knees. “I’m never going home, am I?”
Frozen until now, her girlfriend’s self-loathing spurs Cosworth into action. She bats aside the toppled table between them with a single sweep of her arm, and in the next moment, Camille’s crouched down and cupping Yoona face with both hands so that their eyes meet.
“You are home,” Cosworth says, her voice suddenly firm and confident. “You. Are. Home. Don’t you ever forget that.”
Yoona just stares back blankly for a couple of seconds, her eyes wide and wet. Then she throws herself forward, nuzzling her face against the side of Camille’s neck and tightly clinging onto the other woman as if she didn’t ever want to let go.
“I am home,” she softly sniffles, before repeating with more emphasis, “I am home.”
Cosworth holds her girlfriend in her embrace until the shuddering stops, “So, what do you wanna do now?”
“...let’s go to Mania...” Park responds after a brief hesitation.
Yoona pulls back from the hug and places their heads together, forehead against forehead and nose against nose, then she adds, “...together.”
“Yoona Park, I do believe you’re up to some mischief,” Camille chuckles when she recognizes the familiar glint in Park’s eyes.
“Call Akiyama,” Yoona says, “She’ll want a part in this.”
“Y’know… Mania’s coming up real soon, and you’ve still got a whole bunch of fights to pick from…”
Camille Cosworth says the words as delicately as she can and pushes a stack of unsigned contracts across the breakfast table to her girlfriend. For her part, Yoona Park merely glances at the papers for a moment through dull, listless eyes, then resumes munching on her bowl of slightly soggy Cheerios, paying no mind to the subject at hand.
CAMILLE COSWORTH
YOONA PARK
Camille clenches her jaw, her eyebrows twitching slightly as she suppresses the urge to groan out loud. Ever since suffering a bizarre mental meltdown en route losing to Susannah Burlingame a month ago, Yoona had been stuck in a fugue. Normally so loud and boisterous, Park had suddenly become sullen and taciturn, and her daily routine had degenerated into a cycle of sleeping and eating, and sleeping and eating, and sleeping and eating, and not much more than that.
Through it all, Cosworth had tried to remain as supportive as she could, knowing that falling short on a World Title challenge would be hard for anyone to swallow, let alone someone as prideful as her Yoona. As the days turned into weeks and Yoona’s malaise lingered on and on and on, however, even Camille’s saintly patience was starting to give way to frustration. With the front office still adamantly refusing to give her medical clearance to get back in the ring -- despite her proving her physical condition by setting and resetting record after record at the FAWN Performance Center -- Cosworth had settled into the habit of living her wrestling dreams through her paramour, sharing in both the highs of victory and the lows of defeat.
But now even those vicarious thrills seem to be at an end, as it appears that Yoona Park had given up entirely.
“C’mon, Yoona. You gotta get back on the horse,” Camille softly pleads. “There’s like a dozen ladies on the roster who want a piece of you, anytime, anywhere. All you gotta do is put together another win streak, just three or four matches, and you’ll be back in the title picture by --”
“Whatever,” Yoona mutters through a mouthful of milk and cereal. “It doesn’t matter anyway.”
“It matters to ME!” Camille shouts, rising from her chair and pounding her fist into the table with enough force to upend the furniture and spill Park’s half-eaten bowl of breakfast. “Newsflash: They’re not gonna clear me to wrestle! All they want is for me to churn out workout videos so they can sell T-shirts! You’re all I have left! So every time you get in that ring, everytime you fight, you’re doing it for the both of us! And when I see you in there, it’s like I’m there with you… I feel every punch, every slam… God, it’s so real…! It’s like… like…”
Cosworth chokes on the words -- hateful, stinging words that she’d never given voice to until now.
“...like my career never ended,” she murmurs as she casts her gaze to the linoleum floor.
She’d expected a reaction to her emotional outburst, but evidently there’s none coming. Ten seconds pass in silence, then twenty, then thirty, then a full minute of Yoona silently staring at Camille who in turn silently stares at the mess on the floor. Finally, it’s Cosworth who speaks again.
“I’m sorry, that’s not fair to put everything on you, but I can’t help how I feel,” she sighs as she runs a hand over her face. “Yoona, can I… can I tell you something horrible? There’s a part of me… a tiny, itsy-bitsy part of me… that’s kinda, sorta, maybe… glad that you lost to Susan...”
Camille winces and squeezes her eyes shut when Yoona takes an audible sniff of air, anticipating the storm to come. Again her expectations are met with stone-faced silence, however, and after taking a moment to gather her thoughts, Cosworth elucidates.
“I know, I know… we had a plan. You get the World Title, then we go back to Korea. Meet your parents, get married, have a bunch of kids, open a gym in Gangnam, live happily ever after. And I want those things, Yoona, all of those things. I really, really do… it’s just that I’m not ready to settle down yet. I’m not ready to get off this crazy ride we’re on. So when I was at the airport, waiting to close the book on this chapter of my life, and then I heard you’d lost… well…”
Having just gushed out everything in one go, Camille takes a deep breath before she finishes.
“...I was relieved.”
Park furrows her brow and chews on her bottom lip, but doesn’t speak, leaving it to her girlfriend to break the silence once more.
“God, I’m such a big, fat jerk…” Cosworth sighs as she hangs her head. “You’re mad, I get it, you have every right to be, but Yoona, please just say something or--”
“I’m glad I lost too.”
“Wait, WHAT?” Camille blurts.
“If I’d won, I’d be out of excuses to not go home.”
“I -- I don’t understand. You’ve talked about this for, like, three years. How much you miss your family. How the World Title was your Everest and how you were gonna--”
“’--climb that mountain and shout my existence from the roof of the world,’” Yoona interrupts. “I remember, Cam. And I did it. I really fucking did it. I made that mountain my bitch. Everest was mine and mine alone. I had Burlingame dead to rights, and in that moment, I stood alone above all others. And do you know what I saw -- what I felt -- all around me?”
Cosworth merely shook her head.
“Nothing,” Park scoffs. “There was nothing there. I climbed all that way, trampled over all those people, and in the end, it’s all for nothing.”
“W-What were you expecting?”
“Ugh, I don’t fucking know, Cam,” Yoona groans in disgust as she slouches back in her chair. “Something else. Something different from what I’ve been doing the last seven years of my life. But no, ‘same shit, different day...’ just kicking another dumb bitch upside the head for shits and giggles. Oh sure, the names get bigger and the lights get brighter and the checks get fatter and I still hate myself.”
“Oh, Yoona, no. No, you can’t…” Camille murmurs before quickly trailing off, totally lost for words and left with her mouth gaping open like a fish out of water.
“And if even I hate myself, imagine how my mom and dad feel,” Park says, her voice quivering and cracking and more bitter than cyanide she curls up in her chair with her head buried between her drawn up knees. “I’m never going home, am I?”
Frozen until now, her girlfriend’s self-loathing spurs Cosworth into action. She bats aside the toppled table between them with a single sweep of her arm, and in the next moment, Camille’s crouched down and cupping Yoona face with both hands so that their eyes meet.
“You are home,” Cosworth says, her voice suddenly firm and confident. “You. Are. Home. Don’t you ever forget that.”
Yoona just stares back blankly for a couple of seconds, her eyes wide and wet. Then she throws herself forward, nuzzling her face against the side of Camille’s neck and tightly clinging onto the other woman as if she didn’t ever want to let go.
“I am home,” she softly sniffles, before repeating with more emphasis, “I am home.”
Cosworth holds her girlfriend in her embrace until the shuddering stops, “So, what do you wanna do now?”
“...let’s go to Mania...” Park responds after a brief hesitation.
Yoona pulls back from the hug and places their heads together, forehead against forehead and nose against nose, then she adds, “...together.”
“Yoona Park, I do believe you’re up to some mischief,” Camille chuckles when she recognizes the familiar glint in Park’s eyes.
“Call Akiyama,” Yoona says, “She’ll want a part in this.”