Post by Eliza Valentine on Dec 18, 2014 11:22:26 GMT
"It was her own damn fault!" Eliza strains against the older woman who holds her back against the metal lockers. The old gym echoes with the sound of her yells and struggles as she tries to push through Antonia's body to get to the primadonna currently nursing a bloody nose on the floor. Antonia sighs and shakes her head, tightening her grip a little on the scrappy girl whilst another woman leans down to help the girl who is now whimpering, off the floor.
"She's sorry Miss Cassandra... It was an accident...." the girl flips her long blonde hair back with a scowl and then winces as the expression causes pain to shoot through her clearly broken nose. "We'll see if Jimmy thinks it was an accident shall we?!" Cassandra pushes past the woman who had been trying to plead Eliza's case. In the momentary distraction Eliza pushes past both her and Antonia and slams her hands into Cassandra's back, shoving her several steps forward as the girl shrieks and then turns to tower over Eliza.
"You... Little... BITCH!" she moves to strike Eliza across the face who ducks the swing, before pressing her own foot into the ankle of the spoiled little brat, dragging her forward her hand guides Cassandra's face into the metal lockers, as her face makes impact, Eliza shouts over the noise "That one WASN'T an accident!" Eliza then turns to look at Antonia and the girl whose name she hadn't learned yet, she steps over the now sobbing Cassandra with a scowl of her own... "Anyone see anything?"
Antonia shakes her head and grabs the other woman by the arm as they rush out of the locker room, Eliza pauses and drops down next to Cassandra who has pulled herself up into a sitting position and is trying to wipe her hair from her face, where is sticks to the fresh, red blood "Pick up your own fucking towels...."
"I talked. And the world listened. You cannot imagine what that meant to me, you cannot begin to fathom the electrifying feeling of ecstasy that came with knowing that every single person there hung on my every word. For years, since I was only weeks old, I have been screaming with all my might and no one ever listened...
Then last week, I rolled into that ring and from the moment I dropped my hood, people cared, they wanted to know me - wanted to hear what I had to say...."
Eliza's eyes dance with a weird and almost cruel joy.
"For once, it wasn't about the girls like you Bliss.... It wasn't about the pretty little things who get everything in life with a smile. It was about us, the lost, the forgotten... For a few moments, the shadows rose up and formed as me and all of you turned and watched."
Eliza presses her hands together and rests the bridge of her nose against them as if trying to calm herself.
"You think you know, I know that you do. I see that look in your eyes, behind the smug vanity - You think you know my struggle. And why? Because someone who didn't want you found a loving and perfect family who did - you were probably the fucking prom queen too weren't you Bliss?!
Me... I didn't even go to High School, state care homes tend to see that as a waste of time when you can be working alongside convicts and parolees cleaning up the cities for the beautiful people. Whilst you sat in class and snuck make out session with JC I was picking trash.... Cleaning up the graffiti YOUR entitled generation defaced our walls with...
You made all the fucking mistakes and I had to clean them up after you...."
Eliza almost snarls as she curls her lip in a disgusted look.
"My whole life has been cleaning up after those who are too lazy to clean up after themselves. And now? Well, now it's my chance to take the trash out before society recognizes you as such. This contract, this chance that someone, somewhere shone down upon me, this is a chance to matter....
This is MY chance Bliss and no one, especially not YOU are going to take it away from me....."
Her hand drops the name badge onto the last bench as Eliza marches out of the changing rooms, a single thumb print of blood tarnishes the corner. Antonia watches as Eliza drops her ID and moves across the gym floor towards the staff room. Quietly, she puts down her supplies and follows a few steps behind, closing and locking the door to the staff room once they are both inside.
Eliza turns as she hears the click of the lock and sighs, shaking her head as she spots Antonia standing there "Forget it. I quit - you wont have to explain anything to Jimmy, I promise..." she moves to walk around Antonia and unlock the door but the older woman shakes her head with a cluck of her tongue "Miss Eliza..." Eliza stamps her foot petulantly "Antonia!"
The older woman half smiles and nods "...Eliza... You're a good girl, you work hard you just... You need to learn to quieten el Torro within...." Antonia's hand taps the middle of Eliza's chest gently, a warm smile on the woman's lips and for a moment, Eliza's face softens and she smiles. She leans forward and hugs the older woman for a moment before pulling back "What if... What if I don't want it to be quiet?"
Antonia sighs and clucks her tongue again shaking her head "Que Malo Eliza, don't talk like that! You had a good heart...." she again touches Eliza's heart with her hand and smiles, but Eliza rolls her eyes and shakes her head "No Antonia... I am not Corazon.. The bull, the anger and the passion it huffs into my blood til it boils... I like it...."
Antonia sighs and turns away, walking towards the staff room door she glances back "Muñequita you will not always be so angry..." with that she unlocks the door and walks out, she pauses one last time "Mister Jimmy is out for the day, take what you need..."
"Has anyone ever told you No. You can't. You aren't good enough..... Has anyone ever looked down at you, starving and broken in the bitter cold of homelessness on un-named streets in uncaring counties and sneered? Have they ever judged you for existing, doubting your reasons for being alive...?
No... I don't suppose they have...."
Eliza looks down at her hands now in her lap, her voice softer, almost sad.
"Have you ever looked into the eyes of the people who 'love' you and wondered how much your checks are worth they cash every week? Have you ever been a meal ticket... a possession... Have you ever had to know, what it's like to be alive and have no one care... Or even notice?"
Eliza slowly raises her head, she stares down the lens in silence for a long time, before taking a deep breath.
"Bliss Riley. Protege of the once great Jake Keeton, trained in the best schools with the best up-and-comers, afforded every chance, every moment of training any wannabe wrestler could ever dream of - whispered to be the Next Big Thing in the Diamond's division and already a name recognised in many a home across America....
And what, pray tell, do you do with this power...? With this opportunity...? Do you use it to better yourself? To set an example to girls everywhere that your dreams are achievable that if you work hard enough and long enough, you can make it...?
Do you... Do you use your air time to explain to the world the hardships and pain of growing up knowing you were unwanted? Do you even for one single fucking second think about the thousands upon thousands of other girls JUST LIKE YOU who are living day in and day out in a strangers home....?
NO!"
Eliza jumps up from the simple fold up chair she was sitting in, kicking it back and across the room.
"You waste air time talking about that talentless hack of a boyfriend - you skip around in skimpy little outfits and play stripper barbie for the perverts and preteens... YOU shit all over the name you could have made for yourself. You're a disgrace and I am simply shocked it has taken this long for anyone to call you out on it!"
Eliza turns and grabs the chair, she sets it back in its place and calmly takes a seat, as though taking a moment to collect herself.
"I know the facts here.... You have a legend training you, you have been handed every tool you could possibly need to put someone like me in my place. After all, 99% of my in-ring technique has been learned by hanging around schools after they let out and making drinking buddies out of the guys so they show me a few moves... Hell, sometimes I have even been lucky enough to score a free lesson here or there right before a guy gets called up..
But that cannot possibly compare with someone like you, whose single thimble full of talent has been nurtured and worked on by people who can make a turd sparkle... Now, i'm not calling you a piece of shit, you do enough for people to come to that conclusion on their own... But this week, at the Female ONLY Pay Per View I will prove that all the training in the world cannot beat pure hunger!"
As the key slides into the lock, she hears the phone ringing from the outside "Shit!" they only reconnected the damn thing two days ago, Eliza fights with her key in lock finally getting the door open she barrels into the apartment, spilling through the door and across the kitchen which the door opens into, snatching up the phone...
"Hello!?" she pants heavily trying to get her breath back "Uhhh... Lo Siento, Miss Eliza no live here..." she slowly and carefully drops the cabelled phone back into its base with a flinch.. "You need to work on the accent..." she half smiles, turning on her heels as she glances at the girl standing in the doorway to the apartment "Well, I apologize, not all of us were born with such an alluring accent Carmel..."
The young girl laughs as eliza moves over to the door and waves her in, eliza sticks her head out of the door and glances up and down the hall quickly, before slamming the door shut.
"Eliza, flattery will get you everywhere..." Carmel bats her eyes at Eliza who in turn rolls her eyes "Is that what you tell Ramone?" the young girls pretty face wrinkles at the nose as she bats away thin air "I kicked him out." Eliza slams the cupboard door shut accidentally, spinning on the spot to face her friend "Again, what did he do this time?!"
"My cousin..." Carmel shrugs but the pain that shoots through her eyes is apparent "Mother fucker!" Eliza kicks the single chair pushed up against a beaten up breakfast bar that stands as her table "Luckily not...." Carmel says with a half laugh, but Eliza is already throwing things into a beaten up old purse "Eliza, what are you doing?!" Eliza pauses for a moment, holding a small metal canister midway between her purse and her pocket.
"I am going to kill the Cabron..." she says it casually, no anger or menace in her voice as though the idea of beating the shit out of this guy is natural progression upon hearing the news "Eliza... Corazon... Can we not just get ice-cream and bitch about men...?" Eliza arches a brow and shakes her head at Carmel as though exasperated "How will that help?" Carmel approaches her and takes the purse from Eliza's hand, laying it down on the breakfast bar, she leads Eliza back to the couch.
"It's how normal girls handle these things..." she sits down on the couch and pulls Eliza down next to her, the couch creaks and moans under the limited weight of the two girls, its age betraying itself "Right... When are we ever normal?" Eliza looks again towards her purse loaded with items she desperately wants to jam into several of Ramone's orifices....
"Please..." Carmel almost whines in a childlike voice, she snuggles up close to the side of Eliza, resting her head on Eliza's chest she sighs "Can you not just be my shoulder..." Eliza freezes, she barely moves her head to look down at Carmen who is cuddles up close to her, her arm across Eliza's midsection... She takes a shaky breath and moves her eyes to stare forward, her cheeks flushing slightly "Fine... but don't stain my shirt... tears are a bitch to get out...."
"Sometimes, things just how they are... You can't change your past, I have come to accept that. We all are handed a lot in life, some swim through with everything passed to us on silver spoons like caviar and others have to rise above what they are handed, they have to dig through the dirt to come out clutching a single rose.
This shot, this chance at a career, that's my rose Bliss - and you sure as hell aren't woman enough to take it from me. So go ahead and prance out there at Diamonds are Forever in your little outfit and shake your booty for the crowd, long for their applause, as empty as it will always be for someone as meaningless and tacky as you... But don't be surprised when this untrained little street rat knocks you square on your money-maker."
Eliza shrugs slightly, calm and almost quiet now.
"I get it, everyone has to be something... a bitch. Crazy. A sex symbol... You all need a hook, something to make you stand out - because christ knows your talent wont do that for you. Why are you even here Bliss? What do you hope to get out of this? Become the next soul sucking whore to suck her way to the top whilst sweet little JC sits at home and cooks your dinner?"
She sneers, shaking her head.
"This business is a lonely one, that much I know - what do you know of loneliness? What could you possibly know about thriving and championing all on your own? What will happen to you when you are no longer a student? When you outrun your usefulness and your dear mentor turns his back on you...?
What will become of little Bliss Riley when she is shoved out into the dark cold world all on her own? - When Simon or Keeton or Jessica Reed decides to test your mettle, when you are fed to the wolves who will tear you apart just to taste your blood as a victory... Do you really think you will survive?"
Eliza shakes her head with a cluck of her tongue.
"This week, I will perform a kindness... I will send you back to the training ring from whence you came and you can hide your face. Hide your shame until you are good enough to stand alone, until you can get in that ring and stare me down without Daddy-In-Law holding your hand... When I slam you on your back and take the victory right from your hands, I will be doing so much more than winning...
I will be teaching not just you, but everyone a lesson. The forgotten ones, the lonely ones - the people you pass in the street every day and don't care to look at, the ones who are starving and cold and afraid... The man who you yelled at to get a job... the woman who just wanted a few cents to feed her baby... ALL OF THEM will stand beside me in spirit.."
Eliza's chest heaves up and down as her speech becomes more rapid and fire ignites behind her eyes.
"At Diamond's are Forever, I will strike you down and with you, I will destroy the moniker of the Entitled, I will prove you are all as worthless as you claim us to be... I will prove that your kind, the rich and the privileged are the true dregs on society and, most importantly, I will prove once and for all...
You can beat a dog until it cowers... But you can never EVER put a good bitch down."
"She's sorry Miss Cassandra... It was an accident...." the girl flips her long blonde hair back with a scowl and then winces as the expression causes pain to shoot through her clearly broken nose. "We'll see if Jimmy thinks it was an accident shall we?!" Cassandra pushes past the woman who had been trying to plead Eliza's case. In the momentary distraction Eliza pushes past both her and Antonia and slams her hands into Cassandra's back, shoving her several steps forward as the girl shrieks and then turns to tower over Eliza.
"You... Little... BITCH!" she moves to strike Eliza across the face who ducks the swing, before pressing her own foot into the ankle of the spoiled little brat, dragging her forward her hand guides Cassandra's face into the metal lockers, as her face makes impact, Eliza shouts over the noise "That one WASN'T an accident!" Eliza then turns to look at Antonia and the girl whose name she hadn't learned yet, she steps over the now sobbing Cassandra with a scowl of her own... "Anyone see anything?"
Antonia shakes her head and grabs the other woman by the arm as they rush out of the locker room, Eliza pauses and drops down next to Cassandra who has pulled herself up into a sitting position and is trying to wipe her hair from her face, where is sticks to the fresh, red blood "Pick up your own fucking towels...."
The rich become richer and the poor become poorer is a cry heard throughout the whole civilized world.
"I talked. And the world listened. You cannot imagine what that meant to me, you cannot begin to fathom the electrifying feeling of ecstasy that came with knowing that every single person there hung on my every word. For years, since I was only weeks old, I have been screaming with all my might and no one ever listened...
Then last week, I rolled into that ring and from the moment I dropped my hood, people cared, they wanted to know me - wanted to hear what I had to say...."
Eliza's eyes dance with a weird and almost cruel joy.
"For once, it wasn't about the girls like you Bliss.... It wasn't about the pretty little things who get everything in life with a smile. It was about us, the lost, the forgotten... For a few moments, the shadows rose up and formed as me and all of you turned and watched."
Eliza presses her hands together and rests the bridge of her nose against them as if trying to calm herself.
"You think you know, I know that you do. I see that look in your eyes, behind the smug vanity - You think you know my struggle. And why? Because someone who didn't want you found a loving and perfect family who did - you were probably the fucking prom queen too weren't you Bliss?!
Me... I didn't even go to High School, state care homes tend to see that as a waste of time when you can be working alongside convicts and parolees cleaning up the cities for the beautiful people. Whilst you sat in class and snuck make out session with JC I was picking trash.... Cleaning up the graffiti YOUR entitled generation defaced our walls with...
You made all the fucking mistakes and I had to clean them up after you...."
Eliza almost snarls as she curls her lip in a disgusted look.
"My whole life has been cleaning up after those who are too lazy to clean up after themselves. And now? Well, now it's my chance to take the trash out before society recognizes you as such. This contract, this chance that someone, somewhere shone down upon me, this is a chance to matter....
This is MY chance Bliss and no one, especially not YOU are going to take it away from me....."
I foster a sorrowful conception of affection. Make no sacrifices. - Franz Liszt
Her hand drops the name badge onto the last bench as Eliza marches out of the changing rooms, a single thumb print of blood tarnishes the corner. Antonia watches as Eliza drops her ID and moves across the gym floor towards the staff room. Quietly, she puts down her supplies and follows a few steps behind, closing and locking the door to the staff room once they are both inside.
Eliza turns as she hears the click of the lock and sighs, shaking her head as she spots Antonia standing there "Forget it. I quit - you wont have to explain anything to Jimmy, I promise..." she moves to walk around Antonia and unlock the door but the older woman shakes her head with a cluck of her tongue "Miss Eliza..." Eliza stamps her foot petulantly "Antonia!"
The older woman half smiles and nods "...Eliza... You're a good girl, you work hard you just... You need to learn to quieten el Torro within...." Antonia's hand taps the middle of Eliza's chest gently, a warm smile on the woman's lips and for a moment, Eliza's face softens and she smiles. She leans forward and hugs the older woman for a moment before pulling back "What if... What if I don't want it to be quiet?"
Antonia sighs and clucks her tongue again shaking her head "Que Malo Eliza, don't talk like that! You had a good heart...." she again touches Eliza's heart with her hand and smiles, but Eliza rolls her eyes and shakes her head "No Antonia... I am not Corazon.. The bull, the anger and the passion it huffs into my blood til it boils... I like it...."
Antonia sighs and turns away, walking towards the staff room door she glances back "Muñequita you will not always be so angry..." with that she unlocks the door and walks out, she pauses one last time "Mister Jimmy is out for the day, take what you need..."
I never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude. - Henry David Thoreau
"Has anyone ever told you No. You can't. You aren't good enough..... Has anyone ever looked down at you, starving and broken in the bitter cold of homelessness on un-named streets in uncaring counties and sneered? Have they ever judged you for existing, doubting your reasons for being alive...?
No... I don't suppose they have...."
Eliza looks down at her hands now in her lap, her voice softer, almost sad.
"Have you ever looked into the eyes of the people who 'love' you and wondered how much your checks are worth they cash every week? Have you ever been a meal ticket... a possession... Have you ever had to know, what it's like to be alive and have no one care... Or even notice?"
Eliza slowly raises her head, she stares down the lens in silence for a long time, before taking a deep breath.
"Bliss Riley. Protege of the once great Jake Keeton, trained in the best schools with the best up-and-comers, afforded every chance, every moment of training any wannabe wrestler could ever dream of - whispered to be the Next Big Thing in the Diamond's division and already a name recognised in many a home across America....
And what, pray tell, do you do with this power...? With this opportunity...? Do you use it to better yourself? To set an example to girls everywhere that your dreams are achievable that if you work hard enough and long enough, you can make it...?
Do you... Do you use your air time to explain to the world the hardships and pain of growing up knowing you were unwanted? Do you even for one single fucking second think about the thousands upon thousands of other girls JUST LIKE YOU who are living day in and day out in a strangers home....?
NO!"
Eliza jumps up from the simple fold up chair she was sitting in, kicking it back and across the room.
"You waste air time talking about that talentless hack of a boyfriend - you skip around in skimpy little outfits and play stripper barbie for the perverts and preteens... YOU shit all over the name you could have made for yourself. You're a disgrace and I am simply shocked it has taken this long for anyone to call you out on it!"
Eliza turns and grabs the chair, she sets it back in its place and calmly takes a seat, as though taking a moment to collect herself.
"I know the facts here.... You have a legend training you, you have been handed every tool you could possibly need to put someone like me in my place. After all, 99% of my in-ring technique has been learned by hanging around schools after they let out and making drinking buddies out of the guys so they show me a few moves... Hell, sometimes I have even been lucky enough to score a free lesson here or there right before a guy gets called up..
But that cannot possibly compare with someone like you, whose single thimble full of talent has been nurtured and worked on by people who can make a turd sparkle... Now, i'm not calling you a piece of shit, you do enough for people to come to that conclusion on their own... But this week, at the Female ONLY Pay Per View I will prove that all the training in the world cannot beat pure hunger!"
I have so many different personalities in me and I still feel lonely. - Tori Amos
As the key slides into the lock, she hears the phone ringing from the outside "Shit!" they only reconnected the damn thing two days ago, Eliza fights with her key in lock finally getting the door open she barrels into the apartment, spilling through the door and across the kitchen which the door opens into, snatching up the phone...
"Hello!?" she pants heavily trying to get her breath back "Uhhh... Lo Siento, Miss Eliza no live here..." she slowly and carefully drops the cabelled phone back into its base with a flinch.. "You need to work on the accent..." she half smiles, turning on her heels as she glances at the girl standing in the doorway to the apartment "Well, I apologize, not all of us were born with such an alluring accent Carmel..."
The young girl laughs as eliza moves over to the door and waves her in, eliza sticks her head out of the door and glances up and down the hall quickly, before slamming the door shut.
"Eliza, flattery will get you everywhere..." Carmel bats her eyes at Eliza who in turn rolls her eyes "Is that what you tell Ramone?" the young girls pretty face wrinkles at the nose as she bats away thin air "I kicked him out." Eliza slams the cupboard door shut accidentally, spinning on the spot to face her friend "Again, what did he do this time?!"
"My cousin..." Carmel shrugs but the pain that shoots through her eyes is apparent "Mother fucker!" Eliza kicks the single chair pushed up against a beaten up breakfast bar that stands as her table "Luckily not...." Carmel says with a half laugh, but Eliza is already throwing things into a beaten up old purse "Eliza, what are you doing?!" Eliza pauses for a moment, holding a small metal canister midway between her purse and her pocket.
"I am going to kill the Cabron..." she says it casually, no anger or menace in her voice as though the idea of beating the shit out of this guy is natural progression upon hearing the news "Eliza... Corazon... Can we not just get ice-cream and bitch about men...?" Eliza arches a brow and shakes her head at Carmel as though exasperated "How will that help?" Carmel approaches her and takes the purse from Eliza's hand, laying it down on the breakfast bar, she leads Eliza back to the couch.
"It's how normal girls handle these things..." she sits down on the couch and pulls Eliza down next to her, the couch creaks and moans under the limited weight of the two girls, its age betraying itself "Right... When are we ever normal?" Eliza looks again towards her purse loaded with items she desperately wants to jam into several of Ramone's orifices....
"Please..." Carmel almost whines in a childlike voice, she snuggles up close to the side of Eliza, resting her head on Eliza's chest she sighs "Can you not just be my shoulder..." Eliza freezes, she barely moves her head to look down at Carmen who is cuddles up close to her, her arm across Eliza's midsection... She takes a shaky breath and moves her eyes to stare forward, her cheeks flushing slightly "Fine... but don't stain my shirt... tears are a bitch to get out...."
Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets. - Paul Tournier
"Sometimes, things just how they are... You can't change your past, I have come to accept that. We all are handed a lot in life, some swim through with everything passed to us on silver spoons like caviar and others have to rise above what they are handed, they have to dig through the dirt to come out clutching a single rose.
This shot, this chance at a career, that's my rose Bliss - and you sure as hell aren't woman enough to take it from me. So go ahead and prance out there at Diamonds are Forever in your little outfit and shake your booty for the crowd, long for their applause, as empty as it will always be for someone as meaningless and tacky as you... But don't be surprised when this untrained little street rat knocks you square on your money-maker."
Eliza shrugs slightly, calm and almost quiet now.
"I get it, everyone has to be something... a bitch. Crazy. A sex symbol... You all need a hook, something to make you stand out - because christ knows your talent wont do that for you. Why are you even here Bliss? What do you hope to get out of this? Become the next soul sucking whore to suck her way to the top whilst sweet little JC sits at home and cooks your dinner?"
She sneers, shaking her head.
"This business is a lonely one, that much I know - what do you know of loneliness? What could you possibly know about thriving and championing all on your own? What will happen to you when you are no longer a student? When you outrun your usefulness and your dear mentor turns his back on you...?
What will become of little Bliss Riley when she is shoved out into the dark cold world all on her own? - When Simon or Keeton or Jessica Reed decides to test your mettle, when you are fed to the wolves who will tear you apart just to taste your blood as a victory... Do you really think you will survive?"
Eliza shakes her head with a cluck of her tongue.
"This week, I will perform a kindness... I will send you back to the training ring from whence you came and you can hide your face. Hide your shame until you are good enough to stand alone, until you can get in that ring and stare me down without Daddy-In-Law holding your hand... When I slam you on your back and take the victory right from your hands, I will be doing so much more than winning...
I will be teaching not just you, but everyone a lesson. The forgotten ones, the lonely ones - the people you pass in the street every day and don't care to look at, the ones who are starving and cold and afraid... The man who you yelled at to get a job... the woman who just wanted a few cents to feed her baby... ALL OF THEM will stand beside me in spirit.."
Eliza's chest heaves up and down as her speech becomes more rapid and fire ignites behind her eyes.
"At Diamond's are Forever, I will strike you down and with you, I will destroy the moniker of the Entitled, I will prove you are all as worthless as you claim us to be... I will prove that your kind, the rich and the privileged are the true dregs on society and, most importantly, I will prove once and for all...
You can beat a dog until it cowers... But you can never EVER put a good bitch down."
Well howdy there pardner.