Disclaimer: Don't own anyone or anything. I only own Adrienne, and anyone else you don't recognize.

A/N: Thanks to all the people who read this, added it to their alerts and to those who reviewed, thanks so much! I hope this is okay, and that people enjoy reading it. Anyway, let me know what you thought in a review, please (:

Cheers!

Once she was back in her hotel room, the first thing Adrienne did was collapse on her bed. Now, she is still lying face down on her bed, her face smothered by a pillow. The cool breeze enters the room from the open window and Adrienne finds herself sighing in relief. One match down, only another hundred to go.

As she stretches, she feels her muscles slowly unwind and despite the pain that shoots through her body, Adrienne appreciates the feeling. It feels good to relax, especially since she knows she has only one day to recover before she makes her Smackdown debut.

The thought brings a smile to Adrienne's face. The show was being taped, along with ECW, on the Tuesday night in Roanoke, Virginia and so Adrienne had one day to make her way to the town and to prepare for her next match. Stephanie had told her the plan: she would help Eve backstage after the woman gets attacked by Layla. The original plan was for Eve to face off against Layla, but as she would be unfit to compete, Teddy Long would make Adrienne take her place.

Rolling onto her back, Adrienne stares up at the ceiling and smiles, enjoying the fact she was starting off as a face. It was always a nice feeling, knowing that the crowd was behind you and by being a face, that fact was nearly always guaranteed.

Adrienne closes her eyes for a moment, and tries to catch some sleep. There's a voice at the back of her mind telling her that she should go down to the hotel's restaurant and grab some food, but at the moment, as her muscles soothe and she welcomes the darkness, Adrienne forgets about eating. All she cares about now is sleep.

It's too bad the loud knocking on her door ends her chances of falling asleep.

Groaning slightly, Adrienne rolls off the bed and lands gracefully on her feet. She reluctantly goes and opens the door only to be greeted by the sight of…

Her hearts stops as he stares at her.

Fuck.

"Go away," Adrienne whispers harshly. She quickly glances down the hallway and then back at him. "Go away. Now."

"Can I come in?"

His voice is calm and low and Adrienne feels like punching him. "No," she grits out, her hand tightening around the doorknob. "You cannot come in."

He looks at her for a beat and then pushes past her, allowing himself into her small room. Angrily, Adrienne turns around and slams shut the door. She glares at him as he walks further into the room, his back to her. Despite her best efforts to stop her thoughts, Adrienne hears a part of her mind admit that he looked good. He looked too damn good.

Instantly she recognized the Throw Down t-shirt she had worn more times than she would care to admit. Her eyes involuntarily trace over his lean muscles and the way his jeans were faded and tight in all the annoyingly right places.

No, she shouts at herself, she would not get distracted. He wasn't meant to be in here, she wasn't meant to talk to him when it didn't involve work, and Adrienne was sure that he hadn't come to her hotel room at ten at night to discuss matches. No, he wanted to talk to her but God damn it, she wouldn't let him.

"Punk," Adrienne says, keeping her voice low. "Get out of my room now. I don't want you in here."

She hears him sigh but when he says nothing, and doesn't even turn around to face her, Adrienne feels the anger rise in her. How dare he march into her room and now not explain himself. He started this, he obviously wanted to talk to her but now he was refusing to do so. Adrienne wants to shout at him, remind him of the fact that she had ignored him for so long that she was going to carry on doing so, but she can't seem to find the energy to say it.

Instead, she asks in a quiet voice, "Why are you here?"

His eyes close automatically and Punk sighs again. The memories that flooded his mind whenever she spoke were too much to handle. He could see everything they had done together and the images flashing behind his eyes pained him and so his eyes open, and he stares out of the window. He doesn't know what possess him, but he suddenly whispers, "I needed to see you."

It was a simple explanation but the weight behind his words hit Adrienne with force. He needed to see her. He wanted to see her. After five fucking years, now he wanted to see her. Now he wanted to talk to her. Why the fuck did he want to talk to her? He was the one that hated her, or had he forgotten that fact?

A part of her knows it's too late and she knows she shouldn't be talking like this, but the relief that settled at the back of her mind at his words is small and yet hard to deny. "I've needed to see you, too," she murmurs gently, carefully watching his tense stance.

Suddenly, it feels as if someone is cutting off his oxygen supply because Punk has to take deep breaths to regain control. Unfortunately, it doesn't help to calm him because it still feels as if someone is strangling him. He knows it hurts to be around her, to see her and be reminded, but he can't help himself – he needs to be near her. And not just be around her in the sense of how he's around everyone else – this is Adrienne. It's different with her, it was always different, and it's so addictive that it should be wrong, but it isn't. When he says he needs to see her, it translates to the idea that if he waits another second and isn't in her company, he might just explode.

After all these years, the desire to be around her was undeniable.

She brought out feelings in him he thought he had buried. It angered him because he knows that when she left, when he left, everything had changed. Because of her, he wasn't the same person anymore. There was no reason why he should feel like this anymore. Maria didn't make him want to burst into flames, one look from her didn't cause his heart to clench or stop. When Maria looked at him, his heart quickened, it raced and it was exciting.

Adrienne was the opposite. Time stood still when he was with her, and tonight when Punk had entered the hotel room he shares with Maria, he wanted to be there again. He wanted to be in a room where time stood still.

He had to find Adrienne. He needed to feel that way again.

Slowly, Punk runs a hand through his hair and swallows nervously. When he found himself standing in front of her door, he had realized that he hadn't thought this through. He had no plan. What was he going to say to her when she finally opened the door? What was he going to say to her when she questioned him? How was he going to explain himself?

Punk didn't have a fucking clue. All he knew was that when he got urge, when he felt the impulse ignite through him, he had gone to the front desk to ask what room Adrienne was in. Then, all of a sudden, he was standing in front of her door, wondering what the fuck he had gotten himself into. Now as he stands staring out of her window at the dark night, Punk wonders if this was a bad idea. Maybe he shouldn't have acted on impulse; after all it was hurting him just being in her presence.

But, as a tiny voice reminds him, they needed to see each other.

It had been too long since they stood alone in a room together. The last time that had happened…

Instantly, Punk's eyes darken and he turns around to face Adrienne. She's still beautiful and his eyes soften instantly when he looks at her. There are so many things he wants to say but can't and so he settles for, "How are you?"

To anyone else it would seem like a normal question to ask someone you hadn't seen in nearly five years. But to them, the three words held so much emotion, so much meaning, that it caused Adrienne to suck in her breath. She looks at him, her eyes wide and sad, and shakes her head, her hair falling into her eyes. "I'm fine," she whispers, her eyes never leaving his. "I'm fine. How are you?"

She's lying. He knows that, but instead of forcing more information out of her he merely shrugs and replies, "I'm alright."

"Good," Adrienne says as she looks away. She sighs suddenly and turns back to him. "You should go. It's late."

The words are forced out of him before he has a chance to stop them. "I don't want to go. I want to be here."

Adrienne laughs suddenly, and her lips curl up in disgust. "Now you want to be here? Now you want to be here with me?" She shakes her head and mutters, "Un-fucking-believable…"

Punk frowns and his stance becomes tense. "Hey, if anyone should be angry, it should be me, Adrienne. Not you. You didn't even tell me you got signed."

Her eyes widen and she looks at him in shock. "What? Why the fuck should I have told you? Correct me if I'm wrong, but we hadn't talked in over five years, Punk!"

"And whose fault is that?" Punk asks, his voice rising.

Adrienne face pales instantly and she stares at Punk in horror. "I-I can't believe you just said that," she whispers. She's quiet for a moment and they continue to stare at each other before Adrienne's anger bursts. "You think it's my fault that I didn't call you? You think I wanted to ignore you?"

"I don't know, Adrienne!" Punk shouts suddenly as he glares at her. "You tell me because what am I meant to think? You just cut me off."

"You didn't give me much choice!" Adrienne shouts desperately. She points at him angrily. "You didn't give me a fucking choice, Punk. I didn't want to cut you off but what other choice did I have? Would you have answered my calls?" She sees the hesitance in his eyes and she shakes her head. "No, you wouldn't have so don't you dare blame this on me. There was nothing I could do so don't blame me because you could have called, Punk. You could have done something but you didn't. You didn't do anything. You cut me off, you ignored me and I had no other choice, so don't blame me. Don't you ever blame me."

Her anger hangs in the air between them and it takes him a moment but soon enough Punk mutters, "I'm sorry."

I'm sorry.

The two words repeat in Adrienne's mind as she watches him and feels the hurt radiate off his body. The sudden urge to walk over to him and wrap her arms around his frame is overwhelming, but Adrienne stops herself. He didn't deserve her comfort, not now, not after everything. She clenches her hands into fists and stares at him, unwilling to be taken in by his sadden gaze.

He was sorry, she had waited years to hear those words but now that she has, they don't feel right. He was only saying he was sorry because he knew he should have done something but didn't. He wasn't saying sorry for hurting her, for causing her unnecessary pain, he was saying sorry for a mistake, a mistake that hardly mattered now.

Adrienne didn't want him to say sorry for not calling her. She didn't even want him to say sorry for causing her so much pain. In this moment, she wanted him to come closer and hold her because if she was honest, she was upset and angry and lonely, and Punk always knew how to heal her. There was something about him, about his warmth, that soothed her and there had been many moments in the last five years where she had wished, prayed and begged she could feel that way again. She needed his arms around her but as Adrienne stares at him, tears of anger form in her eyes.

She couldn't do this.

She couldn't be around him and she felt angry at herself because of it.

Letting out a shaky breath, Adrienne quietly asks, "Why did you come here?"

The sight of her eyes shining causes Punk to instinctively take a step forward. "I needed to be with you, Addie."

The sound of her nickname causes Adrienne to flinch slightly. She hadn't heard that in a while. "I know that already. But why? Why now? We've…Can't we carry on as if I'm not here?" She asks, her eyes wide and desperate. "Why do you need to be here?"

"I…" He falters trying to come up with a logical explanation, but he couldn't think of one. All he knew was that he had to see her. Maybe it was because he couldn't believe she was really here, she was actually going to be working with him, but another reason suddenly entered his mind. He looked at her, his eyes masked; protecting himself from the backlash he knew was to come.

"We need to talk."

"I don't want to."

"Come on," he urges. "There's…There's a lot of things we need to discuss, Adrienne."

Although she knows how much it must have pained him to say that, Adrienne remains firm with her decision. "We've ignored it for this long, and just because I'm working in the same company with you, doesn't mean we suddenly have to talk. We don't need to…I'm not your friend, Punk."

It was quick, but Adrienne saw the hurt flash behind his dark eyes. If she had blinked, she would have missed it, but she saw it. However it didn't matter if what she said had hurt him, she was only talking the truth. "I'm just here, Punk. I'm not here to interfere with your life and I'm not here hoping that we can become friends, because I know that won't happen. I know that, and…and I've accepted it. I think you need to realize that too."

"I realize that," he says carefully. "But that doesn't stop the fact that we have things to talk about."

Adrienne huffs and crosses her arms over her chest. "Well, I don't want to talk."

She sounds like a little child and a small smile forms on Punk's lips. Carefully he takes another step forward and his eyes look down to her wrists. If she didn't want to talk about the past, then he could at least try to learn more about her.

"When did you get those?" He asks, trying to stick to a safe topic. It was a start; he just needed her to talk to him again. "I always thought you were afraid of needles."

Adrienne's heart plummets and she looks away, opting to look over his shoulder at the window. "When I moved to Japan, it was the first thing I did."

As if it was second nature, he can easily sense the sorrow behind her voice but for the moment, he ignores it. "Can I see them?" He asks gently as he moves closer to her. "What do they say?"

Letting out a small sigh, Adrienne looks at him and she knows as soon as she shows him, he's going to want the full story. He always wanted to know everything, and Adrienne can feel the dread spread through her already. Sighing, she holds up her left arm and shows him the outside of her wrist. "Straight," she says and then turns her wrist the other way to show the inside. "Edge."

It takes him a moment to register what she said and then he looks closer at her wrist, taking in the sight of the black cursive writing. Straight edge. He raises his eyes to look at Adrienne and he knows he should say something, ask her what happened, if she really believed in the lifestyle, but he can't force his mind to form the words. All he can do is watch as Adrienne raises her other arm and shows him the outside of her wrist. "Never," she whispers before showing him the inside. "Again."

Her voice is filled with tears and Punk wants to take her in his arms but he refrains. Instead he looks her in the eyes and keeps his voice low, "What happened?"

It's obvious to Punk that something must have happened to her to cause her to change her ways and he feels unsettled over the idea. Why would she change her mind? When he knew her, she hadn't been a heavy drinker but he knew she liked her tequila shots when the mood struck her. He knew this and he would never try to change that about her, because at the end of the day, it was her life, not his.

Did she change her life because of him? Did she want to follow in his footsteps hoping it might reconnect them one day? Punk frowns as he studies Adrienne. Something was wrong, he could sense it but he knew she wouldn't tell him.

And just like he predicted, Adrienne confirms his thoughts by replying quietly, "Nothing happened. I just decided I didn't want to ruin my body anymore."

It was an honest answer but Punk didn't want to accept it. "What made you change your mind?"

Adrienne groans in frustration and glares at him. "I just changed my mind, that's all. God, do I really need to give you an explanation?"

"An explanation would be nice," Punk says before adding sarcastically, "Sorry for wanting to get to know you after so long."

"Oh, just shut up, Punk," Adrienne snaps before shaking her head and turning away from him. She stalks to the door and yanks it open before turning back to him. "I think it's time for you to leave."

He laughs at her abruptness before looking at her confidently. "No."

Adrienne jaw sets and she narrows her eyes at him. "Get out before I throw you out."

Punk laughs, a grin on his face. He hadn't heard her say that to him in a long time and though he knows it was annoying her, he can't help but grin. It was just too easy. He used to love annoying her because he always thought she looked cute when she was angry. "We need to talk, Addie," he says as he walks towards her. "I'm not leaving until we do."

"Oh for fuck's sake!" Slamming the door shut, Adrienne turns to glare at him. "We can talk tomorrow if you want but now, I want to sleep. I want some fucking sleep and if you do not leave right now I will grab you and throw you out on your ass." When Punk starts to laugh, Adrienne cuts him off. "If you laugh again I swear to God, I'll rip out your tongue!"

"Okay, okay," he says as he raises his hands. He missed how easily they can go from talking to her shouting at him. Adrienne was a natural hot-head and Punk was comforted in the fact that some things never change. He smiles at her and waves his hand at the door. "I'm going. Calm down."

"Don't tell me to calm down."

"Well, you're getting angry. You need to relax."

Adrienne grunts and opens the door again. "Out."

"I'm going, I'm going," Punk mutters under his breath and walks past her. Once he's on the other side of the door, he turns back to look at her. Even though her face shows her annoyance, Punk can see the fatigue and regret behind her dark eyes. He doesn't know what makes him say it but quietly, Punk says, "I wish we could go back to before."

Adrienne sees the sincerity in his eyes and it causes her shoulders to slump slightly. She leans her head against the side of the door and whispers, "Me too."

"Good night, Addie."

"Good night, Punk."

They stand there, staring at each other for another minute before Adrienne sighs and lowers her eyes. It shouldn't be this hard to leave him–even if it is for a couple of hours–but it is hard because now that Adrienne had found him, she didn't want to be separate from him again. He was here, so close to her and all she wanted to do was keep it that way.

But he needed to leave.

Maria was probably wondering where he was.

Oh God, Adrienne thinks as the color drains from her face. Here she was thinking about being close to Punk when his girlfriend was in their hotel room, on their bed, waiting for him. Shit. Quickly, Adrienne looks up at Punk and bites her bottom lip. He was finding it just as difficult to leave. But he had to. Now.

"Okay…good night," Adrienne mutters before carefully moving away and shutting the door.

She waits a moment before slowly turning away and staring at her bed. She needed to sleep; she has an early flight in the morning. She knows this but instead of moving to her bed, Adrienne slowly slips down the door until she lands on the floor. When she does, she brings her knees to her chest and rests her head on her knees. It takes her a moment, but soon enough, the tears she had been fighting against slide down her cheeks.

She couldn't ignore him any longer and that thought alone, caused a sob to escape her lips.

Fuck.

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