Author's Note: I prefer calling the characters by their English names, but I've noticed that people prefer to call Hilda by her Japanese name, Touko so I hope this doesn't cause any confusion. The reason why I didn't refer to her as White is because that name clashes with her Pokemon Adventures manga counterpart and this story is based on the game. Anyway, now that I've stated that, I hope you enjoy this story and reviews are always appreciated so thank you~. ^_^
-Candyfloss and Ferris Wheels-
Nimbasa City was a very exciting place and Hilda promised to herself that she'd come back and visit it as soon as she defeated the Elite Four and the Champion. Until then, she decided to take a tour around the place and unsurprisingly, the first place she headed to was the amusement park.
"Wow, this place is so awesome," she thought to herself in awe as she gazed around the place in amazement. "I should come here again with Bianca and Cheren… actually, maybe just with Bianca."
She giddily walked around, buying almost everything she saw, from pokemon-shaped balloons to sky-blue candyfloss. It felt nice to feel like a child for once instead of bearing the overwhelming responsibility of a trainer.
As she skipped past the Nimbasa gym and headed over to the Ferris Wheel, something or someone for that matter, caught her eye.
"N?" She stopped and stared at the young man, whose tea green hair swayed against the pleasant breeze. He appeared to be reading a sign and didn't notice her, much to her delight as she decided to creep up behind and surprise him.
"Hilda, I know you're there."
"Oh, darn!" she cursed in frustration and dropped her cover. He turned around to look at her, seemingly not that amused.
"Hey, N," she greeted with an embarrassed grin.
"… Hello." He casually put a hand in his pocket and stared at her silently for a moment, making her feel uncomfortable. "Are you here to challenge the Nimbasa gym leader?"
"Elesa? Um, no, not yet. I still have to train my pokemon… Actually, I came here to ride the Ferris Wheel.." she sheepishly admitted.
He frowned, finding her carefree attitude incomprehensible.
"Aren't you concerned about stopping Team Plasma? Or me, for that matter."
"Well…" She scratched her cheek and took a bite out of her cotton candy. "Yeah, I am. I know I will, anyway," she confidently stated. "What about you? You seem to have the free time to be lounging around in an amusement park..!"
He didn't reply, annoyed by her wittiness.
"Would you like to take a ride on the Ferris Wheel?" he offered, gesturing at the slowly spinning mechanism.
She was sure that he was just trying to change the subject, but she took his offer out of sheer boredom, or at least that's what she thought it was.
"Hey, hey! Look how small everyone is!" Maybe it was a sugar rush from eating the cotton candy or maybe it was just because she was easily amused, but Hilda was far more excited than usual and she couldn't stay still, much to N's dismay.
"Will you stop looking out the window and face my direction?" he snapped out of irritation as he pouted and crossed his arms.
"Right, sorry." She pulled herself away from the window and sat down properly, across where he was sitting. "Did you want to say something?"
"Yes, actually." He adjusted his hat and cleared his throat. "I just wanted to tell you that my intentions of freeing pokemon are all good and that you shouldn't intervene unless you want to get hurt. No good will come out of getting in my way, you know. In fact, maybe you should join us.. That's not a bad idea. You're quite strong and you've proven yourself to be a tough opponent so you'd do well if you were on my side and besides -.""Slow down, N!" Of all the times that Hilda had encountered and talked to N, she never really understood most of what he said, mostly due to the fact that he talked so fast and also because she had a habit of not paying attention halfway through a long conversation. "You know, you talk too fast," she pointed out.
"I believe your friend also mentioned that."
"Cheren? Yeah, he did and I hate to admit it, but the guy's right!"
He didn't appreciate the fact that she pointed out a flaw of his, but he decided to just play along with her. ".. Is that so? Fine, I'll slow down."
She rolled her eyes and sighed in relief. "Thank you." She took another bite out of her candyfloss.
"If I may say so, your act of eating candyfloss whilst I'm talking is.. Irritating."
She frowned and chewed on the blue candy. "You don't have to talk that slow," she stated. "And it's not my fault that you didn't buy cotton candy before getting on the Ferris Wheel. See, now you're just jealous and blaming it on me," she teasingly pointed out with a shrug.
N wasn't used to people making sarcastic jokes, or even jokes, for that matter. It seemed that he probably had to stop complaining and get used to it, though since he probably was going to encounter Hilda a lot more often.
He decided to ignore her statement and take a look out the window. "Look, the sun's setting."
She nodded and continued to eat her candyfloss. "It's pretty." She smiled and turned to look at him. "You know, Bianca and I used to try and chase after the setting sun since we thought that there'd be a pot of gold if we got there before it set and Cheren would chase after us, scorning and scoffing that we misunderstood the Irish saying.. Whatever that saying was."
He seemed rather upset from hearing her story, maybe because he didn't get to have such a cheerful childhood like her. "Why are you telling me this?" he plainly asked.
She frowned. "Oh, I'm sorry. Sometimes I forget you're not a real boy," she sarcastically apologized.
All of a sudden, the Ferris Wheel jolted to a halt, causing Hilda to topple over and fall into N's unwitting arms.
"H-Hilda.." He didn't know whether to push her away or hold her steadily.
"Ow." She got up and pulled herself away from him and rubbed her forehead. "That hurt."
There was a strange feeling as she left his arms, making N feel puzzled and bewildered; it was a feeling he never felt before, it made his heart ache and his body temperature rise rapidly.
"You don't look so good," she pointed out concernedly.
"I'm fine," he assured and turned away. "The Ferris Wheel.. I think it stopped."
"No kidding." She looked down from the window to see that they were up at the top and people were crowding around. "A malfunction, maybe?"
"What do we do?" he asked, a slight demanding, anxiety in his voice.
Hilda took amusement in how helpless and worried he looked; he certainly hadn't expected this to happen.
"I guess we have to wait," she stated and relaxed, crossing her legs and folding her arms behind her head.
"But.. This'll conflict with my schedule!"
She groaned in frustration. "What schedule? Heading off to your headquarters where I'll soon catch up with you and yet again, kick your ass?"
N frowned in disdain; What if he was trapped in the Ferris Wheel for an hour? Or more? He was certain that he couldn't put up with Hilda's jokes and sarcasm for an hour, let alone ten minutes.
Hilda's ears perked up and she turned away from the window to look at him in surprise. "What's that noise?"
The green-haired young man clutched his stomach, knowing for sure where the sound was coming from, which made her realize it, too.
The carefree trainer immediately burst into laughter and didn't even bother to cover her hand over her mouth since she was just too amused to care. "Pfft. N? You must be pretty hungry, huh?"
He pouted angrily and blushed in embarrassment, not the least amused.
She then grinned and put her hand, which was holding the stick of candyfloss, in front of his face, surprising him.
"Here, you can have the rest of this," she offered.
"… You're giving me this?" he asked in disbelief.
"Come on, it's not as if it's a big deal or anything," she pointed out as she took his hand and wrapped it around the stick. "Go on, take it," she urged.
He reluctantly took the cotton candy and hesitantly took a bite out of it. "This.. Tastes quite nice," he remarked in complete surprise and awe. "It's very sugary, though."
"Which is why it tastes so good!" She didn't know whether to be amused or baffled by the fact that he never ate cotton candy before. "N, don't you ever do fun things like riding bumper cars or eating sweets?"
He shook his head without even needing to take a second to think and continued to chomp willingly on the candyfloss.
"Huh." She quietly observed him take amazement in the plain blue cotton candy, which made his face light up in happiness, something that he never expressed before. "I sure hope he doesn't get a sugar rush.." she muttered half-worriedly.
"Hilda." He stopped eating and tilted his head up to look at her.
"Yeah?"
"Thank you."
"… For what?"
"I don't know.. For teaching me how to enjoy stuff like this, I guess. Actually, I don't have a definite answer yet as to why I'm thanking you."
She smiled. "Well, whatever you're thanking me for, you're welcome."
She caught a glimpse of him smiling for a second as he abruptly leaned forward, causing her to flinch and freeze in surprise and confusion.
"N?"
He gently planted a light, soft kiss on her lips and pulled away, leaving her in complete and utter shock. Her face heated up and her cheeks flushed a bright fuchsia as she stuttered and stammered, but couldn't get the words out of her mouth.
"Huh? Wha-?"
"That was… a kiss, I believe. Unless I did it wrong." He desperately tried to keep himself composed and impassive, but he was blushing uncontrollably and kept on touching his lips with his fingers.
"W-why? Why?" she asked, bewildered by the fact that N, of all people, would kiss her.
"I don't know, isn't that what I'm supposed to do?" He grumbled nervously and put a hand over his head. "I watched a few movies and read a few books and they all showed that when a guy and a girl are on a Ferris Wheel, the guy has to kiss the girl… right?"
Her jaw dropped and she was dumbstruck after hearing his bewildering explanation; either he was innocent beyond a child's or he was an excellent liar.
They sat quietly, both of them too shy and embarrassed to even glance at each other and to their relief, the Ferris Wheel was soon fixed and moving. Hilda took a sigh of relief and loosened up as N continued to sit in silence.
As their ride came to an end, they both got up and he allowed her to step out first, much to her surprise since N wasn't known to be a gentleman.
Hilda didn't know if she should bring up what had happened on the Ferris Wheel, but it seemed like she didn't have to.
"I'll see you again, Hilda."
She nodded and smiled faintly. "Yeah."
"Until then, farewell."
She watched him walk away into the distance, but to her surprise and puzzlement, he stopped and turned to take a final look at her.
Before, N only looked forward to seeing Hilda just to battle her and hopefully defeat her and prove that his judgment over humans and pokemon was right, but now… he felt that there was another reason why he looked forward to seeing her again and although he was still confused as to what it was, he gradually came to realizing it and smiled.
"I understand it now," he stated. "The reason why I thanked you.. Thank you, again, for teaching me how to smile."
He turned around and continued to walk and exit the amusement park, disappearing from her sight as Hilda continued to gaze at him and smiled.
"You're welcome."
She sat down on a bench and heaved a sigh as she gazed at the spinning, fluorescent Ferris Wheel.
"I can't help but wonder why it suddenly stopped…"
Elesa playfully spun a wrench in her hand, which seemed to have just been used for some purpose and grinned in satisfaction as she continued to spy on Hilda, who was blissfully unaware of her presence.
"Ah, teenage romance is so sweet," she remarked as she slipped the wrench into her back pocket and headed back to her gym. "I guess my job here is done.. Still, maybe sabotaging my own City's mechanism to spark young love is going too far. I'm such a hopeless romanticist."