11-15-07
10:34pm
Summary–After pondering the biggest obstacle in Drew and May's "relationship", the gang decide to help with a devious plan that can only lead to bad things. Starts with a cube. Some jealousy, confusion and bad acting mixed in. Ends...period.
Disclaimer–I do not own Pokémon, which belongs to its respective owner(s) and is only being used in a fan-made, fictional story.
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Title–And she's so dense sometimes
Chapter 1–A Beginning
By–Moon Prynces
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She's so dense sometimes.
But maybe the right word was...naïve.
The first time it didn't matter. In fact, he wasn't sure why he did it or where it came from. It might have been because after having a Roselia for so long he'd grown fond of that particular flower. And maybe he hadn't meant anything at all by giving it to her.
The fact was though, it became routine. Something that neither of them got tired of, something that was not always expected – as they were usually caught up in the heat of the moment – but it always brought about some pleasant atmosphere with it.
And somewhere along the road – traveling, running into each other, competing, arguing and watching each other grow up – they got closer, friends even.
The fights were less dramatic and taunting, now more teasing with compliments hidden behind insults.
Drew could see it. He watched her since their first few meetings – finding her a worthy rival at first, and then slipping into a comfortable friendship that he didn't mind.
But Brock and Misty (who joined them once in a while) saw something else. Heck, even Ash for all his flaws and blind heroism could hear May laugh louder with him, whether she meant to or not though was still unknown. Max was also around to watch his sister's behavior, though trying to ignore it like the younger brother he was, but then wondering if Drew was even good enough for his sister.
Of course like most things that occurred in their group, it wasn't spoken of.
Until now.
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"You know that's impossible, right?" she asked, looking at the item in his hands.
Drew glanced at her and frowned. "Nothing's impossible," he started.
"Except humans flying, yeah yeah. I've heard it before," May rolled her eyes at his predictability.
"How about a little more encouragement? If I can do it before midnight your brother owes me a twenty," he grinned, still staring at the cube with fingers moving it quickly over and over.
The brunette sighed to herself. "And if you can't do it?"
Drew was frowning again, still looking down in concentration. "I have to do a dare."
She perked up suddenly, leaning forward across the table. "Really? What kind of dare?"
"Don't know yet. He won't tell me unless I lose," Drew responded, glancing up briefly to see her face. "And I won't lose."
"Rubik's cubes are too complicated. I'd rather do math or something instead," May said to herself. "Because at least then there's always someone who can explain to me what I don't get. The chances of you finding someone who can help you with that are slim," she commented.
The thirteen year old girl sighed again as silence reigned and Drew was still focused on the colored cube in his hands – twisting and turning with his eyebrows drawn together.
She watched as he suddenly got up and began taking slow, slightly unsure steps away without once looking up from his important task.
"Where are you going?" she questioned, head in her palms as she still sat at the table.
"Pick up Roselia. Nurse Joy should be done working her magic by now," he said, still not looking up and taking weird, jerky steps.
May jumped up and jogged over just in time to grab his shoulders from behind and steer him away from a Sandslash that was patiently waiting for its trainer to finish a conversation nearby.
Drew looked up in time as he was roughly moved to the left and kept walking. "What–"
"Could you stop staring at that dumb cube all day and watch where you're going? You could've been a pile of ribbons just now! You almost walked into that Sandslash's back!" she scolded over his right shoulder, hands still there as well.
The green-haired boy glanced back to look at her face. "Right. Thanks for–" They both stopped walking and May leaned over, resting her chin on his right shoulder, staring at him with big innocent eyes.
She waited for him to continue. Drew just stared back at her. Slowly his eyes widened and his ears burned suddenly.
And then, he dropped the cube with a loud clack. Drew was removed from her grasp as he quickly bent down to retrieve it.
"I'll see you later!" he said, walking away. "I think Roselia and I are gonna train some more!" he called, looking back briefly.
May just waved energetically. "Alright. Just hope you improve because I am definitely beating you next time!" she said with a smile, watching his leave.
He turned away before she finished and picked up his pace.
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Now if she hadn't felt something, maybe he was just crazy. Drew called out a move distractedly and Roselia looked back at its trainer to see his frustrated face. Instead of listening to him, the pokémon walked over to its master.
Drew looked back up from his thoughts to see his pokémon looking at him questioningly. He let out a big sigh and flopped down onto the grass, lying down completely with hands behind his head.
"Sorry about this. I should've just left you to hang out at the pokémon center and gone for a walk. Now you're just tired and frustrated like I am," Drew said, closing his eyes.
"Ro-ose," the pokémon worried, also sitting down.
"Nothing's wrong," he responded to the unasked question. "Just..." The boy trailed off, then reached into a pocket to pull out the Rubik's cube and picked up where he left off. "A little puzzled," he mumbled, working on the cube.
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"Hey, where have you been?" Misty asked as the other girl entered the room they were staying in. For once the group had decided to get two rooms to separate the genders, since they weren't getting any younger.
"Oh, Drew and I met up for..." May glanced at the clock, "Brunch, I suppose." Misty nodded along, folding her clothes on her bed. "Max has a bet going with him about fixing this Rubik's cube before tonight at twelve."
"You guys sure hang out a lot," the redhead commented carefully.
"Hmm," May nodded, throwing herself onto her bed. "He's like..." She looked over at the other girl, face scrunched up in thought. "He's like my best guy friend. Like you and Ash," she declared.
Misty jerked up at the mention of her and Ash. She stared blankly for a moment. "Right," she said in a low voice, folding something else and looking down again.
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Ash, Brock and Pikachu watched the two discreetly from where they sat at a table in the pokémon center. They looked on as May smiled happily and pointed something out about the cube on the table in front of Drew. He colored suddenly, picking it up and was back to working on it.
They watched as May frowned, saying something else and noticed as Drew's twisting and turning became more erratic.
"At least he blushed," Ash finally mumbled, his palm hiding half his mouth. He moved the hand to rest his chin on it.
"Looks like love to me," Brock commented, picking up a cookie and taking a bite.
"Pika! Pika chuu!" the pokémon input, standing up on the table and raising its arms up. Pikachu's ears twitched and the three turned to see Max walking over with a book tucked under his arm.
"Hey guys! I found this great book on pokémon mating and–" The boy, soon to be eleven years old, stopped as he saw the gaze of his friend's shift to look at something.
Then they both burst out laughing and even Pikachu was smiling with a 'chaa'. Max frowned and took a seat next to Ash.
"What's so funny?" he questioned, fixing his glasses.
"Nothing," Brock said, waving a hand and calmed himself down considerably, while Ash was snorting at the thought. "We were just...watching some mating patterns too," Brock stifled a laugh.
Max just raised a brow at their antics and turned to see what they had been looking at. He sighed as they all now watched Drew make an irritated face and stalk away while May looked up blankly, not understanding.
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Drew angrily twisted and turned the cube in his hands, once again not paying attention to his surroundings. It was already evening – seven or so – and he wasn't looking forward to losing to Max.
Even with the feeling in his stomach threatening to throw off his concentration and May's own smile making his fingers slip the wrong way he wouldn't give up.
But he found himself pausing every once in a while as the images in his head broke free, letting them filter through to explore that strange sensation again. It wasn't something entirely unpleasant, but slightly uncomfortable. The best way he could describe it was when he was waiting for a pokémon contest to begin and as his name was called the nervousness always gave way to excitement and exhilaration.
Except he wasn't far enough along in this to know what this supposed-nervousness would give way to.
As long as he had the puzzle in his hands to work on though, he could preoccupy himself with something he deemed important. Still, his mind wandered as his hands moved swiftly and without thinking.
Ash was just walking by the table that Drew sat at when he heard the loud sound. The dark-haired boy glanced over to find Drew gaping, his hands empty and the Rubik's cube was once again resting on the floor.
"Drew?" he questioned, walking closer.
The younger boy was suddenly animated again, mumbling 'shoot' under his breath and leaning down to snatch up the object.
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He opened his door cautiously after jumping at the sound of a soft knock.
"May?" Drew asked blankly, staring at her. "What are you–" he began in a whisper.
May just smiled brightly in front of him, putting a finger to her lips in the 'shh' motion. Then she used the same finger to point at the clock on the table.
"Eleven...fifty-nine," he said to himself. Then he looked back at her with a raised brow. "Isn't it past your bedtime?"
May rolled her eyes. "Come on. I told Max I'd get you and make sure you didn't cheat. Time's up, buddy," she responded, grabbing his wrist to drag him out of the room.
"Isn't everyone asleep by now?" he asked back, closing his door on his way out.
"Come on, what are you – five?" she said, not looking back as he was being pulled along. "Everyone else is waiting in the lobby and we've got midnight snacks! You have the cube right?"
Drew was already pulling it out of his pocket. "You wanna let go of me now?"
"Nope. You might try to cheat and finish even a little bit more," she said back.
He sighed, and in a few more seconds they emerged from the hallway to see the group sitting at a table that normally seated four but now had two more chairs sloppily pulled closer. A few other trainers and their pokémon hung around while two Chansey moved around the back of the counter.
As the two came closer they saw that Ash was in an intense thumb war battle with Max – and was losing terribly to the younger boy. Meanwhile Brock was standing at one end of the relatively small table with the chair pushed to the side, and making a sandwich as Misty instructed him to what she preferred. Pikachu was happily sitting back with a bottle of ketchup, which squirted out every time he laughed at Ash and landing on his small, yellow body.
"Wow, quite a party," Drew commented as he was moved to sit in the chair that Brock had rejected, with Ash on his left.
May took her spot on the opposite side next to Misty. Brock looked up with a grin. "Hungry?" he asked.
"No," Drew shook his head.
"Not yet you mean," Ash replied, not looking away from the battle he was waging. Finally, "Okay, forget this." He dropped his hand away with a pout.
Max shrugged as if he didn't understand his friend's frustration. "So, do you have it?" he questioned, looking past Ash to stare at Drew.
The green-haired boy let out a hiss of air. "Yeah..." he brought the hand onto the table and everyone looked over.
"Ouch," Brock commented.
Misty looked at him sympathetically. Pikachu stared at the cube blankly.
"Wow, how'd you get that far in one day?" Ash marveled, picking up the object and looking at all the sides.
"Not even a day. He had less than twenty-four hours," Max said matter-of-factly.
"But it was still impossible. Just look. How in the world would you move it so those last three..." May said, grabbing the cube from Ash and turning it over in her hands to examine it.
Max pushed his glasses to their rightful spot on his nose and took the cube away from her. Brock went back to finishing Misty's sandwich as everyone watched the kid genius twist and turn the cube a few times before coming out successful.
"Nice job, Max," Misty said with a smile. Drew shrugged helplessly.
"Showoff," May muttered, rolling her eyes away from her brother.
"So then what does he lose?" Ash questioned.
"A dare," Drew mumbled.
Everyone looked at Max intently, except Drew who was blowing his bangs away as he stared at the ceiling and putting his arms behind his head. He looked back down and noticed May's gaze on him.
"I think I'll just save it for later," Max finally announced, making Ash and Misty groan.
The group stayed up another hour, unable to control the sleep that crept in and with all the excitement gone when Max said he didn't have a dare ready yet.
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He woke up at his usual 'late' time – nine in the morning – and rolled over to try and get some more shut eye. After giving up and commencing with the normal morning routine Drew was out and about, leaving his room for breakfast.
On his way towards the lobby, someone called out to him. The green-haired boy turned around to see a younger boy with glasses jogging over.
Max paused just before Drew, then looked up with a glint in his eyes. "I have the dare," he stated, the words making Drew freeze.
"Oh. Right. Let's get it over with then," he responded, trying to fight off the feeling.
He smiled, pausing for effect. "You have to make May jealous," Max finally said.
Drew blinked in confusion. "Jealous? Of what?"
"Jealous," he replied, "Over you."
Drew still stared. "I don't follow. What?"
Max rolled his eyes. "Denial," he muttered. "You know...make her get jealous of you being tied down to something, or someone, else. Get her to throw a hissy fit."
"Doesn't this sound like you exacting revenge on your own sister?" Drew asked with cautious eyes.
"Trust me. It's about having you do something embarrassing and impossible! That's all!" Max smiled happily to himself. "You can use whatever means necessary, but no one else can know what you're trying to do. Not even a pokémon."
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AGHHHH. Someone hit me. Please. Maybe it'll set me straight and get some real work done. Instead of trying half-a**ed attempts at...this.
Three chapters total, all of which are done.
12-1-07