Rosa raced down the streets of Aspertia City with great alacrity. She hadn't been able to come home since she left on her Pokémon journey. Now, her busy schedule has finally yielded enough to allow her to stay for the whole weekend. She had already been looking forward to this, but now, she found out something that made her the happiest girl in the world: her best friend Hugh was also back in town. They hadn't been able to spend any quality alone time together since Arceus-knows-how-long-ago. And now that they finally had the chance, Rosa wasn't about to let it slip through her fingers.
As she dashed up to the front door of her friend and rival's house, Rosa had to stop and collect herself. The last thing she needed was for her rival to think that she was desperate to be with him. He would surely take that the wrong way. Once she had composed herself, she knocked on the door and waited. Soon, the door was opened, revealing Rosa's best friend Hugh standing there. He smiled warmly when he saw her.
"Well, this is a surprise," he said, "I didn't expect to see you here, Rosa. You couldn't have called on the Xtranceiver or anything?"
"I wanted to surprise you, silly," Rosa told him, "I heard you were back in town, so I decided to come see you."
"And some homecoming this has been," her friend responded, "No sooner than I walk in the door, my folks go and stick me with babysitting duty."
As if on cue, Hugh's little sister Hana peeked out from behind her brother to see what was going on. Her faithful Liepard stood by her side as it always did. Once she recognized her brother's best friend, she immediately came forward and excitedly greeted her with a smile.
"Hi Rosa," she beamed, "Guess what: mommy and daddy are gone for the night! They said that they were going to a confer… uh, a confiri…"
"Conference," Hugh corrected.
"Oh right," Hana exclaimed, "They were going to a conference. They're going to be out all night, so me and big brother have the house all to ourselves. Why don't you come inside? Me and Liepard have something to show you!"
Before waiting for an answer, Hana darted back into the house with her faithful Liepard at her side, leaving Hugh and Rosa alone to talk.
"She never changes, does she?" he observed, "Anyway, I'm sorry things turned out like this. I know you wanted to spend some time together, but I don't think we can right now."
"Who says we can't?" Rosa asked, "Why don't I help you watch Hana for a while?"
Hugh stared at her. "Are you sure?" he asked her, "You know she's not going to be easy."
"All the more reason I should help," she answered, "It's nothing I haven't done before, you know. I used to babysit her all the time when you went out with your parents, remember? And besides, you'll need some help with dinner won't you? Since you're so hopeless in the kitchen, after all."
He smiled. "Well, when you put it like that," he began, "I guess I could use a hand. Why don't you come inside?"
Hugh led her inside to the place that had for so long been her second home. She hadn't been here in years, but it was just as she remembered it. Hana and Liepard were waiting for them in the living room.
"Check this out," she told them, "Liepard learned this really cool new move! Would you like to see it?"
"Sure," Rosa laughed, "Just as long as you don't break anything."
"Okay, watch this," Hana said getting into position, "Liepard, use Assist!"
With the command given, Liepard raised its right paw, forming a white ball of energy in front of it. Soon, vines shot out from the ball in the form of a Vine Whip attack. The vines quickly wrapped themselves around both Hugh and Rosa and tied them tightly together. Both of them turned red when they realized the position they were in, their bodies held very close to each other's.
"See?" Hana beamed, "I managed to call on big brother's Serperior's Vine Whip attack and use it as our own. Isn't that cool?"
"Uh, yeah, it's great," Hugh said nervously, "Now can you please untie us?"
The smile faded from Hana's face. "Untie you?"
She looked at Liepard, who looked back as if to say it didn't know how either.
"You don't know how?" Rosa asked her.
"I-I'll look it up!" she stammered, "I think I wrote it down somewhere. I'll go check!"
Before either of them could say anything, Hana left the two teenagers to go find her notes, leaving them all by themselves. They stood in awkward silence for several minutes as Hana still didn't come back. Eventually, Rosa decided to break the silence.
"You don't have to look so uncomfortable," she told her friend, "I'm sure you're enjoying this a lot more than I am."
"Well," Hugh smirked, "Your chest is making it kind of hard to breathe."
Rosa couldn't help but laugh. That's what she liked about him. Any other guy would have either been too nervous to articulate a full sentence or acted like a total perv and made her want to punch them. But Hugh was able to turn her games around and crack a few jokes with her and play the game too. He always knew the right things to say to make her laugh. Maybe this wasn't so bad of a position after all…
After they had finally sorted themselves out, Rosa went into the kitchen to start dinner while Hugh stayed behind to watch Hana. He was still thinking about what Rosa had said to him while they were tied up together. The truth was, he did enjoy it, but not for the reasons she was thinking of. He just liked being close to her like that. The problem was that he didn't understand why that was. They were only friends. He shouldn't be thinking about her like that. Still, she was the only girl that he ever really cared about. Could something really have changed between them? No, that couldn't be true. He knew her better than anyone. If anything had really changed, she would be the first to know. He took a pretzel from the bowl on the coffee table and started to munch on it.
"Hey big brother?" Hana asked him, "Can I ask you something?"
"Sure," he told her, popping the last of the pretzel in his mouth.
"When are you and Rosa going to get married?"
Hugh almost choked on the pretzel when she asked that. The sudden clatter of pots and pans from the kitchen told him Rosa had heard that too.
"Wh-where did you get that idea from?" he gasped once he regained his breath.
"Well, mommy told me," Hana explained, "That when a boy and a girl like each other very much, they get married. And since you and Rosa seem to like each other a lot, I figured that you were going to marry each other."
"It's not like that!" Hugh protested, "We don't like each other like that. We're just friends right now."
"But there have been many people who started out as just friends and then got married," she pointed out, "I saw things like that on TV. Why don't you two do that?"
"You shouldn't believe everything you see on TV," he told her, "We just want to stay friends right now. Besides, there are several things that we would have to do before we get married."
"Like what?" Hana asked.
Hugh paused as he tried to think of a response. "Well…" he began, "We would have to be dating first. We'd have to see if we were really able to be together like that. And there has to be a certain level of attraction before we can begin dating."
"But you two could begin dating and get married if you wanted to, right?"
He had no answer for that one. Fortunately, Rosa had come in at just the right time.
"We could," she began, "But first, he would have to work on his attitude a bit. I don't want to have my husband going to jail because he flew off the handle at the wrong person yet again."
Hugh smirked. "This coming from a girl who once beat down some guy for coming on too strong at the amusement park?"
"Fair enough," Rosa conceded.
"But don't you two love each other?" Hana asked, "If so, why don't you get married and start a family like mommy and daddy?"
Rosa smiled at her. "We do love each other," she explained, "But not quite in that way. Maybe someday it will happen, but not today. Now go on. Dinner will be ready in a few moments, so you'd better go wash up."
"Awwww!"
"Now Hana," she told her, "Don't be like that. All I'm asking is that you go wash your hands before dinner. If you're good, we can play a game after dinner if you'd like."
"Okay!" Hana exclaimed as she ran upstairs with Liepard. Rosa and Hugh were left to talk alone.
"She never seems to tire," he observed, "how do you manage to handle her so well?"
"I don't know," Rosa admitted, "I guess I'm just one of those people who are just naturally good at taking care of kids. My mom was a receptionist at a Pokémon Center, so maybe it's hereditary?"
"Well, either way," Hugh told her, "I know you'll make somebody one hell of a wife and mother someday."
She blushed when she heard that. "Alright now," she said, "You'd better get cleaned up yourself. I'll go ahead and get everything set for dinner while you go wash your hands too."
"Sheesh," he complained, "We're not even married yet, and you're already nagging me?"
"You'd better get used to it," Rosa giggled, "One day, some lucky girl is going to get her hands on you, and you'll have to put up with it for the rest of your life."
Hugh smiled at her, and left to get cleaned up. Rosa watched him go as his words continued to play over and over in her heart. 'You'll make somebody one hell of a wife and mother someday.' Did he really think that way of her? Even if he didn't, it still made her feel special that she could hear him say those words to her. She left to go set the table for dinner.
After dinner, Hugh and Rosa kept their promise and played a few games with Hana. They played games like Scrabble, Pictionary and Trouble, and Hana won every time. It was obvious that she had been practicing for this for a long time. Finally, Hana decided that the next game she wanted to play was Twister. While she set everything up, Hugh and Rosa got to talk a bit.
"You know," Rosa began, "You're doing a really good job of letting her win these games."
"That's just it," he answered, "I'm not."
"You're not?" she asked, "What do you mean you're not? I mean, how else is she beating the both of us so bad?"
"I don't know," Hugh admitted, "But I think something's up. How else would she be able to play "zinfandel" for 54 points? How does she even know what a zinfandel is?"
"You know, you may be on to something," Rosa agreed, "Maybe we've been underestimating her this whole time."
"I think it's time we took her down a peg," he suggested.
"Sounds like a plan," she agreed.
Once their alliance was formed, Hana called them back to play. They returned to find Hana sitting by the spinner instead of on the mat.
"I'll spin the spinner," she told them, "You two will play the game yourselves."
They stared at her for a while. "Are you sure about this?" Rosa asked, "I thought that you wanted to play this."
"It's okay," Hana answered, "I wanted to be the one spinning the spinner anyway. Now come on, let's play!"
They were a bit hesitant, but soon decided to give it a try. The game started out normal enough, but as it went on, Hugh and Rosa began to get into increasingly awkward positions. Eventually, they got to the point where Hugh was standing over Rosa as they were facing each other up close. They were both blushing as they tried to hold their position. As if things weren't awkward enough, Liepard snuck up behind them and clawed the back of Hugh's leg. He then slipped and landed on Rosa as they both fell down.
"Are you okay?" he asked her.
"Yeah," she groaned, "I'm fine."
He started to get up, but his hand slipped and landed right on Rosa's breast. They both stood there staring at his hand for about a second as they tried to process what just happened. Once they realized it, however, they both jumped back as if they had just been hit with a ThunderShock attack, both as red as humanly possible.
"How about best two out of three?" Hana asked them.
"Uh… no," Rosa answered a little shakily, "I think we're good."
"Okay," she said, "Then how about we play something else? I've got it, how about we play Truth or Dare?"
"I don't know about this," Hugh told her.
"It's easy!" Hana insisted, "Watch, I'll make this easy for you. Rosa, truth or dare?"
Not wanting to reveal anything that she had been thinking of recently, Rosa answered, "Dare."
"I dare you," Hana began, "To make out with big brother for two minutes."
Hugh and Rosa both looked at each other unsure of what to do.
"Truth," Rosa told Hana.
"You can't change your answer now," Hana responded.
"Well, then I guess you won," Hugh told her, "That was fun, what's next?"
"Well, if you two don't want to play that," she began, "You can play another game I read about called 'Seven Minutes in-'"
"OKAY," both of them interrupted, "Time for bed!"
They led a protesting Hana to the stairs trying to goad her to go back to her room. Eventually, they managed to convince her to go, along with Liepard, upstairs. Rosa and Hugh stayed behind as they tried to adjust themselves to what had just happened between them. When their eyes met, they both laughed nervously.
"That was really awkward," Rosa told him, "Why don't we just forget it ever happened?"
"Forget what?" Hugh asked.
She laughed. "Thank you Hugh," she said, "I'm so lucky to have a friend like you."
He smiled at her. He had always loved her laugh. It sounded so melodic to him that it was just the cutest thing he'd ever heard.
"You know," he began, "It's still early. Do you want to stay and watch a movie or something?"
"I'd love that," Rosa answered, "I'll make the popcorn, you go ahead and pick the movie. I'll be right back. Don't stop being so handsome."
Hugh watched her as she ducked into the kitchen. "It's official," he thought to himself, "Something has definitely changed between us."
