I slammed the door shut once I was inside, a large, brown suitcase in my hand and a smaller duffle bag hung off of my back. This isn't all I needed, but it will do for now. I didn't want to spend anymore time saying my goodbyes to Red and the rest of my friends. I had to move on with my life, but I wasn't sure if college was the way I had wanted to do that. Either way, I was accepted for early admission, so I guess that I'd give it a try.
I could tell that my parents had beaten me here, seeing the neatly made bed and most of my larger things from my old home had already been assembled. I was happy to see my fish tank in the corner of my tiny dorm. Compared to the size of my massive fish tank, the room had looked even smaller. Although, I didn't mind. My fish was what kept me calm, and I had really needed that.
I took my phone out of my pocket, and threw it on my bed. I had began to stare longingly at it. I had already missed home and everyone else. It had only been a few hours on the flight but knowing that I couldn't see them whenever I wanted to really got to me. The people who had taken care of me were hundreds of miles away. Cinnabar Island to Viridian City was too much for me to handle. I had already missed Red, way more than I wanted to admit to myself. Saying goodbye to him was terrible and I never wanted to let go of the long hug we shared before I had bored the plane. I needed to call him.
"Hello? Shelly? You there?" It had hurt to hear his voice. He didn't seem upset that I had left at all. The relaxed tone in his voice had brought tears to my eyes and a catch in my throat. I had thought that his voice would solve all of my troubles, but I soon came to terms that a human's voice doesn't have that much power.
"Hey, Red. My dorm is so small. I'm already hating this and I want to go home. I want to come back to you. Now." I could hear the whine in my voice and it made me embarrassed. I had always been strong around Red and now this. Could the day get any worse?
"Shell, you'll be ok. You've always got me to talk to. But I really have some important things I needed to take care of. Sorry but, we'll have to talk later. Bye, Shell." Click. The sound of his voice, and that nickname had brought a shiver through my body. I had needed him more that I had though. He was my everything, but he didn't know that. I truly was excited to be doing something new with my life, but I wanted to be doing it with him. I took off my green converse and laid them neatly by the door. It was time for me to start making this place seem like home.
I unpacked what I had in my suitcase and looked out of the window. All of the buildings reflected the sunlight. It was so beautiful I almost forgot how much I had missed home. I wanted to take an opportunity to go and explore the town, to see if what was here could justify the good in my leaving. I grabbed my converse. They looked kind of strange with a contrast of green shoes and my purple leggings, but when they're your only shoes, you have to make do. Cinnabar Island was always really hot, and always kind of muddy and sandy on the ground. I had never even worn shoes around town just because whenever one wore shoes, the were bound to get messy and or wet. Until Red had bought me my green converse for Christmas, which he thought was funny because Red and green perfectly sum up Christmas, and his sense of childish humor.
Remembering this story again always brought a smile to my face, but this time it gave me a melancholy feeling. I would always have these to remember how great he was, but I wouldn't get to see him for a really long time. Red had practically been my whole life back home. Cinnabar Island is pretty small, once you make a friend, you stick with them. There aren't a lot of people your age to choose from. I was more than happy with Red, he was a great choice for me. He was always the one to calm me down whenever I got too stressed out. He was also the rebel of my grade, with a graduating class of 23 people. He was always the one getting me into adventures which I didn't know at the time I had loved so dearly. Everything he ever did for me was out of his heart, and not to gain anything in return.
As I got to the ground floor of my dorm complex, a few other freshmen were sitting around drinking Oran berry smoothies. Coming from my small town, I didn't really have great socializing skills. Also, my appearance most of the time led people to believe I was slightly insane. Along with my green shoes and purple tights, I had on high waisted black shorts and a *** Lapras swimming team hoodie on that had been my favorite since I was 12. My hair, which was various shades of silver and blue, was tied up in a messy bun. I also had my shell necklace on which Mom had gotten me when I was born. Being so close to water had inspired her to name me Shelly and she loved that name. She then told my jerk of a dad to find me a shell along the beach. It has a crack down the middle but it's not completely broken, which I believe is a metaphor for my whole life.
I decided to walk over to the group. I had no friends in this huge town and I needed to start somewhere. I walked over sheepishly and tried to be as friendly as I had ever been.
"Hey, I'm Shelly. Are you guys new to this town as well?" I received a bunch of blank stares. Not exactly how I wanted to start these friendships. A girl with long, extremely curly black hair with the best brown eyes I had ever seen spoke up to my extremely lame introduction.
"Hey, I'm Cass. I actually used to live just down the street from this building. I know this town like the back of my hand. This here is Branden." Not meaning to be so obvious, I looked over them once or twice. She was quite pretty, and definitely seemed like a city girl. She had both ears pierced many times and her lip also had two rings in it. The guy looked nothing like Red. His hair was buzzed and he had a tattoo on his neck. It was written in Unknown, which I could not yet decipher. His jeans were torn up while she wore a bright, floral dress that was a little short for my liking. Together they seemed like a modern day Cynthia and Wallace, both way more attractive than myself.
"What's up? I'm Branden, Cass' cousin. I'm from Pallet town, which is pretty lame, I know." Pallet town was about twice the size of where I had come from, but he's right, that place was pretty lame. As I've heard there was almost nothing to do there, and the Professor was never in his lab. The only form of entertainment there was training the newly birthed Pokemon. I reached out to shake his hand, which I had realized had more Unknown scripted on it.
"Don't worry, I don't mind where you came from. My town is pretty lame too, but the beach is pretty cool."
"No way, you can't be from Cinnabar, I've only ever met 1 other person from there and they turned out to be a total drag. Don't let me down, ok?" Even though his appearance reminded me nothing of Red, he proceeded to do a half smirk half grin at me. His smile was almost identical to Red's and I felt a sort of relief. I wasn't happy that Red was gone, but maybe I could at least have a few good friends here too. I was starting to lose some of my anxiety. I had introduced myself again to the other three people sitting near them. A couple named Dianne and Tate from Lavender Town who had came here to both be vets, and another guy who had long, dyed red, floppy hair that was pretty cute whose name was Hugo. They all seemed like they were interested in me, which was a first. I had never gotten much attention and I had liked it that was.
Branden had been the most interesting to me which was weird because his life actually seemed pretty boring. I felt kind of bad that cass had gotten to live here while he was stuck in a dead beat town. His style was very city like though which confused me until he explained he had been here for a few months getting settled in with Cass. He had told me that my style would probably change, although I didn't want it to. I loved to dye my hair and I never wanted to stop, unless my hair got too damaged. Branden had told me that he liked my hair, which made me feel special. Cass then finished her smoothie and threw it in the trash can which was even a step up in technology for me since it opened automatically.
"Branden, Hugo, Dianne, Tate, and Shelly, was it? Did you guys want to go the Plaza with me? Around this time of year they have a Summer Celebration. There are usually Sunflora contests and Marill races. And pokemon are allowed too, so you can bring them along if you'd like!" I was beyond excited after Cass had said this. Pokemon were all just so cute, and not leaving Cinnabar only gave me a very limited look at the spectrum. Dianne and Tate had threw their pokeballs first. They had matching seals and Dianne's pokemon showed to be a Butterfree and Tate's a Beedrill. Both pokemon and trainer's were so much in sync that is was obvious they had been together for the majority of their life. I admired their connection with each other and began to miss Red again.
Cass ** then threw an ultra ball out of her dress pocket, which I had never seen before. The best pokeball we had in Cinnabar was a great ball because truthfully the pokemon found there were not that impressive. There was a quick flash of blinding light leading to a Ninetails with a pink bow on it's ear, very well matching Cass's personality. The Ninetails was very well groomed which led me to believe that Cass was a coordinator and not a trainer. Ninetails was unlike anything I had ever seen, which had mostly been water and rock types. Hugo's pokemon was already out of his pokeball, sitting next to him, which I had no realized. His pokemon was a slowpoke which honestly scared me a little. It was very massive compared to what I had seen on my pokedex.
Last to go was Branden. He threw his great ball nonchalantly into the air, making sure he threw it so that it would not go to high. A pokemon flew out of the ball and fell heavily to the ground. An Arbok was now sitting on the ground filling up tons of previously unused space. It's scales were a very vibrant shade of purple that you could see from anywhere in a crowd. It seemed very tame for their usual sly, anxious nature. It seemed to get along very well with Cass, maybe even more than Branden himself, which struck me as odd.
"Arbok! I've missed you so so so much! How's it going buddy?" Cass sounded very cheerful as the snake pokemon slithered over to her feet.
"Cass sent me this pokemon for my 10th birthday 9 years ago. I had called her as a kid to catch up when we got on the topic of how most of the pokemon in my area were too domestic and did not want to be caught. Cass and my Aunt them came over on my 10th birthday with this baby Arbok. I was so surprised and so thankful that vowed to Cass that she would always be my favorite cousin. We called each other every week with the tales of what would happen in the city. I then made it my goal to live down here one day, and look at me now!" He smirked again, which made me smile.
"Shelly, you have a great smile, you should smile more!"
"Thanks, Branden, but I've got a lot on my mind right now."
"What's wrong, Shelly?"
"I'm just missing home. I had to leave my, uhm, best friend behind in order to come here. I really miss him and I wish he would call me, but he said he had some stuff to do." My description of him was accurate, I think. I didn't know if best friend was the right word, but I had to leave before we got to have 'the talk'.
"I can't say that I understand, I didn't really have anyone back home. I'm ecstatic to be here. And, hey, you've got me now!" He proceeded to give me a hug which I wasn't ready for. I didn't really enjoy physical contact, but I let him hug me. I needed a friend at the moment.
"Enough sorrow for me, at least for now. Let's get going to the Plaza, I'm ready for some fun."