Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

I felt inspired to do a one-shot of these two and I knew I couldn't hide it from you all, so here it is. Christmas is here, and now we spend time with our loved ones.

AbilityShipping, just so you know.

"Pidgey!" "Pidgey!"

A girl woke up to the sound of a flock of Pidgey flying overhead. She stared at her ceiling for a few minutes, not moving, not speaking, just thinking. She knew what day it was, but she didn't really care. Sure it was Christmas Eve, but it's not like she was going to see any family today. She had just the two days off; today and tomorrow. It was hardly enough to visit family for any significant time.

She slowly sat up and crawled out of bed, leaving the bed unmade, and made her way over to the mirror. She looked into it; her lilac hair was all ruffled and messy and she looked like she hadn't slept in the last couple days, which was true with all the recent challengers, but that wasn't what caught her eye. She looked into the reflection of her eyes and could see that her eyes were filled with sadness. She couldn't explain why she could feel this emotion until she remembered the incident exactly three months ago.

"Ash…"

It had been three months since she had battled Ash for the second time and lost, forfeiting an Ability Symbol in the process. But that wasn't the reason she battled all-out that day; she battled knowing that if she won again, Ash would have had to stay longer to beat her. Instead however, she could only watch as her crush walked off into the distance and even now, could still vividly recall what she was thinking at the time.

"Guess you can't sense feelings yet Ash, or you would've sensed my feelings for you."

At the time, it seemed like the right thought, but now she was kicking herself for not thinking about going after him. It was what she had wanted to do ever since he left; she contemplated telling Scott to find a new Salon Maiden and running after him, but there was always one thing stopping her. Where was she going to look? Pikachu had told her that Ash always went on journeys to new regions, so he had to be somewhere else, right?

She averted her gaze from the mirror as she walked towards the window and peered outside. The trees surrounding her cabin had lost all their beautiful leaves and the ground which used to be a dirt path was coated with a thick blanket of snow. The view was simply…

"Magical."

With this sight in front of her, a thought found its way into her head. "It was Christmas, wasn't it? He may not be here at Tohjo Falls, but he'd have to visit his family, wouldn't he?"

With this idea firmly planted in her mind, she quickly got changed and grabbed her poké balls. She walked out of her cabin and locked the door; she took a few steps before she felt an icy wind send a shiver down her spine.

"Two hours in this chilly weather for a chance at seeing Ash?" She paused. "I'd take that any day."

She tightened her lavender scarf and continued walking through the snow, eager to finally see that raven-haired boy again.

After two bone-chilling hours of trudging through snow, she finally found herself standing at the top of a hill overlooking a town. She noticed a wooden sign and read it aloud.

"Pallet Town, a pure white beginning."

Hearing these words come out of her mouth gave her a sigh of relief; she had finally arrived in Pallet Town, now she just had to find Ash. She sighed and began her march towards the closest house she could see.

"Wait? Did that sign say a pure white beginning?"

She couldn't help but notice the coincidence between these words and her reason for being here. Here she was, travelling through all this white snow to find Ash, a trainer so pure of heart that it made her heart flutter at the mere thought of his name, with the hope that maybe it could be the beginning of something truly beautiful. She snapped out of her thoughts and found herself standing in front of a house.

"Guess I'm already here."

One thing was for sure, time certainly flew when her mind was focused on Ash. She walked up towards the door and knocked. She could hear the people inside wonder who it could be at the door and she got nervous, thinking maybe she was intruding something she shouldn't be.

"Maybe I should just keep going."

But before she could turn around and walk back towards the main path, she found herself looking at a person staring down at her. She could sense his slight aggravation with her disturbance, but hoped that he wouldn't be too upset to answer anything. After a couple seconds of waiting, she heard the man say something.

"Can I help you?" He said in an obviously unhappy tone.

"He certainly isn't happy about this." She pulled down her scarf and began to speak.

"Uh, yes. I'm sorry to bother you, but I'm looking for ummm, Ash's house."

"Ash's house." She was upset with herself for not being able to remember Ash's last name, but she couldn't help but smile knowing she was so close to seeing him again.

"Oh, you mean the Ketchum's house?"

"Ketchum! Of course, how could I have forgotten?" She snapped back into reality and could see the man didn't seem nearly as upset anymore. "Maybe he thought I was a saleswoman trying to sell him a new kind of Poké ball or something." She quickly fumbled her search for an appropriate answer in her head before giving up and giving the man a slight nod.

"It's three houses down, on the right side."

"So I'm just three houses away…" The thought trailed off as it was replaced with a large grin on her face and a small blush in her cheeks.

"Thank you so much." She said, albeit a little too quickly, as she ran off and down the path.

"Glad I could help!" The man yelled behind her.

"And did you ever." She thought as she sped towards the house that was recently confirmed to be Ash's.

In little to no time at all, she found herself standing on the porch outside what she was told was Ash's house. She was in no rush to knock on the door however; her nerves were starting to freeze her in place of the chilly gusts of wind. She turned and looked around where she stood; most of the ground was covered in snow, but she could make out one surprisingly resilient flower. She admired the flower with an adoring stare and could sense the flower's feelings.

"Wow, that flower really is happy. It feels empowered by making its way through such harsh times."

For some reason, this brought thoughts of a certain someone back to her head and she regained her focus on the task at hand. She took the remaining couple of steps until she was face-to-face with the door. She brought her nervously shaking hand up until it briefly touched the door.

"Here goes everything…"

She gently tapped on the door and held her breath, unsure about what was awaiting her. All these thoughts unwillingly crawled into her head.

"What if I'm at the wrong house? Well maybe they can find me the correct house? But what if I walk in and I find Ash and May sitting together sharing a cup of cocoa? That was what I was hoping we would do… Calm down! Ash and May are not going to be in there together. You just need to relax… And breathe!"

She gasped for air, forgetting she had been holding her breath waiting for someone to answer the door. She put her ear to the door and could hear the faint sound of footsteps across a wooden floor. As the steps got lighter she backed away from the door and stood there ready to present herself to Ash. The doorknob turned and the door slowly opened, but instead of the raven-haired boy she was expecting to see, she saw herself face-to-face with a relatively older woman who she assumed to be his mother.

"Why hello there, is there anything I can help you with?"

"Um, yes," she said shyly. "I'm actually looking for Ash Ketchum, is he here?"

"Yes! I remembered his last name!" She could feel a smile of pride spread across her face, but she couldn't withdraw it.

"Sorry he's not here right now…"

Her heart cracked at the news of Ash not being there. "What…?" She felt her previous smile become a frown rather quickly.

"…But if you come back in a couple hours or so, he should be here. Do you mind telling me who you are though?"

"He's going to be here!" She used every fibre of her being to resist the urge to jump for joy, before realizing she had asked her a question.

"Oh, sorry. I should've started with that, I'm…" She was interrupted by the woman standing in the doorway.

"Before you answer, would you like to come inside? You look like you've been out here a while and I wouldn't want you to freeze."

"Maybe he gets his niceness from her, just like those brown eyes."

"I'd love to." She said as she followed the woman inside.

"Just a couple more hours to go…"

"So you're Anabel?"

"Why did she say it like that? Does she already know me or something?" She could tell that the woman, who previously introduced herself as Delia and did confirm herself to be Ash's mother, made it sound as if this wasn't the first time she had heard of her.

"Yes, that would be me."

"I must say, he was right about you."

"What do you mean 'right about me'?" She watched Delia with open eyes.

"What does she mean? Did Ash tell her something that he didn't tell me?" Her cheeks reddened and she shyly looked down at her feet.

"Oh I think you'll find out soon enough."

"So I have been mentioned, but was it good or bad?" She worried about what her crush might have said for about a minute before her thoughts were interrupted by Delia.

"I'm guessing you're here to surprise Ash, am I correct?"

"How did she know…? Well I guess it's not that hard to figure out… I did show up unannounced and everything and I did specifically ask for Ash earlier…" She sighed before carefully wording her response as to not include her reasoning.

"Uh, yeah. I thought it'd be a real treat he wouldn't be expecting."

"Trust me; he definitely won't be expecting this."

"What do you mean?" She started to worry about the meaning behind Ash's mother's words.

"Don't worry about it." Delia smiled, reassuring her that it was nothing to be afraid about. "Now I think we'll be alone for quite a while longer so if there's anything you'd like to ask, please do not hesitate.

"Perfect."

"Actually, Mrs. Ketchum…" She began before once again being interrupted by Ash's mother.

"Please, just call me Delia."

"Oh, well actually Delia…" She couldn't deny that she felt weird that she was on a first-name basis with 'Delia,' but she let it go and continued, "I was hoping you could help me surprise Ash."

"Oh, I'd be delighted to, how can I help?"

Seeing that Ash's mother was willing to help, she knew her surprise would be one for the record books.

"Well, I was thinking that maybe…"

"Ugh!" A boy, visibly upset with the events that had occurred that day, was grunting and groaning as he walked back towards his house with a pokémon on his shoulder.

"At least it's only a couple of minutes away now."

His faithful companion sent a small jolt of electricity through the boy and immediately gathering his attention.

"What is it Pikachu?" He asked without stopping his walk home.

"Pi-Pika-Pi-Pi. Pika?" Pikachu asked his trainer.

"You bet I'm disappointed, I was looking forward to seeing her again too."

"Disappointed? How about devastated? I'd been looking forward to it for a couple weeks now. Maybe I should have let her know ahead of time, but I guess then it wouldn't have been a surprise…" He sighed.

"Pika-Pika!" Pikachu tried to make his trainer forget about his previous disappointment, but seemingly to no avail.

"It's no use Pikachu…" His stomach grumbled, causing Pikachu to jump. "Maybe a good Christmas feast would make me feel better." He laughed, while Pikachu felt somewhat embarrassed being scared of Ash's stomach.

He turned up the small walkway towards his house and in a disgruntled manner twisted the doorknob and pushed open the door.

"Ma, I'm home…" He noticed that his voice probably had a discontented tone, but he shrugged it off, knowing that he'd be telling her what happened anyways.

"Pi-Pikachu!" Pikachu made his presence known.

He took a couple steps and could see clearly that his mother was putting the finishing touches on a rather large present. He swore that if he curled into a ball, he could probably fit inside it.

"Oh hey Ash!" His mother finally noticed him and was practically running up to him. "How'd it go?"

Hidden from the two of them, a girl listened with interest. "How did what go? Is this why he wasn't here?"

He sighed; unknowing to the fact that his mother already knew what he was going to say. "It didn't. I looked for at least a couple hours, but I couldn't find her anywhere."

The girl cringed hearing this. "He was out trying to find some girl… Maybe I shouldn't even bother."

"I mean, I checked her house, I checked the entire forest, I even checked the Battle Tower itself but nobody seemed to know where she was."

"He spent all this time trying to find this one person… I definitely shouldn't… Wait! Did he just say Battle Tower?" Her disappointment was quickly replaced with a feeling of happiness. "He spent this whole day looking for me, didn't he? What an adorable fool." She fought back the urge to laugh at the situation, as to not give up her hiding spot, and continued to listen in on the conversation Ash was having with 'Delia'.

"Oh, I'm so sorry sweetie." Delia reached out to her son and gave him a hug. "I think I know how to make you feel better."

"How Mom?" He asked as if he'd given up all hope on ever being happy again. "Is it time for dinner or something?"

"Not quite dear." Delia laughed, trying to keep up the façade. "But because of how disappointed you are, I think you should get to open one present tonight."

"Alright…" He mumbled as he walked towards the Christmas tree. "Pikachu, why don't you decide which present we should open?"

"Pika-Pi," Pikachu exclaimed. He jumped off Ash's shoulder and ran around the presents, sniffing each present thoroughly before coming up to the large present they had watched Delia fiddle around with as Ash opened the door. He sniffed it and recognized a familiar scent. "Pi-Pikachu!" Pikachu yelled to his trainer as he pointed at the present.

"Good job Pikachu," both of the girls thought as they both released a sigh of relief.

"You want the big one, eh?" He grinned at his pokémon's choice. "I would've picked that one too."

He made his way over to the present and kneeled, admiring the size of it. "It's pretty big, I wonder what it is."

Ash checked it over, but could not find a label. He shrugged and tore the wrapping paper off of the top of the present which revealed a cardboard box.

"I guess this is it… Start the countdown." Anabel felt her pulse quicken and she knew her cheeks were reddening by the second.

Ash took a deep breath and opened the box. Once he could clearly see what was inside, he felt his sadness replaced with both shock and joy.

"An-Anabel? Wh-What are you d-doing here?"

"He's really surprised, isn't he?" She got up to her knees and stretched out her limbs from being in such a cramped space before answering Ash.

"This."

She lunged towards Ash, her lips connecting with his. It took Ash a couple seconds to register what just happened before he returned the kiss. Their hearts raced as their passion grew stronger and stronger. The kiss lasted for about a minute before Ash pulled away, confused as always.

"What was that for?" He took a glance at where he had seen his mother last, but she wasn't there, relieving Ash from any unfortunate embarrassment.

"You're a little dense Ash Ketchum, but you're my kind of dense. The loveable kind." She pointed to her head and Ash noticed there was a gift tag across her forehead which read:

To: Ash
Love: Anabel

Slowly his eyes shifted from the gift tag back to Anabel's eyes. "Love?" He asked her.

She tried to hold in any tears of happiness, but one by one she failed. She nodded at him, feeling unable to talk and lunged for him again. They connected in another kiss, albeit with much more emotion. She wrapped her arms around his neck and he did the same to her waist. The two embraced as they kissed, just happy to be together again and as the kiss passionately continued, the two of them had a thought pass through their heads which instantly brought smiles to their faces.

"Best…Christmas…Ever…"

I hope your holidays are filled with peace, happiness and love.

MERRY CHRISTMAS EVERYONE!