Pre-Parade

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Love is something that's bittersweet

Simple and clear yet complex and strange stuff

I'm only worrying about things that don't matter

How does it feel?

That's how it feels!
You're gentle and sincere yet eccentric

I pretend to be strong all over and compete against you

Just by being honest, it's so stimulating and I feel dizzy

I get hurt,

I hurt you,

In a preparation of pure feelings

~#~

I didn't understand that stupid girl or me.

From the minute she was born, I'd known I hated her. After all, every time I saw her, I got this twisted feeling in my gut, my face went red, and I felt the immediate urge to tease her until she ran off crying. After that, though, my chest would ache and I'd sulk in my room for about an hour. See, that was the part I didn't get.

The next day, though, would be really strange. That girl will be skipping around town with all her happy emotions flurrying around, as if I never even made her cry. So then I'll get annoyed about how I had no effect on her, tease her, make her cry again, and then the whole situation restarts.

It's been like this since she was born. I'm an entire year older than her, something I frequently use to my advantage. Now I'm thirteen and she's twelve. We haven't been able to go on our journey yet, as Gramps—I mean, Professor Oak has 'forbidden' it until we're older, what with all the apparent pedophiles and kidnappers out there these days. I could see why he was being protective. After all, what if she—I mean—what if I got kidnapped or something by some huge adult? Of course I'm only concerned with myself. That is how the great Gary Oak rolls. Only caring about my own well-being. Of course I won't give two cents about that Leaf girl. She's just a neighbor. Nothing else.

So now here I am, sitting on a tree stump in my hometown of Pallet, waiting for something mildly exciting to happen to me.

Leave it to Leaf to show up just then.

"Hey, Gary!" she chirps annoyingly as I look up slightly to see her with her stupid bouncy brown hair and her dumb soft looking skin and her pretty clear-blue eyes and her just-developing body that makes me want to—

I shake all traitorous thoughts out of my head as I correct my mindset.

"What do you want?" I sigh in exasperation as I try to stop my heart from beating so much due how much I hate her. Because that's obviously the reason it was beating. Duh.

"Nothing," Leaf grins casually. "I was just wondering if you wanted to hang out or something."

I feel my heart give a loud, totally unnecessary 'thump' at those words. Wow, I must really hate her or something.

Or something.

Again, I shake any betraying thoughts out of my brain as I try and concentrate on the conversation at hand.

"Why in the name of Arceus," I say slowly, "would I ever want to 'hang out' with you?"

Leaf seems to ponder that for a moment before she replies bluntly, "Because we're pretty much the only two kids in Pallet Town?"

…

…Well. She's got me there.

I quickly recover and retort, "Well, I don't feel like doing anything with you, idiot. Go do whatever else it is you want to do."

The girl stares, and I give an inside smirk. Now I've got her. Instead, though, she walks around my tree trunk and sits down on the other side of it, her back a few inches away from mine.

I jump slightly at the sudden action. Oh-my-Arceus-what-is-she-doing.

"What are you doing?" I demand, not getting up but instead craning my neck to partially see the back of her head.

"Whatever I want to do," she replies calmly with an air of innocence about her. "Isn't that what you told me? That I can do whatever else I want?"

Darn it. Darn it, darn it, darn it! I hate the way she twists around my words like this! And just to prove my point, I feel another rough pound against my chest. I quickly swallow my emotions (of hate) and think up a totally intelligent reply that will send her home sobbing.

"Whatever."

Darn it.

I can't leave the stump now, because that'll be like surrendering. And the great Gary Oak never surrenders. Instead, I just stare at the sky above us and try to think of something that won't trigger my body's 'I hate Leaf' reactions. I decide to think about cheese. Yes. That's a nice topic.

A million years (OK, it could have been ten minutes) pass in torturous quiet as I try and count how many cheeses are currently in existence, but then my thoughts are interrupted by that annoying bell-like voice again.

"Hey, look what I made!" it giggles irritatingly.

I groan in annoyance as the sound makes me lose track of my counting as I turn and complain, "Why did you have to butt in like that? I was counting cheese!"

A short silence passes as I realize that that particular sentence makes me sound completely insane.

"Wait—no—I didn't mean—" I stammer as my face grows hot, but then I finally push the matter aside. "What is it?"

She holds up a ring made of twisted-together vines and flowers she must have pulled up from the ground. It actually looks half-decent, with all the different colorful plants this town has sprouting around here.

Not wanting to give her credit, though, I simply comment, "It looks stupid."

Her face falls, and I feel a sudden pain shoot into my chest.

"You don't like it…?" she murmurs shakily. "But… I worked really hard on it…"

I don't know why, but at that moment, I feel a sudden rush of panic overcome me as all thoughts referring to Leaf—so, basically, all of my thoughts—are changed in the blink of an eye. Immediately, I don't want her to be sad, especially not because of me. I try to think of something I can say to make her idiotically happy again.

"OK, maybe it's pretty good. For you."

DARN IT!

For her, though, that stupid little sentence seems to work. Her blue eyes sparkle more than usual, and she exclaims, "Really? I'll make another one, then!"

I watch her a little longer as she bends down to gather up more plants, but then I turn my head back up to the sky and try to figure out where I left off when I was counting the cheeses of our world.

A few more moments pass before I hear her body shift upward again, obviously because she's finished gathering up her weird flowers. I don't pay it that much notice.

I definitely notice it, though, when I feel her back press up against mine.

My hate radar goes insane as I feel my blood rush to my face instantly. My heart starts pounding harder than ever. "W-w-w-what a-are y-y-you d-doing?" I gasp, practically cracking my neck in the way it swivels to look at her. Wait, why is the great Gary Oak gasping? OK, something's not right here.

"I got tired of sitting up straight," Leaf replied in that damn innocent tone of hers, "so I want to lean back a little."

She cranes her neck a little to meet my eyes. "You don't mind, do you?" she asks.

Oh, I swear to Arceus, sometimes she can be as eccentric as Gramps.

Instead of protesting, though, my head turns back to its original positioning, and I say, "Do whatever you want."

I feel her back press up more against mine as she relaxes her body.

Is she trying to drive me crazy?

I want to get up. I want to run back to my house as fast as my legs will carry me and sit in my room until every part of me calms down enough for me to show my face respectively again. But instead… instead I find myself relaxing. I slowly let my body unwind as I revel, for some strange reason, in the feeling of Leaf's back against mine.

I try to bring myself back to my senses, but I'm lost in the fog of emotions I'm feeling right now. Against my will, I feel my eyes close.

I only snap back to reality when I hear that voice say suddenly, "It's done!"

My eyelids snap open as I sit up straight, the feeling of our backs touching leaving me altogether. I turn a little to see Leaf standing up. I copy her action, my legs a little sore from sitting so long… it must have been at least an half an hour since she first sat down with me. Maybe forty-five minutes.

"Look!" the plant-named girl giggles. I turn to face her as I see an even more intricately woven wreath in her hands, with flowers of all colors, shapes, and sizes braided into it. I hate to admit it, but she's actually pretty good at this sort of thing.

"Well?" she asks with slight impatience, looking up at me. "Is it good?"

I'm about to say that it's average-looking when my words are interrupted by her placing the wreath on my spiky hair in some kind of headband fashion. I see her blue eyes, her soft-looking skin, and her messy brown bangs covering part of her face.

I blink as a sudden revelation hits me.

Maybe I don't really hate her.

Maybe… maybe I actually like her.

She looks into my eyes, blinks at my most likely dumbfounded expression, but then she smiles.

And, of course, that's when I finally get the common sense to run.

.~.~.

The next day, I'm walking calmly down the street again when I run into—guess who?—Leaf.

My first instinct is to jump into the nearest hole and hide, but she sees me before I can do so. She smiles like only she would do and runs up to me. "Hi, Gary!" she calls.

I simply shrug and reply, "Hi."

"Hey, hey, what did you do with my flower wreath?" she asks.

The flower wreath she gave me. Despite my running like a maniac the entire time I was going home, it had somehow managed to stay glued to my head. Not being able to find the guts to throw it out, it was now placed safely on my bedroom dresser.

Instead of telling her this, of course, I instead answer, "What makes you think I know?"

Leaf blinked, and then replied uncertainly, "Well… I put it on your head before you ran off yesterday…"

"So? Maybe it fell off. Maybe a bird swooped down and stole it off my head while I was going home. Maybe I just took it off," I say in a spur of pure instinct—because naturally, it's in my instinct to get on her nerves.

Leaf looks at me with that slightly helpless expression on her face. "So… wait…" she says slowly, "you don't know what happened to it?"

"Why should I tell you?" I bully further. Leaf looks at me with a completely confused and innocent expression on her face, and I know I'm just one smart-aleck remark off from making her cry.

But instead of doing that, I turn around and walk away.

Leaf, obviously, is taken off guard. "Gary?" she calls after me, "where are you going?"

"Home!" I call back to her. "And… don't worry. I kept the wreath."

Now that I know I… well, like her, I'm going to have to cut down on the teasing a little.

And maybe this isn't a huge step forward…

…But hey… It's a start.

.~.~.

How was it? Was it good? I had the sudden urge to write some OldRivalShipping. This isn't Blue/Green from the manga, though, but from the games. So I'm free to give Leaf whatever personality my little heart desires!

The title of this fanfic lyrics at the start of the fanfic are from the song 'Pre-Parade', the first opening song to the anime 'Toradora!'. I was listening to it, and then I looked up the English lyrics on my phone's browser, and then I just thought, "HEY! THIS INSPIRES ME TO WRITE SOME POKÉMON FANFICTION!" And so I did. I like this pairing. It makes me feel fluffy… I also like this fanfic I wrote. Denial Gary was fun to write about.

I wrote this on a road trip to New Hampshire just now to kill time. The only reason I am able to post it now instead of waiting until we get there is because of McDonalds wi-fi. So thank you, McDonalds wi-fi.

Please review.