This story is for my wonderful friend Sylvia (silvermoonstone23) who always patiently listen to my long rants. I just had to write her a New Year's present or I'll never forgive myself. The story was kinda thought up and typed up the last second. I kinda ran into a huge writer's block so I kinda just typed up the first thing that came to mind. This story is also Japanese culture based so it might be slightly difficult to understand. I actually intended to write a Christmas story for her but my 'Lazy Syndrome' kicked in and there was that writer's block which is the crisis I'm still facing. So to Sylvia (if you're reading this) and the rest of you:
HAPPY NEW YEAR! I hope you guys have another healthy and successful year!
(Kudos to my friend sapphirewitch565 for standing in for my editor and editing my last minute story quickly)
A crowd on the riverbed,
Below was a sky filled with the spreading yellow fireworks?
But I turned around and looked for you.
"Yellow, it's time to go!" a male's bellow echoed throughout the house. A pale blond girl sighed as she gently woke up the yellow, furry creature that was napping quietly on her bed. "Chuchu, get up quickly! It's time to go!" She mutters quietly. Lifting the stirring creature she gently placed it on her shoulder before proceeding towards the entrance of her house in Viridian forest.
To her surprise, waiting at the entrance of the house wasn't only her Uncle Wilton. Standing next to him was a middle-aged woman with canary yellow locks tied tightly into a kempt bun. Her bespectacled glare carefully stares the girl down, as if she was trying to frighten the girl into apologizing for the flaws she wasn't allowed to have. The girl flinched under the woman's disapproving glower.
Noticing his niece's discomfort, the short yet stocky man quickly introduced the woman hoping to dispel the awkward tension that was starting to rise between the woman and his niece.
"Yellow, this is Mrs. Henrietta, the top sponsor of the fishermen's committee; you met her before when you were younger!" he quickly explained. Quickly regaining her posture, she politely bowed at the woman.
"My humble apologies for my discourtesy, Madam Henrietta, My name is Amarillo del Bosque Verde, and it is an honour to see you once again." She rehearsed meekly.
The woman gave an inaudible grunt before her passionless glare softened. The frown that decorated her face twisted into a fake smile.
"Lady Amarillo, it's been a while hasn't it? My, look at you; you've grown into such a beautiful young woman. Such a polite girl too! I'm sure your mother would be proud!" she gushed pulling the girl into her embrace, oblivious to the silent hatred which was starting to bubble up in her blank eyes with the mention of her mother. Noticing his niece's seething anger, he quickly cut into the woman's embrace.
"Mrs. Henrietta, I do not mean to intrude but we'll be late if we do not hurry!" he quickly muttered to the woman and gestured at Yellow, who was trying to control her anger. The spectacled woman sniveled before replying,
"Of course, I wouldn't want to miss dear Amarillo's first performance! Let's hope you will meet everyone's expectation!" She lifted her head up like a giraffe trying to eat leaves off the tall canopies of the rainforest, and stalked out the open door like a highly strung hen.
Red groaned as the girl with chocolate brown locks shouted at him for the tenth time that day. "Hurry up slowpoke! We're going to miss the Kaguya at this rate". The boy cursed under his breath as he ran up to them.
"Why isn't she shouting at you?" he complained to the spiky haired boy. He smirked at his expense and pulled his Charizard mask up to his head so the raven haired boy could see his face.
"That's because for once, I'm actually catching up and not lazing about like you!" he replied meekly but his forest green eyes lit up with amusement.
Red's annoyance increased when the girl leading them pulled up her Jigglypuff mask, showing her anger fused ocean blue eyes. "Hurry up you two! Red, I already let you off once but if I miss the Kaguya because of you, I'll throw you into the Sharpedo's nest!" she screamed. Red sighed as his best friend was dragged along by the collar of his green yukata. After much convincing, Blue had let him off by not forcing him to put on a Yukata under the condition that he watched the Kaguya dance with her and Green.
"Red!" a loud voice bellowed across the street. He frantically turned his head towards the end of the street as his friends weaved their way through the crowd to find a good viewing spot. He scanned the crowd until he found a middle aged woman waving at him. He panicked and quickly dived into the crowd after Blue and Green. The only reason he came to the festival was to get rid of his aunt who was looking after him. If she caught up, then everything would be for nothing. He moved with celerity until he located his friends' blue and green yukatas. He clasped onto their shoulders for dear life, surprising the couple.
"Red? What's wrong?" Blue asked, turning towards the boy gasping for air.
"My aunt!" he whispered loudly, still out of breath. He looked up to find his two panic stricken friends who looked back at him in horror.
"The one that stalks us 24/7 ever since the beginning of our Viridian vacation?" Green questioned. He gave a curt nod before Blue dragged them through the crowd until they came out at the very front of the viewing area for the Shrine Maiden's dance.
Their panic suddenly ceased as the sound of bells filled the air. They quickly squashed themselves into the small space left between two people who were too interested to pay attention to them. They watched as four shrine priestesses entered, each carrying a decorated wood stick. He watched in boredom as they moved around like robots. Suddenly a younger girl came between the four of them. He watched as the four knelt down and bowed to the statue of a god before raising their head and continued singing and ringing the bells as the younger girl started to dance.
Even though her dance had no noticeable difference from the other miko's dance, Red couldn't take his eyes off her. He watched as she moved and twirled, swinging around the sprig of a flower tree on her right hand and the lightning wand with paper streamers on the other. Her blonde hair pranced around in the pale moonlight of the rising moon as if it had a life on its own. Her beautiful eyes shone like the sun even though it was night-time. He was so caught up in observing the young girl, he did not notice his aunt slipping into the seat beside him.
"Quite the beautiful girl isn't she?" she asked snapping the boy out of his trance. Red nodded, making no indication to move even though he was running away from her the whole day. "Wilton's girl, her parent's owned this shrine but it all went to her when they died in an accident." The boy nodded, half listening, half watching the girl dance as if she was possessed by a god in folklores. His mother uses to tell him the shrine priestesses were descendants of the goddess of dawn, Ame-no-Uzume who persuaded everyone to dance for the sun goddess, Amaterasu, when she went into hiding.
The singing suddenly stopped breaking the girl out of her trance as she danced her way to the statue. She slowly knelt down and bowed to the statue and offered the sprig of flowers before making her way off the shrine leaving the rest of the shrine priestess to perform the rest of the ritual.
Yellow frowned as the woman from before made her way towards them with three reluctant kids around her age.
"Amarillo, that was a wonderful performance!" the woman exclaimed. "Actually, I would like to talk to your uncle about the shrine…" she was quickly cut off by the girl screaming no. The woman looked up to her in surprise only to flinch when she met the girl's eyes. It was the first time the woman has seen this much hatred in a living person.
"If you're thinking of buying the shrine with money, you can forget about it! The shrine belongs to me, not my uncle, so if I say this is off, this is off!" she shouted at the women and stormed off.
Taking this chance, the three musketeers escaped the grasp of the evil aunt and decided to hang around her for protection. They followed her in awkward silence until the older girl decided that she didn't like the silence. She quickly caught up with the younger girl and introduced herself, "Hello, My name is Blue, may I know you name?" The blonde stopped walking and turned to her in surprise.
"Yellow." the girl mumbled in a barely audible voice. The girl smiled and to Yellow's surprise pulled her into a warm embrace.
"Nice to meet you Yellow!"
The girl's eyes were cold and distant, even though her reality was here; he knew her soul was somewhere else, maybe in the past where she can still smile and laugh, maybe in the colourful future where she never experienced pain. Red could never know, the only thing he wanted to do when his eyes met hers was to bring her back to reality. He really wanted to show her the part of reality where it was still beautiful, the part of reality that could erase her pain. He really wanted to see it, her genuine smile from the soul, a smile that will probably become the sunlight of the darkness etched inside his own heart.
Even though it was a joyous festival, her eyes remain ignorant and cold. The girl had warmed up slightly to Blue and Green. She knew that Blue had noticed her fake smile and fake politeness, but she played along instead of forcing her into reality. Green was a wise and silent person, so he got along with people like her especially well. The only problem was Red himself. He wanted to help the girl back to reality so bad that he had forgotten to disguise his rude personality which led to the girl's instant dislike. Red sighed; it was going to be a long day.
Yellow was actually enjoying the conversation with the older boy and girl, which was until the girl with the blue yukata ran off towards the goldfish scooping booth, dragging with her the reluctant boy wearing a green yukata. This leaves her and the nephew of 'Mrs. Henrietta'. She knew people like that, they would do anything to increase their wealth, yet the boy had a different kind of aura from the woman. Usually people either would greet her politely or they ignore her because they are wealthier. The boy was different, he greeted her with no manners yet his greetings held no arrogance but rather an unseen friendliness.
She felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around to find herself staring right into his crimson eyes. Unlike hers, his eyes held conviction and determination. He had goals and determination to live unlike her. She quickly took a step back after she noticed the closeness of their face. She didn't like him; he had everything she had thrown away. It was as if he picked up everything she threw away. Yet she found herself being drawn towards him like opposite sides of a magnet. She felt his beautiful crimson eyes pierce through her facade like a needle piercing a balloon. His voice suddenly pulled her out of her thoughts,
"Do you hate me?" she looked into eyes in surprise. "I mean, I was really rude to you and my aunt made a stupid proposal…." He trailed off.
She quickly shook her head, "You were the first one that spoke like that to me so it was refreshing to hear something new! You are not your aunt; she has nothing to do with you." The boy smiled at her reply, and to her surprise held out a hand to her. She smiled before taking his hands and together they wondered though the festival hand in hand.
There are water balloon yo-yos and goldfish scooping,
On the path of stalls that continues on,
Jubilant voices calling out.
"Where are we going?" the girl called out to him as he ran, dragging the girl along with him. He gave her a grin; his crimson eyes told her it was a surprise. He dragged her to the edge of the Viridian city and to her surprise they continued on into Viridian forest. They finally stopped running when they came into a clearing. Yellow looked up and to her surprise she found the large cliff overlooking the river bed. Even more surprising was that she found Chuchu sitting on a large flat rock with another of her species.
"That's Pika!" the boy answered her curious look towards the other Pikachu. He invited her to sit on a rock with him as he suddenly started to count down.
"5, 4, 3, 2, 1." A sudden explosion startled the girl. She watches in amazement as the night sky illuminated into a brilliant rainbow. They shot up into the night sky before exploding like ripples in a dark ocean.
Without warning, the boy leaned in pressed his lips against her forehead. Realizing what he was doing, he quickly pulled back from the girl, whose face was as red as a cherry. She felt as if a firework exploded from her heart into her soul whenever she looks into his crimson eyes. She smiled slipping her hands into his; together they looked up at the beautiful fireworks, recording everything they have seen that night forever into their memories.
On this night of fireworks,
I don't want it to end
As just a memory
Before summer ends.
A crowd on the river bed
Below a sky filled with the spreading pure red fireworks
I grab your hand and start to run.
So, how was my story? Sorry if it wan't good but like I said it was kinda last minute because of this huge writer's block I tangled my self in and I'm trying to untangle it. So I would appreciate it if you leave a review of correction. The story was actually intended to be longer but my 'Lazy Syndrome' also kicked in! T-T The two worst thing to have as an author. Ah! I better give you an explanation on some of the Japanese stuff:
Kagura- It's a traditional Japanese dance performed by Shrine Maidens. The dance is apparently sacred cleansing and it washes away the evil deeds of the audience from the previous year and it also gives fortune and success
Miko- Shrine Priestess/Maidens, They look after the shrine and perform Kaguras. They are said to be the descendent of the goddess of dawn Ame-no-Uzume who tricked the sun goddess who went into hiding Amaterasu into coming out of her hiding place, bring sunlight into the world once again.
Festival- It's the festival that happens in the New Year, I don't know much about it myself but it seems fun!
Hanabi- Fireworks
Does that explain a bit of the story? The song is a Japanese song but I used the English Sub for easier reference. The song's name is just as the title states Hanabi! It fits the story so perfectly so I just had to use it but this isn't a song-fic because the story isn't based on the song, I found the song accidently after I started writing story.
So again, Everyone Happy New Year!
Silver/Moon
