"Don't forget to get your permission slips signed!" my teacher, Professor Birch, shouted at us as we left the classroom.

I adjusted my backpack and started heading back to my house. I could hear my next-door neighbor, May, walking slowly behind me. It was pretty evident that she didn't want me to notice her.

"Hi!" I turned around to greet her. "My name is Brendan."

"Yeah," she replied. She looked sort of annoyed, but continued anyway. "I'm May."

"So, how long have you been in the Hoenn region?" I asked her.

"I moved in a few weeks before school started," she explained. "So we could be closer to my dad."

"Oh okay, does he work around here?" I tried to keep the conversation going, but it was clear she wasn't really interested in talking to me.

"Yep."

"Oh."

I walked next to her silently for a few blocks. I could hear her breathing and looked over at her constantly. I never saw her looking at me. Eventually, the silence got too awkward to stand.

"So are you going on the field trip on Friday?" I asked her, breaking the silence.

"Yeah," she replied, seeming to loosen up. "I've never been to Unova before. Have you?"

I was almost shocked. I'd technically known her for four months, and this was the most of a conversation she'd been willing to put up with. "Yeah I went there once for a business trip with my dad," I told her.

"Why is that?" May asked, but she seemed to have zoned back out into her own world.

"He's a pokemon professor," I said, laughing dryly. "He's always on business trips."

She looked up at me, as if she heard what I said but it didn't process. Luckily, we had arrived at our houses so it didn't actually matter if she heard me or not. I turned to head into my house, but I stopped when I heard something.

"Bye, Brendan," it was May.

"See ya tomorrow," I told her, smiling.

I turned back around and strode into my house.

"BRENDAN BIRCH!" a voice shouted at me as soon as I entered.

"Yes, mom?" I asked.

"Where have you been?" she asked me frantically.

"I was walking home from school!" I explained.

"You know you're supposed to drive home with your father!" she continued to scold me.

"Yeah, Brendon," my father agreed. "We haven't had a problem all school year! What happened?"

I took a moment to think, and strongly considered lying. Something like: "I went to Wally's house to play video games. I thought you'd be mad, so I didn't tell you!" Or even: "I stayed after to copy down some homework, I'll never do it again, I promise!"

"Well?" my mother asked impatiently.

"I was walking home with May," I said as casually as I could.

"May?" my mom asked. I nodded in confirmation, and she continued. "Cute, next-door neighbor girl May?"

"Your field trip partner May?" my dad chimed in.

"Field trip partner?!" We weren't supposed to find out our partners until class tomorrow, but if anyone would know them, it would be the teacher, my dad.

"Oh, did I spoil it? I'm sorry, Brendan," he told me. He didn't look sorry.

"Yes, mom. That May," I explained. "I was just trying to be nice since she hasn't made many friends. Why do you always take things the wrong way?!"

Frustrated, I stormed up the stairs and into my room. I tossed my backpack on my desk and went over to my TV to unwind and play some video games. Within a few minutes, my cellphone was buzzing.

"Hello?" I said into the speaker.

"Hey!" the voice through the phone called. I recognized it immediately to be my best friend, Wally.

"Hey Wally, what's up?" I asked him. It was pretty unusual for him to call me; we usually just texted.

"You haven't replied to my texts all day!" he said in a frantic tone. "I was getting worried about you."

"Thanks for the concern, but my parents were just freaking their freaks because I walked home," I told him, groaning.

"Haha, it's not like you walked home with May or anything!" he laughed in his microphone. "Now that would be cause for an uproar!"

I don't think I meant to, but I hung up on him. I shot him a text pretty soon after saying: "Hey sorry bad connection here I think."

With the perfect excuse to stop talking to Wally and an obvious unwillingness to talk to my parents, I turned the lights off in my room and climbed into bed.