Well it seems that I haven't lost my touch in my four months of absence from writing seeing as how the first chapter has already gotten some success. In one chapter it already has more favorites than my last story. Oh well, thanks to everyone who reviewed the first chapter. Enjoy chapter two.
"Pikapi!"
"Hey Ash, Dawn!" I yelled as I ran up to meet them.
"May!" Dawn yelled as she ran up to me and brought me into a big hug. "Congratulations May! At least one of us was able to win their Grand Festival."
"Piplup, pip." Her little blue penguin Pokémon added from the top of her head.
"Thanks Dawn, thanks Piplup" I said as I returned the hug. "So what place did you take in the Sinnoh's Grand Festival?"
"I only got into the top 16."
"For your first try that's pretty good."
"That's what I keep on saying but you never listen." Ash added.
"What did you get in your first Grand Festival?" Dawn asked completely ignoring Ash. I could see Ash sigh a bit as he turned away a bit, I couldn't help but let out a giggle.
"What's so funny?" Dawn asked again with a completely clueless look on her face.
"Nothing," I waved it off. "But actually I was in the top eight when I competed in the Hoenn Festival."
"See? I knew that it; I didn't do well after all."
"That's not true Dawn," I continued while trying to console the girl. "Think of how many people entered the festival. Most of them were first time attendees as well, but there were only 16 of them that can claim what you can."
"I guess you're right."
"Oh sure I've been telling you that for the past week and you didn't believe me. Now May says it once and you believe her instantly." Ash once again added in.
"So May where do you want to go?" Dawn asked, returning to her usual peppy mood and once again completely ignoring Ash's comment. Ash just let out yet another big sigh.
"I didn't have any real plans from this point on except for the awards ceremony tomorrow."
"Then lets go shopping in celebration of your new position, and then we can go out to eat as well."
"Shopping!" Ash and I said at the same time. I looked over at him as he did the same. I could once again feel my face start to heat up, at I looked at him. I quickly turned away. Although we might have said the same thing at the same time, how we said it was completely different. While I was shouting for the joy and thrill of the activity, Ash's sounded more like one of fear.
"What's the matter Ash? Don't like shopping?" I teased him, finally getting over my unknown reasons for suddenly blushing.
"Not in the way that I know you two will want to do it. A 'shopping trip' should be nothing more than going in, get what you're buying, purchase it, and leave. Simple and painless. I have no clue why you girls have this idea in your head that such a trip is supposed to be a day long experience."
"Oh come on Ash." I said while grabbing one of his arms.
"It'll be fun." Dawn added while grabbing his other arm.
"Piplup!" Dawn's starter seemed just as eager to go shopping as its trainer.
"Pika pika Pikapi." I could hear Pikachu say from my shoulder.
"Don't tell me you're in league with them as well Pikachu." Ash said as he tried to back away.
"Vui." Eevee added in rubbing her cheek against his.
"Not you too Eevee, and here I thought that we were finally bonding." He pouted. "Great, so now I'm completely out voted. Guess I don't have much of a choice now do I?"
"Nope." Both Dawn and I said with a smile.
"Not that I'm complaining or anything Pikachu, but how come you haven't gone back to Ash's shoulder just yet?"
We were already at one of the largest malls in the Silver League Complex and the two of us were dragging Ash in and out of virtually any and every shop that we could find. But there was one thing that was I was slightly questioning my mind, ever since we left to start the shopping trip. Eevee has stayed on Ash's shoulder the entire time while Pikachu stayed on mine.
"Pika, pikachu pi pika pika Pikachu."
"Right, Ash could I get a translation?"
Trying to stay away from Dawn and I, yet still stay in within sight, Ash was leaning up against one of walls just watching and listening to what we were doing. "Well from what I can tell he said that Eevee has been acting a little weird lately and that he just wants his space."
"Vee?" Looking over I could see Eevee staring at me, or I guess it could have been at Pikachu as well, she had a very sad look in her eyes. After only a few seconds she crawled down into Ash's arms and seemed to just try and make herself comfortable.
"Don't think of it in the bad way Eevee," Ash said as he comforted the ball of fur that was currently pushing her way further into his arms. "Pikachu is probably just a little cautious after your initial greeting today. Give him time and he'll open up again to you again, I'm sure of it."
"Pika…" Looking back over at my current passenger I could tell that he wasn't all that all that thrilled about Eevee's reaction to his comment as he tried to cuddle back into my neck.
"Don't worry Pikachu," I whispered into his ear as I pet him. "If I know Eevee it won't take too long for this to blow over. Until then you are welcome to stay here with me."
"Pikachu." He replied softly while giving a small lick to my cheek.
"I'll just assume that that meant thank you. Now back to the task at hand, we need to see how many sales that we can find in this store!" I could hear Ash let out and audible groan as he heard what I said. "Why are you complaining? All you have to do is stand there and watch."
"Sure you say that now, but in a few hours I'll be the one carrying around everything that you two deemed necessary to buy."
I don't know why, but at that moment an idea just seemed to pop into my head. Usually something like this would be beyond the range of things that I would do and even the fact that I thought of something like this surprised me. But with the way that Ash had been acting since we got here I figured that having a little fun wasn't out of the question. Digging into one of the bags of clothes that I already bought I found what I was looking for.
"So then what do you think of these then, are they a necessity Ash?" I asked with a large smile on my face as I held up a pair of pink underwear with a Pikachu print on them.
"Ah…well…I guess…How should I know anything about that!" I could see him getting very flustered and his face was turning a bright red. I couldn't help but laugh at what I did. Dawn and Piplup, looking over and realizing what happened, joined in the laughter as well; even Pikachu couldn't help but laugh at his trainer's modesty. Some of the other customers looked over at us with unapproving glances.
"I'm sorry Ash, I just could resist myself." I could barely get out as I started to control my laughter. "But you really need to lighten up. We're supposed to be having fun after this long away from each other."
"Well at this point what you consider fun isn't so much for me." He shot back, still obviously flustered from my little joke. "In fact it's rather embarrassing."
"I'm sorry Ash but you put yourself in such a good position for it." I said as I walked up to him, finally stopping my laughing spree. "I didn't mean any harm out of it, just nothing more than a joke between good friends. Can I at least say I'm sorry?"
"Alright, I forgive you. Just please don't do that again. You should know how I am in those types of situations."
"No problem, it's just that I thought that you would be able to handle something as simple as this after being on the road for so long." Before I went back to the clothes racks I made sure to give him a quick hug, being careful not to crush Eevee in the process. And yet for some reason the blush on his face still lingered, even this long after the joke. "But you still haven't answered my question Ash?"
"Question?" He tentatively asked.
"You never answered if you like them or not." I don't know when it first started but I found that I enjoyed teasing Ash on various subjects; ones like these seemed to be the most fun.
"Well…they…I…"
Shaking my head I signaled that he didn't need to continue. Revealing another big smile, I had the perfect idea to deal with this. "Don't worry you don't need to answer that one Ash."
"Wait, I don't?"
"Nope," I said as nonchalantly as I could while starting to walk back to the racks. But half way back I made sure to pause and look back at him. "I can always ask your other half."
"Other half? Wait a minute, do you mean?" I nodded. "But why him? Pikachu doesn't know anything about clothes." I'm not really sure if he was trying to get me to ask him the question again to keep it away from Pikachu or to try and avoid the question completely. My guess would be the latter but no matter which one it was I could see a slight tinge of red start to appear into his cheeks.
"That my be so, but after spending time with one another a Pokémon starts to take on some of the traits of its trainer. This would be even more so between you and Pikachu considering that he is never in his Pokéball and spends the entire day on your shoulder."
"But still, why you would ask Pikachu?"
Even though I wasn't showing it, part of me was starting to become slightly annoyed by the fact that he wouldn't just answer it. "This may have originally been a joke, but that doesn't mean that I wouldn't like an answer. I mean he's one of my best friends, not just some random acquaintance, so this shouldn't be that big of a deal to answer. Besides it's not as if it wasn't a little embarrassing for me as well. The least he could do is answer it, especially since I did all this just to cheer him up."
"Actually I think that better question at this point is why not? So Pikachu," I started while once again turning to my passenger. "Did you like them?"
"Pika." He nodded his head with a smile and not even a hint of hesitation. Looking back I could see the red in Ash's cheeks turn a deeper color as he turned his head away.
"Thank you Pikachu, remember girls always enjoy getting compliments." I said as I rubbed him between the ears again, and as always he melted right into my touch giving a satisfied coo in the process. "Well back to work. We only have a little bit more time in this store before we have to move on."
Getting back to the multitudes of clothes I continued to look through them trying to find anything that would look good on me. Although even if part of my mind was focusing on what was in front of me the other part was still thinking about what just happened.
"Well that did nothing but embarrass me," I whispered to Pikachu as I moved to another rack of clothes. "The worst part is I'm not even sure why I did that; I mean I just showed him and nearly half the store my own underwear! Granted I haven't even taken them out of the mall yet but still, it was a spur of the moment type of thing and I just couldn't resist. I've teased him many times before when we still traveled together but that was only because he had no clue about anything related to love. Not that I really know all that much myself considering that I have yet to experience it, but he's so dense on the subject it's unbelievable."
"Pika pika." He nodded, although in the back of my mind I couldn't help but wonder how much my little friend was similar to his trainer.
"At least you seem to have a good grasp on the concept. So do you have your eye on anyone Pikachu?"
"Pi?" He froze before giving a nervous chuckle. "Pika kachu pika pikachu chu Pikapi."
"I didn't understand what you said but it does seem that the Pokémon has a bit more maturity than his trainer." Looking back at Ash I could see him on the far wall. I could just make out the fact that he was talking to Eevee and she was apparently listening intently. I thought that I could also barely still see the light red shade that was on his cheeks, for some reason I couldn't help but smile at the scene. "Though I do have to admit it was funny to watch his reaction. It was so predictable; and he does look cute whenever it happens."
I completely stopped as the words escaped my mouth. I could see that Pikachu was looking at me as well, though it was one more of curiosity than anything else. "Did I actually say that?"
"Pika."
Shaking my head a bit I couldn't believe that those words even came out of my mouth. "Not really sure what that was about, I must have just gotten caught up in the moment. Sure he has supported me all this time and I've always found it easier to concentrate in contests when he's cheering for me, but still he's my best friend and nothing more." Looking back at him I could feel my face start to heat up and quickly looked back at the clothes that were in front of me. "He's my best friend, nothing more." I repeated, "and nothing less."
"So what was that all about?"
I jumped a bit as I heard someone whisper into my ear. Quickly turning around I saw that it was Dawn, but she had this odd grin on her face.
"What was what about?" I spat out with my face growing even hotter.
"You know, that little scene with you and Ash a minute ago."
"Oh that," I gave a small sigh as the tension from the initial surprise started to fade as I realized what she was actually talking about.
"Yes that. What else would there be to talk about?"
"Nothing." I said rater quickly.
"If you say so."
I doubt that she actually completely believed me, but as long as she didn't hear anything that I was saying to Pikachu I'd be fine. Besides it was nothing more than a slip of tongue. Ya that's it, I got caught up in the moment of teasing him and it just came out.
"Um, Earth to May?"
"Huh?"
"You were spacing out on me. But never mind that, I just want to know what exactly transpired for that to happen."
"Right the underwear thing. I guess he just set himself up for it and I just couldn't resist."
"Set himself up for it?"
"I don't remember his exact words but it was something along the lines of 'buying what we considered necessary', for some reason that idea just seemed to pop into my head to embarrass him to high heaven and I couldn't resist it. And well, you saw the results."
She cocked an eyebrow at me. "So you did that just on an impulse to embarrass him?"
"I guess, I really don't have a better explanation than that. But you have to admit that his face was pretty priceless."
Dawn looked as if she was trying to suppress her laughter, no doubt as the picture of Ash at that moment crossed her mind, but in the end she still let out a soft giggle "Ya it was priceless, but I still say that there is more to this than you're letting on whether you know it or not. Because I for one know that I would find some other way to make fun of him than by showing him my underwear."
I could feel my face start to heat up again as she finished.
"I mean it isn't all that hard to get Ash like that using other methods. And because of this I have to ask, is there anything going on between you and Ash?"
By this point my face felt like it was on fire more than just a warm sensation. Thoughts of my use of the word "cute" on him came back into the front of my mind, and they didn't want to leave. "Of course not!" I said a little too loudly. I quickly put my hands in front of my mouth and looked over to where he was sitting. I gave a quick sigh as I could see that he hadn't moved or even shifted from my little outburst. "Of course not." I repeated quite a bit softer, "we're just friends. Best friends, but nothing more."
"If you say so May." Dawn said with a big smile as she started to walk away. "I believe you, but now we should continue moving. We still have a lot of ground to cover."
"I'm starting to not like that smile Pikachu." I whispered to the little mouse once Dawn was out of earshot.
"Pika pika." Looking over I could see that he was a little timid after it as well.
"Can you keep that little slip up a secret Pikachu? I don't want Ash getting the wrong ideas."
Pikachu cocked his head a bit and the reason why seemed to hit me pretty fast.
"Oh no no no, that's not what I meant to say." I nervously said as I shook my head a bit. "What I meant to say was I don't want him thinking that those words came from me. I mean it's not as if he's ugly or anything its quite opp…"
I could feel myself about to do it again, but this time I was able to stop before the mistake came out again. Taking a deep breath I decided that it was best not to really go on with that.
"You know what I think I'll just stop there before it slips yet again. But do we have a deal?"
"Chu." He cooed as he rubbed against my neck a bit.
"Thanks Pikachu."
"I told you that this would happen."
"You didn't say anything of the sort."
"Yes actually I did, and this just proves it."
"You can say it all you want but that won't make it true"
It was about an hour after we finally stopped shopping and as the three of us were walking from the mall to find some restaurant to finally rest and eat. I was walking behind Ash and Dawn as they were having a small argument, one that Ash was obviously the winner but Dawn just wouldn't let down. I kinda felt bad for Eevee because she was still sitting in the middle of it, well on top of Ash's head to be a bit more exact seeing as how his shoulders where a little crowded. I would be feeling sorry for Piplup as well but there were moments where it would join in with its trainer in berating Ash, so she was actually somewhat enjoying the argument.
"Guess Dawn wasn't listening when Ash made his comment about being the one to carry all the bags." I started up a conversation with Pikachu to pass the time as those two continued to argue. "Although I will say that even if he was the one who made the prediction, it did come true. Ash was being real nice when he offered to carry some of my heavier bags, and even then he wasn't very outward with it. But as soon as he offered to take even some of my bags Dawn pretty much forced him to take all of her's as well. Do they always act like this?"
"Pika pika."
"Figures. They bicker like they were brother and sister or something. I just hope that they don't forget where we're headed." Sighing I just let them continue with their pointless argument.
"So do you have anywhere that would like to eat Pikachu? With those two preoccupied like that I'd be willing to bet that until Ash's stomach interrupts them they won't even…"
A quiet rumbling was then heard as Ash and Dawn's discussion come to an abrupt end.
"Speak of the devil." I muttered under my breath.
I could hear Pikachu quietly laughing, most likely from my little comment. Quickening my pace a bit I caught up to the two of them with ease.
"I have to admit that while watching you two argue over the smallest things I think I have to agree with Ash's stomach that there are more important things to concentrate on."
Looking over I could see that Ash was blushing a bit, no doubt from all of a sudden becoming the center of attention for all the wrong reasons. But then again he has been doing that quite often lately so it really wasn't too different than usual.
"In that case how about we head into the next place that we find to eat something, Ash isn't the only one who is getting hungry. And sorry to go against you Dawn, but Ash did say that earlier." I finished off.
"Thank you May. See I told you that I said it." Ash said defiantly as he turned back to Dawn. Dawn looked as if she was about to say something but was quickly cut off by Ash. "Hey I've heard that they sell great ramen here! Its decided then, we'll eat here."
Typical Ash, always thinking of his stomach. But there was one thing that I found curious. "Since when did you get enthusiastic about ramen?" I asked him. "I know that you usually aren't too picky about what you eat but knowing something specific like this doesn't seem like you."
"But you like ramen right?"
"Of course!" I said happily as the thought of which ramen to order started to circulate in my head. "I've yet to try a type of ramen that I don't like."
"What better reason do I need than that?" He asked with a smile. "Now come on, I'm hungry and my shoulders are starting to hurt."
As he walked into the restaurant Dawn followed right behind him, but not before giving me a big smile. But it wasn't just any smile; it was the same one that she made earlier while we were shopping. And as before that smile made my mind start to wonder why I felt so odd about it.
"Is it just me or did I miss something in there?" I asked Pikachu.
"Pi." He shrugged his little shoulders.
"At least I'm not the only one who doesn't understand her, and you've known her longer than I have." I could hear my own stomach give off a soft growl. "But then again why worry about stuff like this on an empty stomach. All this talk about ramen has just reminded me that I'm getting hungry as well. Besides I'm probably not the only one here that is getting hungry, am I right?"
The only response I got out of him was a sheepish smile.
"The apple never falls far from the tree." I say with a laugh. "Let's get going then; those two will start to wonder what's keeping us."
Well there it is. As always please review. I should be keeping my usual update schedule of about every two days for the rest of the story, so until then thanks for reading.