The Sound of Music

Nikki was always the oddball of the group. Shy and sweet, who never talked much about herself. When Sienna and Jasmine decide to pay Nikki a visit in her hometown of Fuchsia City, they discover a beautiful hidden talent that their shy friend has been harbouring.

This one-shot takes place about a year after the conclusion of Spirited. At the time of this fic, Scott is currently at the tail end of fighting his way through the Kanto league circuit and only weeks away from returning home, mysteriously denying himself a chance at taking on the Elite Four.

Nikki and Christian are an established couple.

Jasmine and I took a few short moments to survey the house we were currently standing in front of. The warm evening sun bathed us in a comforting light as I took in every detail of what was around us. The house was a modest, two-storey, semi-detached affair, obviously well-maintained and joined onto an immaculately kept garden, covered in beautifully grown flowers with not a weed in sight, set in a particularly welcoming residential area of Fuchsia City. The lines of near-identical houses ran for what looked like miles in all directions, but a little further down the street on the opposite side of the road, there was another little building. This one looked like a bungalow with a butter yellow door, an old fashioned thatched roof, ivy weaving across the stone walls and with huge gardens at the front and back of the house. I squinted a little, making out a tiny sign sitting next to the letter box. According to the sign this was a Pokemon Daycare. I could also see a little old man with greying hair at the front door, throwing some bread to a flock of tiny wild Pidgey nesting in a huge tree.

I found myself inexplicably liking this little slice of suburbia I was currently in, and I was quite content to continue drinking in these surroundings, but as always, I was interrupted. I jumped violently as Jasmine's foghorn voice punctuated my consciousness and her sharp elbow came into sudden contact with my rib cage, winding me momentarily. "Hey!" she said loudly. "You sure this is the right place?"

Still winded, I flapped the piece of paper I had used to write Nikki's address at her impatiently. "Number nine!" I wheezed, trying to catch some breath. "This is house number nine, right?"

Jasmine looked at the brass number "9" hanging at the gate in front of the house we were standing in front of. She folded her arms and stared at it a few moments, before half-heartedly kicking the stone wall surrounding the house and garden. "Unless the people in number 6 are having a laugh at our expense," she stated.

"Oh shush." I told her, putting the piece of paper with Nikki's directions back into the pocket of my jeans. "Nikki said number nine, this is number nine. So, this must be her house, right?"

"Must be…" Jasmine nodded.

While we had both agreed this had to be Nikki's house, the two of us simply stood there for a few moments in complete silence. After a few long minutes of simply staring at the house, I turned to look at Jasmine expectantly. However, she simply glared back at me in the same expectant manner.

"Well, on you go, then." I offered, waving my hand in the direction of the door. "Go knock!"

"I'm not knocking! You knock!" Jasmine said at once.

"What?! Why me?!" I cried.

"Cos… cos I don't wanna!" Jasmine insisted childishly.

"Why?" I demanded, putting my hands on my hips in a likely unsuccessful attempt at looking more formidable. "You scared or something?!"

"N…no!" Jasmine said indignantly, before crossing her arms firmly in the very epitome of defiance. "I just don't feel like it." She said with grandeur.

I let out a tortured groan and let my arms drop to my side. "I can't believe you. Brute strength of a Machoke and both brave and stupid enough to take on anyone foolish to pick on you, but you're too scared to go and knock on a door?"

I had expected Jasmine to take offence at the 'stupid' jibe, but mercifully she didn't. She merely stuck her nose in the air and demanded "Yeah, what of it?"

I shook my head fiercely, but I knew I was just wasting my time and breath trying to convince her to do what I wanted. I'd be quicker doing it myself, I reasoned, as much as I didn't want to. So I shot Jasmine a fierce glare, grabbed my bag that I had dumped at my feet, swung the gate open and marched as confidently as I could up the front path to the thick wooden door.

I rang the bell and waited tentatively, Jasmine inching nervously up the cobblestone path to stand behind me. I found myself privately thinking she was being ridiculous. Nikki was shy, that was common knowledge to anyone who knew her, but Jasmine was a totally different kettle of Magikarp. She was the polar opposite to Nikki; loud, brash, unsubtle, had a stubborn streak and had a slight violent temper. Seeing her reduced to hiding behind me was quite comical, I had to admit.

We stood there for a few moments after the bell rang. As the seconds ticked on, I turned to look at Jasmine who returned a rather perplexed gaze. Gingerly, and with a much bigger dose of nerves this time, I rang the bell again.

We were met with nothing once again.

"You think anyone's home?" Jasmine piped up behind me.

"I would think so." I nodded. "Nikki's expecting us. She wouldn't go out anywhere, not when she knows we're coming."

"Well she's certainly not coming to the door…" Jasmine said moodily, looking like she'd like to take out her frustration out on the door we were standing in front of.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious…" I groaned.

"You're welcome, Sergeant Sarcasm." She quipped back, poking me in the side and making me squeal. "Ring the bell again." She ordered.

My finger hovered over the button, before I thought better of it. "I think it's broken." I suggested, before rapping my knuckles lightly on the door.

Nothing happened still. Jasmine let out a haughty sigh and gestured madly towards the door handle. "Try the door."

"Eh?" I looked back at her, astonished.

"Try the door!" Jasmine insisted again.

"I'm not gonna open the door, that's breaking and entering!" I said shrilly.

"Not if we're expected, it's not!" Jasmine argued back.

"Oh for goodness sake, Jazz!" I sighed. Privately I knew what she was suggesting was ridiculous and risky beyond belief, but all the same, my hand reached out of its own accord and grasped the doorknob. Out of curiosity I tried to turn it and the door clicked open. I squeaked and dropped the doorknob guiltily like I'd been scalded. The door swung open harmlessly, revealing a glimpse into a hallway. I froze, half-expecting to hear angry shouting, cries of fright and panic, to have the door slammed in my face or a violent combination of all three.

Nothing happened. The door remained open and the silence and emptiness of the hallway were reflected back at us. A moment passed. Jasmine blinked, before edging out behind me to peer in through the gap in the door. "Should… should we go in?"

I looked at her in shock. "Jazz, are you mad?" I cried, grabbing her arm in a vague attempt to hold her back.

"Well, we've come this far!" she said, brushing me off, sweeping past and then pushing her way into the house. "Might as well keep going!" she called back.

"Jazz!" I cried through fiercely gritted teeth. "Get back here!"

But it was too late. Jasmine had already disappeared into the house.

"Unbelievable!" I sighed. "Won't knock on a door but she'll happily waltz into a stranger's house! What on earth am I gonna do with her?"

I reluctantly followed Jasmine inside, praying to every God in existence that we wouldn't be caught and shut the door gently behind me. I didn't even bother taking in any details of the hallway we were standing in, I simply glanced around frantically in search of Jasmine. "Jazz! Jazz!" I hissed into the empty room.

"Sienna!" I suddenly saw Jasmine's head pop around the doorway of a room across the long hallway. "Come here, quick!"

She was making no effort to keep her voice down and I cringed, cursing inwardly. She sounded urgent so I quickly and simply did as I was told and jogged up the polished hallway, conscious of how loud the heels of my boots sounded on the floorboards.

"Look!" Jasmine whispered as I joined her at the doorway, pointing at something.

Before I could even look at what it was had seemed to capture Jasmine's attention so powerfully, I became aware of soft music. At first I thought someone was playing piano music on a speaker or stereos, but as I finally dared to look into the living room, I understood. The piano music wasn't coming from a CD or an iPod like I had thought. It was coming from a real piano, nestled comfortably in the corner of the living room. My jaw hit the floor as I saw someone was sitting up and playing the instrument, lovingly teasing out the slow, gentle notes. The player had their back turned to me, but there was no mistaking the slim physique, the curtain of black hair framing their figure, and the ghostly pale skin exposed and on show under folds of a blue dress.

Nikki.

I watched in shock as Nikki's slim fingers danced across the piano keys, a soft, harmonious and utterly sublime sound echoing out. Her fingers seemed to glide, barely even touching the keys, a fleeting, slow and beautiful melody being expelled from the instrument. I turned to look at Jasmine who looked just as stunned as I was feeling.

And then, just when I thought this whole thing couldn't get any more unbelievable, the music rose to a soft but still stunning crescendo and all of a sudden, she was singing. I gasped.

"Something delicate, special like the love we know. My fragile heart beats, sometimes secure, sometimes alone..."

"Oh my God…" I whispered. Her voice was simply beautiful. She sang with a comforting softness and ease, the syllables barely stressed, her voice quiet and sweet, yet still dancing with melody and harmony.

My first treasure took me years to find…It's what I cling to when confusion clouds my mind…Then you come to me and you smile. Suddenly I feel as if everything's okay. Lost in your smile, all at once I'm swept away. When troubles fall upon me like rain, when the world becomes one big cold and lonely place, you carry me through. From dreary skies the sun breaks through…"

She stopped singing for that one moment, returning to a soft instrumental break. Her fingers darted lithely and lightly across the keys, barely pressing one before moving onto another, the notes spilling out and washing over me like a wave breaking upon the shore.

"When you're—"

BANG!

The almighty noise sounded right beside me and I screeched in fright, snapping straight out of the music induced daydream I had been caught in. The music came to an abrupt halt, several harsh notes sounding out like someone had slammed their palm on any random keys they felt like. I heard Jasmine swear and all of a sudden there was another bang as Nikki leapt to her feet, knocking her piano stool over in fright and whipping around to look at us.

At that moment, I felt horrifically uncomfortable and I wished I could just melt into the shadows, or better yet completely rewind the clock back to five minutes ago when we were all harmlessly standing outside the front door. I cringed. We had basically just invaded her house, crept around without her knowing and had snuck up on her in a moment she thought she was alone. Some friends we were…

Nikki was looking totally astonished, almost like she wasn't quite believing what was right in front of her eyes. "Sienna?!" she exclaimed. "Jasmine?! What… what are you doing here?!"

"Wh… what are we doing here?!" I could tell from Jasmine's voice that she was feeling just as guilty as I was for what we were doing, but she was attempting to cover it up. "You invited us! So we're here,' she cried, a little too loudly.

I wanted to sink my head into my hands and I shot Jasmine a reproachful look before turning back to Nikki, feeling someone at least owed her an explanation. "The, uh… the door was open…"

Nikki looked a little perplexed, before suddenly running up and throwing herself at me in a hug. I staggered back, a little surprised, but I clumsily returned the hug all the same. "Ring the doorbell next time!" she said, but her eyes were sparkling, she was grinning and her tone was light.

"We did. Repeatedly…" Jasmine said, grumbling as she knelt down to pick up a heavy book she had somehow knocked off the cabinet next to the door, which had explained the loud bang from earlier.

Nikki was beginning to look a little sheepish. "Oh…" she said, a blush developing across her pale cheeks. "I… I must not have heard it… over the piano…" the last bit of her sentence escaped her in a barely audible whisper. She all of a sudden looked fiercely embarrassed.

"It's alright," I said. "Yeah, so… we, uh, heard you play. You're really good!" I said as sincerely as I could, really hoping she wouldn't think I was being patronising or mocking her.

She looked horrified at this point. "Oh no! You… you heard me?!"

"Course we did. You're good," Jasmine laughed like it was no big deal. "How come you never told us you could play the piano?"

"Or sing!" I added.

"Um…" Nikki looked flustered at our questioning and her face was slowly reddening. "You… you never asked…"

I opened my mouth to ask something else, desperate to find all about this new side of Nikki I never even knew existed up till now, but she suddenly intercepted, flapping her hands up and down like she was a Pidgey trying to take off into flight. "Oh, guys! Come on, enough of this just now! You must be tired from travelling all the way here. You should go and put your things in my room and then I'll get some dinner started cos it's getting late…"

"You're gonna do dinner?" Jasmine asked, looking surprised and worried at the same time.

"Well, yeah, I kinda have to." She nodded, motioning for us to follow her out the living room and back into the hallway. "Dad's away in Sinnoh for work and mum's had to do a night shift at the hospital. She's a nurse, you see." She added as she began leading us up a set of carpeted stairs.

"And where's Scott?" Jasmine asked out of interest.

"Your guess is as good as mine," Nikki said with a forced laugh. "Somewhere in Kanto. He's gone off trying to take on all the Gyms… we haven't heard from him since he left and that was months ago…"

I could hear the worry in her voice as she said this. Nikki always had been extraordinarily protective over her young brother, and I knew the idea that he was out on his own in Kanto challenging gyms without so much as even a phone call to keep in touch was likely driving her mad with worry. "I'm sure he'll be alright," I told Nikki as we emerged onto yet another hallway. "He's not exactly stupid…"

"He's thirteen years old, it's kinda in a thirteen year old's nature to be stupid." Jasmine piped up behind me.

"Jasmine, shut up!" I hissed through gritted teeth. "Honestly!" I thought in exasperation. "Is the concept of subtlety completely lost on her?"

Nikki was grinning all the same, albeit a little wryly. "It's alright," she said off handedly with a mild shrug. "Scott is Scott. He'll go wherever he wants to. He's always been like that…"

I wanted to say something more, but it was at this point that Nikki opened one of the doors in the upstairs hallway. She pushed it open and motioned for us to follow. As I stepped into the room, I instantly had to reel back at the sight of it. For one moment, I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me as reflected throughout the entire of the bedroom was nothing but pink. So much pink my eyes hurt from simply taking it in. Every surface, every piece of furniture, every decoration, every square inch in that room that wasn't wooden was pink. The bed covers were pink, the curtains were pink, the wallpaper was pink, the lampshades were pink… everything was just pink. Even the vibrant red Flareon plushie sitting on Nikki's bed was beginning to look suspiciously pink. Varying shades from fluorescent pink, neon pink, dusty rose pink and baby pink stared back at me, so much of it all that it was actually making my head hurt.

I could do nothing but look at Nikki in the hope of getting some sort of explanation and I was surprised to see she was blushing and grinning quite nervously. "I, uh, went through a bit of a pink phase when I was younger."

"A bit?!" Jasmine cried incredulously.

"Yeah, just a little bit…" Nikki said with a sheepish grin, fingering a pink blanket draped over the wooden dressing table in the corner of the room. "And with my dad away, my mum working and me not even being home for quite a few months, we never did get around to redecorating."

"I can see that." Jasmine said, still looking awed. "I could never live in this much pink."

"What are you talking about; you like pink." I eyed Jasmine pointedly. For all Jasmine was complaining about the colour of Nikki's room, she wasn't exactly adverse to a bit of pink herself, easily fitting in and adopting the 'girly girl' role of the group, if not in her behaviour (which was certainly not ladylike), then definitely by her clothes and the way she did her hair and makeup and carefully presented herself so she looked good all the time. She was always immaculate, dressed in stylish and trendy clothes that were always on the cutting edge of fashion. Her outfits looked like they belonged on the skinny figure of supermodels or hanging on the mannequins in fancy boutiques. It actually made me wonder where on earth she got the money to dress like that...

"I do like pink," Jasmine was insisting vehemently. "But not baby pink… I like more vibrant colours. No offence, Nikki."

"None taken!" Nikki grinned, before looking official again. "Well, my room's quite small, as you can see." She said, glancing around her modest room again. "And my bed's not very big either…" she said, eyeing her tiny single pink patchwork bed with a little embarrassment. "But what I'll do is I'll make up a bed on the floor for you guys if you'd help me bring the spare mattress through."

"Sure," I nodded.

"Oh no, heavy lifting?" Jasmine looked at Nikki reproachfully. "Really?"

I blinked in surprise at Jasmine's protest. "Jasmine, you've got brute strength like a Machoke! You could pick up that mattress yourself and carry it in here like it was a toothpick."

Jasmine grimaced. "That's the problem… I don't know my own strength. If I hug someone too tight I almost choke them…"

"I hear that," I said, grinning at Nikki who returned it, knowing all too well what I was getting at. Jasmine didn't hug often for that exact reason; she was a little too worried of hurting anyone with her bear hugs. She had caught both me and Nikki out with this a few times, even when she had tried to be gentle. Jasmine wasn't looking too impressed at my remark and stuck her pointed tongue out at me in retaliation. "So mature," I remarked back, before laughing. "Nah, I kinda envy you, Jazz. I'd like to have some strength. I'm a bit of a weakling," I said, trying to flex my skinny arms, making Nikki giggle madly.

Jasmine merely shook her head. "It's not ladylike to be so strong though…" she muttered under her breath, softly enough that I almost didn't hear her.

"Eh?" I questioned her, puzzled. "Ladylike? Since when did you care about ladylike?"

"Huh?" For a split second, she looked guilty and she hastily shook her head. "Uh, n…never mind," she said quickly.

Jasmine dismissed any further questions I had about this odd statement she had made and instead suggested we bring the spare mattress into Nikki's room to avoid doing it later when we were tired. It was an awkward job trying to negotiate the heavy, unwieldy thing from the room across the hall from Nikki's. It wasn't exactly helped by the fact Nikki and I had the combined strength of a Magikarp between us and collapsed into giggles every time we attempted to get a grip of it and carry it. Eventually, Jasmine, who had declined to help in favour of simply holding the doors open for us lost her temper, stormed straight past, practically shouldered the mattress and heaved it into the empty space on the floor whilst Nikki and I had tears rolling down our faces with laughter.

After a few failed attempts at threading sheets onto the mattress, stuffing an unwieldy duvet into a slippery cover and spending more time belting each other with the pillows instead of actually putting pillowcases on them, we admitted defeat and headed down into the kitchen, leaving the bed still a mess and entertaining a vague promise to fix it later. Nikki decided to cook dinner for us and seemed quite eager to impress us, but upon the realisation she had forgotten the vital ingredient, the chunks of Miltank steak for the curry she wanted to make, we had to make alternative plans. That is, of course, after we laughed for a solid ten minutes at the ridiculousness of it all. Thankfully there was a local restaurant just down the street from Nikki so we decided to go there to eat.

We passed the Pokemon daycare as we walked down the street, tightly packed with houses. The old man we had seen earlier was still there, but this time he was dozing in a chair in his garden. Nikki shook her head fondly as she led us by.

"I work there," she nodded, indicating the little daycare centre. "That's my boss there. He always falls asleep around this time of night."

"You work there, huh?" Jasmine looked interested. "What do you do?"

"Bit of everything, really." Nikki nodded. "The couple that run the business are quite old now, so they can't really keep up with paperwork and they certainly don't know how to use a computer. So I try and deal with all the bookings, what trainers drop off what Pokemon, for how long, take down their contact details and load it into the computer and write down a paper copy for them too. I also have to take care of some of the more… energetic Pokemon that my bosses can't keep up with. So I'm kinda a jack of all trades,"

"That sounds like a lot of work." I said, furrowing my brow.

"Yeah, they're not overworking you, are they?" Jasmine asked, looking fierce.

"Oh, no, no!" Nikki looked horrified at the mere suggestion. "I like working at the daycare! I'm actually good at it! And at least I have a job to go back to all the time I'm home. It's not like I'm ever going to get to do what I really want to…"

I looked at Jasmine in confusion. "And what's that?" Jasmine asked.

Nikki jumped almost like she'd been scalded. "Oh, uh, never mind, it's nothing."

"Sounds like a pretty big 'nothing' to me," I remarked to myself. Nikki said nothing further on the subject, so I had no option but to ignore it and we all continued walking.

Dinner was an interesting affair, to say the least. Fuchsia City was a big place, but the place Nikki had chosen to eat out at was quite small and select, a comfortable buzz in the air, but not full to the brim with screaming children. The local waiters and waitresses knew Nikki; apparently the Harpers were frequent customers and the bubbly blonde waitress assigned to our table chatted away to Nikki about work, her family and her Pokemon like they'd known each other for years. It was only after the girl took our order and bounced away did Nikki reveal she had known the waitress while they were both at school. She then clarified that in a close knit community like this little suburb of Fuchsia was, everyone knew everyone. And if you didn't know someone, you at least knew someone else who did.

After ordering and receiving our food, our small talk soon turned to what the three of us had been doing over the couple of months since we had all last seen each other. I had last seen Jasmine in April, not long after my 16th birthday, but Nikki, because of her commitments to work, I hadn't physically seen since I had left the hospital in Hoenn. We'd kept in touch through phone and video calling of course, but I'd missed her, as I missed Jasmine, even though I had seen her more often. Making the decision to come to Fuchsia to see Nikki was a good one, albeit a daunting one. Thankfully I had Elliot to rely on to transport me from Pallet Town as I wasn't really willing to travel out on the road again, and Jasmine had simply met me here. It had been a long time since the three of us had been together, and we had a lot to catch up on since.

Jasmine was strangely cryptic about her news, hiding behind a plateful of low-fat pasta salad, revealing very little about what had happened to her since we'd all come home from Hoenn, claiming it was 'nothing interesting'. Although rather annoying, I was beginning to get used to Jasmine's reluctance to reveal much about her personal life. I did however find it strange that someone as loud and brash as Jasmine was so secretive. While trying to ignore my slight frustration at Jasmine, I told the girls bits and pieces about my own life, how I was attending pastry school in Viridian and had almost finished my first year there. But it wasn't my life or Jasmine's life I was interested in. It was Nikki's, particularly the developments in her romantic life.

I wasn't shy about asking her about this, and she blushed and squealed no sooner had I even said the word 'Christian'. She became such a giggling, blushing, squealing wreck at the mere mention of his name that it made me giggle too, and it took about a good ten minutes to get an answer out of her.

"Christian's very nice…" Nikki blushed violently, refusing to meet anyone's eye and staring right down at the floor instead.

"I think he must be more than 'very nice'." I teased her, elbowing her gently. "How long has it been now?"

"He asked me out in February, so and it's August now… almost six months..."

"Six months," I grinned back. "That's sweet. It'll be a year for me and Elliot next month." I chuckled. "Where's the time gone, huh?"

"I know…" Jasmine nodded, taking a slow sip of her sparkling water which was garnished with a slice of lemon she had insisted on having. "It just goes by so fast…"

I nodded. "It almost feels like yesterday that I first picked up a Pokeball… It doesn't feel right that what…? Sixteen months have passed since that day…"

"That's scary!" Nikki said, her eyes wide.

"I know." I laughed. "It almost feels kinda strange being back to normal after all that… madness. Legendary Pokemon, mad villains wanting world domination… honest to God, I could write a book about it all..."

"Do it, you'll make a fortune," Jasmine laughed.

"I'm just glad no-one ever found out about that…" Nikki murmured. "I mean… we saw Kyogre, Groudon, Rayquaza… Arceus!" she added in a hushed whisper. "How come no-one ever… found out?"

"Wallace, Lance and the Gym Leaders dealt with that." I nodded. "And the trainers they used in that raid were sworn to secrecy. But I'll admit, I don't really like to think about it," I added.

"Me neither…" Jasmine said, poking half-heartedly at the bits still left on her plate. "Just do what I do and forget about it. Pretend it didn't happen…"

"Pfft, that never helps…" I said, pushing a half-eaten meatball across my plate, before sighing.

A strange solemn mood descended on us for a short time as we finished dinner and paid. But as we dragged our heavy bodies to Nikki's house, bellies satisfyingly full, we all started to giggle again over little things. As we finally got back to Nikki's after dawdling a while, we realised it was getting late. So we all dressed for bed, squashed up together on Nikki's tiny bed and watched a film on the old TV in Nikki's room, giggling and gossiping like a couple of schoolgirls. It was like being back in the Pokemon Centre, back out on the road again, being with the people I cared most about. And I was loving it.

We went to bed not long after the film ended, Nikki in her bed, and Jasmine and I squashed up together on the tiny, unmade and uncomfortably warm mattress. Jasmine was a rather restless sleeper, murmuring and muttering, tossing and turning and elbowing me with her skinny elbows constantly. It didn't stop me falling asleep however, thankfully as I was exhausted from the day's travel and all the hilarity. My own sleep was pretty much undisturbed apart from when I woke up once when I heard the front door slam, sometime in the early hours of the morning. My initial panic was eventually overridden by common sense as I remembered that Nikki had told us her mother was a nurse, working the night shifts. Realising that, I chuckled to myself, rolled over and went back to sleep.

The morning came all too soon, but as I opened my eyes into the hazy blur of pink, I instantly became aware of a number of things that caught my attention and made me forget I was tired. Firstly, I was no longer lying on the mattress, but on the scratchy white carpet, while Jasmine was starfishing across the mattress, snoring softly. Secondly, there was a faint burning smell hanging in the air. And thirdly, the noise of soft, melodic piano music was drifting up into the bedroom.

I didn't even bother getting dressed, I simply got to my feet, cracking my sore neck and back in the process and padded downstairs, shivering slightly. I followed the noise of the piano music until I reached the living room once again. Nikki was sitting at the piano, skimming her fingers gently over the piano keys, but she seemed a little more hesitant as the soft notes rang out. I could hear her singing, but it was soft, whispery, breathy singing and I couldn't make out the words.

I felt like I could stand there and watch her for hours, but I felt bad about eavesdropping, considering I'd already been caught doing it once, so I cleared my throat. "Nikki?"

Nikki visibly jumped, but she turned around, smiling broadly which was always a good sign. "Oh! Good morning, Sienna! You sleep okay?"

"I think so," I nodded. "I woke up completely off the mattress, though. Madame Moore up there must have pushed me off."

Nikki giggled, before looking a little guilty. "Em, I did try to make breakfast, but… the pancakes ended up getting a little… burnt."

"Ah," I grinned. "That explains the burning smell."

"Sorry…" she grinned, looking apologetic. "I was gonna try again, but… then I remembered we have a pastry chef in the house… I don't think anything I could do would be comparable to a professional's…"

"I'm not a professional yet," I reminded her with a smile, before crossing over and sitting down next to her on the piano bench. "Playing again?"

"Yeah," she nodded. "I try and play every morning. I was, uh… trying to write a song…"

It was only then that I noticed a piece of sheet music balanced rather haphazardly in the music stand near to Nikki. It was covered in writing, some scribbled out, some intact and screeds of music notes that meant nothing to me. I peered closer, trying to decode some of the writing, but Nikki, suddenly embarrassed, ripped the sheet from the stand and hid it behind her back. "No! Uh, it's not finished yet!" she blushed.

"Can't I hear it?"

"No!" she cried, looking horrified. "I'm… I'm not very good at song writing…" she admitted, looking down to her feet. "I… it's kinda strange. I can hear any piece of music just once and I can play it back almost perfectly. Just from hearing it once. N—not that I'm boasting, of course!" she added hastily. "But… when it comes to putting a song together myself, putting notes and melodies together from nothing, I find it a little more difficult…"

I nodded. "I'm sure you'll get it,"

"I'm trying!" she said cheerfully. "I mean, I've been playing since I was four years old—"

"Four?!"

"Yeah. Four." She grinned, looking a little sheepish, running a hand gently along the piano keys as if caressing an old friend. "My grandmother insisted that I play…" I caught her wrinkle her nose in what looked like a mix of anger and disgust at the word 'grandmother'.

"Grandmother, huh?"

"Yeah. Grandma Nicolle." She sighed. "My father's mum. I was named for her…" she grimaced again. "I don't like her… it's why I don't ever let anyone call me 'Nicolle'."

I nodded. "I always did wonder about that…"

"Yeah. She's horrible… always has been… she's the kind of woman who's never happy, no matter how much you try and please her. She wanted me to play the piano, so I did."

"But you like the piano, don't you?"

"Of course I do!" Nikki cried. "It's what I want to do with my life, after all!"

She suddenly stopped; looking like she wanted to claw back the words she had just said and stuff them back in her mouth.

"You wanna play piano for the rest of your life?"

"I… I… do…" she nodded, after a moment's hesitation.

I frowned. "But… I thought you wanted to be a co-ordinator…"

"I want to do that, too…" Nikki sighed. "But I can't be both."

"Who says?"

"Everyone!" Nikki said, looking woeful. "You have to be exceptionally talented to be a pianist. Like… one person out of, like, a thousand will ever be good enough and lucky enough to become a pianist and do nothing else for the rest of their lives. The rest of us have to just keep it as a hobby…"

"But if it's what you really want to do—"

"But it isn't all I want to do…" Nikki said with a sigh, before a blush crept over her face. "Can I let you in on a secret?"

"Course."

"What I want to do, I mean really want to do… is both of these things. I want to combine contest battling with music."

I blinked. "Combine them?"

"Yeah!" Nikki nodded. "I always imagined combining the two… having Pokemon battle and display themselves to music… Test Pokemon and trainers on musicality, their ability to interpret music, create routines and all that…"

"Well… why don't you do it?"

"Don't be silly, Sienna!" Nikki said primly, shaking her head firmly. "There's never been anything like that. There's never been a co-ordinator who battles with music…"

I grinned, reached out and put my arms around her. "Well, Nikki Harper, I guess you'll just have to be the first, won't you?"

Nikki was quiet for a few moments. "You… you really think I can do it?"

"Yeah." I nodded. "I do."

A smile was touching on Nikki's face. "Yeah…" she smiled, before suddenly seeming to perk up a little. "I'd love that… music is just so amazing, and to combine that with Pokemon… that's be fantastic."

"You really love music, don't you?"

"Of course!" Nikki grinned. "Music is universal… no matter who you are, where you are or what you are, you can understand music… You can move people to tears with just one melody. You can cheer someone up with just one tune. You can touch people's souls with just one lyric. And I love it. It brings people together… "

"Brings people together, huh?"

"Yeah." Nikki smiled. "It brought you here, didn't it? You heard the music, you came here."

I smiled. "Yeah..."

"But of course, it's not always as literal as that…" Nikki smiled, gently tapping a few keys, the notes striking. "People share music in the same way they share memories and experiences. A song that means nothing to one person can mean so much to another. That's incredible, when you think about it, really. A bunch of random notes and words all meshed together to form some sort of tangible… meaning that's as unique and individual as the person listening to it. I think… I think that's beautiful. And music is everywhere too! I see it everywhere. In the wind, the way it whistles… And in the leaves, when they rustle and shake, like laughter… and in the water, when it sparkles and dances… that's music to me. That's my music."

"Nikki…" I said slowly, suddenly totally in awe of what she was saying. At that moment, I wanted to say so much, but my voice failed me and I could only stare at her. My mind was filled with her words and I found them strangely emotive and meaningful. I understood her perfectly.

Nikki however was blushing, like she was embarrassed of what she had just said. "But anyway..." She said with a little grin, taking her hands away from the keys. "What about you? You wanna try?"

"Me?!" I said in shock, looking at the line of keys, feeling daunted and quite intimidated. "I don't think so… I've got the musical capability of a… teaspoon or something! I can't even sing in tune. You really don't wanna hear me sing," I added, cringing at the sheer thought of my own croaky voice.

Nikki giggled. "It's not about singing well. It doesn't matter if you can't sing well, so long as you enjoy what you're doing. Music isn't just for the musically inclined, Sienna."

"Oh, no, I enjoy singing." I said seriously.

"So, what's the problem?"

"No-one else likes me singing," I said with a wry smile.

Nikki chuckled. "Okay, well maybe we'll leave the singing."

"Good plan."

"But I can teach you to play the piano." She said, reaching out, taking my hand and resting it across a selection of keys.

My protests fell on deaf ears; Nikki proving to be surprisingly stubborn and remaining adamant that I at least try. With no other option, I shut up and let her teach me. My piano lesson was difficult, to say the least. Nikki first tried to teach me which key corresponded with each note, and that was complicated enough. My memory was never good to begin with, so I kept forgetting what my fingers were doing half the time. The other half of the time, my fingers were strangely stiff and just didn't want to do what I told them to do. When I eventually mastered a simple six note tune, Nikki decided it was time to simply throw me in at the deep end and teach me a song.

"I can't learn a song!" I wheedled. "I can barely play six notes properly!"

"Don't worry, it's easy." She said with a definitive nod. "I'll teach you a bit of the opening, alright?"

I groaned, wishing I could bang my head against something. "If you say so..." I relented.

I didn't recognise the tune as she taught me it, but thankfully she gave me a relatively easy composition of notes that even I couldn't muck up.

We started playing again after I finally worked out what I was meant to be doing. I felt clumsy compared to Nikki, my heavy notes plinking out and sounding horrifically chunky next to hers, which were flawless and sublime as normal. I was focusing so hard on tapping on the simple tune I had been given, that I almost didn't notice Nikki begin to sing again.

"When you're weary, feeling small…"

When Nikki sang, her voice still sparkled like a glorious stream, but it was different this time. She sang in a lower tone, her voice noticeably deeper. The song sounded almost mournful, the lyrics full of regret and woe, and Nikki's slow, drawn out words inexplicably made me feel quite sad...

"When tears are in your eyes, I will dry them all. I'm on your side, when times get rough and friends just can't be found. Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down. Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down…"

I was ensnared by the beauty of the song, almost forgetting everything that was going on around me, but I was brought down to the earth with a crash when I heard Nikki falter on the next bit. I looked up to see what was wrong and I was shocked to see tears forming in her eyes. Her playing came to an abrupt halt.

"Ni…Nikki!" I cried in surprise, instantly wanting to throw my arms around her. "What's wrong?"

"It's all right," she sniffed. "I'm alright, honestly. It's just that song…"

I frowned."What about it?"

"It's Christian's favourite," She admitted with a rather embarrassed smile. "And somehow it's become our song…" she was blushing now, and although I didn't quite know why, I preferred her blushing than teary. "So, whenever I play it, I get a little emotional…"

I didn't quite know what to say. "You two have a song, huh?"

"Yeah." She nodded with a smile. "I play it for him every time I see him… he loves it." She paused before asking "Do you and Elliot have a song?"

"Elliot and me?" I asked, floundering a little. "No, I can't say that we do."

"You should." Nikki said with a definitive nod of her head. She had her hands on the keys again and was looking thoughtful. "Like I said before, sharing a piece of music is a wonderful thing, it really is. Songs have meaning, you know, and sharing the meaning of something between two people is so… beautiful, I think."

I couldn't help but smile. "Wow, Nik…" I laughed, running a hand through my hair. "For as long as we have been friends, I never knew about this side of you. You kinda shocked me…"

Nikki looked at me. "Shocked you?"

"Yeah." I grinned, sheepishly. "I always said to myself that you can't judge a Pokemon on their appearance because there's more to them than meets the eye. I guess I need to remember that that goes for humans too... We're all so much more than we present to others, I guess."

Nikki was smiling again. She sniffed, repositioned her hands on the keys and effortlessly played a few notes. "Come on," she said. "Let's try it again. You remember how to do it?"

"I think so," I laughed, placing my own unsteady hands on the keys.

"Alright," she grinned, her hands beginning to dance over the piano once again, easily picking up the melody from when she had left off. As the simple tune sounded out into the empty living room, echoing and reverberating like a hundred pianos were playing, the hauntingly beautiful and poignant notes inexplicably tugging at my heartstrings, she turned to look at me. "Thank you for letting me share this music with you, Sienna."

I grinned at her, attempting to play the own small part I had been given. "I think I should be thanking you,"

A wide beaming smile broke out over her face before she once again broke out into song. Her voice was perfect, passionate and melodious, sounding like she meant every single word she sang.

"When you're down and out, when you're on the streets, when evening falls so hard, I will comfort you. I'll take your part when darkness comes and pain is all around...Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down. Like a bridge over troubled water, I will lay me down…"

And as the song continued, the sound of music echoing all around that tiny living room in that house in Fuchsia, I understood. I understood Nikki's love and passion for music, and as I watched her face simply beam with happiness as she continued to play, her eyes dazzling and alight with a passion I had never seen there before. I found myself smiling. I felt like I was seeing Nikki for the first time, like she had come alive and blossomed right in front of me and I was seeing her for who she really was for the first time. I understood everything Nikki said about the power and magic of music. It had made Nikki into who she really was, and I loved seeing her so excited and passionate.

And that's why I hoped that if Nikki really wanted to combine her two loves, music and contest battling, that she would do her best to make that happen. I knew that if you had a love, like the love I rekindled for cooking and baking, you had to chase it in order to make it a reality. Dreams very rarely came true if you just sat around and hoped real hard for them. Talent, even if you had in seemingly endless supply, like Nikki had, often wasn't enough in this day and age. Hard work, determination and even a little bit of luck was just as important as natural ability and a desire for something to happen, perhaps even more so. I just hoped that one day Nikki would be able to fulfil her dream. Not just as her friend, but as someone who could appreciate the beauty and sheer ability the young woman sitting on my side displayed.

Because the sound of music echoing all around me was simply too beautiful to ever be contained in one tiny room.

The Sound of Music

Fin.

Author's Note

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little one-shot. I feel bad I haven't published anything to the extension in so long, but I got this idea and I just had to write it.

The two songs used in this fic are "Serenade" by Daphne Gere, first used in an episode of the anime Fruits Basket, and the second is "Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water" by Simon and Garfunkel, a personal favourite of mine.

I do have a couple more oneshots in the pipeline I would eventually like to get around to writing. Among Monty's backstory and Nathan's backstory, I have another cooking fic called 'Hell's Kitchen' I wanna write, plus a GreenhornShipping oneshot that shows Elliot and Sienna's first meeting as kids. Just wanna ask you guys which one you'd like to see next?

Thanks so much to my reviewers Sniper Mudkip, WildCroconaw, May and Dawn are the best, WOWFan123, eeveelutionluvr, TwewyReaperGirl, ShadowSerenity57, The Neverending Meep and WarriorSwift.

Extra special thanks to WarriorSwift for helping me out with the new name for the extension!

Until next time, guys :D