Maria's POV
"John, I back."
I phased through the window and found him sitting on a chair, doing his homework. When he didn't respond, I decided to perch myself on his head and look it over. All over the desk were textbooks and sheets of graph paper with lines and numbers scribbled (but surprisingly neatly) everywhere. I had no idea what was written there, and just trying to read them made me dizzy.
"Dear God, what it hell is that supposed to be?" I managed to sputter out after being stuck in a trance from the sheer complexity of the papers' mathematical contents.
John chuckled a little at my comment. "Don't bother asking; you won't get this at all. I know I don't." All of a sudden, he put his pencil and ruler down and turned his gaze up, directly into my eyeballs, a curious smile on his face.
"More importantly, where were you? You came back earlier than I expected-it's not even 8 o'clock yet."
"Oh I was just at Jess's place. I asked her what I should do tomorrow. You know, how I should introduce myself." I said earnestly. I wasn't ready to tell him about that...
"Did she say anything about me?" At this, I burst out laughing. Then I remembered others were in the house, and I shut up quickly. I remained silent until I heard no movement around to house through the wooden door, and fell into a fit of giggles.
"What, you got the hots for Jess?" I snickered. John blushed a little and a frown made itself on his face.
"No, it's just that I get a strange feeling that more than just friendly girl talk happened over the last few minutes, with that huge smile you had on your face when you came in." He responded irritably. Next second, his frown was slowly turning into a smile. "So what happened? Please tell me in the most explicit, describable way. Come on, I'm sooooo curious." His grin grew even larger until it looked like it would reach to his ears. It would have been scary, with his long black hair and mismatched eyes, but I was too deep in thought to notice.
I started to feel my cheeks burn at the memory of what happened in that house. Oh God, don't remind me...
...
"So, what's between you and John?"
At this, I looked up at her and respond with a simple "Huh?"
She pressed on, seeing me hesitate and not giving me a chance to recover. "Come on. I know something's going on between you and him. The way you stood up to me at school, you breaking into tears at our little 'storytime', you got feelings for him. I can tell."
At this, words froze midway from my throat and I haplessly looked down at the wooden floor.
"Aww, you like him! That's so cute!" All of a sudden, she started ruffling my hair with one hand and hugging me with the other arm, the cotton from her hoodie rubbing against my face.
"Dammit, Jess, it's not like that!" I managed to mutter out and wriggle my way out of her limbs. I looked at her, pissed off at hugging me again."God you gotta stop doing that! Besides, I just felt the same way everyone else did. Didn't you cry too?"
This managed to stop her for a while, but she turned her eyes back to me with a small smile. "Yeah, but out of all of us, you cried to most. Sure you didn't make any noise, but you were also the one who broke down first."Grrrh...It was true, but I hated admitting it. When I heard John's past with those bullies, I couldn't help but look down and have tears falling down my face. I also felt like my insides were tearing and burning themselves at the same time, especially when he showed me his arm.
"Well no one should deserve that from another, you know?" Was all I managed to say after my silence, growing slightly red in the face, getting teary-eyed. After a few moments, Jess slowly turned her grin into a soft smile.
"Yes, I know, but we all get bullied and get hurt sometimes. Like you-you got roughed up when you were training with Mac, but you shrugged it off. And me-when my parents separated, I was sad and weeping, but I got over that. We all get over these kinds of stuff with time. Remember what he said? "Don't worry about it too much."."She looked at me with caring eyes and ruffled my hair gently. At this, I was really surprised and looked up at her, amazed at her advice and tone.Damn. John was right-womenarestrange!
"Yeah... thanks. I needed that."
...
After about a minute of silence to recollect myself, Jess threw a question out of the blue.
"So, do you like him or not? Come on I want an honest answer!" She said screeching with batting eyelashes, arms to her chest.
I couldn't believe it! After a tender moment like that, she still wants to know if I like John or not!Well,do I like him?
"Well, sure he's nice and let me train and all, but he's also somewhat bossy and keeps me in my Pokeball if I piss him off, which isreallyunnecessary, but-"
"Don't avoid the question." She said with a smug look on her face. "Just say it-you like him or not?"
I wanted to answer right in her face, especially after being reconciled by her, but with those puppy-eyes and voice, I just couldn't answer straight! "What about you! Do you...like him?" I hesitated a little when I said 'like', knowing full well what it really meant.
Now it was her turn to freeze. I smiled a little when I saw the shock in her face, but she recovered and responded back quickly. "Well, sure, I like him. He's nice, and thoughtful, and not at all mean as everyone at school thinks-"
I laughed at her response, knowing that she too was avoiding the question. "Come on, Jess! You and I both know what we mean by 'like'!" I was laughing so hard I actually floated into the air and collided with the ceiling, making me lose focus and dropping myself onto her bed's red blankets with a soft muffledthud!
Jess just smiled and looked at me, recovering from my laughter and shaking myself back to consciousness. "You know you deserved that."
I shook myself awake and stated out "Well, I guess we both like him, right?"
Jess laughed a little at my question. "Yeah, I guess."
"And we won't tell him about this little conversation?"
"Definitely."
I looked at the clock and it read 7:20 p.m.-certainly not late, but it was getting dark and I want to get home with John worrying about me. "I gotta go, John's waiting." I turned around and hovered through the window.
…
"Hey."
"Wake up! Come on don't fall asleep on me now!"
Snap!
Wha...what?I shook myself awake and looked around. I was still planted on John's head, but I was veering close to falling off.
"Gah!" I realized I wasn't concentrating and to avoid face-planting on his desk, I quickly floated up into the air and gasped for air, recovering from my shock. I managed to calm down, but I could still feel my face burning as though it was on fire.
John just looked at me and laughed quietly, a tiny smile on his face. "Well, I take it you had a rather exciting encounter with Jess? Don't tell me! I want to find out myself in time!" emphasizing "exciting", just to piss me off!
Oh the nerve of him!
…
John's POV
"Well, this is the place, according to the PokeNav." We both gazed at the house in front of us.
"God damn!" was all that came out of our mouths. The two-story house was huge, and it reminded me of the presidential White House, for some reason, despite it being nowhere close to it. It had a layer of brown bricks on its surface and white window frames covering the building like a war bunker. A black surface of roofing covered the top, and other than its ridiculous size, it looked just like the neighbouring houses next to it.
"Who in the hell decided to make such a house!" I heard Maria gasp out next to me. I ignored her and went to push the doorbell, making a loud DING-DONG! Instantly, I could hear a stampede of footsteps in the house and the door opened itself with 3 people on the handle. Thankfully, I had Maria send herself back into her Pokeball when I realized what was coming.
One I could automatically tell was Kari. She was wearing a long-sleeved black and white shirt and a pair of jeans. The rest, I assumed are the parents. The mom looked somewhere in her 40s, with a wrinkled but still fair face with short black hair. She had on a pink t-shirt and white pants to cover her small stature (she was smaller than Kari, given her age). It was the male of the group that surprised me, though. He was tall, definitely over 6 feet, and had a rather menacing face; wrinkled around his cold eyes and thin lips, head balding from age, and if I do say so myself, a rather buff build, especially around his t-shirt covered chest. Looking at a man with such stature, I could only imagine what he would do if I was to hurt any of them.
Probably kick me 10 yards out the house with a boot stuck in my ass!
Despite their rather mismatched styles, they both had smiles on their faces and greeted me in their house. I took of my shoes and took a good look around. On the left was a living room, with a large plasma TV and long white couch to boot, a table and a set of chairs around it. On my right was a long corridor with rooms, which I presumed to be the bathrooms and the closets and such.
I would have taken a longer time looking at this rather magnificent house, but Kari quickly and forcefully, dragged me up to her room by the arm and I could only smile at her eager attitude and to calm down her parents, who looked rather scandalized at her daughter's behaviour.
"Don't worry, I'm fine!" was all I managed to speak out to them, before we entered her room and shut the door with a loud thud! Her room wasn't too bad-it was blue with vertical stripes of white and various plushies decorated the room, from animals to Pokemon.
As expected from a rich girl. Other than that, it looked like a bigger version of my room. I took off my coat and used it as a cover when I sat on the grey carpet.
"Wow, you arequite the Pokemon fan, aren't you?" I said, gazing at the number of Pokemon in the room.
"Yeah, well, it helps when I want to hide Mitsune from my parents." She said, walking towards a humongous pile of dolls. After digging into the heap, Mitsune jumped out of it!
"Whoa!" I gasped out when I saw her pop out, her golden hair ruffled from being covered in fake Pokemon.
"Puah! So, you guys' are finally here? Well, you sure took your time; I've been hiding in that pile for an hour!" She gasped out loud, as if she was suffocating in the mountain of plushies.
All of a sudden, Maria popped out of her Pokeball in my PokeNav with a bright flash and turned a rather angry face at Mitsune. "Well, sorry, but it's not our fault that we arrived on time!"
"Maria, please! Don't make a racket. Kari's parents are here, and if they see either of you, who knows what they'll do!" I said, rather panicked and all of us hushed up and turned our heads to the door, as if expecting them to burst out the door. Luckily, we heard no noise behind it and I turned my attention to Kari.
"By the way, what was that about, all that running to the door and dragging me away like that? I wanted to make a good first impression on them." I said sarcastically, acting as though I was hurt.
Her black eyes turned cold when she answered me. "Please, they judge everyone they meet based on their looks, ever since we moved here. It's tiring-every time I bring a guest over, they have to bring them in for a talk, and after they leave, they talk about how awful they are, just on how they look and act!" She said, and I thought I could hear a hint of annoyance in her voice.
I was shocked. Even my parents, with their nosiness, never talked about how awful anyone was. And if they were, we all agreed on it. "So that's why you dragged me away? You don't want your parents badmouthing me? But they look so nice."
She laid her back on the bed and looked at the white ceiling and exhaled. "They do that to everyone. They think if they act all friendly and such, the guests would have no reason to hate them in turn. No offence, but by the way you look, I think you would automatically register as a hoodlum to them."
Wow. Compared to how she acted when we met, she's the complete opposite now!
I was not surprised; a lot of people thought I was a punk after that bullying incident. "Don't worry; I get that all the time." I took another gander around the room and realized what I was here for in the first place. "You ever gave any thought about showing Mitsune to them?"
"HELL NO!" They both screamed at me. "I don't want to know what would happen if they found out! They would probably throw her out or ground me for life for keeping a monster in the house! No offense." Kari quickly said to Mitsune next to her.
She just shrugged it off and continued to look at us grimly. "None taken. Besides, I saw their parents and how they punish Kari, and I don't want to bring her any more trouble than necessary."
Kari looked up from her bed and gave a small grin. "Besides, they're already suspicious as to why I brought a boyto the house, an older boy at that."
"Ooooooohh…"both Maria and I said simultaneously, realizing what she meant and flushing a little."I just wanted to talk. That's all. Besides, with the amount of money you got here, it wouldn't be too hard to take care of Mitsune. At least for the remainder of the game." I said earnestly.
Kari and Mitsune just scoffed and looked away. "Yeah, well trying saying that to my parents."
…
After that, I left the house (with a rather glad look on the parents' faces. Looks like what Kari said was true) and made my way back to my house.
"So how should we show you? Just walk in with you beside me and tell them if they ask?"
Maria turned to me. "Pretty much. I can't think of any other way. I just hope they don't freak out too much." I was sceptical, but laughed at the thought.
"Yeah. I guess that the highest hope we got is the chance that my mom thinks you're cute."
She flared at my comment. "Now don't you start turning into Jess! She thinks everything's cute! How does she do it?"
I laughed even harder at that. I was lucky I saw no one outside (who would? It's 5 degrees out!), otherwise they would have seen me laughing next to a pink-haired ghost!
Eventually I reached the doorstep to my house. I looked down to take off my shoes and noticed a pair of shoes I never saw before. It was black and shaped like dress shoes, but had a rather peculiar pattern of black-and-grey squares on its side.
What the…we have a guest? I never saw any of my relatives ever wearing shoes like that. I looked at the pair again and realized what was up.
"Crap. We have a guest! Maria, I need you to get back in your Pokeball. I only want my parents-"
Creeeeek….
What! Shit…!
I jerked my head up and saw the man before me. He wore a thin black jacket and had equally black short hair flowing to his left. I looked closer and saw he had green eyes and rather worn pair of black jeans. He had a slightly tan skin and appeared about 6 feet tall, making him look even more intimidating. He looked straight, not at me, but at…Maria? I looked to her and asked her if she knew him, but no words came out of me in the state of shock I was in.
"Hello. I think you met us last night, remember? What, no friendly greeting?" The man had a smile on his face and stared directly into Maria's eyes. She just hovered next to me and gasped out loud.
"You! …. It's you!" she could only managed to whisper out in fear.
What the hell is going on!
How was that? It seemed like a little too short, but it's really late right now and I want to get my brains ready for next week's chapter! Please read & review!