QT: Hi! Hi! Everyone! How are you guys?

AJ: Yeah! Yeah! How's it going?

Mikey: Are you looking forward to today's chapter?

May: I am! But I look forward to every chapter so…

Ash: What's everyone so excited about?

All: This chapter!

-cringes-

Ash: Okay…? QTpie456s is not the owner of pokémon.

All: Enjoy!

Mikey: I still don't know what totally kawaii means.

-sigh-

A Different Kind of Rivalry

Chapter 14

Dawn wasn't the only one making a plan. Emily had a scheme of her own. In this demonic mind of hers she had a plan to make Ash fall for her so that May would be jealous and Gary would notice her at last. But how was she to make this happen? In the past she would belittle Ash and put him down for trying to compete with her beloved Gary. Now she was trying to get him to like her and possibly ask her to the dance on Friday.

"Hmm…this is a tough situation. But I can handle it." She smirked and wore and evil grin on her face. She strutted from the corner from where she was hiding and made her way to the table Ash was at. Emily made it point to walk seductively and cutely in order to draw attention to herself. All the boys began to stare and drool, all except Ash and Gary. Ash was too engrossed in his meal to notice and Gary really didn't care. She huffed and blew up her bangs in frustration. 'This is harder than I thought.' She said to in her head.

"Hi Ash." She approached him. "Wha? Oh…Emily." He said. 'How dare you! You little…' she fumed. "How are you?" she asked him sweetly. He looked at her confused. "Did you just ask me…how I was?" she laughed falsely and playfully hit him on the arm. "Of course I did silly. You're so funny!" she smiled a creepy smile. Ash rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't seeing things. He pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming. He checked his pulse to make sure he wasn't dead and cleaned his ears to make sure he wasn't going deaf.

During this entire process, Emily was boiling up inside. "You didn't answer my question!" she yelled catching him off guard. "How are you?" her tone of voice returned. "…Okay, I guess." He answered cautiously. "That's good. So…are you…um…going to the dance on Friday?" she asked running her finger across the table. "Yeah…?" she beamed. "Me too! Are you going with someone?" she smirked. 'Now's my chance to reel him in!' "Not at the moment. No." he said looking down. "I don't have anyone to go with either. Hey! I've got a great idea! We should go together!" she grabbed his hand much like Brock would do to unsuspecting girls. "Uh…" he dragged. "Then it's settled. I'm looking forward to this Ash!" she kissed him on the cheek and skipped away.

Ash sat there with a sickly looking blush on his face. "What the heck just happened?" a second later, he came to the realization that Emily just planted one on his face and wiped his cheek to the point where it was red and looked like a rash. He focused his attention to the table that May was sitting at and saw her staring at him in disbelief. "Oh no. I'm going to the dance with Emily." He propped his head with his arm and sighed angrily.

Back with Emily…

"That went perfectly!" she cheered once she entered her corned. "Ew!" she wiped her mouth. "I know some things require sacrifice, but that's just wrong. This is going to be wonderful." Emily walked to her next class with her head held high. "Emily!" she saw Ebony in the hall waving at her. "Hi Ebony." She greeted her with a light kiss on each cheek. (Stuck up girls do that. – QT) "Where like were you? I missed you like at lunch today." Ebony said in a valley-girl accent. "I had some business to take care of." She flicked her hair back. "Oh. Well, like I've gotta get to my like next class so I'll like see you later! Like bye!" she walked off with her blonde hair swinging from left to right.

While making her way back to her own class, Emily spotted Ash walking as well. She licked her lips and waved with her fingers. When he saw her, he put on a fake smile and waved nervous. All the while he was sweat-dropping. 'What have I gotten myself into now?' he slapped his head. "There's gotta be some way to get out of this. I'll just tell her that there's a huge misunderstanding and that I can't go with her. It shouldn't break her heart seeing as it is made of stone." He joked.

"What's with you today huh?" he turned to the voice. "Huh? Oh hey Misty!" he said. "Hey Ash." She looked at him with a disappointed glare. "Why are you avoiding May?" she asked. His response was looking down at his feet ashamed. "You…you wouldn't understand." He stated. "Well maybe I'd have a better understanding if you told me." She got annoyed. "I can't tell you." He said. Her anger was building up. "Fine! If you won't tell me, then I'll tell you." He looked up at her confused. "She's having a tough time accepting the fact that you don't even look her in the eyes anymore. On top of that, you can't give her valid reason! 'I need my space.' Oh please Ash! If you need your space so bad why are you still hanging around the rest of us? Huh?" she put her hands on her hips.

'She's right. I…I didn't think this through enough. I'm so…so stupid!' he said to himself. "Well? Are you gonna answer me or not? Or is that a secret too?" By now his temper was so close to getting the better of him. "Just…leave me alone." He muttered under his breath. "What? Speak louder if you want to be heard." She snapped. "Leave me alone Misty." He glared at her. "Oh, do you need your space now? Gee, I'm so sorry." She said sarcastically. "I'm only doing it to protect her!" he yelled, startling her. "What?" Misty asked. "I told you wouldn't understand." He walked off.

'Protect her from what?' she asked herself. "Hey Misty!" she turned to meet Dawn and May. "Hey guys." She said crossing her arms. "You had a fight didn't you?" May asked. "Is it that obvious?" they both nodded. "I talked to Ash about…you know. And when I asked him, he said I wouldn't understand." Dawn looked confused. "Understand what?" Misty shrugged. "Then he said he was only doing it the protect you May." She looked up. "Protect me? From what?" she asked and Misty shrugged again. "I don't know. He's not doing it on his own. Someone is behind this probably forcing him to do it somehow." She explained. "Who would get Ash to avoid me though?" they pondered the thought for a second. 'Who would wanna separate Ash from May? Hmm…no…no way…that's crazy!" Dawn was having an argument in her head. "I think I have an idea on who it might be, but it's kinda crazy, just a thought though." They listened. "Who do you think it is?" Misty asked. "What if it's…Gary." May gasped. "…Gary?" her eyes widened. "I mean if you think about it. He has to know that you and Ash like each other. And he knew Ash was gonna hurt you. He's in a competition with Ash and…you're the grand prize." Dawn concluded.

"I think…we should get back to class." May hastily walked down the hall to the class she was currently in. "May…" Misty said sadly. 'This is too overwhelming. I can't take this anymore.' She said to herself. "Why is love so complicated?" she asked, not expecting an answer. "Because if it wasn't, everyone would be falling in love." She turned to see Brendan right behind her. "Where'd you come from?" she asked confused. "From my mom, why?" he joked again. She smiled at his humor. "You're crazy." He smiled back. "A lot of people tell me that. So… it sounds like you're having guy trouble. Wanna talk about it?" he asked her. "I don't know…I don't know you that well." She said skeptically.

"I'm completely harmless. Except when I have a sharp object in my hands." He joked again. She laughed again. "Okay, but you have to promise you won't tell anybody." He nodded. "I, Brendan Birch, swear to keep my mouth such." He saluted. "Alright, okay. I'm going out with Gary, and I like him, but I like Ash too. Now Ash is avoiding me for some reason. An idea is starting to pop in my head that someone is forcing him to stay away from me and it might be Gary." She finished. "Wow…that is pretty bad. What do you plan to do about that?" he asked. "I don't know. That's why I said love is so complicated. And it is." She laughed sadly. "I'm sure you'll get though this." He patted her on the shoulder. "Thanks for listening. You know, you're kinda like a big brother." She smiled. "Sure. Just let me know if there's something else you wanna talk about. I'm all ears. Bye May." She waved as he walked off.

The next day after school…

"I can't wait to find my yellow dress!" Misty squealed. "Blue for me." May added. "The usual." Dawn finished. "Pink." Misty and May said at the same time. "You betcha!" the trio walked into the fairly crowded mall with high hopes in finding a dress for their school dance on Friday. They walked into a dress store and began to browse. "This one is all mine you guys. I call dibs!" Dawn said. "Fine, fine!" May whined. Dawn started to keep an eye out for anything pink that she would like.

She looked in the gown sections, "Too big." She looked in the prom dress section, "Too promy." She looked in the preppy section, "Too…ugh." She even looked in the clearance section, "Too…clearancy." She complained. "Clearancy isn't even a word." Misty said. "Look at the dress section, those are all fancy and…ugh." May said. "Fine, but I won't find…oh…my…gosh!" she ran to a sparkly light pink spaghetti strap dress with little ruffles on the bottom. "So cute! Sold!" she picked it up and hugged it tightly. "See. Now pick out your size so we can go to another store." May urged her. "Bossy much?" Dawn scoffed as she laid the dress on the check-out counter. "Will be all for you?" Dawn nodded her head. "Okay…$85.52 please." She whipped out her visa credit card and swiped it with ease, signed her name, and put it back in its rightful place. "Here's your receipt. Thank you for shopping, please come again.

"So cute!" Dawn said for one final time before they walked out of the store. "On to the next store!" they all cheered. "How'd it go with Ash today?" May looked down. "He's still avoiding me. I just wish I knew the situation better, you know?" they nodded. The next store was Misty's so she browsed around looking for a yellow dress. "You're gonna look like the sun!" Dawn tease when she held up and a yellow puffy dress. "Oh hush!" she warned. "That's too adorable!" Misty saw a bright yellow tube top dress made out of silk material with light pink shawl to match. "Well, get it and let's go." May pushed her. "What's your rush?" Misty asked, walking to the counter. "No rush, I just wanna find my dress now." She smiled.

"$86.21." was all the cashier said. Misty pulled out her four twenties, a five, a one, two dimes and a penny and handed it to the cashier. Then the cashier just sat the bag on the counter. "Have a nice day." Misty was a little angry. "You know, being mean can cause you to get wrinkles, but I guess you knew that already huh?" Misty snatched the bag off the counter and stormed off. "Wow Mist, you sure put her in her place. "Hmph." She smirked. "I did huh?" they all laughed. "My turn! My turn!" May jumped up and down.

The last store they walked in was May's and she ran in ahead of Misty and Dawn and started searching through the racks. "Pink, green, yellow, brown…ew. Black, orange, red. No blue! Are you serious!" she blew up her bangs in frustration. "Where's a blue? Blue, blue, blue, I need a blue." After looking and coming up short May heaved a large sigh. "No luck?" Dawn asked. "None what-so-ever! How come it's so easy for you guys to find dresses but I have such a hard time?" she asked and the shrugged in reply.

May got up and searched again. "Finally!" she found and dark blue and white dress that went just below the knees and it's sleeves were short and came it the shoulder. It was also ruffly at the bottom. "This is it! My dress!" the cashier hang it up and it came to $84.98. May paid the amount and happily walked out of the store. "Done with dresses, now…on to the shoes, accessories and etc.!"

QT: THE END of chapter 14.

Mikey: What does totally kawaii mean?

AJ: Why do you want to know?

Mikey: It sounds cool.

May: I does huh?

QT: I hope you liked this chapter. I tried to describe the dresses to the best of my ability. May's dress is kinda like the one from Wendy Wu: Homecoming Warrior. If you've ever seen it, you know what I'm talking about.

Ash: I wasn't in the end!

May: Don't be such a baby.

All: Yeah, a baby!

-grunts-

-mumbles under breath-

QT: Leave Ash alone guys. Alright readers…

All: Review! 4 Sure!