"A Test of Friendship"
Oh, god… James though as he picked up another handful of pebbles. I can't believe she's still asleep!
It was ten A.M. and James was worried about his newfound friend who had not come from her room for the two's "study session." He gently tossed the pebbles up at the second-story window. Finally James could see something stirring inside. He saw a blurry image of what looked like a girl with long, maroon hair that became clearer and clearer as she approached the window. It was flung open with a great violence.
"WHO IS DOING THAT!?" she cried as she seemed to grow fangs from her grimacing face. Jesse began to look around at the outside world. In seeing James her fangs disappeared and she blushed ever so slightly. She blinked, not sure whether this boy was really there, whether this was just a dream that was to haunt her with feelings that she couldn't believe might exist.
"Um, Jess?" asked the shocked boy. Seeing that girl when she was truly mad was a terror for anyone. "Are you gonna come down eventually or are you just gonna sit up there?"
"Oh," Jesse began. Her eyes grew wide as she remembered the appointment that James had arranged for them. "The study session? Uhhhh…" she had little time to think up an excuse, but had little luck. "I…thought that we were…we were gonna start…ummm…at….at noon!"
"Why would we start at noon when I said that we would meet at the center of the campus at half past eight?" James realized that she had near to completely forgotten the fact that they needed to meet if they were going to pass the test. "Come on down right now! We gotta start studying! We'll never pass if we can't study!" James was clearly fed up with the fact that she didn't care whether she passed.
"Calm down, James!" Jesse began. Sheez, talk about over-reacting! she thought to herself. "Don't worry! I just gotta brush my hair and then I'll meet you at," she shuddered in a way that no one could see, "the library…"
"Alright Jess," James replied. With that, he began to slowly trudge through the campus grounds towards the main building. Growly trailed a short distance behind him as he walked on.
"Growly, do you think that she'll pass? I don't think that she wants to put out the effort to get a good score…" James was talking more to himself then his fire puppy companion. He was worried about her, more than anything else in the world he wanted to help her.
James quickly walked into the main building and through the library to the section marked "Pokémon Evolution." After grabbing a few books, he marched through various other sections, like "Attacks," "Elements," and "Level." He staggered with his heavy load to a table in the front. "This should be a start," he said to no one in particular.
James glanced over the books and chose a blue one. His favorite color, and the opposite of his former "stalker," as she was known to him. He remembered again the reason why he agreed to go to another school for the rich kids.
START FLASHBACK
"James-dear, as you well know you just can't go off on your own and have no protection. What would happen to us if anything happened to you?" said a red-haired woman through a thick country accent. She fluttered at herself with a lace fan and pulled up her scarlet dress ever so slightly so that she could sit down like a gentlewoman. She and her husband sat side by side on the silk couch "We certainly can't risk anything happening to you. Then what would happen to our na- I mean…"
"What your mother is trying to say, son, is that we couldn't keep our memory alive if you were gone," said the man in the light blue suit who sat next to the woman. He was trying to be consoling, but had no success. "Besides, what would happen to your dearest Jessebell?"
"Jessebell?! JESSEBELL?!" James lost his temper as he tried to hold back tears of anger. "I WANT TO COMPLETE MY DREAM AND ALL THAT YOU CAN THINK ABOUT IS MY MAIRRAGE TO THAT DILINQUANTE!"
The girl in two braids, one on each side of her head, raced into the room. She lovingly looked at her future parent-in-laws and then glanced with an upset look over at her husband-to-be. Her red hair bounced at the sides of her face as she took each graceful step.
"Oh, Jessebell, pay no attention to our son…for now. He is just upset because he can't go off on his own and play with all of those little pokémon," James's father said to her. "I don't see why he doesn't just want to go to school and learn about them. He only wants to go on one of those dangerous journeys. What if the Rocket Gang captures him? What if he is forced to join?"
"That's right, James-dear. All we want is the best for us. Our family, I mean, dear," his mother tried to explain. "You don't need any trouble with any of those types. They're like savages, James-dear, savages!"
"Yes, James. If you don't learn all of the things that you need to know now, then you'll end up wasting your fortune and loose me and end up as one of them!" her accent resembled his mother's. "So no more foolish talk of such things. Just stay here and relax with me instead of running off with that flea-bitten mongrel."
"I'd rather be able to do what I want in the Rocket Gang then to be stuck here doing nothing with you! And he's not a flea-bitten mongrel!" James glared at Jessebell as he raced out of the room. "Growly!"
The dog was immediately at his side. They ran up the stairs to the boy's room. He immediately began furiously shuffling the papers on his desk. If I can't be a master the way that I want to, James thought to himself, then I guess that I'll do it their way. Anything to get away from here.
"Growly," James whispered, "running away didn't work." He pulled an envelope out of the stack that he had on his dresser. "Maybe this will…"
In seeing what it was, the growlithe nodded in agreement. Growly was not truly all that fond of Jessebell and her annoying Gloom. Even though Growly needed his freedom too, this would be an advance from the pestering pair following them at every turn. "Growl owlithe owl."
James brushed his jacket off as he exited the room and went downstairs to propose a deal to his parents.
END FLASHBACK
James sighed as he realized just how lucky he was for Growly and him to be without their shadows, even for just now. Suddenly a silhouette covered the book that he had unsuccessfully begun to read. As he glanced up, he saw the most radiant vision that he had yet laid eyes on.
The girl's hair was moosed straight back and hung above her back. Her white t-shirt held tightly and bore the red initial of "J" brightly stitched on it. Her round green earrings matched James's eyes and her short red skirt ended about halfway down to her knees. She wore the same boots as yesterday, only now freshly polished. This girl had definitely done a good deal of work on herself to go from the bed-headed fanged child in pink pajamas to the red lipsticked good looking young woman that she was now. James recognized a striking resemblance between Jess and Jessebell, but only Jesse had ever looked as well, in James's eyes at least.
"So James," she said as she glanced at her fingernails, which were painted a bright red, "how many of these books do we need to read? Not them all, right?" James snickered as he sensed certain doom. "Right?"
"Okay," he began. "Jesse? You begin on the evolution books and I'll look at attacks. Then we can quiz each other, okay?"
"All right, James. You'd know what you're doing, wouldn't you?" Jesse smiled as she looked at him, but she couldn't tell why. She realized that she couldn't stop even when she wanted to. Thank goodness he isn't looking up.
The two sat there and began to read.
{[NEXT SECTION]}
"Okay, Jesse, now we've gone over this. What type of attack is most effective against itself?" James glanced down at his watch. Five fifteen. They were running out of time.
"Um…Psychic?" Jesse nervously thumbed at a piece of paper in front of her. She knew that she couldn't learn enough facts about pokémon to do well on the test. Jesse knew that James would get one of the best scores and she would be sitting in the back of the room tapping her fingers together again and again.
"Uh, let's move on," James said, trying to be nice in knowing that he couldn't help Jesse enough to pass. "Name a pokémon type that has an edge on the following types: water, flying."
"Umm, electric?" Jesse questioned her final answer. (no, not from the show.)
"You're right!" James yelled as he jumped into the air, triumphantly holding the book above him. "Way to go, Jess!"
"Should we call it a day?" Jesse asked, trying to beg without actually officially begging. She wanted to leave for a certain reason, and bring James with. "I mean," she began, "there is a party for all of the test-takers tonight at six. Maybe we could go if you don't mind."
"We?" James questioned his newfound partner with a hint of interest in his voice. "You mean we? As in together?"
"Of course not!" Jesse said as a drop of nervous sweat sprouted as she tried to cover up her now-obvious slip. "I just wanted to tell you…in case you didn't know." Wow, she thought to herself. Saved!
"Good, because that would be disgusting," James announced. He thought that he had slipped up, too. "Maybe we'll see each other there."
"Maybe," Jesse replied. I'll be watching…
The two walked together back to the girls' dorm where Jesse left James's side. James walked on, feeling alone even though Growly was near him in his poke ball. He almost called him out, but there was one thing that the growlithe would see that he didn't want to admit. "I love her…"
{[NEXT SECTION]}
"James!" Jesse called into the crowd of new tech students. "James!"
"Huh?" James glanced over the crowd in confusion. He soon saw a formiliar red-head in a blue dress rushing towards him. "Jesse!" He was a bit surprised to see her following him, for sure he was just a friend, not someone to dance with. And they were best friends, so maybe she just wanted to ask him some questions on pokemon.
"James," Jesse began now that the two were side by side. "So, you having fun?"
"Not really," he replied, adjusting his suit for the umpteenth time. "I can't stand this kinda thing. I always had to were a suit as a kid. Now I'm back to the way I was before. Next thing that I know, Jessebell herself will pop out from behind some of these kids!" James glanced around, and, seeing no danger, knelt down and tapped the polished wood floor. "Knock on wood," he smiled back to Jesse.
"I don't like it either. Let's leave," she began walking to the door and James followed. They stepped outside and looked at each other in the starlight. James looked into his comrades eyes once again, and he envied her.
She seems so free, able to choose what she wants and what she can do…exactly what I want…James gazed into the shining blue eyes and began to have visions. We're just friends, he reminded himself as he saw himself in the future actually kissing this person who seemed more right than anything else in the world. Then again, we may become more… In his mind, James slapped himself in the face, and the emotion vanished for a bit. "Where do you want to go?" he asked her, now being as normal as he ever was.
"I don't know," Jesse replied, not sure of what to do when they had just left something that she usually liked, but now someone else was there, someone who she couldn't stand. "By the way, who is Jessebell?"
"Oh, um…" James didn't know how to say it. Oh boy, I'm in trouble, he thought to himself. "Hey, let's go to the park!"
So off they went, each trying to see past what the other was hiding. Niether was successful, which was the good thing, but they still wanted to know what the other was really up to. Soon they reached the park that was just beyond the campus grounds.
"Hey, James?" Jesse began as she climbed up a slide.
"What Jess?" James said as he called out Growly. The dog looked at him and, as James had originally feared, read him like a book. Even though the growlithe didn't call attention to the thoughts of his master, there was something in the pokemon's eyes that gave it away to its trainer.
"See that star? That one right there?" Jesse pointed a finger straight up at the shining sky.
"Yeah. That's Polaris. It's beautiful," James gazed, too. "That's my favorite star. When I needed help back at home, I could always look to it and find wisdom and hope."
"Well, now it has even more meaning," Jesse continued. "We'll swear on Polaris that our friendship will hold as long as that star burns brightly above."
"Okay," James replied.
{[NEXT SECTION]}
James was back in his dorm room before he knew it. "I know that the two of us must stick together." In saying this, he pulled out a piece of paper and began to scribble down a poem and signed his name. Then he went to sleep.
{[NEXT SECTION]}
"Jesse's in trouble!" James whispered as he looked over at the whincing girl next to him. She kept on filling in an answer bubble, and then erasing it, and then filling it in again. "She can't make it! I can't let her be alone after this! I know what I have to do."
Pencil in hand, James began to erase all of the answer bubles that he had filled in. In the place of all of the choices, he filled in space "D" and turned in his test. I did it for Jesse. She needs me to do this. But is it right?
Soon everyone else had finished, including his best friend. He solomnly walked up to her and handed her the sheet of paper that he had written last night.
"What's wrong, James? You probably got the best grade in the history of the school!" Jesse said in a matter-of-fact tone.
"No, I didn't," he sighed, not knowing what he should think about his action. He quickly changed the subject. "Hey Jess? Could you read this over for me? If you agree, sign your name at the bottom."
"Okay. What is it?"
"Gang mission statement."
"What?"
"Team Rocket. Everything has something to do with what's happened, or just outlaw stuff."
"All right!"
James walked off. As he left from her view, he glanced back over his shoulder. "This tested everything in our friendship so far, and though we might have failed now, in companionship we have a perfect score." As he finished those lines, he near silently whispered on. "I did it for you Jess, I did it for you."
Author's notes: Okay, so the test wasn't truly here until the last page and I didn't include too many details of it. I blame it on how my mind gets at ten o'clock at night, but hey! I got kind of how the Rocket Motto came into play, although it is slightly changed (as you'll see in chapter 2). Next time you'll find out all of those non-person/thing specific detail that I left you to think about for now. Review and read chapter 2 when it comes! 'Til then, I'm blasting off! Oh, and by the way, is anyone seriously mad at me because I don't include enough Jesse history? I think I do, but there's always that feeling…
PokeMaster
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