Raindrops splatter the dirt-smudged window as a five-year0old girl gazes out at the dark and foreboding sky. A deep sigh heaves itself from the little girl's chest and she brushes her pink hair out of her eyes.
"I just wish I had a friend, someone to play with, anyone," the young girl tells the windowsill.
"Jessie, could you come in here for a minute? There's someone I'd like you to meet." The little girl's mother calls her from a different room.
Eagerly Jessie dashes into the next room. She finds herself face-to-face with another girl. The newcomer looks Jessie up and down, and Jessie does the same. This girl is slightly taller than Jessie, and has two sunny orange pigtails, unlike Jessie's long, pink swirl of hair. Light violet eyes flash as the girl smiles.
"Jessie, this is Cassidy, your new next-door neighbor. I'm going to brew Cassidy's mother some tea. Play nicely, girls."
Cassidy finds her hand clasped tightly as she gazes into Jessie's sparkling eyes. "You'll always be my best friend; right, Cassidy?"
Cassidy unfastens one of her dangly earrings and fixes it to Jessie's ear. "As long as you wear this, we'll always be best friends."
The rain patters outside as the two girls shake hands; a pact of friendship.
~five years later~
Jessie stares at her pretty face in a cracked mirror. "I'd really like some lipstick, or a little mascara. What I wouldn't give for a whole makeup set!"
"Hey Jessie, check this out!"
Jessie whirls around to find Cassidy standing in the doorway, a smug grin plastering her lipstick-smeared face. Jessie's eyes dart to the case at Cassidy's side, containing lipstick, mascara, and other makeup complete with all sorts of beauty appliances.
"Let's try it on you!" Cassidy smiles a grin that Jessie has never seen in the past five years; it is almost wicked.
"O-o-okay…" Jessie's voice falters.
"Turn around and close your eyes and don't look 'til I tell you to!" commands Cassidy.
Jessie obediently turns around and listens to her old clock quietly ticking away… ticktock… ticktock…
"All right, you can look now!"
Jessie stares in disbelief at her face in the mirror. The crack distorts her image a little bit, but she can see all she needs to. Her pretty face is covered in a mess of squiggly lines, smudged black and purple. Cassidy had even completed this facial makeover by darkening Jessie's eyebrows and sweeping them downward, giving the victim quite an evil appearance.
"See ya." Cassidy sniggers and leaves Jessie to glare at the earring that had once been a symbol of their friendship.
~three years later~
Finally, something is beginning to go right for Jessie. She smiles inwardly as she strolls down the sidewalk, pursued by a dozen or more young men. They are all in love with her pretty looks, even though she wears no makeup and her clothes are plain.
"Hi, Jessie. Hi, guys."
Jessie finds herself looking into Cassidy's face. The thirteen-year-old cannot help noticing how her neighbor has changed. Cassidy's eyes do not have the kind sparkle they once had when the two girls met, and her grin has an evil tint that was not there before.
Cassidy waves at the boys and gives them one of her most winning smiles. They all blush deeply, and, with guilty looks at Jessie, begin following Cassidy down the sidewalk.
"Wait! Why are you all going-" Jessie cries out.
"See ya round, Jessie!" Cassidy turns around the corner, followed by her audience of lovesick teenagers.
"Sorry, Jessie." A boy named Butch looks shamefully at the ground. Before leaving to follow Cassidy, Butch takes hold of Jessie's hand and kisses the back of it. Jessie slaps the right side of his face, and that seems to make him get going.
Jessie remembers how she and Cassidy used to talk about the cute guys. Cassidy had always said Butch liked Jessie, but Jessie never really like him. Cassidy did, though. Jessie had just made sure that Butch hated her, so maybe now he liked Cassidy.
There. Jessie had done something nice for Cassidy, so maybe Cassidy would be nice to her.
A lone tear trickles down Jessie's cheek. What had she ever done to make Cassidy want to be mean?
Jessie decides to head home. There is nothing left for her to do. A few flakes of snow fall from the sky. Jessie shivers and pulls her tattered coat tighter about her shoulders.
A poster flutters and catches her attention. It says:
JOIN TEAM ROCKET TODAY!
(Call 1-800-ROCKETS to register)
There will be a party on February 4th to meet new teammates, receive your uniform, learn to say the motto, and much more!
"Hmmm…"
Another blast of freezing wind causes Jessie to run the rest of the way home.
"I hope there's no one out in this storm. They'd surely freeze to death." Jessie voices her thoughts as she gazes out at the mad flurry of white fluff. The teenager stares at the telephone. "1-800-ROCKETS…" She reaches for the receiver…
~
The next day, February 4, is much the same in weather terms. Jessie splashes through the half-melted sludge as she makes her way to the town hall.
Actually, "town hall" is a nice way of saying it. It is a ram shackled building with no heat. Jessie sorely regrets leaving her coat at home. She had remembered everything except it, even to add a trace of her mother's lipstick to her mouth.
Jessie rests her hand on the rusty knob and turns.
"Please take your seats, EVERYONE!" A loud, booming voice fills the room. Jessie looks to see where it's coming from. She spots a man with a loudspeaker, but she can't quite see his face; it is partly in the shadow. He must be in charge of Team Rocket.
"TAKE YOUR SEATS!" All activity ceases and everyone sit down immediately. Jessie finds herself next to a girl with messy brown hair and dark sunglasses.
"Yeah, like, I'm Renée. Like, yeah. Like, totally, what's your like, name, like, totally?"
"Huh? Oh… I'm Jessie."
"Like, good name, like, not." Renée turns her back to Jessie. "Like, whoa, where are the cool people? Am I, like, the only cool person here? Like, totally."
"What is her problem?" Jessie mutters while she looks to see who is seated on her other side. Jessie decides to choose her words carefully, and not be snippy like Renée. Lightly tapping the boy on his shoulder to get his attention, Jessie introduces herself. "Hi. I'm Jessie. What's your name?"
"Hello. My name's James."
Jessie sizes up this new appearance. The boy named James has shaggy, blue hair and quite charming greenish-turquoise eyes.
"James… That's a nice name."
James blushes and Jessie guesses that he probably hasn't received very many compliments in his life.
"I think Jessie's a pretty name."
"SILENCE!" booms the man with the loudspeaker. "I'm going to call off all of your names. If I don't call your name please let me know." He begins a long list of names. "Renée, James, Robert, Jessie, Cassidy, Butch…"
"Buhtch! What a funny name!" James pronounces Butch's name with a "short u".
Jessie grabs James' arm. "Did he say Cassidy?"
"I think so."
"Oh no!" Jessie slaps a hand to her forehead.
The man with the loudspeaker shouts away. "Now I'll pair you off, one girl and one boy to each team. When I call your names, please come up to receive your uniforms. Renée and Robert!"
Jessie shivers. "Brrr. It's freezing in here."
"Here. Take my coat." James drapes his coat around Jessie's shoulders. "I'm not cold anyway."
Jessie smiles. "So, who do you think you'll get paired with?"
James shrugs. "Probably someone I don't know."
"JESSIE AND JAMES!" the man yells into the loudspeaker.
The two stare at each other in amazement.
"Well," says James, "I guess we better go get our uniforms from The Boss."
~
"Jessie and James! Welcome to Team Rocket!" Jessie still can't quite figure out why their Boss's face is always in the shadow. "Here are your uniforms." The Boss hands them each a black, one-piece suit with a big, red "R" on it.
"I guess I was expecting something a bit more glamorous," Jessie mutters.
"You must memorize this motto." The Boss gives James a piece of paper. "Your goal is to steal rare pokémon and bring them to me for cash. Any questions?"
"No, sir."
"Good. Now what pokémon do each of you have to battle with?"
"I have an ekans that I got for my birthday," says Jessie.
"The koffing that I got for Christmas is pretty good," James brags.
"Er…" The Boss is slightly disappointed with these pathetic pokémon. "Here, take my meowth. It may be of some use to you."
He hands them a furry, catlike pokémon with a charm on top of its head. It appears to be asleep.
"Now I'm just warning you, this meowth likes to make a lot of noise. He may make rude remarks, and tends to be sarcastic."
"I thought that all a pokémon could say was its own name." Jessie is quite bewildered at how a pokémon can be sarcastic.
"You shall see." The Boss yells into his loudspeaker, "There will now be a coffee hour where you can meet your future friends and teammates!"
Jessie and James cover their ears. Boss had pointed his loudspeaker right at them! "Sorry!" he yells again. The two new Team Rocket members think it best to depart, unless they want to cause more pain to their aching heads.
"What are we going to do about these awful uniforms?" Jessie looks at hers in despair.
"We make our own!" James grins.
"You're brilliant!" Jessie sets Meowth down on the nearest table. Who could've believed that that cat even slept through the loudspeaker attack?
In a few minutes, the two have pieced together new uniforms. They both agree that these are much more stylish than the old ones.
"Now let's practice our motto!" Jessie suggests.
"We can perform with this!" James holds up a microphone.
"Where'd you find that?" Jessie asks.
"Oh, it was just lying on that table over there. I figure we can use it."
"You sure it's not on?"
"Uh-huh."
"Then prepare for trouble!"
"Make it double!"
"To protect the world from devastation!"
"To unite all people within our nation!"
"To denounce the evils of truth and love!"
"To extend our reach to the stars above!"
"Jessie!"
"James!"
"Team Rocket, blast off at the speed of light!"
"Surrender now, or prepare to fight!"
Suddenly coming awake, Meowth snatches the microphone out of James's hand. "Meowth! That's right!"
Jessie blinks. "You can talk?!"
"Of course I can talk! What'd you think I'd do, squawk like a chicken?"
James heads towards the table of refreshments. "I'm going to sample the food." Meowth follows him. Jessie admits that she's not hungry but pursues them anyway. Catching a glimpse of orange hair, Jessie stands on tiptoe, looking for Cassidy. James taps her shoulder. "Mmf fum fmake?"
Jessie laughs. "What?"
James swallows his food. "Sorry. You want some cake?"
Jessie consents and James gives her a forkful of his cake. Looking over James' shoulder, Jessie watches Meowth trying to fill his cup from the punch bowl. Suddenly, with a screech, he falls into the fruity beverage. Seeing Jessie gasp, James spins around and hauls a dripping Meowth from the punch bowl by the scruff of his neck.
"Meow-ow!" Never, ever pick up a meowth by the scruff of its neck. The result can be painful. James finds his face covered in bright red scratch marks. "Owch!" He begins running around in circles.
"That was a cruel, nasty thing to do, Meowth!" Jessie grabs the cat's tail, something else you never want to do to a meowth. Jessie quickly becomes another victim of the "scratch" attack. "Ahh!" She blunders backwards.
"Whoa!" A pair of hands grab Jessie's shoulders and spin her around.
"Cassidy?!" Jessie stares into the familiar face.
Meanwhile, James stumbles across to the other side of the room. His eyes are shut tightly to avoid the stinging. He bumps into something or someone.
"Hey! Watch it!"
James opens his eyes carefully. "Oh, hello. You must be Buhtch."
"Grr… the name's Butch!" Butch throws a powerful punch at James' face
In the meantime, Cassidy laughs at Jessie. "I heard that motto. It was all wrong."
"How did you hear…" Realization grasps Jessie. "The microphone must have been on."
"And that uniform…white? The main Team color is black."
Jessie manages a weak grin.
"So, who'd you get paired with? I'm with Butch."
James goes sailing through the air, propelled by Butch's fist.
"Well…" Jessie falters.
Cassidy giggles and gives Jessie a shove. Something taps against Jessie's cheek. It's the earring. Jessie unfastens it and gives it a long, hard look. Holding the dangly three-beaded object out to Cassidy, Jessie provides the answer for her actions.
"You keep this. I will not wear it, knowing that it once belonged to a cruel girl who used to be my best friend."
Cassidy takes the earring and says, "Fine. You won't wear yours, I won't wear mine." She puts on a new pair of triangular, pink quartz earrings.
Jessie fastens on a pair of round, jade earrings. Cassidy turns he back a walks away, high-heeled boots tapping on the tiled floor.
James limps up, nursing a scratched and swelling nose. "Buhtch is mean!"
Jessie gives him her handkerchief to dab at his injured face.
"Thanks." James walks off in search of more food. He can't quite see because of the handkerchief, so he stumbles headfirst into a rosebush growing indoors for decoration. "Ouch!" James yelps as he encounters a sharp prickle. He looks up and removes the cloth from his face. The roses are pretty, sort of like his new friend Jessie. Maybe he should bring one along when they go to look for valuable pokémon…
Jessie watches Cassidy go. "Ill defeat you someday…Cassidy…" She chokes on the words. Now her only friend left in the world is James…but that's all right; he seems like a nice guy.
"All right," shouts Boss with his loudspeaker, "coffee break's over. Go now, and bring back the rarest pokémon you can find!"
As Cassidy leaves, the shadow of a little girl haunts her mind. "You'll always be my best friend; right, Cassidy?"