Chapter 5: How do I look?

Another day in Eterna City. But this day, was a rush for Nurse Joy – our Amelia – for there was a sick Garchomp she needed to tend to. As far as she knows, his Trainer said that the Mach Pokemon's head was swelling for almost a month. Probably just a cut.

But she had to check the Garchomp to be sure. Stretching her medical gloves and wrapping her face with a surgical glove, she pushes the doors open and tends to the sick Mach Pokemon.

Garchomp's usual glaring eyes had turned out to be a pained, huffing frown with a cold sweat. His lungs were obviously letting out small breaths of labor. For being like this for a few weeks, it might be serious. Then, the Garchomp was coming to.

"Ahh~, morning, Garchomp. How are you?" Amelia started talking to her patient, in hopes of putting him at ease. A low gruff from Garchomp came out. Amelia promptly breathly giggles, showing a smile to Garchomp; she places her gloved hand around his paw. "Don't you worry. You'll be just fine now." Amelia says to the Garchomp. From her hold over his paw, she can tell that the Mach Pokemon was calming down but his breathing condition has not improved.

"Now then, I'll just listen to your breathing, kay~?" Amelia says with a winking smile, bringing up a stethoscope in her hand, and the Garchomp weakly nods up to her. Plugging in the receiving ends to her ears, she gently places its recorder to Garchomp's chest. "Okay. Breathe~" She says, and the Garchomp tries his best to breathe big gulps of air.

There doesn't seem to be any blockage in the patient's windpipe… I wonder… Amelia thinks to herself and thinks up a hypothesis. "Garchomp, would you mind coughing up for me?"

The Garchomp's cough came out normal, then it started to become wheezes, popping like a bubble once he ran out of breath. "Hmm…" Amelia hums a chime before she looks into Garchomp's eyes. She snaps off the surgical mask off her face and smiles down to the Garchomp in bed. "You'll be just fine. You just have trouble breathing from an inflamed throat. I'll get you some good juice and be right back, kay~" She says, a calming grin at the last part. Garchomp's shoulders drop to the bed and give a nod to her.

With that, she exits the doors and is suddenly met with the Garchomp's Trainer. Before she can even speak, Amelia cuts her off. "Miss Ali, your Garchomp's condition is not life-threatening." Amelia's words grant the Trainer with such ease, she crashes back down to the chair, glad being described to herself. "I'll give him some [insert medicine] juice and his windpipe shouldn't be blocked now."

"Oh thank you, Nurse Joy."

"HmHmm. You're welcome, miss. Won't be long now."

After gulping down some [medicine] juice, Garchomp was discharged from the hospital and let loose for the Trainer to cuddle after a week. Seeing the she-Trainer hassle and apologizing to her Garchomp, sobbing while she did, just made her day.

Amelia prescripts some meds and herbal juices for the Garchomp to stop its persisting blight in his throat. "Thanks again, Nurse Joy!"

A grinning Trainer thanked her as she waved the Nurse Joy (Amelia) goodbye; the sliding doors opened and Amelia bid her adieu.

With that, she returned to waiting for more passing Trainers to help out. Behind the counter, Amelia and Shiela sigh, taking a breath from their last customer. Shiela even fans some wind to her nose. "Haaii~ That Garchomp seemed like a biggie, no?"

From her seat, Amelia whips her head back to Shiela's direction. To her surprise, Shiela squeaks from her wide eyes, their sullenness becoming apparent from her angle.

"Why do you say that when you didn't even lend a hand, Shiiieellaaa?" She asks with contempt underneath her peachy, sullen voice with a face that resembled a wraith's as she prolonged her name.

Shiela unconsciously gulps before managing to find the words. "I-uhhhh." Shiela pans out as a drop of sweat rolls down her neck.

The atmosphere between them turned peachy as Amelia's gentle eyes turned to deep daggers that pierced through to her. "… Pfft~" Amelia raspberries before she pinches her stomach, bursting with laughter. Shiela stood there dumbfounded by how she broke character there for a sec. "Haha~ The vibe went all menacing there~. Why wouldn't you say anything?" She wittingly said with a beaming grin.

Shiela still stood there just agape at her own friend. "o-Ohh~ Haha. Yeah sorry 'bout that~ Haha. I'll be making some coffee, then." Shiela laughed off this awkwardness dumped on her and waves at Amelia before walking off to the back room. With that, she went back to typing back on the PC and keeping tabs of their med reports.

After that, she browsed for any messages or notifications she had missed. Then, she sees an email sent to her from – The mayor?! Wh-what could it be this time?

She clicked on it and began reading it. To her dismay, her eyes only widened with the first five words.

[CONFERENCE FOR ONE ENERGY PROJECT.]

By the time Amelia finished reading the subject of the email, Shiela comes out of the back room with a pan of their coffee mugs and glances down to said email and softly smiles down to it. Just as Shiela's eyes rolled to Amelia's, Shiela squeaks at how downtrodden Amelia looked. As she stared with concern, Amelia's face rolled from a wince to genuine annoyance about this email.

"THE f*ck is that geezer thinking?! Sending this to " Amelia rampaged in her seat, going ballistic at the sight of the email in her seat. Shiela set the pan down, frantically calming her colleague down. Passing trainers passed by the counter and immediately avoiding a whipping from Nurse Joy.

"H-Hey, calm down, Amelia. I-I'm sure that Mr. Plow just sent it to you by mistake again." Shiela reasoned in a stammer, frantically swishing her hands at her in a sweatdrop for Amelia. "Calm, girl."

Amelia stowed and regained control of her breathing, slowing down. The tension washes away as she slumps back to her seat behind the counter, as she lets Shiela's voice fade back into earshot.

Amelia breathes in and out, channeling into her passive nature and continues to another day into the counter. Resting her left arm onto the chair's arm, Amelia moves her hand and places it onto her forehead to brace her frustration back.

After changing out of her nurse uniform and back into her civilian clothes, Amelia whips her pink hair behind her and loosely ties her hair with her signature green ribbon, she gets out of the back room and passes by the counter. In her step, she glances at Shiela behind the counter, looking like she is chained.

Shiela sees her passing by with a perking eyebrow. "Eh hehehe. I-I'll do my best to hold down the fort." Shiela shakily says with a thumbs up as she beads a drop of sweat in cartoony fashion.

Amelia giggles through her nose and lowers her grin to a smile. "Do your best." She then slings her bag over her shoulder and spins her heels over for the door. "I'll be seeing you next weekend, Shiela. Bye~"

"Er… bye." Shiela can only murmur as Amelia left her in the dust. Passing by the sliding doors, Amelia's face folds into a smirk as she tried to hold back an evil laugh. This wasn't indeed like last time; this time, she held the upper hand. She felt like going 'Muahahaha!' like some Jojo character.

After the laughter died down inside her chest, she sighs it out and continues onward to her home. As she did, her head just thought up a tune that stuck itself inside for the past week.

"hmm-Hmm-mmmm~" Her upbeat chiming tone helped in toning out everything else as she walked with a tiny hop in each step. She was proud of herself that she actually got Shiela back for that free weekend. She snickers under her cheery smile that she managed to sit Shiela down to the chair and actually do her job.

But second fiddle, she psyches her fortitude for the oncoming days and resting up tonight. And tonight, was to be a feast; it was time that she treated herself. Again.

She unlocks her door and closes it.

"mmraw~"

Her ears catch a meow. Amelia looks down to her shins, feeling the ticklish purring sounds vibrating down her feet. It was the stray Glameow cat, Leena. "Mraw." Leena purred up to Amelia as she smeared herself around Amelia's shins, appealing to her.

Amelia clicks a tongue. "Aww~." She dotes on the Glameow before she picks the cat up. Amelia mimics a kissing sound as she carried Leena up to her chest. "Now, how have you been?"

"Rrawr."

Amelia giggles at the Glameow's meow. "How's about we go get you a snack?"

"R-Rawr." Leena meowed with an eager nod up to Amelia's offer, eliciting another giggle out of Amelia. With that, Amelia carries Leena over to the kitchen for some oats or some Poke Puffs and spends yet another afternoon entertaining a stray-ish Glameow guest.

Entering the kitchen, Leena hops out of Amelia's hold and lands onto the counter. Feeling a slight chill, Amelia takes out a kettle, fills it with water and leaves it onto the oven. Glancing down to her wristwatch, she times the water to be warm by five minutes. Opening the cupboard, she takes out a milk packet and spoon and waits for those five minutes.

Wading away from the oven and leaning on the counter, Amelia glances to Leena licking up her paw and decides that she will bide those five minutes with the cat Pokemon. Then, her fingers brush to her ribbon tying her hair. She pulls on it, ruffling her hair free afterwards.

"Hmm…" Amelia hums with a smirk with a lightbulb dinging in her head. "Hey, Leena." Amelia calls for the Glameow's attention. Once its sharp-slit eyes land on her, Amelia nicely ties her green signature ribbon around her slender wrist. She presents her wrist to her audience. "What'cha think?" Amelia asks, her hands jazzily swishing as she showed off her green ribbon tied elegantly in a bow.

Leena the Glameow sits neatly with her tail tucked around her, staring at the bow in a squint. Amelia started dripping a cold sweat down her nape until Leena stood up and swished her paw to the right. Amelia immediately understood her gesture as, next.

Now, this has become a fashion show.

Amelia unties the ribbon off her wrist and starts thinking about more styles she can do. She's shown to Leena a green choker, an anklet, a hair/headband. Thinking deep about these styles, her ears started to rise in heat.

Midway, she thought of how other people were going to think about how she looked, with the ribbon being an eye snatcher on a person such as Nurse Joy. Her mind flashed images of how her colleagues and friends, how passing Trainers were going to look at her.

Then, an image of Karsten flashed in her mind. Amelia's hand freezes in untying her green ribbon off her neck. Her hand still holding on the ribbon and lets it slip off her neck along with her hands. The heat in Amelia's ears spread to her cheeks. Her palms brush up to brace her face from exploding in heat.

… Seriously? Why did I think of him just now?

As she questioned herself, she felt the heat stretching down to her neck, and she fanned herself for the heat to die down. After a minute, she calmed down her breathing in the air she fanned and railed her train of thought together.

… But going back to that thought, Amelia starts to wonder about what Karsten would say to her newfound fashion sense.

Then, Amelia freezes from her ears picking up the sound of a whistling sound. That whistle turned into a hissing sound, going louder and louder. Leena pointed a paw in panic behind her and Amelia turns to the kettle, bubbling heat

"… aaAAHH!" She yelps as she remembered that she had a kettle of water, which was now bubbling. She whips the knob and turns down the heat, and the kettle's screeching dies down. Amelia could feel the heat bubbling out the kettle from where she stood, leaning back on the counter in relief. "Phew. That was close, huh?" Amelia pans out with a grin pointed at Leena, wo was also panicking as Amelia handled the kettle.

Then, Amelia hears a knock perturbing throughout the house. Amelia looked behind her and through her joint hallway to the door. She squints through the blurry-designed glass to see that there was somebody at the door.

Unnoticing of Leena spiking and turning to the door with her furs spiking, Amelia wades around the counter and walks to the door, with Leena meowing out to Amelia. She then picks Leena up and holds her close, coming up to the door and opens it.

"Oh. Karsten." She pans out with a smile gracing her face seeing Karsten upon her door. But he was apparently panting, as if from marathon. "Goodness, did you run here? You're looking pale too."

"I-I heard a – a scream." Karsten pointed out in-between pants.

"Oh, don't worry, Karsten. It was only a kettle. I overheated it for a glass of milk. I was being careless." Amelia dismissed the situation earlier. Karsten heaves in relief placing a hand over his drumming heart jumping out his chest. "You look dreadful. Where did you come from?" Amelia worriedly asks, noticing Karsten sweating all over.

"I – just came from a" Karsten began, but started taking in the conversation and heard the concern expressed in Amelia's voice. Amelia's sapphire eyes were captivating as if she neared closer where she stood. ",… a-a meeting about a project."

"You were coming home from work! Yo-You should come inside, I'll whip up some milk for you too."

"O-Oh don't don't. I'll just be-"

"Nono. I'm the nurse so I'm obligated to service you." Amelia says, cutting off Karsten mid-sentence, as she opens her arms for Leena to hop off. Amelia takes Karsten by the elbow, interlocking arms, and they wade into Amelia's house.

As Amelia and Karsten pass by her stairs, Karsten breathly chuckles, giving up to Amelia's grasp. "… Guess a drink of milk would not kill me." Karsten says, flashing a high-browed smirk to Amelia.

Amelia looks to Karsten to say a welcoming smile, but is distracted by his smirk and mildly dives into his brown eyes. The sight blending with the somber afternoon's orange sun illuminating his face. … Don't freeze up, girl, Amelia snaps herself out of her frozen stare at Karsten and proceeds to speak out.

"You're welcome." Amelia says in endearing tone under a soft smile. Karsten's thought is dazed by Amelia's smile, staring into her sapphire eyes as her arms guided his tired body to her kitchen. Leena trailed their step and looking up to the two as they waded to the counter.

Pulling out a stool with a foot, Amelia softly pushes him to sit down on it and she steps around the counter. Karsten only stared at Amelia as she prepared for two mugs. Amelia slicked a lock of her pink hair behind her ear as she grabbed another teaspoon and Karsten continues staring. As Amelia shook up some milk packets, Karsten is ticked with guilt that she is servicing him like this.

But instead of speaking out to Amelia, a Nurse Joy, a person that makes a living in servicing people, Karsten just sat by, developing a sweat thinking if he mentioned this and looked at the window. Instead, he composed himself with a blank face as Amelia mixed the powdered milk into their mugs.

Amelia pulls out another stool under the table and sits down, facing Karsten. Right, make some small talk, at least, Amelia. "So, what meeting did you come from? Seemed like a tiresome meeting for you to be this tired."

"…" Karsten looked at Amelia and blinked at her. "Oh, I just had a talk with my superiors about our One Energy project. Apparently, we are still barred to Floarama City."

"Hmm." Amelia hummed as she drank her warm milk and continued listening to Karsten, staring deeply into his warm milk.

"We've been working on this project, which should amplify Floarama City's windmills all across Sinnoh to other cities like Celestic, Jubilife, even to Snowpoint. However, Sinnoh's economists pointed out that it would be nice to have drawback or spend less.

In other words, we should not spend all our resources on one project. Frustrating as that is, I can't really argue with Sinnoh's economists. They're trying to spend less than we've already have." Karsten stories, swirling his mug of milk to put off the heat. He grasps it and takes a drink.

"… Sounds like you'll be changing the world, Karsten." Amelia comments, with a dear smile planted on her face. Karsten notices her face directed to him, and the tension in his shoulders drop as he feels his face soften and his brows raised.

"You think so?"

"Yeah." Amelia nods. "I really think so. You're always working hard for your project. I'm sure that it'll work out in no time." Amelia panned out, keeping her smile on her face before she tipped her mug to drink.

Karsten gazed his brown irises at Amelia's sapphires. He was entranced that Amelia had pointed that out, almost complimenting him. His brown eyes continued to gaze into Amelia's sapphires. "Thanks for the vote of confidence, Nur-" Karsten is interrupted by Amelia's sudden change of face to a furrowed pout. "Amelia."

Her name evoked, Amelia retracts her soft glare and returns her smile onto her face. "Don't worry about those economists, Karsten. Your project sounds good. And, who knows. Maybe they'll come crawling back to you some day, with regret. Hehe." Amelia pans the silver lining, grinning evil-like at the end while Karsten gazed at his neighbor.

Karsten's mind fumbles on the fact that Amelia, a Nurse Joy, would act unlike of a Nurse Joy. At least in his mind. As Amelia cupped her warm mug of milk and drank it. But instead of questioning it, he joins Amelia in drinking the milk. They gasp for air from their drink in unison, and they both catch glance at the tops of their lips and realize that they both have milk-staches.

"…" After a moment in silence, "HAHAHA~!", they burst laughing at the sight of each other. "You have – a milk-mustaHAHAHAche!" Amelia manages to bloat out from her outburst of giggling. Karsten wiped a tear away from his eye from lack of breath.

Their laughing dies down as Amelia dabbles a handkerchief to wipe off the milk off her face. Unsuspected to Karsten, Amelia forwards herself to reach Karsten's milk-glazed lip. The gesture had froze Karsten as he gazed into her eyes, feeling her clothed fingers smudging away the drops of milk.

He began to notice his skin trickled with faint heat as Amelia trailed to the sides of his thin stache. Karsten's hairs stuck up as his mind fumbled and as Amelia finished.

"There. All gone." Amelia surmised as she backed into her seat as Karsten dumbly smiled at her, growing warmer by the minute. Karsten glances away from her captivating eyes and to another sight.

Karsten noticed that the sky outside was past sunset as his eyelids turned dreary. Stifling a yawn and stretching his shoulders, Karsten looks for a clock to see it was past five o'clock.

"Ah. Seems like it's getting late." Karsten points out to the window.

Amelia notices. "Yee! You're right. Were we talking for that long?"

"Yeah. But nohow, time for me to get my rest." Karsten says, standing up and straightening up. "Thanks for the milk, Amelia. You really helped. Thanks."

Amelia smiles up to him. "No problem." She says as she walks Karsten out to the door. "If you need anything, don't hesitate and just knock. 'Kay?" Amelia offers in an endearing tone, charming Karsten once more. Though she was always charming, Karsten thought.

"If you insist." Karsten says smiling back at Amelia, and both feel warmer until Amelia opens the door. Karsten's brown eyes land on Amelia's sapphires. "Right. Have a good evening, Amelia."

"Okay, Karsten. You too."

Karsten steps out of Amelia's house, but not without flashing a smile at Amelia. Stepping down the porch, Karsten passes the small gate and to the pavement. He glances back to Amelia, their eyes meeting and they smile at one another.

Already did. Karsten flashed a thought, to which he gains a red face and showed a grin back to his hearty neighbor in wholesome fashion before looking away and unlocked his door. Swinging the door open, he glances back at Amelia, still by her doorstep.

She waves with a smile at Karsten, which threw him off-guard before smiling and waving her back. "Good night, Karsten."

Karsten musters up a smile as he says "Good night, Amelia." With that, Amelia sees Karsten stepping inside and already put this day to her memory.

"Mraw~." A whining meow cut into Amelia's ears, eliciting a frightened squeak from her. She shot her eyes down her jeans to see Leena sat just beside Amelia's foot.

"You're sleeping here, Leena?" Amelia asks with a palm resting by the side of her face. To which Leena responds with a hearty purr as she rubs her feline head against her. She clicks her lips and dotes on how cute she looked. "Aw~ Leena. Of course, you can stay." Amelia coos before her arms scoop her up and she comes inside. She giggles at Leena's purring, almost tickling her.

And thus, ends this day for her as she closed and locked her door. Contemplating on how this day went, especially earlier, this day has been quite the one to remember. She feels like she's gotten closer to Karsten as neighbors.

Then, a thought flashed into her mind. AS she stepped up her stairs, she slowed her pace to her room suddenly thinking about it. She thought back to her conversation with Karsten… She… wiped his mouth of the milk…

Amelia's face started to tinge with red as it spread to her cheeks as the thought lingered. Her breathing slows down as she stepped inside her room and plops to her bed. Leena squirms off of Amelia's embrace and Amelia immediately places her face into her pillow, dying from the embarrassment from that. Amelia's legs thrashed as she wriggled from the cringe.

EEEHHHHH?!