Jo stared dumbfound at the twins. Had they really been clueless as to the hooded kid's gender this whole entire time?! "…"
"Hehe…guess I wasn't the only one in our group, besides Marcy, who didn't know Jo's gender. I kind of feel better about this now." Rowan smirked as the twins glanced nervously at each other.
"We couldn't have been the only ones who didn't know your gender, Jo…er, were we?" The twin boys asked pitifully. "Elen? Marcy? Rowan? Did you guys know?"
Marcy and Elen shook their heads.
"I didn't have a clue either." Rowan spoke up as he awkwardly scratched the back of his head. "To be honest, I thought you guys knew. Neither Marcy nor I wanted to ask cuz we thought it would be rude."
"…W-Who else didn't know?" Jo asked slowly in a soft tone.
Everyone in the living room raised their hands in the air…including Grandpa Reece. Jo's gender had been a complete mystery to all of them.
Jo gazed at them with a look of hurt. "Really? Hmm…"
"It's good to finally hear what your voice sounds like, Jo." Elen chirped as she gave Jo a toothy grin. "Your song was nice too. Didn't know you could sing so well. Where did you hear it, or did you come up with it on your own?"
Jo's lips pursed into a grimace. "I-I rather not say…Sorry."
"When were you going to tell us that you were a-" Aaron began.
"I-I thought you all knew. I didn't know that I would need to tell you what I was." Jo muttered. "…Sorry, Aaron."
Aaron shook his head. "No, I should be sorry. That was rude of me to say, let alone think."
"We all should be apologizing to you, Jo." Grandpa Reece added lightly. "It was rude of us to not have the decency to ask you in the first place. Though, Sora and Flynn need to apologize to everyone here for using sure vile language. Boys?"
"Sorry, Grandpa Reece. Sorry, everybody." The twins said in unison.
"Wasn't that also the word we were trying to keep Marcy from repeating the other day?" Rowan asked humorously to the group.
"The no-no 's' word!" Marcy gasped.
"We said we're sorry!" The twins complained. "How many more times do you want us to say it?"
"Hmmm…five more times ought'a do it." Elen beamed slyly.
Both Sora and Flynn narrowed their eyes at Elen.
Aaron sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "About yesterday with Jo's aunt…you guys won't have to see her ever again. I'll keep picking Jo up on my own so you don't have to hear anything that she may scream."
Jo grimaced again. "Aunt Sharon…" The hooded kid looked over at Rowan and Marcy. "…Sorry about her…"
"Both you and Aaron have been giving us the same look whenever you two talk about your aunt. Why is that?" Rowan asked. "I already know that she has quite the vocabulary, but what else about her-"
"She's a bigot." Grandpa Reece grumbled as he took a seat in one of the living room chairs. "It's been years since I have run into one, but unfortunately we've got one that is living down the road."
"What's a bigot?" Elen and Marcy asked curiously.
"We'll tell you when you're older." Aaron replied.
Rowan gave him a quick nod of thanks, which the older boy returned.
Both of the young girls frowned, while Elen crossed her arms in frustration. They were really starting to hate that answer. "But we're too young for everything you guys are talking about! When will we be old enough to know?"
"When you're older." The twins replied with a hidden smirk.
"…Really? Really?!" Elen growled. She looked over at Marcy and asked with a huff. "Hey, Marcy, wanna know something cool? Why'd the chicken cross the road?"
Marcy's frown deepened. The little girl hadn't a clue as to where her pink haired friend was going with this. "Uh…why?"
"I'll tell you later when all the oldies are gone. They're not young enough to know anything cool!"
"Is it because the chicken wanted to get to the other side?" Flynn asked.
Elen slowly turned to face the twins. Fury burned in her eyes as she glared menacingly at them. "NO! It's not cuz the chicken wanted to get to the other side. It's much more complicated than that!"
"Is it cuz there was a car coming?" Sora asked.
"YOU GUYS ARE MEAN!" Elen shrieked.
"Aww, we're sorry, Elen." The twins giggled as they tried to give her a group hug.
Elen just shrugged them off and sat down next to Marcy. "Boys are such meanie-heads! Don't trust them, Marcy."
The little girl looked up at her brother before directing her gaze back to her friend. "What about Ro-Ro? Ro-Ro is a boy. Does that make him a meanie-head too?"
"Uh-huh!" Elen nodded abruptly. "Every single boy is!"
Marcy pointed her tiny index finger accusingly at Rowan. "Ro-Ro, you're a meanie-head."
"What?" The accusation was more amusing rather than hurtful to the boy.
"I still wove you okay?" Marcy said quickly. She didn't want to hurt his feelings, even though, unbeknownst to her, they weren't even remotely dented.
"Marcy!" Elen snapped. "No!"
"I love you too, Marc." Rowan grinned.
Elen was about to open her mouth to scowled her friend for making amends with the 'enemy', but was cut off when she noticed Jo's hood being removed. "Short and brown…I always thought you had black hair…"
Jo looked at Elen with unshaded, green eyes. "Huh?"
Rowan found himself staring at Jo as he gradually took in the kid's appearance. "…"
He was roughly pulled from his stunned thoughts to find the twins leaning against his chair. "Love struck there, Rowan?"
"Huh?! No!" Rowan gawked quietly so none of the others could hear.
"Don't worry, man, we won't say anything about it." The twins snickered. "Just make sure you don't make a scene about it."
"I'm not making a scene!"
"Okay, okay. Just don't tell Jo's aunt. She'd flip if she found out that Jo kissed a boy."
"But-"
"Just zip! We won't tell nobody, kay? What happened in this room shall stay in this room. Alrighty? No one will tell anyone."
Rowan blinked and looked over at Jo, who was listening to Elen, Aaron and Grandpa Reece talk. He wasn't paying their conversation any mind. He was too mind boggled to listen. "If Jo's aunt would freak out if she knew Jo kissed me, then…what would my mom think? I'd never hear the end of it! She may flip out too!"
Marcy, who wasn't paying attention to any of the conversations going on around her, glanced out the window and at the rain. It seemed to be lightening up a little. She stood up and walked towards the window to get a better look through the blinds and caught sight of something running through the backyard. "!"
She bolted for the kitchen before anyone could notice and ran out the back door. Her socks were immediately soaked as she slid through the wet grass. Raindrops struck her as she grew closer to the Pokemon, but she paid no mind to how drenched she was getting.
The Pokemon when it heard her feet squish into the muddied earth and turned on her with it's bone-club raised. It faltered as it quickly recognized her from the other day.
"Cubone…" Marcy said softly as she slowed to a stop in front of it. She'd of course made sure to keep a fair enough distance away from it for it's own comfort.
It growled warningly at her, but showed no other signs of potentially attacking.
Marcy gradually lowered herself down onto her knees and stared at the Cubone. The rain continued to fall down on both of them, but neither youngster seemed to care. "Cubone…"
"Marcy, what are you doing?!" Rowan called as he wheeled himself out of the open door. The twins and Aaron followed close behind.
Marcy didn't take her eyes off of the Cubone.
"Marcy!" Rowan called again as he closed the distance between the two of them.
The Cubone flinched and took off running as the four boys neared.
"Cubone, wait!" Marcy cried, but before she could go after it Aaron grabbed her by the wrist. "Lemme go! Ro-Ro, tell him to let me go!"
Marcy, don't you remember what happened yesterday with the Pikachu?" Rowan asked roughly. "I don't want you getting hurt again. Now get back inside the house!"
"But it…" Marcy trailed off as she recalled the cruel man's warning. "…o-okay."
Aaron and the twins escorted Marcy back towards the house. Rowan proceeded to follow them, but back peddled when he noticed Marcy's folded up drawing. She had dropped it sometime when she had run outside.
He looked over at his friends, but they were already inside the house. He glanced down at the paper and tried to reach a hand out for it. Unfortunately, the wind managed to pick it up before he could snag it and blew it into a tree.
"Grr…" He growled. "Sorry, Marcy."
Unbeknownst to the boy, a few yards away from Aaron and Grandpa Reece's backyard lurked three darkly dressed men. They had seen both Cubone and Marcy standing out in the rain together and had even dared to advance on them, but remained at bay when the four boys appeared from the house. They then watched in silence as the proceeding events unfolded before them.
One of the boys hung back as he tried to pick something up from the grass. Before he could grab it, the wind picked it up and blew it out of his grasp. He huffed and wheeled himself back into the house, leaving the three men outside with the drawing.
"Think that paper is important?" One of the men pointed out as he eyed the paper.
"Maybe it's from the little girl we met yesterday. Perhaps she drew us a lovely picture to commemorate our little meet and greet." The obnoxious grunt sneered as he snatched the piece of paper out of the tree. "Shall we take a looks-see?"
The other two only rolled their eyes as he proceeded to carefully unfold the soaked paper. It wasn't an easy feat without tearing or ripping the paper, but he eventually managed to pull the paper open for all of them to see.
The colors were either flowing off of the page or bleeding right through the damaged parchment, but the images weren't very hard to identify.
"Hehe! It looks like our new friend managed to get your good side, Luke!" The obnoxious grunt cackled. "It's just a damn shame that her picture is ruined."
"I say we still return it to her tonight. I'm sure she'll be wanting it back."