Drift
Daisy was waiting for Ash at the door when he arrived. "Hey, Ash. Heard you won with your Swellow." Ash nodded. He had sent out the bird Pokemon after Pikachu had been deemed unable to battle.
Daisy kept up a constant stream of chatter, as if to fill in the spaces left by her listener. "Yeah... is Pikachu okay? That's good. Um, if you're looking for Misty, she's at the gym with Lily; they'll be back around three. We told her everything, but she still can't remember. It's kind of... bittersweet." She smiled painedly. "We got her back, but she doesn't even, like, remember us. Oh, but we didn't tell her about you, though. We think you should tell her yourself."
He nodded, head whirling. What would he say? How could you tell someone that you thought about them with every breath when they didn't even know you?
"Just go." Daisy sent him out the door with a gentle push. "Tell her." She gave him a warm smile and shut the door.
Reluctantly, Ash trudged over to the gym and stepped inside. Immediately he was hit by a wall of noise and excitement, the source of which was a throng of fans that clung to Misty like leeches.
"Have you recovered?"
"Are you going to go on as the Cerulean gym leader?"
"Wait, enough questions!" Misty laughed, giving them all a brilliant, exaggerated smile that sent an unpleasant tingle down Ash's back. It was the same smile that she had always used for people who were bothering her, and had used on him frequently. Of course, her fans didn't know that, so they continued pestering her until she herded them all out the door.
"I'm still recovering, dammit!" she laughed to herself. Then she noticed Ash, standing there with his hands in his pockets and looking embarrassed. "Oh. Hi. Are you a fan?" She laughed again, a soft bell-like sound. "I'm still getting used to being a celebrity and everything. You know, because of my memory thing. Oh, wait! You're that Ketchum guy who won the Gemstone Tournament, right?" Delight wrote itself on her face.
A hollow feeling, identical to the one he had felt when he'd heard about her accident, ached inside of him. "Yeah, I'm a fan of yours, too."
Misty smiled crookedly at him. "So why are you here? You want an autograph or something? But maybe you wouldn't, seeing as you probably sign enough of them yourself." Another laugh.
"No, no thanks. Just wanted to say hi to my favorite Sensational Sister," he said lamely.
"Oh. Okay," she replied, puzzled. Absentmindedly, she bent down and began trailing her hand in the water of the clear, still pool, her aqua-blue eyes distant. Her Horsea, the one she had raised for years, swam up and bumped her hand gently, begging her to pet it. She looked down and started in surprise, then stroked the head of a Pokemon she no longer knew. Ash turned away and stumbled out the door, unable to face the loss. Her eyes held no recognition for him, and he was afraid that they never would.
He spent the night tossing and turning in his bed at the Pokemon Center, unable to sleep, unable to face the nightmares that he knew would plague him if he slept. A script, involving his presence at the gym, played over and over in his head; a fool's errand, because why would anyone be awake in the gym in the middle of the night? He told himself fervently that he was being an idiot again, as if to stave off the inevitable, but at last he rose, carefully stepping over Pikachu and shrugging on a jacket.
He had decided that he wanted to be an idiot after all.
Okay, I'm afraid that I might have writer's block (thank you, Drifting Warrior, for passing it to me), so any suggestions for stories, anyone?