A/N: And now I'm back to updating regularly! Woo hoo! Thank you so far for all your kind reviews and all the favs/follows. As a n00b writer like myself, I am so so sooo glad and extremely happy to get these kind of reviews, or any in general! You guys are the best man.
It's the new year as I'm typing this, and sometimes I wish that I started this story earlier so that the chapters would reflect the season now and I wouldn't have to think super hard how to describe the seasons, since it'll be happening already. But happy new year guys! :)
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Gogoat: OMG THANKS MAN! :) :) And yes! You get to meet Ash in this chapter actually! THE S.S IKARI HAS SET SAIL THE DAY PAUL WAS INTRODUCED LEMME TELL YOU WHEN I SET EYES ON THAT PLUM HEAD I KNEW HE WAS PERF FOR MY BBY GIRL DAWN (this is no lie and these are the exact words I said 5 years ago). Also other ships that have set on an endless voyage long ago was the S.S Poke and S.S Contest(shipping), those two are not coming back anytime soon they WILL KEEP SAILING INTO THE SUNSET~~~ My brother is a die hard amour shipping guy, but I haven't watched the Kalos region episodes, or played the game so I have no say in that.
Sakura Touko: Hahah thank you! And happy new year (late) to you too!
flower power: No worries! She'll be here.
InkPress (4): :) your reviews totally made my day, and if this response is super messy and all over the place i apologize! At the start, it's his eyes. Being surrounded by usual joyous people and having a good life, Dawn is surrounded by happiness and brightness, which Paul isn't. And YES i have a huge problem with tenses and I totally overuse the Paul line. Although I am the one writing this fanfic, I let Dawn's character steer the story and talk about what's important to her, which is why there was so much time spent on the uniform! Paul has a back story, but bits and pieces will be revealed through out the fanfic. And no problem about the shout out! I'd do it anytime haha
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WE SET ON A LONG VOYAGE TOWARDS IKARISHIPPING LAND.
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tǎntè
[?]
adjective
1.
mixture of feeling uneasy or worried, as if you can hear your own heart beat
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It was now early October, and autumn was in full effect. The leaves were red and brown, warm hues that were illuminated by the golden sun. The sunrises and sunsets were longer and more vivd. Vibrant bright lights and a torrent of swirling colors was splashed across the sky everyday Autumn was mother nature's way to accept her inevitable death. She sits back, and accepts the highs and lows in life. Before she falls subject to her darkest time, she reminisces and remembers all the joy and triumph she felt before. The warm hues of her accomplishments, and the everlasting sunsets and sunrises of her dreams. Because she knows that after winter, she'll be reborn into something greater and even more extraordinary.
But we, as a species, we have trouble getting back up when we're pushed down. We tend to be… pessimistic. It's funny how one word, just one simple word, can bring you down more than 100 words would ever bring you back up. Why does that difference even exist? Why do we forget that flowers get stepped on all the time, but get back up and keep growing until they reach their fullest potential? We act like words rip us from the roots, and no matter how much sunshine or rain there is to help us, we can't get back up.
I had Gary, Drew and Melody to lift me back up, and I would do the same for them. They- We were each others sunshine that melted our worries and sorrow from a cold winter. But what about others? May? Leaf? Ursula? Paul? Even Misty? Who did they have?
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"Yo yo yo yo what's up my home skillets? Swag swag swag bitches!" Melody says, dropping her breakfast tray and crossing her arms in what she thought was a "ghetto gangster pose". Me and Drew look at her with wide eyes.
"Melo-"
"YO YO YOOOOO BRUH! My name be young trap lord melz aight? Chill my homies, and pass me the joint." She holds out her hand and Gary comes out of no where, slapping her hand. Melody screams in pain.
"That hurt you douchebag!"
"Well, it got you out of your horrible imitation of… whatever you were trying to do." I said, using my spoon to point at her accusingly. She gave a grunt and sat down.
"I have auditions today for fall play, and I checked to see what my test was. I had to act like I was a gangster." Melody said, fixing her hair. "AND I NEED TO GET THIS MAIN ROLE! This year there are sooooooOoOOo many people going for it! Like that new girl, May…." Melody said, clutching her water bottle tightly, making it creak and groan. Drew raises and eyebrow and I giggle.
"What's wrong with May?" Drew asks, beating me to the question. I give him a sly smile and his ears turn red.
"She is my competition, Andrew Hayden. We were always competing for first in choir last year, freshman year. And this year, her and I were the only sophomores who passed the Music Theory test and were allowed to take the class. It should've been just me! I've been studying music since I popped out the womb!" Melody drops her head to the table, defeated. A few minutes later she raises her head and sighs.
"At least I have one good thing in my life." She mutters.
"Me?" I ask happily
"Dick?" Gary says jokingly
"A bitchy attitude?" Drew says half joking. She glares at all three of us.
"No, no and no. Remember that one guy I mentioned? Ash Kecthum!" Melody clasps her hands and gave a longing sigh. "He's a pure light in this dark world."
"Gross, Ashy boy? Didn't I tell you not to date scum from Pallet Town?"
"Are you calling yourself scum?" Drew says, flicking his hair. Gary groans.
"Melody he's an idiot. He's actually really stupid." Melody glares and Gary, but then looks at me. "Don't you guys have math class together?" I drop my head to the table, I hated math!
"Yeah… we do." Me and Ash were actually good friends. He had a great personaltiy, and like Melody said, he really was a pure light in this dark world. He was always motivated and inspired to do great things and help others around him, even if it was his weak point.
"Help me out! Say good things about me!"
"Aren't you forgetting that Dawn and Ash won homecoming court last year, aren't you guys competition?" Melody widen her eyes and grabbed my shoulders.
"Dawn I love you but I NEED ASH IN MY LIFE OK I LOVE HIM DEARLY!" She said, shaking my body back and forth. I giggle at her animated actions.
"No need to worry Melody! I don't want to win for homecoming anyways." Melody hugs me tightly.
"So you'll help me out right?"
"Of course."
The way Melody casually throws out the word love made me envious. Did she really love Ash? Was every blush, every sigh of admiration, every morning that she ranted to me about the way he battles, the way he talks, his smile, his laugh, was that really love? I thought about it hard, and thought how I would feel if someone felt that way about me. Heat rose to my cheeks. Melody was in love, she had to be.
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My first class of the day was Math. I hated math with a burning passion in my soul, because it was difficult and because I hated it. I was so bad at math that I was behind a year, so majority of the students in my class were freshman. But lucky for me, I had Ash and Ursula with me.
"Why do I need to know the equation for a circle?! Who cares about circles?!" Ursula mutters bitterly, scribbling on a piece of graph paper.
"Wait, so the center of a circle goes where in the equation?" I ask to myself, nibbling on the end of my pencil. It was a bad habit of mine. I drop my head onto the book. Ash pats my head.
"Hey now, you got this! Just keep trying, you'll get there!" Ash smiles at me and I grin back.
"Alright! I can do this!"
"Yeah you can!"
"Ugh, you two are such idiots you know. This is totally useless." Ursula twirls her already perfect curls in her fingers. "Say you two, are you going to make your big comeback at homecoming?" My face turns red, remembering how awkward it was winning homecoming court as a freshman with Ash. Ash also seems a bit nervous.
"Ursula, you al-"
"C'mon drill head, me and Ash weren't a thing when we won, and we still aren't a thing now." I turn to Ash, looking for his support. "Right Ash?"
"Yeah, what Dawn said!"
"So you can take Paul or whoever and win." A sly smile spread across my face. "Although you probably won't be able to take Paul."
"Is that a bet?"
"You bet it."
"I can totally do it."
"Nope, you won't be able to." I winked at her. "If you do, we can trade cheer positions. I'll lift you up instead."
"I don't need that, just proving you wrong would be enough DeeDee."
We grin and shake hands. The bell rings and I get up to get my stuff. Ursula leaves, so I walk with Ash to my next class, and we're talking non stop. Ash is a good guy, he's nice, funny, and a little dorky.
"Listen, about homecoming..."
"Oh, yeah actually about homecoming..." I already know what he's going to say, so I beat him towards it.
"Listen, homecoming was awkward last year for the both of us. And I know that doesn't define our friendship now, so I'm not worried about that."
"Good! Cause I w-"
"And if we were in that situation again, it wouldn't be awkward, but the thing is I know someone who would definitely be a better option to go with than me. Go with Melody."
"Melody?" Ash says, contemplating the decision. He smiles. "Yeah sure!" I grin and hug him tightly.
"Thanks Ash!" I hold out my phone and give him me and Melody's numbers, just in case he needs to contact us later on. "See you around!"
"Yeah, see ya."
There's a longing look in his eyes, and he seems slightly in pain. It's almost as if the words he didn't say are choking him, the actions he didn't take are leaving bruises.
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I walked into English class not expecting much. We were still combined with the other english class for peer editing purposes, but other than that I didn't really care. Even if the she-devil crazy red head Misty was there, ready to attack me on how "I didn't value" or how "I didn't take this seriously", it was nothing that I would worry about. For reasons I wouldn't know, she probably has some motivation for doing that.
I slide in my seat next to Drew and motion Paul to come over. He sits down and Drew looks at him. I left a little early from our peer edit, so I had no idea what Paul marked on my paper.
"Hey man, great battle against Gary by the way." Drew says, flicking his hair as per usual. Paul nods.
"It was nothing." He hands me my paper, and it's scribbled with red ink everywhere. I widen my eyes.
"Wow, I wasn't expecting this much." I smile at him and he just frowns. I look at the paper again, reading over all the suggestions Paul wrote in clean neat writing.
"You have nice handwriting by the way." I mumble, eyebrows scrunched and eyes still focused on my paper. He doesn't say anything.
Majority of my mistakes were short, but that's my writing style. I look up at him again. "I don't agree with some of these changes. The short sentences are just how I like to write."
"Well, maybe you shouldn't."I rolled my eyes.
"This was a free write, maybe you should've paid more attention to my word choice than my sentence structure." I hand him back the paper. "Can you help me with that?"
He hands it back to me. "Take it or leave it."
"I don't understand why you're being so frustrating! Just edit my paper properly." I push the paper back to him, touching his chest. He grabs the paper from my hands.
"Look, you're writing about distance. S-"
"So what does that have to do with anything?" Paul groaned, annoyed that I interrupted him in the middle of his sentence. He looks at the paper and reads a sentence.
"The universe was expanding. Planets were growing father away from each other, and so were we." Paul looked up at me. "You're talking about distance growing and increasing, yet it's not reflected in your writing at all. If this is something that, and I quote 'nature can't fight, but learns to accept.' your writing is also subject to this." I look at him with wide eyes and grab my paper back, slowly.
"I-you-yeah." I say breathlessly, amazed at Paul's way of thinking. "Yeah, I see what you're saying."
He smirked, and whatever admiration I had was pulled away and tossed to burn. I rolled my eyes and looked at the paper again.
"Don't get too cocky now, plum head."
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"Togekiss, Aura Sphere!" A bright blue light appeared, temporarily blinding me and May, as well as our audience. I grinned. Just cause I was a coordinator doesn't mean my pokemon lack power. After all, coordinators are pokemon trainers first.
"Blazekien, Blaze Kick!" Togekiss releases her blue orb and Blazekien jumps up and kicks it with its fiery leg. The orb turns white for a spilt second, and quickly flies towards our opponents. Both of them are down.
"The winner for this contest are- May Maple and Dawn Hikari! They will be moving to the final round." I grin and squeal in joy, running up to May and hugging her. She hugs me back equally as tight. Togekiss comes down and picks the both of us up, tossing us in the sky. When we finally get down, Drew walks over.
"Nice work Dawn. You too, April."
"It's MAY!" I giggle at the two of them. He gives May a rose.
"For your Beautifly."
"Yeah, right. My Beautifly." May rolls her eyes but smiles after and thanks Drew. Drew turns around and walks away, so May doesn't see his red face. I grab May's hand.
"Let's hang out and celebrate!" She widens her eyes.
"You want to hang out with me?" I hold on to her hands tighter.
"YES! Come on we need to shop for our outfit for the final round. And we can talk strategy!" I pull her close. "And we can talk about boys to." I wiggle my eyebrows and gesture towards Drew. She playfully slaps my shoulder.
"Ew! Not him!"We return our pokemon and I drag her away from the class, towards the bus stop. Sadly, we don't have cars but the school is located near a couple of buses that will get you anywhere.
We talk non stop about our upcoming final contest, and we've already planned out what pokemon we're going to use and what appeals we're going to do. When we get to the mall, our eyes light up. May drags me through every single store, commenting on how nice everything looks and rubbing her fingers all over the material. I wave her my debit card but she just tells me to wait until its time.
"Time for what?" I question.
"DAWN JUST WAIT FOR THE TIME." She looks at me aggressively and mutters the words underneath her breath. I laugh and this time I drag her towards the store I usual go to when I buy dresses. We begin to search.
"What pokemon are we using again?" She ask, her head popping in between two frilly dresses.
"I'm using Piplup, you're using Beautifly right?"
"Oh yeah! Maybe we should go for something that reflects our pokemon? Do you think this store sells wings?"
I laugh and May chimes in as well. "You're such an idiot sometimes."
"But I'm your partner, so I'm your idiot." She says proudly. "Be proud of this idiot."
"Yeah yeah whatever Maple."
"Seriously though, the wings could work!" She says again, sarcastically.
"That means you need roses right? Since Drew always gives you roses and everything." She glares at me and hides behind a dress made of chiffon. I grin, happy that I'm steering the conversation to a very important topic.
"C'mon May! I think we both know those roses have to mean something right?" She pops out in front of me this time, her red face in between two vibrantly bright green dresses.
"It's nothing! Drew is just a rival Dawn. Besides, aren't you guys dating?" I widen my eyes and run up to her, dragging her from the dresses.
"Who told you that?!"
"It's a rumor. It's either you and Drew are a thing, or you and Gary." I slap my head.
"Drew is like a brother to me, honestly. He may be a douchebag, but he can really be supportive at times."
"And Gary?" She asks, picking up a dress and examining it.
"Gary is... attractive." I say, breathing in and out deeply. "He's a funny guy too. But him and me... I don't think that would really happen."
"Why not?"
"Gary is into... one night stands if you haven't noticed."
"Oh, I've heard some things."
"I want to know that what I think love is is the real thing. I want to experience the exhilarating, blissful moments that I've grown accustomed too, and with Gary I don't think I'll be able to find that." She looks at me with wide eyes, like I've broken the fourth wall or something.
"You're an interesting girl, Miss Hikari." I smile at her.
"But you know what's more interesting? You and Drew?"
She groaned and threw a fluffy dress and me. "He's such a jerk to me!"
"May, you know I'm Drew's friend. Do you really think I would be pushing for this to irritate him?" She looks at me with an eyebrow raised.
"Okay, I would just to irritate him for fun, but still! If there was nothing between you and Drew I'd burn those roses for you."
May gave me a smile, one that broke my heart to pieces. It was so fake, yet so heart wrenchingly beautiful. Her rosy cheeks were flushed, her sky blue eyes set ablaze with confusion and sadness and her focus was on the past. "I don't know what to think Dawn."
"Then let me help you."
"Will you hear what I think about it?" I study her carefully, and let her words sit in the air. My heart pounds, because I know whatever she has to say will change something, whether it be big or small, change is inevitable with May Maple. Because on the outside she can be a strong, carefree and head strong girl but she can quickly change to be a lost girl who needs support.
"Yes."
I was beginning to see May in a new light, and I couldn't help but wonder why Melody could despise this girl so much. Or why Drew hadn't made any more advances towards this girl.
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A/N: Title refers to the overall change that occurs. Big changes that take place over long periods of time, like the seasons, and small changes that will snowball into something colossal- like May and Dawn's friendship and May's view of Drew. People are not always willing to accept change, or embrace it. They usually go against it or try to reverse the change that takes place- thus the title. The feelings associated with not agreeing and accepting change. IDK how to pronounce it (I don't speak any other languages than english). If you're curious of the word, here's where I got it from (and where I generally get some of my words)- .vu/post/104405815246
YAY! May and Dawn are good friends. Just an explanation on their whole contest scenario: It's more of a tournament, to see who will be the best in their class. Dawn and May have gone through about 7-8 different contests to reach finals, meaning they had to make 7-8 different appeals! Of course, there are other pokemon coordinating classes since this is such a big school, so they haven't really reached "finals" yet. There are about 4 other different coordinating classes, so they still have a while to go. :)
Dawn is now stuck between wanting to be mean to May because of Melody, and also she questions the way Drew approaches May. May is pulling her into a new light, a different view from her close knit circle.
Like always, reviews would be great! I'm definitely looking for some feedback from you guys.
Thanks for taking the time to read this. :)