The snug sense of rest he felt was suddenly shattered. Something bathed his right cheek in even warmer moisture. He took a few seconds to open his eyes, and there she was, drawing her lips away from his face. A giggle escaped the girl, and she bolted, swinging open the wooden door as she retreated.
Ash grunted, still gripped in the haze of sleep, and stumbled out of bed and onto the cabin floor. The boy wrestled with the backs of his brown snow boots, shoving his arms through his winter jacket after he hopped into them. The heat of the cabin evaporated from his body as soon as he plodded outside, frigid air striking him right in the face. Fully alert, Ash looked left to right while his feet sank a little bit into the ground. The entire ground and the patchwork of evergreens in front of and around the cabin were newly white, coated with snow from the previous night. The heavy winds from that night were no longer pounding the area, but an icy sphere slammed Ash right in the face, forcing him down.
Wiping flecks of crystals out of his eyes, a grinning Misty filled Ash's vision. She reached her green-gloved hands into the snow to gather more ammunition, but she was struck on the top of the head with a dose of her own medicine. She continued to chuckle along with Ash as she rose her head, powder falling back to earth from her long, fiery hair. The young lady trotted back slightly, shifting side to side with a snowball in her hand. But Ash kept in step with her, jockeying for position. They never took their eyes off of each other, readying their attacks.
BAM! Direct hit to the head!
FWUMP! Another to the coat-covered belly!
The bombardment continued, and the couple hopped and waded through the snow until they reached the top of a nearby hill. Ash had pelted Misty again, and she ducked close to him to create another sphere. She dug into the ground, and just as the young man above her formed his snowball, she dropped what was in her hand and launched herself at his middle. The two yelled as they rolled down the hill like a couple of kids, their bodies wrapped up in the frost. They tumbled to the base of one of the towering trees, barely missing slamming into it.
Shaking their heads, the duo took a moment to look up into the distance. The afternoon sky was blue and dotted with bundles of clouds—calm, but not void of anything. Not too far away, the laughter and talk of elated voices crept over the wilderness. A few more vacation cabins were nearby, and those were just a mile or so away from the small mountain town at the bottom.
Jingling bells came next, and Ash and Misty smiled as they saw Pikachu and Azumarill, two of their closest Pokémon companions, played chase a ways away with a few children ringing the seasonal instruments; a Chimchar and Clefairy were not far behind, doing their best to cartwheel in the icy land.
Still sitting in the snow, the Cerulean City native turned back to Ash, and her smile didn't leave her as she looked at him. Frosty droplets dropped from his fronds of black hair, and she could see the white wasps of breath leave his mouth as he gasped, his fairly-toned body heave in his dark red fleece jacket, and that wide, wide grin. He wasn't that same ten-year-old kid who played catch-up to become a Pokémon Master, for the most part anyway. In many ways, he went ahead of the pack, and in one way, he was there to stay.
Ash was looking as well, locking his deep brown eyes with Misty's blue ones; both pairs gleamed as they gazed. She kept him from going off the deep end more than a few times, but it was so much fun to go into the unknown, like where they were now. But the Pallet native stopped to take things in much more when he was with her. With strategy, with feeling, with color. Not just the world around him, but the one in front of him—the blazing red hair, the canary yellow pea coat, and those shining blue eyes. Ash kept all of those hues in his mind as he closed his eyes, leaning in close and uniting his lips with Misty's. Misty locked her mouth tight around his, and though she felt that physical steadiness, she felt herself whirling around the world. But they certainly were in one place, the holiday chill melting away as they tightened their arms around each other, nuzzling and rubbing their noses together. It was warmth that they didn't want to leave, and still didn't even when their content smiles turned into mischievous smirks, and the two flicked chunks of crystals from the ground into the other's face.