Hello, it is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter! When I re-read this story to edit it and upload it, I couldn't help but think that this whole idea is so what I have wanted to write about for years - but sometimes these ideas take some time to come to fruition. This chapter is a little on the heavier side. Today, we very much tackle the dynamic between Misty and her sisters - certainly, as the title suggests - between Misty and Daisy. I never really liked her sisters in the anime. They were pretty one dimensional and certainly mean to Misty. But as years have passed and I've considered their upbringing that is me and Shannon's own headcanons, I understand that, in their own ways, deep inside they are those broken kids who lost two parents at such a young age. This chapter certainly explores all that, and also the subject of their parents visiting from up there. I hope you enjoy :3
Ages:
James: 27
Misty: 20
Daisy: 26
Disclaimer: I own the story and the OCs mentioned!
I continued to bask in the sunshine in the entryway of the building, James by my side with a notebook balanced on his lap, pen poised in one hand, and a cigarette gracing the other. As he brought his ring-clad hand to his lips to take a puff, I couldn't refrain from shooting my irises towards him, in the corner of my sockets.
He didn't even see it!
And so, the sunshine melting further into my fur, I let out a few titters instead of pretending to choke like I sometimes chose to do. I didn't particularly enjoy that habit of his. But it beat being captured! And I had to be grateful for the open doors of the building that we sat between, as well as the way that he tactfully blew the smoke out of the corner of his mouth.
How life had changed.
Rather than joining my best friend, Ash, in battle every waking second, on this particular day he was off on some daddy day out as he had called it. Forgoing waking up at the crack of dawn to enlist me to help him capture a new Pokémon, he had rushed off with him and Misty's twins and Gary as well as him and Jayme's twins.
Oh, the struggles of being second best!
I tittered a second time to myself, unaware of the way that James was the one giving me a sideways glance this time, as his cigarette sat idle in between his two fingers and his pencil, was being used to sketch across his page.
I hadn't minded Ash's preferred activity of the day, not really. He had seized life ever since I had known him and it now filled my heart with joy that he was using all of that rambunctious energy to tackle fatherhood head-on.
Be that as it may, I couldn't help but feel sorry for Misty when he took off without a second thought like I had once felt towards Delia over the years. They had always been a team. Parenthood was supposed to be the biggest epitome of that.
However, deep in my soul, I knew that she didn't mind either. Being a young parent was tough. It was wonderful he had not only her to ground him in the midst of it but Gary too who was also going through the same thing. And besides, she had me to hang out with, didn't she?
I couldn't help but feel in my mouth a sensation similar to as if I had taken a puff of James' cigarette when she trotted down the stairs in the next few moments and seemingly came from upstairs to hang out with him instead!
"Hiya." Misty greeted from the second that she stood behind James, touching him with the tip of her sneakers against his belt before clumsily flopping next to him. He only just reacted in time, managing to stop both his pencil from skating across the page as well as his cigarette from lighting his artwork on fire. "Whatcha doing?"
I waited for James to speak only with his eyes, his irises hued like a meadow on a dew-kissed morning making a home in the corner of his white sockets. If anybody else had asked him this question, he definitely would have made this gesture.
Wasn't it perfectly obvious?!
James, however, responded with actual words and not only had a smile for Misty despite her clumsiness but even stubbed his cigarette out on the ground just a foot in front of us both.
I saw how it was!
"Oh, nothing to write home about." James began, that right hand of his that had kept his pencil poised between two fingers raising to his face to scratch along his eyelash as if this gesture would allow him to feel happier about his creation. "I've been advised to put together some sketches for a Fall line." He explained. "But I'm not in the right mood as of yet."
Now had his hand had dropped down closer to his sketchbook, James' eyes wandered to the cloudless cerulean sky looking down on us all and with the beaming sun at its highest point. He did this as if this explained everything to Misty. Apparently, it did.
Even without her hip practically joining his as she sat down on his left side while I was at his right, she would have understood. I did too. But it was only until she had found her voice that I began to get clued in.
"It's unfair that you're always having to think about the next thing. Especially when we're having such a lovely spring." Misty said. Fortunately, James hadn't moved the point of his pencil against the white of his sheet because, as if she had absorbed the rays of the sun, Misty pinged up once more. "You can always use me as inspiration."
James tried not to have a different kind of smile than before as she jokingly lifted her leg in a bit of a kick and offered him a peace symbol with her two fingers, his mouth elevating on just the one corner and towards his earrings.
My pupils were back in the corner of my sockets and I didn't care if Misty saw.
Despite James' amused expression, he was prompt to retaliate.
"Are you really that bored without Ash and the twins?" he looked at her with the same teasing in her eyes as she had just offered to him, momentarily pushing a lock of hair from his eyes as if he wanted to make sure he could see all of her. "You need to learn to enjoy it, honey. Before you know it, they will be toddlers and taking up every waking second of yours."
Before James could add the words a bit like that boyfriend of yours with a different smirk spreading across his face and his irises darkening like weeds spreading themselves across the soil, Misty was back flopping on the ground next to him.
This time she did cause a pencil line to streak across his page!
I had to swallow my giggles. He had said that he wasn't pleased with his work but that had to be annoying for him.
"I can't enjoy it! I love having them around, even when they're being extra pouty and cranky." Misty whined. James was about to open his mouth when she put a stop to the words she knew was coming. "I mean Ben and Katie, James." Her voice altered from drawn out to snippy and this encouraged him to share a glint in his eye with me. But I was snatched off the ground before it could turn into anything else. "I should get on with some work but, like you, I'm not really feeling it."
I had once felt my heart sinking in my chest down to my stomach a little bit when Misty had rushed to James' side instead of mine, even if I had tried to conceal it with humor. I, however, prided myself in being quick to forgive and I could not stop myself from experiencing a lightness in my heart far greater than the sun winking down on my fur as Misty scooped me up in her arms and lovingly grazed her chin against the top of my head.
I knew deep down that it was because she was missing the twins and Ash too and the glance that James offered me told me this as well. I ignored it! I focused on Misty's affection, whatever the reason. I was just glad to still be there to offer her comfort throughout the new chapter of her life.
Seeing as James' lap was occupied only by his sketchpad rather than a creature to cuddle like Misty was experiencing, he decided that at least one of them should focus on being productive. He stretched his legs further out in front of him, past the threshold connecting the outside to the entryway of the building, and rested his pages against his knees.
He prepared to incorporate the line that Misty had made him accidentally swipe across the page into the drawing. He didn't stop conversing with her even if he was preparing to concentrate.
"Well, Munchkin, you're always welcome to keep me company too." He murmured, fashioning the line streaking across the page into a belt, also making it clear that he knew the reason that I had joined him wasn't just for the sunny weather.
I didn't know what to say. In the end, I didn't need to say anything and was able to relish in Misty grinding her knuckles against the top of my head for a few minutes before it was her who found she needed to pull words out from inside of her.
I had to confess that at the time I didn't notice her momentary silence. But looking back, it was definitely there, and she didn't feel her porcelain cheeks setting free a rosy blush thanks to the sunshine at the same time that James had offered her these words.
Misty went on to make a confession of her own. By this time, the line streaking across her page had been turned into a fully functioning belt with a sparkling buckle and chains hanging down from the loops.
"Actually… I was wondering if you could do me a favor." Misty admitted with her cheeks thudding underneath the surface for a different reason. At this exact moment she was holding me underneath my furry armpits but I wasn't the one who needed stabilizing from a dramatic reaction.
James didn't exactly lose his footing. But he decided that he was done with his sketching, even though he had finally seemed to be getting somewhere. Misty's spiky black eyelashes clapped together as he tossed his pages as well as his pencil outside, holding one finger up in the air now that it was no longer occupied.
She wasn't as savvy to the diamond in his eye as I was.
"I knew it! I knew you weren't just being nice to me!" James' arm briefly swiped across his chest in a particular gesture before his finger remained pointing to the rich blue sky, waggling.
For a rare occasion, Misty wasn't catching on to his fruity gesticulations being a way of teasing her and her ankles twitched as they planted on the ground, almost vaulting her upwards in a different way than she had done before.
She nearly lost her grip under my arms. I wasn't sweating that much from the sun; I can assure you!
"Hey, I'm nice to you all of the time, you moron!" Misty snapped, not hearing how her own words sounded as she was far too busy getting them out there. She thought that her friend was laughing at her rather than with her when chuckles erupted from his belly. "I can go and ask somebody else."
My heart dropped lower than my stomach as Misty didn't meet my gaze, instead looking around as if I was suddenly no longer somebody, let alone anybody to ask a favor. But I had to remind myself who I was dealing with. I had to remind myself of the affection!
Misty found it hard to ask anybody for anything at the best of times. And, despite his chuckles, this was not lost on James either. His neck sloping to the one side and encouraging his fond laughter to come to a close, he even reached his unoccupied hand to Misty's wrist so she truly knew that it was all in jest.
It took a moment or two for her trust to kick in and the sincerity to melt into her skin but her not shoving his touch away immediately was a good sign. Well, it was a good sign for him! I wasn't too overjoyed that his hand was so close to me seeing as Misty was still holding onto me.
James waited for Misty to gulp down a little more of her blush.
"Ask away." He told her, his legs even swiveling around so that he could face her further, without words letting her know that it was really okay.
Not that I dared admit it at the time that this story takes place but I always envied how much he could convey without saying anything at all. Truthfully, I had always been jealous of how successful he was at this when it came to Misty especially – as well as the way that she responded to it in turn.
Though even Misty must've known that she would let her guard down and move on eventually, she still stuck her nose in the air for a couple of seconds longer and relinquished me down to her lap so I was just sitting there rather than being gripped.
Eventually, she let her words be known while her toes privately danced inside of her sneakers.
Oh, how she hated asking anybody for anything.
"Seeing as you're already here, do you mind keeping guard and making sure no one buzzes themselves into the building without me knowing?" she looked at her sneakers as she asked this and then, when her gaze finally lifted, it was disguised by her bumping her shoulder against James'. She added more words before he could even think about what he wanted to say. "Thanks, James."
Immediately, my eyes became angular with suspicion. For a rare occasion, James and I were united in our experience. He turned to Misty further, his own shoulder inadvertently colliding with hers but not out of an expression of gratitude.
His eyes appeared to be more eggshell white than green at this point.
"Wait. Hang on a minute here, Misty." James' mind began ticking – far more than when he had been sketching – and I was surprised that I didn't see smoke rising out of them as if he were a chimney. Misty couldn't meet his wide eyes. She was quickly regretting not handling things on her own. "Are you in trouble? Is there somebody giving you trouble?" If-"
James was verbalizing everything that was racing through my own mind but I did not feel a union or acceptance. Him vocalizing what I was fearing made my body twist itself into battle position, my heart elevating itself into my throat this time and pounding there.
I was one step away from my cheeks crackling with electricity.
"Oh, for God's sake, James. No." Misty interjected his concern, her hand raising to push her bangs away from her clammy forehead before both her hands attempted to clasp around my middle. I knew this meant I needed to calm down as well, even if I had not been named. "It's nothing."
James didn't need to share a look with me to know that it couldn't have been nothing for her to be asking anyone for a favor even if it was him.
"Misty, you have to tell me if you're in trouble." James' eyes for a split second grew cloudy with care as his hand reached for hers this time rather than her wrist before they hardened with a look that I could only describe as rigid protection. Then it was his turn to jolt up onto his feet, no longer reaching out to her. "I can protect you. But you have to tell me what's going on."
I didn't think I could feel this way on that day but I felt somewhat bad for James when Misty didn't mirror his expression back to him, touched. Although she stood up to join him and I had only half a second to jump off her lap myself before I tumbled on the ground against my will, her immediate reaction was to laugh in his face.
James' eyes grew wider than ever before.
Misty went on to revolve her irises in her own sockets, speaking past a hand covering her mouth at the genuine response that she had let slip.
"I think if anybody is protecting anybody else around here then it's me who has a better shot at protecting you, James!" Misty told him. Perhaps the wrong thing to say to someone she was trying to get a favor out of! His eyes spoke a different language than before, dropping down and his eyebrows knotting above them. "It's nothing like that." Misty knew she had to change her tactic before she had nobody to ask for help. "I don't know how to explain it but I just need you to stay here and make sure no one tries to knock at my door today."
I was on the floor looking up at them both but I could still observe the full scene. Even I had to confess that the way that Misty had laughed at James – amusing in hindsight but still – would have made me understand if he would go on to not want to help her out at all.
That wasn't fair on James.
Misty was absolutely the kind of young woman more than capable of protecting herself but I knew that James had been there for her more times than she could count on both of her hands. I hated to admit it but even I knew that he would always be there for her in a heartbeat.
It seemed that that would still be the case even if she had just given him a good few reasons not to help her at all. I suppose that was the whole point of friendship. You could read between the lines and hear what the other person was saying with the words that they did not say. You knew the person underneath. So, you would always be willing to help, regardless of the armor that was standing in between you both.
I tried not to feel myself going on tiptoes in admiration when James' hands slid into both of the pockets of his jeans and he tilted his head towards Misty, not turning his back on her.
"Take your time." James said in a tone of voice like he was speaking to a fairy and he was afraid that anything louder than that would cause their wings to shatter.
These words coming from her friend caused Misty's ankles to buckle a second time, though she tried her best to remain standing still, her cheeks reddening as she looked down towards her sneakers.
Sometimes his kindness irked her. But it was only because she felt like sometimes, she didn't deserve it. Perhaps sometimes she didn't. But it was like I said – good friends know the real you and can be unfazed by the kind of persona you were putting on to not get hurt.
Misty was lucky to have good friends.
I reminded her that none of them were going anywhere by jumping up onto her shoulder and the second after this, she ran her hand through her bangs a second time and revolved her own eyes, shuddered breath escaping through her parted lips.
She found her words. She knew that she just had to tell the truth.
"Do… Do you remember when my parents were here last?" she asked James. But now that her fingers were no longer tangling through her bangs, she included me by reaching her hand to her shoulder, clasping my paw. We both nodded. It was hard to remember a time as unexpected as that. "I… I should have told my sisters. But I didn't. They found out anyway."
In the split second between Misty finding her voice and James discovering his in turn, both of our minds raced through a million different things and I'm sure that it was the same for Misty as well.
Yes, that was truly the most unexpected time. Bizarre, even. I had learned a long time that life was far more than what I once believed and the universe was the most surprising place, letting you in on little secrets as long as you could keep them.
My mind and heart were forced to open far more when Misty's parents had come back from the dead the year before. I thought it was a once-in-a-lifetime occasion. We all did. Apparently not. It was devastating to say goodbye to them again after getting to know them a bit better the second time around.
You never knew when their last breath was going to be. Misty never expected any of it to happen. Maybe that was why she hadn't gotten around to telling her sisters.
It was James' turn to feel his toes shuffling in his boots. And it was his turn to answer Misty. So, he did, regardless of if he thought he had anything valuable to say. He could see that she was waiting. In a way, I was too.
"I see." James responded. The truth is, he didn't know what to say. He didn't know if he should ask Misty why she had never told her sisters when she had told both him and Ash that she would get around to it. He didn't want to upset her. He didn't want her to have to process even more.
Maybe in a way, he didn't wish to get involved. Families were so, so complicated.
Misty should have been used to James' lack of words but she believed that the two that he had decided to mutter were filled with judgment. I could feel her holding onto my paw even tighter. Her lower lip fell into her mouth before it plinked out again. She formulated words to explain to James but to reassure herself too.
"I didn't… Intend to keep it from them. To mislead them. Whatever." Misty's sentences were shortened. Instead of looking across at Misty warily, James' hands revealed themselves from his jeans and his eyes appeared like soft blades of grass that enveloped you like a picnic blanket as soon as you sat down against them. "I didn't want my parents to deal with too much too quickly." Misty's cheeks felt as though they had been stung. "I didn't… I didn't want my sisters to not believe me."
Something snapped inside of James. It wasn't like a twanging sound like when elastic is stretched too far and too much and it fails under all of the pressure. It was gradual. It was subtle. It was silent.
All of a sudden, James was prepared to be the soothing leaf in contrast to the nettle stinging Misty's cheeks. It felt natural for him to be exactly this.
James appeared right in front of Misty. Craning to press a kiss to the center of her forehead, he soothed her racing thoughts with this gesture and he soothed all of his concerns. He showed exactly what kind of friend he was.
"Okay." Was the single word that he muttered to her and this is all that he intended to say. He took a step back after his lips left her forehead and his hands slid back into his jeans pockets for something to do.
It took everything in my power to not fall off Misty's shoulder at how close I was to them both when he had kissed her!
In hindsight, I realize that it also took everything in Misty's power to not buckle in the same way at the way that James was behaving toward her. After everything. After all of her words to explain the situation. The messiness of her family. How she had spoken to him.
After everything.
He was still there.
Misty swallowed roughly. She told herself it was to diffuse the sun from making its way into her cheeks. It certainly wasn't tears or emotion.
"O... Okay…?" Misty questioned, her dry eyes clapping together and taking her turn to peer at James from an angle. She had been infected by his wordlessness!
James didn't hesitate to retake that step back closer towards her, his head slowly bobbing up and down even if his mouth pressed together for half a second first, drooping down at the side before he was able to lure more words from inside of him.
"Okay." He reiterated before saying anything else. He bought himself extra time just to make sure he had worthwhile things to say. "If that's what you need from me then I'll do my best." James was savvy to the way that Misty's eyelashes twitched and he was correct to show that he truly understood. "If any of your sisters come around here today for answers then I'll send them on their way."
It had taken so much for Misty to ask for a favor. It had taken so much for her to voice what she needed to say without worrying that he thought she sounded crazy – without her worrying that she thought she sounded crazy.
Misty felt like she didn't have all that many words to say. So, she snatched a leaf out of James' book and took it for her own, deciding that gestures were the best way to express her thanks.
James was still thinking about the embrace that she had given him when the day continued to pass and he resumed trying to get work done on his sketchbook. To tell you the truth, I was thinking about that embrace too!
Needless to say, very different thoughts were running through my mind. I knew I had to be okay with staying watch with James rather than following Misty upstairs to crack on with work on her computer but deep down, I wasn't.
I knew that I should be flattered when Misty enlisted me to keep watch too. But this time, I didn't feel as content to be sat by James and it wasn't because he lit a second cigarette.
I didn't know why she had asked him first. I would have taken the mission very seriously had it been bestowed on me. It seemed that I was okay with being second best to Ash and the twins. But being second best to an ex-Team Rocket member I would never be!
I was still privately sulking when it became clear that James would be put to the test regarding how good of a protector he could be. By that time, the sun was beginning to pale in the sky. And it wasn't because the person tottering up the driveway had stolen all of the light of the rays to color her hair.
It was time for James to see how well he could say no to another Williams girl. He just had to hope that Misty was the only one that had him wrapped around his little finger!
He had almost forgotten the task at hand and had filled a good few more pages in his sketchbook when he was suddenly reminded by Daisy crunching along the gravel driveway in her kitten heels and her pantsuit.
I stretched up off the floor and sniffed the hair ready. Meanwhile, James' heart sank. I don't particularly like using expletives. But I was certain that these kinds of thoughts were popping through his mind when Daisy tootled over to greet him.
Fuck.
James almost dropped his pencil down into the drain hole below. He had been pondering how he was going to send Lily on her way while making it in one piece. He felt concerned at how he was going to not cave to Violet's doe eyes and compelling arguments.
Damn it.
For some reason, he had not anticipated that it might have been Daisy.
Unbeknownst to him, she was equally abashed at having to get past him to get into the building.
"Hiya there, James." Daisy stopped tottering in her heels that were barely bigger than her thumb and stood a good few meters in front of him, mistaking my poised nose for a greeting and bobbing her head at me in return. I was forced to return this gesture. "How are you doing?"
James had been so sure that Daisy was going to ask if she could come in so he almost muttered the word no!
He was known for keeping himself to himself and being shy in a way that to others was somewhat charming but he would never have been able to live it down if he showed this lack of social skills.
Fortunately, the blunder did not occur and Daisy did not even notice one, the tiniest of smiles quirking up her cherry red swiped lips as she took in his sketchpad, pencils, pack of cigarettes, and lighter.
She would have to ask him to design the costumes for a future project, she reminded herself.
"Oh, I couldn't possibly complain, Daisy." He answered her with a squint taking over his eyes that were not the sun and propping his cigarette back into his lips, relighting it since it had gone out amid the shock. He forwent asking her how she was to keep her at arm's length. "What can I do for you?"
Daisy watched him blow the first puff of smoke out of his nostrils, impressed, before her finger twirled the ends of her own long locks, finally stable in her stance now that she had stopped mooching across the driveway.
"I was just hoping to come and see my little sister." Daisy paused. Her hand tumbled back down to her side. I tried not to look at James. That was easy for me because I was still in a mood with him! "Is she in?"
James forwent looking over at me for a different reason and he seemed as though he wanted to be unable to look at anybody when he raised his own cigarette holding hand closer to his face, his thumb scratching his eye for something to do.
In his being, his stomach knotted with awkwardness. On the outside, however, he found his words promptly and cooly.
"I'm afraid she's not, Daisy." He began, scooting on his bottom closer to me to subtly block the doorway before she got any other ideas. He didn't think she would barge in but he had been given a task. I could only focus on him being nearer to me! "She's gone out with Ash and the twins and Gary with his twins." James was beginning to settle back into a life of lying. "I don't know when she'll be back."
He made a point of looking at the watch on his wrist as if the group could be back at any minute but his wrist soon felt limp and flopped closer to his lap before he worried about setting more than just his pages on fire!
I had to agree with James that I hoped that Ash and Gary and the babies wouldn't return without Misty while we were all at the doorway chatting.
I went against my wishes and nudged James subtly with my head, acting as though I wanted affection but was telling him to get rid of Daisy in a hurry.
"Oh, well that's a bummer." Daisy murmured. I was left feeling redder-cheeked than usual when it became apparent that my gesture against James hadn't been as subtle as I thought. Daisy tottered closer to me in particular, holding her hand out for permission by giving me a good scratch between the ears. Those Williams sure were good at it! "Do you think you could let me into her place so I can wait for her to get back? I really do need to talk to her."
James immediately knew that he had to say no but he waited a good few minutes before letting her down, acting like he was charmed by the way that I was responding to Daisy's affection, looking down towards me with a smile curling his lips as I let out coos that were not put on.
He didn't notice it but in between my eyes fluttering shut with pleasure, I took note of the way that Daisy petted me only further as James seemed to smile with approval.
She looked like she had forgotten that she had asked James a question, taken aback when he didn't wish to comply with her words.
"I don't think that's a good idea, Daisy." James' nose scrunched up on his face in between another inhale of his cigarette and, for half a second, she didn't remember what he didn't think was a good idea. "It'll probably be teatime by the time they get back and they need to stick to a routine for the twin's sake as much as anything." James was doing so well. "It does sound important though."
He continued smiling over at Daisy, still squinting at her even though the sun had teased us enough that day with any semblance of the weather that was to grace us for the Kanto summer. James' desire to appease would always be one of his greatest flaws.
On that day, his tactic to be sympathetic to Daisy was close to biting him on the bottom. He suspected as such from the second that these words left his mouth, let alone when she started to address them, standing back to her full height after making a fuss of me.
James couldn't put his cigarette back in his mouth quickly enough!
"It is important." Daisy confirmed, unaware of the way that James had lost the ability to look her in the eye. She was too focused on taking her own big, deep breath as if she had the white tip of a cigarette to suckle on. "It's… It's about our parents."
James had never wanted to look over at Daisy less. He never would have dreamed of telling Misty but he had always thought that she was far more tolerable than the other two. Even saying that was a big no-no as far as Misty was concerned.
He couldn't help it though. He knew enough about what Misty had been through as a child and therefore what they had all been through. He didn't think that it was fair. He didn't know how he was going to continue misleading her.
After I perched myself back on my bottom and accidentally-on-purpose thwacked my tail against his hand as another warning, James took my advice and focused on just repeating Daisy's words.
I prayed his naturally expressive eyes wouldn't give anything else away.
"Your parents?" James' voice instinctively lowered and thickened as he repeated and it wasn't because of the succession of puffs that he had taken on his cigarette after he believed that he had ruined Misty's favor before it had even properly begun.
James still didn't wish to look at Daisy. He knew it was a big risk. But hearing her actually, say those two words – actually address those two people to him for the first time in either of their lives – made some of the empathy that he had for Misty deliver itself to Daisy also.
He couldn't help it. He knew that pain spread like a virus. And it did not even need closeness or touch to harm.
"Yes… Our parents." As James looked over at Daisy behind a small cloud of cigarette smoke, her own voice lowered, inadvertently mimicking his. At the same time, they both let air out of their lips, for very different reasons. Daisy made her shoulders straighten and she forced herself to brighten as if she was the disposition of her hair. "I suppose I had better come back another time." She conceded. "Do you think I can use your downstairs loo quickly before I go, though?"
James had been so filled with relief that she was going to leave the vicinity without too much trouble that he almost nodded to her in a heartbeat. I thwacked my tail against his hand that was supporting himself on the ground a second time – hard!
He cleared his throat instead of yelping. And instead of complying immediately, James responded stiffly, but it was only to continue keeping her at arm's length.
"Sure." James conceded with a sigh and with that, he brushed his sketchpad and other belongings to the side in order to shuffle away from me for more reasons than just to give Daisy enough room to clamber between us both. And head to the small cubicle for visitors underneath the stairway.
Before Daisy tottered in her heels on her way, she shrugged her shoulders up towards her ears and she smiled at James warmly. This caused his stomach to unclench. This caused him to relax just a little too much. This caused him not to suspect a thing.
James thought it was all going so well until Daisy passed the memo board on the way to the toilet. As I craned my head, I saw as clear as the day that we had been having before the clouds filled the sky that she was putting on a bit of a pantomime.
"One thing I don't understand though, James…" Daisy began, this immediately garnering James' attention as he turned behind him, his eyebrows preparing to form a union and knot together. "Is why this little drawing pin says that Misty is in the building when you said that she isn't?" her manicured nail gestured towards the sign where everybody in the building kept in touch but James' face was already draining. "Why are you lying to me?"
I had never seen James stub his cigarette out so quickly! Well, apart from when his parents decided to pay an impromptu visit!
James left all of his belongings in a hurry and me in his wake as he skidded to where not only had Daisy busted him but she was still gesturing to the patch on the memo board where they all listed where the other was instead of logging onto the group chat.
I was quick on my own feet and was just colliding with his ankles at the same time that he was preparing to explain himself, his hands gaining momentum now that they didn't have a cigarette or a pencil to hold.
"I'm not lying to you, Daisy, I-" he tried to explain. But Daisy interjected him.
She reacted in the same way that Misty did when he was fibbing to her, you see. She just didn't understand it. She had no room for lies in her life. Since the age of ten years old, she had been brave in the face of the kind of truth that could break your heart in two so she did not see any reason for dishonesty. No reason at all.
James knew that he was about to have the hardest time of all with the way that Daisy looked at him there and then.
Eyes that were a similar shade to his own threatened to puddle in front of him. She looked at him very seriously.
"I don't expect you to tell me the truth but I expect my sister to." She commenced. From my vantage point on the floor, as I looked up, I could see the way that her fists were trembling by her sides even if she tried to play them off as swaying. "And I expect you not to stand in the way of the preservation of a family."
And with that, whether or not Daisy realized how much her words had done the trick, she moved past both James and me before either of us could stop her and she made her way up the stairs to where her sister's apartment with Ash was located.
Daisy could never have known how much her words had affected James but they had affected me too. We turned to look at each other for the first time in an hour or two. She was right.
We were sure that Misty had her reasons but Jordan and Lynne were Daisy's parents too – they were Lily and Violet's parents – and no matter how understandable her reasons were, she should not have kept them for herself when they visited.
Daisy was more than right.
They had a chance to be a family. A family that neither James nor I had been lucky enough to have been born into. We couldn't stand in the way. Conscience would not allow us to. Not even loyalty would. We were united in our intentions then as we trudged up the stairs and waited for the consequences.
We knew that Misty was sure to be disappointed with us. But that wouldn't be the thing that would break our hearts the most in the end.
We were just making our way to the top of the stairs when Misty opened the apartment door upon hearing a knock thumping against us. We might have been some meters away from her but we could still feel her gaze burning against us after she practically refused to greet her eldest sister.
We were in major trouble!
"I don't have a single word to say to you." Misty blurted out to Daisy before she could stop herself. Before she could think about shutting the door on her, Daisy calmly and without flinching shoved her foot in between the gap in the door. This is when she unleashed her frustration on James and me. "I thought I told you two to not let this happen!"
I was heartbroken at being tarred with the same brush as James. But I was shattered in two furthermore at the way that I had made Misty feel.
I had let her down, I supposed. But it wasn't like I meant to. It wasn't like James had meant to either. It was like Daisy said; they all had a chance to right something that probably hadn't meant to go so wrong all those years ago.
And speaking of Daisy – she opened her mouth and she said words that were sure to cause her sister to ignite into a flame brighter than the hair on her head.
She was unfazed by the pain in her foot. And she was unfazed by the temper that her little sister could unleash.
"Don't take it out on them. This is between you and me and you." Daisy warned with the coolness of a spray from the ocean and when she tugged her foot out from the door, she was sure that Misty would slam it in her face. Instead, her words had caused her to shove the door wide open. Oh, it was on. "This is between our family." Daisy's voice began to waver like she was fatigued from screaming at the ocean. "I can't believe that you would try to keep them for yourself…"
You see, Daisy didn't know for sure that Jordan and Lynne had been able to visit back down in our world. Violet and Lily either. Somehow, they had heard. Rumor perhaps. Someone close to us accidentally letting it slip. We still didn't know.
Regardless, news traveled fast in Pallet Town.
Daisy still didn't know how it could be true. Most of her believed that it couldn't be. Those kinds of things didn't happen. Moreover, their parents had been snatched from them at a young age. Life was cruel. Why would it stop being cruel to them when they were all in their twenties?
There and then, however, Misty's hesitance to face her had told her everything she needed to know. She had been like that since she was a child. In the face of truth – in the face of vulnerability – she had always hidden behind her bedroom door.
When she got older, she couldn't hack conflict and she couldn't hack being part of a family so she had run away. Daisy could never mock the life that she had made for herself. But she was disheartened to see that she had not grown up in that way.
She was disheartened to see that part of her would always be stuck at the age that she was when her mother departed them all, swiftly followed by their father.
Hearing her eldest sister's words quieten down did not encourage the same tone to present itself in her own throat. Seeing the way that Daisy was looking at her with her gaze threatening to tremble and water made Misty want to scream.
She wanted to scream and scream. That was the only way to get her to listen to her, wasn't it?
James was left with his hands in his hair and I was left with my heart in her throat as Misty raged at Daisy.
Their lack of contact over the years made her anger burn very concentrated and very brightly.
"You don't know my reasons! You don't know me!" Misty began, her voice burning in her throat but not stopping due to the pain that she felt. She used it to fuel her. She used it to be heard. She needed to be heard. "I was protecting them, okay? What makes you think that they were ready to play happy families again?!"
Daisy's kneecaps buckled and it wasn't because of the heels that she was wearing. Fortunately for her, James was there and I was there. He appeared like a steady brick wall behind her but he didn't dare reach out and touch her in case it wasn't what he wanted. He already figured that it wasn't what Misty wanted either.
I brushed against her ankles as if I could strengthen there too while she tried to swallow the mottled nature of her neck and felt her own hand fanning towards her forehead.
She had never felt weaker. She had never felt fainter. Part of her did not wish to believe that her parents had walked the earth again. And another, bigger, part of her did not want to face that her sister had kept them from her.
But Daisy had to face the truth.
"What makes you think that you of all people had a right to decide for them?!" Daisy absorbed some of her sister's fire and snapped back towards her, causing Misty to shrink back for a couple of seconds before preparing to erupt even further. But Daisy did not want to be this way. Her voice croaked as if she didn't have it in her to be filled with rage anymore. "We all deserve to be a family, happy or not…"
James was in the closest proximity to Daisy but this wasn't the reason that he could practically feel the emotions bubbling out of her, causing her shoulders to tremble. He didn't dare reach out and touch her like I was doing – she already had to deal with so much.
Misty did too. His eyes filled with sadness as he could tell that flailing and yelling was the only way that she knew how to get attention back then and it was the default method that came as soon as she was in the presence of her sisters.
James saw all of this. He saw her lower lip tremble also before preparing to open her mouth to argue with Daisy. But his own mouth opened.
He wished to put a stop to it before they stopped being a family forever.
"Why don't we all take a breath and go inside? I'll make some tea and we can figure this out…" he suggested, the soothing sound of his voice capturing Daisy's attention immediately. It cut through the chaos in her mind and the chaos prickling her porcelain skin red raw.
She turned to peer emotionally at him over her shoulder, swallowing as she finally recognized the touch that I was offering her.
When Misty's eyes dropped down, I could see that she was finally noticing how close I was to her sister too. She would go on to regret it but, in the moment, she couldn't stop herself from taking her own emotions out on James.
She snapped at him, using him as a punching bag rather than us both.
"Why don't you realize that you have done enough?!" Misty seethed. My bones jolted inside of my body and my heart sank to the point of no return when I saw James scarcely react apart from his eyes locking onto Misty and indeed quietly clamping his mouth shut.
Misty knew what she had done from the second that she had done it. Her eyes pricked with hot tears and she looked down at the ground as if even her sneakers were too hard to look at. She knew what she had done. But she did not do anything to rectify it.
Daisy's breath came shuddering out of her. The way that her head swung from side to side was very telling.
"Don't take it out on him…" she came to James' defense in a hushed voice but he barely reacted to this either. It was as if all emotions had left him a long time ago. Daisy turned back over to her shoulder and when she could see him looking with far more than just a blankness, these words couldn't help but escape from her throat. "Why do you always do this, Misty? Why do you always bite the hand that feeds you?" Daisy's eye moistened in the corner. "You always have done."
These were the words that made Misty feel like the ceiling was caving in on her. These were the words that were like barbed wire constricting around her throat. These were the words that made her feel like she had had enough.
She had had enough.
Misty was going to let that be perfectly known. But only until she had allowed her own words to be perfectly known.
Her nostrils flared as if there were soon to be smoke coming out of them. Her whole body was alight with the flaming color that gave her hair its hue.
"And why don't you realize that none of us want to be near any of you with the way that I was treated back then?!" Misty shouted and with that, her arm shot out. The next sound that followed caused the whole house to shake.
It was lucky that everybody was out of the house!
Misty slammed the door in all of our faces. And the next thing that could be heard was the sound of footsteps disappearing into her bedroom.
James had been still as a statue. I felt the same way. But we forced ourselves to turn starting with our abdomens and it was once that we had turned fully that we heard the second pair of feet use their voice.
A pair of high-heeled shoes clicked and clacked away from us and rushed down the stairs but only after a throat had let out a sob.
Daisy.
The two of us looked at each other, me no longer with room for frustration towards James in my heart and only disdain for the situation. Within that same look, we were eager to be amicable. Our pupils told us what we needed to go and where we needed to be.
Before we could second guess ourselves, I headed off to offer Misty some consolation whether she wanted it or not and James followed after Daisy. They both tell me where the rest of the story took them. And maybe one day I shall tell what awaited me in Ash and Misty's apartment.
James had never sprinted so hard in his life after a girl who wasn't Jessie or Misty. He ran with greater speed towards Daisy than he had run away from Jessebelle!
His heart was fiercely locked inside his throat. But he still managed to croak out past it. He held his hand up as he made it to the threshold leading to the exit of the building, wanting to get her attention before he had to follow her all the way to Cerulean City.
"Daisy!" he called out. He had watched her pace falter the closer that he got to her and now that he had reached her – now that she was hearing a voice as clear as crystal – she stopped in her tracks, her shoulders closer to her ears than ever before. James appeared right behind her. "Are you okay…?"
She hiccupped with her back facing him though she had tried her best to suppress it. It was a foolish question; James knew immediately and he knows more so in hindsight. But he had to ask. He just had to.
What other question was there to offer?
As if her entire body had been compressed by a steam engine, Daisy's body swiveled to face him with all the slowness of a shelled creature. Her face was blotchy as she managed to look at him but her eyes were no longer filled with tears.
She had gone past crying a good few seconds ago. Now all she felt was nothingness.
She still, however, had an answer for James. But she didn't answer his question.
Her hands hung by her sides limply. Uselessly.
"I… I just don't get it." She began with the helplessness of a child and it caused James' mouth to immediately press together in a tight line, seeing her from an angle as she stood in front of him. Daisy looked around the empty drive with dismay as if this could help her before looking back at James. "It's like she wants us to feel awful forever."
A low groan escaped from James' aching throat at the same time that his face screwed up and he had to find his own words promptly before Daisy thought that he was anything other than present with her.
Well, as present as he could be while felt like his own heart was in tatters.
He pushed air out of his lips as carefully as he dispelled smoke from his cigarette oftentimes.
"I really don't believe that she kept your parents a secret to be malicious." James said. Daisy let out a strangled gasp. This was confirmation. They really had graced the earth again, hadn't they? "I just think that-"
The earth was crumbling beneath Daisy's feet. But she still had it in her enough to shake her head from side to side at James – strained – as she let him know that that wasn't what she meant.
Her throat tightened at the same time that her shoulders sunk so low that they almost hung with her helpless hands.
"I thought that… I thought she knew that it was just kid stuff when we were younger. We all teased each other." James began to understand what she was getting at. His head slowly nodded up and down. He usually did when hearing Misty's point of view. This time he was hearing Daisy's. "What were we supposed to do? Just… Just magically all get along because…? Because…?"
Daisy's voice couldn't spell out those words again. She had lost one parent. And then another. She didn't have it in her anymore to think about what had happened. She wanted it all to go away.
Thankfully, James didn't need her to say the words. Misty would surely resent how much James was able to be there for Daisy. But all Daisy could feel was gladness that James knew enough about their situation.
If he was on Misty's side in the end, he sure did a good job at seeming neutral when face-to-face with her.
"Families are the most complicated thing in the world." James began, taking a step closer to Daisy but still not having the incentive to brush against her like I would have done. His lower lip fell into his mouth before it revealed itself again in order to speak. "It's complicated when you don't see each other. Let alone when you do."
As Daisy let out a shuddered breath that she had kept inside of her, along with the momentary relief it brought her, it also brought her the realization that she knew nothing about James. She had heard bits and bobs. She was vaguely aware of his life with Jessie and all of their children. He was friends with a talking Meowth who owned the noodle cart on Route 16. He was in Team Rocket once and his schemes had caused her problems. He wasn't anymore.
She had always… liked him.
Liked was a funny word when she hardly knew him. Hardly said many words to him outside of small talk and sharing Misty in common.
She could almost see why her little sister was so fond of him. She could almost see why she was so mean to him. He was a good one. And that would be a true loss when he left – just like everybody left the Williams girls eventually.
Moments passed and Daisy was taking her time finding her words. As she finally discovered them, tears still didn't fill her eyes. They couldn't.
Part of her feared that she would never feel anything again. Her little sister was always so insistent on not being hurt. Would she ever realize that she had hurt others by acting that way?
"I… I've thought about what happened when we were kids every day and the only conclusion that I can come to is that it wasn't fair at all." Daisy sniffed and she wiped her ears. She had no tears to sniff back. She had no wetness to dry with her fingers. Still, James nodded. "I… I gave my little sisters everything. Even when all the help left us. I tried my best to raise them when I was just a child myself…"
James didn't think words could quickly wash across his mind, let alone be sent out into the ether.
But he could not for a single second let Daisy think that she had failed.
"I know…" he murmured initially to begin with and then when her arm raised to push her clammy bangs out of her eyes, he took a step closer to her. They were almost sharing the same space. "Daisy… I know."
Daisy sniffed a second time and looked over at James, her arm still in midair. Her eyes glossed over in their sockets as if she was going to cry but it just did not come. Her eyebrows grooved together before moving closer to her hairline but she still did not shed a single tear.
Be that as it may, when she found her words again, her tone was laced with the thickness of a fog and it cracked like a line in a lake on a frostbitten day.
"Even after everything… Even after trying my best to raise her in the only way that I knew how…" Daisy began, her voice elevating so high in pitch it was as if it was going to fly up in the sky and join the clouds. Then her voice choked. And a sobbing noise came even if the wetness did not join it. "I just can't believe that Misty hates me for it…"
And with that, she couldn't look at James any longer – she couldn't look at anything any longer. Daisy blocked anything from her line of vision with her palms pressing so hard against her eyelids that it caused a black galaxy to form.
She wondered if that galaxy was filled with the absence of pain. Somehow, she doubted it.
James finally got over himself and knew what he had to do. With his lower lip being bitten on as his own eyes were the pair that managed to fill with wetness, he tentatively reached his hand out and patted her on her upper arm while her elbow was crooked and she continued to refuse to face the world.
She couldn't face anything. All that she could face was that she had failed.
"Oh, Daisy, she doesn't hate you…" James tried to comfort but it was no good. He would have to try harder than that. He would have to get through to her better than that.
Daisy's shoulders jolted closer to her ears with insistence.
The way that she briefly peeped at James from behind her palms was not enough to break his heart in two. But it was enough to snap him into action.
"Oh, but I fear that she does when all I did was try my best for them all…" Daisy murmured before going further than pressing her palms in front of her eyes. She crossed her arms together in front of her and buried her face in the crook of her arm while still standing.
She did not know how she was still standing. To tell you the truth, James did not know how she was still standing. But he knew how important it was that she remained being able to do so no matter what. It wouldn't be easy. But he just had to remind her that she wouldn't be alone. Even if she felt it.
So that's what he did.
What started off as another tentative pat and just murmuring her name once she had repositioned her arms soon turned into him blossoming with a lot more intuition. She wasn't so far apart from Misty even if they both felt it. They both needed a friend. And luckily for them, he was there to be that for him both.
At first, as James' touch lingered on Daisy, she recoiled and it made him wonder if he should pull away. But with the sniff that she uttered with a face concealed from him, James realized that she was more like her little sister than she realized.
She pushed away when all she wanted was to be embraced.
There was nobody around. James had to be the one to do that. He was happy to be the one to do that. He was exactly where he was meant to be on that day.
With her eyes squeezed tightly shut behind her shielding arms, Daisy could feel James' arms wrapping around her. She stiffened. She came close to pushing him away. But then she heard his words whispering close to her shoulder.
"You can let it go…" he told her. And with that sentence, the dam burst. All of the years of heartache and putting on a brave face erupted from her.
James' arms snaked further around her and embraced her close and Daisy collapsed against him, more than just her guard escaping from her. Her tears were unleashed from her like she was a cloud setting free a downpour on unsuspecting people.
James didn't care. He held her further and didn't let her go until she let go of him. When she removed herself from him a good few minutes later, her face tear-stained and blotchy but a lightness filling her heart that she hadn't felt for years, James planted a kiss on the center of her forehead before holding her again.
She sunk into his hold and didn't let go of him again for the next five minutes. She knew she was exactly where she was meant to be too. She hadn't meant to be so vulnerable with a stranger. But this stranger was seeing her more clearly than her own family.
And for that, she was more comfortable to use him as a way to move forward with her chapter in life.
You see, the kiss that James offered her wasn't the same kiss that he gave to Misty. And the hug that he gave her wasn't the kind that brought all the missing pieces of her back together. It was, however, the kind of hug that made her see that – whether those pieces found her again or not – it was okay.
It was the kind of hug that made her feel like she could be okay. Eventually. And that was everything.
To tell you the truth, Daisy had not been embraced like that for years.
It had been hard to accept. It had been nearly easy to resist. But James had insisted. And it put her on the path to where she needed to be.
Her relationship with her little sister would be tumultuous for a little while longer but maybe that was okay too. Maybe they needed to brace a storm together to truly relish in it when the sun came out.
Sometimes you don't know why things happen. You just have to take them in your stride anyway. The lessons that you take on board are up to you. Luckily, Misty and Daisy were willing to be the pupils of life.
It meant that they were able to share their stories with me. And then me with you. In a never-ending cycle of reflection. And togetherness. In the face of all adversity.
The End.
There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) Thank goodness James was there to be a bit of a middle ground between the two sisters. Although, I think it goes without saying that after this chapter ends, he is going to have a hard time getting back on Misty's good side - and that's even before she finds out he shared quite a tender hug with Daisy :D I mentioned that I've wanted to write about this kind of subject for years. And funnily enough, this chapter and certainly the moment at the end between James and Daisy is inspired from an episode of 21 Jump Street back in the 80s. After helping a young woman with a tough situation, Johnny Depp's character embraces her and - like Daisy in this chapter - initially resists due to being so used to taking care of herself - but eventually lets it all go. It's amazing the details that go into a chapter! It's also heavily inspired by - and the title of this chapter is directly from - the Harry Styles song called Matilda. That song reminds me of Misty and Daisy and their upbringings a lot :) Anyways, I'm rambling again! Cheers for reading, and I will be back on the 28th to update my new story of Rocket Daze so maybe see you there!
Amy signing out :P