A/N: Here's another quick one. Thank you for reading and reviewing and I hope you enjoy this one!

To Guest: Thank you!

Days

The day with the bowling

Paul

Saturday, February 15th

Ash
Last seen today at 8:11 AM

Hey Paul, neat piece of information: it's Dawn's birthday today. Good luck! ;) [8:11 AM]

Paul looked at the message on his phone for what felt like the nth time this morning, and then slid it back into his pocket.

He was pretty certain it was Misty who had sent the message and not Ash, because so far their message conversations had been short and consisted mostly of things like: 'u wanna battle?' 'Pokémon Center 2.00 pm' 'ok'.

If Ash wanted to talk about something more complicated (which was usually a question about something Pokémon related), he always called. No, this message was far too eloquent for Ash.

Nonetheless, it felt like it was burning a hole in his pocket.

Paul glanced at Dawn, who was standing off to the side of the battlefield he and Reggie had in their garden. Her blue hair and pink jacket stood off brightly against the snowy white backdrop of the garden. She was staring off into space with a thoughtful look on her face, weighing her Poké Balls in her hands. Probably considering who she was going to use for the Quarter Final tomorrow.

They were having some morning training together and Paul looked back at his Pokémon, who were sparring with each other without needing his commands. The snow on the battle ground around them had turned to a brown slush. He tried to pay attention to their moves, and corrected some stances, but before long he found his eyes wandering back to Dawn.

Who was still not training. Paul frowned a little. She had been acting stranger and stranger since the Tournament. She was often lost in thought and one moment she made excuses to leave early, and other moments she was all enthusiasm and smiles.

Maybe it was stress from the Tournament and the Grand Festival. Reggie always did say it was good to take a break once in a while. Perhaps they should do that today. Her birthday was a good enough reason, after all. People did relaxing, fun things on their birthday, didn't they?

Yes, Paul nodded to himself, they would do something else than training this afternoon. Decision made and his mind calmed, Paul was able to turn his full attention back to his training.

Around lunchtime, a light snow began to fall from the grey clouds, and Paul, Dawn and their Pokémon returned inside for lunch.

"I heard from Ash that it's your birthday today," he spoke up. "Congratulations."

Dawn looked at him in pure surprise.

"Well, yeah," she said, a big smile appearing on her face. "Thanks!"

"Do you want to… do something fun this afternoon?" he asked. After a moment he added, "Something else than Pokémon training?"

"I... really?" Dawn blinked, her smile widening. "Yes, sure! What did you have in mind?"

Well. He had not considered that yet.

"What about bowling?"

So bowling it was. They found a small café that had a free place for them later in the afternoon, so after some more training and taking care of their Pokémon, they went out.

It was snowing hard when they walked there, and both were occupied with their own umbrellas and they walked in silence and at a brisk pace.

"Ah, at least it's warm here," Dawn said when they entered the café, shaking the snow of her umbrella. Paul followed her example and they left their umbrellas and coats in the hallway.

"Have you done this before?" Dawn asked, as they put on the special bowling shoes.

"Reggie and I did this sometimes with my parents, when we were younger," Paul answered. "Reggie was better at it than I was."

"Well, I'm not very experienced, either," Dawn said with a careless hand gesture. "I did it with friends, sometimes still, if we want to have a fun night out. It's been a while, though."

They were pointed to their bowling alley, and Paul held up a ball for her. "It's your birthday."

Dawn took it with a grin, and with practiced steps she walked forward and threw the ball.

Paul had to blink when nine of the ten pins went down.

"Well done," he offered. Dawn smiled brightly at him.

As he should have expected after that first throw, Dawn mercilessly beat him at the five games they played.

Still, it had been a while since he'd had so much fun. It was surprisingly easy to talk to Dawn without Pokémon to be subject of the conversation, and the afternoon flew by.

When they made their way back towards the Pokémon Center where Dawn was staying, the snow had stopped falling and the streets were covered in white. The sun was setting and the street lamps were turning on. Reggie would undoubtedly have started preparing dinner by now. Should he ask her to join?

Dawn prevented him from deliberating on that question by speaking up, her voice soft and maybe even… shy? Odd.

"Thanks, Paul, it was a lot of fun." Her blue eyes shone in the lights of the street lamps. "I really appreciate it."

Paul wanted to say 'You're welcome' but for some reason the words got stuck in his throat. He managed a smile, trying to swallow.

Dawn wrapped her arms around him, trapping his arms against his torso as she gave him a quick hug. When she pulled back she was decidedly more red in the face than before. He didn't think his own flush could be attributed to the cold.

"Are you coming to watch tomorrow?" Her words came out in a rush.

"I haven't missed one yet, have I?" Paul answered, satisfied that his voice sounded normal.

Dawn ducked her head with a smile. "Alright. I'll see you then."

"See you tomorrow," he said.

Dawn gave him a last smile and then quickly turned and went into the Pokémon Center.

Paul watched the doors slide shut behind her, and felt the smile still on his lips. Perhaps doing something else than training wasn't that bad. And perhaps he didn't have to do everything alone, either.

A/N: Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed it! The interactions between Paul and Dawn were more difficult to write than usual, but I think it's because it's from Paul's point of view. It's difficult to find a balance between Paul's rational character and his developing friendship/relationship with Dawn. But still, I hope this chapter was enjoyable anyway. Dawn's talent at bowling was a surprise for me, too, I had not planned that when writing this chapter haha. Please leave me a review!