Chapter Text
I'm a little reluctant to go back to the library the next day. I was hoping to go for the next few days seeing I enjoyed it so much until… him. I'm busy complaining to Chloe at break, groaning and leaning my head against the back of the brick wall we always hang out at.
Dawn is with us, Serena and May having gone to the corner shop in the canteen to grab some snacks. Chloe has started to settle down with Dawn's personality now, them both having heart to hearts about the silliest topics– but true to her word, Chloe never ceases to leave time for me too.
I'm having that time with her right now while I'm scolding her for talking to Ash. Dawn finds it quite amusing, actually. “I can't believe you told him where I was!” I grunt, and she gives me an underwhelming laugh of uncertainty.
“Well what did you want me to do in that situation? Lie?” She splutters, in defence.
I answer back almost immediately. “Yes! Now he'll probably know when I'm gonna be there too, and Cilan already sees me everytime.” I sigh, even though that's not really Chloe’s fault.
Dawn's eyes widen at the mention of Cilan, which makes me always forget she is friends with him too. And Ash. I'm only just realising I should probably be more careful mentioning this kind of topic around her. “Cilan? Well, he's totally nice and chill. Ash is…” She waves her hands around. “Bouncy. Well, he seems like when he's got his mind set, he goes for it.”
I consider this. Ash is kind of bouncy, but to me he's also always pretty chilled out too. He's got a fine balance of them. “Mind set on what?”
Chloe and Dawn share a look I can't read. “Well…he's obviously taken some interest in you...” Chloe begins.
“Like, he wants to be your friend.” Dawn adds, a little quickly.
That's kind of flattering, isn't it?... She looks over at me, while watching me process this, and is looking questionable. “Why don't you really like him?”
I look back at her. “I don't know. He's just-"
I sigh.With Chloe listening too, I'm not the greatest talker in this instance.
“I just don't really get him. He's annoying, he just doesn't leave you alone, he's not got the qualities I want to really see in a friend. Like you guys, I can trust, but him? He–He's just another person to me.” It seems like the right phrase to use, seeing I've used it before too. “Honestly, I'm just not interested. I can't seem to see what everyone else sees in him, I guess. Maybe I'm just weird.”
There's a slight silence and I suddenly cringe to myself. “Sorry.” I realise, and look up at both of them, coming out of my head. I don't even know how much I just spilled out. Especially in front of Dawn, being his friend too.
Dawn shakes her head slowly. “No, it was interesting to know your…perspective. If you don't want to be friends then,” She shrugs. “I guess that's what you want, isn't it?”
I let her continue on, glancing unknowingly at Ash's group of friends in the background behind her in the yard. Gary is mucking about with his can of Dr Pepper, trying to aim it into the bin in a one shot. Cilan is busy with some sort of elegant scrubbing of his jacket with a scrub of tissue. Brock is looking around eagerly for any girls wandering past his way. And Ash… just cleaning his neck, sitting in the grass and staring up at the sky. I slightly look up to see what he's looking at, but there doesn't seem to be anything except clouds.
“Yeah.” I agree, going back to Dawn. Their group isn't as lively as I thought. Or maybe they get too lively. I'm not sure, but I'm just glad I have the group I have– and I'm pleased to stick with it.
At lunch, I've decided to trod off to the library instead. Just because of Ash or even Cilan, that shouldn't hold me back.
When I step in, I creak the door open quietly, not to attract any attention, and before closing it, just dash my eyes around the room. No one really seems to be here.
I walk softly down the bookcases, and hesitate when it gets to Cilan’s area– but I manage to get past pretty awkwardly. He's there, but too busy on his phone, though I see his head flick up just as I've dashed past.
I go over to my Young Adult section, a little relief inside me, that there's no one around, so my confidence regains a bit. I step a foot through the gap between the bookcases, to my little area, and I'm thinking that maybe I'll have a better visit this time–
“You're in a chipper mood.”
Then I become face to face with Ash and his laptop in his lap, an open crisp packet at his side, slumped in the other bean bag chair that was unused previously.
Well. It's a good thing that he at least left the right one for me.
I grit my teeth, the airy feeling seeping out from means being replaced by another weight. “I'm not anymore.”
For some reason, I stand there, and wait. I wait for him to move out, as if he's going to move when he's plugged his AirPod back in and is nodding his head a little to the music.
Now I'm beginning to look stupid. He is deliberately acting unreactive again, and clearly won't budge. So I sigh with emphasis, and find myself reluctantly sitting down in my bean bag, glad the side table is separating us. I give my bean bag a little shove so I'll be as far away from him as possible– and turn my back to him as well.
All I can say is that I'm glad I stil have a bit of my last book left, from clearly not reading it, as I don't have the courage to just get up and wander idly round for a new book to read for an impossibly and embarrassingly long time, right in Ash's view.
I open my book, the velvet of the beanbag now suddenly feeling incredibly uncomfortable under my jeans. Would we just sit here in silence ? Why did he sit here again? How did he know I would come?
I'm pondering silently to myself when Ash suddenly pipes up,
“What's that?”
I don't turn around. “What?”
“What's the book you're reading?” I wonder if he's taken his AirPod out to speak to me.
There's a slight silence. “Noneya.” I reply.
“What? Noneya ? What's that?”
“None ya business.”
I smiled with small triumph, glad my back was turned to him. I don't know why that was necessary, but I just want to let him know he isn't just pushing me around here. As, of course , my comebacks are clearly ever so cunning , as Chloe may say.
Ash was kind of silenced by my response and I'm wondering what he's thinking. Maybe he thinks I'm weird, or maybe he doesn't get it–
Then I hear a little laugh. I didn't realise where it came from until I…realised.
Has he ever really laughed before? If so, I'm noticing it now, and it's opened my ears a little for once. I can literally see his head tilted back and his face on the highest brightness.
“ Wowwww , look at you, we've got the next Gary Oak here.” He jokes, and I can sense the smirk in his voice as well. I'm not sure what is going on and I don't know what I'm feeling about any of it, either.
And is being compared to Gary Oak a bad thing? Ash hasn't even been here as long as I have obviously, and he still seems to know things I don't.
However from previous experience and just general public knowledge, I think being compared to someone as bratty as Gary isn't the highest payment of favour you could give. “Oh that's such an honour.” I sigh, sarcastically, practically rolling my eyes.
“Mmm, Gary is quite the jerk.”
I feel my face grow fiery red, and my lips go tight together because of Ash literally calling me out for being the same as Gary Oak. Including the last part of his description.
But as Ash Ketchum just seems to be used to doing, he brushes it off. “I'm joking. You're not a patch on Gary.”
It flatters me a little bit, but then I can't seem to help countering. “You don't even know me.”
“But I could?”
After that I don't speak for the rest of the time there. I finish my book in silence, slightly comforted by the fact Ash has gone back to listening to his music now, at least presumably. However, that still doesn't encourage me to try to find a new book to read, as much as I want to. So, I shove my finished book in my bag, get up, and slip out without a word not caring for Ash's acknowledgement.
But it took me a lot of silent self-encouragement to literally get up from where I was sitting to leave, worried that Ash would be staring at the back of me, or he would say something stupid again. But at least he didn't, I guess.
I may have tried to search somewhere else in the library for the books I want, but I spot Cilan and get ushered out that idea. Why does everyone suddenly have to be everywhere I go now? Why can't I just be on my own in peace?
…But, what can you do. I'll just try to get a new book to read tomorrow. Maybe I could try reading somewhere else then from then on instead.
I couldn't get a new book tomorrow. Ash was there. He was sitting there, in his ‘usual’ place, with his laptop on his lap, and this time I stand at the gap, insistent. He doesn't look up, but when I grab a random book, hoping it's a good choice, and try to slip back out again, I hear a voice.
“Hey.”
I turn around. He's looking up, and was nibbling his lip a little but stopped when he saw me looking. “Were you… going?”
Despite the awkwardness, I glare at him. “Well, I would rather sit by myself–”
“But I–”
I stop from his interruption, but he seems to stop as well once I have. Even from my wearing of patience and unreliable social battery, I say nothing for him to continue.
He seems nervous.
Suddenly, before me, not like the Ash I am used to seeing.
“I need your help.” He looks up at me solemnly.
I frown.
And that's how I've sat down with Ash Ketchum, wasted my entire lunch, to explain the timeline of tyrannical rulers in the world's history books, for our upcoming History test in approximately 4 and a half minutes from now.
Look. I didn't have much of a choice here. Sit with him and read in silence again, Straight up leave and make things even worse and awkward, or just… do it.
And it may help me revise a little too… but this side of Ash is honestly intriguing to me.
Which no, again, is not at all my motive for this.
But here's a few things I've learnt within this experience. That I have pretty slow realisation times, by just beginning to wonder how I've managed to rope myself into this, and that I'm finding Ash look actually serious, and interested, not just mucking about like I thought he would. He, in fact, scribbles some things down into a black notebook while I speak, and so I also have to try not to sound stupid so his notes don't contain any of my gabble. “But I don't get why he–”
“It's because he wanted to gain leadership of both countries. So he sent out his army after one instead of both at the same time. It would be less suspecting.”
The bell suddenly drones in our ears as I finish my sentence, and it properly strikes me how long we've been sitting here now, and how long Ash has actually sat down and listened to me. When the bell rings, I don't say anything more, and start shoving things in my bag.
But suddenly, I don't know what to do. It feels awkward to just leave without saying that anything, but I'm not waiting for him, and I can't be late for History either, but it's only like 2 minutes away–
“Hey.” I feel a hand on my shoulder.
I don't turn around. My entire body freezes up, except for my heart which lurches forward a bit too soon, out of time with myself. The hand moves away.
His words almost drown out, but I manage to catch them before they do. “Thanks. Without you, I won't be feeling as reassured as I am now.” He pauses, laughing a little. “Well, I'm probably still gonna flunk this, but you definitely helped a ton.”
What should I say? Thanks? It was nothing? Although, it wasn't really just nothing– I literally was having a hard time even opening my mouth at the start before bursting into practical song about our History topic and it already seemed so weird enough that I knew so much about it. I don't know where I found the person in me to even talk for that long with an audience of… Ash.
He carries on.. “I didn't actually expect you to do that.”
I turn around, now, suddenly confused. He suddenly looks sheepish too, caught off guard by my abrupt look at him. I'm wondering whether to look away, but he adds, “I mean, you helping me… I didn't expect it.”
He looks me in the eye a little bit more in the last part, and I, for once, feel the edges of my anger boil down into melting drips for a split-second, before I turn away again.
Before slipping out of the bookcases, I hum in brief acknowledgement, deciding to leave him with no real reaction. But when I've turned away, I focus on the thoughts in my head. Because with an unconscious little smile, I hear myself reply,
“Yeah. Me neither. ”