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"Ah, right — I do have a favor I wanna ask you... If it’s all right, do you wanna, um... Do you wanna trade Pokémon with me?" you asked nervously.
Juliana nodded with a smile.
"Woo-hoo! I’ll trade my Applin! What about you, Juli?"
Juliana looked startled, and... is that a blush? No way, right!? An Applin's not really cause to blush, anyway... you must just be seeing things. The lighting in here, after the remodeling and all, must just have hit her cheeks weird, or something. Maybe you're just badly sleep-deprived again, who knows?
"An Applin!? I... didn't know you felt that way, um... I..." Juliana's Rotom Phone flies out of her pocket and up in front of her. You notice that the case is the one you gave her a few days ago. It makes you feel... proud? Somehow??? She seems flustered, and her face looks quite flushed as she seemingly looks through her Boxes.
After some time, her Rotom Phone goes back into her pocket. Juliana can't seem to look at you for too long. "Sorry, I... don't have a proper response to give you right now, I... it's not... this is not a no. Not by any means, I just... can't give you a proper answer. I-... it's not right for me to ask this of you, and so I would understand if you took it as such, but... give me a few days?"
You feel like you're each having two very different conversations. You're not sure what she means, only that this is not any kind of response to what you know Applins to mean. Still, you're disappointed that you won't get to Trade with her until she finds whatever it is that she'd deem a 'proper response' to an Applin. The suspense might just kill you. "Aw, man... OK, then..."
"Hey Kieran, what's wrong? Need some help with homework?" Lacey must've noticed your lost look.
"It's not that, it's... you ever have a conversation, but you feel like at some point you just... stopped talking about the same thing as each other? Like maybe... I don't know... can words mean different things sometimes?"
"For sure! I know that some words mean different things in Unovan than in Galarian, even though they're technically the same language, just because of differences in dialect! What tripped you up, do you know?"
"It's just... thought I was giving someone a compliment, but they reacted like it was... I don't even know. Something that's a much bigger deal, at any rate."
"Hey Nemona, you're from Paldea, maybe you could help me with something? It's just... Juliana reacted weird to something I said yesterday, so I figured it might just be because of that."
"Well, Juliana's my neighbor now, sure, but don't really know that she's grown up in Paldea herself — I think she only moved into the house up the hill not long before the semester started."
"... she's from Galar," said Penny without looking up from her phone.
"Wow, how do you know that!?"
Penny looked at Nemona, then you, then back at Nemona before looking at her phone again "... classified."
"Sure, keep your secrets!"
What do Applins mean in Galar? You know what they mean in Kitakami — tenacious pests that one would only give to someone they believed to be either crafty, resourceful, or skilled. Or some combination of those things.
… it's times like these where you wish you were better with technology than you are.
You hear a beleaguered sigh. "Ask." Oh, that's Penny.
"I... I don't really have anyone to ask, and I'm... no good with technology, so..."
"And I'm really good with it. So... ask."
"It's just... I need to know... what do Applins mean in Galar?"
"Oh, that's... you're really quite, um... yeah, I can get you the info, no problem."
She seemed awkward, but she always comes across that way, so it's probably nothing to worry about. Right?
It took only one sentence for your face to burn : "[…] in Galar you give the one you want to spend the rest of your life with an Applin."
You read the rest of the article Penny pulled up anyway. It's a good story, and you're kind of a sucker for those — not that you'd admit it to anyone other than yourself, but you are.
Do you tell her about the misunderstanding? Would it make things awkward? Aren't they already?
… would you be okay with letting her think that the Galarian meaning was the one you meant? Is it even the slightest bit true?
Juliana walks into the League Club Room looking... jet-lagged, maybe? ' Where did she go,' you wonder. It strikes you then that you're still not sure what could be considered a 'proper response' to being offered an Applin in a Trade, over in Galar.
"You still up for that Trade?" she asks you, her Rotom Phone flying out of her pocket to be in front of her. You can't help but notice that she's changed the case, and this one has Applins on it. It looks cute.
"Sure... ?" you don't quite dare tell her outright that you don't 100% know what's going on.
The Trade happens, and... oh. Maybe you should've expected that a 'proper response' to an Applin Trade would be... to Trade an Applin back. Maybe you hadn't considered it because of what that would imply about her own feelings.
"You know, Lacey and a few of your friends helped clear up a... misunderstanding, while you were gone."
"Oh?"
"Turns out... sometimes things mean different things in different places! I... hadn't known that."
"Oh really?"
"Yeah, so, um... Applins."
"Oh no."
"It's nothing bad, just... in Kitakami, giving one means that you think that person can thrive in spite of any handicap — or, that maybe they can turn a weakness into a strength. And, apparently, where you're from... you give the one you want to spend the rest of your life with an Applin," your face is burning by the end of it, but in the end you couldn't not tell her. If nothing else, not telling her would've made you some kind of a hypocrite — having been furious with her for so long over her not telling you something important, and then turning around and not telling her something important.
"Oh, um... that is rather the meaning I'm used to, yes. I'm... sorry for assuming?"
"It's... fine, I... I didn't take back my offer for a Trade, or change it once I knew what it means to you, after all."
"Does that mean... ?"
"I... wouldn't mind… spending the rest of my life with you, Juli."