pokémon -- ohio is for lovers (2/2)
title: ohio is for lovers
wordcount: 2461
rating: PG
summary: Twenty secrets, twenty different ways to say I love you; different people have different ways of expressing themselves, and it doesn't have to be through words.
o11 → whirlpool
She is the wind-joyfully free, beautifully, magnificently untamed; he is the sea, constant and never-changing, pushing and pulling with his tides but never quite being able to kiss the sky.
When they meet again, Wallace is struck by a sudden pang of loss which twists and coils like a serpent in his belly. As he stands quietly alongside her and casts around aimlessly for the right things to say, he realises it is this closeness he has missed, this mutual proximity which he has not experienced for painfully long.
They say absence makes the heart fonder; but who are they? Philosophers who never really cared for such trivial matters, most likely. Still, Wallace cannot deny the truth - the longer he goes without once seeing her, or just hearing the familiar cadence of her voice, the more he misses her, and wishes he hadn’t been foolish enough to her just slip by.
He regrets the rash impulsiveness of youth, and the fact that he had allowed Winona to just leave his life almost as easily as she came into it.
When he sees her again, he is determined not to make the same mistake. With trembling fingers, he reaches out to seize her wrist, to urgently utter the words he has longed to give her for so many years.
Don’t leave me again-I love you.
o12 → destiny bond
Perhaps it is selfish of her to want to hold on to this.
She senses the disapproval in the eyes of her sisters; she knows they disagree with this forbidden affair she insists on pursuing-after all, kimono girls are supposed to be chaste, to stay pure and unsullied for their entire lives.
The others-they never express it, but she knows they do not wish for her to follow the capricious fancies of her heart - not in this way. Zuki can see it in the tight pursing of their cherry-red lips, in the frown that knits across their smooth brows; she can see it in the detached sympathy which simmers beneath the surface of their skin, hear it in the quiet note of warning in their voices.
She ignores them.
One evening finds her and Morty atop the Bell Tower-he stands out against the backdrop of gold and vermillion like a dark blot of ink spilled amongst the crinkled fallen leaves, whilst she all but drowns in the sea of rusty, muted colours, the edges of the silken fabric of her kimono bleeding into the papery foliage.
They sit in silence, back-to-back, hearing nothing but the steady rhythm of one another’s breaths and the quiet, distant whisper of wind. “I won’t be able to see you again,” she says at last, watching with unseeing eyes as her Umbreon flits between the coppery tree-trunks like a sinuous, sentient shadow.
Morty does not respond immediately, but his breath hitches in his lungs; she can feel it in the involuntary shudder that passes through him, a faint tremor which ghosts through her own frame. With absent fingers, Zuki tugs at the edge of his scarf, worrying at the frayed edges, feeling the familiar texture as it slips from her grasp.
“It…would be better that way,” he agrees, his voice low, husky. Her heart twists in her chest and she nods mutely, not trusting herself to speak. Memories of their various trysts threaten to overwhelm her - she remembers the contours of his body, the heat of his mouth on hers as they steal kisses under the fiery eyes of the starry sky.
His stoic mask breaks then-it shatters, splinters, falls into a thousand brittle fragments. He turns to press his lips to hers, one last time - and she threads her fingers desperately through his hair, not wanting to let him go. She wants to remember everything about him-his scent, his slow, enigmatic smile, his eccentric sense of humour.
When she descends, hours later, the sensation of his fingers trailing lines of shivering fire over her skin stays with her long after they walk out of one another’s lives.
o13 → drain punch
Once, he makes the mistake of telling her he loves her.
It isn’t so much the words and emotions themselves that he regrets; rather, Aaron regrets blurting it out in the heat of the moment when he drops by to visit her at her gym.
For a single, beautiful moment, she is stunned into silence, her earnest chatter dying on her lips as she gapes at him, complexion taking on a rosy hue which rivals her bubblegum locks. He grins uncertainly at her, but as the seconds slip past, he is mortified by his confession, suddenly wishing for nothing more than to sink into the polished floorboards of the dojo.
Then, without warning, she reacts.
With a muffled cry, she swings her fist; it connects squarely with his nose and he staggers back, winded and horribly confused. “What did you do that for? I th-thought girls like to hear things like that!” Aaron mumbles around his hand as he gingerly feels for a break.
Maylene covers her face as the Karate Brothers abandon their training to affix the two of them with curious stares; their gazes are at once amused, puzzled and incredulous. One of them takes a step forth, knuckles cracking ominously, and Aaron pales. “Wh-what made you think I’m like all girls?” she hollers, scarlet-cheeked. “And don’t j-just simply say things like that! You only say it if you mean it!”
Aaron wishes the smirking, scowling black belts would just go back to pummelling the stuffing out of their punching bags, rather than contemplating doing the same on him. “But I do mean it!”
The young gym leader straightens, still red-faced, tripping over her own words. “W-well, then, I mean…meant to say the exact same th-thing! Haven’t you heard of a ki-kiss…kiss with a fist?”
o14 → heart swap
She’s a princess, and fairytale princesses don’t give their hearts to lowly squires.
She’s a lady, a contessa, an empress, an embodiment of all that is beautiful and pure, and he has no right to fall for her.
But when he’s alone at night, left with the bittersweet company of his churning thoughts, he falls into fitful half-dreams filled with the soft cadence of Missy’s muted, hastily-stifled laughter, the sweet, mellifluous chime of her crystal voice. In his mind’s eye, Dia can just imagine her giving her hand to some dashing knight in shining armour - everything he’s not, not, not - and growing up to be taken away by a nameless, faceless stranger.
Dia wishes he could be her prince.
But he’s not, and he probably never will be. Fairytale princesses only fall in love with handsome princes riding proud, gallant steeds, noble gentlemen who can promise her the sun, the moon, the stars. Fairytale princesses are only ever rescued from the evil witch by valiant knights, and not by the knobble-kneed, gawky young pageboy in his rusty, dented chainmail who stumbles along in the wake of his master.
He may not be able to give her the world, but he can give her his heart-she already holds it cupped within her dainty little hands, even if she doesn’t even know it. He may not be able to stand up to anything and everything that threatens her safety, but he can certainly try.
He knows she’ll never be his, but it never hurts to dare to dream, even if he’ll have his heart broken in the process.
o15 → meditate
Love may be the thing which countless poets, bards and chroniclers sing high praises of, but at the end of the day, Darach sees no point in believing in it-not when he is bound by the constraints of his post and the expectations of everyone else around them.
They’re like the star-crossed lovers doomed to never be together.
He can forgive himself for not wanting to force himself out of bed in the mornings, because he knows better than anyone that he’ll never stand a chance with Caitlin. He can forgive himself for not wanting to face imperious challengers, because he knows she will be watching their battle with that same dignified detachment, and not once will the thought of love cross her mind.
But he won’t be able to forgive himself for not being there for her when she needs him. He is there when she rants and raves and swears eternal vengeance on those who defeated her, furious surges of irrational ferocity which unfold behind closed doors. He is there when she cries into the satin handkerchief he proffers her, when she chastises him in a voice of the coldest ice when he loses. He is there when she suddenly dozes off at the dining table or courtyard, is there to offer apologies to whoever was in her company at the time.
That is the only thing which fuels him onwards, which allows him to go through each day-the memory of her hands clasping his as she spins him around in girlish glee in the aftermath of a win, the silvery peal of her laughter as they share a private joke.
But that is the furthest they’ll ever go, and Darach has to satisfy himself with merely being there to comfort her, and nothing more.
o16 → dark void
Time has not been kind to him; it has changed him, weathered him, ravaged him, left him a bitter husk.
Cynthia had asked him, once, what his childhood had been like - an innocuous question, surely the sort that friends asked one another on occasion. He never replied, had only looked away and mumbled something indecipherable into the palm of his hand, and had left it at that.
Now, she laments the loss of the quietly confident boy he had once been, the brilliant young man she had graduated alongside.
“What happened?” she asks him softly, fingers clenched as she struggles not to choke against the deadened, chilled air of the Distortion World. “Why did you change?”
“Because I had been fettered by the useless chains of emotion for far too long,” he deadpans, cheekbones stark against his features like jags of slate as he bares his teeth in a mirthless grin. “I saw the light…as you never did.”
“Liar,” she murmurs, but there is no malice there, only sadness. “So you’re saying that you never meant anything of what you said? That I was the first person who had been able to wholly accept you for who you are, the first to warm the cockles of your heart?”
Cyrus doesn’t blink. “Yes,” he drones, his voice unpleasantly sycophantic. “I was lying all along.”
She cannot stand it anymore. She turns on her heel and pushes back towards the world of the living.
There is no saving him from himself. Not now, not ever.
o17 → future sight
She is not in this for the money - even though it makes a nice bonus to the shamefully paltry salary allotted to gym leaders by the Pokémon League, what cheapskates - or the status - even if it is nice to be able to order subordinate officers twice her age around.
No, the only reason Sabrina joined Team Rocket was to be closer to the object of her curiosity.
He is a strange man, to be sure-she knows not what motives spur him onwards, for he does not confide in any of them - not Surge, not Koga, not even herself, which is the most galling knowledge of all. He remains distant, impassive, remote - like an unexplored country with a heart of abysmal, immeasurable darkness.
Having the power to see the future is a frustrating gift; however, what she would much rather have is the ability to see the past, to learn more of the elusive enigma that is Giovanni.
If she is capable of that, then surely it is then that he is truly hers.
o18 → powder snow
The cold may have become a distant sensation of discomfort for her, but she can tell he is unused to this weather-Candice can see it in the stiff set of his shoulders and the involuntary tremors which wrack his frame. He is used to the perpetual sun - and surf - of Sunyshore City, and once again, she is struck by a pang of guilty affection for him: to brave the cold for her sake is a thought that warms her to the very bottom of her heart.
Thus so, for his sake, she doesn’t object when Volkner - with loudly-chattering teeth - extricates himself from his coat and drapes it over her shoulders, breath gusting from his lips in smoky puffs as he chides her for wearing such light clothing in such weather.
o19 → brine
The best thing to do for the people you love is to let them go.
And thus, although she is reluctant to, she knows he’ll never truly be hers - not with his frustrating, obfuscating obliviousness, his half-realised fascination towards the petite blonde with the long golden ponytail.
Misty knows it’s useless to wish he’ll one day see her as more than just a friend, a gym leader-he will forever be preoccupied by naïve curiosity and delicate girlish features.
So she lets him go; she releases him from the silvered fishhook forged from her helpless infatuation, and watches as he unknowingly leaves her behind.
Love, Misty knows now, is about making sacrifices; there’s no need to say she’s doing it, because after all, actions speak louder than words.
Red knows that better than most.
o2o → fire blast
When she makes her offer to him, he has no response other than to recoil away from the black-gloved hand - with the burning, searing touch he knows is attributed to more than just the fiery berry juice she daubs her fingers with - as though stung.
“Are you interested in joining us?” she whispers, her voice a silken purr which sends an icicle of fear lodging firmly between his shoulderblades.
Ruby feels rather than sees her smile, a thin, sardonic quirk of her lips as she reaches forwards to boldly, daringly cup his chin. For an instant, he can only gape blankly at her, seeing instead of himself, the light of dancing, flickering flames reflected twofold in her dark gaze.
His hands curl into fists, knuckles straining white against his skin. “Never,” he rasps out, eyes watering from the acrid plumes of smoke coiling from the flames her Ninetales breathes.
For a single, frozen heartbeat, she remains still, features thrown into shadow by the frenetic dance of the ring of fire which surrounds them. Then-
“So be it,” Marge declares, the cold blaze of contempt colouring her rising tones. “If I can’t have you, nobody else can.”
back
part 1
back to index.
wordcount: 2461
rating: PG
summary: Twenty secrets, twenty different ways to say I love you; different people have different ways of expressing themselves, and it doesn't have to be through words.
o11 → whirlpool
She is the wind-joyfully free, beautifully, magnificently untamed; he is the sea, constant and never-changing, pushing and pulling with his tides but never quite being able to kiss the sky.
When they meet again, Wallace is struck by a sudden pang of loss which twists and coils like a serpent in his belly. As he stands quietly alongside her and casts around aimlessly for the right things to say, he realises it is this closeness he has missed, this mutual proximity which he has not experienced for painfully long.
They say absence makes the heart fonder; but who are they? Philosophers who never really cared for such trivial matters, most likely. Still, Wallace cannot deny the truth - the longer he goes without once seeing her, or just hearing the familiar cadence of her voice, the more he misses her, and wishes he hadn’t been foolish enough to her just slip by.
He regrets the rash impulsiveness of youth, and the fact that he had allowed Winona to just leave his life almost as easily as she came into it.
When he sees her again, he is determined not to make the same mistake. With trembling fingers, he reaches out to seize her wrist, to urgently utter the words he has longed to give her for so many years.
Don’t leave me again-I love you.
o12 → destiny bond
Perhaps it is selfish of her to want to hold on to this.
She senses the disapproval in the eyes of her sisters; she knows they disagree with this forbidden affair she insists on pursuing-after all, kimono girls are supposed to be chaste, to stay pure and unsullied for their entire lives.
The others-they never express it, but she knows they do not wish for her to follow the capricious fancies of her heart - not in this way. Zuki can see it in the tight pursing of their cherry-red lips, in the frown that knits across their smooth brows; she can see it in the detached sympathy which simmers beneath the surface of their skin, hear it in the quiet note of warning in their voices.
She ignores them.
One evening finds her and Morty atop the Bell Tower-he stands out against the backdrop of gold and vermillion like a dark blot of ink spilled amongst the crinkled fallen leaves, whilst she all but drowns in the sea of rusty, muted colours, the edges of the silken fabric of her kimono bleeding into the papery foliage.
They sit in silence, back-to-back, hearing nothing but the steady rhythm of one another’s breaths and the quiet, distant whisper of wind. “I won’t be able to see you again,” she says at last, watching with unseeing eyes as her Umbreon flits between the coppery tree-trunks like a sinuous, sentient shadow.
Morty does not respond immediately, but his breath hitches in his lungs; she can feel it in the involuntary shudder that passes through him, a faint tremor which ghosts through her own frame. With absent fingers, Zuki tugs at the edge of his scarf, worrying at the frayed edges, feeling the familiar texture as it slips from her grasp.
“It…would be better that way,” he agrees, his voice low, husky. Her heart twists in her chest and she nods mutely, not trusting herself to speak. Memories of their various trysts threaten to overwhelm her - she remembers the contours of his body, the heat of his mouth on hers as they steal kisses under the fiery eyes of the starry sky.
His stoic mask breaks then-it shatters, splinters, falls into a thousand brittle fragments. He turns to press his lips to hers, one last time - and she threads her fingers desperately through his hair, not wanting to let him go. She wants to remember everything about him-his scent, his slow, enigmatic smile, his eccentric sense of humour.
When she descends, hours later, the sensation of his fingers trailing lines of shivering fire over her skin stays with her long after they walk out of one another’s lives.
o13 → drain punch
Once, he makes the mistake of telling her he loves her.
It isn’t so much the words and emotions themselves that he regrets; rather, Aaron regrets blurting it out in the heat of the moment when he drops by to visit her at her gym.
For a single, beautiful moment, she is stunned into silence, her earnest chatter dying on her lips as she gapes at him, complexion taking on a rosy hue which rivals her bubblegum locks. He grins uncertainly at her, but as the seconds slip past, he is mortified by his confession, suddenly wishing for nothing more than to sink into the polished floorboards of the dojo.
Then, without warning, she reacts.
With a muffled cry, she swings her fist; it connects squarely with his nose and he staggers back, winded and horribly confused. “What did you do that for? I th-thought girls like to hear things like that!” Aaron mumbles around his hand as he gingerly feels for a break.
Maylene covers her face as the Karate Brothers abandon their training to affix the two of them with curious stares; their gazes are at once amused, puzzled and incredulous. One of them takes a step forth, knuckles cracking ominously, and Aaron pales. “Wh-what made you think I’m like all girls?” she hollers, scarlet-cheeked. “And don’t j-just simply say things like that! You only say it if you mean it!”
Aaron wishes the smirking, scowling black belts would just go back to pummelling the stuffing out of their punching bags, rather than contemplating doing the same on him. “But I do mean it!”
The young gym leader straightens, still red-faced, tripping over her own words. “W-well, then, I mean…meant to say the exact same th-thing! Haven’t you heard of a ki-kiss…kiss with a fist?”
o14 → heart swap
She’s a princess, and fairytale princesses don’t give their hearts to lowly squires.
She’s a lady, a contessa, an empress, an embodiment of all that is beautiful and pure, and he has no right to fall for her.
But when he’s alone at night, left with the bittersweet company of his churning thoughts, he falls into fitful half-dreams filled with the soft cadence of Missy’s muted, hastily-stifled laughter, the sweet, mellifluous chime of her crystal voice. In his mind’s eye, Dia can just imagine her giving her hand to some dashing knight in shining armour - everything he’s not, not, not - and growing up to be taken away by a nameless, faceless stranger.
Dia wishes he could be her prince.
But he’s not, and he probably never will be. Fairytale princesses only fall in love with handsome princes riding proud, gallant steeds, noble gentlemen who can promise her the sun, the moon, the stars. Fairytale princesses are only ever rescued from the evil witch by valiant knights, and not by the knobble-kneed, gawky young pageboy in his rusty, dented chainmail who stumbles along in the wake of his master.
He may not be able to give her the world, but he can give her his heart-she already holds it cupped within her dainty little hands, even if she doesn’t even know it. He may not be able to stand up to anything and everything that threatens her safety, but he can certainly try.
He knows she’ll never be his, but it never hurts to dare to dream, even if he’ll have his heart broken in the process.
o15 → meditate
Love may be the thing which countless poets, bards and chroniclers sing high praises of, but at the end of the day, Darach sees no point in believing in it-not when he is bound by the constraints of his post and the expectations of everyone else around them.
They’re like the star-crossed lovers doomed to never be together.
He can forgive himself for not wanting to force himself out of bed in the mornings, because he knows better than anyone that he’ll never stand a chance with Caitlin. He can forgive himself for not wanting to face imperious challengers, because he knows she will be watching their battle with that same dignified detachment, and not once will the thought of love cross her mind.
But he won’t be able to forgive himself for not being there for her when she needs him. He is there when she rants and raves and swears eternal vengeance on those who defeated her, furious surges of irrational ferocity which unfold behind closed doors. He is there when she cries into the satin handkerchief he proffers her, when she chastises him in a voice of the coldest ice when he loses. He is there when she suddenly dozes off at the dining table or courtyard, is there to offer apologies to whoever was in her company at the time.
That is the only thing which fuels him onwards, which allows him to go through each day-the memory of her hands clasping his as she spins him around in girlish glee in the aftermath of a win, the silvery peal of her laughter as they share a private joke.
But that is the furthest they’ll ever go, and Darach has to satisfy himself with merely being there to comfort her, and nothing more.
o16 → dark void
Time has not been kind to him; it has changed him, weathered him, ravaged him, left him a bitter husk.
Cynthia had asked him, once, what his childhood had been like - an innocuous question, surely the sort that friends asked one another on occasion. He never replied, had only looked away and mumbled something indecipherable into the palm of his hand, and had left it at that.
Now, she laments the loss of the quietly confident boy he had once been, the brilliant young man she had graduated alongside.
“What happened?” she asks him softly, fingers clenched as she struggles not to choke against the deadened, chilled air of the Distortion World. “Why did you change?”
“Because I had been fettered by the useless chains of emotion for far too long,” he deadpans, cheekbones stark against his features like jags of slate as he bares his teeth in a mirthless grin. “I saw the light…as you never did.”
“Liar,” she murmurs, but there is no malice there, only sadness. “So you’re saying that you never meant anything of what you said? That I was the first person who had been able to wholly accept you for who you are, the first to warm the cockles of your heart?”
Cyrus doesn’t blink. “Yes,” he drones, his voice unpleasantly sycophantic. “I was lying all along.”
She cannot stand it anymore. She turns on her heel and pushes back towards the world of the living.
There is no saving him from himself. Not now, not ever.
o17 → future sight
She is not in this for the money - even though it makes a nice bonus to the shamefully paltry salary allotted to gym leaders by the Pokémon League, what cheapskates - or the status - even if it is nice to be able to order subordinate officers twice her age around.
No, the only reason Sabrina joined Team Rocket was to be closer to the object of her curiosity.
He is a strange man, to be sure-she knows not what motives spur him onwards, for he does not confide in any of them - not Surge, not Koga, not even herself, which is the most galling knowledge of all. He remains distant, impassive, remote - like an unexplored country with a heart of abysmal, immeasurable darkness.
Having the power to see the future is a frustrating gift; however, what she would much rather have is the ability to see the past, to learn more of the elusive enigma that is Giovanni.
If she is capable of that, then surely it is then that he is truly hers.
o18 → powder snow
The cold may have become a distant sensation of discomfort for her, but she can tell he is unused to this weather-Candice can see it in the stiff set of his shoulders and the involuntary tremors which wrack his frame. He is used to the perpetual sun - and surf - of Sunyshore City, and once again, she is struck by a pang of guilty affection for him: to brave the cold for her sake is a thought that warms her to the very bottom of her heart.
Thus so, for his sake, she doesn’t object when Volkner - with loudly-chattering teeth - extricates himself from his coat and drapes it over her shoulders, breath gusting from his lips in smoky puffs as he chides her for wearing such light clothing in such weather.
o19 → brine
The best thing to do for the people you love is to let them go.
And thus, although she is reluctant to, she knows he’ll never truly be hers - not with his frustrating, obfuscating obliviousness, his half-realised fascination towards the petite blonde with the long golden ponytail.
Misty knows it’s useless to wish he’ll one day see her as more than just a friend, a gym leader-he will forever be preoccupied by naïve curiosity and delicate girlish features.
So she lets him go; she releases him from the silvered fishhook forged from her helpless infatuation, and watches as he unknowingly leaves her behind.
Love, Misty knows now, is about making sacrifices; there’s no need to say she’s doing it, because after all, actions speak louder than words.
Red knows that better than most.
o2o → fire blast
When she makes her offer to him, he has no response other than to recoil away from the black-gloved hand - with the burning, searing touch he knows is attributed to more than just the fiery berry juice she daubs her fingers with - as though stung.
“Are you interested in joining us?” she whispers, her voice a silken purr which sends an icicle of fear lodging firmly between his shoulderblades.
Ruby feels rather than sees her smile, a thin, sardonic quirk of her lips as she reaches forwards to boldly, daringly cup his chin. For an instant, he can only gape blankly at her, seeing instead of himself, the light of dancing, flickering flames reflected twofold in her dark gaze.
His hands curl into fists, knuckles straining white against his skin. “Never,” he rasps out, eyes watering from the acrid plumes of smoke coiling from the flames her Ninetales breathes.
For a single, frozen heartbeat, she remains still, features thrown into shadow by the frenetic dance of the ring of fire which surrounds them. Then-
“So be it,” Marge declares, the cold blaze of contempt colouring her rising tones. “If I can’t have you, nobody else can.”
back
part 1
back to index.