Somebody was shaking me by my shoulder, "Hm?" I groggily sat up. Pitch black. But I could vaguely smell vanilla and pistachio macaroons. Bonnie. "Bonnie, Bonnie, are you okay? Do you need me?" I began sleepily panicking that she might be anxious or upset.

I heard her laugh, "Oh Max," she slipped my glasses onto my face. Great, now the darkness was high definition. "We're going out, get dressed."

"Huh?" I slumped up, "What time is it?"

"It's nearly 2am in the morning." I was about to intervene when she cut me off, "I'll leave the room because you know, I wouldn't want to see you indecently or anything." She gave a very alien laugh and my spine practically snapped "I'll meet you outside the back door. Don't leave me waiting too long now, 'kay? Bye bye!" How the fuck did she have this much energy at this time?

I didn't have much of a choice. After I heard her leave and gently close the door, I got drearily out of bed. I tossed on a t-shirt and switched out of my pyjama pants into a pair of jeans that were messily strung over the end of bed. Using the torch on my phone as a light, I then crept down the hallway to the back door. Our house was a bungalow, meaning there was only one floor, so I didn't have to worry about creaking stairs or anything.

Bonnie was waiting for me outside. I could see her properly now. Stood in jean shorts and knee socks, I realised why everyone we met complimented her on her looks. The moonlight hitting her pale cheeks, the serene blue of her eyes; she was incomparable. "Hey, you're really pretty." I said as if I was reading the news and found a slightly interesting article.

"What?" She whispered, "You really think so?" She never said thank you like she did to everyone else. She shrugged it off and grabbed my hand, "Come on, let's go," she started leading me down the path to the garden, where a gate to the restof the world stood at the bottom.

"Where are we going?" I said.

"Out, I told you," She joked, "But if you must know, North Petalburg." I had tough memories of that place. But I thought it best not to bring it up. "We never actually went there on our journey, I can't believe we missed it!" I could believe it. But whatever made the lady happy.

Petalburg Ciry really isn't big - it didn't take us long at all to reach the border of Petalburg and North Petalburg. Bonnie dropped my hand as we entered the sister city. It had been so many years, but our family was still famous here. I didn't like it.

The buildings were various shades of orange or yellow, ranging from short or a few storeys tall. It wasn't a very exciting place. It was a very average southern Hoenn city. What made it so significant to me, was what happened around seven years ago, here, when I was on my first ever journey.

"Hey!" Bonnie snaps me out of my thoughts, "Look at this picture! This girl kinda looks like May." She was pointing at a withered photograph stuck high up on a street lamp.

"That's because it is May, my dad, too."

"Really? Why is there a picture of them here?" Bonnie looked at me with doe-eyed curiosity.

"My family is what you could call "famous" over here. You know, ex-gym leader dad and all." I sighed.

"Oh, wow!" Bonnie was still glancing dreamily up at the photograph that had been up there for at least half a decade. "Who is the little boy? He's adorable, oh my god! He looks like a manga character! A boy lolita!"

"That's me." I grunted. "And if anybody here is a lolita, it's you, Bonnie."

"I'm not a lolita!" She protested with a look of genuine disgust, despite having called me a "boy lolita" moments ago. She shook her head, "Anyway, that's really you? I barely recognised you." She glanced at me, then back at the picture, "You were so small and cute, you're so tall now... But you have the same eyes you did when you were a boy." What did that mean? "How old were you? And May, too?"

In the photograph, we were all smiling. I remembered the day it was taken. A couple of months before May and I left with Ash and Brock, Dad had taken us out to the movies. He had his arms around us, May on his left, I on his right. A couple of months before I would never be able to think of my dad the same way again. At the time of that picture, I wanted to be just like him. I wanted to be a trainer, a gym leader, and a loving father and husband. But Norman Maple is only two of those things - a trainer and a leader.

"I was eight, she was thirteen."

"She was my age?" Bonnie muttered, "Oh, wow. She was so beautiful, wasn't she? I feel inadequate compared with her."

"You feel inadequate?" I didn't know what was wrong with me, was it hormones or just years of pent up anger. Either way I knew it was wrong to be taking it out on Bonnie. "Try being her brother. Her stupid, ugly, chubby, fucking brother! All I ever hear is how gorgeous my sister is! Nobody gives a fuck about me!"

She gasped.

I started crying. I never cried. It was the first time I had cried since I was around ten, five years back. Here I was, crying in the street, in the middle of the morning, in front of the first true friend I had ever made.

She walked up to me and hugged me. "What's wrong?"

I didn't want to let go. Having somebody care about me like this, having somebody's head so close to my heart, it felt so good. "I'm sorry." I choked on the words. I was suddenly very cold.

"Max," She laced her fingertips inbetween mine, "It's okay. I could see something was up. You're not like this with me. You're kind." She looked up at me, "What's wrong?"

"Let's go sit down, it's a long story." We perched like fletchlings on a nearby wall.

She held onto my arm and rested her head on my shoulder. I had stopped crying. My breathing was steady and my temperature had returned to normal. "You know you're not stupid, you're incredibly smart. You know this." Bonnie closed her eyes. She was most likely finally getting tired. "You're not ugly. You're actually very attractive." This made my brows furrow. It was strange, but I felt better. "You have the most beautiful hands." For some reason she sounded like she was on the brink of tears when she said that, but it was gone by her next sentence, "May is stunning. But you're not ugly - you are just different. Clemont sometimes makes me feel dumb - but I'm smart too, I'm just smart at other things. You're really great, Max, stop comparing yourself to May."

I looked out at the city where it all began to go wrong. The city where my innocence and my hope had fled like a young trainer from a wild encounter. The city where my dream died.

Bonnie giggled, "And you're worried about being chubby? Well, I think it's great! You look perfectly healthy, and it just makes you more huggable!"

"Bonnie," I moved my arm so she couldn't hold on to it, and then I threw it around her and dragged her close to me, "You're so lovely. I don't know what I'm gonna do without you." It was just easier for us both to stay close like this.

"I feel a very similar way, you know." She was blushing intensely and stuttering. The reason why was oblivious to me. I noticed she didn't say "the same way". Did she feel a different way than I did? All I wanted was for her to stick around and be my best friend, nothing more. Did she not feel like I did?

I decided to open up. I had never really done it before to anyone but my big sister, "You know, the reason I've been so grumpy all night is this city. I avoided it on purpose." She didn't say anything, so I elaborated, "You see, I met you at Ash's wedding. I know Ash because I travelled with him on my first journey across Hoenn. I was only eight."

"You think that's impressive? I was seven! And I met a Zygarde!" She playfully intervened, temporarily lightening the mood.

"Zygardes are kid stuff. Fall asleep next to a Jirachi, then we'll talk." I carried on with the story, "So, Ash came back to the gym to challenge my dad after already failing to him once. We passed through here, Ash and our friend Brock (the doctor guy Ash now works for) were of course, totally shocked to see our faces all over the place. Oh my god, we were so famous!"

"Mhm." Bonnie nodded along.

"Well, it was that day I found out that my dad had been sleeping with the local Nurse Joy. So did my mum."

"That's disgusting. Who could do that? It's a good thing Ash and Serena would never cheat on one another!" Bonnie was horrified.

"My mum wanted out. But I cried. And I cried and cried and cried like the little eight year old boy I was. I didn't want mummy and daddy to divorce. I loved them both more than anything!" I bit my lip, "So she stayed. And she put up with the affair. And every single one after that."

"He has a mistress now, doesn't he? I remember you saying." Bonnie added.

"Yes," I said, "Her name is Annie Proctor. She's a lab assistant to her professor husband. But she's been seeing my dad for we'll over a year, now. It's a shame, too. I met her on that very journey, on Wales Island, she seemed so nice." I exhaled.

"She can't have much self respect to cheat on her husband like that, I can't think of anyone I know who'd do such a thing." Bonnie tutted.

"I always feel like if I hadn't have been such a crybaby, my mother would have left then and there. She could have been happy and none of this would still be happening. It's all my fault. I was so smart for a young boy but so stupid..." My voice got small and weak, "I ruined her life."

"You were a confused child," Bonnie comforted me, "You didn't know any better. Don't blame yourself. Blame your piece of crap father for not treating a woman like your mother right."

"This city," I said, "North Petalburg. It's just a reminder of the day everything went down hill."

We walked home shortly after. I whispered a final goodbye to her at her bedroom door, "I'll miss you more than anything Bonnie." I touched her hand gently with mine, "Goodnight and goodbye."

"Goodnight Max," She smiled, "Never forget that you're amazing."