Chapter 31: Mustache

            Violet City feels more faded and ancient in the past, I thought to myself as we pass a lot of older buildings and shrines. It felt more traditional, which is one reason I always loved Johto. I didn't know it had been even more stunning.

            Our Pokemon landed right outside the Pokemon Center, exhausted. We usually didn't have them fly for such long periods of time, especially while carrying two people.

            My body was cramped for sitting so long in the same position, but I surprisingly stayed put when Sadie landed.

            "Are you going to let go, Em?" Daniel glanced back at me, his eyebrow raised.

            I peeled my arms away, wincing from the soreness as I slid off. If I felt like this, I didn't know what Sadie's wings must feel like right now.

            Daniel dismounted, stretching slightly, his eyes continually landing on me until Anthony came over, crossing his arms. "I think they're too tired to fly tomorrow. It's not worth getting there faster if they're going to get hurt. I don't want something happening like it did with Cloud, even if his injuries were caused in a different situation."

            I knew how much that must have killed him to admit. He really didn't want to mess up the time stream, but I really appreciated his thoughtfulness. "I agree."

            "We'll take tomorrow off then." Daniel gripped Anthony's shoulder and they went through the Pokemon Center doors together, leaving me staring at their backs.

            "You ok?" Amanda asked.

I jumped. I hadn't known she was right behind me. "Yep. Just tired."

"It seems like your eyes are still glued on Daniel's back." Amanda smiled.

"Stiff neck," I said, returning Sadie without a word, but patting her Poke Ball soothingly as I walked through the Pokemon Center doors myself, just in time to see Brock down on one knee in front of Nurse Joy and Misty smacking him. Her hand sure made a nice loud noise.

Daniel and Anthony were busy staring at Brock, who was lying on the floor, being dragged away by Misty. In all the distraction, I gave Sadie's Poke Ball to Nurse Joy, asked for a key to a room, which she retrieved swiftly, and headed down the hall. None of us had had dinner, but I was pretty done with today. It had been awkward. And had made me sore. And repetitive. So repetitive. I didn't want to have to stare at Daniel's back ever again.

I collapsed onto the bed, banishing those thoughts from my mind, gripping the sheets from the effort before rolling onto my side facing the wall, hoping to fall asleep.

No one woke me up the next morning and I guessed it had been announced that today was a free day. It was really nice to wake up with the sun already up and the room empty besides me. As much as I loved my friends, being around people all the time could be draining. Especially considering we were all tense from being in the past and with my parents.

After a few minutes of lying in bed, I decided to get up and start the day. Better late than never. Once I was all cleaned up, I decided to make my way to the cafeteria, figuring at least that my dad and Daniel would be there. I was about to round the corner to the room of food when I heard voices.

I heard Amanda first, "Truthfully, it's overwhelming... traveling with her and Daniel."

"Why do you say that?" Anthony asked.

"I love them both. I really do. It's just that I feel like such a third wheel."

A third wheel? I repeated in my head. Why would she feel like that? We talk all the time, play games together, train together, eat together. All three of us. I frowned and concentrated harder.

"It always feels better when you're around. Especially lately," Amanda said. "Because then at least I have someone and I'm not alone and wanting to pull out my hair at those two fighting all the time. They get so absorbed in it and I'm just there."

What? She felt that frustrated by me and Daniel fighting all the time? We didn't really even fight all that much. We just yelled at each other. Or really, I'd yell at him for doing something stupid while he said things to try to make up for whatever he'd done. If anything, she should be blaming him. But still, my heart was practically screaming. She really felt that invisible around us? Like she wasn't important?

I was so zoned out I didn't hear part of their conversation, but a rattling of silverware startled me enough to listen to the quiet, wondering why neither of them were saying anything and wondering if they'd round the corner and run into me.

But then I heard Anthony, "I'm going to be more than a sidekick as well. I'm sick of being the guy who travels by himself, aside from traveling with you three."

Another pause. "Need a travel buddy?"

"That would be nice."

What the heck!? I stormed down the hall back towards the girl's room, turning corners until I got to an area I knew none of them would ever wander to so I could think.

Were they both really that fed up with us? Was it really that bad? Was I that blind that I didn't realize when my best friend was suffering from lack of attention? My heart clenched. How could I do that to her? Why hadn't she talked to me about it?

And what did they mean by being travel buddies? It sounded to me like they were going to ditch us the second we got back to the present. That didn't make any sense in my mind. Friends don't leave each other. I didn't want Amanda to be uncomfortable, but was it that bad that she had to leave without even talking to us about how to fix it?

Because her fixing it would mean leaving me all alone with Daniel, something I'd been avoiding for years.

With that thought in mind, I decided to go find where Daniel was and talk to him about it. We could confront Amanda together and get everything settled so she didn't leave us. I would stop yelling at Daniel if that meant my best friend would stay. I'd do anything for her.

My feet carried me down the maze of hallways I'd lost myself in, coming to the guys' room. I found the door open. The sight inside was enough to make my mouth open.

Sheets were tied together intricately and spread across the room, constructing a giant sheet fortress. Chairs made the walls slope, forming more of a circus tent shape. The person I expected to be inside was sitting crisscross in the middle, his expression mystical as he held a Poke Ball out to me and waved a hand over it mysteriously.

"What's going on?" I asked cautiously.

"Hi, Em," Daniel greeted. I realized he was the only one in the room now that I had snapped out of my initial shock. "What do you think of my castle?"

I really wasn't sure what to think of it. He'd been spending his free time doing this? I looked back at him, knowing how bored he could be and how he jumps outside the box for ideas about how to cure it most of the time. Still, I decided to go with a dry response, "It's something else."

"You always know the right thing to say," Daniel said, smiling. His sarcasm wasn't mean, unlike mine. "So, I was thinking of getting a mustache."

How does a girl respond...?

"Like a fake mustache."

"Why?" Instant relief.

"Because I was going to play fortune teller." He held the Poke Ball out again. "Crystal ball. Palm reading. Telling the future..."

"You're not going to do that," I said bluntly.

"Awe, why not?" Daniel whined. "I'd be so good at it. Like prophet good."

"You're not a prophet." I crossed my arms

"Yet," he said pointedly.

I sighed. "Daniel, you could screw up time. My parents aren't supposed to know who we are. Especially that I'm their daughter."

"Is there a specific time travel rule that says that?"

"Daniel."

"What part of the manual is it in? I seriously missed that part."

"Daniel."

He sighed. "They wouldn't know. I would just be playing around."

I felt like snapping at him, but then I remembered Amanda. It must have shown in my face, because instantly Daniel was crawling out of the tent and looking at me with concern, "What's wrong?"

"I heard Amanda and Anthony talking," I muttered, looking down at my feet.

"About what?"

"About how we drive them crazy with our fighting." I really didn't like admitting it. And Daniel just kept on staring at me for a few seconds too long before letting his eyes stray away.

"Is that all?"

"I think they want to stop traveling with us," I whispered.

"What?" Daniel's eyebrows came down. "But Ant and I promised we'd travel together."

"And I promised Amanda ever since childhood." I shrugged. "They feel like we don't give them enough attention."

"Do you think that's true?"

"Sometimes," I admitted.

"Well, we'll just have to talk to them about it."

"Yeah. I don't know what I'd do if they weren't there," I gushed, glad that Daniel and I were on the same page for once.

"If it was just us?" he questioned, a bit of a challenging knowingness wrapped into it. And now we were in different chapters.

"The point is to get them to keep traveling with us." I ignored the question. "We all stick together.

"But what if we can't? Would that be such a bad thing, just the two of us?" Daniel asked. He couldn't ever drop anything.

"I'd kill you in three days. It'd be a horrible thing."

"Emma."

Anger spiked through me. I hated when he used that serious voice. It was so easy to push him aside when he was joking. "I don't know what would happen, Daniel."

Despite the ice in my voice, Daniel held up his Poke Ball and said with an accent I couldn't place, "Ah, you've come to the right place, weary traveler! For in this crystal ball I hold the answers to your future."

If his face wouldn't have been ridiculous I would have been able to scoff, but he kept going, "Your opportunity to see is upon you, child. Arceus has been watching you carefully from his lofty throne. His delight in your journey fills me with prophecy, if only you would travel into the mystic realm to discover the truth."

He gestured to the makeshift tent dramatically. If he'd taken any other approach, I would have said no. But he was being too amusing not to watch, and this was way better than him forcing me to talk about things I didn't want to, so I found myself on my knees crawling around on the floor, ducking my head under sheets. The light illuminated the top sheet, reminding me of something heavenly. I wondered how long he'd really spent making the tent and if that had been planned.

"You are full of bravery to come here, child." His lip twitched and I imagined him trying to pretend he had a mustache, which was even more obvious as he ran his fingers along his upper lip. I held in a laugh and he leaned forward, whispering, "Now, what did you want to know?"

"I'd like to know how long you can keep up the charade."

"Ah, what is, as you say, a charade?"

"A long time, then."

"The stars will come out before you realize what you desire to know." Daniel made a giant hand motion, his fingers moving crazily to mimic twinkling stars.

"I want to know if we get back home." I leaned back on the hard ground.

"Hm. The question you ask is not the right one."

My amusement slipped a bit as I felt a bit manipulated into the tent of weirdness. "Then what is the right question?"

My eyes were locked with Daniel's in absolute determination for him to know I wasn't going to talk about it, whatever he had planned. Despite his serious face, his voice was gentle, "You have to figure that out on your own."

"Great," I said in a falsely cheerful voice.

"Tell me when you do."

"I'll get right on that." I crawled out of the tent, straightening. "Oh, and don't tell my parents' fortunes. You're not very good at being goofy for that long for them to fall for it, as much as you pretend to be."

"Who's pretending?"

I decided to leave the room, knowing the answer already.

Hey Time Travelers!

Friendship tension. Ooooh. Everyone has it guys. It's normal. But not fun. Let me know what you think in the comments. Thanks for reading this far by the way. Kudos to you.

Pokemon Question of the Day: What would make you the most angry in the Pokemon world?

Keep on keeping on.

-Flips