You Can't Hurry Love

I then thought back to it. The first item of clothing that would have blacked my vision was a cape, I remember thinking about it at the time. Although I’m not a rabid Lance follower, I do like to read a few celebrity gossip magazines and Lance featured regularly. I knew he loved wearing capes, and was never seen without one tied around his neck.

With this fact in mind and the event that happened to me, it was very likely the person that bumped into me.

Not wanting to hear Cat screech about how lucky I was that Lance had come into contact with me, I just shrugged as I resumed eating.

However, as I moved to get out of the booth so I could let Aaron through to get more food, I realised something dropped out of my pink hoodie pocket. I let him through, and then as I slid back into the booth I read the words scrawled on it.

You should be careful who you interact with; the Sandy haired lad is a Team Rocket Grunt. When you’re done with lunch meet with me at the Blackthorn City gym. Bring your friends

It wasn’t signed, but it was more than obvious that Lance was the one who slipped that into my pocket. Lance doesn’t seem like the clumsy type, in fact he’s the opposite as he’s a member of the G-Men, a government organisation for the Johto region that watches and investigates into those who mistreat Pokémon, Team Rocket being their usual target.

Therefore it was definitely Lance who bumped into me.

…Wait. That means I gave my number to a member of Team Rocket. Crap!

I was about to pass the note to Cat, but then I realised her scepticism to pretty much everything. No matter how much I convinced her that she’d be able to meet Lance, she wouldn’t believe it was him that slipped me that note. No, I had to play it cool. I had to try and convince everyone to come to the gym.

I waited until Aaron and Brent sat down too, and decided to just go with the easiest and most truthful way I could that was believable.

“When Lance was here I saw him. He told me to go to the gym after lunch.” I casually stated.

Cat spat her food into her napkin, whilst Aaron started choking on his bite, and Brent had dropped his fork.

“Do you think he heard about how awesome Brent and myself are at battling and wanted to see for himself?” Aaron asked.

“Dudes, you couldn’t battle your way out of a paper bag. I don’t know what he wants, which is why we should probably go there after eating.” I said.

It was so simple, but usually the simplest lies, the ones that only go a little off path from the truth are the ones that work the best.

***

We had now arrived at the Blackthorn City gym. We were outside, deciding how to best approach the situation.

“Maybe we should knock? That would be polite. Clair is after all the last and strongest gym leader if you do the gyms in order.” I stated.

“It’s a gym. It’s basically public property, people would burst in all the time.” Brent stated.

“Yeah, let the pros take care of this.” Aaron winked, shoving the doors open and strutting in.

Usually when someone walks in to see a gym they see many trainers that train under the gym leader. A challenger usually battles these trainers, and then they go onto the leader. Usually gyms are packed and busy places, often holding many other events than just gym battles.

However, this gym was now silent. It was quiet, and although the dragon theme made the gym dark, you could tell this darkness was out of the ordinary. As soon as Cat, Brent and I followed in, we heard the door snap shut behind us.

Being frightened and jumping to look back behind us, we breathed a sigh of relief when we saw none other than the gym leader Clair has closed the door, it didn’t shut of it’s own accord.

“Where’s Lance?” Cat bravely piped up, and I felt second hand embarrassment from her for how rude and fangirly she sounded.

“We’ll get to him in a moment, follow me.” Clair said, and we all began to fall behind.

“Emily, is it?” Clair asked, acknowledging me.

“Yeah…how did you know my name?” I asked, confused.

Clair was one of the most well known gym leaders, being the cousin of Lance and so powerful. She could defeat the elite four easily, having known to only be defeated by Lance in her lifetime. In order to get their eight badge for the Pokémon league people usually just went to Kanto and went up against Misty the water-type gym leader or Brock the rock-type.

I wasn’t even a trainer. I had never travelled, I wasn’t well known. I had no idea how she could know my name.

“I didn’t. My cousin Lance told me. Don’t be so surprised; Lance knows a lot of things. Your name being one of them.” She replied with a smile.

“Does he know my name?” Cat asked, sounding very excited.

“Yeah, he did mention your name in passing. Cat, I think he said?” Clair replied, however she sounded a little less enthusiastic as she addressed me.

I had to put my hands to my ears as Cat let out a huge girlish squeal. The two boys did the same as me, as Clair looked on sounding very unimpressed.

“Before you two even ask, no Lance does not know your names. He knows of you, but not your names in particular.” Clair said to the two boys, who both let out a groan in unison.