You Can't Hurry Love

“So let me guess, behind this door is Lance, who will be revealed after a dramatic opening of the door?” I snickered.

“Hm, yes.” Clair smirked, before opening the door, which led to a separate room.

It looked like a spare room, one that was versatile and could hold a lot of events. But from small amounts of damage, it looked as if it were a training room for those who need it.

I expected Cat to squeal in the presence of Lance, or at least run up to him and flirt with him madly. She held herself back, which was good in a way. However, she acted kind of creepy to make up for it. She began to hyperventilate and reached out for my hand, squeezing it tightly as her hands quickly became clammy.

I hissed at her to ‘play it cool’ and snatched my hand away from her, earning a weird look from Lance who cocked up an eyebrow.

“LANCE! I CHALLENGE YOU TO A BATTLE!” Aaron loudly exclaimed, jumping in front of Lance and grabbing out a pokéball.

“What the hell Aaron! You just can’t go challenging Lance when you feel like it! He’s Pokémon champion, you can only battle him after you get eight badges, and beat the elite four. Duh!” Cat screamed at Aaron.

“Awww but why bother? Why should we all go to the troubles when he’s right here!” Aaron pouted.

“I don’t know why you’re getting all upset about this right now. I thought by now you’d be used to people telling you somebody is out of your league.” I coolly replied.

Cat sent out a huge snort, whilst Brent burst out laughing and high fived me. Clair only rolled her eyes, finding our banter childish but Lance spoke up for the first time.

“Ouch, burn.” Lance smirked.

“So will you battle me?” Aaron asked, not being quite as enthusiastic after I shot him down.

“You seem pretty eager to battle me, no? How about I strike you both up a deal. How about you both have one shot at battling my lovely cousin, Clair. If either of you manage to beat her, you can have a shot at battling me, alright?” Lance asked the two boys.

“Will it be an official match?” Brent asked.

“Sure. If either of you win against me should you beat Clair, you’ll be given the Pokémon champion title.” Lance stated.

“But don’t even dream of it boys, I’m going to beat both of you.” Clair smirked, grabbing out of her Pokéballs and tossing it into the air and catching it again.

The two boys then loudly exclaimed to each other how they were going to win as they shuffled out.

“That should keep them preoccupied for a while.” Clair winked at Lance, giving her cousin a thumbs up as she slipped out.

“Is it rude to cut to the chase and ask what’s happening? You obviously want Cat and I for something if you didn’t want the boys here, not to fact that I GAVE MY NUMBER TO A TEAM ROCKET BOY.” I said, beginning to panic by the end of my sentence.

Lance jumped over and grabbed me by my shoulders in order to calm me down.

“It’s okay, Emily. In fact, it’s more than okay, it’s great. I’m elaborate later, but I need you to stay calm, alright? I need your help, and it’s probably better if you’re calm whilst I do all the explaining.” Lance asked.

“Yeah Cat, stop hyperventilating in front of Lance.” I joked, poking my tongue out at her, in an attempt to joke around and prove to Lance I was now calm.

“Hey Emily, how’s HENRY? Remember how much you cried over him after you dumped him, and then wanted him back and he said you were crazy?” Cat nastily retorted.

I was speechless. Perhaps my comment was a bit far and was uncalled for, but that was just plain nasty. Bringing up something irrelevant to attack me was ten times worse than my joke.

“Wow ladies please, time out. Stop being catty. We have a greater task at hand.” Lance intervened, jumping in front of Cat and doing the time out signal.

“Okay.” Cat huffed, and I remained silent.

I was hurt at what she said. The guy in question was one of the guys I’ve dated in the past. We went great to begin with, but over time he began to change and treated me horribly so I kicked him to the curb. After I did that I remembered the good times and not the bad, and although I never went ‘crawling back’ I was civil to him when I ran into him, with him loudly exclaiming I was clingy.

It was Cat I went crying to thinking I could trust her, but now she was using the pain from my past against me.

Lance gave me a sympathetic look and I could swear he was about to ask ‘are you okay?’ but he didn’t, and continued speaking.

“Thankfully due to a number of reasons, the amount of people in the organisation known as Team Rocket is an all time low. However, because of this their efforts of recruiting are being more and more desperate. Inside information revealed to the G-Men states that they’re on a recruitment run right now, and I believe the Team Rocket grunt that flirted with you, Emily is trying to recruit you.” Lance stated.

“Well who could blame them for going for Emily and not me? She’s so gorgeous.” Cat stated, and although a hint of bitterness could be heard in her voice, I had heard this all before. Cat’s jealousy was never aimed at me, just at the world in general.

I also had a feeling she was digging for compliments from Lance.

“Yes, Emily is quite the looker, but I don’t think that’s entirely the reason he went for her first. Besides, I requested you both here for a reason.” Lance said, after squirming around for a few moments thinking of a response.

“Great. So perhaps you should begin your explanation of everything you wish to tell us. Those two aren’t going to last against Clair very long.” I stated, knowing Lance had better things to do than talk to two rookie Pokémon trainers.

He gave me a warm smile before clearing his throat.