nobody girl conflictingshipping - 1500 words a/n: i got emotional... green is such a g and i love him
There was something special about the girl next door. It was cliché, really, he thought. What a trope, a stereotype, – stupid. Before she dropped in around here, like some kind of silent bomb, he was the standard, the prodigy, the golden goose. He was the chase, the destination, the top of the pedestal. And somewhere along the way, it switched. Like a blanket swept up from underneath him, he fell flat on his face.
Cursing under his breath, it was unlike him. All of it, it was unlike him. To chase, to reach, to be beneath another. To be… underneath her. Underneath her… under her? Quite randomly, and strangely, an odd thought popped into his mind. Her… on top of him? He shook his head. Furrowed brows and eyelids fluttering in confusion, he shrugged his shoulders.
But sometimes, out of nowhere, like the winds from Mt. Silver passing by in a flash, a chill would travel down his spine. And that sometimes only ever happened when he spotted her out randomly. In moments and places where he least expected to find her, but somehow it seemed as if she was everywhere, too. He couldn’t make much of it, or understand it, how she aggravated him so.
The mere existence of this one girl – no, woman – turned his world upside down. His sister would often tease him about her and his grandfather would make the continual comparisons. It seemed as if this nobody girl had charmed… everybody. Even the other gym leaders had come to rely on her, asking her for assistance with errands and odd jobs. Her name was on everyone’s lips.
“Leaf.”
Everyone’s except his. Anytime they met, he could only cast aspersions, as if when opening his mouth he released only the most foul thoughts and disparaging words. Somehow, nobody girl had become his biggest enemy… but was he hers? Just what was he… to her? Just what was anyone to her?
The more he thought of her, the more he became confused. She was almost expressionless at all times outside of battling. The drive, ambition, achievements – they didn’t just come from nowhere! The puny girl who lived next door became the biggest figure in Kanto, the girl who’s skirt he’d kick dirt onto, the girl who used to come crying to him. But what changed? He swore, it was as if one day a switch flipped, and they had become worst enemies.
Was there a certain word he said that went too far one time? Back then, he realized he was only at the top… because she made him feel that way. The way she used to wait outside his front door in the early summer mornings, for them to explore Viridian forest together. The way she lit up hearing about Viridian’s annual spring festivals, and how she couldn’t wait until they were old enough to go together… Speaking of which, they never did end up going together once they grew up.
As he strolled by the water in Vermillion, he kicked a pebble into the ocean. Hearing wingulls squawk and the waves crashing, it wasn’t enough noise to distract him. What was all of this grief and frustration he felt? Where did it come from? The countless times he had lost to her? The relationship they used to have that he didn’t realize he mourned?
And strangely, in that moment, as if fate and Mt. Silver’s gale brushing against his back again, she popped into his eye’s view from across the pier. He could see her, walking side by side with the Vermillion gym leader. Green huffed to himself in distaste, “Everyone knows he’s only about brawn.”
Just then, as he said that, what he saw was unmistakable. A small smile appeared on her mouth, with a slight opening for a chuckle to escape.
She laughed?!
For some reason, this odd sensation boiled up inside him and he ran throughout the pier to make it to the other side. It did not matter whatever it was they spoke of, he had to be in between them – er, it – he had to be in between it and be a part of it. As he ran up to her and the gym leader, they stopped in surprise at his arrival and his state of somewhat disarray.
“Why, Green!” Lt. Surge thunderously laughed. “What brought you about here?”
The young man from Pallet Town cleared his throat before answering. “I was… just around! …” He glanced from side to side looking for an excuse to pull Leaf away. “I needed to ask Leaf to take care of something.”
“Ask? Me?” She suddenly piped in, her voice low. “You never have asked me for anything other than a battle.”
He batted his eyes, baffled and stumped for an answer. She made a great point there, quite often enough they were at odds with each other and he would be the last person alive in Kanto to ask something of her. He clenched his jaw, feeling heat on the back of his neck. Without saying another word, he used his head to gesture to her to walk away with him. Tilting his head to the right and looking everywhere but at her, she blinked when she caught on.
She quickly thanked Vermillion’s gym leader for his time and walked away in whatever direction Green had wanted. Now that he finally had her, he wasn’t entirely sure what to do. For starters, he hadn’t planned to pull her away, or even be with her at all – when he came to Vermillion it had been to shake her from his mind… and now here she was.
They continued to walk alongside the pier’s edge for a while, in silence. Neither said anything, not that he expected her to, she was not exactly the chatty chatot. But after a while, without a noise from either of them but the water and the wind, she had to say something.
“Green?”
That was it. It was all she said. That was all she had to say? Just his crummy old name? Nothing else? Nothing like, I miss you? Nothing like, what happened to us? He bit his lip, and in that moment, she saw him make a face she had never seen before. Eyes full of forlorn and longing, eyes full of hunger – but a hunger she was unfamiliar with.
“Why are we like this?” He finally asked, the sun slowly starting to set on the water’s horizon.
Leaf’s eyebrows only furrowed in confusion, unable to understand what he meant.
“Why…” He continued, “Why does it seem like… I resent you and you could care less for me? When did we become like this? When did we stop being us?”
The young champion standing in front of him swallowed and looked to the side. “We wanted the same thing… It’s that simple. We couldn’t both become the champion.”
“So you’re saying I lost you because of something so childish?”
His sentence caught her off guard. Wasn’t becoming champion everything to him? Everything to both of them? It’s why she trained so hard, why he could only call her ridiculous things, why… they weren’t friends anymore.
“You’re right,” he carried on, almost as if speaking to the ocean. “I wanted to be champion, but I also wanted more than that, I wanted things to stay the same between us, and it seemed like… only I was the only one who wanted that.”
At that moment, she turned towards the water and bent down to hug her knees. She watched the horizon, the sun painting everything in sight a bright and deep orange. “What could be done about it? When one of us got what the other wanted, of course we would never be the same again.”
“Who said that?” Again, his words surprised her. “Was it me? And my pride? Or was it you and that mute way you can’t express yourself? Who told us to leave the other behind?”
She could not answer him. Somewhere, along the way, the training, the pressure to excel – the rivalry; they succumbed to the negativity and the bitterness. A relationship that they both held so close and dearly, they held it too tightly, and when one holds too tightly… it is said one kills it.
“Are you trying to say something? You wish to be friends again?”
He felt like screaming at the ocean again. How could she be so oblivious to his feelings? Of course that was what he wanted. To be close, to explore together, to finally go to that damn spring festival in Viridian. In that very second, he felt like storming off and leaving her without resolving anything. And he started to. He took a couple steps off, leaving her sitting there staring at the water. He also knew, if he did, she would not think anything of it. And that was another thing he hated so deeply, how she would just leave things as is.
Green stopped in his tracks, his back to her, and turned around to walk back. As he stopped beside her, looking down at her and her looking up at him, she finally said something.
“I thought you were leaving?” She said blankly.
“I forgot something,” he said, the back of his neck burning up.
“What?” Leaf questioned.
He extended his hand out to her, and unconsciously, as if they were children again running amongst the leaves in Viridian forest, she grabbed his arm to help her up.
“You.”
