Just How We Left It [Yuletide 2020]

This is one of my Yuletide gifts, for juneedes, based on their love for rival dynamics and the prompt of being a holiday piece (with some fancy haircare thrown in for god measure).

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Dawn represses a laugh as the hair dryer is lowered over Barry’s head. The look on his face is absolute confusion mixed with embarrassment as everyone in the salon can see his hair being covered up by the beehive-like dome. There is no point for the stylist to use it on him, but Dawn slipped her an extra 100P to do it. What can she say? It’s the holidays, and she was feeling generous: why not get a funny memory out of it?

“What’s this thing doing again?” Barry asks. It’s almost enough to make Dawn crack, so she shoots a pleading look at the stylist to come up with an answer.

“This will help keep your hair styled for longer,” Leann, the stylist, says without missing a beat and then walks over to Dawn to lean her chair back so she can wash her hair. Dawn shoots her another look, this time thanking her for both putting Barry through the embarrassment and for the slick answer. “It makes it so that the pomade dries more evenly into your hair.”

“You put a pomeg berry in my hair?! I thought it was gel!”

A few women in the other chairs around the salon chuckle at his misunderstanding.

“Pom-ade, not pom-eg,” the stylist corrects him. “It’s like a gel, but nicer. Your hair won’t be as crunchy with this stuff.”

“Whatever,” Barry says, trying to keep his cool even with people still staring, “As long as it stays up for the party.”

“I’ve been trying to tell you,” Dawn calls over to him as the warm water turns on and Leann starts working shampoo into her hair. “It might be time to start cutting it shorter to get the style you want.”

She can’t see him shaking his head, but he says, “Absolutely not. It won’t look right if it’s shorter… people will start saying I look like my dad.”

“But you do look like your dad,” Dawn says, laughing when she hears him getting worked up in his chair.

“Don’t move too much, you’ll ruin it!” Leann calls over to him, which makes Dawn laugh more knowing that Barry has to sit still. He’s come a long way since their journey, but his restlessness hasn’t.

“So, what’s this party you two are attending?” Leann asks Dawn while the shampoo soaks into her hair for a few minutes.

“It’s a Christmas party at the Pokétch Company in Jubilife,” she says, smiling when Leann’s eyes light up. “Yeah, one of the executives says that after all the press coverage with us, their sales were through the roof when people saw us wearing the Pokétch 4G XL+.”

Not that much was different between versions 3 and 4. So you could send an instant text message to a friend- why not just call them? It was one of the company’s largest flops in decades. But throw the watch on three trainers saving the region, and suddenly everyone’s got to have one. In reality, none of them have ever used the feature, and mostly just use the watch to keep time (what a concept).

“Well, that will be fun!” says Leann as she turns the water back on to rinse Dawn’s hair.

“We’re excited,” Dawn replies, “Some of the Gym Leaders will be there, too, and a few of our friends from the League who we haven’t seen in a while.”

They continue with their chatter until Dawn is seated next to Barry and has her own beehive-like dome lowered onto her head. Barry is unusually silent and still, aside from his foot tapping against the tiled floor. She can guess what’s on his mind.

“He’ll be there,” she tells him. He keeps his eyes focused on the floor.

“He better,” Barry says solemnly, “If he knows what’s good for him.”

He adds the last bit and tries to fake a smile, never wanting to be too serious around even one of his closest friends. Before Dawn can try getting to the root of his worries, he starts using his gift of word vomiting to move far away from any kind of deep discussion.

“Since the last time we battled, he better have been training Clefable because you know Empoleon’s Steel Wing is going to make it really hard for him to win again,” he says, “And Heracross has been working on its Night Slash, which is going to be a big-time counter to Alakazam if we can get close enough to hit it…”

“…do you think he’s caught anything new? Probably not, he wouldn’t keep anything in the PC, and he definitely wouldn’t send anything back home to his mom. Plus, with the Battle Frontier coming up…”

“…he also needs to watch out for your Gastrodon, because that thing is a beast already and his Infernape won’t stand a chance…”

Eventually it becomes too much for Dawn to listen to anymore.

“I just hope that he’s okay after the Spear Pillar.”

She says it sternly enough that Barry pauses and eyes her for a second. Whatever thought passes through his mind is quickly pushed away by more incessant chatter.

“He’ll be fine- he’s got the Battle Frontier to focus on and that will be enough to keep him moving forward. Do you think my dad will go easy on him? He better not, that would be so unfair.”

“Barry, stop talking about battling,” Dawn says a little loudly at him, adding, “Please,” when a few people look their way. Barry tries to put on a face like she’s being unreasonable.

“It’s not that big of a deal,” he argues, “It’s what we all do best.”

“It is a big deal, Barry. We could have died.”

Now she’s keeping her voice a bit lower, and Leann, ever aware of the conversations going on in her salon, walks over to one particularly nosey woman and starts chatting with her about highlights and lowlights to distract her from Dawn and Barry’s conversation.

“Yeah, but we didn’t. We can’t keep living in the past with something like that. None of us will be able to move on if that’s all we think about.”

“But,” she tries to get through to him, “Ignoring it isn’t going to make it go away either.”

“No one said we’re ignoring it. We’re just… putting the focus on something else to help get over it.”

“We shouldn’t be helping him get over it, we should be helping him get through it.” The conversation is so overdone and they both know it. It’s been over a year and Lucas has only gotten more distant with them, but Barry’s only solution is to keep up their rivalry and fight their way to the other side.

“Well maybe that’s what I’m doing!” Barry throws his hands up and smacks the hair dryer by accident.

“Well maybe it’s time to try something else,” she says, looking him straight in the eye, “Like maybe talking to him as a friend and showing him that you care. You know that he listens to you more than me.”

“Probably because you’re always trying to make us talk about how we feel! We don’t want to talk about any of it!”

They glare at each other, and Dawn can see that he’s about to get up and walk away to cool off. Like always, he has to avoid confrontation and run from his problems.

And she’s had enough of it.

At the same time, they scowl at each other and say, “You’re so insensitive.”

Just like she thought, he gets up and leaves. She sits in silence and avoids looking at the nosey woman. It’s a few minutes later when his words creep into her mind. Insensitive? Out of the three of them, she’s the only one willing to talk about anything that’s happened to them! The two of them just want to pretend like saving the world from Team Galactic was just your average accomplishment on a trainer journey.

While Barry cools off outside, Leann returns to lift the dryer from over Dawn’s head and direct her back to the styling chair. Silently, she starts to trim at the edges of Dawn’s hair. Before long, she pins sections of it up so she can work on what’s underneath, brushing here and spraying with water there. She clicks her tongue while she works.

“Have you been using the payapa serum I told you about last time?” she asks as she puts some on her hands and works it into Dawn’s hair.

“No,” Dawn sighs, “I couldn’t remember which one you told me about, so I’ve just been making sure to get Le Terefique conditioner-”

“Ah, that explains it. Your layers are all blended together.”

Feeling even more defeated, Dawn closes her eyes for a minute and lets Leann continue to work her magic. Payapa, payapa, payapa. She tells herself it will stick but knows she will most likely forget about it by tomorrow morning. Lucas was always the one to keep all of the small details in order. She would keep the group organized, he would keep them prepared, and Barry - believe it or not - would keep them punctual, and not by just running to wherever they were going. He could get them to keep moving even when none of them wanted to, which she supposes is all he wants to do with Lucas right now; make sure that their friend continues to move forward with his life, even if he’s too depressed or anxious to talk to them about what’s going on. Maybe there is some merit in the idea.

When she opens her eyes, she realizes she was so in her thoughts that she didn’t even notice Leann stop working on her hair. Their eyes meet in the mirror and Leann’s expression asks if she wants to talk about it. She will never pry, but she knows exactly how to get someone to open up about anything on their mind.

“Just thinking about the boys,” she says, rolling her eyes. She always is, no matter how hard she tries not to. They’re her best friends, and after everything they’ve been through, she wants to know that they’re okay- probably all they want, too, but none of them have ever been that great at talking about their feelings.

“They’ll be alright,” Leann reassures her. “It might bother the hell out of you, but all three of you are resilient and have done more than most people your age - more than most people my age! Just let things work themselves out.”

It’s not much, and with Leann it never is. But it’s enough to get Dawn to let all of the extra and unnecessary thoughts float away so that she can focus on the matter at hand: getting her hair just right before the party in a few hours.

Lucas will be there. Barry will calm down before then.

And Dawn will enjoy the night with her friends.


——


“LUUUUUUCAAAAAAS!!!”

Everyone in attendance at the party watches as a flash of yellow hair barrels across the conference room of the Pokétch Company and tackles another trainer to the ground. What starts as a small area of silence soon spreads through the room until all that anyone can hear is “Carol of the Bells” playing over the speakers and the sounds of struggle from the two trainers on the floor. People start to nervously laugh when they realize that it’s two friends reuniting while others go back to their uppity conversations with each other, too good to watch kids rolling around on the floor.

“Does it have to be every time?” Lucas asks when he finally manages to get Barry off of him.

His friend flashes a toothy grin and says, “Until one of us breaks a hip, you bet!”

Once on their feet, they wrap their arms around each other and enjoy being in the same room once again. Dawn comes out of hiding from the embarrassing scene to give Lucas a hug, but Barry doesn’t release him, so she wraps her arms around both of them. There are muffled cries from the floor below where Barry’s Empoleon must be body slamming Lucas’s Infernape in the same kind of excitement as his trainer.

“How are you, dude?!” says Barry when he finally lets go of his friend.

“Pretty good,” Lucas chuckles. His eyes don’t seem totally present, which doesn’t surprise either Barry or Dawn but neither acknowledges it. They’re just happy to be with their friend again.

“What have you been up to?” Dawn asks, trying to sound as casual as Barry though achieving as much cool as a Sudowoodo.

“Training for the Battle Frontier, I hope!”

Dawn tries to give Barry a reproachful look, but he avoids eye contact.

“Mm,” Lucas muses. “You can say that. Has your dad told you anything about what to expect?”

Shoulders slumped, Barry sighs and says, “Not a thing. No matter how much I bother him he just says to keep up the training because pokémon can lose their mojo pretty easily.”

“That’s what I’ve been hearing,” Lucas tells them, “It’s better to keep your team ready than to let them go straight into relaxation like most do.”

“And you can bet that mine have been busy training so that they’re still in good shape!”

The conversation continues until Dawn mentions gifts, and they all start reaching into their bags and pulling out varying levels of wrapped items. Unsurprisingly, Barry’s presents for his friends are basically covered in crumpled tissue paper, while Dawn and Lucas actually attempted to wrap things with proper paper and tape. In the end it doesn’t really matter, because all that’s left after everything has been opened is outright carnage with bits of wrapping all over the floor.

Lucas thanks Barry for the power band to help train Alakazam while Barry flips through the pack of poké ball seals that Dawn bought for him. She stashes away her gifts from them and before long, Barry has to rush out of the room to challenge someone he recognizes to a battle.

“So… how’ve you been?” asks Dawn after a minute, trying to hide her hesitation. She genuinely wants to know but doesn’t want him to think she’s only asking because she believes that things are not okay on his end. It wouldn’t be the first time Lucas sensed that and pushed her away. He’s not exactly moody, but when he wants to keep things private and feels people prying, he makes sure that they are kept out of his business. She learned that very quickly about him and he’s never faulted on that stance.

Lucas waits a few seconds and thinks on his answer. For a second she thinks that he is about to touch on why he’s seemed distant lately, but then he grins.

“Things are great!”

“O-Oh…?”

He nods and says, “Yeah, my pokémon and I have been training for the Battle Frontier in Eterna. They’ve been hosting local battle tournaments and on the days that they don’t or if I want a change of pace, I’ll head to Cycling Road to get some practice in.”

He tells her all of this so quickly that for a moment he sounds a bit like Barry. And then he stops abruptly, and she has to find her words as un-awkwardly as she can.

“That’s… that’s great! I’m happy to hear that,” she says, “We weren’t sure if you were over in the Resort Area or not, since you-”

She’s about to say since you won’t return our calls, but she quickly stops herself and changes course.

“-had mentioned it sounded like a cool place to check out.”

Whether or not he notices the change of direction, he doesn’t let on. Instead, he shakes his head and keeps smiling, which is beginning to creep Dawn out.

“Since the Battle Frontier is over there, I figured we could all check it out after challenging some Frontier Brains,” he explains. “You two are going to participate, right?”

Dawn shrugs. “I’m not sure. I know Barry wants to since his dad is part of it, but I can’t decide. I kind of like the break, and I think my pokémon do too.”

At the mention, they look off towards the door downstairs to where all of the pokémon are being held and where Barry is somewhere in the throws of a battle.

“Oh, I almost forgot!” says Lucas in a very artificial way, “I kind of started seeing someone. I met them in the battle contests in Eterna, and I think you would really enjoy them.”

“Huh! That’s… awesome, Lucas!”

Dawn is at a complete loss for words she isn’t even sure she sounded happy for him. The Lucas she knows would not just move into a relationship so soon after everything that happened. Maybe she doesn’t know him as well as she thought… or maybe she does, and he isn’t ready for a relationship, but he’s trying to use it as a way to cope with everything and move on. If it helps, she can’t be mad at it, and even if it doesn’t help, she still doesn’t want to be mad about it. All she wants…

All she wants…

Before either of them can say anything else she closes the gap between them and wraps her arms around him. They don’t say anything for a minute. He puts his arms around her after a second and they stay there while old festive music flows over the speakers and the chatter of people with too much money surrounds them.

“I’m so happy to see you again,” Dawn eventually says, just loud enough for him to hear it. “It’s really weird not seeing both of you every day, and I’m just glad that we can spend this time together for now until we all go back to our normal lives.”

“What about our lives are normal?” he asks, which makes her genuinely laugh. Then he adds, “I’m really glad to see you too. I thought you two might bail and I’d be here alone.”

“Why would we bail?”

“I thought you’d be mad at me for not reaching out these past few months. I got all of your messages, but… I had to be alone. I thought you two might not forgive me for that.”

Dawn pulls back and looks at him right in the eyes.

“I would never just drop you like that.”

They stare at each other in silence for a few seconds.

“You’re my best friend and I’m always here for you.”

And then she hugs him again and makes sure not to let it linger in case he starts to want to push away. She can tell he appreciates it. Not soon enough, Barry returns with a grin that tells them he easily defeated his opponent in their battle.

“Did you even give them a chance to feel like they could win?” Lucas half-laughs, knowing Barry would never do that.

“Nah,” he shakes his head and then turns to Dawn to say, “You might want to go check on Torty, though. He seemed to be getting agitated at a murkrow building a nest on his tree.”

Dawn’s face goes white and she bolts out of the room, almost taking a few guests down in her path. The last time a bird tried to nest in Torty’s tree, he almost set off an earthquake that might have destroyed the statue in Eterna. Lucas looks concerned for her and gestures to ask if they should follow, but Barry keeps grinning.

“I just made that up to get her to leave. I wanted some one-on-one time with you, dude!”

Lucas still looks concerned, but Barry is able to get him to walk around the large room and over to some floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the city. They briefly look out at some buildings adorned with some holiday decorations, and then Barry turns to his friend.

“So… how’ve you been?”

If Lucas didn’t know his friends so well, he would have thought they agreed to both privately speak to him about how much he’s ignored them. But since he does know them, he knows they would never be able to agree on how to approach the subject and would just end up fighting about it and never coming up with a game plan. It makes him smile to himself. He does feel bad about shutting them out, but he needed time to process things.

He sighs. “Things have been… tough.”

For once, Barry doesn’t say anything. Instead, he watches his friend carefully and manages to put all of his focus on Lucas and what he’s saying.

“I don’t know, man… all of that stuff with Galactic, like- what the hell? I still think about it every single day. And thank Arceus they didn’t win, but I can’t stop thinking about what if they did. Or what if they come back? I don’t know if I can fight them again.”

“Yeah, it’s…”

But Barry doesn’t know what it is. He honestly hasn’t thought a lot about it because he knows that it will eat him alive. The news likes to cast him as the one who’s kind of ditzy when it comes to the serous stuff, but if he were to take it too seriously he’s not sure what kind of person he would be: depressed and anxious like Lucas or overprotecting and overbearing like Dawn? In reality, he’s the only one of the three who’s managed to keep any of them in contact. Despite Lucas’s attempt to be by himself, Barry was the one who knew how to let him know about the party. And if Barry hadn’t pushed Dawn to go, she would have spent her holiday worrying about Lucas while also trying to keep up a façade around her family like everything was okay.

“It’s tough, like I said,” Lucas continues. “All of this is so difficult. We weren’t supposed to be in this position, but here we are, and we can’t change any of it. I really don’t know what I would do without you two.”

“You would do whatever you’ve been doing in Eterna.”

It’s not the nicest way to comment on Lucas’s distance, but Barry isn’t one to beat around the bush.

“Honestly, the only reason I’ve been able to feel in control of anything in Eterna is because you two check up on me so often… I know that, even though right now I’m trying to figure everything out by myself, if I ever need you guys, I can come right back and-”

He doesn’t get to finish because Barry hugs him so hard it almost turns into tackling him to the ground again.

-and everything will be just how we left it.

“I was going to come back and yell at you for lying to me because I thought it was just a dumb prank, but I’ll let it slide this time,” Dawn says from a few feet away. The boys let go of each other only long enough to give her a joint look that tells her to not say anything else, but she can feel her younger self wanting to banter with them, just like on their journey.

“Jeez, you’d think I was interrupting something special. Do I need to call your girlfriend, Lucas?”

The way Barry nearly passes out at the remark makes Dawn laugh harder than she has in a long time.

“You didn’t tell me?!?!?!” Barry shouts way too loudly for the other people at the party. Normally she would care more about the looks they’re shooting her and her friends, but it only makes Dawn crack up even more. There’s a scramble on Lucas’s part to find a way to explain who this person is (he has to stop himself from correcting Dawn that he never said it was a girlfriend) and all he can come up with is that they’ll just have to visit Eterna so the four of them can go out sometime.

After a few minutes, Dawn remembers what she wanted to tell them before she walked in on their moment.

“While I was checking on a made up murkrow in Torty’s tree, I saw that they’re doing sleigh rides around the city – do you guys want to check it out?”

They nod that yes; they would love to find an excuse to not be around all of these shareholders and company bigwigs. It’s Lucas who surprises them both and grabs their hands to practically drag them out the door and to the ground level. They pick up their pokémon on the way out because they all silently agree that they won’t be coming back, and head out into the winter air of the city.