Blue, but your Mom calls you

Settled into the comfortable chair and with a plate overflowing with food, you start to chow down as you wait for the next match to start. You tune out the announcer while you start to eat your first real meal since yesterday. That is until you hear the word “Blue” come from the television. You stop shoving food in your face for long enough to pay attention to the TV screen which is showing a zoomed in image of Blue standing in the challenger’s box.

“Looks like we have another Rookie challenger from Pallet Town folks! Hopefully he gives as good of a show as the last Rookie. Oh, it even looks like they have the same last name…” You don’t hear what else the announcer might say as you hear your PokeGear start to ring, drawing your attention away from the TV to your pack.

You consider ignoring the call, guessing who is calling. But you know you can’t avoid this conversation forever. Reaching into your pack you pull out your PokeGear and you feel a spike of anxiety in your stomach as you see the caller I.D. confirm your suspicions. You take a deep breath to try and calm your nerves before answering the call. “Hi Mom.”

You can hear your Mom practically yelling into the phone. “Amber! Thank Arceus you picked up! What is going on?!” Her voice is so loud that you move the PokeGear away from your ear, her shouting physically hurting your ear.

You wait until your mom stops yelling into the phone before responding, barely able to follow her barrage of questions thrown your way as your attention is split between her yelling and you trying to watch Blue’s match.

You try to hide your annoyance when you respond, you really do. “Oh, I’m fine Mom thanks for asking.” But your voice drips with sarcasm. Serves her right though, Madison was ruining your post victory good mood.

“Don’t take that tone with me Amber!” Thankfully this isn’t a video call because you can’t resist rolling your eyes. “Answer the question!?”

Before answering you something crunchy from your snack tray and take a loud noisy bite from it, just to annoy her. “A lot of things have happened Mom. You are going to have to be more specific.” Seriously, what did she think you were, a psychic?

“Why did the announcer say your name was Amber OAK!?”

Is that what has her all upset? “I mean, isn’t it pretty obvious Mom?” You take a moment to take a glance at the screen and shove a few chips into your mouth. When you do answer you do so with your mouth full, hoping she could hear you, “We go married.” Were you being petty and immature? Yes. But Madison yelling at you had ruined your post victory good mood, you hadn’t gotten a good night’s sleep (probably hung over), hungry, and she was distracting you from watching Blue’s match.

“Why would you marry an Oak!?!?” You held the PokeGear away from your ear as your Mom somehow started yelling even louder into the phone. Seriously, you figured that she would be upset you didn’t tell her. But she seems more angry than upset.

“Is that what you’re upset about? Not ‘are you ok’, or ‘why wasn’t I invited’, or ‘when’, or ‘how are you’?”

“Answer the question Amber!?”

“Well, why didn’t YOU tell me about the Trainer Submission rules!?” That shut her up. “Guess who I had to learn THAT bit of information from!?” You wait a few seconds to see if Mom has a reply. When she doesn’t say anything you continue, “I had to learn about it from fucking Blue! Do you have any idea how awkward that was?!” How terrified you were, and honestly still are.

When Madison speaks, most of the anger is gone from her voice. Instead, she sounds almost like she is panicking. “Amber, you can’t trust anything that boy says…”

“Oh, don’t worry, MOM, I looked it up.” Ok, you hadn’t looked it up per say. But over the last few days you and Melody had plenty of time for ‘girl talk’ to discuss a lot of different topics. This being one of them. Melody had been borderline horrified that you had been ignorant on this particular topic. “But that still doesn’t explain why YOU didn’t tell me!” Madison might not be angry anymore, but you were now angry enough for the both of you.

For a moment both of you are silent, the only sound coming from the TV which is still showing Blue’s fight. You glance at the TV and see that Blue has a Charmeleon out and seems to be doing well. He must have evolved it while you were training with Melody. Your attention is brought away from the TV when your mom finally speaks up. “I didn’t want you to know Amber.”

“Know what? How to take care of myself as a Trainer?!” You hear your mom mumble something into the phone but can’t make it out. “Well?!”

“Amber, calm down…”

“NO! I won’t ‘calm down’ Mom!” Who was she to get upset about hiding things from who when she was just as guilty. Even more guilty. You could only guess at what else she wasn’t telling you.

“I can’t talk to you when you’re like this Amber”

“You were the one who called me, Mom.”

For a few moments neither of you say anything, the only sound being the TV announcer. “Oh, it looks like the Rookie managed to scrap out a victory! I bet the bookies are having a field day over this one folks.”

You glance at the TV and sure enough, you see the camera zooming in on Blue who is walking towards Brock. It seems like he won his match. “Look Mom, I’ve got to go.”

A part of you expects Madison to start arguing with you again. But instead, you hear her sigh in defeat, “We’ll talk later Amber.”

“Bye Mom.” After you end the call, you stare at your PokeGear for a few seconds. “Well fuck, that could not have gone worse...” You didn’t know how you had expected the conversation to go, but you hadn’t expected it to go that badly.

You almost throw your PokeGear at the wall in frustration but manage to resist the urge. Instead, you put it back into your travel bag. You do grab your plate of food and toss that at the wall, screaming in frustration as the plate shatters into pieces.

Staring nothing, you fall back onto the chair, exhausted, confused, angry, and full of regret, you stare at the ceiling. You had known the conversation with your mom was going to be difficult, but you hadn’t expected her to yell at you, or to yell back at her. A part of you knew that you were stressed out and that the last week had been a stressful emotional roller coaster. You mom calling you and immediately yelling at you had simply been too much and you snapped.

You pull your legs up onto the chair, wrapping your arms around your knees while you hide your face in your thighs. You tell yourself you won’t cry, today is supposed to be a good day. You earned your first badge and from the little you managed to catch on the TV it seems that Blue won as well. Even Melody was fighting today, a sight you were looking forward to.

You sense the chair you are sitting in move a bit. Glancing over your right you see your Bulbasaur has woken up and crawled onto the arm rest. As she curls up next to you, you start to rub the top of her head. Talking to yourself as much as your Pokemon, you say “Everything is fine, everything is going to be all right.”

Maybe if you keep telling yourself that, you will start to believe it.

Author's Notes: Well, THAT took a lot longer than I expected to write. On one hand I wanted to have Amber and Madison argue, but I had a LOT of trouble having the argument not feel THAT ****. I honestly feel that the argument was still kind of ****, but it wasn't getting much better.