Humiliation

Our new plan for capturing Pikachu involved my Weepinbell and a helicopter. We would fly over the twerps in the helicopter and drop the pokemon out. Weepinbell would float gently to the ground, stunning the twerps as it went down. Then we'd capture the rat and escape in the helicopter.

Jesse and I were very proud of this plan and Mondo was thrilled to get a helicopter for us. I don't know what that kid tells the boss, because I can't imagine Giovanni likes us wasting this kind of money.

Anyway, the plan didn't work out. Big surprise. We miscalculated our speed or something, and Weepinbell fell like a rock. The twerps ran from it screaming in terror, which was pretty funny, but they didn't drop Pikachu so that didn't do us any real good. Then we had to land the thing and look for my pokemon.

The good news was that we didn't have to scrape Weepinbell up off the ground. Like us, it seemed to survive falls pretty well. The bad news was that the twerps figured out what was going on and came over to stare and laugh at us. Misty, who must have been in a mean mood that day, said, "Gee, I didn't know James was that stupid."

Jesse took the opportunity to inform Misty that yes, I was that stupid. Then Jesse hit me in the head with the fan. I sat on the ground next to Meowth and clutched my head for a while. It hadn't really hurt, but I was humiliated.

"I wish she'd knock that off," I muttered.

"You should be used to it by now, James," said Meowth.

I considered hitting Meowth in the head but I decided I'd caused enough pokemon suffering for one day.

Then we went over to the pokemon center to get help for Weepinbell. Meowth went off to scout out a place for us to stay. I wanted to ask him who would rent rooms to a talking Pokemon. But he hates Pokemon centers so I just let him go.

I had to explain to Nurse Joy what had happened. I tried to make it sound as if it had been an accident but that didn't work very well. She lost that dippy smile they constantly have and stared at me like I was crazy.

I sat down next to Jesse. "Why did you have to humiliate me in front of the twerps?" I asked.

"I don't know; I hate for Misty to think I have even worse companions than she does."

"Well, I can't speak for Meowth, but I'm insulted. I mean, I'd never compare you to Misty."

"You wouldn't? I wonder sometimes if I was like her when I was younger."

"Not even on a bad hair day, Jesse."

"I've never had a bad hair day, James."

"Right."

Finally Nurse Joy called for us to tell us that Weepinbell would be fine. "You and your wife can go home now."

Jesse burst into hysterical laughter. "He's not my husband!" She was laughing so hard she could barely breathe.

I didn't think it was THAT funny. "All right, fine, let's go," I said. "Nurse Joy doesn't really care."

We met Meowth outside the Pokemon Center; he had found us two adjoining rooms in a motel. Jesse laughed all the way to the motel. Finally I asked her, "Am I that pathetic?"

She looked at me with some sympathy for once. "No, of course not, it's just, I mean, we've never even kissed... oh never mind."

I always thought I made my affection for Jesse embarrassingly obvious, but evidently I hadn't. But I didn't think I had the nerve to change that now.

Finally we got settled in for the night. Meowth shared my room and he began snoring right away. I sat up for quite a while, thinking about what Jesse had said.

Finally I got up and knocked on her door. She opened it.

"The reason I've never kissed you," I said, "is that I don't want to get hit in the head with a mallet."

"Have you been thinking about that ever since I said it?" she asked.

"No!" I lied.

"Well don't you think it's too late now?" she said, and shut the door.

I sat down on the bed, wondering why I had messed up again. Was that it? Would there be no way to make myself matter to Jesse the way I wanted to? Was there any chance that she would change her mind? Maybe she was just mean, and I was better off this way. But that was hard to believe, considering how I felt about her most of the time.

The next day we picked up Weepinbell at the Pokemon Center and decided to chase down the twerps again.

"Maybe if we took the balloon, and had Weezing do a gas attack on them..." I said.

"That's never worked before... but we've never taken them by surprise with Weezing before," said Meowth. It's worth a try."

"Let's camouflage the balloon too," I said.

"As what, a cloud?" asked Jesse.

I blushed. "I don't know, let's just not make it so obvious. And let's go at night while they're asleep."

We all agreed that that was a good idea, but that left us a few hours to kick around. We contacted Mondo and told him to send another balloon made of dark cloth, then Jesse and I went for a walk.

"I'm sorry if I said anything stupid last night," I said finally. Really, I thought she was the one who was acting mean, but I didn't want there to be bad feelings between us.

"I'm sorry I humiliated you," she said finally. That was something I had never heard before, and it made me feel good.

"I do the best I can, you know," I said. "And I do..."

"What?"

I wanted to say, "I do care about you," but it sounded too mushy. Finally I said, "I do hate it when you make fun of me."

She just nodded.

That night we all got in to the balloon, and started going as low as we could over Ash, Misty, and Tracey. They didn't wake up; I couldn't believe our luck. I leaned over the edge of the balloon basket, holding Weezing out. I was about to whisper "gas attack" when...

I fell out of the balloon. I really did. I couldn't believe it. I must have spent years in this thing, and I picked now to fall out. I screamed all the way down; I couldn't help it. Then I screamed some more when I landed, half out of pain and half to let Meowth and Jesse know I wasn't dead.

Unfortunately the twerps woke up and crowded around me to stare. Since I was obviously not hurt badly, they started laughing and pointing at me.

Jesse and Meowth landed the balloon, and Jesse came storming up looking furious. I began to cower and cover my head. It hurt enough already.

But Jesse screamed at the twerps instead of me. "Leave him alone!" The twerps backed off looking scared. Jesse helped me up and led me over to the basket. I looked at her with gratitude.

Meowth flew the basket while Jesse and I sat down.

"Don't bother saying it, even I know that was stupid."

Jesse blushed. "Well, you didn't mean to do it"

I didn't know what to say then. Eventually I said, "What you said last night... is it really too late?"

She knew what I meant. She looked over at Meowth to see if he was listening, then winked at me. "Well, let's just say... you should stop worrying about the mallet."

I smiled, and we flew on.