Part 3

I had only normal, forgettable dreams for the rest of the night, and in the morning when I woke up James was awake and looking at me.

I took a deep breath. “James, I’m sorry I’ve been treating you so badly.”

“You must need something from me, to actually apologize,” he replied.

I threw a pillow at him. “Stop being such a cynic!”

He giggled. He didn’t ask me what the word meant, either.

“But I do need you,” I went on. And I told him all about Cecilia.

“Jessie, I don’t understand why you’re so sure this isn’t just a weird dream. But I know you’re not crazy, so I believe you.”

“Thanks.”

“But I’m scared, Jesse. You say you’re getting sucked into her life.”

“Well, she’s rich! Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad…” I said flippantly.

“And she has her own James,” James finished bitterly.

Now I had made another mistake. I put my hand on his shoulder. “I don’t want her James,” I said.

We stood there, looking at each other, but neither one of us knew where to take the moment so we turned away and started walking together.

“She does have some things in common with me. When I was little, I got the impression her parents were dead or gone like mine. Maybe it’s an alternate existence or something, where I got to be a rich girl,” I said.

“But you said she was a wimp.”

“Maybe that’s what I would have been, without Pokemon and Team Rocket.”

James laughed. “Now that, I can’t picture for a second. And it could be an alternate universe… but I can barely pronounce that so what do I know.”

We stopped talking then, and began searching for traces of Brock. We found nothing, but late in the afternoon Misty shouted from way up in the hills. She had found Brock’s jacket. A few yards away was the mouth of a cave.

Misty was crying. “We have to go in there… Brock could be stuck in there… why would he be so stupid to explore a cave alone?”

“We’ll have to wait until morning,” said James.

“It’s always dark in there!” said Ash.

“What a brilliant observation!” said James. “It’s going to be dangerous enough as it is.”

We couldn’t stop Ash and Misty from going in. We agreed it would be better for us to wait outside, and they had the grace not to accuse us of cowardice. We tried making elaborate plans to have them take along a rope but nothing seemed practical. They agreed to mark the path they took and come back before dawn.

“What if you don’t come back?” I asked.

Ash glared at me. “That won’t happen! We have Pikachu with us, and Misty’s pokemon… Nothing in that cave can beat us.”

Misty looked up suddenly. “What if Brock is dead in there? What if we end up bringing back his body?”

I put my hand on her shoulder. “You’ve got to be prepared for that.” She nodded.

“I’m going with them,” said Meowth finally.

“Are you crazy?” I asked him.

He shrugged. “Nah, I just don’t want to wait out here… anyway, if they run into any Pokemon they might need me to translate or something…”

“Meowth the brave…” I said sarcastically. But I didn’t mean it, and he seemed to realize that. He just gave me a little smile.

James and I started to settle down for the night.

I lay down but I didn’t want to close my eyes. “I don’t want to go to sleep, I’d almost rather be in that cave than deal with Cecilia again.”

I started to cry a little bit. I felt awful, not knowing what was going to happen in my own mind.

James reached over and put his arm around me. He hadn’t done that recently, especially when I had started picking on him so much. I found it very comforting, and I couldn’t help cuddling up against him a little.

He whispered in my ear. “Just relax, you’re stronger than she is… In the morning you’ll wake up and maybe the twerps will be back with Brock.”

I closed my eyes, but when I opened them I was looking at Cecilia in the mirror again.