You would think that resigning yourself to waiting would make you become accustomed to it, but waiting gets only harder for Red. Emiko seems to notice this during the time they spend together and tries to teach Red a meditation technique she thinks is helpful for stress-relief. She even tricks Red into it by using phrases like 'a trainer whose mind is clear sees the battle path ahead, unobstructed.' But even when Red meditates, he quickly finds his focus breaking, his frustration growing, his mind shifting to thoughts of Blue. Sometimes, when it's early on in his loss of focus, it's not even Blue, exactly, who he thinks of, it's just the color that breaks through: a flash of the sky in-between clearing his mind, and, too often to be waved off as insignificant, the Dewford shoreline. The waves are an impermanent but perfect blue—coloration dictated by the lighting of the moment, the way the sun shines that day. And the sound of their ebb and flow—the motion ceaselessly caressing the shore, almost beckoning to it—instills in Red a profounder sense of ease than his focus during meditation has ever achieved. But it's not Dewford he longs for. He knows that. He's been there, and he's done that. It's Blue. And the Dewford shoreline is merely his mind's transition to that...space within itself that Blue, as intangible as he is in Red's life, occupies. Trying not to think of Blue, Red reasons, is like trying to hold your breath.
It's usually at this point in his meditations that his impatience returns with a vicious edge, and he shakes the activity off altogether, more perturbed by it than his resting level of frustration. In fact, he does so presently.
Emiko notices. He supposes that it's possible his impatience has become as apparent as her own with her pokégear used to be.
"You're doing it wrong," she sighs, with an air of long-suffering about her.
They're in the nature reserve that the pokémon breeder's calls a backyard. The space breathes with life, teeming with pokémon who are as carefree as the grass is green. The landscaping is beautiful: trees and flowers abound, and the centerpiece seems to be a small waterfall over rocks flowing peacefully into a sprawling pond. It should be the perfect place to relax, but the clean, blue waters only have Red's shoulders rising with tension.
Red says nothing to Emiko's comment. He thinks it's pretty clear that he sucks at meditation by this point.
"Like right now," Emiko suddenly turns to him with an accusing finger, "Even right now, I can tell you're trying to do it right, aren't you?"
Red furrows his brow at her in a mixture of confusion and irritation. She does realize that doesn't make any sense, doesn't she?
Emiko lets the accusing finger drop. "Meditation can be done incorrectly only when one tries to do it correctly. I know I told you it's about clearing your mind and relaxing, but I didn't mean that it was about emptying your mind. It's more about allowing your mind to wander without judgment. It's about familiarizing yourself with your mind and achieving stress relief by stripping away the labels you have placed on your life that have caused your stress in the first place," Emiko's tone changes then, transitions from a calm lecture to a pointed interrogation, "What were you thinking about just before you quit this time?"
Red pauses for the span of several moments, shutting his eyes obstinately. He could pretend it's because he's gathering his thoughts—does he want to answer her truthfully? for example—but his mind is empty of anything so articulate at this moment. What he is doing, is mastering his feelings. It's not that he's already decided to answer her truthfully and is stressed out by that, it's more...Well, maybe he has already decided to answer her truthfully, but it's more like the first he's hearing of it is from his emotions, not his thoughts, and he needs a moment. When he feels prepared to proceed, Red opens his bag and pulls out Blue's first letter by way of answer. Emiko knows him well-enough by now to know that he's no spokesman or anything.
YOU ARE READING
Letters to You (RedxBlue)
FanfictionAlola!Red and Blue have never met and just became penpals. Read to see how their story turns out. Excerpt: "Trying not to think of Blue, Red reasons, is like trying to hold your breath."
