Aaron and Grey - a Pokémon story

Cleaned Up

The boy continued rambling on and on about the battle until Aaron finally interrupted. "What about your Riolu?" he asked. "It needs some training. It leveled up a bit from the last fight and it has good moves, but it still needs a bit of help." The boy stopped, and he looked down at his faithful companion. He was a great friend, but Aaron was right; he needed to train it some more. "Alright," he said, "but how?" "I'm glad you asked," Aaron responded. "It gives me a chance to show you some other features of your new pokédex. Hand it here for a second, and come over here so you can see." The boy obliged, giving him the small device, and walking over to stand behind him. "I'll need to give you a bag soon," he said almost to himself, "but anyway, just press these buttons and go into your key items." The boy watched intently. "Now, scroll down to the experience share, and tap it to turn it on. I thought I had it on last battle, but even if I did, it wouldn't have done anything at the time." "Well, what does it do?" The boy asked. "It make it so all pokémon in your party, the ones not on the field that is, get experience from a battle, even if they never participated. In other words, you could use only Ninjask and Riolu would still level up."

"But enough about that," he continued. "Let's get you some new clothes and a bag, or at least wash what you have, you have dirt stains everywhere," he leaned in, "and you kind of smell." The boy looked down at himself, and sighed. He knew Aaron was right, and he started thinking about the last time he had been wearing different clothes. It was about a month ago, but he didn't like the shirt; it had holes everywhere, so he just wore his old shirt most of the time. The boy finished his meal, Aaron waved at Roger, and they were off.

They reached the boutique with relative ease, until they came to the door. It appeared to be locked, and they couldn't get in. "Ugh," Aaron groaned. "They always do this." "Do what?" the boy asked. Aaron was trying to look through the window. "They don't let you in unless you have 'enough style'," and it gets annoying. "Hey!" he suddenly yelled. "I'm just trying to get some new clothes for the kid, and if you don't let us in, You'll never get my money again!" Loud footsteps were suddenly heard from inside, and the door opened quickly. "We're truly sorry Mr. Azure,"

"Azure? odd name," the boy thought. Then he remembered that colored named weren't uncommon.

"but it's not uncommon for kids to try and sneak into our store." "Yeah, yeah, you know, you'd think you'd recognize me easier considering I still dress the same way. All white. Yellow flares." "Yes yes, and we can't say thank you enough for your patronage Mr. Azure," the employee continued. "Please, call me Aaron," he interrupted. "Yes sir Mr. Aaron." He rolled his eyes. "Good enough, now," he looked down at the boy, "Clothes or hair first?" "Oh, hair of course," the employee said, "otherwise the dirt gets on our clothes." Aaron glared at the woman. "...which, of course wasn't an insult, I just-" "You can stop now," Aaron butted in again. Just take him to the back corner. Very short seems the most fitting." "Yes of course Mr-" Aaron glared at her. "Uhh...Aaron." He smiled, and looked down at the boy. "Go on," he coaxed. "She's a bit absentminded sometimes, but she means well, and is a pretty good stylist if I say so myself." The boy looked up at Aaron and his haircut. His hair was all white, with two small yellow streaks in his hair that just barely hanged down in front of his ears. Other than that it was really short, and was shaven in the back, and what he had was as stark white as his clothes. "I'll start looking for some clothes to start with, alright?" Aaron said as he walked away. The boy then followed the employee to the back of the bottom floor, and set his bag gently on the floor, in such a way that the Riolu, who was mostly looking around, could see him.

"Oh, is that a pokémon?" the employee suddenly exclaimed, seeing his bag on the floor. "I'm sorry, but all pokémon are required to stay in their pokéballs, so as not to get fur or other substances on the clothes." The boy then looked at the Riolu and walked over. "Listen Ronnie," he whispered, "you'll have to stay in my bag while we're in here." The Riolu looked back, hurt and then ducked back into the small, red sack. "It's only while we're in here," he whispered again, then went back to his chair.

"Do you not have a pokéball for it?" the woman asked. "No," he responded. "Well, dear me, you'll need to fix that. Even if they don't like to stay in their pokéball you should at least get them one. Wait a second," she said." Ugh, I'm such a scatterbrain, let's wash your hair first, come over here." The boy obliged, and he allowed the woman to lead him into a different chair, one with no head, but instead a plastic sink. "Lean back so your neck is in this crook here," and she pointed to it. The boy followed her directions, and she began using the sprayer to wash his mangy hair of all the dirt and grime, built up over years of having no home. He could actually feel the dirt getting unstuck from his hair. "My, your hair is dirty. Doesn't help that you have a lot of it." The boy said nothing, knowing from her tone of voice that Aaron was correct, and she was truly kind-hearted. She then shampooed his hair, about 3 times by his count, and then conditioned it twice. "There," she finally said turning off the sprayer, "all done with your hair. Let me just..." She trailed off and reached for a washrag, which she then wet, and lightly rubbed his face with. It was sudden, and it scared him, but then he understood what was going on, and let her clean his face. "This feels nice," he thought. She lifted it off, and said he could lean up, which he did, for although the clean feeling was nice, his neck was starting to hurt. He watched her wring out the rag, and brown water dripped from it. She led him back the the chair, again fastened the smock, and started brushing his hair. It was an endeavor, to say the least, and a painful one at that. He didn't complain, for she was truly trying not to hurt him, but she was right, he had a lot of hair. When she said she finished brushing, and as she struggled to find a comb in her cluttered workspace, for she said that's what she was looking for, he looked at himself in the mirror for the first time. His skin was dark, but not incredibly so. His hair was extremely curly, but because he had let it grown out so far, it was falling to his shoulders, though it was also growing out to the sides, due to said curly...ness. His nose was of a normal size, maybe slightly small, and he had small and thin lips, but his eyes were huge, and a deep brown. He was also surprised at the fact that his ears were of normal size making his face practically equally proportioned almost, his large eyes balancing out his small lips and nose. "You know what, screw the comb, I can go ahead and start lopping parts off anyways, if very short is what you want of course." The boy nodded. "If you want, I can just shave it, it'll make it much easier to deal with," she continued. "On my part too," she whispered. "Sounds good," the boy said. He was sick of his hair being long and stupid-looking. "It doesn't fit my face," he thought. "Nice," the woman said. "I'm just going to start by cutting parts off so I can shave it easier, alright?" She asked. "No problem," he responded. He just wanted it gone, so she did. Since she was cutting without any pattern or form, it didn't take very long before she got it short enough. "I think it's good, now where's my razor...?" The woman once again looked through her desk, but she found the razor with ease. The shaving was slow going, but when she finished, he liked it. It emphasized his eyes. "All done," she said, sighing. "You really do have a lot of hair, kid. Well, now that that's done, let's go back out and get you some new clothes." She undid his smock, and led him out of the back room. He found Aaron with a bunch of shirts on one arm, and pants on the other, the hangers making thin silver stripes on his sleeves. "I said very short, but dang," Aaron said. "It suits you though. Anyway, I've picked out a couple of things, and I want you to pick the ones you like best." He handed the pants to the woman, whom he called Sharon, and they began with shirts.

When it was through, they had picked out the Grey plaid shirt combo, some simple black pants, a black vinyl bag, some grey sneakers, and a grey logo cap. He was looking around at some of the other stuff there when Sharon told them the total.
"₽241,800 is your total," she said nonchalantly. The boy almost gasped aloud. He had never seen that kind kf money before, and he watched as Aaron paid the price like it was just pocket change. He resolved to ask about that later. Nevertheless, the exchange was pleasant, and they left without any confrontation. "Have a nice day!" Sharon called at them.
He couldn't wait to get...where was Aaron even staying?