Fear - An Aureliashipping and Lonashipping Story

-17-

A deafening silence filled the dining room as the four teens sat staring at each other. Gladion and Moon stared at the untouched pizza in front of them while Lillie looked on with her arms folded. The only sounds that anyone could hear were the sounds of chewing and swallowing, which came from Ash and Pikachu, who were devouring their seventh slices of pizza...or was it eight?

Hobbes quietly poured more water into everyone's glass. He observed everyone's faces and finally decided to break the silence. "Have I missed something?"

"No," came Lillie's short answer. "Nothing at all."

"Alright then," Hobbes answered, unconvinced. "I'll just be in my room then." He left the table, knowing the children wouldn't speak their minds until they were alone.

"Sooooooo." Moon began. "I know what you're thinking-"

"Gladion, why didn't you tell me that you two were a thing?" Lillie asked with a sad face. "Why are you keeping all of these things from me?"

"Because I'm not keeping anything from you! It isn't like that!" Gladion snarled back.

"I thought it was?" Moon replied back with a confused face.

Gladion slouched back in his chair with a deep sigh. "It went like this..."

~~~Flashback~~~

"Talk about what?" Gladion said, trying to stall.

Moon wasn't having any of it. "Do you really not like me that much?" she asked. "I know I was being a bit forward with that...you know, kiss but-"

Gladion remembered that Moon didn't know that he didn't know she tried to kiss him at first. He got an idea. "...What kiss?" he asked, feigning confusion.

Moon gave a confused look. "What do you mean, 'what kiss'?"

Perfect! Gladion thought to himself. "I mean what kiss? What are you talking about?" he asked again. Moon folded her arms. "So you mean you don't know about how I tried to kiss you before we got to the Pokémon Center, you don't know how much pain you were putting me through by letting me think you were straight up rejecting me, and you just happen to act all weird for a while."

"You tried to kiss me?!"

"Gladion, you're an even worse liar than you are at socializing with people." Moon scolded him. Gladion dropped the act. "What do you mean?"

"That little girl you talked to happened to be someone I used to babysit for when I moved to Melemele," Moon explained. "Her mom called me to apologize for her behavior after she ranted about you to her."

Gladion's face got even more pale. Busted. "I...um..."

"Gladion..."

The boy sighed. "Alright. I really didn't know at first. But I thought if we never talked about it, it would cause less problems between us." he admitted.

Moon stood in silence for a few seconds. "Would you have kissed back?" she asked suddenly.

Gladion didn't know what to say. He just sat on his bed stared at the ground.

"Gladion?"

Gladion turned his head to see Moon sitting next to him.

"Huh? How did you get there so fast?"

Moon ignored the question and leaned in to gently press her lips onto his.

~~~Back to the present~~~

"And that's when you found us." Gladion finished.

Lillie leaned back in her chair. "Okay...I'm just glad you didn't try to hide anything from me."

"I don't think it matters." Ash suddenly spoke, looking up from his slice of pizza.

The three other teens turned to look at him. "I mean, if you two are happy together, then I'm happy for you. If it's nothing, then we shouldn't make that big a deal out of it." Ash finished. He began savagely tearing into his pizza again.

Lillie thought about what Ash just said, seeing the logic in his words. She was focusing too much on her own happiness rather than Gladion's. By trying to figure out the new person he became, she was missing all of the positivity he could express. "So...are you two...?"

Moon looked to Gladion, not sure herself. Gladion stared back at into her eyes and searched his heart for a few seconds.

"I guess we are."

—-

Lillie tucked herself into her bed, preparing to turn it for the night.

The teens had talked until the early hours of the morning, happy for the new couple and managing to forget the threat of the Ultra Beasts and Lusamine, just for a little while.

Lillie reflected on the day that just ended. Gladion coming back, the attack on the school, and Gladion's new love. She realized he had quite the eventful life.

Still, she couldn't shake one worrying thought from her head. From what Gladion and Moon told her, their relationship up to this point hasn't been the most stable. Their ups were matched with their emotional downs. She truly was happy for her antisocial, cold brother, and how he found someone who could love him for who he was.

Even so, she hoped the relationship she wanted to have with Ash didn't play out like Gladion's.

How strange that she was trying to learn love, and her first lesson was how not to approach it.

—-
Wow I actually wrote during summer vacation

I need to get more consistent.

Thanks for reading!