"Thank you! Your Pokémon will all be ready to go in just a few hours! Have fun 'til then!"

Nurse Joy's sugary smile could have caused cavities. "Um... sure, we will," James replied halfheartedly as Myrea tugged him through the Pokémon Center door. Jon had already taken off somewhere, leaving the two of them to take all the Pokémon that needed it to the center.

"Ohh James, Celadon is so pretty," Myrea smiled happily, clutching his arm as though she was claiming him as a possession. Several people were staring at them as they walked together up the street; James cleared his throat uncomfortably.

"Myrea, do you think that you could..."

"I'm sorry, am I squeezing too hard? There now, is that better?" James just sighed, deciding it was best to just give up protesting. She would just do as she liked, anyway. Then he remembered what he was going to be doing later today, and his stomach suddenly felt fluttery and tied up in knots at the same time.

God, James, just put it out of your mind. You still have a few hours.

"Thinking about battling again, right? Don't worry.. you'll do fine. There's nothing to be so worried about!" He tried to smile at Myrea's assurance. Of course there was nothing to worry about... no, nothing at all...

"Anyway, where do you suppose Jon has gone off to? I'm not sure it was such a good idea to let him just run off like that..."

"I don't know. He'll turn up sooner or later though, he's really pretty used to taking care of himself."

"I guess so... but a nine year old boy running around alone in a city like this is just asking for trouble, in my opinion."

"Now who's worrying?" James teased. "So where do you want to go?"

"Oh, let's see..." Myrea stopped walking and tapped a finger against her lips as she thought. "There's at least half a dozen flower shops I saw as we were coming in that I'd like to look at... and then there's that perfume store..."

"Flowers? Perfume? I don't know..."

"Oh come on James, it'll be fun!" Giggling, she grabbed his arm again and practically dragged him from shop to shop, somehow managing to embarrass him in every single one. It was in the perfume store, of all places, that they found Jon.

"Hi Jim! Hi Jim's girlfriend!" he yelled over at them from across the room, waving frantically. For some odd reason, he refused to call Myrea anything other than "Jim's girlfriend". Maybe just to be annoying. It certainly worked.

"There you are! We were wondering where you had gotten to... but here?" Myrea grinned down at the boy when they walked over to join him.

"Why not? I was just thinking... what kind of perfume would Jim get for his girlfriend? I got it narrowed down to these two: Daffodil Dream and Vivacious Violet," he announced proudly, holding up two colored glass bottles. "Want to smell them?"

Myrea dutifully smelled them both, while James watched in complete bafflement. Perfume? Why?

"They're both very nice," Myrea affirmed at last, putting one bottle back on the shelf. "But I think I'd go with Vivacious Violet." When she looked at James, her smile turned mischievous. "You boys go outside and wait for me while I buy it."

But standing outside turned out to be rather uncomfortable for James. "I don't know, Jim... you let your girlfriend carry all your money? What, does she manage it better than you?"

"Well, what do you know about perfume?"

"I know enough. Besides, my dad used to buy my mom perfume and it made her happier than she already was. I thought maybe it would work for you, too. You don't want your girlfriend to be happy?"

"It's not that... it's just that she's not my--"

"Okay, I'm back! Our Pokémon should be ready soon, so let's just head back to the Center."

"Cool! I wanna get there first!" Jon cried happily before breaking into a run without much regard for anything that might get in his path. James sighed heavily.

"I wish I knew what that was all about in there," he mumbled as Myrea followed Jon with him at a much slower pace.

"He's just concerned about the two of us, that's all." James decided not to respond to this, but after awhile he realized that she was opening the small paper bag she had brought out from the store. She took the bottle of perfume out, then tossed the bag in the next trash can they passed.

"Here, James," she said, stopping to press the bottle into his hand. "I want you to have this."

James looked confused. "You want me to wear it?"

"No, silly!" she laughed. Her expression grew serious again. "Give it... I want you to give it to your Jessie, when you see her again."

"Oh... I... thank you." James couldn't figure out what else to say. The bottle wasn't very big, so he just slipped it into his pocket. "I... well, I..."

"Your face is cute when it gets all red like that," Myrea interrupted suddenly. She was smiling again, at least.

"I... I..."

"Oh stop stuttering and let's go. You've got a badge to win, right?"

"Right," he finally managed to smile back. The fluttery nervous feeling had miraculously faded already. All he could think about now was getting another step closer to his goal... closer to his friends.

"...and your name, please?"

"It's... heheh... James."

"Um... okay. James, we can schedule you for... well, how does right now sound? There isn't anyone else scheduled for another hour."

"That sounds... heh... oh, that sounds fine."

"Uh... alright. Down the hall and to your left."

"What's the matter with you?" Myrea chided as the two of them headed in the indicated direction. "Why did you keep laughing back there? ...Were you laughing at me?"

Keeping a straight face had been hard, and it was no wonder the receptionist kept looking at him funny. It was just that when that memory had surfaced in his mind... "Heh... no, I wasn't laughing at you... haha... I was laughing at... heh... at Ashley."

"Ashley? Was that the receptionist girl? Do you know her?"

"No, but don't worry about it. I'll tell you all about it someday." It was impossible to keep a smile off his face. Myrea just shook her head.

"Whatever it is, it must be funny..."

His mirth was considerably dampened, however, when they finally reached the main gym area. Jon was waiting in the small audience, like he had said he would, and after giving James a word of encouragement and squeezing his hand gently, Myrea went to join him. Now, of course, the fluttery feeling decided to hit him right in the stomach, and hard. Ignoring it as best he could, he walked to his side of the gym floor, facing Erika.

The black-haired girl had certainly changed little; she was still the prettiest of the female gym leaders, or so James had always thought. He'd just never told anyone that, for obvious reasons.

"You must be James," she smiled at him. "Welcome to the Celadon Gym. I'm sure you'd like to leave here with a Rainbow Badge today, hm?"

Although he wasn't paying much attention to what he said, it must have been satisfactory, for Erika nodded. "Very well, then. It will be a two Pokémon match. Are you ready?"

"I'm ready."

"Alright. For my first Pokémon, I choose Vileplume!"

James almost started feeling sick again. Vileplume brought back some... unpleasant memories. "Victreebel!" he called out, tossing it's ball. It had been a hard decision, choosing it for the first round, but after a lot of thought before the match, he had decided it would probably be best. At least it was behaving now; it just stood calmly after it looked around and saw James, then Jon. Something about the boy seemed to settle it, but James had no idea what.

"Yay! Victreebel!" Jon cheered from the audience. Erika smiled.

"That's a very nice Victreebel," she commented. "It's leaves are just the right shade of green. I can see it's been well taken care of." James just reddened and stammered a thank you at this praise. He had never thought that Erika, of all people, would approve of Victreebel. "But I suppose there will be time for admiring Pokémon after the match. Alright Vileplume, start it off with Stun Spore!"

As the gym leader's Pokémon released the spore, James smiled. What he had been counting on was Victreebel's great speed. That Vileplume wouldn't be moving around much with that heavy head. "Keep out of it's range and send your vine over to Wrap it!"

Victreebel's vine could extend amazingly far, and as it stood just outside the cloud of Stun Spore, it's vine shot through and wrapped tightly around the Vileplume, squeezing it hard.

"Try to shake it off, Vileplume!" It did manage to free itself of the vine, but by that time the spore had dissipated and Victreebel could rush in bodily now to slam into the much slower and out of breath Vileplume.

Erika was still smiling as she returned her Pokémon to it's ball. James figured that must be a good sign. "That seemed easy for your Victreebel. I must admit I have never seen one quite like that... In any case, let's move on."

James opted to call Victreebel back, and this time chose Seel for something different. Seel had become quite well-trained in a short period of time, and had a few good non-water attacks and even Ice Beam to use against any grass Pokémon Erika was likely to pick. He just prayed it wasn't Gloom.

Of course, it was.

"Go, Gloom! Petal Dance!" James took a step back. This was rather unexpected. "Never let the unexpected distract you from a victory", he remembered Myrea telling him once.

Seel was knocked around several times by the force of the attack and was visibly shaken, but now Gloom was confused, and that was where James' chance lay. "Use Headbutt a few times!" he yelled to his Pokémon. Gloom was wobbling about, acting very dizzy as Seel managed to get several good hits in. Erika just stood back and watched silently, knowing there was nothing she could do to control her own Pokémon now.

"Take Down, Seel! Finish it!" For a few seconds, it looked as though Seel would win. But then Gloom started to smell. Bad.

All the humans in the gym had to hold their noses; Seel was so close to the Gloom that it had a hard time functioning. Gloom didn't seem so confused anymore. Hurriedly, James called Seel back, since it obviously wasn't going to do anymore good out there, and considered his options for a split second. He threw out a Pokéball, unable to come to any other decision.

Victreebel screamed as it appeared, but it seemed happy to be out again. James knew that it didn't have a great sense of smell... he'd have to depend on that. "Razor Leaf!"

Victreebel obeyed, and seemed to have no real problem with Gloom's odor. And fortunately, the bad-smelling Pokémon was weakened enough by Seel and it's own confusion that it didn't take long for it to fall over, defeated.

"Well, well," Erika smiled when it was all over. "Your Victreebel proved to be more than a match for me... it's a wonderful Pokémon. Oh, I believe this is yours now." James accepted the Rainbow Badge she handed him as graciously as he was able. But he wanted to laugh, or jump up and down in a most undignified way. As it was, he did start to cry. But from joy, not sadness.

I'm halfway to the League... Jessie... Meowth... I want to see you again...

"Hey Jim, what was the matter with ya? Ya shoulda been happy that you got a badge... but you bawled half the time! Or was the Gloom stink just too much for ya?"

"Don't tease James," Myrea scolded, resting a hand on top of Jon's head as he walked alongside her. James was on her other side as the left Celadon City behind, merely looking amused as he studied the landscape ahead. He was still too happy to be bothered by the boy's sarcasm.

"He wasn't sad... he was just very, very happy," the green-haired girl continued. "Weren't you?" She looked to James for confirmation. He looked at them sideways, then stopped abruptly to get down on one knee in front of Jon, putting his best mock pathetic face on.

"No! I'm so upset! I wanted to lose! Here, take this badge. I didn't even want it!" He held the shiny piece of metal out on his palm, and Jon's eyes lit up in wonder.

"Cool! I can have it? I... hey, that's mean!" James had snatched it away at the last second, and now he stood up and put the badge back where it belonged, grinning devilishly.

"Oh yeah? I can't believe you fell for it."

"Hey! Are you gonna let him get away with that!?" the boy demanded of Myrea. She just giggled.

"Oh, it's alright. It's good to see him in such a good mood. Anyway..." she continued as the trio resumed walking, with Jon grumbling under his breath occasionally. "That seemed like a pretty easy match, didn't it?"

"Yes... it did," James answered reflectively. He had given it a bit of thought, and it had seemed easy. Maybe it wouldn't be so easy from here on out... but he was coming to realize that he didn't care. He knew he would do just about anything within his power to win and reach his ultimate goal... no matter how difficult that turned out to be.

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