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Lost Love
by Rocket Jesse
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Chapter 1~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jesse and James walked huddled together under their umbrella. It was the only one they had (besides Meowth's Pokémon umbrella), and neither wanted their hair to get wet in the rain. They had no choice.
Their umbrella just happened to be a particularly small one, designed to be used by only one person at a time.
This situation would make most people uncomfortable. The way they had to hold on to each other so tightly made them look like nothing less than a young couple in love. Jesse and James had no complaints. Maybe that's because they *were* in love.
The two were so tuned in to each other that they were able to walk without the slightest misstep, while any other two people would trip every few paces..
A bolt of lightning crashed to the ground, not one-hundred feet away. The unbelievably loud clap of thunder caused them to involuntarily tighten their already beyond firm embrace and pull each other even closer.
Jesse would never let on that she was afraid of a little lightning, or anything else that females were stereotypically scared of. She didn't want to be treated like a poor, defenseless, weak girl, and she had always prided herself in being strong and able to withstand anything a male could and more.. For these reasons, she mentally chided herself for clutching James as though he could make all her fear go away.
The problem with that was that if she *did* hold him close enough, her fear *would* go away.
James was surprised that she squeezed his waist harder than she had been when the lightning touched down. He knew it was a rare occurrence to be able to hold her so close while she held him just as hard, so he reveled in the moment and tried not to question her action.
"Hey, look!" yelled Meowth. "It's a cave!" He pointed towards a hill with a big opening that was barely visible through all the vegetation and downpour. The cat had a good eye.
"Let's go for it," Jesse replied, not really putting her heart into it. She really liked being in James' arms, even though she would never admit to it. She wasn't ready to give it up just yet.
It took the three of them about five minutes to make it through the rain and bushes and trees to the cave entrance. The interior was large enough for Jesse and James to stand in, so they went inside.
Once out of the storm, they stood like they had been a few seconds longer than was necessary, neither quite willing to give up the contact of their bodies. Reluctantly, each drew their arms back to their own sides and threw the umbrella to the floor.
"Wow," James observed. "It looks like this passageway goes really far into the cave."
"As long as we're here, we might as well explore." Jesse reached into her left boot, and pulled out a pack of matches. "Who knows what kind of Pokémon could be lurking in the shadows?"
"Here, Jesse, I'll break off the stem of our umbrella and we can use it as a torch."
She nodded and he proceeded to snap it off.
"You know, you guys are gonna need to put some cloth on that or it's not going to work," Meowth informed the two humans.
Jesse and James looked at one another, surprised for a brief moment. She realized that it would have to be her jacket -- it was the most appropriately-sized piece of clothing that either of them could remove and still be adequately dressed.
It was fine with her. She pulled it off to reveal her black, sleeveless top.. There were about eight more in her possession. Plus, there was never any harm in showing a little more skin. She tossed it to James, who looked a bit stunned. She smiled to herself.
Jesse's white jacket hit him in the face before he shot his arms out to grab it on its way to the ground. He noticed (among other things) that it smelled like her. Indulging in the sight of his partner for a few more seconds, he tore his gaze away to wrap her jacket around the umbrella stick. If he'd stared at her for just half a second longer, he was sure she would've smacked him.
Jesse lit a match and held it to their makeshift torch when it was ready. James carried it and they followed him into the dark recesses of the cave.
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Ten minutes and a few twists and turns later, they'd arrived in a large cavern.
Jesse and James were sitting against a wall next to each other, both pretty sleepy. Meowth used the torch to look for ancient markings on the wall.
"It's getting a little cold in here." She shivered and hugged herself, missing the jacket that had covered her now bare upper arms.
"Yeah," was all he could say. He wanted to hold her more than anything, but was afraid she wouldn't like it and slap him. So, he opted for the next best thing: he gave her his jacket.
Jesse didn't quite know what to say. She was tempted to tell him thanks, but she didn't want to get all soft on him. She resisted the urge to tell him she didn't want his big ugly stinky jacket; she hated how she always said something mean to him when she meant to express what she really felt. Plus, the jacket wasn't ugly *or* stinky.
Finally, she smiled, took it and slipped it on. And it was definitely not stinky. Actually, it smelled good, but the scent wasn't the only nice thing about it.
The sight of James in his tight black tee shirt was quite lovely. She drank it in for as long as she dared, tracing his musculature with her eyes.
Worried James might have caught her, she looked at Meowth for a distraction.
He turned out to be more than just a distraction; he'd found something big and heavy and was trying to move it. She got up, curious, and aided him in moving the stone. "There could be rare Pokémon in there," she pointed out as her reason for helping. It turned out that her help did the trick.
Meowth and Jesse had only moved the huge rock about six inches, but a sliver of an opening was visible. A tiny Pokémon hopped out.
"Zubat!" it greeted them.
"It's a Zubat?" James asked from across the room.
"Yeah, just a baby." She held her hand out to it, and it hopped on. "We should capture it."
"It looks tasty!" Meowth blurted out.
"Shut up! I think it looks cute." She bit the finger of her right glove and pulled her arm out of it so she could pet it. When she reached her hand out, it bit her. "Ow!" She recoiled and dropped it on the ground, where it scurried back to where it came from.
"What's wrong, Jesse?" James picked himself up and walked over to her.
Jesse held her finger up to him, which had a trickle of blood running down the side. "The little twerp bit me." Standing up so she could be next to James, she noticed something was wrong; she felt awfully dizzy.
"You scared it away!" Such an insensitive comment could only come from Meowth. He noticed, along with James, that something was very wrong with Jesse when she failed to respond threateningly to him.
She held her hand to her temple. A strange lightheaded sensation came over her. "Something's... not right..."
"Jesse! What is it?" James grabbed her arms. She looked severely unsteady; he was just trying to hold her up.
"Need to... lie... down..." Her hands clutched his shoulders so she wouldn't fall.
While James eased her down to the ground as gently as he could, Meowth stood over her with the fire.
"Jesse! Snap out of it!"
"James... "
Her eyes closed and she laid still; unconscious.
Chapter 2~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lines of worry etched his young face as he stroked hers gently, willing her to awaken in his arms. Meowth had long since left for help, and James now had Jesse on his lap in a futile attempt to revive her.
The small amount of poison a Zubat usually releases into its victims (not to mention a baby Zubat) shouldn't have had such a drastic effect. She had not moved a muscle in what seemed like forever, but her cheeks were now flushed with color and she felt as if she had a high-grade fever.
All the while, he softly sang to her and used some of her favorite lyrics to tell her everything would be alright, even if he didn't really believe it. He wanted to with all his heart, though.
Because he had not taken his eyes from her face since she'd fainted, he caught the movement right away: her lashes fluttered.
"Jesse?" he asked, trying to keep the fear from his voice and his care in it..
When she spoke, she just barely whispered. "Hmm... what happened?"
Relieved that she was awake, but still not letting himself believe she had recovered, he told her, "You fainted, Jesse. Don't you remember? That baby Zubat bit you. How do you feel? We really should get you to a hospital." Only after the string of words left his mouth did he recognize how scared he sounded.
A few more seconds later, her eyes snapped wide open and she became fully aware of her surroundings. Or so it seemed. "Um... what did you say my name was?"
Thinking nothing of her query, he answered it without question. "Jesse."
"Jesse? And... and what's your name?"
This one frightened him. Her normally crystalline blue eyes were shrouded with confusion and fear. "Jesse, don't you remember anything?!"
"I... um... no, I don't. Nothing."
"You don't know who I am?"
"I don't even know who *I* am!" The panic in her voice was worse than he ever remembered hearing.
He could tell that the pallor of his skin was turning white. Here she was, his best friend and his true love, sitting in his lap, scared and without a clue of anything they had ever been through together.
Hoping that her amnesia was only temporary, he hoisted her off himself. "We've got to get you to a hospital -- that Zubat that bit you may have had a disease or something. With any luck, you'll have your memories back once the doctors figure it out."
Standing up, he saw that Jesse still looked pretty sick, so he extended a hand to her to help her up. Normally, she wouldn't have taken it, but he decided to try his luck.
She took it.
He grabbed the torch and led her out of the cave. They took a few wrong turns, but they eventually made their way to the wet forest outside.
It had stopped raining, but the sky was still particularly gray and it looked as though it could start again at any time. This was when Jesse decided to start asking questions.
"What did you say your name was, again?"
Squinting at the trails around them, he spotted Meowth's footprints in the wet mud and followed them with her.
"My name? Just call me Eric," he said on a whim. He liked his middle name more than he let on, and thought it might be interesting if Jesse called him that.
"Eric. Nice to... uh... meet you."
Suddenly angry at her total loss of any knowledge of him, he said through gritted teeth, "Pleasure's all mine."
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His dull jaded eyes bore holes in the wall of the hospital waiting room while he tried to keep his emotions in check.
The doctors had been performing tests on Jesse for hours, now, and he hadn't heard a word from any of them. Nightmarish scenarios consequently ran through his mind, even though he did his best to stop them.
What if she never gets her memories back? What if she's bedridden for the rest of her life? What if she goes into a coma?
What if she never wakes up?
"Here. I brought you some coffee."
James looked up to see Meowth handing him a steaming styrofoam cup with a rare glint of empathy in his eyes. Taking the hot drink, he used body language to tell the cat that he wasn't in the mood to talk.
When Jesse and James had been following Meowth's tracks for a mile or so, they'd met up with him and a medical crew in an ambulanceThe whole time, Jesse had been asking James questions about herself, about himself, about Team Rocket... but never once about their relationship. He assumed that she had seen herself in a man's jacket, thought it to be his jacket, and decided he was her boyfriend. After all, she *did* wake up in his lap.
While he'd been taking a break from her inquiries and staring out the window of the ambulance, he'd heard her whisper to Meowth, "Is he my boyfriend?" Out of the corner of his eye, he'd seen the cat shake his head.
"Excuse me, Eric?"
James looked up to see a 35ish man in a doctor's lab coat holding his hand out to him. "I'm Dr. Lindquist."
Shaking hands and standing up, James asked about Jesse without bothering with a greeting. "Will she be alright?"
The doctor's face was indecipherable. "Your Meowth says that Jesse was bitten by a baby Zubat, correct?"
"Yes, in a cave."
"The Zubat was most likely carrying the disease she's now infected with. We've never seen it before; it's a kind of mutated poison. She's already looking better, though, so we're hoping she'll pull through soon."
Breathing a sigh of relief, he asked one more question that had been hanging in his mind. "What about her memories?"
"We're not sure about that. Her amnesia may be a permanent condition, but, then again, it may also just be a temporary symptom of her illness."
The next words out of his mouth were ones he didn't even need to think about.. "Can I see her?"
Giving him a tiny smile and a small nod, Dr. Lindquist turned and led the way to her room on the fourth floor of the hospital.
James pushed the door open to Jesse's room, but felt apprehensive and impatient at the same time. Maybe once she saw his face again, she'd remember.
"Hi, Eric."
No such luck.
"Hey, Jesse. How are you doing?" He pulled up a chair and sat next to her bed.
"I'm sure that I've felt better."
So had he; he gave her a sympathizing nod.
"Ooh, have you seen that nurse? I think his name is Luke."
"No . . . why?" His spirits sank at the way she said his name.
"He's *so* dreamy!"
Chapter 3~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
James was out running in a misty forest, where he could barely see. It was hard to tell what time of day or night it was; the trees overhead blocked all the light, and the only thing that illuminated the woods was an eerie pinkish glow.
Only one thing was on his mind -- Jesse. He had to find her.
He had to give her back her memories.
Not knowing where anything could be found, he just kept on going and relied on his instincts to tell him what direction to choose.
Then, he saw her. She was the one emitting the red light. Her body was glowing.
Picking up his pace, he went straight for her.
"James…"
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He awoke in his sleeping bag, covered with a thin sheen of sweat but chilled to the bone. Meowth lay not too far away, still snoozing peacefully.
Suddenly, James had an inexplicable urge to run.
He got up and threw on his white pants, boots and tee shirt and burst out at a dead run for the hospital.
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All he had really wanted was to see her. It was so strange not being able to turn his head in his sleeping bag and gaze upon her beautiful face, smiling sweetly while she dreamt. He'd spent almost every minute with her for the longest time, and now that she wasn't there, he realized just how much he needed her.
Now, Jesse slept on her hospital bed in front of him in his chair, wearing exactly the type of shapeless gown that she'd hate. Her hair was in a messy bun, probably so it didn't get in her way, but she'd never had her hair anything less than perfect while he'd known her.
Here she was, just as gorgeous as ever, but nothing like the Jesse he knew. His Jesse was short tempered and loved him, even if she wasn't *in* love with him. This Jesse hadn't gotten angry once, and didn't really feel anything for him but a weak friendship. He wanted to love her with all his heart, but His Jesse wasn't there to love.
James hadn't even noticed the tears in his eyes until one slid down his cheek. Laying his head on her pillow next to hers, he whispered, "Come back, Jesse. I need you."
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"Hey, Eric," a familiar voice quietly said. "Wake up."
"Jesse!" He snapped into reality at the sound of her and brought his head up.
"Uh, good morning." She smiled kindly, a rare thing to see on Jesse.
"How are you? Any memories?" he asked, probably a little too eagerly.
"Nope. Sorry. Hey, umm… what were you doing here?"
"Well, I just… I guess I just missed you." He probably never would've told that to His Jesse; it was strange with this one. He felt like he could open up to her more. "I really have no life. Neither of us do. We spend all of our time together."
Looking a little surprised, she nervously asked, "But we're not a couple, are we?"
He just had to laugh at the way she asked it. "No, we're not. Never were, and probably never will be more than best friends."
"Well, Eric, I must say that you're a great friend. What do you say you tell me why we have no lives?" The innocence he found in her eyes was like nothing he'd ever seen; it was so foreign to him to experience this kind of personality in Jesse, and, quite frankly, he wouldn't mind if she were always this nice.
But he'd trade that and anything else he could if she could have her memories back.
Knowing how ineffective it would be, he decided to tell her *everything* he could in hopes that *something* would ring a bell. "Remember how I told you about Team Rocket and that Pikachu?"
"Uh huh."
"Well, every single time we try to capture it, we get *so* close, but fail miserably. Every time."
"So… how long have we been after it?" If there was one similarity between His Jesse and this one, it was that they were both adept at hiding their emotions. This Jesse didn't do so nearly as often as His, and she obviously used a less violent technique, but James could see the pity in her eyes no matter how well she disguised it.
"Oh, I'd say… a year or so, now. The Boss isn't too kind to us."
"A year? Wow." Clearly, she was surprised, but didn't seem to care all that much. If he was reading her correctly, she didn't want to have anything to do with Team Rocket anymore. She was turning into a good guy.
A knock sounded from the door and a rather nice-looking young man opened it a second later and walked in. "Hello, Jesse. Do you remember me?"
"Yes, of course, Nurse Hartwell."
James thought he'd been depressed before, but now his emotions sunk to a new low. Her eyes were getting that glazed-over look and she was smiling shyly at the nurse. It had never hurt him so much to see her admiring another man..
Sure, His Jesse had had crushes before, but she never sought them out and made them special. For whatever reason, she always stuck by his side, and for that he was eternally grateful. James was in love with her, plain and simple, and he knew there was no way she could feel the same. More than a few times, it had seemed as though she might, but he was just seeing what he wanted to see. Just as long as she loved him as her best friend, he could live.
"Please, just call me Luke, Jesse." The man grinned and winked at her, which upset James to no end. Couldn't he see that she was taken?
Well, she wasn't really *taken.* He always got that way when men looked at her like that. For as long as he could remember being with her, he'd felt as if he had to protect her like she was his own.
"Eric, right?" he asked as he held his hand out to James, who was in no mood for politeness.
The only reason he shook hands with Nurse Hartwell was because Jesse might look upon it well. After that, he simply left without needing to be told that check-ups and tests were to be performed on her. "See ya, Jesse."
"Bye, Eric!"
There was no way he could stand to be in the presence of Jesse when she was swooning over some muscle-head in a white uniform. He'd never seen her like this. Usually, she just commented on a man's looks and then moved on, but she was taking this way too far.
The thing that was killing him was that he knew that there was no way to stop her.
Chapter 4~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A month or so had passed when James heard the news.
Nurse Hartwell had been fired.
It wasn't as good as it sounds at first; he'd been laid off because of Jesse..
As far as Dr. Lindquist had kindly told him, Nurse Hartwell had been caught kissing her.
*Kissing* her.
And he had been given a second chance, but apparently he chose Jesse over his job. Said he was in love, or some such thing.
He had no idea what love really meant.
And the worst part was that Jesse would not shut up about her 'Lovely Luke.' But she wasn't the one to tell him about his situation. She was no idiot-- it was easy to see that James was in love with her, and she probably figured that out right away. Never had she said she loved Hartwell or that she'd kissed him; she just talked about every single other aspect of his life. Like she didn't want to hurt James by telling him she was in love.
Too many times, James had come in to visit Jesse, but found her with Hartwell. Soon, he just stopped coming.
Jesse called him once in a while, to check on him from her little hospital room. She'd give him information on her latest test results, what all the doctors thought, how she wished she could remember.
Truthfully, he didn't think she wanted to remember.
He'd told her all about her terrible childhood, her cruel nature and her temper tantrums. It must not have sounded too appealing to her. Even though he'd included all the good qualities of her personality he could without sounding like a love-struck poet, it seemed that Jesse simply did not like the person she used to be.
The only reason His Jesse had turned out so fierce was because of the way she grew up. When she was stripped of all her tough-girl experience, all her memories, she was actually *nice.*
It just didn't fit her.
And she was being a little *too* nice to Hartwell.
As a result, James locked himself up in his hotel room every day, and usually wouldn't even let Meowth in. He'd long since kicked the cat out.
All he could think of was His Jesse. The only thing he needed was for her to come back.
Once, Meowth had come with a bag of doughnuts and a chocolate milkshake for him. As mean as he might be to James sometimes, he was still a friend, and Meowth felt that he needed to cheer the guy up.
James had grumpily accepted the cat into his room and sat at the tiny standard-issue hotel room table with him. His mouth never opened, not even for the doughnuts, but Meowth's kept on going. Rumors, news, the weather… James seemed okay with everything he had to say. But when he got to talking about Jesse…
All Meowth had said was, "Ya know, I'll bet she still likes ya."
The broken man had stood with fire in his eyes directed straight at Meowth. If looks could kill, the cat would already have been dead nine times over.
"What? What'd I say?"
Still not uttering a word, James punched the him square in the face, then kicked him out the door.
Even while Meowth was laying in the hotel hallway, he could hear smashing and banging noises sounding very loudly from James' room. By the time he finally found the strength to stand and walk to his own room, James could be heard whispering hoarsely, "Come back, Jesse, come back, Jesse," over and over again.
He was just an empty shell, now.
The doctors were saying that if she didn't remember anything in one more week, they'd let her out of the hospital and pass the amnesia as permanent.
Just one more week, when it had already been countless ones since His Jesse died.
It didn't seem like enough time. What if it just takes her a week and a day? But the doctors knew. They wouldn't tell him something that they weren't almost certain of.
This new Jesse left James in a wreck. Suffering was a mild word to him, now.. There was really nothing that could describe the pain he felt every second of every hour of every day. Tears were beyond him-- he'd used them all up. In one more week, he'd be dead, too.
Chapter 5~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"James? I just got a message from Jesse. Open up!"
If it was about Jesse, he might as well.
Without a word, he pulled open the door to his disgustingly dark hotel room for Meowth. The cat didn't come in, like he might have before all this, for he knew that James had warped into more violent of a person than His Jesse had been.
"She says that she really needs to tell you something important. And she sounded kinda worried."
Meowth paused, waiting for a response. When it didn't come, he awkwardly filled in the silence. "She said you wouldn't answer your phone."
"It's off the hook."
"Go see her, okay? I'm sure she misses you." And with that, Meowth scrambled into his own room next to James', afraid of getting hit or kicked for mentioning Jesse. It had happened to him all too often lately.
Deep down, James knew Meowth was only trying to help him out, but he got furious with him anyway, knowing that he had no idea what it was like for him and wanting to make it better when he didn't even know what it took.
Not for the first time, he wondered: if he killed himself, would His Jesse be waiting for him in the afterlife? That's what it would take to make him better. Death.
Since he hadn't visited her in weeks now, he decided it would be best if he showered before he left and put on something besides his now usual attire: flannel pants and a tank top. It wasn't too long before he was on his way.
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James did not allow one thought to pass through his mind about Jesse while he walked to her hospital room. All he knew was that if she needed to see him, he'd be there. Whatever she wanted.
Before turning the corner from the fourth floor waiting room into her corridor, he spotted Hartwell in a chair with his head hanging.
"Something wrong?" he coldly asked, hoping that Jesse had hurt him as much as he'd hurt James.
"Jesse… she says she's in love… with… with another guy."
Even with Hartwell's tear-streaked face and bloodshot eyes, James did not feel the slightest bit of sympathy for him. Just anger that she was still in love.
As he continued down the hall to Jesse, his instincts told him that she had big news for him. It was *definitely* not good news-- it was a day before she was to be released from the hospital, and there was no way he was going to let himself believe that she actually had her memories back. He'd done that to himself before and been horribly disappointed. She probably just wanted to say goodbye and go run off with this new love of hers. There was a good chance he'd never see her again.
Slowly, he knocked and waited for her to tell him to come in. Expecting the worst, he did, and didn't allow himself to look at her face until he was sitting in the chair next to her bed.
When he did dare cast his eyes upon her splendor, he almost went into a trance. It had been far too long since he'd seen her exquisite features, and it affected him more than the most beautiful work of art ever could. Her gorgeous blues were almost singing to him, and he helplessly became lost within those eyes.
If only she could remember.
Her angel voice rang clearly to him, even though seeing her again had induced a haze which still hung in his mind.
"James, how could you let them put me in this shapeless gown?"
The tears he had thought he'd never be capable of producing again ran down his cheeks as both of them smiled more brightly than anyone would have ever thought possible.
"Jesse! You remember!"
She proved that she was happy to have him back, too, when she affectionately told him, "I could tell I'd forgotten something important. You. I missed my memories of you."
"So did I."
Once they pulled away from each other, James sat on the side of her bed at her unspoken request. He still could not stop grinning at her.
"James…" She reached up to brush the wetness from his cheeks so tenderly she melted his heart.
It felt so good to just to hear her say his name again. "Yeah, Jesse?"
"Why didn't you tell me that I was in love with you?"
Just when he thought he was done crying, new tears spilled out of his eyes. He was happier than he could ever remember being.
"Oh, don't cry," she fondly said as she pushed herself up into a sitting position. Her arms wrapped around him to give him comfort once more. "I might have to get you with my fan."
"Just as long as you don't forget I love you."
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Did this bring out your tears at all? Are you laughing at my inability to write mush? Are you dead? I want to know. Allicatt3@aol.com.
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