The contents of the mostly empty medicine cabinet were revealed as I opened the mirror door. My hand hovered over a few pill bottles and bandage boxes until I spotted a small blue box that read “gauze.” The bike injury that I received earlier had practically flown from my mind because of certain recent events. Speaking of recent events, I looked up from bandaging my arm to briefly glance at the sleeping pokemon on my bed. Keelia, my newest friend.

I was surprised that she warmed up to me as fast as she did. Thinking back to the many encounters I have had with wild pokemon over the years, it was easy for me to be surprised. When a wild pokemon doesn’t like you or any humans for that matter, it is difficult to move them from that stance. I half expected Keelia to run away or attack me like many others have, but she seemed different.

Having finished bandaging my arm, I turned off the lights and sat down on my bed. The only light in the room was the soft, silver moonlight that flitted between the curtains. I looked over again at Keelia’s bushy form at the foot of my bed. I felt the same feeling as when I chose to take her at the pokemon center. It was this sort of feeling that I could not pinpoint, but it told me something. It told me that somehow we were meant to find each other, and that together both of our lives would be changed in ways that we never expected. I ceased my musings for the time in favor of sleep. Carefully, I settled myself under the covers so as not to knock the sleeping eevee off my bed. Only a few moments after I laid my head on the pillow, I felt my mind drifting into the void of sleep.

----------

I sat up and opened my eyes. Immediately, I shut them again. For some reason, I was in a brightly lit room! After taking a few moments to allow my vision to adjust to the harsh light, I looked around. I was sitting at a desk with a phone and computer in some sort of office. I could not tell why, but everything was blurry and it seemed as though my senses were muted. As I took in my blurred surroundings, I could have sworn that the walls were getting closer to me. I would turn one way, then look back. By the time I looked back, the wall was definitely closer. In a matter of moments, the walls had come within inches of my chair and the desk on all sides. I began to panic, and I did the only thing I could do to get out of this situation. I closed my eyes. At that moment, I felt myself falling into blackness.

Suddenly, I was standing in the center of a clearing with trees surrounding me. Confused, I looked around at the lush forest barring me on sides. It took a few moments, but I realized that I had fallen from my bizarre office dream into this oddly vivid one. I could feel the cool forest breeze on my skin, see the verdant woodland around me in exquisite detail, and smell the damp scent of exposed soil.

From somewhere behind me, I heard a stifled giggle. I turned to see Keelia poking her head through a bush with a small smirk on her face. Without an exchange of words, somehow we both knew what would happen next. Keelia turned and bolted off into the forest. On some kind of instinct, I felt my legs propel me after her. What a dream! Just me and Keelia laughing as we played an endless simple game of tag in the woods.

There was something more though, something strangely fulfilling about our little game. It was as if some long-dormant desire had awoken within me. I, for lack of a better word, just felt…free. Really free for the first time in what felt like forever. It was great.

Some far-off crashing noise pulled me from the dream.

----------

With a long yawn, I opened my eyes to see streaks of sunlight laying across my bedroom. The dreams I just had felt like they had lasted a few minutes, and they were just bizarre! They also seemed to stay in my memory like they were actual things I did a few minutes before. When I awoke from other dreams, it always felt like the memory of it was slipping away with every minute that I was awake. Still after a few moments of pondering this, I could recall every detail of the dreams. The appearance of Keelia in the doorway pulled me from my thoughts.

“Good morning Keelia, how are you feeling?” I asked, the sleep still clear in my voice. Keelia did not respond, she just slowly walked up to the left side of bed with her head hung.

“I broke something in there,” she gestured with her head toward the living room, “I’m sorry Will, but my tail is bushy and I wasn’t looking and-”

“I think I know what you’re talking about Keelia, and it’s okay, I understand. I’m not mad at you.” I said caringly, recalling that I left a glass on the living room table. “I’ll go clean it up.” Keelia would occasionally sneak bashful glances up at me as I got up and made my way to the living room. Sure enough, scattered across the floor beneath the coffee table were several pieces of sharp glass.

“Keelia, it really isn’t that big of a deal. I shouldn’t have left the thing out to begin with,” I said, having finished sweeping up the mess without a word from Keelia.

“Thanks, I just didn’t want to upset you since you were nice enough to take me in. I didn’t want to be a burden. You have shown me that humans can be nice, and that’s something that I’ve never experienced,” she said after a moment, looking me in the eyes.

“You’ll never be a burden to me, but I think you’ll find that I can be a burden to you. It’s just sort of my personality,” I said with a laugh, which earned a laugh from Keelia too.

“Much better!” Keelia said after I dumped the broken shards of glass into the trashcan.

“Hmm? Much better?” I asked.

“Yeah, much better! You asked me how I was feeling a few minutes ago. I’m feeling much better, thanks!”

“That’s great to hear Keelia, I was really worried about you.”

There were a few moments with me taking in the beautiful morning through the window and Keelia shuffling from paw to paw.

“Uh, I gotta pee Will,” Keelia said shyly.

“Well, I don’t think you’d be too keen on using the toilet, so how about we go for a morning walk? It looks gorgeous out there.”

“Sure that sounds good! But what’s a toilet?” Keelia yipped.

I laughed for a bit as I went and got my jacket. “I’ll tell you later, after our walk I’ll give you the grand tour!” I said making a sweeping gesture with a hand. Without much further preparation, we went out the door and down the stairs. Soon we were walking across the parking lot toward the woods. The morning air was crisp and the sky was a clear blue without a single cloud. Winters in the Johto region were not much, usually just cold rain and rarely a bit of snow, and this one was no exception. It was not going to be cold for much longer, and this beautiful day was just an indicator of that.

We made our way down a little path in the woods that led to a small creek. Keelia, finding a suitable place to relieve herself, trotted off the path. With a few moments to myself, I examined my jacket where it was torn up. This jacket was still usable, but it had an oval-shaped hole running the full length of my left forearm. I pulled up the damaged sleeve so I could check the gauze that was wrapped around the scratches beneath. The gauze wrapping looked good without any visible bloodstains showing through. That was good, but it still stung somewhat and was sore to the touch. I guess it was more bruised that anything else.

“That was one reason that I decided to trust you, Will.” Keelia had returned from her business and was now speaking to me with a small smile on her face. I chuckled at this remark.

“You decided to trust me because I was an idiot and crashed my bike,” I snorted.

“No, it was because you seemed to ignore your injury and cared more about my well-being than your own. It was then a little bit easier to trust you,” she said, still giving me the small smile. In her eyes I could see genuine respect.

“Well, I’m humbled that you think of me like that. I’m sure anyone else who was in my situation would have done the same thing. You’re just too darn cute!” I replied, reaching down and ruffling the little normal-type’s head fur. She giggled and pawed a little bit at her spiky head fur, bringing it back into a comfortable level of messy.

“There’s something more though, some other reason that I knew I could trust you. I feel like…we’re connected in some sort of way. I don’t know, but when I look at you, I have this feeling that we were maybe meant to find each other. And there is also this weird, almost pulling, that tells me our lives will never be the same just because we met each other. I don’t know, I’m weird I guess,” Keelia said in an oddly wistful voice that was very out of character for her.

“I suppose that we can be weird together, because I feel the same way!” though I was a bit confused myself that we had felt the same way about this. I dismissed it though, and filed it in my brain somewhere behind that first chemistry exam. “Okay, I think we should be heading back now, you look like you could use a good bath!” It was true, though she may have been feeling well, her coat was still looking quite muddy and matted.

A cool morning breeze washed over us as we walked back to the apartment complex. When we got back up my apartment, I gave Keelia the grand tour of the whole 3 rooms that make up the space. I do not think that she had ever been in this sort of human home before, and many things were new to her. This made what was supposed to be a very brief tour last far longer because I had to explain why I had so many “weird” things as she put it. She was especially confused when I got around to explaining what the toilet was used for. After that, we settled down for a bit of breakfast. The hardy meal consisted of a couple of those fruit and grain bars that I fed to Keelia the previous night.

“So, how about that bath now?” I said while throwing away the fruit bar wrappers.

“Sure, I love water!” she yipped in reply. She then ran across the room excitedly, and was already sitting on the edge of the tub by the time I entered the bathroom.

“Sorry, but I only have this ‘people’ shampoo, but it should still work,” I said a little louder than normal because of the hot water gushing into the tub.

“It’s okay, it will still feel great!” she said excitedly as she jumped into the steaming water. As the water got deeper, she began to swim around in a little circle. Occasionally her tail would flick around and sling water in my direction. I would respond by flicking some water at her myself, but it was hardly effective as she was soaked already. After she had settled down a little, I began to lather up her fur. Filth that had built up in her thick fur ebbed away into the water as I continued my work. Every now and then, I would get a giggle and a squirm from the eevee when I got to a ticklish spot. Eventually, I finished and dried her off.

“Sorry, but only human stuff in my household,” I chuckled, brushing Keelia’s fur with my own hairbrush. She did not seem to mind, although it probably was a bit uncomfortable for her with her think fur. Satisfied with my work, I picked her up and held her in front of the mirror so she could see her reflection.

“Much better now, right?” I asked.

“Right! Thanks!” she replied cheerfully. She was admiring her now shiny and full coat in the mirror with a smirk on her fuzzy face.

So the rest of that day went on, quite unlike most other Sunday afternoons at my apartment. The introduction of a new friend, a pokemon no less, had added a brightness to my day that went beyond the inherent charm of it. The weather was great, and I had no homework to do. What better could I ask for? Well, I found that answer in Keelia.

----------

The sun was setting gracefully over Goldenrod city; the beautiful day was fabulously brought to a close by a vivid display of colors painting the sky. Keelia and I were on another walk as we took in the great view of the sunset through the trees. The sunset was beautiful and all, but the day was ending. Its beauty was somewhat muted in my mind. In no time at all, it would be Monday again and I would have to fall back into the rut of routine.

After a few more minutes, we headed back to the apartment. I was feeling even more down when we got back, and Keelia had noticed.

“Hey Will, what’s wrong?” she asked. Bless her heart, she was actually concerned about me.

“Nothing really, I just have a lot of human things to do this week starting tomorrow. I get burned out on them because they are repetitive and stressful. I see how free you are, and it makes me realize the truth that I don’t always enjoy what I do. But I really shouldn’t be complaining about this. It’s nothing, really,” I said tiredly, staring off into space. I needed to unwind, and I knew exactly what would help with that. I turned to Keelia who had a concerned complexion, “Do you want to hear me play some piano?” I asked with a small smile appearing on my face.

“I guess…what is a piano again?” She asked with a cute, puzzled expression.

“Here, I’ll show you,” I said with a grin, walking over to the old upright piano. It may have been old and beaten up, but it was tuned well and was a pleasure to play on. I lifted the wooden cover to reveal the black and white keys. I seated myself on the bench in front of it and positioned my hands. Keelia hopped up next to me.

“What are you going to do?” Keelia asked, looking at my hands and then back at my face.

“Just listen,” was my reply. I began to play. My cares and worries proceeded to fade away as the music flowed from my hands. It always worked this sort of magic on my mood. It was because in those moments of playing, nothing in the world mattered. It was just me and the music that was flowing from me. The next riff, the next chord, and the next melody; that was all that mattered. I finished my first piece feeling relaxed.

“That was cool!” Keelia said, her eyes wide and her long ears standing up.

“Thanks, it’s just something I like to do in my free time! I have found that it really helps me relax,” I said modestly.

“Really, that is cool! How does this thing work anyway?” she said leaning forward and examining the keys. She then reached out and touched one, then pressed down. When it made a sound, her ears jumped and she grinned. Soon she was using both of her front paws and hitting random notes. It did not exactly sound too great, but she was having a blast.

“Hey, I just thought of a good nickname for you! That is, if you wouldn’t mind,” I said eagerly.

“Huh? And what would that be?” She said with a sideways glance from her playing.

“Key,” I said proudly, “You really seem to love these piano keys, so it makes sense right?”

“Key? I like it! You can call me that as much as you want!” she replied, grinning.

The next couple hours consisted of me teaching Key how to play simple little songs with varying degrees of success. The cares of tomorrow seemed not so big when I saw how much fun she was having. This is funny, because I always considered myself to be a very boring person. Eventually, I managed to pull her away from the piano because it was starting to get late. I had learned from a very grumpy elderly man across the hall to not play the piano after dark.

We went out for one last walk for the night, and on the way back I tried to start up a conversation.

“Hey Key, were you traveling alone before I found you? And for that matter, do you think your family will start to wonder where you are?” I asked. What I got in response was not what I was expecting at all. I heard a little whine, which got me to look down intently at the now prone form of Keelia on the ground.

She was crying.

“Whoa, Keelia! Are you okay? Did you get hurt?” I asked with sudden concern. I knelt down and examined her body. There were no scratches or bumps anywhere, so why was she crying?

Suddenly, it all made sense. Her comment about the red and white ball from yesterday, her fear of humans, the scars on her belly…it all made sense. I did not know the exact details, but I was sure of one thing. She had an encounter with the worst type of person, a careless trainer.