smash_logs | One of Multiple Talks: A Saga Combined.

Entry tags:

One of Multiple Talks: A Saga Combined.

Who: Green guys
What: Talkin' 'bout Stuff. And Things.
When: Uh.
Where: RA suite life.
Warnings: Feelings.

It was an entirely strange position to be in when you were aware of the fact that things were steadily going back to the way things always were, and yet you were teetering on the edge of everything being completely different. All it would take was a single step, or the uttering a single sentence. With one breath, everything would change. It was odd to think about.

They were the sort of thoughts that were ticking away in Bulba's head as he laid on his back on Green's bed, a book in hand above his face. This was what things going back to normal was like, with simple time spent with his trainer without any issues to make things awkward. He had, as best he could manage, tried to leave those behind at the hot springs. It had worked, mostly. He'd enjoyed the time since settling back into the way things were supposed to be, like simply passing the time with him and reading this book.

Except he wasn't really reading it anymore more than he was just staring intently at the text on the page as if they were entirely different symbols. Bulba's mind wasn't really focused on those either. It lingered on the concept of one sentence. If he just said one thing…

He still wasn't sure how selfish he was allowed to be while trying to exist for himself. Everything seemed entirely out of line, and he wasn't sure how much really was and how much was just him holding on to what was familiar. He didn't know if he was allowed to let his heart race, or if it even mattered if he was allowed or not.

Probably it didn't, because he certainly couldn't stop it.

He finally set the book down on his chest, staring up at the ceiling for a moment more. As much as things seemed the same right now, they were already different for both of them. They were already changing, and he couldn't keep it from happening. All he could do was decide if he was going to take things into his own hands while he could.

So he took a breath. "Hey, Green? Could I ask you for some advice about… uh…. stuff…?"

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It was like a rumbling storm had passed over Green's head without him even noticing. He was over the moon that things had started to go back to normal, but he had no idea to what extent it almost wasn't, and probably wouldn't ever fully understand. All he was concerned with was the relaxing moments like this, and being able to share them comfortably with his starter again. At the sound of said Ivysaur's voice, he perked up.

"Huh? Yeah, anything."

Said Ivysaur took a moment to start looking flustered with himself. He turned his head a bit to look over at Green, and then he sort of looked away as he nervously tapped a rhythm against the covers of his books.

"Well... Mmm. Would you think it's a bad idea to... uh..." This was off to a great start. Bulba stilled his fingers and tried another attempt. The Ivysaur looked over at his Trainer again, a bit more directly now, and his brows knit together slightly in worry.

"Would you say it was a bad idea to tell someone that you liked them, even if you already know they aren't going to like you back like that? Just to kind of get it off your chest so you could forget about it, I guess..."

Green set down his book, giving Bulba a hesitant look. Wow, that was... quite a question. Did Bulba even like anyone? But no, that wasn't even the most shocking part of the question. That was the fact that he didn't really have much of an answer. Of course, you gotta just go for it is what he wanted to say, but what authority did he really have? What the hell was he doing, anyways. Sitting there, not making a move on a certain someone. So, what could he really say?

"... No. I guess in that situation, that'd be a good move. Although, what if it ended up changing your relationship for the worse?"

He blinked. "Or, uh. Maybe you don't actually have one, already. I don't know what your situation is."

Well, if this one was also something Green hadn't pick up on, then Bulba had kept a better lid on it than he thought he had. That was good. At least he thought it was good. It wasn't as though he was proud of the fact that he was able to keep things from the person that could read him best, but it was a relief in these brief instances.

It was also good to hear that Green didn't think it was a totally dumb idea. Bulba's worried look eased a bit, shifting to a small, almost sad smile.

"It's friends. We're friends." Just friends. Bulba turned his eyes towards the ceiling, speaking softly. "...I've thought about that a lot though." Probably more than he should have. "With most people I guess I'd be scared they'd think I was gross or something for trying. It might be weird for a while, but he wouldn't turn me away for something like this."

"A friend, huh?" That narrowed it down a bit, but not entirely. As to whom Bulba's secret crush could be, he still had no idea. He was concerned it would be prying to ask, though.

"... If you're sure that's the case?" He did seem pretty sure. What about Green? Was he sure? He couldn't really think of a situation where his friend wouldn't want to be around him any more, but if he tried to change their relationship, would she freak out? In this moment, he envied Bulba's confidence.

"You're a pretty strong guy, you know that?"

It was a confidence built up by a few things. On one hand, as he recently discovered from the Garden, there was actually absolutely nothing weird about the way he was. It had been kind of surprising, especially since he was already pretty solidly comfortable with the whole liking dudes thing. On the other hand, he'd already done so much worse. How much harm could saying he liked someone really do to them after all that?

He didn't really think of himself as very strong for it, though. Bulba's ears flicked at the statement, unsure, and the Ivysaur sounded both a little surprised and a little confused when he spoke.

"Huh? I don't think that really has anything to do with it..."

"I do," Green replied, sighing. "I mean, obviously this isn't the thing that cinches that, but... I feel like you might already know the answer to this question, right? If it'll make things better for your head, that's the way to go."

Could be be any more hypocritical? When did he ever do anything like that? Green was the king of keeping genuine emotion bottled up inside.

Bulba hummed to himself and sighed in turn. "Yeah, I guess. The only thing left would be to actually do it, right?" That sounded simple, but he knew it wasn't. He knew Green knew it wasn't either. As far as Bulba was aware, the trainer's mouth had still been clamped shut pretty tight himself. When speaking up only changed things, it was hard to voice them.

He was still having trouble finding his voice. Even if he thought he already knew the answer, that was just one of the questions on his mind.

The grass type rolled over on his side facing Green, gently folding his book under his arm. His ears drooped slowly the longer he laid there quietly, studying the ridges of his knuckles. The worry was creeping back onto his face, and it was much harder to shake it this time around.

"I guess the question now is actually if I should do it when it's... When it's someone I'm not supposed to like."

Green's stomach did a flip. That was... an ominous sentence. It pretty much guaranteed that the next words out of Bulba's mouth would hold all kinds of implications Green wasn't sure he was prepared to deal with. But, this was his starter. Prepared or not, he had to listen.

"... Not supposed to... ?"

The pokemon gave a little nod, dropping his gaze because it was hard to keep eye contact when all he could expect was some form of disappointment. He was sticking Green in an unfair position and he knew it, and he kind of hated it. There wasn't much he could do about it though, if he wanted to be honest.

He had only ever muttered it to his plants before when he was trying to figure out what to do, and it had never come out more than a whisper for fear that someone would hear him or it would somehow become true if he said it too loud. That was when he was still trying to pretend like it wasn't really anything, though. He knew better know. Trying to tell himself that was ridiculous. So as much as he wanted to whisper it into the covers, he spoke up in as calm a voice as he could muster.

"I like Vinnie."

An apology was almost uttered, but Bulba bit it back. It wasn't something he could allow himself to apologize over, but it was evident on his face that it was something Bulba still wanted to do.

The first shockwave came from the words themselves, because his knee jerk reaction was to laugh (he suppressed this urge). Historically, it would be an odd but hilarious joke. Oh, good one, Bulba. You like a Pokemon off the rival team, that hotheaded Saur that's so much fun to fuck with. Then, he snapped back to reality. This wasn't working in Gramps' lab in Kanto, this was now, at Smash Academy. Bulba was an Ivysaur, Vinnie was a Venusaur. They had both grown up. And had been spending a lot of time together. And now...

That was the second shockwave. Holy shit, he's not joking. Of course he wasn't joking, look at him. He looked like the words themselves have been like dragging razor blades out of his throat. He almost looked like one bad word from the trainer would break him in half. He was being entirely sincere. He liked Vinnie.

Third shockwave: He liked Vinnie. Again.

Fourth: How the fuck hadn't he seen this one coming? They had been spending so much time together, had become closer than Green ever thought possible between Red and Green team. Going to the Garden. Taking care of the greenhouse. All that stuff. It was only a matter of time 'till...

Fifth: How the fuck hadn't he seen this one coming? Had he not been paying close enough attention? He was a terrible friend, trainer, room mate, everything in between. This shockwave came with a nice side order of guilt.

Sixth: OH CRAP, had any other members of the team noticed without him? Had Char?

Seventh: What the fuck was Char going to say?!

It all hit him at the same time, before the maelstrom of emotion finally died down enough for one final question to remain. And it wasn't even 'How do I feel about this?'

What do I say now?

He settled on something to give him more time to think. He blinked in total surprise.

"... F-for how long?!"

Green could take however long he wanted to process the information. Bulba realized the sudden bombshell was a bit unfair. It was somehow more of a game changer than just being gay in the first place. It didn't matter who it was he wanted to be with until, suddenly, it did matter. Not because of the what, but the who. Vinnie was a pretty prominent Who for all of them.

The Ivysaur pressed his palms against the bed and forced himself to sit up, facing his trainer. It wouldn't do any good to hope he'd sink through the mattress or anything impossible like that. Now that he said it, he was going to have to own up to it. It would have been so much easier with anyone else. Bulba might have been trying to be more of his own person, but Green's opinion had always been the one that mattered most since Day One.

Of course there were other very loud opinions that mattered to him, especially Dragon ones, but only one nerve wracking conversation at a time.

Seeing the amount of surprise on Green's face was almost comforting. The fact that he didn't out right say that it was totally ridiculous was also a good sign. Bulba leaned his elbows on his knees, rubbing the back of his neck as he considered the question.

"... November." There was a pause and he frowned a bit, considering that further. "... September." He paused again, but before he could get himself stuck in a loop of switching to even more alarmingly early dates, Bulba simply shrugged sheepishly.

Green tapped his index finger on his chin in lack of better thing to say. Ah. Well. That was. A while.

"That's..." What was it? He couldn't think of a single thing he had prepared to say. His brain somehow had missed out on that file 'What to say when one of your best friends has a crush on one of your rivals'. Go figure.

"Uh. I mean. I guess you have been hanging out a lot." God, that was lame, and even he knew it. There had to be something better than that.

"... Sorry. I somehow wasn't expecting his name to come up... Why do you... think he doesn't like you back?"

What was he saying?! Did he want Vinnie to like Bulba that way? But then again, why wouldn't he?! What was wrong with Bulba?! He was delightful!!

It was kind of touching, really. Bulba could tell that Green was trying really hard not to simply flip the fuck out, and he really appreciated the effort. He smiled a little, trying to be reassuring even though his ears were still looking a little droopy and he was still feeling kind of nervous over this whole conversation in general. It'd be okay though. It was going to be okay.

Whatever "okay" actually entailed, he wasn't sure, but it'd be fine.

"It's fine," he said assuringly. "To be fair I wasn't expecting it either so..." Bulba shook his head and shrugged.

The answer was easy enough though, and Bulba couldn't help the small self-deprecating laugh that came with it. "I'm not a girl."

"... Oh."

Damn. Green admittedly couldn't relate to this feeling-- unrequited love was one thing, unrequited love due to sexual preference felt like a whole different level. With the added level of who Vinnie was to Bulba and his family, it was quite a mess. The Gym Leader sighed.

"... I'm sorry."

"It's..."

It wasn't really okay. He couldn't actually say that. Even if he was kind of used to the under current of thought that came with things, that didn't make it any actually better. He looked down at his hands in his lap, idly rubbing the spot on the back of his hand as he shrugged for lack of anything better to add to his sentence.

He stayed quiet for a little bit, letting Green have a moment to sort through some of the things he knew had to have been whirling in his head. Eventually he took in a deep breath, though this time he did not look up at Green right way when he spoke.

"... Would you still say its still something I should do?"

Now that he knew all of the pieces.

Edited 2013-06-09 20:15 (UTC)

It was a complicated question, with just as many layers as barbs. Green might have even said something different if one particular person had not popped into his mind at that exact moment-- Blue.

Looking at his own situation, what was the advice he should give? Regardless of what he thought the outcome would be, would Green be able to walk around for the rest of his time with her with a feeling he would never be able to share? Would that be preferable, really?

He would wait, and someone else would approach her. She would get the itch again, and head off for wider, more unexplored pastures. Another regret in a bed of them.

"... That's up to you. If it were me..." He frowned, looking at his knees. "I guess I would probably tell her."

His head snapped up. "Him. I would probably tell him." Ugh. He had said it. How could he ignore his own advice now?

Bulba was already looking up at him again, and this time he wore a soft, understanding smile.

"Then I would tell her, too."

The Ivysaur shifted his limbs around again, this time so he could move to sit more next to Green. It felt okay to do that, since there hadn't been a point where Green had sent up any sort of I'm betrayed signals or anything like that. Not yet anyway. Bulba was kind of glad to be able to shift some of the focus off of it, if just for a moment.

"I was actually going to ask," he said once he was closer, "if you had told her yet." It was almost a bit surprising to hear that he hadn't. Almost. This was Green, after all. No emotional confessions unless something was truly at stake.

"... No. Not a peep," he mumbled, feeling incredibly awkward talking about something like this out loud. If it was just spiraling around in his head over and over, he could pretend like it was a personal neurosis, not like something that other people could weigh in on.

"I'm having a similar issue."

"It's hard for everyone to know if they should, huh?" The Ivysaur leaned against him, comfortably nestling his head on Green's shoulder since they were the only two there. For a little while he was content to let the pondering silence go as it would go. There were things he wanted to say though, he just needed to open his mouth and let them go.

Now that his secrets had been knocked back down to one instead of two, he felt a lot better. It was suddenly comfortable to tell Green (almost) anything again, and that was a relief.

"I wasn't going to say anything," he admitted quietly after a little while. "It was just going to be something I tried to forget about, since I didn't want to cause a mess or anything." And what a mess it would be. Nothing would ever be dry or not on fire ever again, he was pretty sure. He also wasn't sure if his dragon of a brother would find it in his heart to forgive him, either.

"But you know I... always sort of regret not telling Kirby sooner." It was something he'd never actually said. Kirby wasn't really a subject that was brought up a lot anymore, even when commemorative birthday cupcakes still happened or he still had some of the puff's hoodies in his closet. "If I had told him sooner, would we had gotten more time together that way?"

Of course that wasn't his only regret, but the other was one he couldn't voice. He'd lost Green too, in a way, though it was more accurate to say he never had him in the first place. Not in that way. "That's the other reason I want to tell him," he continued to say. "I might already know the answer and I know it could be a mess but I... don't want to regret not trying. Not anymore."

Bulba pulled his knees up closer to himself, turning his head up to look up in Green's general direction.

"So I don't want you to regret it either, ok?"

A slow sort of shock prevented Green from saying anything for a moment, but it eventually gave way to begrudging understanding. Of course what Bulba was saying rang true, as much as he didn't want to admit it.

It was beginning to get harder and harder to avoid. And as such, more and more important to acknowledge.

"... What if I regretted it, anyway?" It was strange, asking Bulba for frank advice like this. A feeling he could get used to, maybe. But new.

Bulba's eyelids dropped slightly for a moment as he glanced down. That was something else he had thought about, in more cases than one.

If he was going to regret his decision either way, which one would he have regretted less? Did he actually regret it now?

Bulba looked up at him again. "Then you need to ask if you would really rather having never tried at all when you had the chance. Would that really be the the thing you could get along with more?"

The Ivysaur pushed himself up a bit more, gently nudging Green's cheek with his nose in another gesture that was more saur than anything else. "...I think once you choose, you need to try and make it something you don't regret." His own revolving the trainer were all rooted in things he had no control over. Had it all happened again, he would have still done it. It was a lie to say otherwise.

"You're the only one that can actually make that choice, after all."

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One of Multiple Talks: A Saga Combined.

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