Pokemon High School Life Spin-Off- C.C.

C.C. taps her foot rapidly. “Come ON, guys! I know-I know-I know it’s long, and there’s a lot to memorize, but it’s worth it!”
Theo puts his head back in place. “I blanked on one line, C.C. Give it a break!”
Penn hmphs. “I memorized my lines in a week.”
Theo throws up his hands. “Yeah, cause you’ve got photographic memory!”
“I am not expecting the same of you. You failed my low expectations.”
“Wha-” The Ultra Beast throws up his hands. “That’s it! That’s it. I’m done for today. See you all tomorrow.”
C.C. rushes after him. “Wait-wait-wait!” Theo’s already out the door. Penn crosses her arms. “He needs to learn to take things seriously.”
The Pikachu screams into her paws. “Great! We were getting somewhere…” Grace calls over from her seat, “Penn, perhaps you could try to get along with him more?” Penn huffs. C.C. jabs a finger at Penn. “Seriously! Why can’t you just…” She groans. “Never mind…”
Mimi holds her ladder and paintbrush steady. “…please be quieter… I’m messing up…”
C.C. claps her hands over her mouth and rather loudly whispers, “Is this better?” Mimi turns away and goes back to painting.
Zero takes out an earbud. “This is our biggest project yet. If we’re going to do this, we have to take it seriously.”
C.C. nods. “Yeah! That means we need to memorize our lines, get along with each other, finish the costumes…” Grace smiles. “She’s right. We have to get this right.” She turns to Mimi. “You can come down now. We’re done for today.”
“alright…” Mimi carefully makes her way down and heads to the door. C.C. calls after her, “HEY! Wait for me! I can walk back with you!”
Mimi flinches. C.C. grabs her bag and zips up. “C’mon, we’re neighbours! Ever since sixth grade, you’ve been all introvert-y and ignoring me!”
Mimi sighs and walks out the door.
As they walk through the cooling air of fall, Mimi doodles a road surrounded by fall leaves. There’s no one there, and it’s quiet. There’re shadows on the leaf piles. The bottoms of the tree trunks are shaded. The sidewalk has cracks. It’s so quiet…
“So how are things with your crush?~”
Mimi jolts, thankfully removing her pencil from the paper before C.C. talks. “I don’t want to talk about it…”
“Why? I’m the only person who knows about it! It’s healthy to get it all out! My therapist told me that! She was a total hypocrite though, because she told me to slow down when I went to get everything out-”
“He likes the Sylveon girl.”
C.C. taps her foot. “So what, you’re just giving up?”
“I’m not going to…”
“You just have to be a little bit aggressive-”
“C.C.”
“You just have to prove to him you’re-”
“Cynthia.”
Cynthia quiets. “What?”
“I’m not you. I’m not aggressive, and I’m not going to be. Just…” she puts her headphones on, hits the power button on the side. C.C. catches a faint bit of an anime theme. “…see you tomorrow.”
C.C. faintly says, “Bye.” Her heart feels like lead.

Cynthia paces in her room. “All I want is to… help…” She sits on the bed, grabs a fidget spinner. It makes a whizz through her frantic self-talk. “I’m her friend! I was just trying to give advice! Did I hurt her? I’m just helping!” She looks at a photo in a frame of her and Mimi back in fifth grade, C.C. dragging her by the paw to her surprise birthday party that they’d themed off her favourite horror game. She grabs the five-year-old never-solved Rubik’s cube next to it and turns it in random directions, not really trying to solve it. “We’re besties! I think…”
Her mom calls from downstairs, “Cynthia! Come eat your dinner!”
“What’re we having, huh-huh-huh?”
“Spaghetti.”
“OOH!” She pats the photo frame. “I’ll get back to this later!” She rushes down the stairs as fast as she can.

Theo practices his lines in his room. “Yahahaha! Strange maiden, I am locked here, but I am the one who is free!” “Your mind is so limited, so limited! The insane are the ones who are free, free!” “Look outside the limits of your sanity, follow your instinct, you’ll see what’s right at first impression, not after long thought and contemplation!”

Penn finishes her homework just in time to hear her mother call up, “Penn, you need to get to ballet!” She heads down without complaint, knowing she’ll be back by dinner. After dinner, she’ll practice her lines. Everything goes perfectly.

Grace is sewing C.C.’s costume as she checks the time. Shouldn’t Mom be back by now? Like on cue, her mother comes in. Grace smiles brightly. “Dinner’s ready! You might want to put it in the microwave a bit.” Her mother nods tiredly.

Zero listens to his voice on recording. “That’s not right. No, no…” He starts to record again when someone knocks. “GYAH!” “Zippy, Mom says come down for dinner now!” “Guh…”

C.C.’s mom looks her daughter in the eye. “Cynthia, what’s wrong?” C.C. stops tapping her foot, pasta half-swallowed. She looks around a moment before swallowing and responding, “Just thinking about how I can help my friends!” Her mom ruffles her ears. “Crazy girl.”