To Bloom Again

Epilogue

Marina awoke from her slumber at 5:55am, just as the bright orange sun started to rise to start yet another morning. She sat up, gently rubbed her eyes, stretched her arms, and reached for the sticky note aside her nightstand.

'Kanto. Monday morning.'

Oh, right.

Marina made sure she did not forget that she had to go to that said region. She always writes little reminders on sticky notes and pastes them on her night stand, like she did back in her school and contest days.

Her PokeNav goes off. She lunged for it and checked the recent message sent to her. Of course, it's from Hugo.

'Marina, I hope you had a good night's rest, sugar plum. Please grab everything you need and come to the Lilycove docks before 8am. That's when the fairy takes off and your new journey begins.'

Marina cringes at the ' Sugar Plum' part, asking herself why he still calls her that. It wasn't bothersome when she was a little girl. Heck, she used to love it and didn't seem too fazed by it when she reunited with him. Now, it feels a bit so embarrassing, especially at her age of twenty-two.

But Marina ignored it for now, as she is indeed running out of time. She jumps out of bed, discarding her white nightgown onto the floor and changing into a brown T-shirt with an eevee head on the upper right side, dark blue skinny jeans and orange slip ons.

She took her hairbrush from the dresser and brushed her sky blue hair to get rid of the tangles and put on a black hairband with a big bow that matches her shoes.

Marina takes one final look at the mirror, smiling. She now feels confident and comfortable wearing clothes that showed off her body, going as far as making a silly comment to herself about how her butt looks good in those jeans or how nice her boobs are in her shirt.

Now, she quickly gathers all the stuff she needs: extra clothing, pokemon supplies, first aid kit, journals, pens, feminine products because Marina knows damn well her mother will nag her about that, as well as two gifts and placed everything in her big traveling bag.

And before she forgets, Marina puts on deodorant and sprays a bit of her berry scented perfume so she does not stink.

She lets out a sigh while taking one last glance at her old bedroom, realizing that this is the last time she'll be able to stay in there.

Marina walks out of the room, shuts the door behind her and makes her way to the kitchen. Her mother chops up fresh peaches and bananas and throws the first in the blender with the rest of the fruit.

"Did you sleep well?" She inquired, adding some soy milk into the mixture and then blending it.

Marina nods, waiting for the blender to finish its job so that her worlds would be drowned out.

"That's good." Her mother pours the drink into a long, purple cup and lents it to her daughter, "I made you a smoothie, just like you asked. You sure you don't want any pancakes or tofu scrambled. I'll whip some up if you want."

Marina takes a sip, "No thanks. I'm fine with just a smoothie. I have to leave soon."

"Oh that's right."

Marina asks an important question, "Will the rest of my pokemon be safe here? Hugo says I can only take one with me."

Marina remembers the further discussion she had with her brother about that last night and the emotion driven goodbyes she had to say to Karen, Sheldon, Kiki and Tobias, since Marina decided to take Grace so she can use her teleports to go back and forth to each therapy session while staying on track with the gyms.