With You By My Side (A Contestshipping fanfic)

Chapter 7

"Drew! Would you please slow down just a little bit!" May huffed as her rival once again increased the pace.

"It's your own fault if you can't keep up, Airhead. By the looks of things, it's going to start raining pretty soon," he explained.

"If we hurry, we might make it to the Dark Cave before that happens, because I don't need to deal with the both of us coming down with colds."

May nodded and went into a light jog, the equivalent of Drew's fast walk.

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The two burst into a small cave, thankful to be out of the rain which had quickly escalated to a down pour.

"What the heck happened to the end of August?" May asked, referring to the freezing temperatures that they had just experienced.

"Well, Johto is further south than Hoenn or Kanto, so I guess it's naturally colder. Also, most of the heat seems to come from the sun, making it rather cold during the night or when the sun is covered. Then again, I wouldn't expect you to know any of that," he informed her.

They both shivered as a gust of wind chilled their already soaked to the bone with cold rain bodies.

Drew produced a towel from his backpack and began drying himself, but he stopped when he realized that May wasn't doing the same.

"Did you remember to pack a towel? I wouldn't be surprised if you didn't."

"F-for your information, I do have one, but it's not quite d-dry from this morning," she chattered.

"Here," he said, pulling a second towel from his backpack, and tossed it on her head

"H-huh?"

He rolled his eyes. "It's a towel. You dry yourself with it so you don't freeze to death."

"...thanks, Drew," she said softly, wringing out her hair.

"No prob," he replied.

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The two had just finished toweling off and had changed into their PJs, hanging their towels and their clothes on a clothes line that May had brought and they had tied to to parts of the uneven rock walls.

It turns out, they had entered a very small, un inhabited part. It went just as far as a turn, which thankfully was enough to block out most of the wind.

They gathered together what dry logs they had found in the cave and the kindling they had brought with them.

"Don't burn yourself, January."

"Hey. Cooking might not be my strong suit, but I can make a fire just as well as you could!"

"Sure."

"Was that sarcasm?"

"Noooo..."

"Wait! That was sarcasm too!"

"Ding ding ding. Someone give her a prize."

"GRASSHEAD!!!!!!!!!!!"

Drew smirked and pulled out some fresh berries and began citing them up.

"You and your Grassheaded sarcasm are going to be the death of me..." May muttered, setting up the fire.

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They had just finish eating (drinking?) the yummy soup that Drew had made which had warmed the both of them up through and through.

The rain seemed to fall even harder outside, making the two even more glad that they had made it safely to shelter.

No doubt they would have been freezing, wet, and most likely irritable and yelling at each other due to their discomfort.

But thankfully for all of us contestshippers, they were warm and dry and just hanging out and chatting by the dying fire.

"Hey, Drew? Do you think it's going to start thundering and lightning?" May asked.

Drew shrugged. "I don't know. Probably. Why? Someone scared of the lightning?" He said, adding a teasing tone to the last part.

"No," May responded. "It's just harder for me to fall asleep with the unrhythmic sounds of thunder," she told him.

"Kind of like fireworks on New Year's and such?"

"Yup. Seriously, some of our neighbors have fireworks until 1 AM!!!!!!"

"Ouch."

Maybe twenty minutes later, they both settled down in their sleeping bags.

As predicted by both Drew and every reader, a loud bit of thunder crashed across the sky, and May involuntarily let out a yelp.

She quickly clamped a hand over her mouth. So what if she was scared of it? There was no way that she could let Drew know... She didn't want to seem any weaker than she already did.

"Are you sure you're not scared, October?" He teased.

"N-no. Just fine," May falsely reassured him.

Thunder crashed again, this time May shook and hid inside her sleeping bag.

Seeing that his friend was terrified, he got up and knelt beside her. "May? Can I please talk to you rather than your sleeping bag?"

"Just go ahead and laugh..." She said, voice muffled.

Drew paused. "Why would I laugh? I don't exactly find another person's fear to be amusing."

Suddenly he had an idea. Taking one of the longer sticks from the now dead fire, he planted one end into the ground. May, who had just popped her head out, was officially confused.

"What... Are you doing?"

"There. Lightning goes to the highest place in the area, so if it does come over here, we can just roast marshmallows or something," he explained.

May giggled, but still flinched when the noise sounded again. Although it had helped, she was still kind of scared.

Drew, seeing this, pulled his sleeping bag right next to her and laid down in it, surprising May.

You see, so far, the two had kept their sleeping bags about ten feet apart. The closes they had slept to each other was on the other side of the room on the boat to Johto.

They had done that to avoid any awkward situations, just starting to travel together and all.

"Don't worry, Airhead. If a bolt of lightning came along, it wouldn't be able to fry your brain. It short circuited years ago."

She rolled her eyes. Drew certainly had interesting ways of reassuring people.

She flinched again at the awful noise.

To her even greater surprise, he reach one of his hands out and placed it on top of her own hand that was laying on the ground between them.

She blushed as he gently closed his warm hand around her smaller one.

His pulse raced. Had he really just pulled together the courage to do that? What if she hates this? What if she rejects me? What if she doesn't want to travel together anymore? What if-

His heart stopped. She had gingerly closed her fingers around his.

Drew, you need to breath. In. Out. That's it...

The teens drifted off, storm raging outside now invisible.

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Hey guys! Guess what! I think I broke my toe!

No, seriously. I'm going to a hospital to see once my mom drags my lazy butt out of bed.

Heh heh... I kind of stubbed my pinkie toe REALLY hard on a door frame, so... Yeah. Who's the klutz now, May?

On a happier note, I'm re-continuing 'Contestshipping hints (both from bulbapidia and ones I've noticed)' and 'Through Norman's eyes.'

I should have the next few hints up by tonight.

See ya, peeps!