[ Death Separates and Unites ]

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Death is always a heartbreaking thing to overcome, especially so when it takes away a very precious person.

Just before diving into what could have been an ordinary day by going to work, your family was contacted by the hospital of Ecruteak City. A very sympathetic nurse was the one who broke the news to your mother, telling her as considerately as possible in such a situation that the woman who had given birth to her had passed away.

Although your grandmother was already quite old, her weak immune system was what took away her last breath. It was unspoken, but as soon as she was moved to live in the hospital permanently, you all knew life for her would be much more painless if she were to fall asleep eternally. That didn't mean that her now being gone was easier to swallow or come to terms with.

You were familiar with the gist of funerals, but you had no idea how upsetting it was of other people to rush the mourning family to accelerate its process. You were painfully made aware of that in the funeral home you found yourself in approximately four hours after your grandma's passing.

Your father was busy contacting your other family members to inform everyone of the tragedy, so you offered to take care of the more technical aspects of this situation along with your mother, which led you to your current situation, or rather, location. The two of you stood across a man sitting at the information counter, a thin wall of glass separating you.

Although your mother had said that she would hold the conversation, you had a feeling that you would eventually need to step in, given the many sobs that still cut the poor woman off at her every attempt of speech. Tears may have not been rolling down her cheeks, but it was evident that the both of you had already had a crying session earlier in the day. If your face was objectively considered notably unattractive, you didn't want to begin searching for an adjective that fit the description of your mother's facial features.

What with you standing on the sidelines for the moment, you had the opportunity to notice the employee's reactions more than your mother did as she spoke, and you couldn't help but frown at your observations. The man was clearly growing impatient with his client's inability to talk fluently and you caught him looking back and forth at the clock that hung on the wall behind himself more often than not.

It was a few minutes before midday, so of course this man's priority would be his lunch break.

"Ma'am, not to pressure you or anything, but could you be a bit more clear about what you want us to do?" His obviously forced remark was the last straw for you moments before you decided to speak over your mother. "What are you expecting from us, that we know this entire process as good as you do? This is the first time we have to do something like this, for Pete's sake!"

"You know what? We'll just find someone else who can help us. Let's go, mom." After he had rolled his eyes at your remark, you figured there had to be a different funeral home whose workers were more sympathetic than this awful receptionist. Grabbing your mother's wrist, you began heading towards the exit only to bump into someone on your way out.

"Is something the matter?" It was a blond young man who asked that almost rhetorical question after interpreting your feelings from the unsatisfied expression you were wearing. Given the Gastly that was floating next to him, he could have been any random Trainer, but the name tag that was attached to his black jumper identified him as an employee of this same company. "Nothing's the matter."

"Actually, we were just about to leave. Enjoy your meal." Despite the fact that this blond young man was unmistakably not at fault for his colleague's behavior, you couldn't bite back the bitter comment that unappealingly left your lips. It was at your second sentence where he realized what the issue was, and just before you had stepped out of the building, the man took a hold of your lower arm.

"If you have time right now, would you like to discuss matters with me? Given the situation, I'm assuming this is about a burial?" Your furrowed brows hadn't relaxed yet, but you did begin feeling a tad less tense when the blond immediately figured out the purpose of your visit — unlike his coworker at the counter. If one used their brain or simply took a look at your tear-stained face, one didn't even need to be a genius to realize the reason in the first place.

"That's fine, we don't want to interrupt your precious lunch break." You persevered with your foul attitude, but so did the stranger with his firm grip. "I insist." His tone was as solid as his grasp which made his offer difficult to turn down, especially when being stared at so intently by his amethyst eyes.

"Why don't you go ahead and meet with dad and the others? I can handle things here." You turned around to face your mother and voice your suggestion to her. She very much appreciated your understanding nature and excused herself before resuming on her way out, leaving you in silence with the blond.

He and his Gastly wordlessly led you through a few hallways, the destination you ultimately reached being his personal office by the looks of it. He sat down on one of the couches and asked you to take a seat across him, something you did without needing to be told twice.

"My name is Morty, I'm Ecruteak City's Gym Leader and the funeral director here." Although you had read his name on the tag, now that he said it himself you did remember the ghost-type specialist looking like this after thinking about it. Not allowing unnecessary thoughts to sidetrack you, you introduced yourself as well, albeit a bit dryly.

"It's a pleasure to make your acquaintance, [Name]. Although I'm sure we both would have preferred to meet under different circumstances." Morty continued in a soft voice, referring to the fact that you were most likely here because of a precious person's passing. Your stomach suddenly began churning uncomfortably at the worker's kindness, as if the one at the reception had only been an illusion. "May I ask who the ceremony will be for?"

"For my grandma..." You flinched at the sound of your own voice cracking, and the lump that was forming in your throat threatened to suffocate you. Perhaps that was the same reason why your vision was getting all blurry again. Not wanting to disgrace yourself even further with your horrible appearance, you tried to fight back your emotions, or at least prevent them from materializing.

"I see. My sincerest condolences." The blond replied, seeking eye-contact to express his genuineness. He succeeded, even if only for a second since you averted your gaze instantly afterwards. He proceeded to carry the conversation with smalltalk in attempt to make you feel more at ease, and you had to admit that he had a great way with words. He even went as far as to apologize for his coworker's behavior without even knowing what had actually happened between you and him.

There were a lot of things you were ignorant of that Morty introduced you to and explained in according detail such as the various documents and certificates that needed to be made or handed in, the process in itself that led to the final burial and how it differed depending on religions and customs.

"Your late grandmother's bank will most likely try to contact your family members in the next few days, so I suggest you to ignore them for the time being." The blond added after concluding his speech about the embalmer's part of the job in the procedure, and at first you couldn't quite connect the relation that the bank was supposed to have with all of this.

Morty could read the question off of your expression, so he gladly elaborated. "They need to contact the heirs to settle the inheritance that regards financial aspects. It's a process of theirs. I just think that mourners shouldn't be confronted by so much paperwork right after losing a family member."

Your bad conscience only continued to grow and you truly regretted having behaved so pettily towards the man who took over forty minutes to discuss this sensitive topic with you. Once the session was done and the two of you were back at the entrance of the funeral home, you took it upon yourself to apologize properly. "I'm very sorry about my... embarrassing attitude in the beginning, as well as actually robbing you of your lunch break."

"Would you let me treat you to a meal to make it up to you?" You added somewhat shyly, not knowing if you were taking your expression of regret too far or if you were even overstepping professional boundaries. Morty was slightly taken aback by your invitation, but not necessarily in a bad way. "There's really no need to go that far, I'm glad I could help you."

"It's just that... I'll feel really horrible if we leave things as they are. You can look at our lunch as if you were still counseling me." You instinctively insisted and even made up an excuse in case the blond was bothered by eating during his working hours. It may have taken another pleading look from your part, but it was enough to make Morty accept your offer.

Not much later, the two of you sat once again face-to-face in the Kimono Sisters' teahouse, ready to let your orders be taken. Neither of you settled on anything too heavy, since — at least in your case — you didn't have much of an appetite to begin with.

You may have been the one who suggested this friendly outing, but now that you were actually out here, you didn't know what to talk about with Morty. It wasn't like you two knew each other — you had barely heard that he was one of the eight Gym Leaders in Johto and that was about it. But it was to be expected that someone as good at keeping a conversation alive as him would know the exact thing to say in such a situation. "What do you usually do, [Name]?"

"Believe it or not, I'm actually a Trainer. Although I'm not really in it for the competitive aspects." You answered light-heartedly, seen as a big amount of the population took your status much more seriously than you did, what with challenging the Pokémon League and such. "That's nothing to be ashamed of. You don't need to collect gym badges to see all the beautiful places in Johto."

"Oh, but I would be pleased if we could meet again though. As opponents in my Gym, that is." You could tell he was aiming for a chuckle with that remark and you gladly played along, since that would indeed be nicer than discussing deep subjects such as death and everything that comes with it.

One of the Kimono Girls arrived with your meals, giving you the perfect opportunity to think about how you could steer the light chat in Morty's direction, seen as you were currently the center of attention. Given the fact that, unlike him, you actually knew what he did for a living, you settled on finding out more about it. "But isn't it tough, being a Gym Leader and working as a funeral director at the same time?"

"If I were Clair, it probably would be. But since I'm only the fourth Gym Leader, I'm not obligated to dedicate a lot of time to training my Pokémon." The blond explained, hinting that he would be a hindrance to many Trainers if his Pokémon's high levels forced them to get stuck in Ecruteak for too long. "And I actually enjoy my job a lot, so I don't see it as much of a bother."

"Ah, but you may have picked up that I don't exactly get along with my colleagues." Morty added whilst frowning unintentionally. Although you didn't notice it yourself, you could imagine that someone as caring as him wouldn't get along with the likes of that receptionist you met before bumping into him. "Figures. Your coworker didn't seem to have a shred of decency in him. Then again, that's only my personal take on it."

"You're not that far off, honestly. They're not necessarily horrible people, it's just that they get insensitive because of little things, and that's not really a good quality in our line of work." His point of view was both mature and quite objective which made it pleasant to listen to. Not to mention that the way he phrased himself entirely camouflaged any complaints he may have been voicing. "They're probably unpleasant for our customers, but to me they're great reference material: They're exactly what I don't want to be like."

"I want to be able to guide people through difficult times." The smile that unconsciously crawled onto his lips was very contagious, seen as you yourself were smiling at the display. Morty quickly realized that he had trailed off of the original question quite a bit and scratched the back of his neck that his purple scarf didn't cover. "I'm sorry, I ended up rambling."

"It's fine. I'm also sorry that I made the director himself take up our case, but I'm really glad that you were the one who advised me." Was what you replied with in hopes of not making Morty feel awkward after pouring his heart out to you. Your plan both worked and backfired at the same time, because now you were the one feeling conscious of the words that you may or may not have blurted out too boldly.

"You're not supposed to get all red after saying that so confidently." Morty chuckled, causing your cheeks to get even hotter now that you knew he had sensed your inner desperation. A few more light-hearted comments were thrown over the table as the two of you busied yourselves with eating, and it was honestly just what you needed after an extremely depressing day.

The pleasant time with the funeral director sadly drew to an end when the two of you found yourselves at the exterior of the Kimono Sisters' teahouse. And again you were unsure on how to bid the blond goodbye, but he took care of it anew by pulling out a small object from his pocket. "Here, I'll give you my business card. How about you give me a call when you have a bit of spare time, so that we can choose the flowers for your grandmother."

"Thank you. Would tomorrow work out well with your schedule?" Seen as you probably weren't going to do anything that was unrelated to your grandma's passing any time soon, you figured it was best to take care of things as quickly as possible — to allow her to rest peacefully sooner rather than later. "Normally, it should. Otherwise I'll let you know."

What you didn't expect the next day was to be packed with things to do to the point that you had to postpone your meeting with Morty. Your aunt and uncle from Sinnoh and Kalos respectively had booked the first flights upon hearing the heartbreaking news and had arrived in your home region the same day.

Picking them up at the airport in Goldenrod City at different times had already consumed half of the day, and preparing the rooms in which they would sleep and make themselves comfortable in took care of the rest of the time you thought you had at your disposal.

The remainder of the week flew by similarly, and before you had even realized it, the day of your grandmother's funeral was right at the doorstep.

It didn't rain vigorously like it stereotypically would in movies, but the sadness and tears of the people who were present substituted the grey clouds that would cover the bright sun all the same. After the casket was lowered into the ground and buried in it, everyone placed down the candles and flowers that they had brought, one after the other. But since the tombstone hadn't been properly installed yet, you knew you would come here again tomorrow to relocate every item once everything was nice and proper.

That was precisely what you did late in the next morning. The funeral home employees had arranged the fine stone you had settled on with Morty as planned, and they had even gone as far as to put all the mementos on top of it instead of letting them rest in the grass. Nonetheless, you still knelt down and began moving objects around, sorting out the candles, small ceramic sculptures and flowers.

You were so engrossed in your task and the thoughts that kept you company as you did them that you hadn't noticed the presence loitering behind you. At least not until an arm was stretched out next to you to lay down a bouquet of purple flowers.

When you turned your head around to get a look at the person who had brought it in order to than them, you were more than surprised — pleasantly so — to be greeted by the smile of a certain blond Gym Leader. "Morty? Fancy meeting you here."

"I didn't expect to run into you either, honestly." He retorted sheepishly as he watched you straighten yourself in a standing position. It was also then that you noticed that he was being accompanied by Gastly again, who you assumed was his partner. It didn't take too long for your gaze to travel lower only to rest on the arrangement of petals in his hands again. "I couldn't be of much use to you when it came to choosing the flowers, so I figured I could bring them here myself."

"I didn't know your grandmother, but if she was someone like you, I don't think my choice is that poor." Morty stated with a soft chuckle, lowering the bouquet to the gravestone. He later explained that those violet gladioli were supposed to represent strength of character, remembrance, faithfulness, and moral integrity.

You couldn't help but watch him endearingly while he spoke and meticulously positioned his gift amongst those of your family members and close friends, not even minding the heat that began to spread across your cheeks. Your grandma's death was very painful to process, but being united with a person like Morty made you believe that with every bad thing indeed came a good one that made it less cruel.

Perhaps the quick pace of your heartbeat or the Butterfree fluttering in your stomach in his presence were a misunderstanding on your part, seen as Morty had been there for you during a very hard time. But you were willing to find out for certain by meeting the blond outside of his working hours and getting to know the him who loved ghost-type Pokémon and green tea, not just helping people find comfort in tough situations. He seemed ready to try the same thing when he asked you out to spend a relaxing time with one another whilst holding your hand.

The coincidence of having met Morty of all people under such circumstances made you feel as though your grandmother had brought him to you, and you were more than willing to play the game of fate she left you with before leaving to watch over you two.

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My note to you:
After two consecutive deeper oneshots, I'm hoping that I'll be able to lighten the mood with the next one that will (hopefully) be featuring our precious flame boy Chili! ^3^

Thank You for Reading!