📚Haunting my heart

There’s a familiar presence in the Sinnoh League, even after it’s gone.

Characters: Cynthia, Orchid is implied to be there but doesn’t speak

Warnings: Grief, mentions of badly coping, and overall themes of death.

Wordcount: 1,236

Vibe: Angsty / bittersweet

Original AN:

i have no idea where i was goin with this. saw the vague prompt of ‘character a finds out their house is haunted’ and went with it. mostly angsty/bittersweet at the end

this is mostly cynthia-centric with orchid not even being named until the end but watever . her ghost is there the entire time just chillin so it counts

once again. its 3am. havent revised. goodnight

also if this is cheesy near the end sorry idk how to write conclusions <3

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It still hurt.

It still hurt like it was an open wound. It was impossible, and yet…

“Cynthia?”

The voice was from someone standing above Cynthia, who was sitting in the dirt in front of a flowerbed.
Looking up, she could see it was the Sinnoh League estate’s head maid.

Cynthia hadn’t noticed how long she’d been sitting out there, though the cold was starting to nip at her fingers, as well as her wet tear-stained cheeks. Slowly, Cynthia wiped her face on her sleeve, and looked up to the maid with a pathetic smile.

“I promised I’d stop doing this, I know…” was all she had to say in response to the maid’s concerned look.

“Cynthia…”

With some help from the maid, Cynthia got back on her feet, though her eyes were still fixated on the flowerbed.

Her flowerbed…

She was drifting off again. The maid noticed and simply gave a small tug to Cynthia’s coat.

“It’s nearly lunchtime. If you’re not feeling up to it, I can prepare something for you.” she said, her words concise.

“…That’d be lovely” Cynthia replied, though a bit hesitant.

–

While eating, Cynthia’s thoughts were plagued. She’d lied to her therapist that she was doing better simply because the media attention was exhausting, but in reality, her brain was overflowing.

She couldn’t really be gone, there was no way. There… had to be something.

Cynthia absentmindedly watched the garden from the patio, where visitors had just begun coming in for the day. It wasn’t too busy, as it was a weekday, and chilly to boot. But there was a mother and child wandering around.

It hurt.

Cynthia watched in envy as the child ran around the flowerbeds, with an energetic attitude. Though suddenly, the child stopped and turned around, as if called to – though their mother was quietly reading on a bench.
The child proceeded to bend down to the center flowerbed – her flowerbed, and plucked a single flower.

People, especially children, pulled flowers from the garden all the time. But today, combined with it being her flowers… Cynthia found herself wanting to race over to the center of the garden and grab it out of the child’s hands… but she was emotionally exhausted. Begrudgingly, her eyes followed the kid as they absentmindedly nodded to nothing – odd. She watched as they skipped closer and closer… until they were as close to the edge of the lifted patio as they could get.

Waving, the child said something incomprehensibly, the flower’s bloom just poking over the edge of the patio.

“Blonde lady! Can you come over here?”

With a deep sigh, Cynthia got up. She didn’t want to deal with fans, not today. Though it’s strange a fan would call her ‘blonde lady’ instead of ‘Champion’. She walked over to the edge on the patio and crouched down, leaning over the edge just a bit so she could see the child’s face.

“The lady in the robe asked me to give this to you!” the child said, insisting Cynthia grab the flower.

Confused, Cynthia did, and the child ran off to bug their mother – who was still reading on a bench.

The lady in the robe?

There was nobody who fit that description in the garden, and certainly nobody who looked like that within speaking distance of the child.

Cynthia had so many questions, but given how young the child was, she felt it’d be out of place to interrogate them. She simply looked at the flower – a deep red colored orchid with clumps of dirt on its still-attached roots.
She’d always noted how she liked having a flower name, and wanted to give one to their daughter, too. It was Draconid tradition, after all. How they could grow a garden of their namesakes. As a family.

Cynthia found herself spiraling again. But… her curiosity stopped her. Why did some random child give her one of her flowers, claiming a non-existent robed woman asked them to? It didn’t make sense… but Cynthia didn’t have the energy to investigate further. So, she simply locked it at the back of her mind.

As the weather got warmer with the oncoming of spring, more visitors would come by. And as it would happen, more odd encounters would happen. Pokemon, especially her absol, would act strangely around the center bed. Her absol would stare into space, wagging its tail… before suddenly going off to doing its normal wandering. More children would gift Cynthia with flowers plucked from the garden, and while many didn’t give a reason, many cited ‘a woman’.

Cynthia, while still in the mires of grief, was beginning to unclog her brain just enough to realize a pattern… that it had to be connected.

She knew ghost pokemon existed, she had one herself. But human spirits? She hadn’t thought of it, and wasn’t quite sure if she believed in them or not. Cynthia let her curiosity overcome her discomfort as she opened up the library that had been practically abandoned since her passing. It was a bit gut-wrenching to see her desk, her notes all scattered, just as she had left them – only minorly touched by the maid. But Cynthia took a deep breath and went searching.

Cynthia knew she wasn’t the type to believe in pseudo-mysticism, and instead founded her beliefs of the divine and supernatural on facts… but this felt like it could be real, so she had to have had something in her massive collection.

Given how big and oddly organized the library was, it took Cynthia a good chunk of time to find her late wife’s section on the supernatural. It took more searching through old books to find anything, but Cynthia was eventually able to find something.

‘I’ve found most cases of odd behavior from children and pokemon, as well as minor poltergeists, chills, and orbs to be the result of human spirits. In every case I’ve investigated, there was a link to the body of a victim of a traumatic death nearby. I believe these traumatic deaths cause humans to stay after death, with the body to be the anchor. Moreover…’ was the author’s excerpt that caught Cynthia’s attention.
It was… almost exactly what was happening… minus all the harsher paranormal activity, of course.

She had been buried in the center bed, where all the activity occurred. Was… was she trying to communicate? Did she realize children could see her, thus directing them to give Cynthia flowers?

It was an epiphany. In a sudden burst of energy, Cynthia ran past the maid who was wheeling laundry around, and right out the back door. The sun was starting to set, a testament to how long Cynthia had spent in the library. All the visitors were gone for the day, so Cynthia made her way to just in front of the center bed, and cupped her hands around her mouth.

“ORCHID!! I know you’re still here!! And I know you’ve been trying to let me know!” Cynthia yelled, briefly pausing. “And I wanted to let you know! That I still love you! And I always will! And that even though you’re not here… you’re still alive in my heart! I’ll keep your memory and legacy alive for as long as I live, and that’s a promise!”

And it would seem, ever so suddenly, the cold night air around Cynthia got warmer.