Hoenn University ~ To the Lovely Lioness...

Thyme lay stretched out on his bed, listening to the quiet music his computer’s speakers emitted at the late hour. He didn’t know why he was up so late; he should have dozed off hours ago. He glanced over at the crimson box sitting atop the chest of drawers at the side of his bed, then his eyes wandered over to the refrigerator in his dorm. He’d been up late making sweets like he used to back home, keeping them in the fridge to chill. He hadn’t made sweets in quite a long time...

The Bellossom huffed and sat upright, thinking of his old home back in the Orre region, his brother and his fathers and all of his friends...He missed it all; it just wasn’t the same without having them around. It was...lonely. Thyme couldn’t help but feel homesick. Making chocolates was fun, and it brought back memories of when he was a kid, but not being able to share them dampened his spirits. He sat there for quite a while when a messy scrawl on his calendar across the room caught his eye. He recalled what the scribble was without looking at it...

While dropping off some paperwork in the main office, Bianca the Pikachu had bumped into him by accident, spilling her piping-hot coffee all over Thyme’s shirt and causing her papers to scatter across the floor. Thyme had graciously helped the secretary girl out, and while helping her gather the papers he found a list of students with their birthdays written down, separated by month. The paper he had picked up had March and April birthdays, and the first thing he noticed of course was Alice’s name. Before handing the papers back to Bianca, he took a mental note of the Litleo girl’s birthday. He then went back to his dorm to change his shirt and mark his calendar so he wouldn’t forget when Alice’s birthday was--the twenty-third of March.

That’s right, Alice’s birthday was just around the corner. Thyme glanced back at the crimson box on his chest of drawers, his lips curling into a smile, and he left the warmth of his bed and wandered over to his writing desk beside his computer, turned on the table lamp, got a blank piece of paper out, folded it in half, then began to write...

“Alice, meet generic hand-written birthday card. ♫

...Heh, anyway, I heard you have a sweet tooth, so I decided to put together something really...sweet. I hope you like it; I made the delicacies from scratch. _{I’ve been feeling really homesick lately, and I was remembering how often I made sweets for my family...it’s a very special thing for me. And I wanted to share this special thing with you~}

Hopefully you haven’t been feelin’ as homesick as I have lately. A beautiful girl like you shouldn’t be feelin’ the Blues instead of the Rhythm. Maybe we can hang out some time later?

For the time being, I do hope you enjoy your birthday.

Sincerely, the generic hand-written birthday card.

Even more sincerely, your friendly neighborhood flower, Thyme R. ♪”

What a dorky letter, great Arceus above. Thyme was too tired to really care how dumb it was; it was at least something. He closed the card, finding a preserved four-leaf clover he had found and pressed between some books on his desk and decided to tape the clover to the front of the card. Yay plants. He wrote in clean handwriting, “To the Lovely Lioness, Alice:” on the front just above the clover, then stood up with the card in his hand and went to place it in the crimson-colored box. He then opened up the fridge and took out a little Tupperware container of home-made chocolates and candies. Having been in the colder portion of the fridge, the chocolates were nice and solid so they wouldn’t immediately melt. The Bellossom then put the sweets into the box. Then Thyme looked around for the last thing to go into the box. He had bought an MP3 player and crammed all sorts of R&B songs and albums on it to give to Alice for her birthday. Soon finding it, he placed that on top of the Tupperware with its charging cable and a set of ear buds. He then placed the lid on the crimson box. The gift was completely prepared.

Thyme turned off the lamp on his writing desk, then the music playing on his computer. After that, he left his dorm and the Fraternity building, the chills of midnight striking him. He wore a rather simple green t-shirt, which didn’t help much with isolating the heat. Carrying the gift box carefully, the Bellossom boy wandered across the cold, damp grass over towards the Co-Ed Dorms. He had recalled that Alice’s dorm was somewhere in the Co-Ed Dorms from the day they had met and from the night of the Toga Party. Though Deejay was accompanying the girl to her dorm after the Toga Party and didn’t return to his dorm in Fraternity until the next morning, which was rather curious...but Thyme decided not to think anything of it.

Thyme didn’t feel like knocking on every door just to find out where Alice was, so his first plan was to ask where Alice was without waking everyone in the Co-Ed Dorms. The boy scanned the doors back and forth before simply choosing one and knocking quietly on it, hiding the present behind his back...

A very tired Alice opened the door, glaring. She momentarily looked surprised to see the Bellossom standing outside her door. Then, the Litleo girl began to snap angrily at Thyme when she was suddenly pulled close. Stunned by the random hug, she froze in his arms, blushing a bit.

“Happy Birthday to you,” Thyme sang gently, embracing Alice, “Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday, dear Alice...” He released the hug and revealed the gift. “...Happy Birthday to you~”