Clarissa didn't pay much attention to what Serena and Misty were thinking. Just like Serena had done earlier, bringing up those events from the past immediately drew her deep into her memories.
"Ash was very smart. When Sister Daisy told him that the Joy family wanted to arrange a marriage with him, he immediately understood the reason behind the proposal."
"The Joy family wanted to marry him because they wanted to obtain the healing psychic power he possessed—to acquire a bloodline capable of inheriting that healing ability."
"But Ash's healing psychic power was extremely special. It couldn't be passed down to the next generation through blood inheritance. He knew that even if he agreed to the marriage, the Joy family would ultimately be unable to obtain what they wanted."
"Ash was an upright person. He didn't want to deceive the Joy family, but at the same time, he didn't want to offend the Joy family behind me. However, his healing psychic power was his secret, so he couldn't exactly explain everything to outsiders."
"In the end, when Ash asked Sister Daisy to relay his response to the Joy family, he subtly conveyed that his healing psychic power could not be inherited by future generations. At the same time, he politely declined the Joy family's marriage proposal."
"At first, when the family elders received Ash's response, quite a few of them felt deeply disappointed. I was equally devastated."
"But Ash had underestimated his own appeal. Even if his healing psychic power couldn't be inherited..."
"As someone born into an ordinary commoner's family with a perfectly respectable background, possessing outstanding looks, character, and talent, and being an extraordinarily rare psychic with abilities that perhaps only one person among several million might possess..."
"He was still an extremely desirable son-in-law in the eyes of wealthy families, influential clans, and major corporate powers. This was especially true for a family like ours, which had always maintained a neutral position and whose daughters were required to choose their husbands from among ordinary trainers."
"So even though Ash had politely declined the engagement on the grounds that his healing psychic power could not be inherited, quite a few elders in the family gradually gave up on the marriage proposal."
"But my mother and grandmother had already decided that Ash was the son-in-law and grandson-in-law they wanted. And by then, I had already fallen for Ash, so naturally, I wasn't going to give up on him either."
"Fortunately, not long afterward, Ash needed to obtain a medical qualification certificate and complete the procedures for a clinic operating license because he wanted to open his online medical clinic. Since he was a talent valued by the Kanto Pokémon League, the League opened a green channel for him."
"But his healing psychic power still needed to undergo an efficacy assessment, and Ash himself needed to receive basic medical training."
"I have to say, it really felt as though fate had arranged everything. Since the opportunity had practically been delivered right to our doorstep, there was no way Mother, Grandmother, and I were going to turn it down. So I immediately accompanied Aunt Amelie to the Pokémon Center in Viridian City."
"What happened afterward, Serena and Misty, you already know."
"I trained alongside Ash in medical knowledge. Spending a month as classmates allowed us to develop a deep friendship, and being together every day gave me the chance to understand Ash much better."
"My feelings for him gradually changed as well. What had initially been simple attraction slowly transformed into deep affection and longing. Just like Serena said earlier, Ash was like a little sun—bright, warm, and impossible not to be drawn toward."
"A boy as outstanding as him... as long as a girl is normal and spends enough time around him, I believe she would inevitably be attracted to him and eventually fall hopelessly in love. And I was no exception."
"But it seemed that Ash still had some reservations because he had previously declined the marriage proposal from the Joy family while he was receiving training at the Pokémon Center."
"Although he could sense my feelings for him, and he had actually begun developing feelings for me as well, he felt that he had only just rejected a marriage proposal from the higher-ups of the Joy family. If he immediately turned around and started dating a girl from the Joy family, he worried that his actions would offend our family."
"So although Ash was very close to me, he deliberately kept our relationship at the level of good friends."
"After some more time passed, Ash unexpectedly learned about my identity from Aunt Mitsuko, Gary's mother, and his own mother, Delia."
"He learned that I was the girl who had nearly become his fiancée because of the Joy family's earlier marriage proposal."
"He also learned that I was the granddaughter of the head of the Kanto Joy family, and that I had come to the Pokémon Center in Viridian City specifically to train alongside him and spend every day with him. That obviously meant my family wasn't opposed to the two of us becoming a couple."
"That night, while Ash was walking me back to the Pokémon Center, he finally opened his heart and spoke honestly with me. We cleared up the misunderstanding between us, and Ash and I officially became a couple."
"The fact that we had nearly become engaged before didn't hurt our relationship at all. Instead, it actually caused our feelings for each other to heat up rapidly, and our relationship progressed incredibly quickly."
"After that, whenever Ash came to the Pokémon Center every afternoon for his training, he would stop by Aunt Delia's flower shop on the way and bring me a bouquet of flowers."
"At first, they were flowers with relatively subtle meanings, like lisianthus, baby's breath, sunflowers, and chamomile... But gradually, they became lilies, yellow roses, white roses, and red roses..."
"What Ash didn't know was that every bouquet he gave me would be placed in a vase beside my bed that very same day. Once the flowers showed the slightest signs of wilting, I would turn them into dried flowers and carefully preserve them permanently."
"Now, at the Joy family's estate in Saffron City, I've set aside an entire room next to my walk-in closet specifically for storing all the dried flowers Ash has given me. The room is almost completely full by now."
As Clarissa spoke, lost in her memories, a sweet and blissful smile appeared on her face.
Even though she was lying beneath the covers, the distant, dreamy expression in her eyes seemed to radiate light. Serena and Misty couldn't help feeling envious as they watched her.
"And then?" Misty asked curiously when she realized Clarissa had stopped speaking for quite some time.
"After that? Well, Ash continued his training at the Pokémon Center. Once the training ended, we went together to the emergency room for our clinical internship. Ash was the attending physician who performed the surgeries, while I was his dedicated nurse and assistant."
"We worked together, ate together, and after work in the evenings, Ash would go with Gary and Green to the Viridian City Arena to compete."