Author's Note: Thank you all so much for your continuous patience and support! I'm so sorry for the long waits between my chapters. School often gets in the way of writing, but please know I greatly appreciate my readers! Thank you guys so much!


At Yuki's request, Tohru sat patiently in one of the many empty seats of an elongated mahogany table in the heart of the library. The silence in the room was so profound, Tohru began to wonder if this, too, was enchanted in some way. If a spell could heal Kyo-kun's gushing hand with such ease, then there must be one that absorbed noise!

These thoughts were her only company. She smiled in vain at company that had yet to arrive. At the realization that she truly was along, a piece of Tohru's heart sank. She knew she had been sitting here for at least a half hour waiting for Yuki and Kyo. This feeling brought with it a vague nostalgia of a long forgotten memory. The memory of the Fruits Basket game she'd longed to play with her elementary peers came flooding back to her. Then, too, Tohru had waited patiently, politely for someone to call, 'riceball', and let her join their game the eager children, but to this day, no one had called, 'riceball,' and she had never played.

Surely, Yuki and Kyo weren't like that.

Just as she'd begun to lose hope, a strikingly white creature with contorted claws and a long, naked tail scurried across the table towards her at full speed. Tohru's heart thudded against her chest. She let out a small, startled yelp as the beast scampered closer to her. The creature skidded to a menacing halt that made Tohru's breath hitch. It was just then, during her moments of terror that she made out the rushed, ever-slanted cursive handwriting of her name right there on the creature's back.

Very carefully, Tohru reached out her hand to touch the writing on the beast's back. To her delight, it was not fur she felt, but the brittle crackle of paper against her skin. It had seemed the white that she'd assumed was the back of an animal was actually a card addressed to her.. But something was still lingering beneath it. The claw-like toes and limp tail snaked out from beneath the envelop, followed by whiskers, rounded ears, and a sleek, grey physique. "A rat…?" Tohru whispered aloud.

A librarian with outrageously crooked glasses shouted, "Who do you think you are, girl!? Didn't you see the no-pets policy!"

"Eh?! B-but it's not mine!" she stammered, awkwardly reaching for the card. When she opened the envelop, the card read this:

Miss Honda,

My apologies for standing you up today. Kyo and I had a bit of an emergency and it looks like I won't be able to make it. I promise to help with your herbology homework another day.

Sincerely,

Yuki

Of course! Tohru thought. How selfish she'd been to think they had stood her up, when really the poor boys were going through an emergency! She brushed off what she hoped was the previous self-pity she'd felt as she stood, and headed into the herbology classroom. When she came out, a bouquet of vibrantly colored flowers filled her arms (though, she had gotten the permission of Professor Ritsu, of course).

She gently cradled the flowers in her arms as she walked the corridor of the Ravenclaw wing. Along her journey, she passed numerous talking portraitures, all sporting picture-perfect sapphire blue robes. Each one murmured to the next their theories about why a Hufflepuff girl might invade Ravenclaw territory, but none seemed to guess right. When she finally arrived, she was barricaded by the biggest portrait of them all: a man with long white hair and serpent-like eyes. "Ah, my child, you have made it thus far, but can you answer me a riddle?"

Tohru's eyes widened with anxiety. She had never answered a riddle before, but she assumed any Ravenclaw riddle would be much too challenging for a Hufflepuff like her. So instead, she shook her head. "Please let me in, Mister Portrait. I'm not trying to trick you or pass as a Ravenclaw. I couldn't even pretend to be that wise. I'm just trying to deliver a gift for my friends."

The portrait merely smiled as he slowly swung open. "That, my dear, is a very wise answer. True wisdom is being able to admit to your limitations. You may enter."

With a surprised and delighted bow, she entered the Ravenclaw common room. At her entrance, several Ravenclaws clapped. "A Hufflepuff with brains!" cheered one. "A girl!" cheered another. With a small blush, Tohru softly said, "Excuse me, but does anyone know where Yuki Sohma's room is?" One of the boys cocked his head partially with wonder, but pointed. "Through that door. His room's the very last one at the end of the hall."

Tohru was pleased to see that even without the boy's help, she would have guessed which room was Yuki's. The doorframe was almost entirely covered in constantly changing floral decorations, deep green ivy vines, and swaying flowers. Just as she was about to knock, the door abruptly swung open and collided with Yuki's bedroom wall.

Now that the door was open, Tohru caught a glance of the inside of the room. At first, Tohru worried Yuki had forgot to unpack. The room was entirely bare, aside from a mattress-less bed and barren desk in two corners. It wasn't until she glanced at the walls, however, that she realized all of Yuki's belongings were floating mysteriously in midair. Vases, pens, clothing, blankets, plant holders, and the like hovered eerily in the room with Yuki and Kyo standing in the midst of all of it. Tohru wondered if perhaps Yuki had placed some sort of odd spell on his room to make it this way, until she saw the wand clenched in Kyo's furious, white-knuckled hand.

"YOU STOLE IT! I KNOW IT WAS YOU!" screamed Kyo. Tohru could have been mistaken, but she thought she sensed heavy anxiety in his tone.

"This is ridiculous. I never took anything, and you know it," Yuki replied, surprisingly calm for someone who was possibly about to be killed with his own belongings. "You're acting like a fool."

"YOU'RE LYING! YOU TOOK IT AND NOW YOU'RE GONNA PAY!" Kyo growled. Suddenly, an oversized glass planter soared towards Yuki's head with dangerous speed.

"No!" Tohru shouted. Before she even knew what she was doing, she flung herself forward and tackled Kyo from behind. It was a pretty pathetic, awkward tackle, but at least it startled him enough for him to loose his balance. Both her and Kyo tumbled to the ground. She should have landed with face burried into his shoulder blades, as he was much taller than she was. But instead, her face painfully hit the cold, hardwood floor of Yuki's room. When she looked down, Kyo was nowhere to be found. "Um… Kyo-kun..?" she asked with a dazed expression, patting the floor for evidence of the boy that had been there just a moment ago.

"For God's sake," Yuki grumbled, forcing his palm into his hand as Tohru franticly tossed Kyo's previously-worn robes behind her in search for him. Finally, her hands caught a soft, bright orange tuft of hair the exact color of Kyo's. She felt relieved. Or at least, she did until she lifted it up.

Because what she had lifted was not Kyo's unconscious head, as she had assumed. Instead, it was the slender, curved back of a bright orange tabby cat.