Alright guys, sorry for the wait! Summer camps and what not. Anyway, this here is one of my favorite chapters thus far and nice and long to boot. I hope you have as much fun reading it as I had writing it!

Déjà Vu

I step out of the carriage again and am instantly hit with a wave of déjà vu so strong that I get hiccups again.

CURSES! And I'm not even wearing a corset or laughing! I hate hiccups. I glare at Lexi, wanting to blame her. I shouldn't, not that that stops me.

I hiccup all the way up the stairs. Remembering my first walk up here but nothing past that. It is all exactly the same. Same empty hallways, same tapestry that I wanted to hide behind, same fear… but a look at the guard from last time gets me walking up to the top of the stairs again. Just as I did last time I scan the crowd and see no Anthony, I wobble carefully down the steps, though not quite so bad as last time. And I find my self in the same empty faced crowd.

I HATE THIS!

Oh dear Grimm, please let the déjà vu end soon! I promise I will be as good as my sarcasm allows me to be and I will never try and make the story repeat again! It might even be bearable if I could just remember up to what point I had to repeat to!

And as you must have figured out by now (and if you haven't just stop reading now and leave) when nervous and fearful, I get angry or I collapse and seeing as I was not about to collapse. "Anthony? Where are you?" I mutter angrily under my breath.

ARG I already did that!

"You owe me an explanation and an apology."

And with that voice, all of last night comes rushing back to me. A LITTLE LATE! Now I can't run away or hide or…

A hand on my shoulder pulls me around and I find my self face to face with Donovan. AGAIN!!

I think I will just melt now. I am going to go curl up in a corner and die. As if it's not bad enough that he had to see me yesterday in all my hiccupy grass stained glory, now I am wearing a slightly more revealing dress and… I might have to TALK to him… civilly… though I don't think it will go THAT far.

This time though I don't even pause before I start glaring. "Why are you STILL here?!"

"If you would shut up for a minute you might realize that I was just about to ask YOU that." he retorts.

"I- I-" I fluster.

"How have you gone and messed up this time?" he says, interpreting my flustered state as embarrassment or guilt or something silly and completely unfounded like that.

"You can't just automatically assume that this is somehow my fault!" I shoot back indignantly. Not a word you.

"You mean, just because it probably is?" he says cockily, stupid git.

"You have no-"

"Proof? You mean besides the fact that the last time I saw you, you were raging angry at me? And I am supposing this is a curse so you probably tried to curse me, though seeing as you are here something went wrong, AND the fact that you are the only other person I know here?" Drat he's sharp.

I glare at him and am about to come up with a brilliant reply but Lexi chooses just that moment to show up again. And beside her is a male pixie with the same blue-green skin and spiky hair.

Who is he?

Did the curse decide I needed ANOTHER little pixie to order me around? I was being good!

"Dray…" Donovan groans. Oh, it's his pixie.

See, I can be sharp too.

"I'm supposing the other is yours?" he mutters.

I glare at him and refuse to reply, not that I would have had much time to do so anyway. As soon as Lexi and… Dray? Are within speaking distance they start chattering and ordering us about.

"Why aren't you dancing yet?"

"You are supposed to be dancing!"

"You are supposed to be falling in love right now."

I gag at the last bit.

Never.

Ever.

The curse has OBVIOUSLY messed up, and I am not in denial or anything, I am simply stating the facts, pure and simple.

"You-" Donovan starts, but I interrupt quickly.

"No," I say calmly to the pair, "Sorry, but you have obviously messed up, I'm going to go find the real prince now, bye." I say quickly and before any of them can say anything I am running off through the crowd.

Now see how easy that was?

While wandering through the blank faced puppets I come to two theories as to why Donovan is here. Both require you to know a fact that I don't even like to acknowledge myself.

Anthony and Donovan are so close they are almost brothers.

How Anthony can even stand him is beyond me, which is why I normally try to ignore the fact. But acknowledging it now is better than accepting that the curse is trying to get me to fall in love with a troll. My first theory is that the curse has just carted Donovan along to play some sort of role, maybe it is like The False Princess just with a Prince… it's possible! The other theory is that the curse just got confused. The two are constantly together, it probably just picked Donovan up accidentally, though how it could confuse Anthony for a troll I have no idea. So all I have to do is somehow convince the curse that it got it wrong!

But how am I going to do that if I am stuck trying to follow the story?!

It's a dilemma. Speaking of which, I should go find Adele, if anyone can help me, it would probably be her.

I wander to the outskirts of the crowd and find Adele in a corner near the thrones. She is staring rather blankly at the crowd and barely even registers as I approach.

"Any luck?" she asks distantly as I approach her.

"I haven't found him yet," I shake my head, coming to rest against the pillar next to her. I join her in dress watching. The people obviously aren't very interesting, but the dresses are all more modern and different enough to be a source of entertainment.

Adele looks at me strangely, "Really? He should have found you by now. I saw him go off towards you in the crowd, were you hiding or something?"

"No," I sigh, "I haven't seen him at all yet! Just this jerk from school, who keeps claiming he's the prince."

All of her attention is now focused on me, "Elle, there are no spare guys in here, just the fact that he's not a puppet, not to mention if you recognize him. He's probably your prince."

I laugh, "But see, I hate him, that is why I was yelling at him last night!" I explain, somehow still thinking it funny. "I wasn't drunk after all! And speaking of which, the guy I was thinking of is very handsome, Donovan is a troll."

Adele looks at me worriedly, "Trust me, I know the feeling, that the curse must have gotten it all wrong," she says. "Why do you think I got stuck here? But it isn't worth it just to be stubborn, just pretend and get out of here while you can," she says seriously.

"Well, what happens if I don't?" I ask, not yet worried, "Won't it just accept it and pick someone else? The curse I mean-"

She shakes her head and I frown.

"But- but it's the wrong guy! The curse just got confused and picked the wrong guy-" I try, but my voice sounds whiney even to me.

"Just try and stand it for a few hours and you will never have to bother with him again," she advises.

"But- but he goes to my school and you haven't met him, if I give him anything he will taunt me with it forever."

Adele gives me a look and I shut up, but just for a minute, "You know what, talk to him for like ten seconds and you will see what I am on about."

Adele raises an eyebrow.

"I'm not saying I won't do it, I'm just letting you fully appreciate that it will not only be difficult to convince him to go along with this, but I am going to need to have someone I can complain about him to! Someone to understand my suffering!"

Adele smiles, "Alright, lets go meet this troll then."

As we start off through the crowd Adele mentions, "You know, we aren't really supposed to be talking."

I shrug, "Please, I'm sure Cinderella and the stepsisters talk all the time, it's just supposed to be insulting or something, but if the curse is counting what I actually say, then I am dead, because there is no way I can be civil to Donovan for more than ten seconds, and that is just enough to say 'Don't talk to me!'."

We laugh. It's nice to have a friend in a place like this.

As we approach Donovan though, the smile melts off my face.

"Dairson, there you are, knew you couldn't stay away," he looks so smug I just want to hit him. He shuts up and raises and eyebrow though as he spots Adele. Well he should, he chases every pretty girl he sets eyes on and with my amazing dressing skills, Adele is gorgeous.

Thank you, thank you. Yes I AM amazing.

"Hello," Donovan says, I think he is trying to be flirtatious or charming. He fails miserably on both counts.

Adele giggles, "Well, so far you were right," she mutters to me.

Donovan looks put out.

I am happy to see that Lexi and… the other pixie, have been hanging around Donovan, hopefully annoying him to no end. Unfortunately though, as soon as they spot me, they start muttering together. I stop listening to Donovan trying to win Adele over, (I'm not too worried, she seems pretty sensible) and I start watching the two pixies probably plotting all sorts of misfortune for us.

Suddenly they attack. Both pixies go for their individual targets' ears and start whispering furiously.

I try to swipe at Lexi as she grabs my ear, the wind in my ear is anything but comfortable, but she starts pinching my earlobe.

OUCH!

I can only console myself that it is probably more painful for Donovan with his elf ears.

I growl at her and keep trying to flick her away but she is a determined little fly!

"You have to… you owe Adele… do you want her to have to cut of her heel just because you don't want to dance?" I stop. I look guiltily at Adele, who is glaring at the male pixie and bite my lip. I glance, well, glare over at Donovan who is… looking at my general direction… strangely.

I would kill to know what that pixie is black mailing him with, because whatever it is he walks over, grabs my arm, and says "We're dancing." Orders is more like it.

I glare and wrench my hand back, "Not if you are asking me like that."

"I'm not exactly asking am I?" Donovan says glaring at me. And he had been acting almost civil before. WHAT did that pixie say?!

I glare.

"Shall we dance?" he growls.

"Fine," I glare and allow myself to be dragged onto the dance floor. Now I must impress on you, how much of a sacrifice this is for me. I HATE dancing. With a passion, it's so awkward, I hate being so close to other people, I hate how complex it is… I hate it. The fact that my dance partner is Donovan only makes it worse. Much worse.

Not only do I hate him but of course he has to show me up doing it! Elves are naturally graceful and strong with great hearing to boot. I have managed to work until I am almost even with him in the latter two, but I am not in anyway graceful, and with my tiny little feet, I am a lost cause. At least I lost my hiccups somewhere back there.

Nope, there they go again.

We stand staring at each other in the middle of the dance floor.

"Which dance?" Donovan asks me shortly. I am grateful that for the moment he seems to have forgotten how terribly I did in dance classes.

And then as if reading my mind, "because we both know that you dance like a hippopotamus on stilts."

Troll. I decide to ignore the comment…for now. Revenge will come in the form of my "bad" dancing, all over his feet.

My first thought is waltz, because it is the simplest. But it is rather… close to your partner.

My next thought is… no I need to do the waltz, I will fall and break something if I try anything else.

"Waltz," I say shortly.

"Fine," and we take our positions, as far apart as the dance will allow.

I begin my struggle to stay upright.

"Now that I have your attention-" Donovan starts.

"Don't make me kick you again," I stop him.

"Now is that anyway to treat your True Love?" he says smugly.

I would have kicked him if I wasn't suddenly being swung around like a rag doll. I stumble through the spin and return to his hold too dizzy to even think about lifting my foot enough to kick him.

"You ch-eated," I hiccup.

He laughs at me… Troll.

"Who told you," I demand.

"I can read your mind, it's my favorite part about this curse!"

I curse furiously, words that aren't suitable for your poor Igg ears. If he can read my mind- oh curses, what if he is reading it right now?

I look up at his smirk and realize the joke at my expense, "Li-ar," but my accusation is ruined. "Lexi told you didn't she."

He grins.

"Trai-tor."

"She was much more helpful than Dray," he shrugs.

"Well, it doesn't matter anyway," I growl, "because the curse messed up."

His face is impassive as he says, "Oh because it's Anthony is it?"

I pale, oh right, I asked him about that.

"No."

"Please," he glares, "even if I had forgotten about yesterday, I see the way you look at him every time we pass in the halls."

I glare back, "I do not-"

"You can be so dense sometimes, you think that just because he isn't watching that no one else is?" How does he always manage to make me feel like an idiot? I think that must be another elfish talent.

-Make Elle Dairson feel like she is losing brain cells just by looking at you.

-Point out everything Elle Dairson does wrong.

-Be a jerk.

That is unfair, I know plenty of nice elves. It's just him.

"Oh, you're wa-tching me?" I point out, defensively, "You may tease about you being my true love, but it goes both ways and that would have to mean that you are in lov-e with me."

He snorts. "Right. I would rather kiss a troll."

"At least we can agree on that," I say, "But too bad, because it is the only way to get out of here."

"Right, the bugs mentioned that," Donovan says darkly. "But you can't complain too much," he says, a grin touching his lips, I can see where this is going but he spins me again before I can stop him. He continues as he pulls me back in, "After all at least you get to kiss me, I am not as fortunate to get someone as good looking."

I slap him and pull away, stopping our dance half way through.

"You troll!"

"I think you have already said that, can't you come up with a better insult?" he shoots back.

"I can't believe the curse could mist-ake you for Anthony!" I yell at him.

"Oh because you know him so well, do you Dairson?" Donovan says, his glare intensifying.

"I at least know he is more of a gentleman than you could ever be!" Cliched line I know, but…

"And why am I not a gentleman?" Donovan challenges, his voice dangerously quiet. I think it is an elf thing how threatening he is managing to look

"I- I-," I struggle to come up with a specific reason. "A gentleman wouldn't let a lady just fa-ll down the stairs like that!" I think of the most glaringly obvious and recent example.

"A lady wouldn't shove a gentleman so that he can't catch her when she stupidly throws herself off balance," he retorts.

"A gentleman wouldn't have thrown me in the lake after I accidentally dropped my lunch on him!" I shoot.

"We both know that wasn't an accident," he shrugs. (Actually, that time had been, like I would waste my lunch on the likes of him.)

"He wouldn't lock me in the library so I was late to finals freshman year!"

"I can't believe you still remember that, but if you will fight that selective memory of yours, the period before you'd tried to convince Ms Tolder that I was cheating. Besides you got to retake it later."

I glare but keep pushing. "He wouldn't try to choke me in fighting class!"

"In case you didn't recall, you started it," he says pointing at his eyebrow which is still healing from the incident, "and at least I held back. Since you didn't seem to notice- you only got a few bruises, and I STILL have some injuries. And I'M a fey!" (They heal faster, since I don't think you would have caught that on your own… iggs.)

"Anthony wouldn't have tu-rned Jaz down so ru-dely and public-ly as you did!" I shout finally.

I think the hiccups are getting worse.

Donovan's face takes on a look that clearly says 'so this is what this is all about', "Anthony wouldn't turn her down at all," he says quietly.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You ARE dense," he says looking me squarely in the eye.

"What?" I say, getting more and more frustrated by the second.

"You know why crushes are called crushes? Because they usually end up being crushingly disappointing," he informs me oh-so-sagely. "Anthony likes Jaz, and that is why I couldn't say yes," he confides.

My stomach sinks all the way down to my toes. And here I had been so convinced every time he was looking over at our table, he was smiling at me. I had somehow managed to convince myself that he might maybe just like me back but we were both just too nervous to admit it.

I shake my head and glare at Donovan, am I actually listening to him?

"You're ly-ing." I accuse.

"Believe what you like," he shrugs, "Now I believe we were supposed to be dancing?"

I refuse to say another word to him the rest of the night (because if I had I think my voice might have cracked if I didn't break down completely) and at least half of the times I stepped on his feet were not on accident.

Midnight comes and I can't get out of there fast enough. I don't even say goodbye to Adele.

I wanted to punch Donovan as a parting gift. I REALLY wanted to. But I am pretty sure THAT would have been noticed by that curse. I hope Adele realizes how much I am doing for her… Maybe she could slap him for me later?

I storm down the stairs and into the carriage that is waiting there for me, all terribly antsy to take off. As the horses take off I can only think how much I refuse to believe anything the troll has said. It can't be true it can't! It's all like some bad soap opera! Anthony is my true love!

The carriage disappears halfway down the road, and I, left still moving through empty air, land on my butt and skid onto my face. I am left alone on a dirt road in my raggedy dress. So with some abundant and creative curses I end up following Lexi the rest of the way back to the house. I enter through the kitchen and my limbs feel numb, but it has nothing to do with my walk.

I stumble upstairs and collapse on the bed.

If crying weren't stupid and useless, I think I would be doing that now. But I don't. I curl up on my bed and fall asleep, continuing to list all of the reasons why Donovan is lying and shouldn't be trusted.

He's a troll

I hate him

He ALWAYS lies

He's a troll

He loves making my life miserable

He's a troll

He's just trying to avoid my anger

He's a troll

He's a TROLL

I hate him so much…

Isn't it nice to finally get some insight into the ridiculously difficult to write, cocktail of sarcastic comments that is Donovan? Still open to suggestions and witty help!