Disclaimer: You'll have to excuse the big pink bunny; I'm slightly drugged on NyQuil right now.

A/N: Maybe slightly isn't the best word for it if I'm talking to a big pink bunny....o.O Anyhoo, I'm home sick, which is the only reason you're getting new chapter(s?). But don't worry about it, I'm better and will be back at school tomorrow at 7 (is actually happy about this; crazy, huh? Must be the NyQuil). Anyways, on with the chapter. Hope you all enjoy.

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Petrified Tears
chapter 74



The power came back on, the split second surge over. Pan and Trunks blinked, suddenly completely aware of how they were sitting, Pan half on his lap, him holding her quite intimately.

She giggled nervously, and he smiled dumbly. Their eyes met, and he swore.

"Dammit! I can't get over that sister comment! Explain!"

She blinked, leaned back, then started laughing.

"So wait, ok….explain that for me again?"

Pan smiled and shook her head. "What don't you understand?"

"Everything," Trunks replied, laying on his desk, his head hanging off the edge, knees propped up, hands folded across his stomach. Below him, Pan lay on her back with the top of her head next to the desk, looking up at the top of his head and his eyes, her own legs propped up, her hands folded beneath her head. "Starting with 'I would give anything to be your sister for just one day'."

She shook her head and looked up at him. "You really want me to explain all of that again?"

He tilted his head father backwards so that his gaze was full on hers. "You really need me to answer that?"

With a laugh, she arched her back and clenched her eyes, stretching her spine.

Trunks mentally throttled himself.

Do not look at her chest. Do not look at her chest… he chanted.

"Fine." She paused for a moment, then smiled. "I would give anything to be your sister for just one day."

"I caught that much, Panno; now what the hell do you mean by it?" he groaned, rubbing his face, then laying his hands out straight from his sides, his lower arms dangling off the desk.

"All of my life, I haven't been seen as anything more then a tomboy. Despite my mom's efforts, my dad's, my grandmother's, that's what I was when I was little. Sure, they stuffed me into dresses back then, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. I still found it easier to connect with you, my uncle, Uub, and whatever other guys that were hanging around than I could with Marron or Bra. As soon as I hit the age when most girls are discovered by boys, I might as well have been a boy. I was 'one of the guys', without being a guy at all; which only made it worse. If there's one thing I've learned about guys, it's that they have these secret bonds that they don't show anyone, and that they don't make with girls. But if they can find a girl who might as well be one of them; hell. I was a guy with most of you and almost every guy I've met in my life from the moment I walked into sight."

She paused and her smile grew superficial, her gaze seemed to look right up through his head before she lowered her eyes to some distant point in a corner of the room.

"But Bra had this way about her; even in grade school she had that way. She'd come home from school, some boy having walked her to the gate, no matter how far out of the way your house was. 'Course she never let them walk her to the door, but that's not the point. I'd be sitting on the stoop, or be exploring the grounds, and I'd see her walk up with this boy; he'd be carrying her books or her bag, and would just be out-of-his-mind-crazy with her. As soon as we were both in high school, when I finally got into public school that is, I thought maybe it'd be the same.

"It wasn't. Sure, there was the occasional guy that could see past the tomboy routine which I was desperately trying to drop, but that never lasted. The minute they met my family, that was it; they were gone. What was even worse, was that most of them never lasted long enough for me to take home. I'd meet a guy at a baseball or a basketball game, at the arcade, at work, and we'd hang out…but the minute he met Bra, that was it. I was 'one of the guys' again, and he was throwing himself at Bra."

Trunks blinked, absorbing this, and rolled over onto his stomach, crossing his arms across the desk and resting his chin on the cross of his wrists, looking down at her.

"Bra was usually oblivious, and would do whatever was in her power to try and get the guy to notice me as a girl again, but it would only make her a goddess in the guy's eyes. She never so much as admitted to liking any of them, even if I knew she did. And she never so much as entertained the thought of working at the same store as any of them. She's a good friend. But she still had that way about her, still does as far I saw last Sunday. And I'm serious; I would do almost anything to be able to be her for just one day, for guys to see me like that for just one day out of my entire life." She trailed off, looking up at him with a smile that resembled a doll's, painted and forced. "Sound's pretty stupid, doesn't it?" she laughed, trying to joke. But he knew she wasn't joking; that wish meant a lot to her and it was probably the source of everything that had been eating her up inside since she'd come home to the people she'd grown up around.

"No, Pan, it doesn't," he told her quietly, his strong voice gentle and reassuring.

She looked up at him, raising an eyebrow, as if to pretend the whole thing was still a big joke.

"I explain the thing three times, you're completely lost and clueless the entire time, but all of a sudden, you understand?" He shrugged. "I just wanted to make sure I hadn't missed anything. Believe me, knowing that you want to be my sister, and not my sister makes quite a difference."

She blinked, her eyes filming over, and looked up into his cobalt blue eyes.

"You actually thought I'd want to be related to you? Ha!"

He ignored her comment and reached down an arm, resting his cheek against the other as he flailed his hand uselessly at her bangs.

"If you've wanted that wish so badly, why didn't you just gather the dragonballs?" Trunks asked, batting her bangs from side to side. She crossed her eyes at his fingers, but didn't stop him.

"Because I wanted people to notice me for me, not because of some spell the dragon would cast." She sighed as he smiled down on her. "Yeah, yeah. I know I'm completely contradicting myself and coming off sounding like a complete moron. But it's true, no matter how stupid it sounds."

"It doesn't sound stupid to me, Pan. It makes perfect sense."

She looked up at him, suddenly confused herself. Was he being sincere, or was he just pretending to be like he sometimes was?

"And if you want to know the truth, Bra would happily trade places with you."

"What do you mean?" she mumbled, her eyes probing into his as his hand stilled, now drawing the strands of silken midnight through his fingers rather than playing with them.

He smiled. "She'd never admit it to you or anyone else, but she'd give anything to be 'one of the guys' rather than the pretty girl."

"How do you know that?"

He shrugged. "I'm her big brother. She tell me things, just like you tell Goten. She's on the other side of the spectrum, and she hates it there. Guys used to flock her, her attitude and her looks drew her a lot of praise. But since high school's ended, most of those guys that she could never keep hold of have gone off and gotten married or have wound up with bum-fuck lives. As she puts it, 'all of the decent guys want more than a pretty face'. Now, she's just being observed by guys who think she'd be a good lay, or that she's just one of those airheads that has a dozen guys for every dime she owns. That 'way' she had is gone now; the charm's worn off, and she's not as attractive as boys used to find her."

Pan laughed sarcastically. "I find that hard to believe; Sunday she and I went shopping. Guys would stop and stare at her; it was like she was a princess or something."

Trunks laughed. "She is, in case you've forgotten. But I sincerely doubt that anyone on this planet outside of our family circles would appreciate that. A princess without a planet doesn't sound so spectacular, does it?"

Pan laughed quietly. "But still…"

"And did you ever stop to think that maybe they weren't looking at my sister, Panny, but at my best friend instead?"

The laugh that bubbled out of her was so real and yet so incredulous that it almost hurt him to hear it. He pushed himself up into a sitting position and looked down at her, waiting for her to quiet down.

"Trunks," she laughed, half-sobbingly, "no one would ever look at me like they look at Bra. She's cute, she's adorable, and surprisingly loyal and honest. She never dated anyone just because she felt sorry for them, there was always some attraction in it on her part if she dated anyone. I'm everything Bra's not: not cute, not adorable, and somewhere between my grandfather and Yamcha."

Trunks shook his head down at her and she stood up, glaring at him.

"Trunks, we both know it's true. I was crazy enough to tell Bra once that I envied the attention she got. She told me that someday everyone would wake up and see me as me and not a tomboy. I told her she was probably right, but deep down, I know the truth. Everyone already has woken up; I'm just Panny, the kid. Not the little girl, not the little boy. Just, 'the kid'."

"Pan, that's not-"

She shook her head.

"You know what? I'm getting back to work. Thank you very much."

He watched, dumbstruck, as she turned her back to him and walked back to her nest of papers, keeping her back to him as she set to work.

"P-"

Her shoulders stiffened as his lips parted, and her name fell into a sigh of defeat. Hanging his head, he climbed down and sat down in his own nest, pulling papers and notes into his lap.

She has no idea how gorgeous she is, he thought to himself, his gaze drifting now and then to her back, his eyes making out the curves of her shoulders and her shoulder blades through her teeshirt, the lines of her bra. He sighed again, stopping himself from speaking, and he leaned his head back against his desk, purple locks falling across his eyes.

Dawn broke a few moments later, the life-giving rays stretching across the ceiling, falling on Pan, but not on him as he sat in the shadow of his desk. Lowering his head, his eyes landed on the mug she'd given him a few hours earlier. Slowly, he picked it up, recognizing it as a present she'd given him years ago when ChiChi had ordained that Pan would become a world-famous artist, one scholar in the family being more than enough.

Pan had entertained her grandmother for a few weeks, takings classes here and there, learning how to throw pots and vases. Eventually she had told ChiChi that art just wasn't her thing; maybe the art of movement, but not any kind of art that could be displayed in a museum. She'd given Trunks a mug, just a simple little cup with no handle that was stained black at the top, and faded gradually down into purple at the bottom. She'd confessed that someone else had glazed and painted it for her, but he still loved the mug; always had.

He sighed, cupping both hands around the old ceramic, and his eyes drifted to Pan, her back still turned to him.

He had a sinking suspicion that she was crying, but he knew better than to intrude.

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A/N: Hey, it wasn't my normal "they're about to 'get it on' and then get pissed at each other instead" routine, ya gotta give me that much. ;P I might be able to upload a second chapter tonight, no promises though. I'm still kinda sick, so it takes me a little longer than usual to edit my chapters before I post them. *looks at the 'Chat Girls' because they've seen what she goes through to edit* That and, well, Jack does funny things on NyQuil, and Saraneth's just plain konked out. Chibi and Goku are attempting to make soup...*turns green at the thought*...ok, ya know what? I'm just gonna go back to work now....