I'm soooooooo sorry I haven't written in ages. I was just lazy. Hehe. Well now I'm back. Thank you everyone for giving me reviews and telling me to continue to write. Hope you enjoy this chapter and many more to come!

Part II: The Morning After

Chapter X: Chance Meeting at the Amusement Park

"Let's go on that first!" Shigeru pointed to a roller coaster that had 3 loops and sharp falls.

Akira paled. "How about we start with something small and work our way to the dangerous rides." Akira pointed to the opposite direction, to a roller coaster that had no loops.

"Fine, but we're definitely coming back here."

They went over to the kiddy ride. The ride lasted less than a minute. Everyone thought it was boring, except Akira. He was tightly holding onto the bar in front of him to keep from screaming.

"I don't know why I go on these rides when I always get sick afterwards."

Tsukasa laughed, "You're such a wuss. I remember when we were kids you used to throw up from the kiddy ride we were just on."

"I'm going to stay away from the roller coaster rides. You guys go ahead. I'll just wait here."

"I'll wait with you," said Rui. He wasn't in the mood to go on rides.

Akira and Soujiro exchanged glances. Akira caught the message. He was in charge of finding out what happened in France. The question was: how was he going to do it? He doubted Rui would just answer if he asked.

Rui and Akira walked over to sit down on a wooden bench. "So Rui, how come you're back?"

"I wanted to."

Akira sighed, an expected answer he thought.

Rui stood up.

"Where are you going?"

To a place where I won't be questioned, he thought, but he since he knew Akira had the best intentions he didn't say that. At that moment a girl wearing glasses, a long skirt and hair in a ponytail walked by. "I have a date with this girl here." Rui put an arm around the girl's shoulder and nudged her away before she had time to protest.

"Let go of me," the girl cried. She struggled to get out of Rui's hold but he was too strong. When Rui felt they were a good distance away from Akira he let go of the girl's arm.

"Sorry," Rui turned to walk away.

"Wait, you can't just drag me off and then leave. From what I can tell, I helped you, the least you could do is buy me a drink."

Rui stared at the girl. She didn't look like a pushover. She was tall, a few inches from eye level, and she wasn't wearing high heels. He was tempted to just toss cash at her and tell her to get it herself, but he was intrigued. She was wearing her school outfit, a white collared shirt that was a size too large on her, and a dull blue colored skirt that reached her ankles instead of opting to wear a short skirt. She wasn't attractive at all but there was something about her eyes behind her glasses that twinkled with intelligence and confidence.

The girl knew she was being evaluated, and she knew she looked horrible but she didn't care. She wasn't going to be used without at least getting something from it, and she knew the rich Hanazawa Rui could afford a drink. She recognized him immediately when he grabbed her arm.

"Fine. Where do you want to go get a drink?"

She looked around and spotted a store. "There is fine." Rui looked to where she pointed. It was a food court. They walked in. She asked for a bottle of water from the cashier. Rui took out his wallet and paid. He turned to walk out of the food court.

"Wait, sit and talk to me. You don't have anything else to do right?"

"You know you helped me for only a few seconds."

"It's okay if you want to go. I just thought you might want company."

"I just left my friend. What makes you think I want company, especially yours?"

She shrugged, "Just a hunch, and if you don't want to be with your friends you might as well stay here a while with me. Since I'm a stranger I won't ask anything personal." She walked over to the table on the side. She didn't look back to see if Rui followed. She didn't doubt he would. She was very good at reading people.

Rui walked behind her, thinking who is this girl? True, he wanted company but now he wanted to know more about her. Ever since Makino he hadn't been interested in getting to know anyone else.

Rui sat down across the girl. "Do you make a habit of talking to strangers?"

"Do you make a habit of dragging girls you don't know?" she retorted. "And besides, you're not really a stranger. I know who you are, Hanawaza Rui. I saw your picture in a magazine."

"I see." Now it made sense. She made up all that nonsense of him wanting company. She just wanted to keep him with her. Rui struggled to hide his disappointment. He didn't want to her to be another girl who was after his money.

"You're probably thinking I'm after your money."

"Aren't you?"

"No. Money can only buy so much. I have enough to live on, and that's all I need."

Rui scoffed. "It's never enough."

She shrugged. "I'm not naïve to think that some people aren't obsessed with acquiring wealth. I'm just saying that I'm not. Look, I know you're not going to believe me no matter what I say, so let's not argue and move to a neutral subject, what hobbies do you have?"

"I like to sleep and watch t.v."

"Sleeping is not a hobby."

Rui shrugged, "It's what I like to do."

"But a person can only sleep so many hours a day."

"That's what you think."

"But there's so much to do, it's such a waste to go to sleep."

"There's nothing else to do."

"What are you talking about? There's so much to see, so much to learn, so much to do, and since you're rich you definitely don't have financial limitations."

"I'm not interested."

She shook her head, "What about your friends? Don't they go out and drag you along?"

"My friends are girl crazy. I'm not, so we don't hang out often, especially at nights." Rui thought about Akira and Soujiro. Since junior high they were already crazy for the opposite sex. Every night they would go out to clubs to meet women. They always asked him out but he never went with them, so they stopped asking him. He thought of Tsukasa. Ever since he met Tsukushi he's been in one mood or another. Even though he considered Tsukasa his best friend they didn't really hang out.

"Maybe you need new friends."

"I'm content where I am, so why change?"

"But are you really content? You don't seem like it." Before Rui could think of a response, the clock outside the store gonged. The girl looked at her watch. "Oh no, it's already so late. I'm late for work." She stood up and smiled at Rui. "It was nice meeting you Hanazawa Rui. Don't think too much, sometimes it just makes a person more depressed." And with that she ran off.

Rui stared at her and his eyes followed her until she was lost in the crowd. Are you really content, he heard her voice whisper in his head. Rui clenched his fist. There was nothing he could do to stop the ache in his heart. When Shizuka went to Tokyo to ask him to come with her he was so happy. But once he was there he realized there was no place for him. He stayed at home while she worked. He felt like a child. Still, he might have stayed to find work but Shizuka and he had been getting into more and more fights lately. She had to socialize but he didn't want to, nor did he want her to.

The last argument they had replayed itself in his head. He wanted to pick her up after her dinner with her coworkers and apologize for being a child. He was outside the restaurant when he saw her come out with one of her male coworkers. They hugged and kissed. He went back to the apartment, packed up his things and left.

God, he was so stupid. Why did he think that Shizuka would ever fall in love with him? She was elegant, sophisticated and sociable. She was the first girl he fell in love with, the first woman he made love to, but he wasn't her first in anything. Damn he felt like a fool.

Rui got up and saw the water bottle on the table, the one he had bought for the girl. He stared at the bottle, and realized that she didn't tell him her name. If she was a gold digger she would've told him her name and given him her number. Maybe she was telling the truth, maybe she actually stayed with him to keep him company, nothing else. Or she realized that there was no point in giving him her contact info because he wouldn't call her. Yeah that was probably it, Rui concluded. He walked away, water bottle in hand.

Akira was sitting alone when the rest of his friends came back from the ride.

"Where's Rui?" Soujiro asked.

"I don't know. One minute I was talking to him, asking him about what happened in France. Next minute he pulls some girl walking by and said he had a date with her."

"Maybe he really had a date with her," said Tsukasa.

"Yeah right," Akira responded, "she didn't look willing to be dragged off."

"Then why the hell did you let him take her away? That's kidnapping!" Tsukushi yelled.

"It's ok, I'm sure Rui wouldn't do anything to her. He's not Soujiro," Shigeru said.

"Hey!" Soujiro pretended to be hurt, "I take offense to that. All the girls I've been with were willing."

"No doubt." Tsukushi has seen girls fall over the F4. She remembered her first year at Eitoku. The only thing the girls talked about were the F4. She was so disgusted by their boy crazy minds, and now she's in the exact place all the girls dreamed of being. She looked around to the faces of the boys. If someone had told her back then that she would be friends with the F4, she would have laughed in disbelief. She thought the F4 were selfish and spoiled rich boys. She still felt the same, but she started seeing them as friends and she learned that each and every one of them would go through hell for the other, and for her. She didn't understand why she was so lucky to have such great friends, but she was grateful.

The big clock in the amusement park started gonging. Tsukushi looked at her watch and saw that it was already four.

"Tsukasa, we have to go to our lessons. It's already four. We can't be late."

"Shit. I forgot about that. Sorry guys." Tsukasa and Tsukushi left the amusement park, leaving only Akira, Soujiro, Shigeru and Sakurago. The four of them watched the couple leave hand in hand.

"Do you think they'll make it?" Shigeru asked.

"If they don't I'll be there for Doumyoji-sama," Sakurago proclaimed.

"You would just make things worse," said Soujiro.

"I hope they make it. They've been through so much together," said Akira.

"They'll definitely make it," Soujiro declared. "Tsukasa is crazy for her. He won't let her go, ever."

"He definitely changed a lot because of Tsukushi. I remember other than the F4 and family, nobody used to be able to approach him without getting hurt," said Sakurago.

"You don't even know half of it. You and Shigeru started hanging out with him P.T."

"What's P.T.?" Shigeru asked.

"Post-Tsukushi, and believe me there's a definite difference between before and after. Akira and I have been with Tsukasa since we were kids. Shigeru, I know you like Tsukasa but if you had met him B.T. (before Tsukushi) you wouldn't have been able to talk to Tsukasa without getting hurt."

Akira agreed. "He didn't discriminate between women and men. He simply felt everyone was beneath him. Every rich household has a sense of formality but Tsukasa's family took it to the next level. Tsukasa grew up with people telling him that his family was the best, and since he was surrounded by people who threw themselves at him he started believing it. And since you were a rich girl that his mother betrothed him to, he would have had even more reason to hurt you."

Shigeru knew and understood all this, which was why she was willing to let Tsukasa go. He would never look at her the way he looked at Tsukushi. She had bared herself to him, physically and emotionally but he wasn't swayed. Her self-confidence had dropped significantly. But she knew she only had two choices, either try to force Tsukasa to love her or help them get together. Maybe she would have chosen the former if she hadn't liked Tsukushi. Shigeru didn't have any close friends. She came from a rich family, maybe not as rich as Tsukasa's but definitely amongst the richest. There were too many people who approached her saying they wanted to be friends but they only wanted to be friends with her because of her family. Tsukushi was the first one that really didn't care. Tsukushi talked to her as if there were no social barrier. Shigeru cherished that, more so than being with Tsukasa. Tsukushi and Tsukasa were her best friends. She didn't want to hurt either of them so she decided to do everything she could do get them together. She knew that in everyone's eyes she looked like the jilted bride, but it didn't matter as long as the two of them were together, without one another they were miserable. If both of them were happy then she could be happy too.

"Let's forget about them, and have fun on our own. There are still so many rides left we didn't go on!" Shigeru walked to the next ride.

Akira paled but he still followed after them.

Finally! I have a chapter out. Thanks to everyone who's been waiting!