Author's Note: Sorry for the late update! Summer school sucks! And NO, I'm not in trouble/failed a class. I'm doing it to get a head start on my high school credits, but ever freakin moment I have, I'll work on this story, K? They give us so much dang HW! But three weeks for a sememster credit isn't so bad.

THANKS SO MUCH FOR ALL OF THE REVIEWS! YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME! And since I'm in a good mood, this chapter is dedicated to those who reviewed in the last chapter. Enjoy!

Chapter 10

--Top Ten to Top Five Part II—

The first group returned a little after three-thirty. The ride back was quiet except for the occasional flipping of the papers, reading each response carefully, and sharing answers to her friends.

Yamato and the other contestants sat watching her all wondering what she was thinking. Once the limousine arrived at the station, everyone got out of the car and waited for the last minute announcement.

"Just a reminder that the results are going to be announced here tomorrow at four in the afternoon," Uo shouted. "Now you can leave."

It was a little over three forty-five and all five of the remaining contestants were already there. Three were in a group talking amongst themselves while the other two were just standing around waiting patiently.

"Huh? I guess these guys are punctual. Why don't you go mingle with them, Tohru?" Uo insisted, seeing that they had about ten minutes until they leave.

Tohru obeyed and walked over toward one of the guys standing around. He looked really handsome with his green hair and yellow eyes. His yellow short sleeve shirt revealed nice arm muscles that went well with his baggy forest green pants.

"Hi!" the singer said cheerfully, tapping him on the shoulder and scaring him half to death.

He jumped and turned around.

"Oh, sorry…I didn't mean to scare you like that," the brunette said with a very apologetic face.

"Errr…It's OK. By the way, I'm Julian Smith," he said a bit more calm and friendly.

"Well, you probably know who I am, but I want to introduce myself better. My name is Tohru Honda. Nice to meet you," she said, sticking her hand out for a handshake. Julian shook her hand. His grip was firm, but soft.

"So…you look nice," complimenting her white knee-length skirt and pink top. She had on matching pink high heel shoes.

Tohru blushed. Even after all these times, she still wasn't used to compliments.

"Thanks."

A few minutes passed by, and they were just standing next to each other in awkward silence.

"Sooo…ummm…" they both started at the same and then stopped with their faces red.

"So what were you going to say?" she asked.

"Oh no, you can go first," Julian insisted.

"That's OK. It wasn't important. Please, go ahead," Tohru persisted.

Instead of neither of them saying something, Uo interrupted everyone in that room.

"Listen up. Everyone who is in the Tohru Honda Contest, odd numbers, please head out to the painting shop across the street," Uo instructed.

The eight people crossed the street and went into the shop. The guys were wondering why they were there.

The shop had paintings hung on the walls and about twenty canvases for people to paint.

"Ah, I see you are here," said an old man in a kimono.

"Hey, Aishawa-san," Uo greeted.

"Thanks for letting us use your shop for today," Tohru said graciously, bowing.

"It was no problem, Honda-san. After all, it isn't every day when an old man gets to help beautiful women," he said.

"You sick b------!" Uo shouted.

"And I'm getting paid double too," he added.

'Ehh…he reminds me of Shigure,' Yuki thought, being disgusted.

"Well, um…why don't we get started? We're going to have our own canvas and paint something that represents stuff about us. For example, I like to cook so maybe an apron and add more stuff," Tohru said excitedly.

"Out of all the things we could do, why this? I can't even paint to save my life," someone grumbled.

"I don't want to hear your complaints. I can't either so I'm just gonna do my best for Tohru-kun's sake so shut your d--- mouth!" Uo shouted.

No one else complained and went to work, picking colors, and started thinking of what to paint.

Yuki really didn't like painting, but went along with it since he made a promise saying that he was going to do anything for Tohru for her happiness and love. He really didn't know what he was doing. The rat thought about painting a garden somewhere, a mouse, a judge's hammer and briefcase, and a plate of leeks and livers with a background of blue.

The silver hair man sighed as he looked at his picture of a garden. The garden wasn't bad, but it wasn't vivid. The red, yellow, and green were messing with each other to form a brownish color.

"Maybe I should've let it dry first," the rat mumbled to himself. There was no point in starting over.

Yuki started outlining a rat shape with gray colored paint. It was probably the most recognizable shape on the canvas. Then, he sketched out a hammer and briefcase. Making sure that he couldn't mess up anymore, he started outlining the sketch and filling in the hole. At the end, it was fairly distinguished compared to the garden.

The only thing left was to paint the plate of leeks and livers on the canvas and background.

It took him awhile to draw a nice round circle. The leeks and livers were easy enough to paint. All it was were streaks of green and brown on the outlined plate. Now, last but not least, the background. He brushed on some blue on the empty spaces that didn't have any color. He left some of the canvas revealed on the silhouette of the four pictures.

Yuki sighed. He had finished ten minutes early. This was something he was going to do in a once in lifetime experience. He glanced around and was relieved that his wasn't the worst one. A contestant's mural had blobs of yellowish-brown and black lines. Yuki assumed that the black lines were just an outline of something that he couldn't tell. The yellowish-brown blobs weren't even painted inside the line. It was slowly dripping down the page.

Those ten minutes flew by quickly as the guy with the horrible painting cussed and was about to throw the canvas out the glass window.

"I hope everyone's finished. We're going tell us a little bit about yourself and share your painting so we get to know each other better. It's OK if your mural isn't perfect or what you wanted it to be. It was fun, right?" Tohru smiled as she waited anxiously to see what they painted. "And…to see who goes first, let's draw from this mug," she told them as she randomly drew a name. "Tetsuya Tojo."

Tetsuya was a young man with black hair and yellow eyes. He was a little taller than Tohru by a few inches and had a thinner body figure than most men his age.

"As you can guess, I'm Tetsuya. I'm twenty-three years old, and I'm a senior at Tokyo University. I have an older sister and a little brother," he started. Then he moved a bit to the side and removed the cloth covering his picture.

His picture wasn't that bad. It wasn't very good, but it was perceptible. Everyone in the room could easily tell that he had a kendo stick, a hamburger, and books.

"I am still learning to master the kendo stick, but it's my favorite thing to do except reading books. My favorite type of food is American, but hamburgers are my favorite. My favorite color is yellow as you can tell by the background," Tetsuya told them.

"Julian Smith, you're next," Tohru called.

The green hair young man stood up and walked next to his mural. "My name's Julian Smith and I'm twenty-two years old. I'm attending Tokyo University also studying to be a doctor. I have five siblings," he introduced himself. Pointing to each picture on the mural, he explained it, "I have a soccer ball because my favorite sport is soccer. I'm captain of the TU's (Tokyo University) soccer team. The three flags represent my culture. I'm a fourth Japanese, half-German, and a fourth Korean. I love jazz as you can tell by the saxophone, but I can't play one. I can play the piano though. Lastly, the temple shows that I'm Buddhist and that's pretty much it."

"Uo-chan, it looks like you're next," Tohru read from the scrap of paper in her hand.

"Great," she muttered. "The name's Arisa Uotani. NO ONE can call me by my first name. As you can see, I'm one of Tohru's best friends so if you hurt her, you're going to be hurting a whole lot more," she threatened. "Now, for my picture, it looks like c--- so I don't need you to laugh.

She walked over to where her painting was and was right. It was all messed up and you couldn't tell what it was. The canvas had the red and black and other colors you couldn't identify smeared around the whole thing. Not a spot was left blank.

"Now that you've seen it. None of yours could be worse. I'm just going to explain myself without you getting hurt on trying to find the picture. I was in a gang, but then I quit because Tohru's mom, Kyoko-san, helped me understand that it was time to move on and I shouldn't be so angry at things. I admired her since she was the leader of her very own gang and was nicknamed the Red Butterfly. She even gave me this trench coat," Uo told them, showing off the black trench coat with a red butterfly on the back and red words on the sleeves.

"That's all I'm telling you about myself," Uo grunted, sitting back down.

"Nachi Kai," the singer said.

Nachi was the same person who griped on painting. He was also the same one that Yuki noticed after he was finished. He couldn't blame him for whining since his painting was no better than Uo's.

Nachi was a head shorter than Yuki and had brown hair and brown eyes. Nothing seemed special about him exact for the fact that he had made it this far, but probably was not going to make it any farther.

"I'm Nachi and I'm twenty-four years old. I graduated from Tokyo University a year ago and have a job at Mr. Smiley's Dental Care," he started. "As you can see, I'm not going to even try pointing at what I painted. I'm just going to tell you. I'm half Chinese and Japanese. I love noodles, and that's all about all I had time to try to paint," he told them.

"Hana-chan, you're up," Tohru told her.

"My name is Saki Hanajima. I don't know what to say except I wouldn't mind zapping you with electropoison waves if you hurt Tohru-kun," she said, her eyes gave a slight quick glare. "As for my picture, it's black. My favorite color is black. It was never black, but because of personal problems, it's black now."

The guys were sitting with one thought in their mind, 'Personal problems….?'

"It looks like I'm next," Tohru said, standing up and handing the mug to Uo. "You already know who I am, but let me introduce myself properly. I'm Tohru Honda, and this is my mural. I love cooking so I painted a pot with food cooking in it. Since I'm a singer, I have a microphone. These stick figures are supposed to be kid stick figures because I love kids. They are so adorable! Pink is my favorite color," she told them. Her painting wasn't bad compare to Uo's and Nachi's, but it wasn't good as the next person.

Next was Daisuke Yura. He was tall and handsome. He didn't have muscles, but looked really fit. He had black hair with blonde highlights and blue eyes. He looked like he was really shy to be talking about himself, but did it anyway.

"I'm Daisuke. I'm twenty-two years old. My minor at Tokyo University is art. I really want to be an artist, but my parents want me to be a pharmacist so I'm majoring in that. I love animals too, and errr…my favorite food is dumpling. I don't know what else to say except I know that we had to paint something about ourselves, but I wanted to paint something that had feelings and emotions. So…I…err…painted a portrait of Honda-chan," he said nervously since he didn't follow the directions and was embarrass of what they thought.

Daisuke removed the cover covering his picture. When everyone saw it, they gasped. It looked so lifelike and captured her perfectly. All the right curves, eye color, and even the outfit she was wearing right now.

"I hope you like it because I want you to have it," he whispered shyly.

"WOW! It's REALLY good!" Tohru exclaimed, jumping off her seat. Then, the words that he said hit her. "Oh no! I couldn't. I don't want to keep something so beautiful and…I just couldn't," Tohru shouted.

"It's not really good," he said modestly. "You can have it. I'm sure it's not every day you get a portrait of yourself," he insisted.

At the end, Tohru accepted the painting of herself.

"Yuki Sohma, you're the last one," Tohru called out.

Yuki hesitantly stood up and walked over to where his picture was. "Hello, my name is Yuki Sohma. I'm twenty-one years old, and I go to Tokyo University too. I have one annoying older brother also," the rat rolled his eyes. "I am majoring in law because I hope to be a lawyer. Leeks and livers is my favorite dish. In my spare time, I like working in my garden. I guess you can say it's like a hobby. I was born in the year of the rat, and my favorite color is blue," Yuki explained, pointing at each picture so they knew what it was.

"Well, now that we all know everyone else a bit better, let's get some dinner!" Uo said as her stomach growled loudly. Everyone chuckled, but Uo looked like she was about to jump someone. Uo on an empty stomach was like her PMSing.

The limo was already parked in front of the shop so everybody went it and drove off to the restaurant. The restaurant that the company picked out happened to be the one that Momiji owned. It was only a minute drive away, which surprised everyone.

When Yuki stepped out of the limousine, he was surprised that they were eating here.

"Surprised?" Tohru asked, popping out of no where.

"Eh…yes. I didn't expect to eat here with you and your friends again," Yuki told her.

"That's because your cousin insisted that we do eat here. He was going to give us a discount, but I told him no because the company was paying. I really hate this company and Akito," Uo said.

"Well, if you hate is so much, then why not find a new music dealer and company while you're at it?" the rat asked.

"Tohru's thinking about it. She doesn't want to because Akito was the one who made her famous, but he's a real jerk if you asked me. Hopefully after this contest, we can find a new one. I probably shouldn't be telling you this since you're his cousin, huh?" she said.

"Just because he's my cousin doesn't mean I like him. No one in our family likes him. I rarely talk to him," Yuki said with hatred.

"Hmm…so it'll be good if you do win for Tohru to get a new music dealer, huh?"

Yuki blushed. "That's IF I do, but I doubt it."

"Nah, you don't have competition except for maybe that Yamato Nakano and Julian, Oh, and that Daisuke probably got extra credit with that picture of his," Uo said, putting her hands behind her head. "You DO like Tohru, don't you?"

Yuki looked startled. He didn't only like her, but love her. He never told anyone about and wasn't going to until he told Tohru, but that depended on how far he would make it. "Of course! Why would I enter if I didn't like her?" he said, as his face grew redder. Actually, it was Shigure who entered him. He wasn't fond of the idea, but it didn't turn out to be so bad.

The ex-Yankee noticed his face and smiled. "Don't worry, lover boy. I ain't telling her what you said," patting his back really hard making him trip over his feet.

When they entered the restaurant, instead of having a worker seat us and take their orders, it was Momiji. He insisted on seating and waitering them.

"Hello! Come in! I saved the biggest room for you," he said excitedly. "I'm gonna be your waiter too!"

He ushered Tohru, who was in front, to the middle room on the right side and started talking to her. Once they were all seated, Momiji was still talking to Tohru. Those two were oblivious to the fact that all seven people in that room was staring at them.

Yuki coughed to get their attention. "Momiji, don't think we have a lot of time so since you're our waiter, do you think you can take our orders?" he asked nicely.

"Whoops, sorry, Yuki. OK, what do you guys want?" Momiji looked sad at first, but then his expression changed to serious. Momiji started scribbling stuff down. "I'll be back with your drinks in a minute."

After about an hour of eating and talking, everyone was full. Momiji managed to squeeze in and talk with them from time to time. This bunch was more talkative and loud than the first group. It was probably the fact that Momiji was with them, making it more fun.

Soon, it was time to leave and do something else. Before Yuki left, Momiji pulled Yuki aside to talk to him.

"So haven't told her about us, have you?" he whispered.

Yuki nodded.

"Are you going to tell her?"

"I don't know. If I do, I'm going to be wondering what she'll think. You remember how it was when we were little. All of those kids had to get their memories suppress. I'll never forget what they said," Yuki mumbled, remembering what had happened years ago.

"Even if she does think we're disgusting, Hatori could always suppress hers. It's who we are. She's going to find out sooner or later," he mummered.

"I…I don't want her to forget; especially the fact of meeting me, every second we spent together. It hasn't been much, but those moments that we were together, I've never felt happier," Yuki told the rabbit

"You love her, don't you? Hehe, Yuki is in love. Yuki is in love," Momiji sang.

"Momiji!" Yuki growled.

The eight people headed straight for the limo once more and now they drove back to the station. The contestants still had about two hours left with Tohru. They were curious as to why they were back here early.

"The last thing you guys are going to do with Tohru is sing. Each of you will get at least two chances to sing with Tohru, and on the second time, you can dance with her if you choose," Hana said in her eerie voice before anyone could whine saying that the first group got more time with Tohru.

"The order is determined by the place you got on the last audition," Hana spoke up as if she was reading their mind.

First of was Yuki. He got to pick a song and then those two sang in unison like before except they weren't dancing. They took turns holding the mike. The other guys were envious. They weren't going to do it perfect like Yuki. How in the world did they know when they would sing which part since it wasn't a duet song or when to pass the mike off?

Next was Julian. He was pretty good. The other guys were relieved that he wasn't perfect so that when they messed up, it wouldn't look totally bad.

They thought the duet was bad, the dancing was even worse. Yuki and Tohru sang and danced perfectly with each other. Julian kind of tripped, and it all went downhill from there. Nachi was so horrible, that it made the rest of the guys not want to dance with her, but rather sing.

Nachi tripped over himself and then somehow managed to trip him and Tohru. The last line before the song was over, he tripped over the cord. This didn't happen before. It was probably his nerves, but how nervous was it to sing and dance with Tohru in front of six people rather than the whole world and by yourself?

Before you know it, it was nine. The guys slowly left the station, but after Uo reminded them to come back here tomorrow at four for the results. Yuki decided to let all the other guys go first seeing that he didn't have a rush to go home. His brother was probably over there at Shigure's house waiting for him so he could ask questions like before. Now that he thought about it, he really didn't want to go home.

"Sohma-kun," someone shouted his name.

The rat turned around, surprised to see Tohru jogging towards him.

"Whew, I'm glad I caught you. I just wanted to ask you if you had fun this afternoon," she questioned, smiling at him.

"Yes, but now I really don't want to go home," he sighed.

Tohru thought that he was talking about leaving her so she blushed.

"My onii-chan is probably going to ask me a million questions. If I don't answer, then he's probably going to talk to Momiji and get the wrong idea from my cousin," he told her.

Tohru's smile left her face. "I see, but you must get along with your brother now and then right?"

"Actually, it's once in a blue moon we would agree on something," Yuki stated.

"Oh…well then, can you do me a favor?" Tohru asked.

"Sure."

"Momiji-san didn't want us to pay for the dinner today, but I feel bad so do you think you can give him this money. I know it's not much, but I don't know how much the food cost," Tohru whispered, as she handed him a wad of money.

"Sure, but I don't know if he'll take it," Yuki replied, taking the money. "He can be very stubborn when it comes to these things. What do you want me to do with the money if he doesn't take it?"

"Give it back then unless you want the money," Tohru said nonchalantly.

"OK."

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That same day, after lots of thinking that made his head hurt, the cat finally figured what to do about the problem. He only hoped the boar still loved him.

On the way to her house, since she lived outside, he bought her some lilies, her favorite flowers. When he arrived on her street, he was about to turn the corner. Instead of finding an empty street, he saw Kagura laughing with a guy. It wasn't that that made him mad, but the fact that she went into his car and drove off together.

"D---it," he cuss as he picked a direction and ran. 'WHY? Why was this happening to me?' he thought. He had never cried since he was little, but why did he start now? He had to do something. Something to get his mind away from his troubles. Something that will relieve whatever he was feeling. Something that he could take all the frustration out. He wanted to fight Yuki, but knew that one: he had helped him and two: he was at the contest thing so the only place left was the dojo.

All these emotions were all new to him. He's either angry or happy. What was this feeling now?

Every time he would feel this weird feeling, he was going to go to the dojo and burn it off there or fight Yuki. That was the only solution. He wanted to tell someone, but they would probably laugh at him. If fighting was going to take his mind of things, so be it.

KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK

The three young women were back at their hotel. After a day's work, they were all tired.

"Hana-chan, Uo-chan," Tohru said softly just in case they were asleep.

"Yes, Tohru-kun," Hana replied.

"You're not asleep?"

"How can we when you're talking to us?" Uo spoke up.

"I guess you're right. I just wanted to know how exactly am I going to pick five?" Tohru asked her best friends.

"Tohru-kun, it's easy. Which five do you like the most so far? Which ones do you wish to continue to get to know them better? This isn't only for your next CD, but your life." Hana turned to face Tohru.

"Hmmm, thanks Hana-chan, but I only got rid of three. I need to get rid of two more though. I guess I can think about it tomorrow. I just hope I'm making the right choice," Tohru said, closing her eyes.

"Who are the three you don't like?" Uo asked curiously.

"It's…"

DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD

As anticipated, Ayame was at the house. The moment he opened the door, Ayame jumped on him with questions. Shigure decided to join in and ask him some very personal questions being the pervert he is. Yuki didn't get one minute to relax.

Unfortunately for him, Ayame slept over. Yuki was too slow to lock his door so Ayame slept in his room. In the middle of the night, Yuki sneaked down to the living room to sleep there. The snake noticed and crawled down the stairs and flung his arms around Yuki's neck and fell asleep. Yuki didn't get an ounce of sleep.

At three o'clock, Yuki went early so that he could visit Momiji at his restaurant. After a very long debate, Momiji took the money since Tohru was kind enough to offer. He didn't want her to feel bad.

Yuki had about fifteen minutes left to wait. He sat down inside the lobby of the radio station. The lists from the previous auditions were down. Now there were bright colorful ads placed there.

"Aw, if it isn't my dear cousin, Yuki," Akito hissed.

"What are you doing here?" Yuki spat.

"Well, I am Tohru's music dealer. I deserve to know who the top five are." Akito placed his fingertip on Yuki's chin to raise it to his eye level. "I suppose you want to make it. I heard from Hatori that Shigure entered you. It's not that you like Tohru, is it?"

"I do," Yuki said with confidence. "I like her. It wasn't so bad as I thought it would be. Honda-san is nice and pretty. She doesn't deserve you as her music dealer," Yuki muttered.

Akito grabbed him by the neck and raised him up to the wall. "What did you say?" Blood boiled in his veins. "As I recall, I was the one who gave orders in this family. I was being nice enough to let you live your own life for the past few years and this is what I get? Maybe I should take control once more. Show you were your rank in this family is. I am the head. I rule all. I told you that I wasn't going to hurt her if you would just quit, but I guess I will have to."

"I don't think you'd hurt her. After all, it's because of her you're filthy rich. It's because of her that you still have your job. I'm sure the owner of the company would fire you instantly, but you have one thing he wants and that's Honda-san," Yuki argued.

"My, my, I see that you've learned how to disobey orders and talk back. I thought that a week in the black room did some good, but I guess not," Akito smirked.

"You wouldn't."

"Oh, I would."

Purple eyes glared at the cruel black ones.

"You know…maybe the room isn't enough. Maybe exposing your form will teach you a lesson," Akito chuckled.

"Reveal the curse? Are you mad? You always told us that people would hate us if they found out," Yuki whispered so that no one except Akito heard.

"Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. They don't know that I'm cursed. I have no other form than this. Besides, I could make it look like you're the only one cursed. Just have Hatori fix their memories," Akito sneered. "Wouldn't you like that? To have people hate you because of the rat. Just like when you were little except this time, it won't be for mere minutes, but for all of your life."

"No…No..NO!" Yuki screamed. Those memories. No one understood. Always taunting him. He wouldn't be able to face Tohru then.

"But I guess we'll see depending on if you win at the end, huh?" With that, Akito left.

Yuki fell to the floor, looking down at the turquoise carpet.

"Sohma-kun! Are you alright?" Tohru appeared out of nowhere. She kneeled on the ground, trying to see if she could help him.

"Honda-san! I…I…I can't do this," he cried out.

"Do what?"

"This. I can't do this contest anymore."

"But you have to. You made it to the top five," she said calmly.

"I don't care. Please, I can't."

"Sohma-kun, I want to learn more about you."

"No you don't. I might be normal to you right now, but I'm not," Yuki whispered.

"That's silly. Of course you're normal."

"No I'm not. I can't tell you. Not right now, anyway. You'd think I'm disgusting."

Tohru didn't say anything. She had never seen him like this. She wanted to help him, understand him more.

"Sohma-kun, if you don't want to do this anymore, then just let us be friends. I still want to get to know you better. I promise that I won't pick you for the next round, but please don't quit yet," Tohru said, trying to ease him.

"Friends…" he mummered as a smile formed. "I'd like that." 'But I rather want lovers,' he thought.

Tohru offered a hand and he accepted.

A few minutes later, Tohru announced the top five. Akito watched from a distance and smirked. Yuki was failing. He wasn't going to stay and win, not after that incident.

"And the top five, in no particular order, are…."

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Author's Note: Perhaps I went too far with the Akito thing…hmm…I really wasn't planning that. Anyway, Kyo's jealous, but he doesn't know that. HAHA!

R&R PLEASE!