Title: Living in a Romance Novel

Chapter 10: Battling the Climax

Authors Note: Woot – chapter ten! We're in the double digits. I think a lot of you have waited for this chapter, and I certainly enjoyed writing it, so enjoy!

Disclaimer: I do not own Fruits Basket or any of the characters. Evalena White is my own creation however, and belongs solely to me.

Life itself is the most wonderful fairytale of all. ~Hans Christian Andersen

"Lena…." Mii scowled and dragged one of the feathery pillows, one hit, two hits, three hits.

Nothing.

"Good lord, LENA," she brought the feathery pillow down on Lena's face…hard.

"OW. DAMN IT. WHAT?" Lena's eyes snapped wide open as she seethed up at the intruder on her dreams, "This had better be a fucking emergency Mii! Prince had better be on fire!"

"Better," Mii replied with a satisfying smirk, "Sensei is on the phone."

For a moment, Lena just starred, gaping at Mii, "Who? Oh….I hate you," she finally said after a long period of time that wafted in the air, "With every fiber of my being, I hate you."

"Should I tell him to call back?" Mii hesitated as she looked to the phone.

"AND HALT TRUE ROMANCE?!?" a voice screamed from the phone.

One word went through Lena's mind….Ayame.

"You still have trouble telling Shigure no…" Lena gapped at her, "After all the suicidal moments he's put you through, you can't tell him no…" amazing, just….amazing.

"N…NO!" Mii trembled as she debated the point, "Sensei really wants to talk to you."

"One, stop calling Shigure that, I don't and two, work on saying no," Lena snapped and grabbed the phone from her.

"This. Had. Better. Be. Good." She demanded, each word staccato and accentuated.

"Would I call if it wasn't?" Shigure hummed, Ayame was singing something in the background, which was distracting enough because it was Ayame.

"Yes," Lena replied, point blank.

"Well, that's just rude," he tried to sound offended, but it was hard with Lena snorting through the phone line in disbelief.

"I've never seen you even close to being offended, because you don't let anything, I mean, anything bother you," Lena remarked, with just a little bit of sass on the phone, "Stop getting me off track," oh yeah, she blamed him, whole heartedly, "What did you call for?"

"There you go, blaming me again," Shigure whined, "I was calling to offer a private, romantic lunch in an enchanted forest with sugar plum faeries catering to your every whim…but if you're going to insult me…"

"Okay, one, you're back yard is not an enchanted forest, and two – I don't think you should call Tohru, Yuki and Kyo sugar plum faeries. If Ayame is there with outfits…count me in," a visual she would never forgive herself if she missed.

"It's all in the imagination," Shigure remarked tartly.

"Say's the damn writer," stupid writers.

"Is that a yes?"

"Whatever." With Lena's one worded, not so much of a reply response of agreement, Mii began to do some girly squeal, which Lena ignored for the sake of her own sanity. Shigure was already pushing it to the limit.

By the time Lena arrived at Shigure's, the sun was slowly rising into the sky, the gentle wind had a bite to it though and she was slightly worried of her outfit of choice. Shigure was right, she did where a lot of lace and silk.

But it was pretty and feminine and damn the man that would mock her for dressing appealingly….even if it was outrageously expensive and incredibly uncomfortable – welcome to stylish uptown New York.

If Lena didn't have a blister from her shoes at the end of the day, they were out of style.

"A picnic, are you insane? It's going to rain later," Lena grumbled as Shigure seemed to appear out of thin air – he had a way of doing that.

"Let a poor writer entertain his lady," Shigure in turn, also used the same whiny grumble that Lena had just given him and took her hand, forcing her to plop down on the red checkered picnic blanket. There was an authentic woven basket next to him.

"You've got to be kidding me, we look like an idyllic picture out of some Italian wine grove garden, where did you find all this….crap." Good lord, the man even had all the plates set out, when did the photographer arrive? Where they going to be in Home And Garden?

"What are you looking for?" Shigure had a funny smile on his face when he asked the question as Lena's head whipped around three, four times.

"You're sugar plum faeries," Lena remarked sarcastically, a language she was fluent in and proud of it, "But really, let's talk about over the top – this here, Sohma, is way over the top." She should have expected it, the man didn't half-ass things. Thing was proven with the horse drawn buggy he invested in.

"A lady of my heart that's worth every minute of it," he picked up her hand and kissed it.

It if had been anyone else, Lena might have believed it, but never, never believe a writer. "Cut the crap," she retorted before stretching out on the blanket, might as well enjoy it.

"Ah, point proven," Shigure remarked and dragged a slow finger down the lacy skirt, a mischievous smirk went well with the crafty look in his eyes.

"So? I like looking nice," It was the only excuse she had, "when you live in New York, you live in style…that is if you don't want to be an outcast," she sniffed and looked away. Lena had spent enough years in an orphanage to know what the word 'rug rat' meant and that it had applied to her tattered and patched mis-matching itchy clashing fabrics in every way.

Now she wore Prada, Gucci, Coach, Ralph Lauren, Dolce Gabbana, Marc Jacobs, and her personal hailing god, Garavani. With an editor's salary, she added wardroom pierces yearly, but over the course of her twenty seven years of living with only her and a dog to provide for, she had a nice, but not outrageous collection.

It was enough to make any middle aged house wife jealous, but not enough to intimidate women that were truly affluent and bought a new Dolce Gabbana every day.

"If you have a problem with my clothes, keep it to yourself," Lena remarked with sass.

"The only problem I have, is that they're still on," Shigure remarked.

Lena would have smacked him, under normal circumstances if she was more in control of her body, but Shigure plummeted his lips to hers, one of his hands was lost in the tangles of her soft blonde hair, and the other hand stayed on her side.

They were lost in the moment, otherwise Shigure would have been more careful, more aware of his surroundings and her body began to inch closer to his, how his hand no longer remained on the ground but was beginning to travel up her thigh when…

Poof.

The sound that came out of Lena's mouth couldn't even be declared human. One minute, she was kissing a rather handsome and sometimes annoying writer. The next, there was a dog practically in her lap.

Now would be a great time for the cameras to roll out with a man and a big 'GOTCHA' or "YOU'VE BEEN PRANKED' sign to come out

Of course those things only happen on T.V.

"Uhm…Shigure, you're a dog…" for some reason, pointing out the obvious seemed to work.

"Yes, well, that's rather a long story," he replied dryly.

Lena didn't miss how he didn't exactly look her in the eyes, he did move away from her though.

It had been different when Tohru had found out, Shigure hadn't truly cared if her memories were erased, though as far as a cook and maid went, he was certainly glad she had kept her memories. From the start he had done all he could to protect Evalena from having her memories suppressed.

Until this moment, things had gone quite well too.

"Damn Sohma's," Lena finally hissed, "All you come with is trouble!" First her mother, now her – this was a generation problem. The one thing she had passed down from her mother, problems with men. Perfect. Her therapist could defiantly put the family issues on hold, they had a whole new closet of skeletons to deal with…all thanks to the Sohmas.

"We really are," Shigure replied, and with that he took off into the forest.

"Hey…HEY! YOU DON'T GET TO BE THE ANGRY RUN OFF ONE HERE!" Lena gnashed her teeth and starred at the horizon of trees until she finally collected up his clothes and folded them nicely.

"I'm not chasing after you! I'm wearing heels. Shigure….I mean it. GET YOUR DOG TAIL BACK HERE NOW…I SWEAR, I"LL COUNT," what was he twelve? And what was she, his mother? He didn't give a damn if she counted to three and then spanked him – he'd probably like it.

Besides, no amount of shouting, screaming, and tantrum throwing amounted to Shigure coming back from the forest.

Finally, after minutes had passed, Lena had to sort out her thoughts on what had happened and what she could accept. The sane healthy thing would have been to walk away right there, get in her car and drive home.

But, if Lena was a sane and rational person…she would have gotten on the air plane in the first place.

"Your hide is so tanned when I get my hands on you," Lena finally swiftly decided and began to trudge into the forest. Not a mile in, and the heavy downpour started. She had warned Shigure that it was going to rain.

"The one time I have to be right…THE ONE TIME," shouting at Shigure, or shouting up at God, Lena wasn't sure – both were men, both were there for, responsible for her above and beyond irritation at the moment.

The wind picked up, so Lena was tossed around like a fragile little rag doll, "Fine, take Shigure's side…you men are all the same," she huffed and maneuvered her way, poorly around the thick trunks of the trees and knee deep foliage.

At one point, she lost a shoe, a three hundred and seventy five dollar excluding tax shoe. That was the breaking point. Her hair was stringy and hanging in her face, there was mud on her fine lace and a tear through her skirt.

Hell, had finally claimed her.

"Oh this is just lovely, now I'm lost…" put her in a crowded city any day, her Starbucks tingles would go off and she'd be home within the hour. A forest though? Figuratively, she was screwed.

There were two choices now, one, Lena could waste her energy chasing Shigure and end up going nowhere, or she could turn around, re-trace her steps as good as she could in the mud and rain and find her way back home, leave Japan and chalk it all down to a crashing decline of her mental health.

Stupidly, and Lena realized this very much - she continued.

Because she believed in fairy tales, and happy endings and if the prince was too stubborn to come out of his castle to slay the dragon and rescue the princess than it was up to the princess to slay the dragon and then drag the annoying, brat prince screaming and kicking out of his castle. Because if this was the only shot at magic and wonders she had, she wasn't going to look five back and wonder…one step more, what would one step more of done?

And above all else, because this was her story, and her story, damn it, was going to have a happy ending.

Because of all these reasons, and the last one in particular, Lena marched on, red faced, huffing and cursing as she combed the forest down.

This was her life, and she wasn't going to give up the reins to fate, or destiny or the circumstances. She had never allowed outside forced to control her before now, not since she was a baby without a voice or a will.

Evalena Aurelia White, certainly, was not about to start now.