Disclaimer:  Pan, Trunks, Capsule Corp., etc. and all canon to it belong to Akira Toriyama. 

Summary: Trunks has been married to Pan for a blissful ten years.  On the morning of their anniversary, he reveals he has forgotten a very important day.  After a trip to Milan, dozens of roses, fancy sweet-nothings, stunning dresses and diamonds, will he prove he still deserves her?  Or will he forget something else?

"Consequential Forgetfulness"

By Akira

Pan yawned softly, stretching out the kinks that had lodged themselves in very discomforting places in her back, careful not to wake the lavender-haired demi-saiyan next to her.  Slipping out of bed as quietly as possible, she donned a blue silk robe.  She would set out breakfast today but no, not cook it, for that would turn out into a disaster.  She thought of setting breakfast as another operation, another mission that needed to be completed, and without hesitation, she set her mission on wheels.

Stacks of pancakes, sticks of butter, jars of maple syrup, strawberries, and pitchers of orange juice later, she was ready.  She ran into the bathroom, yanking off her robe and grabbing her attire for work.  She slipped on her formal skirt quickly, smoothing its wrinkles out with one hand as she buttoned her blouse with another.  Finally, she applied her normal, natural make-up, only adding a little more than usual to make her appearance more striking.  She made it back into the dining room just as Trunks ambled in.

"Hey, baby," he greeted her, kissing her warmly on the lips… then he spotted breakfast.  "Oh!  Breakfast!  Looks great!"

Pan nodded and sat down, her face flushing.  The two of them began to eat without further ado, both of them sharing a mutual hunger that had developed from the fasting overnight.  She was in the middle of another sip of orange juice when Trunks voiced a question,

"So, what's the special occasion?"

Pan flushed an indignant red and spit out her mouthful of orange juice (ruining an entire stack of pancakes in Trunks's opinion).  "You forgot?!" she practically yelled.

"Hey, there's no reason for you to get so mad," he started.  He was getting a little afraid.  Her power was skyrocketing in little flares.

"Trunks Vegeta Briefs!  I can't believe you forgot such an important occasion!  It's only our goddamned –" she never finished the sentence.  "Forget it.  If it's so insignificant that you don't need to remember it and 'pen' it into your busy schedule, then it obviously isn't much."  She threw down her napkin and slammed the front door; she had risked being late for work already.

Trunks sat absently pushing forkfuls of pancakes in his mouth, benumbed by her words and mind itching with the knowledge that he had forgotten something.  It was a good thing that Lila, their six-year-old daughter, was with her grandparents and had not witnessed her mother's anger.  After all, Lila got upset when they fought… with being married and all for years on end, one would think they would've learned better.  Trunks smiled wryly.  Now, what did he forget?

In the middle of his sip of orange juice, Trunks remembered.  "Oh, shit!"  He hurried back into the bedroom, pulling on his pants and dragging himself out of the door.  Once on the highway, he dialed the number for Capsule Corp. and told his mom that an emergency had come up and he would not be at work today.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

"And the bloody bastard forgot!  Can you believe it?!" Pan said vehemently to a certain aqua-haired demi-saiyan.

Bra sighed, running a hand along her swelling abdomen, a constant reminder of the unborn baby inside her.  Her brother just had to go and screw something else up, didn't he?  "Pan, maybe you should calm down a little.  Perhaps he wanted to surprise you when you got home."

"I highly doubt it," she replied, swirling her spoon inside the bowl of soup.  "His entire face showed no recognition whatsoever.  It's only our tenth anniversary!  Do you know how many people actually celebrate that?  Only about millions and billions in the world!"

Bra hugged her distressed friend.  She said no more, but inwardly she was thinking.  If Goten ever did anything of the like to her, she would kill him until he lost more lives than a cat could afford.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Still fuming, Pan walked into her house.  When she heard no holler or experimental explosions from the lab, a tiny bit of her anger evaporated.  So he did have some common sense.  Avoiding her when she was angry was a smart thing to do.  Going into the bedroom to find clothes to change into, Pan almost missed the sight of a large gift-wrapped package lying on her desk.  Hope surged deep in her heart, but she quenched it, still a little angry.  Subconsciously she remembered what Bra said earlier this afternoon, the words echoing in her hollow mind.

In the middle of picking out an outfit, curiosity won out, and she made a mad dash towards the box.  A hand-scrawled note lay on top of the contents of the package. 

Hey, beautiful.

            I didn't forget.  J 

                                                                        Love you always,

                                                                                    Trunks

Pan blinked.  So he didn't forget after all.  She was lost; she didn't know what to feel.  When she was upset and disappointed this morning, she hid behind a shroud of anger.  Now he had done his act of penance and she didn't know what to feel.  No one ever said forgiveness came easy.

Putting aside the note, Pan started for the rest of the box.  A dress came next – a gorgeous black dress with off-shoulder straps lined in a soft baby blue, a bodice that looked much like a corset-like deal with tiny light-blue sapphires and diamonds studded into designs, and a slit up the right side that looked to reach about mid-thigh, which was lined with the same type of diamonds and sapphires.  Out from the box also came matching stilettos and a dazzling diamond set of a pair of earrings, necklace, and bracelet, all of which had Trunks's name on it so as to "brand" her as "property of Trunks".  He still had a possessive streak within him after all these years.

Gasping in surprise, Pan immediately changed into the dress, getting the idea that Trunks had something special planned.  After slipping on the dress, jewelry, and shoes, she regarded herself in the mirror.  The dress showed off her arms, which were firm with muscle, but still had a consistency about them which made them all the more feminine.  The bodice was almost exactly as she imagined how it would feel.  It had a painful itch to it, but it did manage to show off her curves quite well.  The slit was a little too high for her liking, but overall, the dress was beautiful.  She didn't look too shabby for having mothered a baby already.

Arms snaked around her from behind, and she distinctly saw a lavender-blob in the mirror before a blindfold was put over her eyes.  "Are you ready to leave, honey?" Trunks whispered huskily in her ear.

"Where are we going?"  His voice was sending shivers up and down her spine.

"That's for me to know, and you to find out," he replied, then he added, "Are you still mad at me?"

"After all this?  What sane woman would be mad?" Pan replied softly.  Her anger had dissipated, but as it was with her, there was still a tiny streak of resentment in her due to his leading her on this morning.

Trunks wanted to retort to that rhetorical question, but he didn't, knowing the result would spoil this entire evening.  "I'm glad you like it.  Now hold on tight."

In the blink of an eye, Trunks used instant transmission to teleport them into his suite in Milan.  The view looked right over to the famous Milan Cathedral.  Hesitantly, he untied her blindfold.

Pan blinked.  "T-Trunks, are we in M-Milan?"

"I'm afraid so, Panny."

She was so absorbed by the view that she didn't even remember to glare at her husband for using her nickname.  "It's beautiful."  Pan's eyes, the observant eyes of one of Japan's leading designers, flickered from one point to the other, mentally memorizing every nook and cranny in the Milan Cathedral.

When she finally turned around, her face was met with a huge bouquet of flowers.  White roses, dozens and dozens of them, seemed to pop from every direction.  Pan wrapped her hands around the base of the bouquet.  A single solitary red plastic rose was in the middle.  It bore a fancy card on it in which she could distinctly make out Trunks's scrawl.

Son Pan, until all of the petals fall off, I will always love you… and we all know that the plastic ones can't fall off… I will love you with the last dying breath in my body.  I will love you; I did love you; and I do love you.

Pan dropped the bouquet after reading the last sentence through a mist of tears.  She turned, hugging Trunks with every ounce of love in her heart.  "Damn you, Trunks…." she said through the welling of tears in her eyes.

"I love you, Pan."

They stayed in that position until Pan finally wiped her eyes, clearing them of the tears that had welled up.  "It's beautiful," she said, not knowing what else to say, and even she did not know what she was referring to when she said beautiful.  It could've been the cathedral, the flowers, or Trunks himself.

"We could go sight-seeing," Trunks proposed.  "Or we could stay here and make the best of tonight," he continued in a voice that dropped a few octaves.

Pan didn't reply, only kissed him with all the need in her body.  Desire had reached its climax with his words.  This mutual desire burned with a passion such as the one they shared that blissful night six years ago when Lila was conceived.  Without warning, Pan's knees hit the back of the bed.  Trunks picked her up slightly to ease her onto the bed, where they continued what they started earlier by the window.  In between kisses, which were about to lead to something more, Trunks gasped out,

"Happy birthday, Pan."

A/N:  Oh, yes, our dear lavender-haired demi-saiyan is indeed in trouble.  I'll leave the rest up to your imaginations, but I'd love to hear what you would do if this ever happened to you… or what you think Pan would do next.  This is my first one-shot.  Hope you enjoyed it!