Chaos in Her Wake

Chapter 1: Don

Many thanks to Laura and Dr. Riley for beta-reading this story, and to my mom for her constant encouragement and support.

A/N: This story was inspired by Ink Mage's fanfic entitled "Saving Mr. Sherman" on FFN, so if you enjoy this, I would recommend that you check out "Saving Mr. Sherman" as well. And, as always, please leave reviews! :)

Disclaimer: I don't own Saving Mr. Banks, Mary Poppins, or any of the characters from those two movies.

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A heavy, brooding silence hung over the dimly lit rehearsal room in the Animation building at Walt Disney Studios, where three men were working late into the night. Don DaGradi, the animator-turned-screenwriter, slouched despondently in a rolling chair with his feet propped up on the end of the long table in the center of the room. He'd spent the last twenty minutes staring with unseeing eyes at the sketchpad in his lap while his mind stewed over the conundrum that was Mrs. P. L. Travers.

He should have seen it coming. He'd been working at Disney Studios long enough to know that most authors jumped at the chance to have their stories make it to the big screen, as Mrs. Travers herself had put it, "in glorious Technicolor, for all the world to see." But she, the author of the Mary Poppins books, was less than thrilled about the opportunity, and had made sure to let them all know it. Don pursed his lips in frustration. He should have known. A woman who, after denying Walt the film rights for twenty years straight, had finally accepted his offer only on the condition that she be given the authority of script approval—he should have known she'd be nothing but trouble. But, despite everything, he had still held out hope that she'd at least turn out to be tolerably friendly and cooperative.

It had taken her all of five minutes to crush his optimism.

"Good morning, Pamela!" he had greeted her as she stepped out of the car that first day.

"It is so discomfiting to hear a perfect stranger use my first name," she'd returned with a coldness that belied the smile on her face. "Mrs. Travers, please."

And things had only gone downhill from there.

Every time they came up with a new idea to show her—a new song, a new sequence, a new concept drawing—she immediately shot it down.

"No, no, no!"

"Goodness me, no!"

"It's all a big mistake; it's all wrong!"

Eventually, this routine had become as predictable as it was painful, like throwing one's body against a stone wall in the pathetically vain hope of knocking it down on the hundred-and-first attempt. Obviously, it hadn't worked. None of their attempts had; on the contrary, everything they did only seemed to make her more upset. A few times—earlier that very day, in fact—she had even left the room in anger. And, try as they might, none of them could ever figure out what it was that had ticked her off, or why, or what they could do to fix it. All they knew was that she seemed to hate the entire project.

After witnessing the ruthless way she picked apart his script—and it was his script, no matter what she said—Don had quickly concluded that this peevish author could give any Disney villain a run for their money. "Whatever she says, don't let it get to you," Walt had encouraged him after the first day of fire and brimstone. "Remember, you don't work for her; you work for me." But that assurance was small consolation when Don still had the woman's venom to contend with on a daily basis. His mind was exhausted; his nerves were shot; his head had been aching for the past three days . . . yet still he had to push through it and keep swallowing her barbs, because it was the only way this project would ever have any hope of completion.