OHSHC - Summer Hosts - 3

Ouran High School Host Club Tale:
Part Three: Our Unsettling Saturday

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"I don't need to pay a therapist to give me crap. I have roommates that do it for free."
- Ally McBeal

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Hikaru:

"Oh, Haruhi, why don't you join us?" Tamaki called.

I sat up so fast I splashed Kaoru as I turned to look over at the stairs that led down to the basement. Haruhi was there, in a pair of jeans and a "Sparkling Trendy Flower Purple Top" Hunny had bought her for her last birthday. Even I had to admit it suited her.

She smiled and walked over to the four of us in the hot tub built into the floor of the basement. She didn't get in, obviously, but she did come over and find a dry spot near me to sit down next to the tub.

"Hey guys," she greeted us. This frustrated me a little. I was getting kind of sick of her grouping us together as 'the guys'. Why couldn't she come over and say something like, 'Hey Hikaru, Kaoru. Oh, hi Tamaki'.

"Don't you have a bathing suit, Haruhi?" Tamaki asked in that sort of tone he had that made it sound like he was asking 'Can't you afford a bathing suit, Haruhi?'. I gritted my teeth together before my dumb ass could say something I'd regret.

Haruhi just nodded, bored. "Yes, Tamaki," she answered, "You've given me a lot of bathing suits, of course I have one."

"Well then," Tamaki acted like this was some new surprising news to him, "You should go change and come join us here in the hot tub."

Oh yes, Tamaki, you'd like that, wouldn't you?

Out of the corner of my eyes I caught Kaoru's amused expression. In our own little twin-talk he was basically saying, 'You'd like that too, would you?' Problem is, you can't really deny the truth in twin-talk, because your twin knows it's a lie, so I just kind of rolled my eyes, expressing boredom like Haruhi had.

"No thanks," Ha Ha! Turned down flat! "I don't want to get wet right now, thanks."

"Some other time then," Tamaki shrugged, trying to act indifferent. But since reading people was a twin's greatest power, I could easily see that he was disappointed. I barely stopped myself from grinning at this.

"So Haruhi," Kaoru started speaking to Haruhi while his eyes were still on me and his tone was constricted, which told me he was upset with me reaction. He turned his head and smiled at her, "Are you all settled in?"

Haruhi nodded, "Yep," she began standing up, a smirk playing at the edges of her lips, "Completely and totally unpacked, so make sure you guys don't mess this up, cause I'd really like to stay." Then she left to go check out Hunny and Mori at the foosball table across the room with our other games.

Kaoru shifted back around and slid himself farther into the bubbling hot water. "Well, I'm glad she likes it here," he commented.

"Yeah," Tamaki's eyes were still on the laughing Haruhi, as were mine, "But what did she mean by 'so make sure you guys don't mess this up'?"

Kaoru and I exchanged amused glances and held up our hands in one of our signature unison moves. "If you don't know by now, Tamaki," we spoke in unison as well as we lowered our hands, "You're too hopeless to save."

Tamaki pulled himself away from watching Haruhi to raise an eyebrow in our direction, but before he got a chance to ask what he meant, Haruhi spoke up and we all looked over at her.

"Hey, Kyouya," Haruhi called to the glasses character who sat on the large leather couch we had set up in front of the X-large screen T.V. in the corner.

Kyouya stopped his typing and pushed his glasses up with his middle finger before looking over at Haruhi. "Hm?" he responded, clearly not even interested in the world beyond his laptop enough to grace us with an actual word.

"You should come play me in Air Hockey," Haruhi invited, jutting a thumb over her shoulder at the Air Hockey table she stood in front of.

If the Boss hadn't been so stunned, I'm sure he would have already been out of the hot tub and halfway across the room before Kyouya had a chance to reply. But, as  I mentioned, he was too stunned, and his jaw dropped so far it almost touched the water of the hot tub. And it wasn't like he was the only one, Kaoru and I looked on with an odd mix of confusion and curiosity.

"No thanks," Kyouya chuckled, "I'm not a gaming kind of guy."

"Is that so?" Haruhi crossed her arms and raised a challenging eyebrow, "Well, I'm not really a gaming kind of girl… So how about this? I'll bet you a two week salary that I can beat you in the game of your choice."

Now Kaoru and I lost our jaws.

Kyouya chuckled again, "Two weeks salary is nothing to me, Haruhi-"

"A month then," she offered, but it wasn't in a begging sort of way. It was more of a challenge. Then, as if to prove me right, she continued with, "Come on, what do you have to loose? Well, you know, besides a month of my salary."

Kyouya dropped his head and his shoulders moved a bit with another chuckle. He looked back up at Haruhi a moment later and smirked. "All right, Air Hockey," he agreed, setting his laptop on the coffee table in front of the couch and standing up, "And you're on."

The two of them made their way over to the Air Hockey table. Haruhi looked especially cocky - which was unusual for her, so I had no idea if she was cocky in thinking she could win easily, or cocky because she had gotten Kyouya to verse her.

Tamaki looked over at Kaoru and I. There were a few seconds of stillness then all of a sudden the three of us practically launched ourselves out of the hot tub all at the same time.

~~~~~

"You think he let her win?"

Kaoru's voice floated up to me from the bottom bunk. I looked away from the magazine I had propped up on my stomach and to the mattress I was laying on, like I expected to be able to see through it to Kaoru.

"I don't really know," I replied, "It was pretty close, so your guess is as good as mine."

It had been close. 28 to 30. First to thirty won. Of course, if Kyouya hadn't been so over-zealous he wouldn't have gotten fouled so many times by the ref, Mori, and probably could have creamed Haruhi.

But who really knows what happened. I had been too busy watching the actual game to read their body languages, so I didn't have a clue who let whom win or whatever.

"Kyouya's a lot of things," Kaoru told me, and the movement beneath me made me guess he was getting out of his bed - a guess that was proven a moment later when I saw his head and bright orange hair appear next to the top bunk - "But he's not a cheater. And with the way he loves money, I can't think that he would have lost the game on purpose."

I shrugged, but Kaoru didn't see it. "So what if he did, so what if he didn't?" I turned back to my magazine, "What does it matter?" As long as Haruhi didn't have to loose a month's salary, I was happy.

"I don't know," Kaoru sighed. He walked over to his desk, where his backpack was sitting on his chair and started fishing around in it. "Still," he continued, his arm in his backpack up to the elbow, "If he let her win, it could be true..."

"What could be true?" I dropped the magazine again. Not that it mattered that I kept getting distracted. I wasn't really interested in any of the articles. Just kind of scanning over the pictures.

He must have found what he needed, because Kaoru pulled his arm out of his backpack and tucked something into his pocket. Nothing special, I'd find out later it was just his wallet. "You know, about Kyouya being interested in Haruhi," he reminded me.

I gave off a little that-is-so-ridiculous kind of snort – the same snort I gave him every time he brought up this subject. I mean honestly… Haruhi and Kyouya? Please.

Kaoru rolled his eyes at me. "You never take anything seriously, do you?" he asked me in a more than unfriendly, less than hostile tone, "And one of these days a real threat is going to come along and you're not gonna expect it when it knocks you on your ass."

I sat up and looked over at him. "I do so take things seriously," I argued, just for the sake of arguing I guess, since I didn't even have a real argument, "All the time."

He rolled his eyes at me again, but this time I knew I deserved it. That was a pretty pathetic attempt at a comeback. "Uh-huh, whatever," was his response, so I didn't really feel too bad about my poor arguing skills, "Are you coming? Everyone's taking Haruhi out for dinner in town."

Oh great. A date with six guys sharing one girl. What could possibly go wrong there? Still, I didn't want to just be alone in the house if everyone else was going.

"Yeah, coming," I tossed my magazine down to the foot of my bed and swung my legs over the side railing so I could drop down from the upper bunk. I grabbed my white scarf from the hook on the back of our bedroom door and the two of us left together as I was winding it around my neck.

Everyone else was in the living room when Kaoru and I were making our way down the steps. They looked over at us and greeted us accordingly. Tamaki waved to us with the hand he had Antoinette's leash in while he stood beside a smiling Haruhi.

I know what you're thinking. Why not just eat at our bed and breakfast right? Wrong. Who wants to eat at the same place on the weekend that they have to eat the other five days of the week? Not me.

We went to a little Café in town with outside seating. I know I said I put a scarf on, but I was also wearing an orange shirt without sleeves. It was a comfortable day and a nice time to be outside. Well, that and the Café didn't allow dogs inside.

Since there were seven of us, (eight if you counted Tamaki's dog), we had to wait to have the largest circle table they had outside. It was a short wait though, since Kyouya boldly went over and offered the family of four that had been sitting there 9,000 yen to move to a different table – which they obviously took.

When we were finally settled and had placed our orders the conversations began. Mostly we all wanted to know what Haruhi thought of living with all of us. She smiled through all the questions so I actually believed she liked living with us, but the skepticism coming off Kaoru sent shivers down my spine.

I stuck the straw of my water glass into my mouth to take a sip and threw Kaoru a confuse glance. In our own secret language I was asking him why he was being skeptical. He gave me a half shrug like 'I have no idea' and we left it at that for the moment.

Maybe my peripherals are better than other people, maybe not, but as Haruhi leaned forward to grab her drink, a white rectangle slipped out of her back pocket and fell to the ground between her seat and mine. I reached my arm down and picked it up.

It was an envelope with Haruhi's name and the address of the bed and breakfast printed on it in loopy cursive. The top was sliced open and inside there was a white piece of paper. As I reached into it to grab the paper, I saw Haruhi's hand dart over and grab the envelope. She got the envelope from me, but the paper was still in my hand.

"Hikaru, give me that," she demanded, reaching for the paper.

I held it out of her reach, but it still disappeared from my hand. Kaoru had snatched it and now opened the tri-folded letter. Haruhi tried in vain to reach past me and grab it from Kaoru, but I seized her wrists and held her back as gently as I could. His eyes scanned over whatever was written on it, then they bugged out of his head.

"What is it?" I asked curiously, still holding onto Haruhi.

"It's an acceptance letter," Kaoru whispered, stunned. He looked up at Haruhi, "You got accepted to that law school you wanted so much to go to…"

Haruhi pulled herself away from me, so I released her wrists. "So what?" she snapped, reaching for her glass of water.

Tamaki was just as stunned as Kaoru and I. "Why didn't you tell us?" he asked with the sort of offended tone that couldn't possibly be faked.

"Because it's none of your business," she muttered. She was trying to act pissed and angry, but Kaoru and I could see the way her eyes glossed over. She was sad. Question was… Why?

"How can you say that, Haru-chan?" Hunny suddenly jumped in, "We're your best friends, aren't we?"

Haruhi didn't answer him. I could tell she was getting uncomfortable, which I'm sure was understandable since there were five pairs of eyes on… Hey, what the?

"Kyouya," I addressed the one person who was not looking at Haruhi. He raised his eyes from the table, but as always they were much to blank for me to guess what he was feeling about this whole situation. "I'll just assume you already knew about this, right?" I nailed him.

He did that stupid thing he does to try and buy himself some time to think – pushing up his glasses with his middle finger. "I did," he replied simply, looking up but not keeping eye contact with any of us, tricky little bastard.

"Kyouya!" again with the offended tone, Tamaki caught Kyouya's eyes finally, "Why didn't you tell us?!"

Kyouya shrugged, "It wasn't my place."

"Be that as it may," Tamaki was getting a little heated, even rising from his seat as he raised his voice, "I'm your best friend, and Haruhi's father! I can't believe you would keep this from me of all people!"

Ugh. Just when I thought the Boss was being serious, he pulls out the daddy card again. Honestly, the guy lives in a fantasy land.

Kaoru shot me an unpleasant look that was actually kind of hard to interpret. Something along the lines of 'He IS being serious' but I couldn't be sure.

"You're not my dad, Tamaki!" Haruhi stood up and slammed her hands on the table. The people at the tables around us began to look over curiously. The two waiters on there way over with our food stopped to watch the scene unfold.

Tamaki was speechless. Well that was a first for him.

"And as for this-!" Haruhi snatched the paper from Mori, as it had been passed around to each of us and made a full circle around the table. She waved it furiously, "It's none of your business where I go to school because we're not a family and you are not allowed to put your input into my matters unless you are!" She whirled and ran away from the table. It kind of gave me a déjà-vu feeling. But last time it had been me running away.

Ouch. I know I wasn't the only one who felt the sting of that one. Even Mori seemed a little taken aback. But no one moved for a whole minute until Kaoru stood.

"Where are you going?" I asked him.

He stopped a few steps from the table and turned back to us. "Where else?" he asked with a small grin, "I'm going after my sister."

There was a pause, and Kaoru continued walking. Much to the surprise of the rest of us, Kyouya was the next to stand and follow Kaoru silently. The rest of us exchanged blank glances then got up from our seats to jog and catch up with Kaoru and Kyouya.