What: character introspection through the extended metaphor of Yami-nabe, or dark hot pot, as explained in the Ouran manga series.
Words: ~720
Genre: humor & angst (wot, really?)
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how to say i love you with chopsticks
(Tamaki requested the following title:
how good parents should behave)
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Tamaki ponders the vegetables and other goodies (but mostly vegetables, he believes) swirling under the top of the dark foamy broth as he would ponder choco stars, commoner's ramen, and the latest instant coffee collection from Nestea—that is, he ponders these things with a sense of ruefulness and careful consideration.
He has a good deal of mixed feelings (very mixed) about the endeavor of yami-nabe, almost as mixed as the contents of the pot and almost as mixed up as the variety of ingredients hailing from both richy-rich and poverty-striken locales.
Haruhi has told him to 'Behave, please, sempai', so he will try to do so… but oh so carefully, as to not attract attention, he stirs up the pot a bit more when reaching in which his chopsticks, feeling around, tentatively but deliberately avoiding the pricy Satsuma chicken and the delicious extra large shitake mushrooms.
Instead, he fishes out a trailing leaf of cabbage, white and long and (after putting it in his mouth) decidedly soggy-tasting.
(He tells her it's delicious. Banzai the cabbage of the commoners. Prized at only 400 yen a bushel!)
After the general teasing and poking at the Suoh heir's "ill fortune" dies down, Kyoya goes next. The raven-haired man moves toward the pot with exactly no extraneous movements, dipping his first pair of chopsticks into the stewing dark broth. He has the air of a surgeon, deftly extracting the flavorful centerpiece of the broth without unnecessary dilly-dally. It's the giant taro root that Mori brought over. The taro has been made plump and flavorful from the time spent soaking in the pot. Kyoya deposits it on his plate, sets aside his first pair of chopsticks for his second, personal-use pair and takes a small bite, out of politeness.
Inside, Tamaki breathes a sigh of relief that Kyoya did not fish out the Hokkaido-raised beef he brought. The taro is expensive, no doubt, and specialty of the region the Morinozuka's has inhabited for generations, but Tamaki imagines that meat is considerably more rare in Haruhi's frugal diet.
It's Kaoru's turn now, and then it would be Haruhi's. Her petite, nonchalant form is wedged directly in between the unscrupulous twins, and the whole party is gathered around a medium-sized kotatsu table in Haruhi's small (but cute) apartment.
"Oi, Hikaru…" Kaoru fishes out the jumbo Alaskan tiger shrimp, and proceeds to wave the fierce, floppy thing at his twin. "I know you've been wanting this for a while, so I brought it to yami-nabe today. Here."
Hikaru, after commending his twin in the style of brotherly love, accepts the shrimp. Tamaki watches with a mixture of heartache and acute agitation as the shrimp passed over Haruhi's plate and landed on Hikaru's with a heavy 'plop'.
Well… at least it's his cute daughter's turn now! The pot still had a 1/3 balance of rich/poor ingredients. The odds are not entirely bad.
"Kao-chan gave his to Hika-chan, so he should go again!" a clear, sweet voice pipes.
La choque! L'horreur! Tamaki stares at the speaker of the innocent but oh-so-offending sentence. Hunny blinks back, with adorable trademark flowers popping up out of nowhere.
Kaoru shrugs. "Sure. Though I've already tried everything we have in here before."
Tamaki twitches.
"H-Hunny-sempai!" He looks imploringly (frantically) between the senior and the freshman twins. "Why doesn't Hikaru just give his piece of food to Kaoru when it's his turn? That sounds like a better idea, no?" Tamaki exclaims.
But Kaoru has already dipped his chopsticks into the pot again. This time, he pulls out a lean strip of Hokkaido-100% grass-fed beef.
Upon seeing it, many people in the table give an "oooohhhh" in appreciation of his good fortune. (Not because they couldn't eat such a thing on a normal basis, but because everyone knew the beef was the best ingredient stewing in the dark broth.) Kaoru eats it with great pomp and circumstance, just to liven the occasion. Tamaki does not notice. Tamaki's attention is still fixated on how Haruhi's face looked truly impressed when she saw the beef and then… is that… for a second… oh no, is that… d-d-disappointment?
Darn the twins and their unsightly behavior! How could they eat such expensive food with such great relish when his cute daughter had never tried it before in her life!? His poor Haruhi, likely malnourished and so thin and slight due to a subsistence diet of rice and commoners' vegetables!
Haruhi comes next, and Tamaki snaps out of his extended internal soliloquy to watch, breath held, as she sticks her chopsticks into the pot with a small splash and fishes out a piece of potato.
Yes, you read that right.
Commoner's potato.
Tamaki's heart nearly tore asunder.
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Suzu: this fic itself was fished out of the recesses of my computer. I hope you enjoyed it, if not for my crappy take at "serious humor", then for Tamaki's over-the-top but honest-hearted efforts to show love to Haruhi. He has always struck me as the sort of character to gravely serious about helping others, but go about it in a silly way.
Drop a note, pretty please?