Ouran High School Host Club
Ever The Same

Rating: K+

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the rights to Ouran High School Host Club.

Summary: In a world where Tamaki Suoh never moved to Ouran, the Hitachiin twins live through high school as sheltered and selfish as ever. But one day, they cross paths with a girl not like the others.

I got this idea randomly a few months ago and penned it down. I recently stumbled across it while cleaning out my autosave files and decided it was worth a post, despite it's short length. This is just a oneshot and I don't really plan on continuing, sorry. But I hope you enjoy it nonetheless! TWIN ANGST! SQUEE! xD

It was always the same thing with these girls.

They pined for us because of our looks, for our secretive ways and our devilish gleams. The Hitachiin brothers - the stereotypical bad boy type, the kind of boy who didn't give a damn about anyone or anything. Just the type of boy for a snobby rich teen to latch onto to prove Daddy something. And the best part – there were two of us. Plenty to go around.

It was just another day. A pink envelope was waiting for me as I sat down at my desk. A love note. Just another stupid love note. We'd been getting them since grade school, and they were always the same. We would read them together in the sanctuary of the boy's bathroom, laughing at the stupid lovey-dovey metaphors and tacky confessions. Sometimes they even rhymed, or were decorated with flourishy hearts. They were terribly written, really. All of them. Then again, even if a letter arrived with prose and poetry to deem it prizeworthy in a contest, it was junk to us, because we knew the truth. There was nothing but lies and vanity behind those words.

They were so fake. All of the letters. All of the girls.

Everyone, really.

The sun was warm against my back as I approached a familiar shadowy corridor in the courtyard of the high school wing. I could see in my mind exactly how it would all play out – how it had always played out. The same nervous yet hopeful girl – only the hairstyle and height seemed to change. And from us? The same deception. The same reveal. The same tears splashing down her cheeks as the tattered shreds of her carefully-crafted letter sprinkled to the floor like confetti. So many times now, but always the same…

I glanced up as she approached, like a prisoner facing down the firing squad, but I didn't let that show on my face.

Right away, something seemed different. I knew immediately her dress wasn't standard issue, but a terrible recreation of the yellow dress the girls of Ouran were required to wear. It looked homemade, even. Her hair was cut short, almost boyish in appearance. Her eyes sparkled up at me through a pair of large glasses. She did not appear nervous, or shy, or hopeful. Just expectant.

"So," I said without missing a beat, not allowing my surprise to show through as I held up the pink envelope between two fingers. "You were the one who sent me this?"

"Yes, Kaoru," she said. There was a smile to her lips, like so many before her. But something still seemed a little different, and I didn't know why. I brushed it off like I hadn't noticed a thing, and gave my best debonair smile.

"Well… I'm sorry to disappoint you, but, I'm Hikaru. You must've gotten my desk confused with Kaoru's. But I-"

"No I didn't."

I froze mid-sentence. My spine straightened involuntarily, my suave, seductive stance broken as I stared down at her.

"What?" I murmured.

She shrugged. "Maybe I got your names confused, but that note, it was intended for you."

I couldn't speak. I couldn't even breathe. My arm fell to my side, still clutching the soft pink note as I stared incredulously down at her. She looked up at me with a knowing smile. "I noticed you two switch desks every day. I knew you'd be sitting at that one today…"

…she'd… noticed…?

I couldn't say anything. My mind felt like it had short circuited. I realized I had even forgotten how to breathe. After a long moment, I shook my head violently, clenching my eyes tight. "That's impossible…" I hissed.

She blinked, as though confused. "What do y—"

Before I realized what I was doing, I'd grasped her shoulders with both my hands, the letter crinkling beneath my shaking palm as I squeezed her arms. "Stop fucking with us!" I spat suddenly in her face, my eyes widening furiously. "There is no way you can tell us apart! No one has ever told us apart!"

She didn't flinch away from me. She held her ground in a way none of the girls before her ever had. She looked a little bewildered. "Really? I mean, I don't know why… you guys are so different…."

I could already feel unwelcomed tears coming to my eyes. My grip tightened further on her shoulders, and I leaned in, my face twisted in a snarl. "You're tricking us!" I screamed. "I know you are! Someone told you what we do to girls who send us letters and you're shoving this in our faces! Who the hell do you think you are? Do you think you're trying to save us, or are you just trying to beat us at our own game?"

I could feel Hikaru's eyes at my back as I screamed. But the girl – this stupid, boyish girl in the fake school uniform – just stared at me. She didn't say a word, only smiling her stupid, knowing smile, causing my anger to grow and the tears to break loose. I shoved her away – not too harshly, since she was just a stupid girl – and turned my back to her.

"Just get away from us," I spat, my shoulders curling towards my ears. "Just leave us alone!"

I could feel her gaze watching me, could still see her strange smile as a small silence passed. Finally, she spoke, quietly. "You are both such a contradiction… you want to be told apart, but won't let anyone close enough to tell you apart. Face it. We're in the same class, but… do you even know my name? Or just another person who is not you or Hikaru?"

A moment of silence passed. I stared at the point where sidewalk turned into grass before me, realizing I didn't. I didn't know her name. I knew I'd heard it, the story of the poor girl charity case, here on scholarship, in her own dress. Heard the teasing and the names, threw a few myself. But I'd never bother to pay attention to her name, not even out of curiosity.

Just another stupid girl…

I looked up. Some other students were roaming around. I could name a few of them, talk about their families, their wealth, their status, their class years. Wasn't that all that mattered?

I saw Hikaru, his head poking over the bush, watching me with astonishment, clearly just at a loss as I was. I knew everything about him, because I'd spent my life with him. I knew what made him laugh, what made him scared, what made him angry. I knew what made him different from me.

But the rest of them… they were all the same, weren't they? They all looked different, yet were the same, while Hikaru and I looked the same, but were different.

That was the way the world worked, right?

Our eyes connected across the courtyard. Right? I asked him silently, a tear shining on my cheek.

Small footsteps sounded, walking away from me. But then, they paused, replaced by her low voice. "And by the way… you were right. In the end, I really was here to mess with you. That's what you get for breaking my friends' hearts, Kaoru."

The tears felt like beads of ice upon my cheeks as I turned, watching her leave with a strange strangling sensation in my chest. I'd only felt that sensation once before, in my whole entire life.

The day our nanny left.

The crunch of grass behind me revealed Hikaru walking up to me, pausing beside me with our shoulders nearly touching. I didn't have to look at him to know that his face reflected mine.

"What just happened…?" he murmured quietly under his breath. It really wasn't a question, but a statement of disbelief. I felt his hand close around mine, clutching it in reassurance, as we'd done so many times in our life. A long silence enveloped us, as we watched her, this nameless, shabby girl, walk through the archway into the school building, disappearing from view.

"There is no way… she could have known…" Hikaru murmured darkly, as though to convince himself that this was the truth. I glanced at him sideways, that empty feeling still in the pit of my stomach.

She did know. I knew she did.

I wondered if Hikaru realized what'd just happened. Up until this point, there'd been only two groups of people: us, and everyone else. But for the first time, someone had crossed into our world….

And we had just let her go.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you thought! :)