Disclaimer: I don't own Ouran High School Host Club. Please don't sue me for this work of fiction.
Dedication: Shei, on her 22nd birthday. 3
Manual Windows
Haruhi is cleaning away wine goblets and grape stalks whilst dressed in Legionnaire armour when the sharp pip-pip of a horn sounds. For a moment the members of the Host Club freeze, blinking in confusion at one another, before they dash, run, scramble, stalk, hop, and/or glide to the window.
"Ne, Takashi, what's that?" Hunny asks.
"Car," Mori grunts. Haruhi, piling used dishes one on top of the other, stops mid-motion.
"Ah! One of those 'learner' cars, right Kyouya?" Tamaki says, striking one palm with his fist. Kyouya pushes his glasses up his nose so that they glint in the sun. Wide-eyed, Haruhi's head swivels to watch the crisis occurring right in front of her.
"What's a 'learner' car, Tono-san?" the twins chorus. Somehow, Haruhi's stomach manages simultaneously to launch itself into her throat and sink to a point below her knees as Tamaki replies, with excessive grandiose gestures,
"Oh Kaoru, oh Hikaru, so innocent of the ways of commoners? A 'learner' car is a special kind of car that teaches commoners how to drive themselves because –" and here he pauses for dramatic effect, leaning soulfully against a wall "– they do not have chauffeurs!" He sheds a single glistening tear, even as the Hitachiin brothers wibble and clutch at each other. Haruhi can feel her teeth grinding and a twitch forming above her left eye.
"But why would one be here?" Hunny pipes up. The Host Club stare blankly at each other before, as one, their heads turn to face Haruhi. Only months of this exact kind of reaction prevent her from blanching an unhealthy shade of white.
"It would appear that Haruhi is taking driving lessons," Kyouya says, rather unnecessarily in Haruhi's opinion, until she sees the realisation dawn in Tamaki's eyes.
"Oh Haruhi, how marvelous! This is the perfect opportunity for the Host Club to see how the car teaches commoners to drive!" His effusiveness sends her reeling with a metallic clang against the wall.
"Does that mean –" says Kaoru, or possibly Hikaru.
"– we get to come too?" finishes Hikaru, or possibly Kaoru.
"Can we, Haruhi-chan? Usa-chan wants to see!" Hunny pleads. When Haruhi eventually finds her feet (the Legionnaires, she decides, were only victorious in battle because falling over was such a pain), she is faced with six pleading faces (okay, two pleading faces, two alarmingly devious faces, and two perfectly disinterested faces if you want to be technical). She glances uneasily at the door, but the Host Club has her hemmed in against the wall.
"And if I say 'no'?" she asks in the weary tone of someone who knows that 'no' isn't even an asteroid in a distant galaxy called 'possibility'. Kyouya ruffles some papers in his ever-present folder. Haruhi heaves a deep sigh. "Fine, but there's only room for three people in the backseat."
"Aha!" Tamaki declares, one finger raised importantly in the air. "As Haruhi's father, it is obvious that I should be reserved a space."
"No," Haruhi says succinctly. Tamaki whisks into a corner to grow mushrooms, a black cloud over his head. "Choose fairly, or you can all stay behind. And be quick; I should have been down five minutes ago."
While Tamaki tries to shoo the twins away from his corner and they try to steal his mushrooms, Kyouya collects a sample of Hunny's straws from his stash by his bed and quickly fashions an easy method of selection. Meanwhile, Haruhi struggles out of the most prohibiting parts of her costume but decides she doesn't have time to change out of the tunic (hiked up to mid-thigh at Tamaki's behest, and much to her own chagrin). She's just tying her shoes when Tamaki's triumph voice rings out:
"Ha! I get a seat! That'll teach you rotten devils!" A large crash follows, but Haruhi really can't bring herself to turn and see what damage has been done. She's brushing out the last creases in her tunic when she feels a tug. Judging by the curiously dog-like growls she assumes that Tamaki and the twins are otherwise engaged, and thus feels assured enough to risk looking around. Hunny stares up at her with his big eyes, Usa-chan clutched in one hand.
"Haruhi-chan, me and Takashi pulled long straws too. I asked Kyouya-kun if Usa-chan had to pull a straw as well, but he said I could bring him with me. Is that okay? I don't want to go without Usa-chan or Takashi."
"That's fine, Hunny-sempai," Haruhi says, smiling until the twins and Tamaki tumble past. "I'm leaving now, sempai," she says shortly, and wastes no more time about it.
Five minutes later they're in the car. Sakamoto-sensei gives Haruhi a look so bemused his eyebrows meet in the middle but says nothing about her tardiness or her entourage. For her part, Haruhi is too busy trying to pull her tunic down to a less obscene level on her legs and failing.
"It's so small in here!" Hunny says wonderingly. Haruhi spares a glance in the rearview mirror to see Mori crushed in one corner as Hunny leans over to look out the window and Tamaki simultaneously bounces like a child and sprawls with the regal air of a king. She takes a deep breath to brace herself.
"Everyone. Seatbelts, now." There's rustling.
"How does it –?"
"Hunny-sempai, could you –?"
"Ugh."
Haruhi straightens in her seat, ignores her instructor's expression, and starts the car.
"Ooo!" Hunny gasps. He and Tamaki lean forward in excitement. Painfully slowly, the car crawls into motion. Haruhi bends over the steering with her tongue poking out and a look of deep concentration on her face.
"Anno, Haruhi," Tamaki says, "why aren't we moving any faster?" Haruhi inexplicably suffers a full-body spasm that causes her foot to lift swiftly off the gas. The car stalls.
"Because I'm trying to concentrate," she replies through clenched teeth, and starts the engine again. They lurch forward.
"Put it in neutral," comes Mori's voice from the back. Luckily he can't see the twitch in her cheek as she does as he says.
"Mori-sempai, you can drive?" Tamaki gasps.
"Ah."
"Takashi is very clever," Hunny says, beaming up at his cousin. The engine turns over successfully and Haruhi puts the car into gear.
"Haruhi, open my window," Tamaki orders. Haruhi grits her teeth.
"You have to do it yourself," she grinds out. There's a pause.
"Where's the button?"
"IT'S NOT AN ELECTRIC WINDOW!"
"Ne, I'm sorry, Haruhi. Don't be mad at daddy!" Tamaki whines. Sakamoto-sensei stares wide-eyed at Haruhi, but she shoots him a look that would silence sheep. She aims it at Tamaki too, then stubbornly turns back to the steering wheel, clenching it in both hands until the knuckles turn white. Very slowly they creep forward again.
"Takashi, what does that stick do?" Hunny asks. A second later Haruhi feels cool spring air on the nape of her neck. She shivers and hunches further into herself, trying to concentrate on steering around the central fountain.
"Ooo! I want to see!" Tamaki crows.
"GAH!" Harui cries as an elbow or possibly a very sharp knee digs itself into her back through the seat.
"Ho ho, this is fabulous! Commoners are so inventive, aren't they Hunny-sempai? I wonder how turning a stick makes a window go up and down?" The car shakes with the vigour Tamaki puts into turning the handle.
"Ne, Tamaki-kun, you have one too," Hunny says. He's too short to see the deathglare Haruhi sends him via the rearview mirror, heedless of Mori's watchful gaze.
"Oh yes! I have decided that every member of the Host Club should have one of these cars to teach them how to drive, except for Hunny-sempai – I'm sorry, but you're just too small – and those pesky twins because they would cause nothing but trouble." The window squeaks as Tamaki winds it up and down, up and down, making the car wobble. "And my darling daughter can show us what buttons to press for the car to teach us how to drive, or would it be another handle? Commoners really are so very clever –"
"ENOUGH!" The car halts. Haruhi whirls about in her seat with thunder flashing in her eyes. "Get out right now." The chill tone of her voice is so reminiscent of Kyouya at his most menacing that Tamaki and Hunny immediately scramble from the car. Mori moves more fluidly but no less swift. The second the doors shut Haruhi grinds the gearbox into first and floors the gas pedal.
Five seconds later the car is tilted forward at about thirty degrees, with Haruhi and Sakamoto-sensei staring at two lily pads floating in water. There are worried shouts rapidly approaching from behind.
"I think I'm going to give up driving for the time being," Haruhi says, hands still gripping the steering wheel. Sakamoto-sensei nods slowly.
"Me too."