Note: This idea ate at me while I took an SAT practice test, no kidding. I stopped the time, and wrote the rough summary on a sticky note before continuing with the critical reading section. Plot bunnies pop up in strange places…
When one takes a deep look at the seven members of Ouran Academy's illustrious host club, one might find that not one of them, not one, truly benefits due to the age-old idea of primogeniture. The one that suffers alone may as well endure silence in a group that quietly, leisurely defies tradition and birthright.
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Pri·mo·gen·i·ture
: An exclusive right of inheritance belonging to the eldest son
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Kyouya
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People have looked at him a certain way all his life.
At high society parties, at business meetings, at school—the looks he garners are all the same once he is properly introduced, as one must be in all proper circles. An ironic dead end? Hardly.
'An Ohtori'.
Ah. Wonderful.
'Third son'.
A pity.
So much talent. So much.
'His name is Kyouya'.
I see. Well then, nice to meet you, young man.
At this point they brush him off. Kyouya? The name slides off. It's the Ohtori part they must remember. They leave their sons and daughters in the same grade to associate with the third son of the Ohtori Group. It's not a matter consequential enough to garner attention from the actual larger scale players, anyhow. The big fish is the father. They look expectantly at the eldest son next, waiting to see if he can fill his father's shoes.
A contemplative thought for the second son, maybe.
And a passing glance for the third.
That look again.
But Kyouya is essentially a patient person.
Until he can prove them wrong, he settles into the niche of third son. It's a comfortable place, really, if you have the resilience to get used to it. There are no shoes to fill, really. Just the worn path his brothers have carved out for him already.
Primogeniture.
His eldest brother wins that round.
And Kyouya?
Just wait and see.
'When you give me that look, you'd better pay closer attention. There are market tactics and stocks and shares and legal and illegal procedures today.
My eldest brother won that round.
The next?
We'll see...
Haruhi
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Haruhi is a girl.
She herself may not be particularly attuned to the fact, but primogeniture does not take kindly to girls.
It doesn't really matter, though, as there is no great inheritance to inherit in the first place. Her father works a night job at a popular local gay bar. An okama's wages are anything but high-end, but it's sufficient for their apartment, sufficient for food and clothing and warmth.
This doesn't really matter, either, because Haruhi has never believed that success is something to be inherited. In a fit of righteous nostalgia, she read her mother's old law tomes as a child.
'We're all born equal, right? It shouldn't matter who comes first'.
Achievement is earned.
Bread and rice and meat and a roof over your head are earned by your own hard work.
Haruhi doesn't believe in primogeniture the same way she doesn't believe in inheritance.
It works out just fine for her, though, since she does not really qualify for a hefty benefit from either.
Hunny
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It is Hunny's right to take what he does not want.
He loves his family as much as he loves and respects the dojo, but no… it will be a responsibility, not a passion, to sit at the chair of family head and burn with the same fiery, manly pride his father radiated.
Not the cute, pink Hunny flowers that popped up exclusively for him when he was feeling particularly cuddly that day.
So he wonders if they made a mistake. He was not supposed to come first.
His father stares at him in a disapproving way before Hunny beats the living daylights out of him, and then, then, his father merely shifts his eyes away in shame—at whom, Hunny will never really know.
He never asked to come first.
Chika Haninozuka is a young flame, bright and volatile, who loves the dojo and knows, somewhere in his very soul, that it is a way of life, his way of life. He burns with love for the dojo as much as he burns with envy at Hunny, who was born first, and therefore born with both the inheritance and the talent, whereas Chika was left only with the passion, the worst curse of all.
Hunny never asked to come first.
But history is not meant to be rewritten in so short a time, with so selfish a grievance such as his.
Mori
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No one really knew what to do when Mori Takahashi was born. His family and their servants and housekeepers yielded to the customary baby showers and blessings that came with a new arrival in the household, especially of the first-born.
But their family was a special case. Should they celebrate the birth of a new baby boy or cry for the burden he faced being born into the role that he was strapped to?
It didn't really matter if you were first born or not, your inheritance was sealed, and given to all male members of the family.
'Serve the Haninozuka line'.
Every male member has a similar fate. The first-born so much more so, since he would be charged with ensuring the safety and comfort of the all-important eldest Haninozuka. A task such as this would determine the continuation of the Haninozuka dojo and generations to come—for both families.
Accustomed to this fate, this inheritance, the Morinozuka family celebrate the arrival of a first-born boy with a little more relish.
Hitachiin Brothers
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No one was first.
Their mother had them by C-section, since the two had been in a difficult, entangled fetal position during pregnancy's end. When the doctors withdrew them from the womb, no one remembered who came first. In fact, nurses said the two babies were clutching each other as both experienced the hospital air at the same time.
So who gets the inheritance? No one really knows, or really bothers to figure it out. Contrary to common belief, the Hitachiin line is known in upper social circles as being very traditional, adhering to the idea of a sole inheritor who must keep the main family line strong. Right now, the Hitachiin line is dominated by a female role. It's unfortunate, but she does the job.
Now that two male sons have been born, people expect a resurgence of the old.
However, Hikaru and Koaru's mother has never exactly been able to distinguish her eldest from the second eldest.
'Hikaru, deshou? Am I right?'
Since she doesn't bother, can't bother, isn't the type to bother, no one else in the household spares it much of a thought anyways.
When the time comes, they'll learn to share.
An inheritance is more easily split than a mother's devotion, anyhow.
When the time comes, they'll figure it out.
After all, the two came out of the womb together. It must be impossible to pick out the individual of the two who's more fortunate than the other, anyways.
Hikaru and Koaru don't mind. They've learned to share, already. They also rather like the myth that they came out of their mother's womb intertwined in a flurry of arms and legs, impossible to separate.
They keep quiet.
Still, once in a blue moon, the twins wonder if someone could have paid the attention to record who came first, Hikaru or Koaru. Maybe then, they would have been a little more individual than they are now.
Tamaki
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Tamaki may be the first-born and a son at that, but he has not always been heir, and even now, the scars of an ugly start mar his perfect countenance beyond where anyone else, even his grandmother, can see.
Even Tamaki does not realize the full extent of what it means to be a lucky bastard, because, yes, that is what he is.
The lucky part stays for now, because the matriarch of the Suoh family tolerates it and tolerates his presence.
The bastard part will never change.
Because that is what Tamaki is—a bastard child born of his father and a woman who was never properly given away at her nonexistent wedding.
Primogeniture is not his to cite, not his to use.
The Suoh family holdings don't belong to him on any right. They are his grandmother's to give away as she sees fit, and she would rather it be to the bastard stranger who has Suoh blood in his veins, but not a Suoh upbringing, and no, never, ever a Suoh birth. He is a stranger to the inheritance but for the plethora of seals on his official documents and the carefully, painstakingly masked truth his father serves up, guilty, on a beautiful, moneyed silver platter to the many other family names that dine in the Suoh halls.
'This is my son, Tamaki'.
Illustrious heir to the Suoh line.
Look at his nose and cheekbones! He looks exactly like the fathers that came before him!
Lies.
No one mentions his mother.
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Suzu: Now that you're all feeling dismal, let's end it here! My first gen oneshot… I'm feeling a little proud. And completely ashamed that I actually feel proud about writing a drabble-ish piece with no plot whatsoever.
Ah well.
Glossary:
Deshou?- right?
Cookies?
Rotten Vegetables?
Critique?
Bombard the authoress with your comments, pretty please?