The day Kaoru fell out of love with his brother had been an uneventful day—they were sat next to each other on Hikaru's bed, their legs touching from their ankles to their thighs, and each of them were busy with their own electronic device. Hikaru was laying down on his back, leisurely texting away on his phone, with each message he received making a little buzzing noise that would offset the quietness of the room. Kaoru was sitting up, a small tablet computer in his lap as he sketched a cute A-line dress that would no doubt fit very well on Haruhi.

Their curtain was drawn, drowning out the last vestiges of the sunset, but Kaoru could still see the thin streams of golden light that escaped into the confines of their darkened room. A sliver of it landed on the screen of his tablet and made it hard to see. Kaoru squinted down at his lap and then looked over to his twin.

Sensing his gaze, Hikaru looked back.

"Haruhi refuses to join us for tea," Hikaru pouted even though Kaoru knew he thought afternoon tea was boring and a waste of time. Kaoru didn't know Hikaru had even planned some sort meeting. "Milord says that it's because we're being insensitive."

Kaoru looked back to the dress on his tablet. It was cute and feminine, with pinks and whites and deep maroons as accents, and had intricate sheer detailing in the back. He closed the program and binned the file.

"He means you're being insensitive," Kaoru corrected. He looked over at Hikaru, at his twin—his brother, his world, his second half, his everything from the core of his soul to the tips of his fingers—and smiled. "Have you tried asking her nicely?"

Hikaru frowned and went back to his phone. Kaoru looked back to his tablet, but the screen was turned off and the blinding sliver of sunlight had long since moved on to darkness.

Afternoons spent at the club were fairly similar, the monotony broken up by Tamaki being Tamaki, stupid and predictable in his unpredictability. Most days didn't deviate from the pattern that had established itself from day one: they set up, they entertain the girls, they close up before the sunset hours, clean, and then return to their homes. Kaoru wasn't sure what he preferred; the known, familiar uniformity of scheduling or the whimsical changes of Tamaki.

The weather was in the last dredges of autumn with winter creeping around the corner like a lazy cat, content to take its time, and the windows of the third music room were opened to let in the crisp, cool air. There was little to no breeze, making the air stand still, almost stagnant despite the season. Many of the girls had brought along scarves and gloves and sweaters, and while some of those had been discarded, most of the girls still wore them and just looking at the thick cottons and rich furs made Kaoru feel unreasonably warm. He and Hikaru were at the table farthest away from the windows, but even then, the temperature shouldn't be uncomfortable. Kyouya was always making sure of that.

"You're looking rather warm," Hikaru said. He leaned in close, pressed their foreheads together to the enjoyment of their onlookers, and frowned. "I hope you're not coming down with anything. Let me help you out of your blazer."

The squeals of barely concealed joy from their customers were completely drowned out by the loud noise of Tamaki clearing his throat thunderously behind the couch.

"You devil twins! What did you say to Haruhi?!" he roared, practically spitting fire.

Hikaru stopped in his motion of unbuttoning Kaoru's school blazer to turn to Tamaki, who was very red in the face and clearly demanding answers. Hikaru grinned unabashedly and replied; "Haruhi's coming over for tea. And then after, maybe we could do—"

"No!" Tamaki practically screeched, horror stricken. "No, absolutely not! You corrupt little devils, I'm coming too!"

Kaoru would have retaliated with something, probably by making childish faces at Tamaki, but he was feeling too warm and a little uncomfortable. He held up a hand, fingers splayed, and said; "Milord, hold out your hand. Yes, like that." He slapped it, got out of his seat, and pushed Tamaki into the vacated spot. He turned to the girls and gave his best apologetic smile. "Milord will be my replacement for now. Try not to feed him too much, he'll get fat."

Tamaki started to yell in protest, but Hikaru silenced him.

"Hey," he said, talking to Kaoru over Tamaki's head. "Are you okay?"

Kaoru nodded. "I just need some air."

Hikaru smiled sensually. "Come back soon. I'll miss you."

"Get off of my head!"

Kaoru took the opportunity to walk away from their table and towards the windows. He removed his blazer and dropped it onto an empty chair that sat at an unoccupied table. The air was cooler, fresher as he reached the windows and he closed his eyes and inhaled slowly, letting everything around him melt away until it was just him and him alone. He felt better after that; he had been stifled.

He opened his eyes to find Kyouya standing next to him, the discarded blazer in the crook of Kyouya's arm. The usually warm lights of the third music room that reflected off of Kyouya's glasses were cold and his dark eyes gave away nothing as to what he might have been thinking. His face was a stone wall.

"You still have customers," Kyouya said, his voice calm and steady and for a moment, Kaoru felt a flare of anger and violence towards him.

Kaoru looked at his blazer in Kyouya's arms. "Just give me a moment," he said, but it came out sounding more snappish than he intended.

Kyouya pushed his glasses up his nose, the lights reflecting in his glasses momentarily blocking his eyes from view.

"You're looking very red," Kyouya said, tone still as steady as before. "Are you alright?"

Kaoru nodded. He was feeling suffocated again. "Fine. I told you, I just needed a moment," he said, and again, despite his intentions, the words that tumbled from his mouth continued to be snappy and churlish. It was like rolling down a hill he didn't climb and he didn't know how to stop.

He forced a smile and told himself to calm down. "Sorry."

To Kaoru's surprise, Kyouya closed his eyes and sighed. "It's stifling in here, isn't it?" Kyouya murmured, though he didn't look the least bit bothered by anything at all, always the cool and collected Shadow King that Kaoru didn't feel like crossing. "Shall I turn on the air conditioning?"

His smile turned just a bit genuine at that. "Maybe, but I don't think it'd help," Kaoru replied.

Haruhi interrupted them as she walked by, several fresh plates of cake balanced precariously in her arms. "Are you crazy?" she gave them an odd look. "It's freezing in here."

The afternoon tea date—henceforth called the afternoon tea event, thanks to Tamaki inviting himself and the rest of the host club—had been more or less a hair short of a waste of time for Kaoru.

The weekend's weather wasn't absolutely frightful and thus, they were all sat outside in his family's well maintained garden where Hikaru and Tamaki fought over Haruhi's attention like six-week old puppies while everyone else either joined in or watched. Kaoru wheedled Tamaki a bit, getting indignant and nonsensical responses in return, and as the hour wore on, Kaoru found himself leaning back into his chair to stare up into the sky.

It was a cloudless day and his fingers itched something terrible. He didn't even realized he had been drumming them on the side of his chair until the person next to him placed a warm hand over his fingers to hold them in place. He looked over, bored, expecting it to be Hikaru, but Hikaru was on the other side of the table trying to force feed Haruhi one of the many special luxury cakes they've ordered. Instead, it was Kyouya.

"It's unseemly," was all Kyouya said. He gave Kaoru's fingers a little squeeze and let go.

Kaoru looked away, but found himself being scrutinized by Honey's big brown eyes. It wasn't often that he saw the serious, contemplative side of the smallest member of the host club and it was easy to forget that Honey was two years his senior and cleverer by far. Kaoru shifted in his seat and tried to find something to say, but his tongue was in knots and his brain had decided right then to forget all the vocabulary he's learned in the last decade of his life.

Honey smiled, big and wide and innocent, with such great childish delight that made Kaoru wonder how, at the cusp of boyhood and manhood, Honey had avoided becoming jaded and egotistic, especially with their upbringing. Kaoru's heart clenched and his chest felt heavy, like it was caving inward to crush him.

"Have some cake," Honey said, sliding a plate in Kaoru's direction even though there was already a half-eaten slice in front of him. His voice was gentle and quiet, unlike his usual exuberant and cheerful self when cake or sweets were involved. Mori, sitting to Honey's other side, looked on with his usual taciturn countenance, though he nodded along with what Honey said.

Still unable to speak, Kaoru smiled back in what he hoped was a reassuring manner and picked up his fork.

"You're early."

Kaoru shut the door to the club room behind him and looked to the clock; classes have just ended and they wouldn't be opening the doors for the host club for another half an hour. Sitting at an empty table with his laptop open in front of him and a reef of papers around him, was Kyouya. His eyes never left the screen as he continued to crunch his numbers, balancing expenditures and revenue; not an easy task when their president was frivolous and their means of income was just as fickle.

"You are too," Kaoru replied, dropping his school bag and taking the empty seat next to Kyouya. He leaned over to peer at the spreadsheet, but none of it interested him and he fished out his phone to play games.

It was quiet in the large, cavernous music room, the stillness only broken by the tapping of keys on a keyboard. Kaoru's phone was on mute and no sound emitted from it.

"Hikaru must be worried," Kyouya said after a long, long moment. A glance over at the laptop told Kaoru that he's finished with the accounting for the day and some time between him beating levels seventeen and eighteen, Kyouya's cleaned up the mountain of papers that he had been putting into his spreadsheet.

Kaoru shut his game off and shoved his phone back into his bag. "It's fine," he said. "We're not children anymore."

Kyouya sighed, as if burdened by some great weight upon his shoulders and the air was pushed forcefully from his lungs. "Transitions are difficult, more so for some people than others," he said. He shut his laptop down and closed the lid. His eyes were sharp and discerning and it raised Kaoru's hackles in a way that no one, but Hikaru has ever done and even then, only on rare occasions.

"Isn't it?" Kaoru stretched, heard and felt his joints pop satisfyingly, and leaned on the table, one hand pillowing his head as he looked up at his conversation partner. "And you? Are you over him yet?"

Kyouya smiled, cold. "I can see that you're not."

Kaoru chuckled. "No," he admitted, "but you're not either."

The silence in the room was suffocating and the tension thick, so unbearable and malevolent that Kaoru thought that this was an irreversible moment in time in which he'll say something to permanently damage whatever friendship he's fostered with Ohtori Kyouya.

Do something, he thought, fix this before it becomes irreparable. Apologize.

Kyouya made a move to get up from his seat, but Kaoru reached over and grabbed the front of his blazer, halting his movement. He knew it could be seen as a hostile action, even violent, and if it were to come to fisticuffs, Kaoru had no doubt he'd lose, so with his free hand, he cupped the back of Kyouya's head and brought their foreheads together.

"What are you doing?"

Kaoru ignored him. "Don't move." He let go of Kyouya and surprisingly, Kyouya didn't move away. He sat stock still, back ramrod straight, fingers digging tightly into the armrests of the seat, and eyes narrowed in suspicion. Kaoru slowly placed his hands on Kyouya's glasses and took them off, gingerly folding them up and setting them down on the table next to them without looking away.

Up close, Kyouya looked different from the infallible host persona he projected. Shadows under his eyes, normally hidden by the rims of his glasses, were more pronounced than ever, making him seem drained and worn. His eyes, so dark and piercing in the way they observed everything, were softer, less severe. Less of a predator hunting prey, and something more…human. Kaoru lifted a hand and covered them. He didn't want to be seen and questioned and scrutinized, not then, not by Kyouya.

He pressed their mouths together, gently, in a facsimile of a kiss; he was shaking, just slightly, but if it was noticeable to him, Kyouya definitely noticed as well. Kyouya's lips were soft, well taken care of, and not at all like Hikaru's, who chewed his bottom lip when he was thinking too hard on something and would never apply lip balm unless prodded to by Kaoru. Contrary to what everyone thought, Kaoru had never kissed Hikaru on the lips before and the act of kissing itself was not what he expected. The shape was wrong, different; the texture, strange.

He couldn't pretend Kyouya was Hikaru.

Kyouya probably couldn't pretend he was Tamaki either.

"Satisfied?" Kyouya asked. He hasn't moved, though his fingers were no longer digging into the armrests.

"That was my first kiss," Kaoru said.

"Terrible," said Kyouya.

"Yeah," Kaoru agreed. He got up and went into the back to put his things away, leaving Kyouya sitting alone in the empty club room.

Hikaru's gaze on him was passionate and steady and their customers were watching intently, giggling softly behind teacups and the like. Kaoru brought a hand to his heart and lowered his gaze demurely; it was a game they've played more than once and he was well-versed in this deception. A hand lifted his chin and pulled his face back into its original position: looking at Hikaru.

"You've been really distant lately," Hikaru started, his tone kept soft and pleading, but Kaoru knew the many subtleties, all the different layers, facades, masks of Hikaru too well to have seen it as just an act. There was an undertone of quiet fury in Hikaru's words and the hand on his chin was rougher than usual. "Kaoru. Look at me. Please?"

"I am," Kaoru replied. "Just at you. Only at you." The hand not holding onto his chin pulled him into an embrace and Kaoru closed his eyes, pretending to revere the closeness, the touches, the motions. He heard the titillated giggling from the girls and he opened his eyes, if only to just gauge their reactions, but what caught his attention wasn't his customers.

Kyouya was sitting on the other side of the room, overseeing the activities within the club and making sure everyone was doing their jobs. He didn't have customers that day and was utilizing his free time wisely to keep Honey's sweet tooth in check; the accounting he did several days ago had revealed an increase in Honey's sweets spending that was eating up a portion of the club's budget. Honey was visibly distraught and was sending death glares to Kyouya from where he was sat next to Mori with a full table of customers.

Kyouya's eyes were on him and he was looking visibly exhausted. It was much like how Kaoru felt.

Kaoru pulled away from Hikaru, gingerly dislodging his brother's limbs from around him. "You're an idiot," he said as heartfelt as he could without breaking character. He picked up his cup of tea and sipped; the taste was bitter with not enough sugar, though it wasn't altogether unpleasant. He took another sip.

"What? Why am I an idiot?" Hikaru muttered, but he didn't push it. They both turned their attentions back to their customers, bright smiles on their faces, like twin sets of an identical mask.

When the hour had passed and after they closed their doors and the last of the customers left, Kaoru left Hikaru's side and sought out Kyouya.

Kyouya hadn't moved from his spot earlier, his laptop out and all his energies seemingly focused on it. Kaoru, too well-versed in body language and the subtleties that make up its components, knew he had Kyouya's attention.

"It wasn't as difficult as you thought," he said and Kyouya raised an eyebrow.

"No?"

Kaoru turned his head to the side and took the empty seat next to Kyouya, nearly mirroring their positions from the other day. He kept a respectable distance this time.

"It's harder if you still play pretend," he said and he saw Kyouya's eyes flick up to him and back to the screen.

"Do you want take separate customers?" Kyouya asked.

Kaoru shook his head. "No, it's fine." He smiled and reached over to pat Kyouya on the arm. "You can move on too."

"Hey!" Hikaru barked, appearing almost magically from thin air. He was a heavy presence as he leaned onto Kaoru's back, nearly suffocating him with his weight, forcing Kaoru to retract his hand from Kyouya's arm to brace himself against the tabletop. "What do you mean separate customers? What are you two talking about?"

Right behind him was Haruhi, wearing a worried furrow upon her brow.

"Are you alright?" she asked. "You haven't—"

"Haruhi!" Tamaki interrupted, dashing into the scene. "They're a hopeless case! Don't you worry about them!" He flipped his hair and Kaoru could have sworn he saw glitter and roses when he blinked. Tamaki slammed his hands onto the tabletop, looking for all intents and purposes thunderous. Kaoru felt Hikaru's arms around him tighten and the expanding of Hikaru's chest as he was getting ready to retort.

But Tamaki being Tamaki, whether he was stupid or actually clever, looked Kaoru in the eyes and spoke in a gentle, soothing tone accompanied by a smile that was unlike anything that Kaoru had ever seen before, making his chest twist painfully and his eyes water. "If there's anything that you need, we're here for you."

This was how, Kaoru thought, this was what Kyouya saw in him, the foolish blond that had a heart of gold.

Hikaru shifted from Kaoru's back and poked him in the ribs, right in the spot that tickled him. "Yeah, you dummy. We're here for you."

Everyone surrounded the table; Honey and Mori standing in silent vigil behind, Hikaru and Haruhi to his left and right, and Kyouya and Tamaki before him. It warmed him to hear those words, from Tamaki, from Hikaru, from Haruhi. To know that his friends were there for him in the loneliness of the vast world before him constricted his throat and made his tongue nothing but a useless organ in his mouth, unable to produce any words. One big fat glob of a tear poured down his cheek and he couldn't contain the smile that threatened to break out onto his face. He laughed in lieu of something to say and if some people were confused, he'd prefer it stay that way.

Finally, after his laughter died down, he looked at Kyouya.

"Yeah, we're all here for you too," he managed to say, even though his voice was strained and cracking.

Kyouya turned away, but Tamaki latched onto Kaoru's words and pounced onto him.

"Kyouya!" Tamaki cried, doing his best to rub his face against a protesting Kyouya. "Are you feeling depressed too? Don't worry, we're here for you! Cheer up!"

"Oh, go away," Kyouya muttered, doing his best to disentangle a clingy Tamaki, but the tip of his ears were red and Kaoru counted it as a win.

It was full blown winter now; the snow fell in soft pellets outside and the temperature was dropping ever lower still, freezing water easily overnight and making the roads dangerous in the morning with fog and frosty mist. It was days like these that made Kaoru not want to get out of bed, but to curl up and become nothing but a larvae encased within a cocoon of blankets. He didn't care for the cold much, but he loved the things that winter brought with it: holiday break, hot chocolate, and days that he could have Hikaru to himself.

Someone's phone rang and Kaoru groaned mentally, not wanting to leave his wonderfully warm blankets. In the other bed in the room, Hikaru yelled from within a similar cocoon of blankets: "Pick up your damn phone!"

Kaoru shut his eyes and counted to three, willing his phone to silence itself. It did, for a moment, and Kaoru breathed a sigh of relief, and then his phone started up again. Whoever it was that was calling him was insistent.

He rolled out of bed, bringing his blankets with him as he went to his desk to pick up his phone. It had nearly vibrated itself off of his desk and onto the carpeted floor. The caller identification read in alarming letters: OHTORI KYOUYA.

He picked up, wondering why of all people Kyouya was calling him.

"Hello?"

"Kaoru!" The person on the other end of the phone was not Kyouya, but Tamaki. "Come out! Come out, we're outside! Let's make an igloo!"

Somehow, that's how Kaoru and his brother found themselves being dragged into an afternoon of snow and slush with the other members of the host club and Kaoru didn't regret it. Later, after a terrible snowball fight that ended in Tamaki being buried in the biggest mountain of snowballs ever known to man and nearly losing Honey in the same mountain of snow, they huddled around the fireplace with blankets and delicious cups of hot chocolate in their hands.

Haruhi was making faces at her cup and the lavish new clothes that Kaoru and Hikaru had insisted she change into after they came in from the snow. It wasn't quite that fancy, Kaoru thought; it was a set of warm winter pajyamas made of the softest cashmere. He had a set similar to it, as did Hikaru. The price tag on them may have been a bit exorbitant, but the point was: she looked very cute in them and Tamaki still hasn't stopped gushing about it.

Kaoru was finishing his first cup of hot chocolate—Honey was already on his third—when he felt someone's head drop onto his shoulder. He turned, thinking it might be Hikaru, but a mass of dark hair came into his vision and he realized the person sitting next to him was Kyouya.

Kyouya's cup of hot chocolate was set down on the ground next to his foot, half finished; the blanket that was over his shoulders slipping off ever so slowly with every inhale he took. His eyes were closed, expression peaceful, his breathing even. He was asleep, for all Kaoru could tell.

Perhaps it was because Kyouya was asleep, was so defenseless and unprickly in his moment of slumber, that let Kaoru lean into Kyouya's warmth and close his eyes. He let the nonsensical bickering of the others wash over him and enjoyed the sensation of someone beside him, leaning on him.

And then, hidden behind the blankets, he felt Kyouya's hand clasp his own, holding on as if for dear life. Kaoru didn't open his eyes and he felt no other movement from Kyouya other than his hand. Not asleep, then, just pretending.

Kaoru squeezed Kyouya's hand back just as tightly. If Kyouya needed him to be his unspoken pillar for a little while, he could do it. He'd be immovable, a mountain against the wind.

It was just past midnight on the third day of holiday break when Kaoru's phone began to buzz. He learned from that first day that keeping his phone on his desk was an annoyance and brought it to bed with him, shoving it under his pillow when he slept. He retrieved it now, turning it on with bleary eyes, to see what the text message he got was about.

Thank you.

Kaoru checked the sender, unsurprised. He yawned as he typed in a response.

We all need help sometimes.

His phone didn't buzz again for another twenty minutes and by then, Kaoru was drifting off again into the hazy in-between of dreams and wakefulness.

I appreciate you, Kaoru.

The message, delivered so late at night, nearly didn't penetrate Kaoru's sleep-addled brain. But it made him smile nonetheless and hold his phone closer to him as he closed his eyes. For once, he didn't dream of high walls and being left behind; instead, there was a young man with dark hair and darker eyes that extended a hand to him, an invitation if Kaoru ever saw one. He felt warm and he couldn't stop smiling, even in the depths of sleep.

Hikaru, in the other bed, continued to snore away obliviously.

Break flew by in a blink of an eye and had filled Kaoru with such joy, he could scarcely believe it. The world had widened for him, if only just a little bit. It also helped that fate was always bringing him and Kyouya together.

Tamaki, ever the event planner, had dragged them through a bucket list of things he wanted to do, including buying a Christmas cake on Christmas Eve. That had been a spectacular disaster, separating everyone, except Kyouya and Kaoru. The shopping center they were at was too noisy and crowded for worthwhile conversation so all they did was wait at the entrance for the others to show up. Haruhi became the one to round up everyone like a strict mother of six rascally boys.

At the New Years party that was being joint hosted by the Morinozuka and Haninozuka families, of which all the members of the host club attended, Kaoru had found himself out in the gardens with everyone else. Somehow or another, not to anyone's surprise, Tamaki and Hikaru were fighting over who would be the one to stand next to Haruhi when the New Year rang in while dodging their own fervent gathering of girls.

"The countdown's happening," Kaoru had said conversationally, having eluded a gaggle of girls by hiding with Kyouya. He could hear the people counting down enthusiastically and out on the lawn, Kaoru thought he saw Hikaru running for his life away from his fangirls. It looked like Tamaki won that round for Haruhi's favor, Kaoru thought, but just after Hikaru passed his view, Haruhi moseyed by, obliviously enjoying a plate of food. Tamaki was nowhere to be seen. He was probably overrun.

Kyouya was actually smiling then, surprisingly. "Yes," he said.

"You know what the tradition is."

Kyouya pushed his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. "As do every single one of the people here."

Kaoru laughed and when the fireworks went off, he turned and bowed deeply to Kyouya, giving a kiss to the back of his hand. When he looked up, there was a twinkle of amusement in Kyouya's dark eyes.

"We have school tomorrow," Hikaru said, his voice quiet in the stillness of the dark.

Kaoru sighed and tried to bury himself deeper under the pillows and blankets. It didn't work.

"It'll be different again," Hikaru continued. "It'll be like you're not there anymore."

Kaoru squinted into the darkness, but he could only make out a lump on the bed across the room that he assumed was his brother. "Hikaru. We live together. We wake up together, we go to school together, we eat together; we almost do everything together. What are you on about?"

Hikaru was quiet for a long while, but Kaoru knew him better than to think he had fallen asleep. He waited until Hikaru was ready to talk.

Finally: "We're drifting apart, Kaoru."

There was a myriad of things that he could have said in response, the chief in his mind being you left me behind first, or Haruhi is a bigger priority to you than me these days, but he said none of that. It wasn't fair of him to blame Hikaru for any of it. They were simply growing up, transitioning from their shattered and broken childhood selves into mended, better people. They were no longer the twins that no one could tell apart, had no identity of their own except for each other; Hikaru was becoming Hikaru and Kaoru was becoming Kaoru. Their world was growing bigger.

"I know," he replied. "I'll always be here for you."

"You know I'm here too, right?" Hikaru asked.

Kaoru smiled into his pillow. "Yeah, I know."

There was a short lull in their conversation then, and when Hikaru spoke again, Kaoru was beginning to fall asleep.

"We should stop it. That game."

Kaoru frowned as he tried to think of what Hikaru was talking about. "The Which-One's-Hikaru Game?"

"Yeah."

He pretended to think on it for a moment. "Yeah," he replied. "Let's stop."

Being early to the club meant being alone with Kyouya, something that was happening more often than not these days. The scene was a familiar one: Kyouya was again on his laptop, the keys click-clacking away in the hollow silence of the spacious third music room. Kaoru set his things down on the floor and sat in the empty chair next to Kyouya. There was a pause in the noise of the keyboard, but then it continued as if nothing ever happened. Kaoru fished out his phone and started to play on it.

It was completely dull and yet, Kaoru luxuriated in the silence and peace. It was nothing like being with Hikaru where they'd whisper secrets and plans and knew each other so well, in and out, that one touch, one motion was a telling conversation. With Kyouya, things were unknown, unknowable. It was thrilling and terrifying all at once and Kaoru wondered if this was falling in love. He wouldn't know. He had always loved Hikaru from the day he was born and he had thought, until the day he would die.

How things change, he thought wryly.

"You're staring," Kyouya said.

Kaoru put his phone away and scooted closer. "I am, aren't I," he stated with just the right undertones of a purr to his voice.

Kyouya shut the lid to his laptop and gave Kaoru his undivided attention.

"You know who I am. You know what I want to do," he said, pushing his glasses further up his nose. "If I was willing to give up on Tamaki, what makes you think I wouldn't do the same to you?"

"Because unlike Milord, I'm actually interested," Kaoru replied. "I don't think this would be an opportunity you'd like to squander."

Kyouya looked down at the lid of his laptop and then back to Kaoru. "There's nothing to gain from this."

"Maybe," Kaoru said, his heart pounding in his ears as he leaned in closer, so close that he could feel Kyouya's breath on his skin. "Or maybe there's more to gain than you think. How would you know without trying?" He brought their foreheads together, gently, and removed Kyouya's glasses. "Can I kiss you?"

Kyouya's lips quirked upwards. "You didn't ask the first time."

Their second kiss was very different. It wasn't just a brush of lips against lips, but there was movement and life and breath, the pull and push of two people brought together into an intimate moment. Kyouya had pulled him forward and the edge of the table was digging uncomfortably into his thigh, but he didn't stop—he couldn't stop. One of his arms was around Kyouya's neck and Kyouya's hand was tangled with his tie and Kaoru thought yes, yes, this was how it should be.

When they pulled away, finally—after a minute or eternity or did time ended up standing still for them?—they were breathing hard and both their faces were flushed. Kaoru had never seen Kyouya so pink in the face before.

"Go out with me," Kaoru said, slowly dislodging Kyouya's fingers from his tie to thread them together with his own.

Kyouya hummed and kissed the back of Kaoru's hand.