You might say Kyouya was a mystery, and you'd be right. Where did his seemingly limitless information come from? How did he attain the ability to be all knowing? Was he even human? Typical questions that no one quite knows the answer to, at least unless you're Kyouya himself, or perhaps Tamaki.
If anyone had ever gathered enough courage to ask Kyouya these questions, they wouldn't get an answer. A small smirk, and maybe a slight raise of the eyebrows would be their only response. For as dangerously mysterious as he may be, Kyouya knows that Tamaki is even more of a mystery. The boy is an enigma all to himself, and the most pressing question Kyouya has ever wanted an answer to was this: How in all of the sane world, had Tamaki Suou, of all people, managed to see through his façade?
This of course was a question that Kyouya had long since given up on having an answer to. In large part due to the fact that he was too proud to ask, but in all honesty he was certain that by now, he already had the answer.
Tamaki may have had the appearance of an emotional idiot, and by all of Kyouya's standards, he was. But in actuality, Tamaki was also much more than that. He was genuine. Sincere. Open. Like a window, he was made to be seen straight through. To his heart. The man wore it on his sleeve.
What you saw with Tamaki was what you got. No more. No less. Period. There was nothing about him that was hidden, and nothing he would care to be. No secrets. Kyouya, for all of his calm intelligence, was the opposite. Masked, walled up, slightly standoffish, and emotionally stunted. There were a lot of secrets.
The other boy had the ability to see things Kyouya could not. He could read people's eyes, their facial expressions, understand other people's emotions. While Kyouya had to go digging for information on people's motives, Tamaki only had to spend some time with them, talk with them, get to know them. Enchanting people was so easy for Tamaki. It came so naturally to him, in a way that it never could for his friend. Although Kyouya could easily manipulate others with his deceptively smooth and friendly demeanor, people just never seemed to be quite as drawn to him as they were to the other. Perhaps it was Tamaki's glowing, ever-present warmth that made it so, or perhaps it was something else.
Kyouya spent so much time making himself impenetrable, tried so hard, too hard in fact, to keep up his cool façade, that his mask occasionally became a little too perfect. It made people wary of what he was trying to hide. Kyouya put so much effort into being suave, that he didn't realize how sinister his own coolness had become, so cool that it was frigid. Therefore, by default, with nothing else left to work with, Kyouya had to then resort to intimidation. He sometimes missed this flaw in his foundation, but there are others; the cracks in small places, the seams he fails to cover up. Normal people can't see them; they're too minuscule. But then again, Tamaki has never been normal.
Tamaki, as mentioned, was always open. There were no seams, nothing to cover or protect, because Tamaki didn't try to. His own honesty allowed him to see the truth in others. His face wasn't hooded, remained unsheltered, while Kyouya's eyes were shielded so that no one could see in. As a result, sometimes he couldn't see out. He overlooked things. Only little things, but still, it got to him. Kyouya, at times, became blinded by the not-so-perfectly-cut eyeholes in his mask.
He became jaded by his own falsehood.
For this reason, Kyouya envies Tamaki. Yet never enough to hate him.
Moron. Kyouya thinks this and since no one is looking anyway, he smiles affectionately, lets his mask slip. As he contemplates these things, he stares wonderingly at the man occupying his thoughts, the only one for whom he would ever grin so warmly.
Tamaki, at the moment, is busy entertaining some tittering female guests, fluttering excitedly from table to table. He stops mid-explanation to look over at Kyouya. The look is strange, a curious tilt to his lips.
The smile on Kyouya's face snaps off quicker than a camera flash. "Tamaki, you do have guests to be entertaining. We already wasted enough time with Haruhi stopping so long to tie her shoes earlier." He says this in a rather indifferent way, but underneath the polite manner of speaking and the clipped formal tone, everyone knows he means it. And even underneath whatever is left, Tamaki is the only one who knows that he doesn't. Not really. Concerns over wasted money and wasted time are not the only things behind that mask, and perhaps he will be the only one to ever know. But that's okay with Tamaki. The secret is safe with him.
Tamaki's innocent, inquiring smile turns into a smirk. "Whatever you say Kyouya."
Kyouya can hear the laughter in his voice, and it almost makes him angry. Almost.
A look of understanding passes between them. Of course, Tamaki knows Kyouya was smiling at him. He also knows that he wasn't thinking about hosting duties while doing so, and that Kyouya is putting on his mask again. Kyouya knows all of this too. He breaks eye contact first and turns away, and Tamaki's voice starts up the conversation with his guests once more. Safe now, another smile comes back, smaller this time. He shakes his head. Moron.