Disclaimer: I don't own or have anything to do with the creation of Ouran High School Host Club. This is just me sharing my fantasies based on all those wonderful characters.

When It All Falls Apart

Prologue

It's been three years since Haruhi had come home from America, three years since Tamaki had chosen to stay. His grandmother had been able to get Tamaki into the management program at MIT. It was one of the most prestigious universities in the world, the program would greatly benefit Tamaki as the future head of the Suoh family. His grandmother had actually begged him to do it. She was a proud woman always demanding her way, never asking, and she had begged him. She had even beseeched Haruhi to convince him to stay and go through with the program. And so he agreed. Haruhi couldn't afford to stay in America for university after she finished her one year of study abroad. She refused to go into debt over it, especially not when she had a full scholarship to Ouran University where she had always originally planned on going. She had refused both her father's and Tamaki's offers to help her pay for it. She knew it was too much of a financial burden for her father and she never wanted to be in debt to Tamaki again. This was her dream she had to make sure she saw it through but she also felt the need to do it on her own without their help.

She and Tamaki had argued at length about her having an overinflated sense of independence. He wanted to know why they just couldn't get married, then what was his would be hers anyways. But there was no way she would get married before she finished university. He was hurt by the fact that she still wouldn't let him take care of her, but eventually he begrudgingly accepted her need to earn her way on her own. It was just four years they could handle it.

But in the end they couldn't.

They'd had been through a lot to get where they were, they had a very strong bond. They were devoted to each other but life has way of messing with even the best laid plans. Two years into university Tamaki's father died very unexpectedly. It threw their whole world into chaos. Tamaki was devastated but he now had the whole Suoh Company resting on his shoulders so many lives depending on him. He returned to Japan for just a few days for the funeral, even then Haruhi wasn't allowed to spend hardly any time with him. He was always surrounded by advisors with mountains of decisions to make. They were always asking her to leave so she wouldn't be a distraction. Tamaki didn't fight them on it. He was barely a shadow of he was, so drawn into himself. All the light that always shined out of him so brightly seem snuffed. It broke her heart, and she wouldn't dare make things more stressful for him. So she stayed away. Then far too soon Tamaki was set to go back to America. End of term exams were just around the corner for Haruhi. He told her to stay in Japan for now and not jeopardize her studies just to keep him company, that he would be alright. It sort of hurt that he didn't need her to come, she just wanted to be able to be there for him. Still she did not want to add any more pressure on him so she did as he asked.

Life became a whirlwind for Tamaki with the company trying to juggle finishing university while stepping in to fill his father's place. The board members kept him running around the clock, he hardly ever had time to talk with Haruhi. Then communication with him came to a halt almost entirely six months after his father died with one final message on her voicemail. Tamaki explained he needed time to work through things and he just couldn't be sure what would happen in the future anymore. He asked her not to call or contact him. He had a lot of heavy decisions to make he would contact Haruhi when he figured some things out. Haruhi wasn't positive since the message was short and not entirely clear but she was fairly certain Tamaki had meant they were putting their relationship on hold. They were breaking up.

Two months later Lady Éclair Tonnerre showed up at Haruhi's door. She was a year older than Tamaki and had been attending university in America as well, at Harvard University studying Public Administration and International development. When Tamaki was a second year student in high school he had almost been forced into an arranged marriage with her made by their parents, which he narrowly escaped thanks to Haruhi. Not that he ever bore any ill will towards Éclair for it. She was already there when Haruhi had begun her exchange program with Harvard. Haruhi made quite a splash in her attendance, everyone was impressed that she was only a high school student but had still made it into the program. It garnered her a certain amount of respect even from Éclair. Even with their rocky past she and Haruhi were able to form a close friendship and eventually Éclair become friends with the other members of the host club including Tamaki. With Harvard only being mere miles from MIT she was able to continue her friendship with Tamaki even after the others returned to Japan.

Lady Éclair had come to convince Haruhi to come back to America with her. Tamaki was in pretty bad shape. The stress was getting to him but he wouldn't let anyone help. He was working himself to death, he hadn't even given himself time to grieve properly. She explained how she cared a great deal for Tamaki and was willing to do anything to make this easier on him. She figured if anyone one could set Tamaki strait, it was Haruhi. And for the first time in her life something was more important to Haruhi than achieving her dreams. What good was love if you didn't drop everything else to help the person when they needed you most? They were going to leave right away. They quickly secured her visa and plane tickets and as she was in line to board her flight the guards informed her that her visa had been revoked. No explanations were given. Éclair couldn't stay longer since she had to return to her studies as a senior year student. She promised to do her best to help her clear up this mess and to take care of Tamaki. She would keep Haruhi updated even when Tamaki wouldn't.

Shortly after that she did finally receive a message from Tamaki. It was just an innocuous email how his day had went. It was strange as though it hadn't been months since she had heard from him, but there was a glimmer of the old Tamaki in it, enough to bring her hope. So she emailed back in kind, just about how her day went. And slowly but surely they began to trade emails back and forth and it finally felt like she might be getting her Tamaki back.

But at the same time, the Suoh company board started in on her. Of course it was all without Tamaki's knowledge of it but for weeks they tried to buy her off with an inordinate amount of money saying she wasn't what the Suoh Company needed as the president of the company's wife. Haruhi figured they were the ones that had somehow blocked her visa the month prior. She didn't dare mention it to Tamaki knowing he still had far too much to worry about. Of course she refused their offers over and over and it seemed like finally the board had backed off. But just weeks later strange things started happening.

It was little things at first, someone calling her phone and then hanging up, vague random threatening letters at her apartment door, and she could swear someone was following her. But then she lost her job at the restaurant she had been working at for over two year. They were extremely apologetic, the owner's wife even cried. They said they just weren't able to afford to keep paying her, that business wasn't so good, but they would still give her a recommendation. Then she heard a week later they hired someone new to replace her. The first replacement job she found a grocer let her go after a week, simply saying she wasn't a fit for their store. It was very suspicious. Her saving were stretching thin it was making her nervous. She had finally been able to find a new job at a sweet little bakery but had a niggling feeling that it might not last.

Then suddenly things became much worse, a few weeks ago she was caught in the subway doors. The train almost dragged her down the platform as it moved away. Thankfully it had only caught her coat and she was able to wiggle out of it in time. It had felt as though someone had grabbed her to pull her back in the way of the door as she was walking out. Last week she also had almost been hit by falling pottery. It fell from a top floor window of her own four story apartment building. It would have likely killed her if it had hit her. And then just a couple days ago she narrowly missed being hit by a car, that time she knew someone had pushed her into the road. Even though it had been a crowded street she felt the deliberate hand on her back pushing her. She was still scuffed and sore from hitting the ground. This was becoming too serious, she wasn't sure what to do but she need to figure out why and soon. She had a bad feeling this was going to get worse.

Author's Note: Not sure how I feel about prologue's in general, not a great piece of literature right here, but with original storyline as well as all the fanfictions out there for Ouran I wanted to get us all on the same page. Better writers could do this without the info dump but here it is anyways. Let me know if after reading the first few chapters if you think it's completely unnecessary. NOW onward to the real story.