Chapter 2

~Krystal's POV~

Beep, beep, beep.

I jolted awake, looked at my surroundings, and almost freaked out.

Almost.

Then I remembered that yesterday Haruhi and I had gotten this housekeeping job for these Host Club boys' house. I wondered where their parents were.

Haruhi was staying in the other room, a sliding Japanese screen between the two of us. We only got cots to sleep on; the blankets were the ones that we only brought, nothing else. I remembered about the meeting at the front door, about them not hiring boys…?

I was not looking forward to being a boy, but it was better than nothing. Dad and Mom were in the hospital, and ever since that car crash, they hadn't even woken up yet. I wanted to go to the hospital right now and check up on them, but I couldn't do that. I had work to do.

The twins and Honey had told me that it was okay to decorate the room as I liked, so I got comfortable last night and hung a bulletin board above my cot, and thumb tacked a calendar on it. Plus, there was a schedule for everything that I was supposed to do that came from Kyoya, that boy with the glasses. A clock sat next to me, still beeping away.

I shut it off and stood up, stretched. Outside, it was still dark, six in the morning. I quietly walked over and slid open the screen door to check up on Haruhi. There she was, sitting on her bed, hair a mess. "Good morning," she croaked out.

"G'morning," I replied, my voice sounding like scraping gravel across cement.

After making sure that she was okay and asking about how she slept, I went to go and wash up. I twisted my hair up into a bun and set a sideways baseball cap so it would go with my 'boyish' appearance. In my duffel bag, I shoved past the skirts and leggings and went for the camo khakis and a big, loose t-shirt that made me seem a bit flatter than I really was. Ditching makeup, I hurriedly checked the first thing on my schedule: make breakfast.

Easy enough.

I grabbed a map of the huge mansion on my way out and followed the directions downstairs. In the morning, it was nice and quiet. Entering the kitchen, I quickly turned on the stove and found the ingredients that I needed for pancakes. Simple and easy to make. Haruhi came down soon after and started up the coffee brewer, though we weren't exactly even sure if these boys would drink coffee at all. So, just in case, we made some tea, too.

A few minutes later, I had a stack of pancakes ready at my service. My step-sister busied herself by making toast. I hoped that those boys that she was going to be a personal assistant for liked toast, though I sort of highly doubted it. I mean, these were RICH boys. They weren't used to homemade bread and plain toast with nothing on it. They were used to natural honey and freshly brewed coffee made from the finest coffee beans on the planet or something.

Everything was very simple to use—the stove, ingredients were easy to find; very convenient. The marble counter was wide and big, and there was more than enough space for everything and anything.

Since Honey was probably used to sleeping in a bit later than the rest of us teens, (though he was like, the oldest…) I decided to send up the twins' breakfast first. I placed three pancakes on each plate, drizzled them with organic maple syrup and butter, poured two hot piping mugs of coffee, and loaded everything onto one big silver tray. Then I hefted the whole thing up and headed towards toward the twins' room.

The room was absolutely dark, and when I knocked, nobody answered. My watch read seven thirty, so I guessed that this was the best time to wake them up. They had to get to school, man!

Uncertainly, I opened the door. There was a small nightlight on in the corner of the room, but other than that, nothing gave off light. But even without it, I could tell that the room was huge, with floor to ceiling windows with beautiful tapestries and curtains decorated all around. How come my room wasn't like this? Haruhi and I just got the old Japanese style room, with a wooden floor and a lame ole cot and a flowered screen. Geez.

Eyes adjusting to the darkness, I gently laid the tray onto a night table and opened the curtains, pulling them up until all the light came through from outside. The twins just muttered something in their sleep and turned around, backs facing the sunlight.

I sighed, lips pulled into a thin line. I walked towards the twins, grabbed hold of their covers, and, in one swift motion, flung them off.

And nearly gagged.

Okay, really, I know that it shouldn't have been surprising, but I was totally unprepared to see two twins in boxers. Nothing else. Gosh, if I had knew, then I wouldn't have pulled their covers off, I would've probably just splashed their faces with water or something. But I had already finished pulling the covers off, and there was just no time to re do that action.

"WAKE UP!" I yelled. It was a bit mean to wake them up this way, but compared to the way that my old dad had to wake me up, it was like a drop of water next the ocean. Not very cool, if you asked me.

The two twins nearly leaped out of bed. They both shot up, stark straight. "Why'd you wake us up that way, dude?"

I placed my hands on my hips, then realized that I was supposed to be a boy. "How else do you think I would've woken you two boys up? Gently shake you awake?"

They nodded vigorously. One of them said, "That's what all the other maids did."

"Well, guess what?" I told them. "I'm NOT your maid, and I'm NOT gonna wake you up gently. BE A MAN! Tomorrow, I'm dumping a bucket of water on your faces." I stalked over to the blanket that I had yanked off of them and started folding it.

"Can we just have breakfast now?" They asked in unison.

"Help yourself," I called over my shoulder, laying the blanket back onto the bed again. Sitting down on the edge of their bed, I watched in silence as they took the tray and began to eat.

One of them nudged the other and whispered something. The other nodded, pointing at me.

"You know, I'm here," I said, waving.

They stared at me with that really creepy look of theirs, and asked, "Do you know who is who?"

I rolled my eyes at them. "Duh. The left is Hikaru, and the right is Kaoru. Is it supposed to be hard?"

Their jaws almost came off, eyes boggling at me.

"Yup," I answered my own question, standing up. Walking over to their dresser, they asked me, "By the way, why is your name Krystal? It's sort of weird. We were questioning it a lot when the boss—"

"You mean Tamaki?" I began to pull their uniforms out and laid them on the bed for them to dress into.

"Yes."

"Well, my name is Krystal," I started, a bit unsure where this conversation was going, "because the last baby doctor that my parents went to said that I was a girl. And so my parents named me Krystal, and… um, didn't have any time to change it." Biting back an insult at myself, my hands worked by themselves, organizing and color coding the clothes in the twins' dresser.

"Oh."

"Just eat your breakfast and mind your own business. I need to go check up on Honey now. Bring the tray down when you're done eating." Finished with these two idiots, I was halfway through the doorway when Kaoru said, "Stop. Take this tray."

"I just told you to take it down yourself. And get dressed!" My hand was closing the door when Hikaru said again, "Stop. You're our servant, so you follow our orders. And our order is: get back in here."

A sigh flew out of my mouth, but I obeyed. "What is it?"

"You aren't done with your job here," they said in unison.

My eyes spotted the cluttered desk, and I began walking towards it. Two briefcases—for school, I guessed—were on the floor. Picking them up, I turned them upside down and, voila, out fell a mess of papers, video games and cartridges, and some rose petals. Weird combination, I thought, but I started to sort through everything, getting down on my knees and making three piles: Kaoru's stuff, Hikaru's stuff, and Video Games.

But you can't expect me NOT to snoop around, can you?

And that's why I spotted a big fat F on a test paper. Carefully picking it up, I smoothed out the wrinkles and crinkles and looked it over. So it was Hikaru's, drawn all over, and pieces of it ripped out. Probably for spit balls. But that wasn't what I was concerned about. I was concerned about the education of these people. I mean, if these kids were going to inherit some big company or something, they had to have brains, and for the good stuff, not just video game cheats and football stats. I stood, paper still in hand. The boys were still sitting in bed, talking, so I sat next to them and gently said, "Are you guys struggling with school?"

You should've seen their faces! They stared at me in disbelief. I bet none of their maids or housekeepers or any number of their person assistants ever asked them that question. They probably had the: 'You stay out of my business, I stay out of yours' kind of relationship. But education was important. Even if these two twins were really little devils, I couldn't just ignore this, could I?

"Y-yeah," they mumbled, their cheeks getting a bit red.

I shook my head and smiled. "Listen. I'm your servant, right? If you ever need any help with homework, you call me. No exceptions. I don't care what subject it is. And you boys are not going to play video games, do you understand? You're gonna listen in class and take notes. Understand?"

They nodded, head bowed down.

Chuckling, I patted their backs. "Hey, you'll do great. Now get dressed and get ready for school, okay?"

Then, with that, I took the breakfast tray and headed downstairs to wake Honey up.