Why Me?
Chapter Four
Two weeks had passed since the incident and everything seemed to go rather smoothly; well, at least it was for the most part. The host club, which had expected some sort of miraculous friendship to bloom out of the previous events, was severely let down as they realized that not a single word had been spoken between Melanie and Hikaru. Any sort of chance to communicate with each other was ignored and all eye contact had been kept to something less than a minimum. It got to the point that one day, the club had walked in to realize that the piano in the corner had been turned so that it was no longer facing the twins' corner, but instead Hunny and Mori's.
Tamaki and Kyoya (the latter of which didn't necessarily care) sat in the back of the classroom that morning, waiting for the right person to pass through the door, and when she did, Tamaki made quite the display until she finally sat in between them.
"Melanie! How are you doing, my princess?" Tamaki greeted. Melanie shrugged her shoulders, not really giving them the response they had been hoping for. In all honesty, she hadn't had a very good night's sleep, not that that was anything new considering that her sleep schedule had always been messed up, but last night was particularly hard for some weird reason. All she knew was that she had awoken after sleeping for perhaps an hour with tears streaming from her eyes, but what was the cause behind them she couldn't remember.
"Well, we have the trip coming up soon, and you're going to come, right?" Tamaki asked excitedly. Melanie, once again, shrugged her shoulders before pulling out her notebook and doodling in it. It was the only way she knew she could possibly stay awake.
"I didn't think that I would have to say this, but it is my duty to inform you that you don't actually have a choice in the matter, we were just trying to be polite," Kyoya interrupted Melanie's doodling. Melanie immediately looked over at the shadow king.
"B-but I can't afford it!" Melanie pleaded, trying to reason with Kyoya only to be cut off by Tamaki.
"Do you want to go?"
"Yes, but-"
"Then it's all expenses paid, don't even worry about it," Tamaki explained, giving her a cheerful smile. Melanie returned the favor and started doodling again in her book, except this time it was fast and more excited.
"So where is this trip anyway?"
"Venice."
At the sound of that, Melanie closed her eyes and felt the smile wipe straight off of her face. Why does everything always have to come back and bite her in the-
"Is there a problem with that?" Kyoya asked her. You would have had to be oblivious to not notice that her entire demeanor had changed within a single moment.
She wore the most believable smile that she could muster when she turned her attention back to Kyoya.
"Not at all."
Kyoya looked suspiciously at the girl. He didn't know very much about her private life since he'd been busier with Tamaki's schemes lately, but he was well aware about a few things. He knew of the fact that she actually had a family business for example. The White group was the pharmaceutical and hospital management tycoon of the United States, even rivaling the Ootori Empire in comparison. What he didn't know though was why the daughter of such a rich man was in the middle of Japan living with her mother and going to Ouran on a music scholarship of all things. Had it not been for the sudden appearance of Hikaru, he would have pulled out his laptop and answered any question he had regarding their new piano player.
"Hikaru! Did you come to see your precious king?" Tamaki asked, standing up with open arms as he waited for Hikaru to embrace him, only to be met with him ducking right underneath his arm and walking straight to Melanie's desk.
Melanie felt way too nervous for her liking, it had been weeks now since she had last talked to him and somehow she was perfectly fine with their no speaking arrangement, but now he was in her classroom standing right in front of her and she couldn't have wished any harder that she was anywhere else.
"So I know I haven't talked to you lately, but I still feel kind of bad for what I did so I got you this." Hikaru started, handing over a glittering silver box and then crossing his arm in annoyance. He didn't like all the attention he was getting for being in the classroom and having given some girl a present but he knew that it would have been so much worse if he had done it at the host club.
Melanie hesitantly stared at the box, her face burning up as she felt not only Tamaki and Kyoya staring directly at her but also the entire classroom. At this point it wasn't a matter of just making enemies, she was committing social suicide. The thought was enough to send her anxiety into over drive and her foot lifted itself up to scratch the back of her other leg, a little quirk she developed to try to cope with it.
"Can you please open it a little quicker?" Hikaru asked impatiently, causing Melanie to quickly open the top off the box and see sitting in there a white gold bracelet with a sapphire hanging off of it along with a little heart right by the side.
"It's beautiful..." Melanie replied, picking up the bracelet from its container and fiddling with it. It was exquisitely shiny and somehow she started wondering if she had seen it before? She used to always go jewelry shopping before any sort of formal event that she was forced to attend with her parents so it was quite possible that she had. Melanie redirected her attention to Hikaru as she felt his hands gently touch hers and take the bracelet from her, open the latch, and then wrap it around Melanie's wrist before closing the latch again. She could have sworn that she saw a small smile start to form on the corner of his lips, and it made her wonder just how childish Hikaru really was.
"I hope you accept my apology," Hikaru grumbled, only low enough for Melanie to hear. She picked up her head and looked straight up to meet his bright eyes staring down at her and even though he tried to act like he was extremely annoyed, his eyes gave a different impression; he actually seemed kind of like he was enjoying himself.
Getting pleasure from simple mannerisms and praising yourself for it seemed like the type of thing Hikaru was prone to do.
Melanie nodded her head in delight and watched as Hikaru bowed before her and then turned around and walked directly out of the classroom. All heads returned their initial position facing Melanie and soon you could hear whispers formulate around the room for the second time.
"Melanie, what was that about?" Tamaki whispered to her, moving his desk over so it was right next to her's instead of the normal two feet wide gap.
"I guess Hikaru felt really badly about what he did," Melanie replied back. The more she thought about it, the more this entire situation made her wonder; she had already accepted his apology two week ago, and now he made a point to say he was sorry again?
Something told her that Kaoru was behind this.
Tamaki and Kyoya exchanged confused looks, both wondering about the whole situation but being beaten to it by the ringing of the bell and the sudden appearance of their teacher.
As Melanie entered the host club that evening, all eyes were on her again. Word had gotten around to the hosts about the incident that morning and all of them had the same initial thought about it.
Hikaru did something... nice?
And funny enough, all of them trailed back to the same conclusion as Melanie.
Must be Kaoru's doing.
Melanie laid her stuff down by the piano and stretched her wrists and fingers, noticing Haruhi approach her from the horizon. Ever since she found out her secret and the meaning behind it, she felt relieved that she wasn't going insane when she first started wondering about Haruhi.
"Word got around to a lot of people about the situation that happened this morning and I for one am wondering what exactly happened," Haruhi started, sitting down on the bench next to her.
"Well, I'm not exactly sure myself if I'm being honest, but Hikaru gave me this cool bracelet." Melanie replied, holding up her hand to show the jewelry to her friend. Haruhi nodded her head, holding up the two charms on it and then releasing them again.
"Just out of personal experience, I'd advise you to keep an eye out for Hikaru. The host club is notorious for bringing up old memories in exchange for favors." Haruhi explained, looking over to the twins and noticing them poking Kyoya from both sides. They seemed to be whining about some sort of overabundance of customers and how they wanted more free time in between to bother Tamaki.
"Well, I guess I'll have to settle it right now," Melanie said, getting up and starting her descent towards Hikaru and Kaoru. She soon realized though that that was easier said than done as she tapped on Hikaru's shoulder and saw his face turn to face her.
"Do you need something?" Hikaru asked in a rather rude voice. Melanie was about to roll her eyes at the comment when she thought about how she wasn't about to get in a fight with Hikaru after he just gave her a gift.
"I just wanted to thank you once again for the gift-" Melanie started, being interrupted by Hikaru before she could even finish.
"Don't be too flattered, it only cost 100,000 yen so it was relatively cheap compared to what I could have bought you," Hikaru explained nonchalantly, raising his elbow and putting it on the shoulder of his twin who had managed to join the two.
Melanie in the meanwhile, felt like she was going to faint.
"Wait one moment, I can't accept this, that's way too much," Melanie started to ramble, trying her best to take off the bracelet but seeing as Hikaru put it on her left hand while she was left handed seemed to make it entirely more difficult. "I can't even dream of affording anything this expensive anymore."
"Seriously? I spent a lot of time trying to find a nice bracelet that I thought you would like and now you're going to give it back?" Hikaru asked, his face twisted in annoyance as he watched Melanie fiddle with her bracelet. At his words though, she seemed to stop trying to undo the hook and rather looked back up at him. He could start to see a small smile form on her face and admittedly, he flashed back to that night two weeks ago when he first noticed how she actually had a cute smile. It started to make him wonder how it could possibly be adorable even at a moment like this when his guard wasn't down.
"If I keep it, I'm not going to let you use it against me," Melanie warned. Hikaru couldn't really take her warning seriously seeing as she was basically giggling through the whole sentence.
"Wasn't planning on it, I like to think that I don't have the means to blackmail people like Kyoya does." Hikaru replied, also laughing, but stopping once he noticed that Kaoru had disappeared from his side and was standing right by Tamaki and Hunny as all of them gave him funny looks. The type of looks your friend would give you to tell you that they're going to mercilessly embarrass you later. Hikaru felt a shiver go down his spine as he realized that when he gets home that night, the horrible taunting from Kaoru would only begin.
Melanie noticed Hikaru's smile fade and turned around to see some of her host club friend's standing there in a huddle. Their whispers were amazingly quiet considering that their normal speaking voices were louder than her screaming. By Haruhi's look of disapproval and Mori's shaking head from across the room, Melanie started to realize that whatever they were talking about couldn't possibly be good news for her.
"Just ignore them, they get like that when they have nothing else to do," Hikaru dissed them, rolling his eyes and walking away to his and Kaoru's area, leaving Melanie by herself in the middle of the room to watch him walk away.
'I guess his kindness only goes so far,' she thought before shrugging her shoulders and walking back to the piano, hearing the excited whispers tone down while she passed only to resume again when she was out of ear shot.
"Mom! I'm home." Melanie yelled into her house that afternoon once she returned from the school. She still had a smile on her face that held through all two hours of the host club meeting. Even when people asked what she was so happy about, she couldn't quite explain why, but was still unwavering in her attitude.
"How was school?" Her mom asked from the kitchen area. Melanie set her stuff down on their tiny dining table before gently sitting on the chair accompanying it and crossing her legs.
"It was interesting," Melanie admitted, picking up one of the cups that was left from her breakfast that morning and drinking the left over tea.
"I can see that," Misa replied. She caught a glimpse of something around her daughter's wrist that she didn't remember seeing that morning when she left the house, so she walked over to her and lifted up her hand to examine the bracelet. "I don't remember seeing this before."
"I got it from a friend."
"A friend?"
"Yeah, his name is Hikaru and our relationship kinda hit a rough patch a few weeks ago but to make up for it he gave me this." Melanie explained, feeling her arm start to grow sore from being held up for so long. Misa flipped over the heart pendent, rubbing a single finger over the word etched into it.
"Hitachiin?" Misa gasped quietly as she reread the word over and over again.
"That's his last name." Melanie replied, taking her hand away as she finally grew tired of keeping it up.
"How in the world did you manage to become friends with one of the Hitachiins?" Misa wondered out loud, crossing her arms and looking expectantly at her daughter. It was obvious that she was becoming increasingly nervous in the situation and the smile that Melanie clearly had on her face the entire time started to fade away.
"Well you know how I got a job at the host club, right?"
"Yes, I am aware."
"Well Hikaru and his twin Kaoru are actually in the host club."
Misa held a confused expression on her face for a full minute before letting a sly grin show.
"Oh, is that so?" Misa started giggling. If her daughter's accusations were true about what the host club was truly about, beautiful men entertaining bored young ladies, then all of a sudden her happy demeanor made a lot more sense. "So I'm guessing Hikaru is your favorite, huh?"
Melanie looked confused at her mom, obviously playing dumb.
"No mom, I play in the club." Melanie tried to explain but Misa only started giggling at her before turning back around and returning to the stove to finish her cooking.
Melanie felt the eerie silence overcome her household and for once she noticed that no music was actually playing. It was just her and her mom's breathing filling in the empty space.
Or at least it was until she noticed her mother singing under her breath.
"Melanie and Hikaru sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-"
"Mom!"
"Hm? Oh, was I singing out loud again? My bad." Misa lied, bopping her head from side to side and continuing the familiar tune.
"It's not even close to being like that!" Melanie whined, standing up and poking her mom in an attempt to get her attention.
"I didn't say anything as far as I'm concerned."
Melanie humphed loudly at her fake accusation and returned back to her chair, crossing her arms and pouting.
"After what happened back in the states, I don't want anything to do with love." Melanie mumbled to herself, thinking that her mom hadn't heard her.
Misa's face fell when she heard her daughter's whisper and she stared at the teen sitting in her chair and looking out of the window towards the road.
Being caught in a crossfire can do that to people.
A:N: Hey y'all. Please excuse my lateness once again but I recently finished school which meant a lot of tests and stuff which was killing me. I haven't even touched my laptop in over a month until about two days ago and so I finally got this chapter out. (Which I hope everyone enjoyed of course!)
Anyway, so review, favorite, or follow to your hearts content. I look forward to every sign that someone out there is enjoying what I'm writing and it really gives me the motivation to keep going, because sometimes we all get a little bit discouraged.
Hope to see y'all next week!
(Credits to MusicOfMadness for editing this chapter for me!)