The Common Folk

Chapter 4

Join the Club

Edward's headache grew and grew the longer he was on the phone with his commanding officer. The Headmaster of the school, Mr. Suoh, called to tell Mustang about his fight. The school apparently had strict rules against even the slightest confrontation and even was warned about Mustang's even stricter policy. Jonathan was unfortunately let off the hook as he was seen as the victim, having being punched and bruised while Edward didn't have a scratch. Jonathan was currently in the nurse office being pampered by medicines and lollipops. The idea of it just made Edward sick, however Mustang just used it as fuel to the fire he was burning through the phone line. The man was chewing him out all the way from Amestris.

"Edward, I know it was about your brother, it always is, but remember you have a job to do down there. You are a representative of Amestris, an insult should be overlooked if it means for the betterment of all. If news of this gets out, which it surely will, the Japanese government will think twice about having you as their teacher."

"Yes sir," Edward grumbled a little nastily but he knew the man was right and Mustang let it slide.

"Now I am only going to say this one more time, Fullmetal. Don't fuck up." With that said, the phone line clicked off and Edward let out a breath of air he didn't know he was holding as he set it back on the receiver. At least he got that off of his chest, however Mr. Suoh was still glaring at him.

"You do realise that this has an impact on the school as well, Elric. We teach proper aristocrats here, we hold manners and demeanor above all else. Even though you are a honour student and earned the right to be here, we will not have someone as wild as you in our institution."

"Alright, I will not hit anyone. I already got a lecture from the Colonel-"

"Not just that Elric," the man interrupted sternly. "You need to turn into a proper gentleman. We need to see you refined. In order to see this through I have added you to the school's honorary Host Club-"

"The WHAT!" Edward exclaimed as he heard the words spew out of the man's mouth. Mr. Suoh seemed startled by his sudden outburst as Edward stood up from his chair in the large office. "No, you can't do that! Not with them!" Edward said. "I have work right after school I can't-"

"All arrangements have been made, Elric, I told your class about your predicament and they gladly moved the schedule back a couple hours. You will participate in the host club in order to learn proper manners. Until you show us that you are worthy of being a true gentleman, you will attend all and every meeting that the club's president holds. Do I make myself clear, Mr. Elric?" the man huffed. Edward's mouth hung agape as he was completely lost for words. He couldn't believe that he was ever lead to this. Those stupid members were following him around all week. They were spying on him, prying him to answer stupid questions, over dramatizing his life, the last thing he was going to do was to give into their constant begs to be in the host club. He could just see the twins annoying him not only for seven hours of school classes but for an extra two hours of club. The very group of people he wanted to stay away from was the people he was being sent to for his punishment. Edward felt his head hang in defeat. The idea was all too much.

"Yes sir," he muttered. The man seemed satisfied and he sketched a little note on a pink piece of paper and handed it to him. Edward took it and looked down at it. The sloppy signature was too loopy to read.

"That's a note to let them know my orders. They have a meeting right now. I expect you to be there," he ordered him. Edward nodded his head solemnly and grabbed his backpack which had his dinner box in it. He slung it over his shoulder and gave a small bow before leaving the Headmaster's Office. He slowly made his way out of the Admissions building and towards the arts. He found his footsteps slow and unwilling. A death sentence would have been more acceptable than this! As he passed students, whispers and gossip picked up. He noticed some of the take small steps away from him like they were afraid that he would hurt them too. Edward rolled his eyes as he let out a small sigh. He guessed he brought this upon himself. Alphonse was always warning him about his temper. As he made it to the third music room, remembering the route that the twins showed him the beginning of that week, he slowly pushed the large ornate door open and poked his head inside.

"Welcome!" he heard the usual ring of handsome voices. Edward rolled his eyes as he stepped into the room to find it as normal, full of fancy women dazzling over the few select men in the room. Tea sets were on all of tables along with fancy cakes for the guests to enjoy. Edward knew that they tasted terrible, but were rather for people's eyes than their tastebuds.

"Shut up," Edward mumbled as Tamaki abandoned his post of guests and flew over to him, about to make one of his elaborate welcome speeches. Edward stopped him before he even began though he cut it a little too bluntly. The kid looked rather falsely offended.

"My little soldier, what brings you here? After the lunch incident I would have thought you to have been sent home," the kid smiled trying to pick up a conversation. "You do know that punching someone isn't looked lightly upon here."

"That's the only reason why I am here," Edward grumbled as he handed the boy his pink slip. Tamaki took it curiously and his face suddenly lit up with extreme pleasure. Edward took a tiny step back from him but it was too late. The kid was hugging him and spinning him around in complete joy.

"Yes! I knew you would come around to your senses soon, my soldier! I am so glad you will be joining us!"

"GET OFF OF ME!" Edward exclaimed as he shoved the kid off. He felt as if his ribcage had been crushed to dust. It was even worse than one of Alphonse's metal hugs.

"What's going on over here?" Kyoya's monotonous voice asked curiously. He had his clipboard in hand as usual and looked down on Edward with an all knowing stare. He wouldn't be surprised if the kid was just asking that question to get on his nerves. Tamaki flashed the pink slip over to the boy and he barely looked it over. Edward crossed his arms angrily and looked away from the kid who just smiled back gently. "Well. It looks like we have another Host in our club. I might have to recalculate some numbers but we might be able to make this work. It will definitely be difficult with your new status as the first year Typhoon."

"The what?" Edward gasped, disbelieving what his ears were told. Kyoya nodded his head and pushed up his glasses.

"Yes, as you know gossip is the one major form of entertainment here and everyone already has their own version of what happened in Lunch today. Some of them are completely fabricated but they all earned you the name of Typhoon," he said. Edward groaned and massaged his face with his hands. This was going to be a lot harder to overcome than he originally thought.

"Yes, with that name it might be difficult for any of the girls to request you. What a shame it is. You had such potential, but now with such a horrid name, you are dragged down" Tamaki yawned.

"Used to it," Edward grumbled. "I don't want girls to request me."

"So you are a homosexual after all?"

"NO!" Edward growled at him. "I just don't have time for girls or friends. I have work, research, and now school. I don't have time."

"But, Mr. Elric, now that you are required to be in our club as a host, all hosts have a quota they must meet. Even Haruhi here has one. In order to see how far you have come on being a real gentleman we need to see how you fair becoming a host."

"And with that said, let's begin!" Tamaki exclaimed in excitement. "Suoh's 6 steps of Gentleman's Etiquette!"

…..

"Step 1! A Gentleman's guide to written communication!" Tamaki said as he shoved Edward down at a table and slapped a fancy journal down in front of him and a fountain pen. Edward growled as he was forced to sit through this man's many made up classes. He hated his voice as it was very annoying and even sitting in his presence was enough to make him stressed out. He was practically being dragged around like a hopeless puppet until the club was over in a couple hours. Haruhi looked sorry for him and he suspected that she had to go through the same thing when she was first made a host.

"Yes, though this might seem old fashion, a written letter can touch the hearts deeper than any internet connected message. Texts, Post messages, Emails, they are all superficial. The art of writing goes back thousands of ages and can be used to deeply express one's inner most desire and portray their own unique styles-"

"Wait, time out," Edward interrupted. Tamaki stopped a bit surprised that he didn't even get far in his speech and was already being asked questions. "What in the world are you talking about?"

"Writing a formal letter," Tamaki replied a bit taken back.

"Not that! All that other stuff you were talking about, nets and all of that."

"The internet?" Edward nodded his head and Tamaki looked even more bewildered. "Are you telling me you don't know what the internet is? You poor poor soul!" The man was sent off again into his own rampage and Edward hated himself for even asking. "You're so starved for money you don't even know what a computer is! You probably can't afford it, spending all of your money on food just to stay alive, living in the slums or on the streets! What a terrible, terrible-"

"Shut up already!" Edward scolded him. "It can't be that important if I haven't heard about it!"

"Well, Edward," Kyoya said, having heard his outburst from across the room. Though Edward was frankly suspicious of the kid, he did know how to save him from Tamaki's dramatics. "The internet is one of the largest forms of communication, data collection, and research tools in the world today. People use it for nearly everything. I guess you could say it is the world's largest library at your fingertips."

"Wait, what?" Edward asked dumbfounded.

"I am not surprised that you haven't heard of it, coming from Amestris. It probably doesn't even work in your country let alone exist. I don't even know how much information on it really is relative to you, but if you want to see what it is about, I will gladly have one of us show you some time outside of the club meeting." Kyoya jotted something down on his clipboard and tucked it under his arm, giving him a smile that sent shivers down his spine. "Tamaki, I suggest you skip this part of the lesson and get on with the other half. Edward would not be needing to know how to write a letter. It is, after all, his only way of communications outside of the telephone." The tall black haired boy pushed up his glasses and turned on his heel to go supervise the other hosts who were trying to entertain the guests that so happily came for their company. If the kid wasn't on track of everything, Edward would have guessed that their club would have fallen into chaos long ago.

"Very well," Tamaki huffed as he puffed out his chest to continue his lecture on written arts. Edward groaned as he massaged his temples and prepared himself. "Not only letter but journals can be kept to express these as well. Journals are important for keeping track of agendas, of ideas one might want to relate on, and even-"

"I already got one," Edward grumbled cutting the kid off of his elaborate rampage of art and beauty. Tamaki paused and gave him a rather surprised look as if he wasn't expecting a commoner to know what a journal even was. However the blond haired prince looked even more disheartened that he couldn't deliver his speech on etiquette as shapely as he wanted to. Edward rolled his eyes and got up from the chair he was ungraciously shoved into. He grabbed his journal from his satchel and threw it at him. Tamaki caught it clumsily as it nearly hit his head and stared at it. "I have been keeping them since I was five."

"Really?" Tamaki muttered as he flipped through the pages. "It… is a really strange… travel log you got here…"

"Well, you are just reading it superficially," Edward mocked him as he tore it back out of his hands. Of course Tamaki wouldn't know anything about alchemy so he couldn't even recognise it as his alchemy notes but Edward still didn't want him looking at it for long.

"What hand do you write with?"

"My left," Edward told him as he crossed his arms grumpily. "Is that wrong?"

"Well, actually, yes," he muttered. He motioned to see Edward's journal back and he opened it to a random page. He pointed to Edward's writing and had him stare at it closely. Yes, Edward's handwriting wasn't the best but it was perfectly legible aside from the snide comments the Colonel liked to make about it. "I see that your writing style is a rather sharp cursive, which is all fine, but if you look here at your lines, they are rather wobbly. If your write with your left hand like this, it makes me believe that you would write smoother in your right."

"I can't," Edward mumbled as he grabbed the book back out of his hands and snapped it shut.

"Why not? It is just a simple switch-"

"I-I... break pens with my right hand," he admitted. The look on Tamaki's face looked like he heard blasphemy but believed it.

"V-very well…," he said with an accepting pause. "Onto step two!

…..

Edward suffered through five of the six steps Tamaki threw at him that afternoon and he felt like he wanted to drop over dead. He went through how to talk about sports, how to introduce yourself, how to host a party, and how to dress (which he could never afford). With all of Tamaki's oblivious insults and dramatics, Edward was so relieved when the bell rang for the end of school. He never knew there would be a day when he was glad to be teaching middle aged politicians about alchemy. However, now that his class was kicked back a couple hours he was going to have a really late night. He didn't think he would be up to doing homework when he got home. Edward sighed to himself as he picked up his duffle bag. He would at least have to try.

Edward got changed in the large dressing room that the hosts set up in the abandoned music room. He thought that since he was now forced to stay with them for two hours of the day he could atleast use their facilities and get changed into his uniform. He slipped his gloves on and was working on blousing the bottoms of his pants when the curtain suddenly opened.

"Hey!" Edward started to say but it was Mori. He was carrying what appeared to be his leather journal in his hands. Edward quickly looked down in his schoolbag to see that his was nowhere to be found. Forgetting about tying his boots, Edward jumped up and snatched it from the boy's hands. "Where did you get this? Why do you have it?!" he scolded the kid, who was older and quite taller than him.

"Mitsukuni took it," the boy said flatly. As Edward learned he wasn't the most talkative type but he still felt himself heat up.

"I don't care who took it! Why?! This isn't yours! There is no reason for any of you stuck up elitists to steal my stuff!" Edward yelled at him. He quickly opened his notebook and flipped through it. Though none of the pages seemed to be missing, he noticed that there was some cake icing and sprinkles from the pastries that they had for the guests stuck in the spine. It was a smeared mess. "I can't believe you would do this," Edward whined as he saw the discord his journal was reduced to. "And everyone is saying that I am the one who isn't a gentleman."

"Won't happen again-" the kid made out and Edward heard him as being sincere, making him believe that Mori really didn't have anything to do with it. However the boy faltered and cut himself off as something else seemed to catch his attention. Edward looked down to see that his left pant leg was still rolled up from where he was trying to blouse it into his boots. His automail was shining out bright as day. He pinched the bridge of his nose and huffed to himself absolutely frustrated with everything that was happening that day. He was having the worse of luck. He tossed his journal back into his duffle bag and finished tucking his pants back into his boots. Mori's eyes stayed locked on Edward's leg even after it was covered from sight. He guessed that the boy really wasn't expecting it, but who really was? Edward zipped his duffle up and slung it over his shoulder.

"Look," Edward sighed as he ran his hand through his bangs. "Thank-you for returning it to me, but please, I don't have time for any nonsense. I need to get to work." The tall kid just nodded his head in confirmation and Edward eyed him for a second before walking past him and out of the door. The rest of the host club were gathered around Haruhi, making light fun of her for one reason or another, but they froze when they caught sight of them. Edward scowled at them and walked freely out of the door. He didn't have time for their stupid games.

…..