I am so proud of myself! Seven hours after i finished the last chapter, I sat for an hour and a half straight--with only a drink and some pixie sticks--and I cranked this out! -claps for self- And it's awsome! I concluded the date!!

Chapter Nine

We dawdled. It was the best single word that defined what the Hitachiin boy made me do—stand still, cross at cross-walks, browse store windows as if we had interest to buy, and stand in line as he bought yet another cold confection, this time in the form or two ice cream bars. I disliked it. I knew that I disliked it, and I silently brooded on this as I obligingly ate the sandwich. Something told me that Kaoru sensed my discomfort as well, for he was quite, too, glancing from side to side like the tourists we were supposedly playing the parts of—and in a way, we were tourists in the commoner world, and I'm sure it showed evidently on our faces.

A brown haired child made the mistake of pointing at us and proclaiming loudly to his mother or older sister, "Look! Homo-spatulas!!" Her age did not obscure her from what some would describe as a death glare, and in a matter of seconds, her face was buried in the older woman's skirt as the other one asked, "What? Where?" with an interest that was insane in anyone other than that Renge girl.

"It does look it," I heard a slightly familiar voice agree to something undisclosed, and I turned to face Kaoru with a sour look in my eyes, as if I had just eaten a lemon. "A date, I mean. It looks like we're cutting to class to go on a date…. I don't like it."

At least we were somewhat in the same mind—the stares were getting annoying, and after the child's outburst, they were becoming more and more numerous and daring, becoming louder and much less coveted and private. All I could do was sneer in agreement and turn sharply down an alleyway that was located part way down the street we were currently traveling, making Kaoru stop abruptly, tense, and then following me like a sick little puppy dog. Any other time, I would have gloated over the minimal power of direction I had over him, but at the moment, my emotions were far to wide spread and angered to recognize triumph.

"We're going to get lost," I heard the red head puff behind me as I quickened my pace in an attempt to get away from the crowd that had now crowded around the mouth of the alleyway and were murmuring about how "hansom, dashing and ravishing" we were together.

"Like we're not already," I tossed back over my shoulder. There was another huff, perhaps of an indignant, before silence except for the sound of our feet moving along the pavement and our breathing. Much better, in my opinion.

Then, from somewhere to my left, I heard a quiet, "I knew where I was going, and you would have, too, once we got there…"

"Oh?" I asked, drawling and filled with condescending interest. "And where was that?"

"The hospital…" The answer was so quiet that I had to actually stop and turn to glare directly at Kaoru, then demand he repeat himself so that I could hear what he had said. I sucked restraining, on my bottom lip and bit the soft flesh of my cheek with impatience and superiority.

"My hospital, Hitachiin?"

"Yes."

"As in—my family hospital? Where my father works?" Could he really be that stupid, or was this possibly a side effect of whatever medication they had him on? I couldn't tell, but my state of vindictive mind made me to believe the former and the latter with equal indifference. "Do you know what would happen if my father or one of my brothers saw me there? During school hours?"

I waited for a reply, tapping my foot with contempt upon the pavement. Kaoru shrugged, eyeing the ground and sliding a foot across the pavement, like a metro-gnome in time with my foot tapping. He seemed either unwilling or unable to answer me and I deemed it fit to scoff. The gruff sound was almost entirely out of my mouth when he finally said something, a fragmented sentence—in reality only one word.

"Help."

"Excuse me?"

"I…I wanted…" help?

Any better a man would have touched him in some form when the first tear rolled into sight and down his jawbone, collecting under his chin and then seeping into the clothing line of his shirt. Any honorable man would have offered to help, or at least offered a handkerchief and a pat on the hand. Any woman would have held his hand, or kissed him, and any person like Tamaki would have cried with him. I realized that some time later, I think, but was too caught up in my own selfish notions to actually care what was going on in his brain or compare it to mine.

"You wanted what?" I spat the last word as if it were some sort of cure word, cutting the pained silence that had slowly been enveloping Kaoru, making him look up with remarkably dry—if not somewhat red—eyes.

"I…I wanted you to help me," he confessed, one more tear gathering around the corner of his shockingly amber eyes before being lost in the rapid blinking. Judging from my state of shock and his following amendment, I am entirely sure that I treated him with a stare of indifference. "I…I remember, you, alright? I remember when he was me and I was him and there wasn't any difference between the two of us and then there was you—that Notebook Boy, and I remembered that your father owned the hospital where…" here it got a little hard to hear, and I do believe that Kaoru compensated for words he did not want to say with dry heaves and pitiful sniffling sounds. "I wanted…I wanted to see if you could help me keep him…on."

On? Like a light switch? Ah, yes, the older of the twin's life hung in the balance, or had done son until a little under a day ago, and here was the younger, begging me for help with saving his already long gone brother's life. It was the first moment that I couldn't remember completely hating him since that day with the therapist and mental break through or mental breakdown.

I treated Kaoru with nothing more than a impassive gaze that bore no secrets, nor any signs of the raging battle behind my eyebrows. How…this entire thing did not fit into anything I had thought nor recalculated. It was…off book…. And I kept walking, turned from him and continued down the somewhat smelly commoner's alleyway, thinking.

Admittedly, I was waiting for him to follow me. I paused slightly before continuing at a slower pace when I did not immediately hear the red head following me down the walkway, only resuming my normal pace when he was within a foot of my presence.

That pain…It had been so raw and unprecedented for a boy who hadn't talked to the object of his unreturned feelings since he had been six and crying over his brother's lifeless body in the hospital hallway. I did not understand it nor did I think I would ever feel anything that could compare to that—not even for my brothers. Perhaps my sister, but never for a brother. Perhaps it had been because I wasn't a twin, nor ever grown within a close knit bond like, as I would guess, those two had before.

I wanted to say something snappish to lower his self esteem—at least part of me did, and the other part of me wanted to go home, draw a nice bath, then hold my breath underwater until I felt that burning sensation in my lungs and heart before resurfacing. Instead, my mouth opened of its own accord and two words left my throat, laced with more feeling and meaning that any I had ever said to any one human being had been, except for Tamaki that day he had forced his presence at my house and forced me to confront my true inner demons.

"I'm sorry."

There was nothing. Kaoru did not respond, and we reached the other end of the alleyway, from the mouth of which we could see the extensive hill that separated poor from middle class to high class by a visible line of creativity and design that was all to evident from this look out. I could see Ouran, the initial path we had run to get to the commoner park that was now behind us, the little shop corner, and several street crossings. Something that I would later excuse as heart burn or pride at my physical endurance, fluttered inside my chest, and I couldn't help but flash what could pass as a smile in no one's direction.

We continued to walk in a silence so absolute that I figured that it was possible that Kaoru hadn't heard a single think I had said, and I was relieved for a while, letting loose the clamp-like grip that my teeth held on the inside of my cheek. However, that reassurance was shattered when something brushed my knuckles and finger tips momentarily traced the back of my hand, as if wishing to hold it tightly, for comfort and reassurance. My limb twitched, successfully jerking the fingers from my skin and getting ready to object and question what he was playing at when I finally got my response.

"Thank you. I'm sorry, too." As for what, I could not tell you. In confusing, I looked to Kaoru and saw what could either be a grimace of internal pain or a…smile?

However, before I could confirm that, he turned away and I noticed that my chest was hurting. It was just then that I realized I had been holding my breath, and took the second to breathe before continuing the walk.

Feelings! There're so many feelings in this chapter, if I do say so myself! -swells with pride- MY BABY!! Anyway, I'm sure you've tended to notice that I like to make them have important things to circle aroundas they realize their feelings. Kyouya's mom's birthday, the founding of the club, and so there is another birthday in the future! November 22 is all I'll say ;D