Hikaru stared at Kaoru in horror as his twin left the room, jeans swishing as he walked casually outside, one pale ear against the phone… as if he hadn't just driven a stake into his twin's heart. He heard a strange strangled noise as his face fell into his hands, and he realized with sick fascination that it came from his throat. He watched, with a detached confusion, as he slowly fell apart piece by piece in front of his own eyes, his body not even moving a muscle. So this was what it was like to lose the one thing that mattered to you more than anything in the world and have it be your fault. This was what it was like to push the most loving, patient person over the edge with your idiotic pursuit of something that could not, should not be yours.

Kaoru… Kaoru, I'm sorry… he thought desperately. But it was too late. Kaoru was tired of waiting for him… standing around and waiting for him to realize his stupidity and come back to him. Kaoru was tired of it, and that'd been the last straw. There was no way he would ever accept his apology.

It wasn't stupidity! part of him cried, and it disgusted him. Haruhi-

Is not as important as Kaoru. he said with finality, but the other part of him, the one that typically won such arguments, continued on with its selfish arguments, and he realized that he should never have let it win so many times and let it become spoiled. Let himself become so spoiled.

Not in the same way. Kaoru's your twin, and you two are closer than anyone else in the world could be. But Haruhi would be close to you in a totally different way-

Kaoru and I were always close in that way! We were close in every way imaginable… and I ruined it.

But that wasn't supposed to be. That's not right. It's against every rule out there. You and Haruhi would be right. It-

Who cares about right and wrong? We never did. It was always about breaking the rules, having fun-

You can't have fun all your life. The voice was beginning to sound desperate now, and Hikaru's chest filled with hope that maybe this time the right side would win. The part of him that listened to Kaoru, his voice of reason all his life. Exactly, he's so boring. He's always trying to get you to do the right thing-

And I'm going to do the right thing. From this moment onward, I'm going to do the right thing, Kaoru. For you. And Hikaru smiled inwardly as the voice remained silent, obviously not having a response. And maybe then I'll be worthy of your acceptance, Kaoru. Maybe then… maybe then you can forgive me.

Haruhi stared in confusion at Hikaru for a few more moments before silently getting up and walking outside to where Kaoru was. Typically she wasn't one to meddle, but this was out of hand. Kaoru was just putting his phone into his pocket, bracing himself against the wall and staring out the window moodily. If she didn't know any better she would have thought he was Hikaru, what with a face like that.

"Are you okay?" she asked hesitantly, stopping five or six feet from him. The pale red-head looked up at her and forced a host club smile.

"Of course." His outline was traced in a glowing gold, the sun setting behind him and staining the sky red. It was a gorgeous sight that would have made the girls cry, but for the tears that even Haruhi could see he hadn't successfully wiped away.

"It doesn't look like it," she pointed out in her typical blunt way. "What's wrong with you? Why'd you do that?"

"Do what?" he said nonchalantly, getting that typical Hitachinn look of disinterest and obliviously rude candor. Haruhi looked at him pointedly.

"Do you want to hurt him? Because if so then you succeeded," she said tartly, and Kaoru snorted.

"Who? I didn't see me hurting anyone in there. I offered to help tono. How is that hurting anyone?" He pursed his lips and let that fake frown spread across his face. "I thought I was being helpful."

Haruhi felt the anger bubbling up inside of her, a feeling she hardly ever felt, let alone expressed. But it was something that came whenever someone hurt these new things she'd never really had to this extent or needed, these things called friends. Of course she'd had friends before, but this was at a different level than before. Even when she spoke with someone it wasn't the same way she treated them. She had always distanced herself from other people the try and achieve her goals, never really thinking too much about anything else except that one objective. But now that she had friends, now that she cared for them, it angered her to see them in such a state of misery as Hikaru had collapsed into as soon as Kaoru had left the room.

"You didn't volunteer because you wanted to be helpful. You volunteered for yourself and no one else. You're being selfish," she replied, her voice still dry and blunt. But she could feel something bubbling up inside of her like molten rock, burning away at her, setting every nerve ending aflame with little puffs of smoke somewhere deep inside of her. And as she scolded herself for getting angry of all things, part of her was exhilarated by this new thing, this fury. It was something she hardly ever felt, but it was coming more often now. Maybe it was due to the stress of their current situation, but suddenly it was a part of her life. She cherished the feeling, savoring the taste in her mouth as she waited for Kaoru's response.

"Well I suppose I want tono to get better. Does that really make me selfish?" he asked, looking confused and a little hurt. And that was all it took. Haruhi's fists clenched and her body straightened into a rigid line as she stood on her toes to glare up at her friend.

"You hurting Hikaru is selfish! Whatever is going on between you isn't worth hurting him like this! The two of you are so close, don't you understand how much you're hurting him? Do you expect me to sit by and not be angry with you while you hurt my friend?" she burst out, a pang of pain remembering who she had first yelled at in Ouran washed away as she watched Kaoru's expression. He flinched at the mention of his twin but then his face became angry.

"Look who's talking about selfish," he replied, bitter sarcasm dripping from every single word that slipped from between his lips. And they were slipping, like ice cubes cold and hard, and he couldn't catch them as they fell or hold them between his lips. "You sit there and give us all false hope. Who's the one who's really selfish?"

Haruhi's anger faded as her body turned numb, his next statement unheard in her moment of shock. But he was still talking.

"…and you know why he's sick. You're the selfish one." His voice hadn't raised in volume at all, but every single one was crystal clear and stung like dry ice. Of course, she'd thought it was her fault too, but she didn't think everyone else did as well. She didn't think that everyone else… well, that was foolish of her. Of course they knew. They weren't all in the A classes for nothing, after all. They weren't all in Ouran for nothing. They were smart enough to know exactly what was going on. It was her that had taken too long to figure it out, too long to process it, too long to try and work up a little courage. She still didn't have the courage, and somehow she knew deep down a part of her was happy he was unconscious, because she wouldn't have to speak to him until he woke up.

When he did, on the other hand…

They stood in silence for a few moments, and finally Kaoru turned and looked back out the window.

"It doesn't matter anyway," he said finally, his voice back to the disinterested blunt one. Haruhi looked at him, confusedly, but he was already walking away.

"Where are you going?" she asked. He shrugged listlessly.

"Anywhere but here," he replied whimsically, but his voice broke at the last moment, and as he turned the corner a single glistening drop fell to the floor, sparkling like a diamond in the ruby-red sun.

A/N: :'( Sadness… well, pleeease tell me what u think will happen/how u like it. sniff