Quick Note: I rewrote this chapter about 4 times, totally changing the story line every time... I hope you all enjoy the one I ended up with!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
It felt so good to get rid of the grimy sandy feeling from the beach… enjoying the gentle warmth of the water, I rinsed the intrusive sand from my hair where it clung. I could feel the twins both leaning against me and then quickly moving away… curious as to what they could possibly be up to, I leaned out of the water opening my eyes.
I caught sight of the little image they were both grinning down at and felt my eye begin to twitch slightly. The three of us were pressed against each other seductively… all of our eyes closed with my hands running through my hair, a satisfied smile playing across my lips… with their arms around me, their hands not visible in the photo…their heads against mine, mouths slightly parted with looks of distracted pleasure tainting their features.
"You guys can't be serious…delete it." As I moved from the water trying to forcibly take the phone away from Hikaru. He continued to tease me, holding it just out of my grasp, while snidely commenting, "But Haruhi, you promised pictures to replace the one you deleted"
My agitation was growing, and to remind them how badly they had already annoyed me this trip, I growled "As your Master, I demand you delete it"
When I had almost climbed up Hikaru enough to touch the tip of my finger to the phone, Kaoru came up behind me, his arms tightly set across my waist, dragging me back under the shower, and reminded me of the ill-chosen promise to them of dressing up with a photo shoot. After all the clothes I had to try on the last few days! "No way! This entire week was one long dress up day with your mom!"
I felt Kaoru lean tighter against me, resting his chest against my back and lips against my ear, "Doesn't count… that was for our mom, not us…" With the water running over our heads I almost couldn't distinguish between the warmth from his lips and the warmth from the shower… None the less it was still rather distracting…
That is until Hikaru wrapped around the front of me, hands on my hips as he leaned into to touch the tip of my nose with his… I couldn't even keep my focus on his eyes as he moved in, my gaze looking down to see his lips approaching me. Even with the water running over my mouth, I could feel the breath from his lips as he hissed, "Besides, we didn't get any pictures then either, now did we?"
They had me there… and if that one picture would save me a wasted day of playing dress up and them making me stand there for tons of stupid picture… it might just be worth it. Then again, taken out of context, this picture looked way worse than the one of me and Kyoya… but at least I knew this one was staged…
"So, if I let you keep that one… I don't have to do a dress up day and photo shoot?" If so, then it really would be worth it to me, I concluded. In response, they both tightened their grip on me, with Hikaru moving in even closer… his nose brushing against my cheek, with his lips far too close for comfort…
"Just this one… and any other ones we happen to take this weekend… but you don't have to pose… if you don't want to…" I could feel my body reacting to their proximity, wanting to run, but at the same time urging me to stay and melt into their embrace… but that's what they want… they want me to give in to their game…
Not. Happening…pushing Hikaru back a little harder than I meant to, I cleared my throat, taking a regal stance and pointing towards the door, "I'm done in here. Slave, go fetch me a towel!" Hikaru, losing his footing with my shove fell backwards onto the tile… causing Kaoru to loosen his grip around my waist. "And you!" I spun around intending to also command Kaoru, only to catch sight of Kyoya standing there watching us, a look of dark amusement spreading over his face… but still showing anger burning in his eyes…
"Kyoya!" I dropped my pose and walked over to him, my lips unconsciously turning upwards at the corners. But I came to a halt a couple of feet away from him when I realized that his mood only seemed to darken. Suddenly losing the will to speak, I stared up at him, waiting for him to break the awkward silence… he did not disappoint…
"I hope I'm not interrupting." He quipped with a degree of harshness coloring his sarcastic tone. I am such an idiot… that's why he's upset… Of course he'd be mad if he saw the twins teasing me like that… but how is that my fault! Didn't he also see me push them off? Deciding to just try to ignore his less than desirable disposition, I shrugged, "Not really… Just my SLAVES going to fetch me a towel…" For the last bit of the comment I had turned to chide the twins who were still frozen in the same places looking a little nervous.
I turned back towards Kyoya only to have a large white beach towel tossed at my face. I looked up to him with anger threatening to boil within me. I know he's annoyed, but how dare he! Without realizing how bad that pissed me off, or maybe just without caring, he continued to return my gaze and then calmly stated, "Maybe you should go get dressed… I need to have a little chat with your little friends."
First a towel to the face, and now he's bossing me around! I continued to return his glare for a few seconds longer before I threw the towel to the ground at his feet and stomped past him, huffing on my way out. I continued up to my room without as much as a glance at the other hosts. As I practically slammed the bedroom door behind me, and collapsed on the bed, still dripping wet.
Fine! He wants to blame me for something that's not my fault? Well it would be the first time! My fault Tamaki backed me into the vase! My fault Shiro dropped the tea set! My fault the twins torment me! "Arrrggghhhh!" I groaned in my frustration…
Seriously, for someone who could be so smart, he really could be such a stupid jerk! Closing my eyes for a minute, I tried to calm myself, focusing on slowing my breathing. When I had finally let go of enough of my anger, I opened my eyes as I sat up and moved to the edge of the bed. My eyes wandered over to the three bags sitting neatly by the closet.
Huh… three? Even if it was the fashion-obsessed twins, they couldn't possibly have thought I'd need three bags of clothing for a single weekend! Slightly intrigued now, I made my way over and plodded down on the floor next to them to sift through their contents.
As I opened the first bag, my brows knit as the confusion manifested… these clothes were a little too big for me, which is odd considering the twins tend to know my size better than I do. I kept digging until I felt something silky and deliciously soft… thinking it might be a night gown, I pulled it out only to feel my cheeks begin to burn… boxers?
In fact, all of the clothing in this bag had looked rather masculine… wait, these clothes weren't for me… I looked back down at the three bags, two of which, I realize were identical except for color, orange and blue, and the third white with my initials embroidered in gold on the side. It was beautiful, but my eyes found their way back to the other of the two matching bags that I had yet to explore… needing to verify my theory.
I quickly unzipped it and began sifting through rather similar clothing until I came across a pair of black boxer briefs…I stared at them for a second, and then back at the red silken boxers… I wonder what the difference is… Realizing that I shouldn't be looking at these AND I was getting distracted from the point, I quickly dropped them back into the bag.
Why were the twin's bags in my room! And then it hit me… seven hosts, three rooms… How could I have missed that!
It had only been about five minutes since Kyo-chan went to search for Haru-chan, having realized that she and the twins were missing, when a rather irate and sopping wet Haru-chan came stomping out of the downstairs shower room and immediately turned to continue her march up the stairs without so much as a glance in our direction... promptly followed by the slam of a door somewhere above us.
Geez, if I thought Kyo-chan could be scary… she totally had him beat! I looked around to gauge Tama-chan and Takashi's responses. Takashi stood behind one of the bar stools gripping the shoulders of the high chair tightly, clearly restraining himself from following her. Tama-chan on the other hand was shaking his head sadly with a mirthless smile, appearing to already know what conspired. It was hardly more than a whisper, but I could still hear him mutter, "What a fool…"
"Who?" He couldn't have been talking about Haru-chan… he'd never say that about her. His lavender blue eyes moved over to me, clearly surprised I had caught the comment dropped under his breath. Before I could get a response, almost as if on cue, a rather cranky looking Shadow King stalked past us, proceeding out to sit by the fire on the patio. Oh… that fool…
I looked back to Tama-chan to see him watching his friend intently, concern clearly written across his face... Takashi was still gazing longingly at the stairs… and now two rather pale and serious looking red heads were coming to join us in the kitchen, wrapped in large white beach towels. Everyone just sat in awkward silence, no one taking the initiative to try and fix what was broken. Well, gee… this is fun…
Refusing to let the rest of the weekend continue in the same fashion, I leaned in towards the other two onlookers at the table, getting them to come into the huddle with me… "Tama-chan… go sort out Kyo-chan, he's way too grumpy! Takashi… go cheer up Haru-chan and bring her back! And I… I will get the twins to help me get ready for s'mores!"
With determined nods, the three of us each broke off in our separate directions…
Leave it to Mitsukuni to know exactly what everyone is feeling… I hated seeing Haruhi so upset and couldn't stand not trying to do something about it… but was it really my place to go follow her?
He solved that dilemma for me, and immediately I rushed off to complete my assignment. A little too distracted by worrying about her, I tripped my way up the stairs… hoping the whole way to be able to think of something that might cheer her up.
Even now, standing outside the third bedroom door, I hesitated before knocking… Maybe it should be Mitsukuni up here and not me… he always knows what to do to lighten the mood and make people happy. Still the longer I delay, the longer she's in there alone and brooding…
Steeling my resolve, I lightly wrapped on the door and waited for her response… After it didn't come, I began to worry slightly and knocked again, "Haruhi?"
Almost immediately after saying her name, the door opened with her standing there still wet in her bikini and blushing sheepishly, "Sorry sem- Takashi, I thought it might have been someone else…" She shivered slightly as she moved back into the room to let me follow. Closing the door behind me, I unconsciously moved over to her and began rubbing my hands up and down her arms trying to warm her.
"You should get dressed… you're freezing" She shifted her gaze from me over to the pile of clothing on the floor by a white bag. It was obvious from the style of the bag and several of the dresses already pulled out from it, that the bag must have been packed for her. She started walking over to it and knelt down before looking back up to me with a smile, "Help me find something to wear?"
I felt my heart flutter slightly at that innocent smile as I nodded and move over to take a seat next to her on the floor. As I sifted through the clothing with her, I could feel the heat rising to my face, based on several of the panty styles I had unwittingly come across, it was evident that the twins, and not her father had packed for her this time.
I heard her giggle beside and quickly looked to what she was holding. It was the most awful orange and yellow monstrosity of a dress I think I've ever seen, "I could wear this just to see what everyone says…" I couldn't help as my smile widened picturing her in that terrible thing…
"Yes, very stylish." At my statement she looked over at me and we both erupted into a fit of laughter. I was so happy to see her smiling again. We went back to digging through the bag when a piece of dark olive green caught my eye. Pulling it out, I saw that it was actually a little camouflage patterned dress… it looked like it would be perfect on her.
Turning and showing her my find, I commented, "Go back dressed for battle?" to which she began giggling again, "Takashi… that's ideal!" She managed to gasp out through the laughter wracking her small frame. I handed the dress to her, then stood up smiling, "I'll even dress to match… be right back"
She was still on the floor giggling away as I left to go get changed. From my position on the balcony, I could see a rather animated discussion out by the fire pit and hear the chaos below me in the kitchen… I just smiled as I strode purposefully to my room, happy to have gotten the best of the three possible options...
