Disclaimer: I do not own Ouran high school host club.

Chapter 36: In all seriousness

"Sit down," Kaoru unfolded the piece of paper he had crumpled in one hand. He placed it on the table and smoothed it out slowly. "And explain this."

Yuuichi eyed it cautiously from across the room, only able to see a slightly stained page of writing from where he stood. Some sort of curiosity kicked in then as he sighed and almost rolled his eyes sardonically. He slowly made his way over, as if to amplify the fact that he was 'kindly' wasting his precious time on this little venture.

The way he sat on the sofa was almost regal; his back straight as a rod, you could almost see the crown resting on his amazingly pristine (what with the abrupt sleepover on the couch,) black hair. But, if possible, his back became even straighter. "What is this?" he asked, his face a mix of confusion and irritation. No, irritation wasn't the right word. Rage. Pure, bubbling rage. The bubbling was being kept under a lid for now, but the pot was slowly, surely starting to shake, break apart.

"I…" Kaoru felt his voice waver a little. "I… found it. On the table. In front of you."

Without even batting an eyelid, Yuuichi stood and made no effort to retrieve the paper. "I don't know what you're trying to pull here, but whatever that is, it certainly isn't mine."

Suddenly, Kaoru felt like a small child being humiliated by an all-powerful adult. Was he just dreaming the words on the page? Wide eyed, he had to look down at the page in front of him. No… no, it was still the same as before. So then, was it just his sugar-fuelled sleep deprived brain making links that weren't there? But… but… "But…"

"It's not good for your skin if you wake up too early." Yuuichi flicked him a quick self-satisfied smirk before making his way to and up the stairs. "Good morning, brother dearest."

By this time, Kaoru's breaths were coming in short, panicked pants. He was usually abnormally good at standing up to pressure, but this… He slowly counted to ten, not wanting to start hyperventilating or having an otherwise unattractive panic attack. With his teeth chattering, his breath still shaking slightly and a sheen of sweat covering his forehead, he admittedly didn't look too great to begin with, but he put that out of mind as he picked up the paper. "Wait… wait." His voice was feeble with a sense of realisation. The paper he was holding probably didn't have anyone's fingerprints but his own and Yuuichi's. If worst came to worst, Yuuichi could say that he was forced into holding the paper.

The complexity of the thought sent Kaoru's mind spinning into madness. No matter what situation he imagined, it always turned out for the worst for him. There was always something in his way, no matter what the option, and, and, and… lasduglgfe.

For some reason, he imagined himself banging his head against a laptop keyboard like a frustrated squid of anger. Why his laptop keyboard specifically, he couldn't quite say. Maybe it was the sleep. Or lack of it. And… stuff. He could feel the fine line between genius and madness smudging. If there ever was such a line. Maybe he had just gone mad. It would be nice not to have to worry about anything. Maybe spend some time wrapped up in a protective suit, throwing himself at a padded wall… He knew it was stupid- he wasn't going mad- but it beat having to face Yuuichi. Because he'd have to now. He'd started digging directly down without packing a ladder.

It wasn't that they were purposefully avoiding the Ootoris.

It was just…

Haruhi sighed, decided there wasn't enough time for her to be sighing, picked up her pen and started scribbling again.

Her notes were scrawled over, besides and between every line of a printed document she had been given, telling the owner of said document what needed to be changed. She had a feeling that said recipient wouldn't want her to be adding this job to her workload but…

There was a knock on her office door. "Come in," knowing who it was, she didn't raise her head. "Speak of the devil…"

Tamaki barely looked up from his pages either, giving her a quick smile before reverting back into business mode. "Mr. Bushi wants to talk with you at a meeting tomorrow at three regarding the PITMAS case. I'm going to be in France from the 17th to the 23rd, Natsume's nanny is going on a day's holiday on the 25th- did you say you were going to be free then?"

During his speech, Haruhi had switched from scribbling on the papers to into her diary, making a couple of quick notes to herself. "Yep, should be free then. If not, I'll call one of the others." She looked up then, meeting Tamaki's eye. "…I didn't think it would be so much of a reflex to depend on them so much, even now…"

He let out a small, tired laugh as he looked up; a ghost of the ruckus he used to be capable of. "It's almost been 13 years since we met, I'm pretty sure we're allowed to depend on them, no matter what's happened. Maybe it'll be good, having a chat with them again."

"What, and just expect them to drop all of their work to come and have some tea?" Her smile grew as she tried to deepen her voice. "'Oh hey, I know you're busy but how's about dressing up like pompous bishies and serving expensive cakes to rich girls like the good ol' days?'"

Tamaki bowed slightly, and when he came up he had a cheeky smile plastered over his face- the one that made girls faint and sparkles and roses appear from nowhere. "It would be pleasure to serve you, my princess."

She batted her eyelids playfully, adopting the stereotypical female persona. "Oh my~" She giggled (a sound that she didn't even think she could produce ten odd years ago,) before suddenly switching persona again. "Or maybe my lady would prefer the natural type? I'm not much, but I hope I could be of some service to you…" her voice had become… not timid, but thoughtful; the kind of voice you would expect of some soft-spoken intellect.

This time it was Tamaki's turn to be the maiden, and, as Haruhi had had to admit on several occasions, without the overdone make-up and regency dress, he was pretty darn convincing. Every so often Tamaki would grow his hair out so that it was just long enough to tie up into a silky ponytail, which he did with any of the accessories he found in his wife's room, or occasionally even with a rubber band to get the full commoner feel (though that usually ended in tears.) This was one such month and, removing the more professional-looking black hairband, he swished his hair Hollywood/ Shampoo commercial style. "Because I'm worth it." He held the dramatic pose (including the mouth agape, misty eyes and middle-distance stare) for a little under two seconds before his face was split into two by a grin.

"I hate to be the one to break it to you but I think the mass media is having a serious effect on you."

"Nonsense!" Tamaki half-laughed, half-exclaimed, retying his sun-coloured hair in a casually coiffed manner. His fingers worked quickly and expertly, not missing a single strand in order to make the perfect ponytail; dead centre of his head and supremely smooth. "I just have luscious colour AND volume of my own accord!"

"Damned rich bastards…" Haruhi had never completely shaken off the expression, and, although she wasn't exactly poor now, her hand unconsciously moved to her own hair, which she expected was definitely ruffled up from her busy day. Never even missing a beat, Tamaki held out a hairbrush, making it appear as if by magic. She glared at him silently before sighing and taking it. Apparently, it didn't matter how much of a tomboy she had been, or even how much she talked about her opinions on gender and outwards appearance- in this world she'd entered, she would have to wear a skirt suit, high heels and have the best damned hair you'd ever seen.

As she brushed through her hair for what felt like a lifetime, she looked up at the man who'd now perched himself on the end of her desk. "Are you free on the 25th?"

Tamaki pulled a pained face, but quickly wiped it off. "I am now. I think my father wouldn't mind me just taking a single day off…"

"If it's going to cause you trouble, you don't have to do it, Tamaki. I can call another nanny by then."

"No. No, I want us to be happy again. All of us, Ouran's Host Club."

"You forgot the 'High School' part," she said jokingly. "I don't think we're still them."

"We'll always be them, no matter what." To her great chagrin, Tamaki reached out and ruffled her now almost completely straight hair. "See? As childish as always, you have nothing to worry about."

Haruhi huffed, swatting away his hand. "Fine. 25th. Now we just need the others to be as childish as you."

"Qu'ils mangent de la brioche!"

"Let them eat cake indeed…"

"There's going to be cake!?"

"Of course, what tea party would be a tea party without cake?"

There was a strangely masculine giggle on the other side of the line. It wasn't the childish, almost girlish one he had possessed in his pre-pubescent years, but Hunny was still Hunny, and no deep voice or monumentally rapid growth spurt could change that. It was unmistakably the voice of an almost thirty year old man who could seem like he would kill you one second, then play with bunnies the next. Some would say that this was basically describing a psychopath. And they'd probably be right if they met him on the wrong side of noon.

"Haru-chan," he asked, somehow managing to sound like a curious five year old, "can Ume-chan come too?"

Haruhi almost spluttered down the phone, having taken a sip of water at just the wrong time. "'Ume-chan'? You still call… him that?" The name, which would've been an adorable one for a kitten, just sounded plain strange to describe… "Sure, Nekozawa-san can come too… as long as we don't have to black out the whole house…"

"No problem! I told Ume-chan that if he was going to live with me, then no curtains would be closed until the sun set and then I slowly started to take away his cloaks from his wardrobe and threatened to throw out Beelzenef if he went to get more, and… and… and…"

His tone sounded like a child boasting about his day to his mum, but Haruhi could only imagine the pure fear of living with the man (for calling him a boy would seem amazingly absurd). Nekozawa certainly had guts; she had to give him that. It had been a while since she'd heard about their… relationship… but up 'til this point, she could only imagine a small, European looking boy trailing alongside what looked to all the world like Death incarnate. Now she imagined the two blonde bombshells (if that was even the right terminology to describe men,) striding down a street like they owned the damn place, which, to be brutally honest, they probably did. Hunny wasn't tall, but he wasn't short either and now he sported the same kind of hairstyle as Mori, though with a longer fringe. In his 'adult form' he certainly seemed a lot more scary a lot more of the time, though his heart was still almost identical to how it had been before.

"That sounds… uhm…" she couldn't think of the right word to mask her raw fear so she let the sentence trail off. "So then, the 25th- and let Kirimi-chan know too."

"The 25th?" Hikaru leant back in his chair, phone held handless between his shoulder and ear. "Uh… What day is it today? The… uhm…" He flicked through his diary, purely for the show of it. He never wrote anything down in it; it just made him look very impressive with all of its black leather goodness. "Uhh…" He leant back even further so that now he was sitting balanced on the chair's two back legs, abandoning the book on the floor and getting back to the coding he needed to have done a couple of hours ago. "Well… uh, let's be honest now, I have no idea what I'm doing on that day. I'm probably free though, so we'll definitely be th-"

Haruhi, shaking her head with a small smile, interrupted him. "Mori left about 20 minutes ago; he should be coming home about now. Just ask him, please? Tell him that Tamaki's thinking about making it a no-work day for all of our associates, god knows how much trouble that's going to cause."

"Oooookayyyy~" The sounds of him speedily touch typing suddenly ceased. "Ooh, oh, just hang on a sec, I think I heard the door." He took the phone from his mouth so that he could hear better. "MOOOooooooooooooooooori? Phoooooooone!"

The sound of a door closing, heavy but fast footsteps on stairs, another door opening. Haruhi couldn't help but smile when she heard a kiss on the cheek. Then a small, muffled conversation.

"Who?"

"Haruhi."

"Something wrong?" She could almost see the concerned expression he would be wearing right now.

"No, no, well… I don't think so… it sounded like pleasure not business." The phone was passed between them.

"Hey." The man had some magical power of making you feel special, even why only one word had been said.

"Hey, Mori, sorry to call you when you're at home…"

"Not at all, always a pleasure to speak with you. Something the matter?"

"Tamaki's had another 'genius' plan, as ever." She let out a small laugh/sigh hybrid. "He wants us to have a tea party… all of us, the host club."

"Whenever it is, we'll be free. Hmm?" His voice became slightly quieter as Hikaru asked him a question. "She said we're going to have a Host club event." His voice got louder again. "Hikaru would like to know why."

"I'm pretty certain you know exactly why," she said. "For them. Well, tell a lie, it started because we needed a babysitter for Natsume, but I can't fault Tamaki's idea."

"For Kyoya and Kaoru," Mori said, once again in the quiet voice. "I don't know."

There was a small silence then, until the phone switched holders again. "Will he come?" He seemed to think about it for a second. "Will Kao come?"

"I don't know, Hikaru. I really don't. The last time I spoke to them, well the last time I spoke to either of them was months ago, and even then they weren't… they weren't the same as before. Maybe something's changed since then, though," she said consolingly. "And even if it hasn't, this could be what does it. A tea party, like before."

Hikaru sighed acceptingly. The thought of not having talked to his brother for over two… maybe three months depressed him beyond belief. "Okay, well… let me know either way."