Something felt warm. Not just on the outside, but on the inside. After that wicked nightmare I had last night, I thought it would've woken me up, but it didn't. I fell right back to sleep. There was something in that voice. That wasn't Daddy's voice, yet it did the same thing. It was a cup of chamomile tea and half an Ambien on a rainy night. Although, when I opened my eyes, I noticed a hand in front of me. That wasn't thee when I fell asleep. What the hell…?

I followed the hand up the arm it was attached to, confused to all hell, "Ritsu…"

"Hey," Ritsu grumbled, slowly but surely waking up, "Good morning, Rei."

"Good morning," I blinked a couple times, "Can I ask you a question?"

"Be my guest."

"I thought you said you were taking the floor," I pointed out, "The fuck are you doing up here?"

"Do you not remember?" Ritsu gave me a look, "You were freaking out in your sleep last night, Rei. You started crying and everything. You kept saying why over and over. I couldn't leave you like that. Shit was bad for a while, but once you settled down, you wouldn't let me go. For a minute, I lost feeling in my hand from you squeezing so hard."

"Was I really that bad?" I could remember my dream vividly. If I was ok, I'd be worried.

"Oh, yeah," he nodded, holding me a little closer, "You alright, though? You wouldn't want to talk about it, would you?"

"Not particularly," I shot him down. But then, I rolled into his chest, nuzzling my face into his t-shirt, "But thank you, Ritsu."

"You're welcome," Ritsu pulled the blanket over us, "If you ever wanted to…Because I've seen some fucked up shit, too…If you need a little sympathy without the pity, you could…I don't now…Talk to me, I guess."

"Thanks." He's trying…He's trying so hard. If the hushed whispers I've heard about Ritsu were true, he's not exactly the sweet and cuddly type. Yet, I'm currently his little spoon.

"You know," he cuddled me, "Since we're here for the chance to explore Osaka, you wouldn't want to do that with me, would you?"

"I don't know about you," I teased, "But where I'm from, that's called asking a girl on a school sponsored date."

"Well?" Ritsu pushed back, 'do you want to or not?"

"I don't know," I laid my head on his chest, listening to his heart beat fast, but steady, "Osaka's cool, but this isn't too bad either…"

"We can't stay here forever."

"Who says?"

Knock, knock.

"Whoever's at the door," he shrugged.

"Boo," I got out of bed, digging a little something, something from my pocket. In case whoever has ruined our moment needs a bit of discipline.

"Jesus Christ, Rei," Ritsu jumped, "Did you really bring your fucking knife with?"

"Did you bring any kind of protection?"

"No, but…!"

"So, yes," I headed for the door, "I did. And if whoever's at our door tries to kill us, you'll thank me."

"You're fucking nuts," Ritsu rolled back over, making himself comfortable.

"Who is it?" I deepened my voice, holding my knife behind my back.

"Good morning, Kasanoda!" Tamaki's voice sang on the other side, "Could I speak to Rei, please?"

I threw the door open, "It is Rei, Tamaki."

"Not a half bad impression of me, though," Ritsu applauded, "Very nice, Rei."

"Thank you!"

"Good morning, Rei," Tamaki sat back in bewildered amazement, "That was really you?"

"Yeah," I stumbled a few steps, making my way to the kitchen table, "I know. Before the coffee gets all the shit out of my throat, I sound like a dude for a bit."

"A young lady like yourself shouldn't be calling herself dude!" he scolded me.

"Why not?" Ritsu called from the bed, "She should be able to call herself whatever she damn well pleases."

"And she does," I nodded, "Thanks, Ritsu!"

"I got you…"

"So," I wondered, leaning over the table. This wasn't my first negotiation, "What do you want, Tamaki? There's no way you just popped over to say good morning. You wanted to check on me?"

"That, too," Tamaki took a quick look around our room, locking on to the lump in the bed, "Rei…Where did you sleep last night?"

"In here," I told him, "Why?"

"Where, specifically?"

"I got the bed," I rolled my eyes, "Ritsu took the floor."

"Then, why is he in the bed?"

"Because," I defended him, "This is his room as much as it is mine. Nothing happened last night, Tamaki. You don't need to worry. My hymen's still intact."

"What's a hymen?" Tamaki gave me a look.

"Oh, sweetheart…" I awed, resting my face on his cheek, "So much to learn about the world."

Besides, he didn't need to know what really went down in here last night. Something tells me Tamaki wouldn't look too favorably on Ritsu scoring me sake and the two of us getting a tad drunk last night. Even worse, I'm sure he'd overreact to my nightmare, too. See, that's where Ritsu was smart. He didn't force it, but he let me know he was there. He meets me halfway. Tamaki could stand to learn some of that restraint.

"But you're right," Tamaki confirmed, "I'm not here for a social call. I told you we'd need you for host club purposes and I wanted to make sure you were awake. Hurry up and get dressed."

"Settle down, Tamaki," I hushed him, "I had a late night last night. Goddamn…Are you medicated?"

"You're not the first person to ask me that."

"I'm shocked," I rolled my eyes, pushing myself up from the chair, "Give me twenty minutes and I'll be ready to go."

"Fantastic!" he approved.

"Do I have to be in my uniform?" I asked, digging for some clothes in my bag.

"You'll be changing as soon as we get to where we're set up," Tamaki filled me in, "So whatever you'd like for now."

"Alright," I grabbed a tank top and a pair of longer shorts. Unfortunately, I'm going to have to hide some of my best feature, but I'll live, "I'll meet you downstairs. I'm sure I'm not the only one you've woken up already, am I?"

"Nope!" he beamed, "I've only woken up Haruhi. You were the next room down the line."

"You're shitting me…"

"Not at all," Tamaki shook his head, "On the other side of your room to the left is Haruhi and me, to the right is Kyoya, in front to the left is Honey-senpai and Mori-senpai and directly across the hall is Hikaru and Kaoru."

"Was that done on purpose?"

"Maybe…" he had a smug little grin on his face. I could've sworn we were just supposed to pull keycards at random. I hate it.

"Whatever," I grumbled under my breath, "Hey, Ritsu?"

"Yeah, Rei?" Ritsu mumbled from the bed.

"Pray for me."

"Will do," he stuck his thumb up in the air.

I jumped in and out of the shower and headed downstairs. What awaited me, I didn't know. It's not like Tamaki liked to keep me well informed. Although, I think I heard a door being slammed from my neighbor to the right. Promptly followed by someone thumping onto the floor. Sounds like Kyoya's not exactly a morning person. Either that or Tamaki tried something weird and wasn't getting the no means no memo. When I walked downstairs, I found Honey and Mori standing at the bottom. By the looks of it, I'm not the only one whose fallen victim to Tamaki's wakeup call.

"Honey…?" I worried, "You ok?"

"Good morning, Rei-chan…" Honey rubbed his eyes, "I'm sorry…I'm still a little tired."

"I'm sure you are," I got down on the floor next to him, "Do you know what's going on yet?"

"All I know was that it was Kyo-chan's idea," he curled into my lap, "But I think he underestimated how early we'd all have to be up in order to set everything up."

"I bet," I wrapped my arms around him, "And you didn't come out with us last night…"

"You guys went out last night?" Honey perked up, "Without us?"

"You were tired, Honey," I pointed out, "You were already asleep when we got here. So, yeah. We went out without you. It wasn't anything overly exciting. We went to a hot spring and got yakisoba and cracked a bottle of…No. That was just Ritsu and me. I don't know what the others did after we left the hot spring."

"A bottle of what?" Mori wondered. It always scares the shit out of me a little bit when I hear him talk. Even when we're in kendo, he hardly makes a peep.

"Just sake," I assured, "It's not like we were getting completely trashed. I had never had sake before and Ritsu's got a fake ID. It's good, too."

"There you guys are!" the twins came skipping down the stairs.

"Come on!" Hikaru grabbed one hand.

"We're going to be late!" And Kaoru grabbed the other. They dragged me off to a spot in the lobby that had been sectioned off already.

"Good morning, Rei," Kyoya stood at the rope, handing me a box, "Go put this on."

"Ok…?" I gave him a look, "What is it?"

"A uniform," he explained, "We're running a pop-up butler café in the lobby and you do need to look the part."

"What?" I whined, "Really? Come on. It's a Saturday. Why can't we just get a day off?"

"Because," Kyoya brought me a little closer, an angry fire burning in his eyes, "Time is money and if you're wasting both, that's when bad things happen."

"Alright," I backed off. Looks like Honey's not the only one that didn't get enough sleep. That confirms my suspicions of Kyoya kicking the shit out of Tamaki this morning. I didn't have the energy to fight Kyoya on anything, so I turned into the bathroom around the corner and threw on the butler uniform he gave me. Honestly…Not too bad. The tie was a little bit of a pain in the ass, but I managed. I was already hot and sweaty and this wasn't helping. You can do this, Rei. How long could this be? I pulled myself together and walked out. To no surprise, I ended up getting swarmed.

"Rei!" Tamaki threw his arms around me, "You look so cute!"

"Tamaki…" I demanded, "Get. The fuck. Off of me."

"That's not how you're supposed to talk," he scolded me. If he comes out of this day without anything bruised, I'll be amazed.

"Just out of curiosity," I noticed everyone standing together, "Do any of you have any real experience working at a restaurant?"

"Nope."

"No."

"Nuh-uh."

"Not us."

"Mm…"

"No."

"Awesome…" I've only worked in a restaurant once. One of my cousins owned a pizzeria in Brooklyn and Daddy wanted me to have something to do for a summer. I made bank in tips that summer, too. Mostly because a lot of people thought I was an unwed teenage mother trying to raise her baby on her own. They make assumptions. That's not my problem. Whatever put the money in the tip jar at the end of the day.

I got a bunch of unexperienced people about to work a café. It shouldn't be much different from the host club. Although, I have a feeling that once a lot of them realize it's work, they won't want to do it anymore. Pop-up closes. I go back to the room and get this uniform off. Ritsu and I go wander aimlessly around Osaka. That sounds like a fucking plan I can get behind.

As soon as the open sign got flipped, our twelve-table pop-up café was open for business with two tables for each of us. People flocked to us and started forming a line at the rope. That's what we had Mori for. He made sure people weren't trying to push and shove their way to the front in hopes of spending some quality time with the illustrious Ouran Host Club. And this was Kyoya's idea? Why am I surprised and not surprised at the same time?

"Rei…" Speak of the devil, Kyoya came up behind me, snapping me out of the slight daze I was in, "You have guests at your tables. And they ordered salt."

"Ok," I knew exactly what they were looking for. When someone ordered salt, they wanted a tsundere asshole to take care of them. Fortunately, I was sleep and caffeine deprived enough to give them what they wanted. I walked over to my first table and pulled my order pad out of my apron pocket, "What do you two want?"

"Can we have some tea cakes, please?" one of them ordered, so sweet and mousy.

"And some green tea mochi?" the other requested.

"Fine," I groaned, rolling my eyes, "I guess I can get you some...Hold on. I'll be right back."

I heard them squealing behind me about how cute I was and how they thought they could make me fall in love again. These two girls who knew nothing about me managed to create an entire backstory for me with just a few words out of my mouth. Oh, it's going to be a long fucking morning, isn't it? I could tell. Because those two were just the beginning. Let's just say, it didn't take me much to put on the tsundere act for them. I could hardly stand any of them. Some of them that showed up didn't even go to Ouran, so we were making side money, too. Although, our tips were also based on performance, so I'd be lying if I said some of them didn't make it into my apron pocket. Bitch don't work for free.

Halfway through, I got waved down for what I'm assuming was yet another group of giggly airheads paying me to talk down at them and treat them like shit, only to give them a little bit of a peek into the heart of gold. I just wanted this to be over. When I looked at the clock, it only made things worse. Although, the next person in my section had ordered sugar, so I couldn't be that tsundere asshole that everyone made me before. I collected myself and turned on the innocent charm, stealing Honey's brand.

"Hi…" I spoke softly to my customer behind the menu, "I'm sorry. It's my first day and I'll try my best. But please don't be mad at me if I mess up…"

"Cut the host club bullshit, Reila. I know better," I couldn't hold back a smile if I wanted to, "Besides, I could make food in the room better than this garbage."

"Ritsu…" I took his menu out of his hands, "Hi."

"Hi there," Ritsu smiled a bit, warming my heart. Something I sorely needed, "I figured you could use the moral support."

"You only get the table for ten minutes," I winced.

"How much would it cost me to get it for the rest of the open time?" he pulled his wallet out of his pocket.

"I think that's a Kyoya question," I assumed, "But due to zoning, I don't think you can do that anyway."

"Dammit," Ritsu put his wallet back in his pocket, "How much longer until this place shuts down?"

"Not for another hour," I grumbled, "Yay for me."

"My sympathies," he cringed, "Look, what do you got planned for after this nightmare?"

"I think I'm free from my host club chains," I hoped.

"Nope," Kyoya happened to walk by, "You're our property."

"Goddammit…" I pouted, "Seriously, Kyoya?"

"That was a joke, Rei," he let me go.

"Thank God," I unclenched, "Plans for after, though? Going back to the room, getting this off, doing some contour, and then…After that, I got nothing. Why do you ask?"

"I was thinking," Ritsu suggested, holding onto my hand, "That you and I could go up and see the shrines. Then, maybe we get lunch and find some trouble to get into. How's that sound?"

"Ok," I sure as hell wasn't going to say no, "I think I can manage until then."

"That's my girl," he smirked, his attitude not lasting very long. Then, Ritsu started getting twitchy and his face turned colors, "I mean…I…You know what I mean, right? Not that's my girl. Or not even girl! That's right. This is a host club thing…Not everyone knows their secrets…"

"Ritsu…" I stopped him before he could spiral any further, "It's ok. I get it."

"You do?" Ritsu hoped.

"Yeah…" I took a quick look around, making sure no one was watching. But just for a little added security (and my paranoia), I held up a menu, pretending like we were going over the specials. Instead, I went with something a little off the menu just for him, kissing his cheek, "Don't forget to tip your waitress…"

A/N: It's amazing what could happen in that one more hour. Perhaps some group shenanigans? Or would it be host club business as usual? Then again, group shenanigans would count as host club business as usual. But I needed some fluff. A little Rei and Ritsu action with them being cuter than hell. He really is a good dude, isn't he? See you next chapter! xx