Update for you, guest AE. Hope you like it! :) I have one other chapter I wrote a few months ago that I'll put up later. I'm not sure if I'll continue the story past that though. Thanks for the support, everyone!

Kaoru received a letter once a day. They were either placed in his shoe cubby or in his desk. He'd been finding them for over a week now. The Mazawa twins returned home to find a familiar face bustling about.

"Akimi-nee-chan!" They launched themselves at the young girl, who caught them with open arms.

"You're back," Emi said.

"How are things?" Ryuu said.

"My brother should be fine," Akimi said. "The treatment is working. I'll be visiting again in a few more weeks, if nothing goes wrong."

"Roro's back too," Berty said, stepping into the living room from the kitchen.

"What?" Emi's eyes grew wide. "Where? Where?" She was moving before he finished his next sentence.

"He's resting upstairs- Emi-sama, he's still recovering, so let him rest," he said as she went up the stairs. Akimi chuckled.

"Why'd it take so long anyway?" Ryuu sat down on the couch while Akimi went back to fetch some tea.

"He got stitches for his cut, but it developed an infection. He had a fever for two days. After he recovered from that, they waited until they could pull the stitches out again before sending him back."

"Sounds like he's had it rough," Akimi said, setting a tray down. "I feel like things have become a mess since I was gone. You two haven't cleaned your rooms at all, have you?"

Ryuu gulped the hot tea down. "Maybe…"

Berty smiled. "They're a handful when you're not around, Akimi-san."

Later that night, the twins spoke to their dad about the papers. He sent them to be analyzed and warned his children to be careful. Emi and Kaoru planned out their Saturday, deciding to have a picnic and watch movies at Kaoru's place.

"Michi invited me on Saturday!" Ryuu told her with eyes wide. "I think it's the first time she's invited me out."

"It'll also be Valentine's Day."

He gasped and ran around the living room table several times with his hands on his cheeks, before dropping to the floor. "Emi, what does that mean?"

She shrugged, smiling. "I wonder."

On Wednesday, their dad came back with results.

"There was nothing special about the paper or the ink," Mr. Mazawa said. "But the letters are more likely cut from a particular magazine. That one about celebrity gossip and such. I don't remember the name." He squinted his eyes and scratched his chin.

"You mean" - Ryuu snatched a magazine off the table - "this?"

Their dad snapped his fingers. "Yes! That's the one. Well, based on the colors and shapes of the letters, it was most matched to that, but the possibility of it being wrong is high."

It was the magazine that had first reported their cousin Nozomi dating Kenta.

"It's the Horiyukis, isn't it," Ryuu said.

"I wouldn't be surprised," Emi said. "But if they were also behind the dating scandal, why would they cut it up into a threatening note?"

He shrugged. "Maybe they were also cutting up Nozo-nee-chan's face."

She frowned. "Jerks."

"Just be careful," their dad said. "Watch out for Kaoru Hitachiin too."

The next day, Emi found a letter in her shoe cubby that read: "Break up with Kaoru Hitachiin." She folded it up in fourths and tucked it away.

Probably the Horiyukis again.

Her phone buzzed with a message as they walked to the classroom. It was from Megumi and it read, "I want to talk to you. Meet me after school in 2-B."

Again? What does she want now? Emi returned her phone to her pocket. She'd just have to find out.

"Ryo-chan, you're making chocolates with us today right?" Aki swung her legs back and forth during lunch. "Who are you going to give your chocolates to? Ooh, ooh. Your crush?" She raised an eyebrow and smirked.

"What? No!"

"But it's Valentine's Day. It's the only time you can give chocolates to-"

Ryuu shook his head. "No no no. I'm just making some for my family."

"Aww, what a shame," Aki said with a small pout as she resumed eating. "You could say they're platonic chocolates. Actually, if you said that, it'd tip off that you have a crush on her."

"What are you talking about?" Miwa clapped her hands together. Iwao was beside her, hands in his pocket and a broad smile on his face. They hadn't shown up in the past two days, so the twins had been hoping it was safe to eat in the cafeteria now.

"Chocolate," Aki said. "Are you going to give chocolate to Ryo-chan, Miwa-senpai?"

"Maybe." Miwa smiled. "If you'll accept them, Ryo-chan." Aki giggled and kicked Ryuu underneath the table.

"I'm looking forward to tomorrow," Iwao said, looking at Emi.

"Don't expect chocolates from me," she said. "Sorry."

"Oh we'll see." He winked at her and strolled away, humming. Miwa waved and followed after.

Emi lowered her head close towards Ryuu. "That's very suspicious."

He nodded. "Agreed. We better be careful."

Maybe I should ask Ryuu to come with me, but then he'd find out about the video and… She sighed. It's probably something else. Maybe she's just returning my handkerchief.

When she entered the classroom after school, though, she found it empty and quiet. "Enomoto-san?" Emi glanced around, wandering further in.

"She's not here." It was a familiar voice. The door shut as she spun around.

Iwao Horiyuki.

"Wow." Emi shook her head and laid the sarcasm on thick. "I am just… so surprised. You know, who else could it have been?" She shrugged, crossing her arms. "It would have been more interesting if it was Enomoto-san or someone else."

"What?" he said.

"What do you want?"

"Why do you think I want any-"

"You sent the message right? What do you want?"

He blinked and the light innocence in his eyes vanished. He smiled. "You're not so dumb, Emi Mazawa." He brandished his phone, revealing the same video Megumi had. Emi's eyes narrowed, but she kept silent. Iwao began pacing in front of the door. "She was supposed to make you suffer with this video, but she failed. I never thought you could be eloquent."

"I'm not." She swallowed. If they were right about everything, who knew what Iwao would want.

He stopped and sat down on one of the desks, dangling his phone by his thumb and index finger. "I wonder if you can persuade me out of this too?"

"Cut to the chase."

"There's a business deal from the Satos that your father won't accept." He wrapped his fingers around the handheld device. "I want you to persuade him into accepting it. Tonight. Also, I want chocolates and you on Saturday." He met her gaze, lifting his chin higher than necessary. "You'd do that for your brother, wouldn't you? After all, isn't he crossdressing for you?"

Frick. What do I do? Shoot. Crap. What can I do? No, stay calm. Her head was buzzing. First, tell him okay. Wait, no I should ask him what he wants on Saturday- No. Not Saturday.

"You're a good actor you know." She could hear her own voice quiver. She clenched her fists around the handles of her crutches.

"Yeah, I am." He slid off the desk. "It helped that you look like her."

"Who?" Her eyes snapped to his face. One that'd previously been full of youth and adoration.

"Yes or no," he said, coming to stand in front of her.

"I'll do the business deal and the chocolate" - she couldn't help swallowing again - "but what do you want on Saturday?" Her throat was too dry, yet her palms were too sweaty.

He picked up one of her braided pigtails. "I want a date. From 10 AM to 8 PM."

She swiped his hand away. "As long as you don't do anything else illegal."

"That'll depend on how well you can convince your father," he said, taking a step back. "And of course, you can't tell anyone about this, or your brother's reputation will be ruined. Your family's too."

Just what we need. Her nails dug into her palm.

"Don't forget the chocolate tomorrow," he said with a wave as he stepped out of the room. The door shut with a thud. She crouched, squeezing her eyes shut and wrapping her arms around herself.

Goddammit.

"What took so long?" Ryuu said when Emi entered Music Room 3 twenty minutes later. She sought out Kaoru with her eyes and tilted her head to the side. He stood and they met in the corner of the room.

"Can we change our meeting time on Saturday? Like after 8 at night?" She was grimacing already at the words she would have to say. "Something came up, and I'm not going to be able to make it."

"What is it?" he said.

"Just… something." She shrugged.

"What? What's going on?" He raised an eyebrow.

She breathed in and shook her head, diverting her gaze. "I can't tell you. I'm sorry."

"Is it bullies again? I thought you said you'd tell me if something happened." His voice was rising, and she couldn't bring herself to lift her head. She didn't want to know what kind of face he was making, what his eyes looked like.

"It's not…"

"Not what? A big deal? Last time you ended up twisting your ankle. Are you going to - I don't know - have a twisted wrist next? I thought you trusted me, Emi."

She pursed her lips, glancing up. "I do trust you Kaoru, so won't you trust me?" There was a slight crease in his brow, and his lips were pressed shut. "I'd tell you if I could, but I can't. Please, trust me. This doesn't just affect me, or us, so I can't selfishly tell you."

They held each other's gaze for a long moment. His eyes darted left and right, as if searching for something in her face. A moment later, his shoulders loosened. "Fine. Forget about Saturday then."

"What?"

Kaoru turned to walk away. "There's not much we can do with that time frame, so just forget about plans."

"But-"

"It's fine."

Well, that's the perfect icing to this cake.

The problem with going along with blackmail was that the demands would increase. The perpetrator would push and prod until the victim could no longer stand the demands. The only way to get out of their hold would be to remove that secret, or get one of theirs that held equal value.

Emi brainstormed solutions for the rest of the day until Sumiko and Aki had gone home with their chocolates complete, and she was ready for bed. Why was Ryuu crossdressing in the first place? For her sake? It seemed rather arrogant to think that way. He was doing so to get over his fear of women as well.

But I guess the main reason… or what led him to come up with the idea in the first place was me, huh? She sighed as she entered the study to talk to her father. "I heard you got a business deal from the Satos."

"Yes, I did. Where'd you hear that from?" Her dad glanced up from his computer.

"Why aren't you accepting it?" She stepped closer.

"Would you like to see it?" He pushed a stack of papers half a centimeter thick towards her. She picked up the first sheet and began skimming. The contract offered a billion yen for five pieces of property.

Her dad leaned back in his seat as she read. "The problem with it is they're offering too little for what they want."

Why would Iwao Horiyuki want me to persuade Dad to accept this? It wouldn't benefit his family… unless it would somehow. Emi set the papers down. "Who are the Satos?"

"You don't know? They're the family with the third most amount of property."

"Who's second and first?" She kept staring at the edge of the table, racking her head for hypotheses, ideas, reasons.

"We're the first. The Adachi's are second. I believe you're friends with their youngest daughter, actually."

"Adachi?" She couldn't remember anyone with a name like that.

"No, Sato." Her dad typed something on his computer. "Akiko Sato."

"Aki-chan?" Emi licked her lips. The business deal means a net loss of money on our part, but why would he know that?

"What did you want to talk about, Emi?"

"Oh." She blinked. "You should take the deal." Her dad looked at her with a steady gaze. It took a moment for her to realize that he was waiting for an explanation. "Well. I mean, the properties aren't very important to us. Right?" She tried to smile.

He lifted the papers up. "They're decent ones. The thing is that I don't like selling property if I don't have to. Some of our buildings may be going up in flames recently, but we're not in so much trouble as to need to sell them."

Emi snapped her fingers. "Have you caught who was behind all those fires?"

"Not yet. They're still investigating." He inspected her for a second before sitting back. "Emi, what's going on?"

A theory was brewing in her head. She tapped her chin. "I can't tell you, Dad. For now, can you work on getting that contract through?"

"You really want me to accept it?" He furrowed his brows. "We'll gain nothing from this. We'll lose, in fact. Besides, I've already rejected the offer. If they want the property, they'll need much more money than that."

Emi tilted her head. How could she get this across? Even if she did, it'd only leave him with more questions. I have to do this, somehow, though. If Ryuu gets revealed… If that has to happen, it should be on his terms.

She pointed at the contract. "Would you take it if you knew something was on the line?"

"What is?"

Bzz. Her phone vibrated in her pocket. She reached in and pulled it out to see a message from Iwao: "I forgot this. Don't tip anyone off." There was an image attached of her and Kaoru holding hands.

Great.

"What is it?" her dad said again. He had an elbow on the table, resting his cheek in his hand. Emi lowered her phone without shutting the screen off. She was aware of the window to her right.

"It's… nothing to talk about," she said, angling her phone towards her dad. His eyes flickered over, to the picture of her and Kaoru.

"So I see." He lowered his arm.

"And, our buildings have been set on fire. If you sell some of the property, maybe those buildings will get burned too, and the Satos will have to deal with it instead. Or maybe the people behind the burning will find out the property isn't ours anymore and won't burn the buildings."

"Alright." He nodded. "It'd be a good way to see if they're targeting us specifically."

"Or maybe they can fake it."

"Fake it?" He raised an eyebrow.

"Fake a fire," she said, keeping her gaze locked with his. "I'm sure they could do that."

He nodded once. "I'll discuss the contract again with the family tomorrow morning. I'll see if I can get everyone else's approval. Is that good enough?"

"It'll have to be," she said and smiled. "Thanks, Dad."

There was something else she still had to do.

An hour after they'd both gone to bed, Emi snuck into Ryuu's room and under the covers. She poked his side, and he grunted. "What?" He rolled over, rubbing his eyes. "The heck, Emi. I wanna sleep."

She pressed a finger to her lips. She could see him clamp his mouth shut from the dim glow of her phone screen. She showed him the message Iwao had sent. Then she shut her phone off, took his palm, and began writing letter after letter on it.

She had to get her message through somehow.

When the Mazawa twins entered the school on Friday, papers were flurrying all over the school.

"Is this true?" One girl stomped right up to Emi holding a sheet.

"What is?" Ryuu took it, but Emi already knew what it was: a picture of her and Kaoru holding hands. She leaned over to look anyway, and forced her eyes to widen.

"Of course not," she said, chuckling and waving her hand. "Do you really think someone like me could woo Kaoru Hitachiin? I'm not half as pretty or smart enough for that."

The girl narrowed her eyes. "Then explain this picture."

Other girls were gathering around, whispering and pulling out their phones. Ryuu's breathing was growing shallow and quick. Emi took his hand and gave it a squeeze. "It's photoshop. Can't you see? It wouldn't be hard to do that."

"Hmm." Another girl held the image close to her face. "It does look somewhat hazy around their hands."

Emi rolled her eyes. "You should all know that Kaoru's in love with his brother anyway. And if I could date a host, it'd be Haruhi-kun, cause he's just so cute."

"Agreed!" a voice in the crowd chimed out.

"I'd rather date Tamaki-senpai."

"No, Mori-senpai!"

"I think Hikaru would be a great boyfriend."

Emi widened her grin, releasing Ryuu's hand to continue towards their classroom. "It'd be nice if you could clear up this misunderstanding with everyone else in the school. It'd be bad for Kaoru's reputation if this got out of hand, don't you think?"

"Don't worry," the first girl said with a hand on Emi's shoulder. "I'll make sure to announce it to my class."

With that, the crowd began to disperse and Ryuu let out a quiet sigh. He shuddered, scratching his head. "I'm gonna go to the bathroom real quick," he said and ducked away.

Sorry. Emi watched him go with a heavy heart. I… only cause trouble, huh. She moved towards the wall to wait.

"You said you weren't eloquent?"

She gritted her teeth at the voice. "What do you want, Horiyuki?"

He smiled, coming to stand next to her. His arms were crossed. "You deflected that too easily."

"Stuff your ugly face somewhere else," she said. He laughed, then rested one of his hands on the wall behind her. Emi managed to not roll her eyes, or barf, and pushed him away. "Go away."

"I want my chocolate." He held a hand out.

"You'll leave me alone for the rest of today?"

He shrugged. "Sure."

She reached into her bag, leaning her crutches against the wall, and pulled the bag of chocolates out. "Here." She tossed them at him.

"Thanks." He smiled and glanced to his right.

It was Kaoru, standing at the hallway intersection and staring.

Well, isn't this… oh what was that word. Fortuitous? No. No, just well-timed. Of course, Kaoru's here to see me give chocolate to this douchebag. Emi scowled and grabbed her crutches. Kaoru's face was blank, and he vanished behind the corner.

She moved in his direction, but Iwao grabbed her wrist. "Where are you going?" he said.

"To class." She glared at him.

"I haven't even had the chocolates yet." His face lit up and he grinned. "Don't you want to hear my thoughts-"

"No." She tried to shake him off, but between holding her crutch upright, she couldn't do it. "Let go." She yanked harder. She could hear footsteps. Probably Kaoru running past them to go to class, to avoid her.

"Didn't you hear her?" Kaoru was beside her and gripping Iwao's arm. "Let go."

"What are you getting so angry about, Kaoru Hitachiin?" Iwao kept his innocent grin. "It's not like you're her boyfriend."

Then Hikaru was behind Iwao and pulling the second-year away by the shoulders. "No, but as hosts," Hikaru said.

"We can't stand seeing a guy treat a girl like that," Kaoru said.

"Especially one with a broken foot." Hikaru glanced over at Emi, who was now struggling to contain her smile.

Iwao pursed his lips. "I'll see you tomorrow, Emi." Then he stalked off.

"Thanks-" Emi turned to see that the Hitachiin twins were already walking away, and Kaoru wasn't looking back.

Ryuu came out of the bathroom. "Everything okay?"

The stone was back in her chest. "I… don't know."

There was one good thing happening on Friday, and that was making chocolates with Michi. They set up in her kitchen, melting chocolate on the stove. Emi had brought all her chocolate-making tools over, including various heart-shaped molds and sprinkles.

"I don't really get how this is called making chocolate when we're not really making anything," Michi said, while stirring the pot. "We're just remixing it."

"Basically." Emi smiled. "It's still fun though."

Emi was making dark chocolate hearts with a cherry filling for Kaoru, but she wasn't even sure if he would eat them. Or if he wanted to see her. He hadn't spoken much to her all day and thinking about it made her want to cry in a corner.

"Who else are you making the chocolates for?"

"Only Ryuu. I already sent my parents chocolate as usual. There's not really anyone else, I guess."

The chocolate was done, so they moved to fill up their molds. Emi took this time to insert the cherry filling. Then the molds were put in the fridge to cool before decorating.

"Do you like him?"

"Of course. He's like my best friend." Michi set some tea down on the table.

"Thanks. And, I meant in a romantic way."

She sat down across from Emi at the dining table. "I haven't really thought about it," she said, holding the teacup in both hands. "I feel like friends should come first before something like that. I don't know." She chuckled.

Guess Ryuu will have to be patient. Emi smiled back. "You know, Ryuu would never tell you this, but he's scared of women, mostly of them assaulting him since it used to happen often."

"What?" Michi's jaw dropped. "Isn't that illegal?"

Emi shrugged. "The girls liked him a lot. He's usually really tense around them, and he can't stand touching them either. Except me, of course."

And now, you.

"Oh." Michi blinked as she processed the information. "That's interesting."

"I guess, what I'm trying to say is," Emi said, "you're- you've done something- you're incredible. To be able to become, like, his first female friend. That he likes."

"I don't think… It's not-"

"You can just say thanks. If it's a compliment to you."

Michi stared for a second, before saying, "Thanks, Emi-san." She had a soft smile and a warm glow to her face. "You're a lot like your brother. It's nice. I'm glad I get to know you."

"Me too. I'm glad it's you."

"What?"

"Nothing."

Thanks for reading! :)