Chapter 6: The Game

Mori took notice at Tamaki in his coughing fit and then looked around at the other hosts and saw no one took action. He dropped his shoulders, shook his head at Tamaki and the others and did nothing as well. He turned back to his customers and continued to chat and woo them.

As he took a drink, he thought I can't help but think that Tamaki is acting a bit....different this week. This was bothering him; he wasn't sure if it just seemed that way or if Tamaki was actually changing for some odd reason. He wanted to talk with someone. However, the only one he would really say more than a sentence to was Hunny. Mori then set his glass down and then asked their customers, "May I borrow Hunny for a few minutes?"

The five of them looked at each other curiously and then nodded their heads while one said, "of course."

Mori nodded his head and then picked Hunny up by the arm pits and carried him into the ballroom. Hunny was just eating cake at talking with customers, until Mori suddenly carried him away from everyone. He walked over to a corner on the far side away from the patio and set Hunny down on his feet. With his back turned to everyone else, he asked Hunny, "Mitsukuni... Have you noticed that Tamaki has been acting a bit strange...er?"

"Tama-chan being strange...." Hunny looked over at Tamaki and examined him from afar.

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After a moment or two of his little coughing fit, Tamaki finally regained control of himself and he pounded his chest twice to force anything back down that he might further cough up. "Forgive me my fair maidens." he apologized, "I wasn't expecting such a comment." he couldn't quiet fathom the idea of his relationship with Haruhi being compared to the twins but also after some past experiences, the idea of the father-daughter relationship was fading. If that's not my relationship with her he thought to himself, then what is?

Unknowingly, He wore a sad expression on his face as the thought passed his mind. Some of his customers started to worry about him and the one the three that made those comments said, "I'm sorry Tamaki-kun!"

"We didn't mean it." The other admitted

The third then asked, "Please forgive us."

Tamaki realized what was going on and he panicked for a moment and then stuttered out, "N-n-no, no need to worry." he came in close to hem on his one knee and said to them in his prince voice, "You should never regret word of you true feelings. Forgive me for not accepting them caringly."

The three turned deep red and they tried comforting him again by forgiving him. The other girls were acting all emotional at the scene.
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That sentence about 'true feelings' caught Hunny's attention for some reason. Tamaki always said stuff like that, but this time it seemed sincere. Everything Tamaki seemed to say to his customers seemed true, but this time it was different. Hunny wondered if Tamaki even noticed this fact. Hunny looked back at Mori with a worried expression. "Well, it seems like something's bothering Tama-chan... What do you think it could be, Takashi?"

Mori let out a sigh of slight relief; he was glad that he wasn't just imaging things. However, he was also worried about Tamaki, If this goes on, he thought, Kyoya will start to get mad again. He looked around with shifty eyes and then said to his cousin, "I think it might have something to do Haruhi." He remembered the necklace that Haruhi was wearing. It was like one of those friendship necklaces that had two halves and Haruhi only had one of those halves. He also has seen Tamaki fiddling with his shirt a few times like he was wearing a necklace too.

Mori held his chin in thought and then he declared quietly to Hunny, "I think he might be realizing he has deeper feelings for her." He looked back at their king and saw him still hosting to the ladies but things were a little more under control. He sighed and then said, "But I think he's still too dense to realize what those feelings are."

Hunny nodded in agreement, without even giving it a second thought. That was the reason why Tamaki had been acting strange lately. But just like Mori had said, Tamaki was still to dense to realize his true feelings.

Mori thought of how he could prove his theory, however, to do that, he had to provoke Tamaki somehow into a situation where he would finally admit his feelings. He thought about how he, or anyone else, could push Tamaki's buttons in the right way to get him to do that. A thought passed through his mind; he sighed and dropped his shoulders at the idea. Well... he thought I guess I could start one of those. He waited for Hunny to confirm his thoughts before he'd go and ask them if they were interested in his plan.

Hunny gazed up at Mori, noticing that something had crossed his mind, and Hunny wanted--no, had to know what. "I agree with you 100%, Takashi!" Hunny declared "So tell me what you have in mind..."

Mori sighed, looked around again and then whispered to Hunny his idea. Hunny's eyes grew wide and began to sparkle. Mori's plan was sure to be fool-proof. Hunny was confident that his cousin's plan would work out. Tamaki would finally admit his true feelings toward Haruhi. As Mori carried Hunny back to their customers, he thought, This is so exciting! I just want to run around and tell the world of Takashi's plan. But I must resist! If I don't, Takashi will be mad at me! Mori carefully placed him back in his seat and he told their customers, "Sorry for taking him away, but if you excuse me, I need to use the rest room now."

Hunny waved goodbye to Mori, and turned to face his customers. "I'm back, ladies! I hope we didn't take too long."

The three girls shook their heads, and then said in unison, "No! Of course not! You didn't take long at all, Hunny-kun!"

While two of the girls continued to convince Hunny otherwise, the third girl leaned back in her chair, with a worried look in her eyes. "But... Is there something wrong? It's not very often that Mori-kun will just want to go talk somewhere, even with you, Hunny-kun." The other two girls nodded in agreement, and watched Hunny, waiting for a response.

Hunny felt his heart drop. He eagerly wanted to say, but knew he couldn't. So he put on his best act. Hunny shook his head and said, "No, nothing's wrong at all! Takashi was just making sure that I brushed my teeth this morning! He took me over there you he can look at them, just to be sure!" His lie was believable.

The girls nodded their heads. The one who had asked said quietly, "Oh, I see. Well that's just fine, then." She smiled at Hunny.

Hunny smiled big His lie actually worked! He felt bad for lying...but it had to be done! Hunny reached behind him and said, "Now, onto other matters. Who would like to hold my bunny?!?" Obviously, Hunny pulled out his bun-bun out in front of him. His customers began to squeal and reached out for Hunny's bun-bun.
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However, Mori didn't go to the rest room but stopped over to where the twins were hosting. He caught them in the middle of one of their brotherly love acts, so he just sat down and waited for them to finish. Once his customers were done squealing, he walked up behind them and he asked their customers, "Is it alright if I borrow these two for a few minutes?" Their customers looked at him with curious eyes and they nodded their heads

Mori nodded and he helped the twins up, and then guided them into the ballroom and into the hotel, he had an arm over each of their shoulders. Once they were out of sight from everyone, Mori turned towards the twins and he asked them something that no one would have ever guessed Mori would ask for: "Wanna play a game?"

The twins raised their eyebrows simultaneously when they heard Mori's request. "Game?" They asked, linking arms. "What did you have in mind?" It wasn't often that Mori wanted to play a game, so they were sure that whatever it was, they'd end up participating.

Mori gave a satisfactory smirk; he knew that they wouldn't turn down his request to play a game. He then went onto explain, "Ok I think we all agree that Tamaki likes Haruhi and doesn't really know it. So the name of the game is Get-Tamaki-to-Admit-his-Feelings-to-Haurhi. The object of the game is to get Tamaki to say "I love you." to Haruhi by the end of the dance.

There are rules.
#1. The winner is decided by who can get Tamaki to say "I love you", truthfully to Haruhi's face.
#2. Neither Tamaki or Haruhi can know about this.
#3. We work in teams. So there's you two and then Mitsukuni and I.
#4. If Kyoya find out about this, we have to make him play as well.
#5. The only limits on how you can get him to say "I love you" are you can't tell him or Haruhi about this game and you can't hurt or threaten Tamaki into saying it..."

"The winners get...." Mori stopped to think for a minute, he had to think of something the twins would want. "…a 2 night stay..." He stuttered out, "in a hotel...of their choice...paid for by....the losers." Mori nodded to himself as when he thought, yeah the twins would go for that. He went on to explain, "If either of them find out about this game, whoever spilled the beans to them, looses and the other teams, assuming Kyoya will join, will get the prize paid for by the one loosing team."

Mori thought of a few last minute problems with his plan. So to fix them, he added, "There's one last catch to the game. If either we don't get him to say it by the end of the dance, you get Tamaki to say "I love you" to her and she turns him down, or, by some happens chance, he says it without us helping him along, Tamaki gets a 3 night stay at a hotel of his choice with one other person, paid for by the 4 or 5 of us."

"Whadaya think guys?" he asked "you wanna play?" If this worked, Mori was almost sure Tamaki would finally admit his feelings to Haruhi. The twins knew how to push Tamaki's buttons better than anyone in the club.

The twins smirked, looking at each other, before giving Mori a thumbs up. "You've got yourself a deal." They said in unison, thrilled about being able to play a new game. It sounded very interesting too.

They looked over to Tamaki and Kaoru said, "Shall we begin once our hosting activities are over?" he asked.

Hikaru nodded and added "Yeah, we should get back before our customers go into a frenzy."

Mori nodded at the twins' decision and said, "Agreed." With that, the three of them snuck back to their hosting positions and continued hosting. No one really noticed Mori's actions, especially not Tamaki, so the possibility of being questioned by either Haruhi or Tamaki was slim to none.

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After the 4 hours of hosting was up, all of the princesses left the ballroom and went off to do their various things. Tamaki stretched after all of them left, stood up and said, "Well, that was another successful host club afternoon." After Mori and Hunny's customers left, Mori lifted his cousin up onto his shoulders and walked over to their king, not only to see what he had planned but to see if they could do something to commence the Get-Tamaki-to-Admit-his-Feelings-to-Haruhi game. Hunny smiled as Mori carried him off towards Tamaki. He knew that their "game" was just about to begin.

Tamaki looked around and saw all of the chairs strewn about and Ice tea glasses all over the place. He then remembered Kyoya's schedule and he said aloud, "I believe it's Haruhi's turn first to clean up..." Tamaki didn't really want Haruhi to clean up this giant mess but he didn't want to face the wrath of Kyoya for not following the almighty schedule.

Mori looked up at his cousin with one of the twin's smirk. This is too perfect he thought and he walked up behind Tamaki and he said softly to him so Haruhi wouldn't necessarily hear him, "Why don't you help Haruhi? I'm sure she would appreciate it and the work will get done twice as fast."

Hunny smiled even brighter. He leaned in towards Tamaki a little, causing him to hang over Mori's shoulder a bit, and said, "Yeah, Tama-chan! I'm sure Haruhi would be happy if you helped her out!" Deep down, Hunny was hoping that this game of theirs would be a total success.

A thought hit Tamaki as his senpais were offering ideas, Wow...I can't believe I didn't think of that. "Excellent idea Mori-sempai" he said to him.

Haruhi walked over to Tamaki, Hunny, and Mori, tea glasses in hand. She couldn't help but overhear the three of them. "Well, I know it's my turn to clean up, but some help would be nice. But that's all up to you three. Either way I don't really mind."

Haruhi would feel a little bad if Tamaki or anyone else were to help her clean up when it was her turn to clean up. But she was sure that Kyoya wouldn't mind too much.

Mori shook his head at Haruhi and said to her as he looked up at Hunny, "Sorry, we have to go warm up on the off chance we have to defend 'Rukia'. We'll see you when you finish here." with that, Mori walked away into the ballroom and then into the hotel. However, they didn't go off to exercise but instead he took Hunny off of his shoulders and pressed his back up against the ballroom door and peered around the corner to watch what Tamaki would do.

Just like Mori, Hunny was peaking around the corner as well. He was just as curious about the situation as Mori was, or at least seemed to be. But as far as Hunny could tell, the moment seemed...awkward. Hunny looked up at his hovering cousin and whispered, "Do you think anything's going to happen, Takashi?"

Mori looked down at his cousin and said to him, "Don't expect this game to be won so quickly Mitsukuni."

He then quickly turned and looked back up at Mori and whispered even quieter, "Yeah...You're probably right. I should've known."

The twins, who had been watching as well, snuck over to where Mori and Hunny were and grouped up with them. "It looks like things are about to get interesting." Hikaru whispered, attempting to get a better view.

"It's upsetting that Mori and Hunny got the upper hand." Kaoru whispered as well, but to his twin.

Hikaru, nodded, agreeing "We'll just have to get an early start tomorrow."

Hunny looked back at the twins, held his index finger over his mouth, and said, "Shh!! They'll hear you!"

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"Well..." Tamaki tried to say to Haruhi but she ran off to clean up more. He turned around for Mori's or Hunny's support but they had left already. Tamaki sighed and then shrugged his shoulders and he thought to himself, Why not. He found the cart that the servers had used to bring in the glasses before and found a large bin on the bottom shelf of the cart and he laid that out on one of the tables. Tamaki went to each of the tables and pushed in all of the chairs and then grabbed all the glasses and stacked them. If any of the glasses still had tea in them, he dumped the tea into the bin and then he made towers that were 5 glasses tall and placed them on the cart.

The air was a little too quiet for Tamaki as they cleaned up so he tried to make conversation. "So..." he started, "How was your hosting today? I noticed you had a new customer today." He wasn't sure what to talk about, the last time he tried this they got onto that awkward subject of dreams and h was trying to avoid awkwardness.

Haruhi lifted her head and looked at Tamaki as she gathered up more cups. "I think it went pretty well, and the new customer seemed nice." Haruhi gathered up the last few remaining cups and set them down with all the others. As she began putting chairs back to their original positions, Haruhi said, "What about you? It sounded like you were dying at one point."

He observed Tamaki and saw that he was making conversation with Haruhi as they were coming close to finishing the clean up. He glanced at the twins and then back at Hunny and said, "But I did get him to do what I wanted him to." Hunny didn't seem to follow so Mori explained, "He is talking with her."

Tamaki rubbed the back of his head when she mentioned about him dying and he explained semi laughing, "It's a funny story actually...they asked me about my time here and i told them about us spending yesterday together." Tamaki continued to push the chairs back into place quickly as he continued on. "It was when I was taking a sip of my Ice tea that they made the crazy notion that there was a brotherly bond between the two of us..." Haruhi listened to what Tamaki was saying, until he mentioned something about a brotherly bond. It was then that Haruhi stopped what she was doing and stared into nothingness with a blank expression.

Meanwhile, Tamaki was working at such a fast pace that when he was fixing a table right next to Haruhi that when he turned around to go to the next one, he tripped on of the chairs and fell onto of Haruhi. Tamaki was in that awkward position that looked like he was about to kiss her and he froze up when he realized he was onto of her like that. "G-gomen Haruhi..." he said all embarrassed as he sat there for a few seconds trying to regain control of his body.

Hunny heard a boom-crash-bang and quickly turned towards Tamaki and Haruhi. Tamaki had fallen on top of Haruhi, like he sometimes did and thought Tama-chan sure does that a lot...

Mori watched as Tamaki tripped onto of Haruhi like that and he slapped himself in the face. "Wow~" he mumbled to himself, "That Tamaki is such a klutz." He looked again and saw that he was in that awkward position like he was going to kiss her. He knew Tamaki wouldn't but he held his chin and thought, That actually might have been a good thing.

Once he did he stood up real quickly, Helped Haruhi up, brushed some dirt off of her shirt and continued on working. Haruhi said back to him, "It's okay, Senpai. It was only an accident...like it always is."

With out looking at her he finished his story, "So because I was so surprised that my customers said that, I ended up choking on my own tea..."

Haruhi pushed in the remaining chairs as Tamaki finished the rest of his story. "Ah...that would make sense..."

Tamaki then finished the last table just as Haruhi was about to look up at Tamaki and he said to Haruhi, "I'm going up now." Tamaki avoided eye contact because he was still embarrassed about how he tripped onto her and he didn't want her to see how red he was. With that, he made his way to the ball room, unknowingly, directly towards his spies.

"O—oh, alright then, Thanks for sticking around, Senpai. You really helped me a lot." Haruhi smiled at him as he began to leave. But something didn't seem right to her; kind of like an empty feeling. A thought crossed her mind. It didn't mean much, but it still made her wonder. Should I follow him...?

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Mori saw Tamaki swiftly moving towards them and before he knew it, his cousin of all people was pushing him away. Crap he thought That baka is leaving too abruptly...and with out Haruhi!

Hunny jumped as he saw Tamaki heading their way. He quickly pushed Mori and the twins out of few and said, "C'mon, we can't let Tama-chan see us!" Without realizing it, Hunny was pushing Mori down the hallway at a rapid speed. "I can't believe that Tama-chan is already leaving! Yes, he did fall on Haru-chan, again. But still!" Hunny stopped pushing Mori once they reached the lobby and said to his cousin, "Should we get him to go back there somehow, Takashi?"

A radical thought went through Mori's mind and without thinking it through he acted on impulse. He ran towards the door from the side the door was on, so Tamaki wouldn't see him, and he slammed the door shut. Mori put his back up to the door and held it shut. "This should keep him there for a little while" he said aloud. Tamaki wasn't very strong, well at least compared to Mori.

Tamaki was right by the door when all of a sudden it slammed in his face. Tamaki was surprised and he tried the door handle; it wouldn't budge. Tamaki slammed his shoulder into the door three times in hopes that it would move; again the door wouldn't open. "They locked us in!" he exclaimed to himself, "They must have thought we were done and locked it." Tamaki put his back up against the door and saw Haruhi looking at him from the patio. He sighed and thought to himself, Well, I might as well go back to her if I can't leave.

Kyoya walked out of the ballroom when all of the hosting activities were done but realized that the others stayed behind by the door, watching Tamaki and Haruhi clean up. Curious as to what they were doing, he decided to just stand there quietly and watch them; none of them even realized he was there. Kyoya didn't decided to do anything until after Mori was holding the door shut, Tamaki and Haruhi still in.

Seeming to come from out of nowhere from the fours' perspectives, Kyoya stood in front of the four. He used his finger to fix his glasses and the lights reflection made it impossible to see his eyes. "May I ask what you're doing?" Kyoya asked in the 'I just popped up out of nowhere and now you're going to fill me in on everything or else' voice

Mori turned his attention from the jiggling door knob to Kyoya, who assumed his maniacal stance in front of the 4 of them. As he stared a little frightened of his friend, he thought, I can never get over how scary he looks when the light hits his glasses like that. Mori was the first to speak, "Alright you caught us. We're playing a game. It's called Get-Tamaki-to-Admit-his-Feelings-to-Haurhi. The object of the game is to get Tamaki to say "I love you." to Haruhi by the end of the dance. But now that you know, you have to play too."

Mori explained all of the rules to Kyoya, leaving out the one about having to get him to join, and then explained about how the 2-night at the hotel prize was won or lost. He also mentioned the extra twist about how Tamaki could win something instead of the 5 of them. "That klutz goofed up like he always does and out of embarrassment went to leave too soon." Mori explained, "So, we're locking him in there with Haruhi to try and get them to spend a little more time together."

The twins grinned. "Brilliant idea Mori." They said, giving him a thumbs up. Knowing Kyoya, he'd join their game, as long as there was something in it for him. They put their heads to the door, listening. Neither of them could hear their footsteps any longer.

"I think they've left." Kaoru told the group. "They'll make it back to the room eventually, so we should probably head up there to make it look like that's where we were the whole time." They looked at the other members, and then placed their hands on their hips.

"Don't you think?" They said in unison.

Hunny nodded his head, and then held his ear against the closed door. He heard fading foot steps, and Tamaki talking, hopefully to Haruhi, and not himself. "He's walking away from the door, Takashi!" he also declared. Hunny smiled with glee and jumped up in front of Kyoya. "Kyou-chan, you're going to help us, right?" Hunny was overly eager to see Kyoya participate in this game.

Mori put his ear to the door as well and he too couldn't hear them anymore. He then looked at the impatient twins, nodded his head and said, "Yeah lets go." Mori walked with the rest of the group back up the room. They all changed out of their cosplays to some extent; there was no need to put the uniform back on.

Hunny sat down on one of the various couches and yawned. He rubbed his eyes and asked, in a sleepy tone, "How long do you think it'll take for them to realize that the door's not really locked?"

After they all got changed they lazed around the room, pretending that they didn't know what was taking Tamaki and Haruhi so long.
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Tamaki walked back towards Haruhi, still a little embarrassed about the accident and he said to her as he pointed at the door, "We're locked out. We're gonna have to go through the garden and enter from another door." Tamaki felt a little awkward, first the Haru-chan, then the accident, now this. He just wasn't having any good luck this week.

Haruhi cocked her head to the side, and sighed. Shouldn't the hotel staff actually check the room before they lock the doors? Haruhi walked forward until her and Tamaki met. They really didn't have much of a choice but to go search for another door. As she began to turn, Haruhi said, "Well, we better go look for that other door, Senpai."

The two of them walked out onto the patio, and into the garden. They looked all around them for people, doors, and possible signs. But of course, there weren't any, from what they could see that is. Then again, they have only gone through probably half of the garden.

Tamaki walked with Haruhi as they tried to navigate through the garden, the garden was surrounded on three sides by the hotel in the back, however, it was hard to find a visitor entrance door from the path they were walking on. It also didn't help that it seemed that they were the only ones out in the garden.

The two teens stayed silent. Every now and then, they would glance at each other, but nothing really more than that. Tamaki kept quiet because the last thing he wanted to do was to make Haruhi walk away from him so that they would both be in different parts of the garden. Tamaki also figured that after that little accident, she couldn't be all that happy with him. He was glancing at Haruhi every once in awhile to see how she was doing, but also...just to catch a glance of that cute face of hers. Haruhi decided to break the silence. "I--It sure is nice out today..." she said hesitantly. This was a very sad attempt, in Haruhi's opinion. But she would do just about anything to end this awkward silence.

Tamaki's heart jumped for joy, She isn't mad at me he thought gleefully to himself otherwise she wouldn't have started talking with me. "Yes it is quite beautiful weather out today." Tamaki said in a relaxed tone, "But I think I'd enjoy it more if I wasn't locked out of the hotel." he laughed to himself for a little bit then started to chat with Haruhi about some of the flowers that they passed on the way. He wasn't all that sure what to talk about, but as long as he kept a relaxed mood he was fine. Haruhi, on the other hand, sighed quietly to herself in relief. No more awkward silence. In all honesty, Haruhi was enjoying herself a little. She liked large gardens like this. But just like Tamaki, she would probably enjoy it more if they weren't locked out.

After a few more minutes of walking and chatting, his stomach gurgled to where only Tamaki could hear it. Tamaki sighed and thought to himself, Aww man~. I haven't eaten anything since breakfast and now it's almost supper. He saw a bench and said to Haruhi, "Hold on Haruhi. Let's sit down. I'm getting exhausted." He sat down on the bench, made room for Haruhi and then thought to himself, You know, if neither of us ate since breakfast, then I bet Haruhi's hungry too.

Haruhi raised her eyebrow, but then shrugged. Tamaki-senpai exhausted? That doesn't happen often. None the less, this didn't bother her much. "Sure." She said plainly as she sat down next to Tamaki on the bench and sighed peacefully. It seems like we've been walking around forever.

Tamaki leaned back in his seat and saw above his head a peach tree. His eyes twinkled in delight and thought to himself, We're saved! He examined the tree from his seat but saw that only one of the peaches on the tree was ripe enough to eat. He sighed depressingly to himself but then came to a gentleman's decision. He reached up into the tree, plucked the ripe peach, held it in front of Haruhi and said, "Here Haruhi, I bet you're hungry. Take it."

Haruhi sweat-dropped and started waving her hands in front of her, in a slightly panicky tone. "No, it's alright. I'm not hungry--" At that moment, her stomach growled. She actually was hungry, very hungry. That's right. I haven't had anything since breakfast, and it's been quite a few hours since then. Haruhi looked down at the ground in front of her and folded her hands in her lap. "Well...maybe I'll have just a little, if you don't mind..." Haruhi slowly took the peach from Tamaki and bit into it. It tasted like heaven to her, but that was only because she was really hungry.

She took a few bites into it, but stopped when she noticed that Tamaki seemed to be staring at her as she bit into the peach. "Senpai...do you want some?" Haruhi held the peach in front of him, hoping that we would take her offer. He was probably just as hungry as she was.

Tamaki raise his eyebrows in shock as she held the peach for him to eat. She's willing for us to share the same fruit? Tamaki thought to himself, That's almost like...kissing... The thought was strange to him, yet pleasurable at the same time. The idea of kissing Haruhi never crossed his mind before so at the moment it seemed absurd, but that just added a whole new level to his inner mind theaters.

Tamaki took the fruit back and he said, "Here, let me try and split it so we don't have to keep passing it back and forth." He held it in between both of his hands and was using his thumb nails to rip it in half, like one would do with an orange. Tamaki was having slight difficulty accomplishing this task. He started to apply more pressure to the fruit when, finally, a rip occurred in the fruit but peach juice squirted all over his face. Tamaki started to laugh and he said, "Wow... that wasn't supposed to happen." Haruhi laughed slightly as peach juice splattered onto Tamaki's face, but flinched when some splattered onto her own.

He pulled out a white handkerchief and wiped his face off. He finished ripping it in half, making sure the half with Haruhi's bite in it was the bigger half. He threw the pit out and then handed Haruhi the half with her bite in it. "Here you go." Tamaki said as she gently took her half of the peach, when he noticed there was some peach juice on her face. "Hold on," he said as he grabbed his handkerchief again, "you got some juice on your face. Let me get that for you." Tamaki then gentle rubbed her face with the handkerchief and got the small splash of fruit off of her face. "There we are." he said as he put the handkerchief back. He then bit into his half and enjoyed all the juice that just poured down his throat; it tasted so good.

Haruhi was going to rub the juice off but Tamaki beat her to it. "Th--Thanks, Senpai." She said bashfully. Haruhi felt nervous and a little strange. But why? Not only that, her face felt a little warm. Was she blushing? She didn't know, nor did she really want to. But if she was, hopefully Tamaki wouldn't notice.

Tamaki looked at Haruhi as he was in the middle of his second bite, sucking on the juice as it poured down his lips. He noticed that she was kind of red in the face. She's blushing? he thought to himself, what for? He wasn't sure why Haruhi would blush, he hardly ever saw he blush unless she was really flustered or embarrassed about something. But nothing happened between them so why was she now? He didn't press the matter because he didn't want her to flip out on him

Haruhi bit into her half of the peach, and glanced up at Tamaki. He seemed just as overjoyed as she did when she took her first bite. "I can see that you're enjoying your half."

Tamaki finished chewing and said, "Of course. It was right from the tree and I haven't eaten since 9 this morning." It was just then that a guy student came walking past them. Tamaki almost tackled him before he left and asked him, "Wait, what door did you use to get out here?"

"I-I-I used the door over by the internet cafe" he stuttered out, completely terrified of Tamaki's over reaction. He pointed down the path and said "I-its strait down the path that way."

Tamaki let the kid go and grabbed Haruhi by the hand, almost running, and said, "Let's go! Freedom awaits!" and he led her back into the hotel, each with their peach halves in hand.

"--gah!" Haruhi shouted as Tamaki grabbed her by the hand and pulled her away towards the door.

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Once they were in, Tamaki said, "Let's finally get up to the rooms so we can go down to the springs." Haruhi nodded as he suggested going up to the room.

Halfway up the steps, a question hit Haruhi. She looked up at Tamaki, who was still dragging her from behind by the hand, and asked him, "Senpai, if the door was locked...how you suppose the one guy got in? I'm sure the staff wouldn't have just opened it."

Tamaki gave a curious eye to Haruhi at her question and stopped. He rubbed her head and replied, "Have the springs gotten to you already? He used the door by the springs and cafe while we were locked out by the door to the ballroom." He retracted his hand from her head and held his chin with it, "Although..." he thought aloud, "that does bring up a curious point. Why would the staff lock one door but leave another open?"

Tamaki didn't think long on it but instead started walking back to the rooms and ushered Haruhi to follow him. Once they were by the rooms he said to her, "Alright, go on and change. I'll have Mori-senpai and Hunny-senpai keep an ear out for you and they will escort you down." Tamaki then waved to Haruhi as he entered the door to the boys' room and saw everyone sitting at the coffee table. "Hey guys," he greeted everyone, "Sorry we're a little late. The strangest thing happened. The employees locked us in the ballroom! We had to go find another entrance through the garden."

Mori looked up at Tamaki and nodded at him to acknowledge that he heard Tamaki. Mori did his best to keep himself from laughing from the irony of the situation. Mori wore a smirk and said back to Tamaki, "You don't say..."