Disclaimer: I don't own Ouran. I believe I've said that already. Thank you for keeping the lawyers away.

CHAPTER 8: NECESSITY

Back at the Ohtori hospital…

"Welcome home, Kotoko."

The dirty blond-haired young man in a red plaid apron greeted the sharply-dressed yet very pregnant woman standing in the doorway of their apartment. Even though she could take maternity leave at this stage of her pregnancy, Kotoko Fujioka chose to continue championing her clients and winning cases for them. It was her secret hope that maybe her determination and courage would rub off on her unborn child.

"Hello, Ryoji. Have you had a good day?" Kotoko removed her heels and then dropped her briefcase by the table casually. It had certainly been another long and strange day for her, but a victorious one nonetheless. She had seen yet another frivolous lawsuit dismissed, and was going to spend the next few days preparing a countersuit on the part of the former defendant. But for now, she could relax a little. "Who the hell sues someone over a misplaced obi?"

Ryoji stared slack-jawed at what his wife said. Were these the kinds of cases she always dealt with? He always figured she would be sending murders or armed robbers off to jail, or maybe settling cases of medical malpractice. Perhaps even arbitrating over a rental dispute of some sort…but a misplaced obi? People sued for everything nowadays, but even that was pretty ridiculous.

"I don't know, Kotoko. People are weird and greedy I guess. Anyways, I made this wonderful stir fry dish that I found in that new recipe book you gave me. Want to try it?" Ryoji asked as he presented the sizzling hodgepodge of vegetables and meat on a plate and set it in front of his wife. He gestured grandly at the plate and said, "Please, enjoy, my lady."

Kotoko looked at the seriously overcooked dish in front of her but smiled graciously nonetheless. In her mind she immediately regretted giving him the book. Her husband was by no means an expert chef, judging by the dubious state of the vegetables and meat. She silently hoped that her child (whom she was fairly certain was a girl) would put the recipe book to better use and maybe even teach her father the finer points needed to make proper stir fry.

Still, for the sake of her beaming husband, and the fact that she was indeed feeling pretty hungry after such a long day, she decided she would try it. Maybe the food tasted better than it looked.

"Well, let's eat." Kotoko took her chopsticks from the side of her plate and picked up a bamboo shoot while Ryoji fiddled with the rice cooker. She chewed the overcooked vegetable and savored its over-seasoned texture. This was hardly the kind of cooking that she was capable of creating, but she knew Ryoji had tried. She didn't want to discourage him. "Hm…this is definitely a new flavor to me. I had no idea you were so creative with spices, Ryoji." She hoped she sounded tactful enough for the young man who was busily scooping white rice into two bowls. Shouldn't he have had the rice on the table along with the main dish?

"It's quite tasty though." Kotoko finished. And she meant it. At least Ryoji had a cursory knowledge of stir fry, even if he still had a lot to learn. After all, she had tasted plenty worse vegetables when she was learning to cook. But why was she suddenly feeling funny?

"Here we go. Sorry but the rice cooker seems to be acting up again," the lawyer's husband announced while placing two bowls of rice on the table. Then he looked up sharply to see Kotoko looking like she was in some sort of pain. "Kotoko? What's wrong?"

Kotoko's face was flushed with perspiration, as if she was suddenly running a high fever, and she was clutching her stomach closely. Her breath was coming in ragged pants and her eyes were shut tightly against her discomfort. She got up and staggered a couple of steps before collapsing in her frantic husband's arms.

"Kotoko? Is it…time?" Ryoji had some of knowledge when it came to childbirth and labor pains. He held his wife steadily hoping that her sudden discomfort would become more manageable. His eyes widened in terror when he heard her cry out and start convulsing.

"It's burning! It's burning!" The lawyer held her throat with one hand and placed her hand on her stomach and continued to scream. Smoke started pouring out of her eyes and mouth and she started to choke from the lack of oxygen. Suddenly the room became much hotter and the amount of smoke increased around the couple. Ryoji knew he had to get his wife and child to safety, but then when he tried to pick Kotoko up, he couldn't budge her. She had never felt that heavy to him before.

"Come on, Kotoko! We have to get out of here. You need to get to the hospital." Ryoji continued to struggle with his wife, when he heard muffled screams from the apartment next door. A loud crash and the sounds of crying children resonated from the outside of the building on the stairwell. Flames started to eat away at the far wall of the Fujioka apartment, and that made Ryoji all the more determined to get his wife and baby out as fast as possible.

Then he yelped in pain as he abruptly released his wife from his arms. She had suddenly gotten to hot for him to hold. Upon looking at his arms, Ryoji saw a line of ugly black burns. How could she get this hot so fast? Why did she feel like she was on fire? He could only stare as his wife cried out to him and continued writhing as if she were in torment.

"Ryoji! Get out! I'm burning! Everything's burning! Please, just go!" The young lawyer gasped in a smoke-choked voice, imploring her husband to get to safety. But he continued to stare in horror as some unseen force was consuming her body. All around the apartment, flames spread to the furniture and the nursery, which the proud parents had created. The entire apartment was burning away, and for some reason, Kotoko was too.

"Ryoji, please get out. It'll be okay. Don't worry." With tears blurring his eyes and great hesitation, Ryoji stumbled toward the door…only to find it blocked by a wall of fire which had spread all around the apartment and was trapping them both.

"Kotoko! I can't…" But when Ryoji turned back to his wife, he saw that she was literally encased in a cocoon of white-hot flame. Screams once again emanated from the still-pregnant young woman, and she fought desperately against the unseen force searing her body and wrapping her in agony and eating away at her. Ryoji tried to reach for his wife to save her, only to find that the same unseen force was starting to coil around his body like an incendiary boa constrictor. The relentless heat singed his body and he too starting convulsing as his world disintegrated in the out-of-control blaze. "Kotoko! Kotoko! I can't get to you!"

He struggled against his fiery bonds which ate away at his skin and continued to consume him in the way they were consuming his beloved.

"Kotoko! KOTOKOOOOOOO!!!!"

Ryoji Fujioka's eyes shot open. He made a brief yet audible cry of fear, which immediately made his face hurt. The now-older man felt sweat on the unburned side of his face and he wiped it off with his uninjured hand. Then he felt tears stinging his eyes as he thought of the dream he just escaped from.

Why does that same damn dream keep coming back? Will I never get any sleep? The elder Fujioka was getting fed up with having to endure such an awful nightmare. Wasn't there something the nurses could give him that would make him stop dreaming? He was about to push the call button to summon one of the nurses to ask for such a thing when the door to his room opened again.

"Dad? What's wrong?" Haruhi asked her father when she saw him breathing heavily and his face flushed with perspiration. She had overheard the nurses talking about Ryoji and had mentioned how he was having trouble sleeping. They worried that if he continued to move around due to his tossing and turning, he would cause further injury to himself. Because of their concern, Haruhi decided that she needed to be closer to her father. So she waited until the hallway was clear, and went to be by his side once again.

Ranka watched his daughter sit down in the chair beside his bed and take his uninjured hand in hers. He couldn't help but feel incredible relief that she had escaped injury and possible death from the blaze that had taken their home away days ago. If she had perished in that fire like she had in his dream, he would have completely lost any will to live that he had. The only reason he was even making an effort to recover was because of his little girl.

He wasn't able to get Kotoko's ashes out in time.

"Haruhi." Even though talking was still difficult for the former crossdresser, he still tried to speak loud enough so she could hear him. Haruhi leaned in so that she could hear her father better, and he whispered a single word into her ear.

"Dresser."

Hm? Dresser? Haruhi hadn't expected her father to say something like this. For a moment, she pondered its meaning, and then she watched her father look away. Following his line of sight, she noticed an envelope on top of a small mahogany dresser set on the far wall of the room. Letting go of her father's hand, Haruhi got up and walked over to the dresser and picked up the envelope, emptying it of its contents.

Spread out on the dresser were two dry cleaner receipts, a few random business cards from various clients, a folded-up menu for a sushi restaurant, a metal thimble (even though Ranka couldn't even sew a button), some expired supermarket coupons, and finally, a slightly-singed photograph. Haruhi's eyes widened when she saw the smiling faces of her mother, her father, and herself as a dark-haired baby in a cute frilly pink one-piece bathing suit that didn't match her serious expression. They were all dressed in beach clothes and standing by the sea after asking some passer-by to take their picture. The brunette turned over the picture and looked at her mother's writing.

Hokkaido in April…Fun time at the beach, but why doesn't Haruhi-chan smile? Oh well, I'm sure she'll like it better when she's older.

Despite the welling moisture in her chocolate eyes, Haruhi smiled as she gazed lovingly at the young husband and wife and the all-too-serious looking child. Then she turned back toward her father and held up the photograph.

Ranka smiled wider than he had since the night of that terrible fire and motioned for his daughter to come back to his side with the picture. She came without hesitation and placed the photo in the palm of her father's hand. She looked at her father's face and noticed a few tears playing at the corner of his eyes as he whispered "Thank you."

Haruhi leaned in and hugged her father carefully so as not to exacerbate his injuries. As she broke the embrace after a moment, the door opened slowly. The nurse walked up to the bed carrying a clipboard. "Fujioka-san, I need to change a few bandages," she stated addressing the red-haired man lying in the hospital bed after acknowledging his daughter with a nod.

"Your friends are waiting for you outside, Haruhi-san." The blond nurse smiled for the uninjured girl before she started tending her still very-injured father. Ranka's eyes met Haruhi's for a moment and he clutched the photograph closer in his hand. He looked happier at least. Even though he had lost everything else in that fire, he still had her and this one photograph that he had kept on his person at all times. He silently thanked Kyouya Ohtori for forbidding the nurses from throwing out any of his personal possessions.

"Thank you, nurse." Haruhi stood up and acknowledged the young woman before leaning in to kiss her father on the cheek. "I'll be back, Dad."

Then she turned and ran to the door to see her friends who were waiting with open arms for their cherished princess. Hikaru and Kaoru were first in line to greet her, shoving past Tamaki and crushing their little friend in a tight group hug. Haruhi smiled and hugged them back just as tightly while the rest of the Host Club (with Tamaki hanging woefully at the back of the group behind Kyouya) watched and waited their turns to hold her.

At last, the Host Club was together again.

TBC

A/N: I was thinking about a lawsuit over a missing pair of pants that got thrown out of court not too long ago when I was writing this chapter. I imagine there are some stranger cases out there, though.

Anyway, now that the Host Club has reunited under less strenuous circumstances, life is somewhat better for our heroine. However, there is still a lot that needs to be addressed. In the meantime, let's hope Ranka can get a better night's sleep.

I'm still trying to decide whether or not to turn this into a romance. Guess it depends on where my creative mind steers me. And let's not forget the Host Club families. I'm glad Chapter 7 turned out so well. I wonder if I should bring the grandmas back at some point. Hmmmmm…do I dare?

As always, comments and reviews are welcome, as well as constructive criticism. Thank you very much!