A week passed since Akari and Arashi became Hosts. It was the day when the Host club would be themed as a sleepover party, and Akari did most of the set up and decorations as punishment for calling Kyoya a professional stalker. He enjoyed her misery. She spent the entire week fretting over the decorations and staying late after club hours for preparations much to her three brother's dissatisfaction. On Friday, she was nearly done with putting up all the decorations, and the teacher had allowed her to leave early to do so.
"Whew! Finally, almost done. I just need to hang up these last couple of stickers,"I was on the ladder and was attaching some fancy glow-in-the-dark star stickers on the ceiling. Although I'm pretty tall, reaching the ceiling is pretty tough. I went on my tippy toes and tried to stick one up there, but I was too short! I reached as far as I could, and I felt the ladder shake and tip over. My heart stopped, I could feel myself falling backwards, and I turned my body around so that I could attempt to catch myself. Poop. I shut my eyes and braced myself for a painful crash, but instead I found a pair of hands wrapping themselves around me. My face hit something hard, but not hard like the floor. Whoever caught me smelled like clean laundry, and we both fell backwards and closer to the ground. I looked up only to see someone's neck, my face had been buried in their chest while we were falling. I suddenly felt a sharp jerk. He grunted from the impact of hitting the floor, and my head rammed into his chest again. I tried to get up, but the person's arms were still wrapped around me. I looked up to see a stoic face looking back.
"Oh! Mori-senpai, sorry I kinda crashed into you! My bad..." I smiled apologetically and tried to get up. He released his grip on me and we both sat up, dismissing the fact that I had been pancaked right on top of him. I was now sitting right next to him, but I got up and offered him a hand to avoid awkward silence.
"Thanks for cushioning my fall, I owe ya one," I grinned at him as he grabbed my hand and hoisted himself up. Good thing I was strong, otherwise I would've fallen on top of him again.
"Be more careful," he said in his passive voice. Standing straight, he casted a shadow over me. His face looked emotionless as always, like Arashi's. But I could still tell that he was a bit worried about me.
"I will, and sorry. And thanks," I turned around and picked up the ladder that toppled over. I then set it up again, and tried to gather the glow-in-the-dark star stickers I had dropped. The reason why they were so expensive was because they glowed very brightly in the dark, unlike the regular ones. Mori joined me and helped. I wondered why he came so early alone.
"Where's Honey-senpai?" I asked him.
"Napping," he said. It's the most he has talked since I got here.
"Oh I see," I picked up the last one and stood.
"You don't really talk much huh? Arashi is a lot like you." I smiled at him.
"If you don't mind, could you hold the ladder for me so I can finish putting the stars up?" I asked politely.
"I'll do them," he grabbed the stickers from my hand and started to climb up the ladder. He easily placed them on the ceiling with no trouble. I held onto the ladder of course, I didn't want some giant crushing me! And he would get hurt if I let go so yeah. Common sense. After a minute he got down again, and he turned towards me. I He was about a head taller than me. I felt like a shortie next to him. Looking up at his face, I gave him a smile.
"Thanks big brother! You're the best!" I gave him a thumbs up.
"You don't mind me calling you that, do you?" He only grunted in response, which meant he was okay with it. I thought I saw the corners of his mouth turn up slightly.
"Great! Well, I'll see you in a little bit, Big Brother." My grin widened, and I happily folded up and carried the ladder with one arm and skipped away humming. I exited the music room, and turned left to the janitor's closet. I opened it, and placed the ladder inside. After shutting the door, the bells chimed indicating that school was over.
Later...
I had done a fantastic job with the decorations. There were pillows everywhere as well as blanket tents for every host, and the primary colors were baby blue, violet, and cotton candy pink. The color scheme created a very dream-like vibe, and everyone was super relaxed. The Hosts all wore pajamas and slippers, and guests were asked to remove their shoes upon entering the blanket tents to be entertained by their Host. Tamaki wore a white, silk pajama set and his button-up top was a little to, well...unbuttoned. He just wore the top like a vest, his bare torso exposed for the world to see. Kyoya was better, the purple shirt was just unbuttoned a bit at the top. The twins didn't wear their shirts at all, and they only wore blue pajama bottoms. Mori was also shirtless to my dismay. Arashi insisted on being all covered up like Haruhi, Honey, and me. Honey senpai wore a cute, pink, bunny footsie, Haruhi wore a black and white polka-dotted pajama set, and Arashi and I wore our matching batman pj's. All the Hosts were just wearing their actual pajamas to save on costumes. At the center of the club room, a little boxing ring was placed for pillow fighting(which would take place near closing time).
As I entertained my customers, I couldn't help but feeling proud of my hard work. Everyone really seemed to like it! Kyoya even complimented me!(Kind've).
"Would you ladies mind if I did your hair?" I asked my four guests.
"Of course not! Please do whatever you would like!" My red-haired customer spoke up first. After about thirty minutes of braiding all of my customer's hair, they all were laughing and playfully throwing popcorn at each other. Today, Arashi was going for more of a sleepy bad boy rather than a tsundere bad boy. I think he was getting real fed up having to pretend blush all the time. Tamaki with his loud voice then called for the attention of everyone in the club.
"It is now time for the pillow fighting to begin! Are there any challengers against Mori senpai?" The girls looked around the room giggling from excitement. The Hitachiins volunteered to go first. The twins and Mori were given pillow armor, which made them look like ridiculous marshmallows and a huge body pillow as their "sword." They stood at opposite ends of the ring.
"Go!" Tamaki yelled, standing outside of the ring. The twins immediately lurched towards Mori and tried attacking him from different sides. Mori knocked out the twin to his right first, and ducked down when the second twin tried to get him. The twins tried recovering. In their moment of weakness, Mori swung the pillow at the head of one twin, sending him flying out of the ring. He crashed onto the ground, which was pretty far since the ring was elevated, and he groaned despite having armor cushioning his fall.
"Kaoru!" The other twin threw down his "sword" and some pillow armor. He rushed to his brother's side and held him in his arms.
"Kaoru, are you alright?" Hikaru asked.
"I...I think so..." Said Kaoru in a pretend weak voice. I rolled my eyes, their brotherly love act was kinda lame to me.
"Dummy, don't scare me like that again," fangirl meltdown. After the chaos settled down, Tamaki called for more challengers. After a few silent moments and seeing that no one was really volunteering, I raised my hand.
"Me!" I said cheerfully. Tamaki smiled and ushered me on to the ring.
"Don't go easy on me big brother," I said as some other Hosts helped me put on my pillow armor. He didn't say anything, but I knew that he would go easy on me anyway. We stood at the opposite side of the rings again, and stared each other down. I heard a lot of girls cheering me on.
"Go!" Said Tamaki once again
I slowly stepped forward, and Mori did too. We circled each other cautiously for a while, until he made his first move. He had tried to trip me by attacking my legs first, but I jumped up and over him in a "leapfrog" type of action. I whipped my pillow around at his legs, and he slightly lost balance but recovered in the blink of an eye. I lurched towards him again, aiming for his face this time, but he easily blocked my move and tried to go for my shoulder. I was too slow to dodge, so I ended up falling on my right side. He stopped, and offered me his hand to get up so we could resume. I beamed at him, took his hand and hoisted myself up. Before I was in a full standing position, I lunged at him with all my might hoping to knock him down. I didn't succeed, but I managed to make him take a couple of steps back. After a couple more seconds of sparring, he won. I lost my balance and staggered backwards and out of the ring. Girls cheered, Mori won. I took off my pillow armor and smiled at him.
"Go Big Brother!" I joined the girls in cheering. The pillow fights continued on for a little bit more. Honey and Mori didn't really get anywhere, but Arashi almost won until he fell for the same move I did and staggered out of the ring as well. When the club was about to close, all the customers were laughing and smiling brightly, they said today was one of the most exciting days at the host club. They also complimented my idea on their way out, and said they hoped I kept mentioning them to Tamaki and Kyoya. I smiled at them all and kept waving until the last of the customers had left.
"The sleepover party theme was a huge success! I knew you would make me proud!" Tamaki doted over me and hugged me while twirling around again. I was laughing as he did.
"Thanks King, but you can put me down now," I gently pushed away and he released me. Arashi was now more tolerant over Tamaki and the twins, but he still shooed them away from me and Haruhi when they were getting too touchy or if we didn't like it.
"Speaking of sleepovers, you should come over to my house sometime Akari," Haruhi smiled at me.
"Really?! Would that be okay?!" I started jumping up and down a little bit from excitement.
"Sure, how about next weekend?" She suggested.
"You bet I'll be there!" I glomped on her.
"It'll be my very first sleepover! We should totally have a pillow fight like the one from today!" I was beaming. I then turned towards Arashi and gave him the puppy eyes, hoping he would say yes.
"Hm," he nodded in approval, which sent me squealing and jumping up and down.
"You are so cute right now!" Tamaki and the twins said in unison. I stopped in my tracks, and then I shot them a glare and cracked my knuckles menacingly.
"Say that again and you're dead meat, punks," I growled in deep, threatening voice. The three of them squeaked from fear at the same time, cracking me up.
"Hahaha, I'm just kidding! you guys are so funny," I laughed really hard while slapping my leg.
"That's not funny," said the twins.
"You did look really cute! But you also looked so scary just now Akari-chan!" Honey senpai is probably the definition of moe. Kyoya then adjusted his glasses.
"Seeing the success of today, I think we can allow you to help us deciding the themes in the future as well," he gave me that fake smile again.
"Great! I won't let you down!" I gave the Host club a salute, and we headed out after changing.
Unfortunately, on out way out to the driveway we got a text from Osamu saying that he and Haku had left us behind since we took so long. He also told us that from now on if we kept them waiting they would leave without us. Not believing what I was reading, I sprinted out to the driveway only to find that Osamu had been telling me the truth.
"Ugh, that impatient jerk!" I stomped my foot and huffed angrily. Arashi had a blank expression on his face, he didn't really care.
"We can walk," said Arashi.
"What?! But that would take at least an hour!" I exclaimed. He just shrugged, and was about to start walking.
"Do you two need a lift?" A cool voice asked us. I turned around to find Kyoya standing in front of us.
"Yeah, Osamu and Haku betrayed us and left us behind." I smiled sheepishly while my hand rubbed the back of my neck.
"I see. Your apartment isn't too far from my mansion, so it wouldn't be a problem for me to drive you both home." He took out his phone and quickly arranged for a limo to pick all three of us up, and hung up in less than thirty seconds.
"Thanks Kyoya! You're the best!" I raised my fist to him for a fist bump. He raised his eyebrow questionably and stared at my fist.
"What are you doing?" He asked me. I raised my eyebrows this time.
"You never heard of a fist bump?" Seeing his confusion, I explained it to him.
"It's kinda like a high five and sometimes used as a greeting or a gesture to celebrate an accomplishment. It could also be a way to show that you're friends with someone. I mainly do the brofist with my friends to show that we're tight, ya know?" I smiled at him expectantly.
"You think we're friends?" Kyoya looked at me weirdly.
"Well, we can start now. Come on, don't leave me hanging," I motioned with my eyes for him to bump his fist into mine. He somewhat awkwardly curled his hand into a fist, and lightly bumped his fist into mine. I grinned at him. Just then, a sleek, black limo pulled up in front of us.
We all got in, and I told the driver what our address was. Kyoya didn't really talk to us on the way home, he was typing something into that laptop of his. I ended up talking to Arashi, and since my conversations with him were usually one-sided I felt like I was talking to myself. I eventually stopped talking all together. The last minutes of our car ride were kind've awkward and quiet. We arrived at our apartment complex, and we bid our farewells, and of course I got Kyoya to give me another brofist.
"See ya Kyoya!" Arashi and I got out of the car. I kept waving and standing at the sidewalk until he left, but Arashi walked away as soon as he had gotten off.
"Bye Kyoya!" I furiously waved my hand as his limo pulled away from near the sidewalk, and sped away.
During the car ride home, the Ootori boy had stopped typing and instead stared out the window. He looked down at his hand for a brief moment and made it into a fist. He slightly smiled, then watched the sky as the sun started to descend.