The following day, I decided to find out exactly who and what was involved in this mysterious Host Club. I went to school with the heavily perfumed letter tucked away safely into a zipped up side pouch of my messenger bag; the hastily ripped and written note from the boy with black hair was equally well guarded in my breast pocket. I'd done the button up for extra security. Because, odd as it may sound, I almost cherished that little note. It really was a much-needed reminder of other people's kindness; despite my morning being really rather good (particular thanks given to the excess of vitamins from the veritable fruit display I'd had for breakfast, courtesy of the Host Club's basket) and my spirits higher than they had been since my arrival, there were always people trying to bring those spirits back down. Like anywhere in the world, people were aggravated by the way I was able to smile so early in the morning - yes, how dare I be happy at a time when they were still grumpy because one of their twelve pillows didn't have soft enough goose feathers? How dare I be happy, full stop.

For example, in passing a girl with long straight brown hair who was walking alone, I stopped her and asked her where I could find the Host Club.

"Why on earth would you want to know?" she'd asked, her voice more a sneer than anything else, as she pulled an expensively bangle-clad hand through her sleek cinnamon coloured hair, eyeing my own cropped mess with amused disdain. "I doubt you could even afford to say one sentence to a single one of them."

"I just want to know," I replied, lifting the lightly fraying leather flap of my bag and fumbling to unzip the side pocket. I could feel her cold grey eyes fixing upon my cheap bag, before they rolled skyward in her boredom; similarly, she heaved a melodramatic sigh and began tapping her foot. "I - hold on - one second."

"I doubt anything you could show me will be of even the slightest interest," the girl yawned, fixing a red bow she had tied with ribbon beneath the collar of her pale yellow blouse. I fished out the letter, now just a little bit crumpled, and proffered it toward her. She noted the gold crest emblazoned upon it, and snatched it from my grasp. Raising it to her face, she sniffed. Clearly she recognized the perfume, for she quickly flipped the card open and I saw her eyes skim the swirly writing written in that dark blue ink. "This is Tamaki's writing…" she told herself in a low voice, and as she looked slowly up at me I noticed her eyes narrowed coldly. "Why is Tamaki, of all people, writing to you, commoner? What on earth does he have to thank you for?"

"That's none of your business, but I'll take that back now," I said, holding out my hand to take the card, but she turned her body away from me and held it out of my reach. "Give me that card." The corner of her painted red lip curled up fractionally.

"What a crude species you commoners are," she said in a drawling sort of voice, "You don't even understand the use of 'please' or 'thank you'. That goes without saying how you fail to recognise your superiors when engaged in conversation."

"I don't see anything that could qualify you as superior to me," I remarked coolly.

"Oh, no, of course not," the girl affirmed in a sweet tone of voice, and with that she took hold of either end of the card and ripped it deliberately down the centre. She smirked as she slid one half into her expensive looking bag and crumpled the other into an uneven little ball and threw it into my face. "Oops," she pouted as it bounced off my forehead and onto the floor. "My regards to Tamaki, should you find him, little commoner." She sauntered away at that, laughing darkly under her breath, as I was left to stoop to my knees and retrieve the ripped up ball of paper from the painstakingly polished floor. I quickly unravelled it and found she had left me with only the Ouran crest on the front and not the message, now making it a perfectly ordinary and indiscernible piece of paper that could have been ripped from the front of the academy brochure. And now, should I ever find the infernal Host Club, I would look so very strange with just an odd brochure page as proof of being the rescuer of one of their members. Or perhaps I wouldn't need identification? Perhaps that strange boy with black hair would remember me? I hoped he did. More accurately, I hoped he remembered me and not the kiss.

With a sigh, I stuffed the halved card back into my bag and stalked off to find one of the many vast libraries, where I perhaps could find solace for an hour or two until my next class.

'Solace.'

Ha.

How wrong I was. I should have guessed before I even opened the door that it wasn't somewhere for studying. Like everywhere else, it was a place for complaining about the terrible and burdening lives of the super rich and beautiful. I sighed, turning away and closing the door. I picked up my bag and slung it back over my shoulder, pushing the thick-rimmed glasses up my nose. I started walking away, hoping to find somewhere quiet to study. I would have been happy enough with a broom cupboard, but knowing Ouran they would definitely have been bigger than my bedroom. Way for those damn wealthy snobs to rub it in my face. Besides, the school had four libraries - you'd think at least one of them would be quiet.

I passed a corridor of high windows on the second floor, and paused to look at a flock of white birds flying past behind the clean glass. I dropped my bag on the sleek floor beside me, and walked over to press myself against the window. My breath fogged on the glass, and I looked out at the birds as they flapped up through the chilly Spring skies. They flew up and out of sight behind a group of large, fluffy white clouds. Thin rays of weak sunlight broke through them like sweeps of a watercolour brush, illuminating the courtyard below, where a number of students were lounging about on a bench and chattering noisily. The cherry blossoms above them, were just coming into bud, small pink petals starting to show along the dewy branches. A few droplets of rain were still stuck to the windows from this morning's quick shower. As the sunlight shone through them, tiny rainbows danced along the floor and walls around me.

I smiled faintly, putting a hand on the cool glass of the window. I looked up at the clouds, the sunlight fading for a moment. As it did so I started away down the corridor, towards the wide carpeted staircase to the next floor. After spending just over a week at this school, I still didn't know if it was possible to find a quiet place to just sit and study, other than my little accommodation home - and I was far too tired to go traipsing back there for so little time before having to come back for my next class. All the other students had such high standing or rich families that it didn't seem to matter what they did with their education. I was starting to think that all these rich kid snobs just came here to have a good time, getting away from said families to live in the lap of luxury as free as most fine-looking young adults without consequence to their actions. Apart from the fact each and every one of their actions led to distracting me from my studies; studies which I actually took seriously.

Ascending the stairs slowly, I looked up and down the corridor as I rounded the banister. There were lots of doors but I knew already that a number of them were occupied with classes. I looked behind me and down the other end of the corridor, to see it bereft of anything but a collection of vast paintings and a double doorway at the very end. Deciding this was perhaps my best bet, I started down toward it, walking slowly so as to admire the artworks upon the walls; Pre Raphaelite, mostly, and highly romanticised with roses and incredibly beautiful women. I reached the end of the corridor, and looked at the plaque on the wall beside the high double doors. It declared the room to be Music Room 3. As a precaution, I put my ear to the smooth surface of the door and listened for any sign of life or lesson from within, but no such sound reached my ears.

"Well, seems about the only place I'll find, on campus," I told myself as I pushed down on the handle and swung the door open, not expecting it to be occupied. But it was. I stopped suddenly as I found myself confronted by the backs of six males, two of which I recognised as the insufferable pair of redheads who pestered me so incessantly. I was about to try and back out quietly so as not to disturb whatever the small gathering was for, but my footsteps had been detected.

"What are you doing here?" the twins asked me, both having turned their heads in unison to see me in the doorway - the four other heads subsequently stared at me in quick succession. Immediately I recognised them all; two were blonde, one being the tiny boy with the pink rabbit and the other who was obsessed with coffee; the other two had black hair, one with glasses and the other was incredibly tall and messy haired. "Don't you know it's rude not to knock."

"I - I - " I began to stutter, not having formed my conversation to the boy with black hair before I now tried to address him with words I drew from nowhere.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot," said the one on the right, "They don't understand us, do they?"

"No, we have to speak in French," said the one on the left.

"You - "

"French!" cried the coffee boy, clapping his hands together and beaming elatedly, "Cette belle langue de ma mère!"

"Oui, ce très be - ah, sorry, I'm not here for - "

"Oh, but of course, you're not here for speaking French," the boy with glasses interrupted, walking toward me and extending a hand, "I wouldn't have thought so - not from such a prestigious honour student as yourself. Your sights must be set on something far more regarded in the public eye, yes - Haruhi Fujioka?"

"You know who I am?" I asked with great surprise, almost giddily accepting his hand and feeling him shake it firmly. It was such a shock to have been recognised for my real name and not 'commoner', even though it really shouldn't have been.

"Why, of course," the boy smiled wanly, releasing my hand. "It's not everyday we have a commoner in our midst here at Ouran - you must have an audacious nerve expected only from those of the highest calibre." Aaaand there it was - the ever-favoured 'c word'. I couldn't help but feel my intial hopefulness at being realised as human and not a sub-species of pauper deflate. "You're infamous."

"Oh... right," I mumbled.

"You're highly intelligent to have sought us out, of course," he continued, and I looked up with renewed surprise at having been paid an actual compliment. "You're the first to have shown interest in joining our fraternity who actually has something to offer - intellectually, of course, because forgive me for saying that your appearance is in dire need of assistance."

"I - what?"

"It's a mixture of everything, really - the hair, the clothes, the posture - "

"No, that's not what I meant," I added hastily. They all looked at me quizzically; the tiny blonde boy with the pink rabbit even cocked his head to one side, rather like a confused puppy. "I don't mean to give the impression of expressing any interest at all in joining your fraternity - no offence intended to you, of course, but… Well, really, I only came to see one of you…"

"One of us?" Coffee Boy repeated, and I nodded. It seemed to take a second or two to click for him. "One of us! Aaah, I see!" I nodded again, letting out a short breath of laughter, thinking that perhaps he'd turn about and usher forward the tallest one. "So you're a customer!"

"Yes, I - wait, what do you mean by customer?"

"Who would have thought such a reputable honour student," said the twins together, looking me up and down, "would be so openly gay?"

"I'm sorry, what?"

"So!" the blonde boy who was so fanatical about caffeinated drinks chimed, having come over and thrust an arm about my shoulders. "Tell me what kind of guy you're into!"

"Excuse me!?" He extended his other arm to point at each boy in turn, beginning with the boy with glasses.

"Do you like the Cool type?" he inquired, and I grimaced in bewilderment.

"Actually, I'm not - "

"Not into that sort of thing, okay, I understand!" Coffee Boy acknowledged, wheeling me about to face the other boys, now pointing at the twins. "How about the mischievous type?" At the thought of those two being my 'type' I barely suppressed a scoff. "Not them either, then. Alright, what about the boy lolita?" he suggested, waving his hand down to the tiny boy who grinned at me, his fat pink cheeks glowing.

"Um, how old is he, exactly?"

"Oh, I see, you perhaps don't like them looking too young - then tell me…" His hand arched upwards and rested pointing at the tall boy with black hair, who looked at me with a very vague curve of a smile upon his very thin lips. At the sight of those lips I almost blushed to think they'd actually - oh, shut up, Haruhi! "What do you think of the strong, silent type?" I was barely able to open my mouth, nor form a response, before he'd released my shoulders and instead his arm had slipped to hook about my waist, pulling me closer, his other hand taking a light old of my chin. "Or, maybe, you're into a guy like me…" he breathed, and his face moved tantalisingly close to mine, which felt grow hot with embarrassment, "…the princely type."

He winked, flashing a dazzling smile of brilliant white teeth.

"Sorry, but I don't think so," I said curtly, unhooking his arm from about me and pushing him away, trying to regain my composure with a not at all subtle cough to clear my throat. "I'm not especially interested in any of your 'types', thank you."

"But how on earth were you able to resist my charms?" Coffee Boy asked, seeming genuinely shocked that he had not verbally seduced the very clothes off of me.

"It's not you or your charms I'm interested in," I responded, instead walking past him (to the mildly suppressed snickers of the twins) and toward the boy I had been seeking, his enormous frame much more impressive and his face much more handsome while not pathetically drunk and slumped over my sofa and hanging open as he snored. He looked down at me with interest, at least, I think it was interest - he had solid features and his expressions did not seem to change easily. At least, not while he was sober. For a moment I didn't say anything, wanting to piece together what I said properly.

"Watch out, Mori-senpai," one of the twins, I have no idea which, called, "I think you're about to witness a confession of love." I ignored his comment, which his brother had started laughing at, and instead cleared my throat.

"You… perhaps won't remember me," I started to say, looking up and connecting eyes with the tall boy. His eyes were darker than I remembered them being, deep and yet still bright, like a sky full of stars. I smiled, just a little. "My name's Haruhi Fujioka - you, um… you got a bit carried away at a party a few nights ago and ended up sleeping on my sofa. I gave you some paracetamol and water, and you thanked me by writing this." I unbuttoned my breast pocket and fished out from within it the tiny piece of crumpled paper, upon which he had written his thanks. He took it from me with hands that were surprisingly tender considering their inordinate size, and he smiled little to see it. "You also tidied up all the mess in my sitting room, which was far more than I could have expected of you. I suppose I just wanted to thank you." He nodded gently, and my smile widened a smidge. I was only pleased not to have had to present some form of identification, otherwise it perhaps could have taken an odd turn.

"Thank you for taking care of me," he replied after a few moments, and his voice was low and deep and mild. It was a very calming voice, unlike the excitable natures of the others in the Host Club. "Is that all that happened? I don't remember very much. Only, I did rather noticed I'd stained your sofa as well as slept on it."

"No, it's quite alright," I remarked, "It's not a huge calamity. But... yes, that's all." I did not think it wise to mention the fact that he had also kissed me quite vigorously. The boy nodded, seemingly relieved, and proffered the scrap of paper back to me - I reached up to take it, and as I did so his fingers just brushed against mine and lingered for a moment, warm and very gentle to the touch.

"Well, that's alright, then," I heard Coffee Boy say brightly, and he appeared at my shoulder rather like a golden retriever; I hastily retracted my hand and tucked the paper away back into my pocket, clearing my throat. "I take it you got my gift basket?"

"Yes, it was lovely," I affirmed, taking a step backward from him, which eh mirrored by taking two - he didn't seem a fan of upholding values of personal space, or else did not understand them. "Th-thank you. Although, I really don't know why you hid it underneath my welcome mat."

"To throw people off, of course," he said, "We hid it so that people wouldn't steal it."

"You hid it, you great buffon," the twins scoffed from behind him.

"Indeed you are welcome for the gift. But it is we who should be thanking you, Haruhi Fujioka," called the boy with glasses, who also now began to approach. "First you take in and care for one of our members, and then you advise the Host Club without even realising it."

"I did?"

"Why, of course - that coffee you recommended us brewed up a storm with our customers." I continued to slowly pace backward in the direction I believed the door to be in as the two boys advanced on me, not threateningly but still with a certain power to them.

"Oh, I - you're welcome, then."

"Are you quite sure you won't join us?" asked the bespectacled boy, withdrawing a little black notebook from a pocket of his fitted grey jacket. "I'm sure you'd be of invaluable resource and income for our fraternity. You could even move out of that hovel of an accommodation home and stay in the fraternity house, with us." At this I saw the tiny boy with the rabbit beam and begin to tug excitedly on the arm of the boy with black hair.

"Thank you, but I'm quite honestly not qualified in any way to be in a fraternity," I rushed to say, putting out my hands as a kind of barrier to send them the message to stop following me.

"And why is that?" asked Coffee Boy, who had suddenly quickened his pace in his apparent eagerness to recruit me. Well, I thought, considering how I'm not actually a male, as you somehow believe me to be…

"Look, I'm sorry if I gave you the wrong impression," I started to say quickly, similarly quickening my backwards footsteps, "but I really don't - " It was then that I tripped over my own stupid feet, and was sent tumbling backwards into a pedestal that I hadn't noticed upon entering the room. Upon said pedestal was a dark blue and gold vase, beautifully sculpted and positioned upon a velvet cushion. Or, at least, it was upon said pedestal - that is until I fell into it, and thereby caused it to tumble from its placement and fall to the floor, where it shattered into glittering debris.

Silence seemed to hang, petrified, as my heart thumped loudly in my ears. I then heard the sound of a pen scribbling against paper, and looked up to see the boy with black hair and glasses writing hurriedly in his little notebook.

"Exactly, Fujioka," he said coolly, looking up at me and pushing his oval shaped glasses up the bridge of his nose with a thin, pale forefinger. I saw the curl of his sardonic smile. "You really don't have a choice."

With that, he snapped his notebook shut.