A/N: Special thanks go to them3crazygirls, .xX, Monobear Lawliet, UnICoRN MaGiCc, MU5IC-FRE4K, HimeCiela, VioletRose16, FanOfPiPercy, carmengal, pessimisticiguana for following and faving.
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Boxes were strewn about the room, dogs sniffed every corner, reptiles skittered around their aquariums, moving men could be heard all over the house placing the newly bought furniture, and Lorena stood in the middle of the chaos. She orchestrated where what furniture was going where and Oh just put the boxes in the kitchen. and Creature get out of the way. and Be careful with that one please.
After two hours of this and some well-spent money, Lorena collapsed onto her bed. She still had many boxes of new stuff to unpack and final details to iron out. But for now, sleep sounded like a very nice option. So without even changing into pajamas or getting under the covers, she fell asleep.
Lorena stood in the doorway of her kitchen, clothes wrinkled and hair tangled, and a frown set on her face. Her kitchen was completely inaccessible. Cardboard boxes were stacked on every inch of floorspace, haphazardly stacked all the way up to the countertops, and the smaller boxes were stacked on the counter tops themselves. There wasn't even enough space to walk through the room.
Lorena hit her head against the doorframe. So. Much. Stuff. Thankfully, her forehead was saved by Percival, the little puppy standing on his back legs, his front ones pushing her. His little tail wagged at a supersonic speed and his little yips heart meltingly cute. She leaned down and scratched his little head.
She stood back up after a minute, and walked back to her room and grabbed her phone.
For the next hour and a half, Lorena made arrangements for her new home. Such as, hiring a couple maids, a professional dog sitter (that was also willing to take care of her reptiles as well), a gardener, a chauffeur, and a decorator. She also made an appointment with the Headmaster of Ouran to discuss her re-enrollment.
Next order of business: school. It was already mid-morning, so everyone would be in class, which would make things much easier.
Because she had to walk there, it was about mid-day by the time she arrived. Everyone was in class, thankfully, so the halls were empty.
A secretary directed her straight to the Headmaster's office to speak with him for their appointment.
She knocked, and waited for him to call her in. "Thank you for seeing me, Headmaster. I hope I'm not inconveniencing you too terribly."
"Not at all. Please, sit." He gestured to one of the chairs in front of his large oak desk.
She perched on the edge of the chair, "If you don't mind, I would prefer to get right to the point. I would like to re-enroll to Ouran Academy."
Headmaster Suoh nodded and shuffled the papers on his desk. When he found the forms he was looking for, he held them up for her to see. "These are your official transfer request forms." He then proceeded to rip them up and throw them away. "Consider it denied."
Lorena smiled kindly at the man. "Thank you, Headmaster, I really appreciate it. I could return to class as soon as tomorrow if you'd like."
He raised a hand to stop her from rising from her chair, "I have one condition, though." She sat back down, "You are registered as a first year, and yet you are old enough to be a second year. The board feels that it would reflect badly upon our school."
Lorena absorbed this information for a minute before replying, "What are you going to do?"
He leaned back in the chair, "I'm going to move you to Class 2-A."
"But, it's the middle of the school year..."
"I am confident that you will be able to handle the jump in academics. And as I understand it, you are a popular person, so you shouldn't have problems making friends either."
Lorena nodded, "I understand. Thank you, sir."
He nodded back, "That is all. Return to school tomorrow." He went back to filling out paperwork as she stood and left.
For the rest of the day, Lorena was unpacking. She first moved each box to their correct room, and then went room by room unpacking what could be unpacked. By the time she was mostly done, school was over and the Host Club would be ending soon.
I really should call Haruhi before it's too late. Lorena thought.
Without allowing herself to psych herself out of it, she opened her phone and called Haruhi. After three rings, she picked up.
"Lorena! Oh my God it's been so long since I've seen you! Where are you? What's going on?"
"Hi Haruhi." She hoped that her voice didn't let on how anxious and scared she felt. "I'm back in Japan." Her voice was small and soft, almost whispering into the phone.
"You are?! I'm coming over right now!"
Lorena could hear shuffling through the phone, "No, no. I'll come to you. I'm no longer in my apartment, so it would just be easier for me to come to you." She made sure she had her keys before leaving the house as she said this.
Haruhi sighed, "We were all so worried about you. You just disappeared. Out of the blue. We went to your apartment and found that everything had been packed up into boxes. It was only because of Kyoya that we knew you were leaving the country."
Lorena hailed a cab and informed the driver of where to take her. "I know, and I'm so sorry. I promise I will explain everything when I get there."
"Okay."
Lorena's hand rested on the doorknob to Music Room #3. She took a deep breath.
The urge to run was overwhelming.
Lorena had never been a particularly brave or selfless person. Quite the opposite, in fact, she was selfish and cowardly. But she would defy her nature for today. She owed that much to them.
The door felt like it was made of three-inch steel as Lorena opened it with dread.
On the other side, she found her friends all standing in a line with the parental "I'm-disappointed-in-you" pose. She breifly wondered if they planned it or if it just happened.
She gulped as the door clicked closed behind her.
There was a tense silence.
"What happened? Why did you cut us off like that? Do we really mean so little to you?" Haruhi looked both sad and angry.
The hurt expression on her friend's face broke her heart. "Of course not, Haruhi. If I could've contacted you, I would've." She sighed. "Theresa... She completely kept me from any contact with the outside world. She took away my laptop and my phone, and I was never out of her sight. And..."
"And?"
"And even if I could've, I wouldn't have. She was going to get you and Ranka evicted! And ruin the Suoh's reputation, cut off some of the Ootori's trading partners, and who knows what else."
Haruhi came over and hugged her tightly. "You were protecting us." She breathed.
Lorena hugged her back. "I'm sorry. Can you guys ever forgive me?"
Next thing she knew she was in the middle of a group hug, the twins and Tamaki cooing, "Awww, of course we forgive you Rena-chan~!"
Hikaru pulled away from nuzzling her head to ask, "Wait, you're here to stay, right?"
She laughed, "Yeah, unfortunately for you I'm not going anywhere." Another few seconds of hugging passed before Lorena remembered, "Oh yeah, in related news: I'm now a second-year."
Ba-dump. Lorena fell to the floor after ungracefully tripping over Haruhi's table. Luckily, Haruhi didn't see it, she only saw her lying on the floor. "What're you doing on the floor?"
"Just chillin'." She lied, her head resting on her hand leisurely as she played it off.
"Okay..." Haruhi probably thought she was really weird, but seemed to believe it.
When Haruhi sat down at the other side of the table, Lorena sat up correctly.
They sipped on tea and nibbled on crackers for a while.
Haruhi broke the comfortable silence, "Why did you never tell us about Jenna?"
She struggled to find the right words, "Uhm..." She fiddled with her teacup. She was going to make some witty comment, but when she looked at Haruhi, she found that she couldn't. "It hurt too much... It still feels like yesterday that it happened...I'm actually kind of surprised that the others didn't ask me about her. I was expecting a bombardment of questions."
"We want to respect your privacy, we understand why you wouldn't be able to bring it up. I'm gonna risk asking, but what exactly did happen?"
"I'm sorry, but I just can't..."
Haruhi interrupted her, "No, of course not, you're right. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have asked."
"It's fine." Lorena waved it away. "But I still feel as if I owe you something." She thought for a minute until a solution popped into her head. "I know, ask me anything. Except about Jenna."
Haruhi thought for a minute before straightening her back with purpose. "Tell me about how you got some of your scars. If that's okay."
She nodded. Moving around the table, she lifted the front of her shirt.
Her scars were not neat or pretty. They were ugly. And disfiguring. They caused her skin to stretch and discolor. Even gold-hearted Haruhi cringed a bit when she saw them. Everyone did.
Pointing to the large burn scar, she said, "I got this one when I had to lean across a burning beam to catch someone." She pointed to the large curved scar going diagonally across her torso, "This one I got from shrapnel in an explosion."
"Where does it start and end?" Haruhi asked curiously.
Lorena pulled down the waistband of her jeans on her left side to show her that it ended just above the top of her thigh. At the same time, she also pulled up the right side of her shirt so she could see that it started at the bottom of her ribcage.
She pointed to the one just above her right hip, "This one is from a surgery I had to get to fix my hip bone when I broke it."
"And this one?" Haruhi's fingers ghosted over the circular scar, her index finger could fit in the hole if she tried.
"I got that the day she was murdered. For that matter, that's when I also got this one." She pointed at the one that went across her torso.
"But you said you got that from shrapnel in an explosion. How did-?"
Lorena cut her off-forgetting what she had said only moments ago-, "We were at the mall, when it happened. It was a weekend, so it was pretty busy. We were in a shop, just outside of the food court-we were planning to get some ice cream once we were done there." Lorena's eyes were unfocused, lost in the memory, a contemptful smile on her face. "All of a sudden, some...crazy guy comes into the foodcourt and just...opened fire." She had to pause for a second, "Since we were so close, plenty of bullets made it into the store. She got two in the chest. I got one there-" she once again pointed at the mark in question, "-which punctured my lung, only to be stooped by the other side of my ribcage." She sighed, "Not a minute later, he committed suicide...using a bomb." She chuckled bitterly. "A piece of metal came flying at me, giving me this." She motioned to the large scar.
Haruhi didn't bother to wipe away her tears, instead going for a hug. Her arms wrapped around Lorena's neck tightly. "Thank you for trusting me this much."
Lorena hugged her back just as tightly, allowing herself to be completely immersed in the warmth and comfort of it. She buried her face in her friend's shoulder, closing her eyes and letting her heart be at peace for now. "I'm just glad things are back to normal."
Lorena stood confidently in front of the class, hiding a smirk at Tamaki's excited behavior.
"Class, this is Lorena Boone. She is new to this class but not to this school, so many of you may already know her. Regardless, please do your best to make her feel welcomed here." The teacher finished up her introduction and motioned her to an empty seat at the front of the room.
As she had mentioned, many of the students in the class already knew Lorena, but the ones who didn't know her introduced themselves accordingly.
When it came to be lunch time, Tamaki and Kyoya approached her. "Rena-chan~! We have a very important request for you!" Tamaki yanked her out of her seat with his usual flamboyance.
Kyoya explained for her, "Seeing as you are a memeber of the Host Club who is not a first-year, Tamaki wants you to join the rest of us and Nekozawa in our venture to scare the wits out of Haruhi and the twins."
Lorena smiled at them, "That sounds like a lot of fun. Do we get to dress up in scary costumes?"
"Of course!" Tamaki sparkled and shimmered at the idea.
"I have the perfect idea for my costume." Lorena smirked mischievously at the thought of it.
It was perfect. Down to the last detail.
Lorena was dressed up as a widow who killed her husband. She wore a lacy black dress with matching black heels, a black spiked bracelet, a skull ring, and a black hat with a little black veil tilted on her head. Her weapon was a fireman's axe (the blade was foam-for safety purposes).
The plan was as follows: Tamaki would scare them away from the stairs and down the hallway. Takashi would be waiting in the first room as Frankenstein. Honey would be waiting in the second room as a pumpkin-head (though he insisted he was the Wolf-man). And finally, Lorena would be waiting in the third room to give them the final blow.
She didn't have to wait long. Getting in position when she heard the screams, she was standing sideways to the door, and hid the axe behind her leg.
She almost couldn't stand the excitement as she heard the first two rooms being opened by Soga and Kaoru and their screams of terror. She put a hand to her face as the tears sprang to her eyes.
Bam! The doors hit the walls as they were flung open.
Her sobs echoed in the empty room, the light spilling in from the hallway illuminating her figure.
"H-...Hello?" She almost didn't hear Soga's stuttering voice.
"My-My husband... He...He..." She sobbed. Facing them fully, the axe was revealed, "He was too easy to kill!"
They screamed bloody-murder as they ran away, only to be pushed into a room and trapped there by Nekozawa and his servants.
"Wheee~!" Honey cheered as he swung on Lorena's shoulders.
"Careful, Honey. It's not easy balancing in high heels, and I don't want to fall." She held him to her side so he couldn't swing anymore as they made their way out of the school.
"Rena-chan, do you wanna go trick-or-treating with me and Takashi?"
She paused, "Oh. I'm sorry, but I already agreed to go trick-or-treating with someone else."
"Who?"
She smiled, "Oh, just a new friend I made. I met him not long after I got back here." Honey's face fell, disappointed. "I promise next year I'll trick-or-treat with you guys." He cheered up at that.
"That sounds great! Right, Takashi?"
Startled, she looked over her shoulder to see that he was indeed following along behind her. "How long have you been there?"
"Not long."
"Uh-huh..." She looked forward once again and saw that Mizuno was waiting for her at the school gate. "Oh! There"s my ride." She handed Honey to Takashi. "See you guys later!"
They watched her walk away and say something to the person before she got on the back of the motorcycle and drove away.
"I wonder who that was..." Honey muttered from atop Takashi's shoulders.
2:19 am. Her phone was blindingly bright in the darkness, illuminating the way up her driveway. Heels in one hand, her phone and keys in the other, she almost couldn't get the door open.
Her stomach ached from all the candy and food she had shared with Mizuno, but it was worth it. Everything they ate was so damn good.
She locked the door behind her and padded to her room, nearly killing herself when she almost tripped over Creature. She plugged in her phone and changed for bed, washing the makeup off her face. She only noticed her texts when she was getting into bed.
Mizuno: I had a lot of fun tonight.
Lorena: Me too.
Mizuno: I wanted to thank you, for treating me like a person, inspite of my disability. Not many people do that. You don't make me feel like I'm inconveniencing you when we speak in sign language. Thank you.
Lorena: Of course. It makes me happy that you can be so comfortable around me. Thank you for being such a wonderful friend.
Mizuno: Alright, enough mushy talk. Isn't it past your bed time? Go the fuck to sleep.
Lorena: Alright, alright. Goodnight. Be safe.
Mizuno: Goodnight. Sweet dreams. Sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite. Whatever you Americans say.
She shook her head and turned her phone off, rolling over to snuggle up against Percival. Within the minute, she was asleep.
A/N: So, tell me what you think. Up next: Kasanoda!
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