Ouran High School Host Club Fan Fiction ❯ Sleeping In ❯ Sleeping In - Chapter Eleven - Best Laid Plans ( Chapter 11 )

Sleeping In

by Palatyne

Chapter Eleven

Best-Laid Plans

Disclaimer: I do not own Ouran High School Host Club. The original manga story, characters and plot belong to Bisco Hatori, Lala, English editions to Viz Media and the anime to Bones, et.al.

Author's Note: I begin again with apologies for the delay. I hope you enjoy this, though it's a little short.

Thank you so much to all those still faithfully following this story. I appreciate all the reviews, and I am ever grateful. Thank you!

Kyouya Ootori sat in a slightly secluded corner of the Music Room, in an alcove of sorts that gave him the perfect vantage point from which to view the entire room, and the rest of the Club. It was another busy afternoon and normally he'd be watching the progress of the designations whilst reviewing their books or planning and organizing a future event.

He sat there as he always did, calm and collected. Yet his notebook lay open and unnoticed on his lap. His gaze would occasionally sweep the room, but only out of habit.

For a strange sense of disarray simmered beneath his veneer of calm, and this was now a constant feature of his days.

At times he felt as is he were constantly on the alert, his mind and body humming and ready for battle. At other times he felt a hushed sense of excitement, as if he were standing at the edge of the shore in an undertow, the onslaught of waves imminent but not unwelcome.

A less pragmatic man would be worried, but Kyouya Ootori embraced this newfound facet of his otherwise monotone emotional spectrum with an alacrity that surprised him - even if he did so only in the silence and privacy of his reflections.

The source of these strange emotions he was now able to deduce. Several weeks ago he stood at the precipice of failure. But with a turn of the tide, his suit moved from the edge of the cliff to safer ground.

A fighting chance.

The trip to Haruhi's house was an impulse (or as near as an impulsive decision for someone like him) and he had not expected it to work out at all. But it did, and in some small way it made a difference.

It proved to him something that he had begun to realize the moment he confessed his feelings - that she found it difficult to trust him.

She always suspected him of ulterior motives, always jumping to the more sinister conclusion -

believing that she had no value to him, other than as a Host Club member, the girl who owed him 8 million yen.

He couldn't blame her for her distrust, not when he was partly responsible for her being forced into the Club. Their very first encounter involved a debt to be paid, and even now that was all she could think of.

Yet he never told her or the others that the vase meant nothing to him, worthless compared to all the other things he had to spend for in the Club. The vase had been easily replaced with one from his family's own collection - a piece worth far more than the one destroyed.

He never even wrote the debt down.

Special Student, Haruhi Fujioka.

He had read her name, saw her records and her excellent grades, saw her picture - he had been expecting to run into her sooner or later.

What he didn't expect were her brown eyes, her irreverence, her nonchalance, her disdain for their wealth and privilege, her perceptiveness, and her kindness.

He didn't expect her.

He had learned his lesson.

No more plans, no more schemes.

There was only one plan now. To make her trust him. To make her believe him.

And more.

But all the rest could wait.

He could wait.

He took the near-forgotten notebook and browsed through it for that afternoon's schedule. He had a meeting with the president of the History Club for the use of certain artifacts for the Host Club's activities next month. The theme was the Italian Renaissance - another extravagant but foolish request from Tamaki.

The same Tamaki who, for the past hour had been trying in vain to observe him as inconspicuously as possible.

Kyouya could make him out from the distance, seated in one of the loveseats at the center of the room looking for all the world like the perfect host fully attentive to his clients. But surreptitiously his eyes would wander, his eyes trained towards Kyouya's direction - observing, watching, perhaps even waiting for something. For days he had been that way, suddenly aloof and observant.

Perhaps this, Kyouya thought, was another reason why he had been on edge the past days. He stood then, striding purposefully towards the door, leaving the steady chatter and noise of the Music Room behind him.

He was not surprised when a few strides after the door clicked shut, it creaked open again and he heard Tamaki voice.

“Kyouya, I need to talk to you.” Tamaki intoned gravely, his exaggerated somber voice echoing in the empty hallway.

Inwardly, Kyouya sighed - part relief, part unease. He knew that sooner or later the rest of the Club would figure out his pursuit of Haruhi. Mori and Hunny-sempai were first, then the Hitaachin twins.

And now was Tamaki's turn.

He knew Tamaki was not a fool - despite most of his actions pointing towards that conclusion. His only weakness was his lack of perceptiveness, his utter trust in the goodness of others, his naiveté - but he was no fool.

Now, though last of them all, he had finally noticed. The one person he would consider calling his friend.

Friend.

He had always wondered about the word. Tamaki used the terms so freely, so casually. It was the same with the rest of Club members. He, on the other hand, could not claim to have the same ease with the word.

Yet, despite his own reticence, he could not deny that Tamaki was indeed his friend - or at least the closest to one he will ever have.

And if nothing else, Tamaki was a good friend.

“What is it, Tamaki?” He asked evenly, as he paused in his stride, turning around to face him. He set his face with a mask of indifference.

They were barely a few feet from each other, yet Kyouya could sense the distance as if it were an actual physical barrier.

Tamaki was staring at him defiantly, determinedly - as if he were putting all of his courage in the act.

When his words came out they were uncertain, but firm.

“I…I've seen what you've been doing.”

“I've been doing a lot of things lately. To which are you referring to?” Kyouya asked, not to feign innocence or to mock but to make things clear.

If this was to be the inevitable confrontation, then at least the terms were clear.

“I know what you've been doing...” Tamaki paused, gauging his next words. “As Otousan I cannot condone what you're doing! You've been spending way too much time with our daughter and it's not fair!”

So it begins.

“I...I know you went to her house last week! And every time there's a break in-between designations you are always with her!” Tamaki continued.

The outburst came in a rush of breath and whining, and in the end the effort seemed to have drained Tamaki of all the determined courage he had built up. He seemed to have relaxed a little, now that he had spoken his mind.

Kyouya however, felt a spark of anger. The realization disturbed him and for a moment he was still. His plan was to evade Tamaki's questions, to deflect them as he had done with the others.

But something about Tamaki's words angered him, the way he reverted to the mask of Otousan, the way he held back and let the illusion of family hold - despite his obvious objection to whatever it was he thought Kyouya was doing.

“Well, aren't you going to say anything?” Tamaki demanded.

“Why are you asking me this?” He intoned, trying to force calmness into his words.

“I told you! Why are you monopolizing our daughter?!”

“What Haruhi does with her time is her business.”

“It is my business, she's our daughter!” Tamaki cried out.

For a few still moments he was silent, then in a quiet voice he replied.

“She is not your daughter, nor mine.”

Perhaps it was the way he said it, the icy steel in his voice.

Or perhaps it was the way he moved as step forward as he said it, his steady eyes trained on Tamaki - willing him to realize that he was no longer playing games.

Perhaps it was simply the expression of sheer frustration and anger on his face.

But as the words came out, spoken harshly enough to echo slightly in the hallway, he knew that there would be no turning back.

He could only hope, that Tamaki realized this as well.

“Instead of asking me stupid questions about Haruhi, you should be asking yourself why you even care.” He continued quietly.

“I don't understand…”

For the first time since they stepped into the hallway, Tamaki's voice had changed its tenor. No longer was it the childish whine that it was seconds earlier. It was the voice of someone utterly confused, confronted by something unexpected.

This was the voice of his friend.

A friend that may very well be the one hurdle to his current goal - perhaps the one obstacle he could not possibly surmount.

A rival.

Possibly.

If he stops being an idiot.

But he took comfort in the fact that Tamaki was still blissfully ignorant of his own feelings, his true feelings for the girl he called his daughter.

He would not be the one to make the realization for him.

It was not his place.

More importantly, although Tamaki was perhaps his only friend, he was still Kyouya Ootori.

And this was one struggle he could not bear to lose.

But as always, the terms had to be clear. He had to be fair. He would give his friend sufficient warning.

Or as clear a warning as I can afford.

As he turned away from a now frowning, thoroughly confused Tamaki, he declared:

“I already know what I want.”

To be continued…