~The Twins Fight~

Kofuyu stood beside the person she'd consider her closest friend, Haruhi. It was sort of Kofuyu's silent way of checking up on her to make sure she wasn't too bothered by Hikaru, Kaoru, and Tamaki's actions.  

"Can you believe them?" Haruhi sighed more to herself than to Kofuyu. Kofuyu hummed and her eyes went to the floor. The silence that fell between them only lasted for a second, though. The twins got the girls' attention by waving them over. 

"We've got a favor to ask you," they explained. Kofuyu's eyes narrowed, and she was already ready to decline their request. Hikaru and Kaoru asking for a favor? Yeah, that's very suspicious. 

"What is it?" answered Haruhi in a flat tone. She waited for the twins to answer, but Kofuyu turned her head away, uninterested. 

"The next time we get a day off..." 

"Can we come over to your place and hang out?"

"You're neighbors, so it's convenient." 

"No," Kofuyu answered quickly.  Not only had she made up her mind before they even asked, but there was no way Kofuyu wanted to invite them over. 

"Why would you wanna do that?" asked Haruhi. The three didn't respond to Kofuyu's hasty decision, and the two brothers tried to convince Haruhi to agree. 

"We're curious! We want to see where you live." Hikaru and Kaoru stood on either side of the girls. 

Haruhi answered in a blank face. "No way." Kofuyu confidently shook her head and tried to walk away from the three, but one of the twins, Hikaru, wrapped an arm around her to keep her from leaving. 

"Aww, pretty please?" asked Hikaru. Kofuyu glared up at him, but he was unphased by her hostile actions. 

"What makes you think that I'd ever agree to that?" She wiggled in Hikaru's arm, trying to get away from him. 

She no longer panicked when the hosts would hold her or show any sort of physical "affection", but that still doesn't mean she enjoyed it. 

"Haruhi, please?" Kaoru asked her. Kofuyu eventually got away from Hikaru by pinching his arm, something she's seen Haruhi effectively do to get Tamaki away from her. 

"No, you guys are just going to make fun of me," answered Haruhi, defensively. 

"You guys are so judgmental without even realizing it," added Kofuyu. With her arms crossed over her chest, she turned her head away. 

"No matter how much we beg you?" Hikaru and Kaoru persisted, and Kofuyu noted how they didn't even deny their accusations. 

"I, too, have been thinking that it is about time we pay our respects to your family!" Tamaki suddenly shouted, more determined than he's ever been. 

"No way in hell, Senpai," Haruhi declined. 

"Yeah, no thanks. I'm alone more than half the time anyway," Kofuyu mumbled. "You probably wouldn't meet my aunt."

"All the more reason you should invite your friends to keep you company!" Tamaki reasoned. Kofuyu's eyes trailed down to the floor, and she found herself thinking about how Takejiro would visit her house whenever she was home alone. 

"Huh... it's been a while since I thought about him..."

"We can settle this with a game!" Hikaru and Kaoru pulled on their green hats. "If neither of you can pick out which one of us is Hikaru, then we get to come over to your house later tonight!~" The two started spinning around, and Kofuyu narrowed her eyes into another glare. "So, which one of us is Hikaru?" 

Without missing a beat, Haruhi answered, "This one's Kaoru, and this one's Hikaru." She pointed to each twins as she said their name. Kofuyu nodded, agreeing with Haruhi. She wasn't confident enough to answer which twins was which, but she was confident in Haruhi's judgment. 

"Uh, oh! You got it wrong!" Hikaru and Kaoru smiled, and so did Haruhi. Kofuyu's chest filled with confusion at Haruhi's reaction. 

"No, I know I'm right. You guys may look alike but you're very different," replied Haruhi. 

"I guess I've never payed enough attention to try and see the differences in their personalities," Kofuyu admitted. "Then again, I've never needed to," she thought. Kofuyu's eyes searched for any physical differences in the twins, but she couldn't find any. She glanced at Haruhi before saying, "I always go by the differences in their voices." 

"Yeah, I guess that is the most noticable difference between them," Haruhi agreed.

"How can you tell them apart, Haruhi? It's almost impossible when they wear those hats that cover their hair and talk at the same time!" The guest marveled at Haruhi and practically shoved Kofuyu out of the way to speak with the hosts. 

Kofuyu fought the urge to glare at them. She took a deep breath then slowly backed away from the group until she was able to walk away, unnoticed by the hosts. She felt no need to stay around any longer. Haruhi was able to tell them apart, she won the game, so they wouldn't be visiting that night. 

"Good thing too. I think this is one of the nights Aunt Tomiko will be home too. I don't need her meeting these guys. If she does, she'll never stop mentioning them," Kofuyu figured. "Plus, I don't need them asking questions about Takejiro's shrine." She did what she normally did when she didn't have any work to do, and began gathering the abandoned cups left around the room. 

Her mind went blank, and she was completely unaware of her surroundings and unaware of the festering argument between the twin hosts. She started to feel sluggish, tired, and ready to go home. A small sigh left her mouth, but she continued to carefully stack the teacups onto the cart. 

"What!?" Tamaki shouted causing Kofuyu to flinch. She lifted her head and looked for the origin of his voice. 

"You've got it all wrong, Kaoru! Man, you're such a freak," Hikaru berated his brother, and Kofuyu's eyebrows furrowed. She's never seen them look so genuinely agree at each other. 

"Yeah, there's some things in this world that must never be said," added Tamaki in a shaky voice.  

"What on Earth are they talking about?" Kofuyu watched from half-way across the room. "Maybe I should try and distance myself, so I can stay out of it." She pushed the cart towards the kitchen doors, but curiosity got the best of her. She continued to listen in, and it wasn't hard because of how loud they were being. 

"Why would I fall for her?! I mean, she looks like a tanuki!" Hikaru threw his arm up towards where Haruhi stood. 

Kofuyu stood in front of the kitchen doors and faced the twins. She watched secretly interested yet indifferent on the outside. "Why are they bringing Haruhi into their argument??"

"How dare you call her a raccoon dog! You're gonna pay for that!" Tamaki screamed. The brothers didn't reply. They were too busy arguing with each other to respond to him. 

"Cut it out already! You're the one who's always crawling into my bed," Hikaru shouted at his brother. "How annoying," he sneered. Kofuyu's eyes narrowed. 

"I only do that cause you look lonely! I wouldn't choose to sleep in your bed, you idiot," argued Kaoru. 

Kofuyu rolled her eyes. Even when they were arguing, they're making the guests swoon. 

"The girls love their incestuous act, don't they? Wait a minute... are they acting right now? I can't tell. They look genuinely angry at each other, but I desperately don't want to believe their relationship is anything more than familial," thought Kofuyu. She cringed as the guests squealed. She decided to push those thoughts out of her head. 

"Who are you calling me an idiot! You're the one that sucks at math!"

"Oh, yeah? Well, you're failing your foreign language class, you big dummy!"

"At least I don't toss and turn  so much that I fall out of bed!" 

Kofuyu turned away. She already lost interest as the brothers kept hurling insults at each other. She went into the kitchen and left the cart of dishes in there. She didn't feel like unloading them and decided to leave them there for the nightly clean-up crew instead. 

When she left the kitchen, the guests were leaving. Tamaki held the doors open for the girls that headed out, and Hikaru and Kaoru were still hurling random insults at each other. 

"Could their argument really be that serious?" Kofuyu found herself walking towards Kyoya. He stood off to the side while scribbling notes down in his notebook. "He looks focused, maybe stressed. I think it's about the twins. Knowing him, he's probably trying to calculate how much the host club is going to loose." Kofuyu scoffed quietly. She stood beside Kyoya and asked, "We're closing early today?" 

"We won't be able to functions up to the normal host club standards with the twins arguing like this," answered Kyoya. He peaked over the edge of his notebook to look at her. 

"You've known them way longer than I have. Have they ever argued like this before?" Kofuyu asked. Her eyes watched the twins, looking for any sign that they weren't actually angry at each other, but she found none. 

"No." 

"Oh," mumbled Kofuyu. She didn't say anything else even though she had so many other questions. Her hands clasped together in front of her 

"Are your hands healing properly?" Kyoya spoke in a quiet tone. His eyes went to the large band-aids that covered the meaty part of her palms, then he went back to staring at the pen marks that littered over the notebook pages. 

"Huh? Oh, yeah, it's fine." It took her a second to understand what he was talking about. Her mind was quickly filled with thoughts from the kitchen with Kyoya and Haruhi. She thought about the way he held her hands. "He was so gentle. Maybe too gentle? Is that possible? I remember it felt like he actually cared, but he could've just learned that because of his family's health care organization."

Kofuyu's eyes darted around the room, but her eyes never actually focused on anything. Her mouth was going dry, and her lips were pressed into a thin line. 

"Why is my gut telling me he actually cares? Could it just be confirmation bias? Am I just choosing to believe he cares about me because I want him to care?" 

Kyoya's eyes went back to the girl standing beside him. He noticed the worried look on her face, and a frown tugged on his lips. He quickly recovered, and went back the calm and collected expression he normally had. 

"You seem worried." 

"Hmm," mumbled Kofuyu. "I'm not... just thinking." Feeling vulnerable because he was able to read her emotions, she crossed her arms over her chest and walked away.