Emi

Escaping while the host club was busy with their customers proved easier than I thought it would be. I guess during class there aren’t any squealing girls to pull the twins away from their prey- meaning me. I had no doubt that tomorrow I would hear about this from someone, most likely them. I couldn’t really bring it in myself to care, however. I mean, who wants to sit in a room full of squealing girls while the boys flirt with them? And if what I caught as I inched out of the door was any indication, those twins were not exactly the sort I wanted to stand there and watch. What was with them having their hands all over each other, anyways?

At home, I found Eri missing from her bed. Instead she was sprawled out in the middle of her bedroom floor with piles of clothing, books, and papers spread out around her. It wasn’t that horribly surprising seeing as the longer Eri was confined to her room, more and more things tended to pile up. It was actually more encouraging than anything, she must have been full of energy after getting up if she’d managed to get this mess. I swear, Eri was the sort who without our maids would have a room that you couldn’t walk across without stepping on something.

“And may I ask what your room did this time around to deserve this?” I asked, dropping my things on top of a pile on her desk. “Also, why aren’t you in bed?”

“We’re switching places today.”

I paused, rather surprised to be honest. Normally that sort of thing was my field of business.

“That’s not exactly the answer I was looking for,” I told her, examining her piles with my eyes. I knew from experience not to mess them up when I crossed the room. One wrong move and there’d be an avalanche.

“I decided about an hour ago. Today, we’re switching, then we can play the two places at once game on Thursday. Until then, I get to be you and you get to stay here,” she said, ignoring me.

I blinked, then sighed a little as I picked my path around her stacks and dropped myself next to her on the floor. My back was up against the foot of her bed and I could easily see the book she’d been flipping through. It seemed to be something comparing centipedes and millipedes.

My sister astounded me sometimes. It made me question how on earth we could be twins.

“The reason?” I asked, deciding to leave the topic of her literature choice out of the discussion for now.

Eri scowled, snapping her book shut as she looked to me.

“I’m tired of sitting around here wiggling my thumbs, and I would rather die than have one more person call me or one more servant come in here, both just to ask if I’m feeling any better. LIke they even give a fu-”

“So you’re going to school before the doctor said you could so you can make me take the calls and questions instead of you,” I said, choosing to cut into her rant. Eri rarely cursed, although she tended to have a bit of a temper when it came to these things. I’d actually seen her yell at someone for telling her that she shouldn’t do something because of her health.

“I am.”

“You’ll no doubt get sick again,” I told her, disapproval filling my tone.

“Might not,” Eri replied, sticking out her tongue as she dropped her eyes back down to the textbook. “I’m tired of studying out of these. I want to learn in a classroom with a teacher. I want to be around people besides you, no offense, even if I’d rather not actually talk to them. You like skipping school, right? Then this should be something you’d enjoy.”

She impatiently shoved the book back against one of her stacks as she spoke and sat up to dig through another. Just as she’d found whatever it was she was searching for, she clasped her hands to her face in order to cover up a cough that racked her whole body.

“You’ll get caught,” I pointed out. “I’m not sick.”

“I won’t get caught if you help me,” she retorted, grabbing the book she’d located and tugging on it. “As for the cough, it’s not as bad as the vomiting was. I can just tell anyone that asks that you have some sort of small cold from being out all night or whatever. Knowing how you act they’d probably believe it.”

I sighed, reaching out to steady the stack as it almost fell over on her. When it was secure, I reached up to curl a strand of my hair around a finger.

“No way to talk you out of this?” I asked.

There was no way I would do this if there was. After all, I’d rather have an unusually annoyed and messy her than a sick her on any day.

“Not a chance in hell,” she retorted.

“Alright…” I told Eri finally. “I guess I should tell you about the people I’ve met, then. You’ll probably have to deal with at least a few of them.”

_________________________________

Eri

Like always, switching rooms was a piece of cake. I could feel the worry rolling off Emi as we said our good-nights before hand, but I pushed it aside. there was no way I was spending another day stuck here. I couldn’t help it if she was worried about me, I’d told her enough times not to be. Besides, she’d shown me her notes. I was going to go crazy if those things were the only thing telling me what was going on at school.

The next morning found me up long before the maids. I carefully sat out Emi’s sketchbook on her bed, an excuse for the reason she was up so early if the maids saw the light on. On normal days, meaning days when I wasn’t sick, Emi wasn’t up until at least ten minutes after they’d started trying. The alarmclock sat by her bed wasn’t even turned on, on those days. Secretly, I believe she’s up before then, just refuses to make anything easy for them.

When I was sure I had things the way she would have them, I located the uniform in her closet. The dress fit a little loosely, but that was easy to hide just by adjusting it with pins from her dresser. Maybe I should have grabbed my dress before we switched rooms. As identical as we were, there was that small difference in size, it wasn’t completely noticeable, but existed none-the-less.

It didn’t take me long to realize that my impatience to get out of the house has led to being up far too long before I’d be leaving for school. I ended up sitting on the bed and flipping through Emi’s sketchbook until the maid knocked on the door to say that breakfast was beings served in “Eri’s” room. I was fine enough with putting her sketchbook aside, seeing as I’d realized, much to my annoyance, that most of the pictures in there were portraits of me. Honestly, my sister needed to take a look at herself. Someday someone would accuse her of having a sister complex, she’d deny it of course and probably deck the person, but it’d be true!

Thanking the maid, I waited until I knew she was gone before crossing the hall. Emi was already propped up on the bed, her eyes narrowed and locked on me the moment I stepped inside.

“I still don’t think this is a good idea,” she informed me as I pulled the top off of my breakfast. Her annoyed tone lost it’s effect as she yawned, covering her mouth one of her hands.

“Aren’t you the one who’s always saying I should be more like you since we’re twins?” I asked. “This is something you would do.”

She scowled, picking at the tray I now noticed was sat beside her.

“I didn’t mean something that could possibly get you sick.”

“One day early isn’t going to kill me,” I retorted.

She didn’t reply. Sighing, I pulled up a chair next to my bed ends at down to eat. We had around thirty minutes left before I could leave without being disastrously early for class.

“Don’t get anything on my blankets,” I instructed, eyes watching her hands.

“Says the girl who had her room trashed yesterday,” Emi snorted.

“Oh, yeah… did you clean that up or did the help?”

“I did, of course.”

I sighed again, picking at my food. Of course Emi did. She was too concerned about everything involving me for her own good. My eyes soon found their way to the clock on the wall, showing only a few minutes had passed since I last checked it.

“The school isn’t going anywhere,” Emi told me.

“I know that.”

"I know that."

"Then quit looking."

"Watch where your hands are instead of where my eyes are."

"If I watch my hands I might spill something."

"Because that logic computes."

"Aren't you supposed to be the nice one?"

"You're me right now, I can be as rude as I want."

"Shut up."

We stared at each other for a moment, before both of us burst out laughing. I had a feeling that today was going to go just fine.

_______________________________________

When I arrived at school, I was as nervous as possible.

When I arrived at school, I was as nervous as possible. I couldn't really help it, to be honest. Despite my earlier feelings that everything was going to go fine, deceiving people wasn't something I normally chose to do. That was more my sister's field of expertise.

I've gone this far, though, so I might as well continue with it, I told myself, shaking my head a little.

At the same time, I felt my throat itch. Since I'd gotten up, a dull ache had been trying to draw attention to itself in the back of my throat, this itch just being a little part of that. Immediately, I had my hand over my mouth as a small cough tried to slip out. The sound ended up being muffled as annoyance flooded through me.

Forget deceiving, I would be lucky if I didn't get "Emi" sent home sick. All I could hope for is that my new classmates weren't germaphobes.

"Hano-chan!"

The moment I stepped through the door I jumped back to keep from having two arms draped over my shoulders. I shuddered at the thought. Physical contact just wasn’t my thing, no matter who it was, well, beyond Emi of course.

Why did she have to catch their attention? I wondered, drawing up the names she had given me in my mind.

Hikaru and Kaoru, although she hadn't told me any way to tell them apart. Glancing up at them, I carefully noted any differences in features, figuring that I'd see someone identify one of them at a later point. The only point I found instantly was that their hair was parted in opposite directions.

"Why'd you leave yesterday?" the left one asked.

"Honey-senpai was disappointed," right twin added.

"I didn't want to watch a bunch of girls being airheads," I responded, easily pulling up the excuse Emi had given me.

"They aren't that bad. They adore us," said left.

"That's part of the problem," I retorted, allowing my eyes to scan the room. Emi had said I sat next to one of the twins, Kaoru, I think. "Who in their right minds would adore you?"

Internally, I knew that comment was not only harsh, but untrue. After all, they were cute, not shy, and they were twins. From what I’d heard of them from Emi, they seemed to be the sort that most girls fawned over. Although, I could have been wrong, Emi could have left something out or have twisted the details. She tended to over exaggerate sometimes.

“Girls with bad taste,” I grumbled, pulling an Emi response from my mind.

“Hello, Hano-san,” a voice spoke up, drawing my attention from the twins for a moment.

There was a girl, no… wait, she/he was wearing a guy’s uniform, so it must have been a guy. They were sitting at the desk between the twins. A name bubbled to the surface of my thoughts. Emi had mentioned a girl-like guy named Haruhi.

“That’s not nice.”

Haruhi said something to the twins, drawing their attention away from me and giving me a chance to study him. I found it hard to shake off my first impression. Yet, if he/she was wearing a guy’s uniform and everyone else thought he/she was a he… I guess I’d agree to it, as wrong a feeling as it gave me.

Besides, Emi had informed me to be “extra nice” to Haruhi. Apparently she found him interesting. Poor him.

The twins had begun bickering with Haruhi, giving me my chance to locate Emi's seat. At the same time, I couldn't help but scan the room for where I would sit when we were both here. There was only two other open seats in the room, one of them at the front, the other directly in front of the seat I had to assume was Hikaru's.

Well, the one in front of him would put me closer to Emi...

"What're you looking at?" one of them asked, startling me. I couldn't help the small squeak that escaped me, followed by a cough.

"N-nothing," I muttered, turning my attention back to my original destination.

The twin who had spoken rose a brow. Crap, that definitely wasn't Emi behavior.

"Are you ok-"

"I'm fine," I interrupted, give a roll of my eyes. "It's just a cough."

They couldn't know her well enough for that to be suspicious, I decided, forcing myself to relax after the little slip. The twins took their seats, giving me the idea that I should do the same.

Just as I'd done so, the teacher approached the front of the room. Straightening up, I pulled out the notebook Emi had been using to take notes for me. Flipping to the last page, I scowled a little when I noticed her doodles. They managed to cover basically all of the margins, along with overlapping the words in a few places.

She really needed to focus more if she was going to try and keep up for me. Maybe I'd have to talk to someone so that next time I was gone they'd take notes for me instead...

Class passed rather quickly. It wasn't that difficult to infer the things I didn't know whenever the teacher would bring up a topic that I hadn't covered completely, or hadn't touched at school. Most of my textbooks at home were for that purpose, keeping me up in my classes so I wouldn't have a chance of flunking and falling a class behind.

When it was time for lunch, I found myself hesitating on what to do. Emi had warned me that I would probably be asked to accompany them, and I couldn’t figure out whether it was a bad idea or not. Emi would argue if asked, but she might give in now simply for the amount of cute boys she’d described as being the twins’ friends. I, on the other hand, could decide if, when surrounded by so many males, I’d be able to hold up Emi’s personality. Eventually I decided I could, seeing as since I wasn’t the type to be dazzled by them, and Emi was the type to respond rudely rather than actually showed that she’s dazzled, it would be easy enough.

With this in mind, I agreed when they brought it up. I hadn’t quite figured out what part of Emi had caught their attention, but it worked. This also meant I wouldn’t be spending lunch alone.

“Emi-chan!’

I glanced away from the twins, who had been discussing something I hadn’t quite been paying attention to. The one who’d called out was the a small blonde boy, who I could easily guess was the one Akari had called Honey. In front of him he had a few plates of cake, and there was a pink bunny perched on his lap.

Emi had said to call him… senpai…?

“Honey-senpai,” I greeted, turning my eyes to the others sitting around the table. I could easily guess which was which from Emi’s descriptions and what I’d already heard when attending Lobelia.

“Why’d you disappear yesterday?” Honey asked, drawing my attention back to him. There was a small pout on his lips. “You said you’d have cake with me.”

Damn you, Emi. I thought to myself.

“I’m sorry,” I told him, putting a smile on my face. Emi loved kids. “I remembered yesterday that I had something to deal with at home. I’d be happy to make up for that now, though.”

I hated sweets, Emi was the one who didn’t have a problem with them.

A pleased smile wiped away the pout Honey’d had as he moved one of his plates of cake to the empty space next to him.

“Okay!”

“What sort of business did you have at home?” one of the others, Kyoya I believe, asked. His eyes were studying me, a small smirk on his lips.

Crap, had I done something out of character?

“Family business.”

I sat down next to Honey, the twins still stuck in their conversation as they took a seat on the opposite side of me. It seemed that now that they’d gotten what they wanted they were content to leave me be.

“Anything to do with your sister?”

I froze, eyes darting back up to him. I could tell the others were surprised. Kyoya, however, was unreadable. A simple smirk sat on his lips, one hand braced against the bridge of his glasses.

“You have a sister?” the one next to him, Tamaki, asked.

“Y-yes,” I sputtered, losing my cool for just a moment. How had Kyoya known that? “An older sister.”

“How much older? Will she be coming to this school? Why’d you have to go home?” Tamaki asked, the questions coming in rapid fire.

“What’s she look like?” one of the twins asked.

I hesitated, trying to quickly draw my answers. This wasn’t how things were supposed to go. Good thing that the answer I had on hand was one that could apply to all of it.

“She gets sick,” I said, dropping my eyes. I would just have to play the distraught girl. “I had to go home because I was worried about her. I’m not sure if her health will allow her to come, although our parents planned on sending both of us here. She’s a year older… her and I aren’t that different in looks…”

I dropped my voice for good luck, trying to pull the emotional card. If I made it seem like a hard subject, maybe they wouldn’t as anymore, as guilty as tricking them like that made me feel. Plus, the year thin wasn’t a complete lie, Emi and I were New Year babies. Meaning that even though we were only born thirty minutes apart, we we’re technically born in different years.

Take that, I thought, thinking of Kyoya’s smirk.

"How sad!" Tamaki declared, and I was suddenly swept out of my seat in a hug. Surprise shot through me, I hadn't even noticed him get up. "You can cry on me, Hano-chan!"

"W-what?!" I sputtered, struggling to get free.

"Really sad," Honey added in. I caught sight of him, his eyes were welled up with tears and he had his bunny clutched to his chest.

"Put her down, Tamaki," Kyoya said with a sigh.

Tamaki let me go, and I fell back into my seat, gasping. A small cough burst from my chest at that moment, the excitement causing a problem. Another cough followed a second later.

"Are you okay?"

My eyes snapped upwards, locking on one of the twins. If I was right, it was Kaoru. He was leaning towards me, curiosity in his eyes.

"You were coughing in class, earlier, too," he added.

"Hmmm."

My eyes moved to Kyoya, who seemed to be considering something. I couldn't help but shiver, getting the nagging feeling that he knew more than he should. Coughing once more, I turned my attention back to everyone else and gave them a thin smile.

"I'm fine."