The Host Club Is Back In Session
. . . Sort Of

It would have been a stretch of the truth to say that the evening of the ball had a completely happy ending, an outright fallacy to think that the latter half of the soon-to-be infamous Christmas Saturnalia went as well as the first half. The entire affair did not go off, as they say, without its fair share of hitches.

But the decency of the rich would not allow for anything less than a civil ending at very least—strained perhaps, not as magical as it was hard to convince people a pumpkin was a carriage once it had already changed back, but still far from the disaster host and black magic club alike were acutely aware it could have become. Perhaps it was knowing that it was the last school function before the New Year's break that was responsible for the benefit of the doubt attendees gave the ball; or perhaps it had more to do with the irresistibility of the hosts, who by this time were quite proficient in rescuing a situation. However, one thing that could be said with absolute certainty was that, as Tamaki had rightly spoken, the event most definitely could not have been called a complete failure. And so their track record continued.

Vacation had passed before it even seemed to start, students returning to classes with slates wiped clean by the changing of the year, their memories of that night softened by family celebrations and the general holiday cheer that assaulted all who went out in public. The first day back was a gloomy winter day indeed. Gray covered everything, not least of all the cloudy sky that constantly threatened but never delivered upon snow.

Partly because of that, partly because of lingering holiday fatigue, and partly because of the mysterious absence of the twins, the host club was only operating at half speed; however, they had found a very fitting use for Mori, as his deep, monotone voice was perfect for reading out the verses on the One Hundred Poems by One Hundred Poets cards.

"Long as the long tail/ of the mountain pheasants/ in the foot-wearying hills . . ."

Honey immediately began scrounging through the cards scattered on the mat for the ending lines like a pig going after truffles, making the girls playing with him laugh as they tried to find the one with the appropriate finishing lines before him, and earning a chastisement from Tamaki who complained he couldn't see and Honey wasn't playing fair. And that was why he kept grabbing the wrong cards and putting their team in last place? Haruhi wanted to know, to which he replied that he was sure it was just bad new year's luck.

Haruhi was even more sure it had everything to do with classical grammar being one of Tamaki's worst subjects, but she kept that thought to herself.

Then again, perhaps there was some truth to his excuse. Perhaps it should have been taken as an omen, for when the mysterious set of doors opened a few seconds later onto the host club's meeting that afternoon, it was with an uncharacteristic essence of black roses that, if the club's members remembered, they had witnessed on one occasion before.

"Suou-kun?" came the tremulous voice from within as the doors creaked open.

The club's female guests turned at the sound of that (as didn't happen nearly often enough in the host club, as far as they were concerned) unfamiliar male voice, and promptly forgot what they had been talking about. A few mouths fell open and a few cups of tea almost got spilled. They could hardly believe what their eyes were seeing. For standing in the doorway, calling Tamaki's name in that familiar tone of voice, was a third-year boy whose fair face rivaled the host club king's in beauty—beneath a mane of glossy black, chin-length hair.

They gasped as the meaning of it sank in. Tamaki was wanted by an equally handsome young man!

"Suou-kun . . ." he repeated as he stepped tentatively into the gloomy room. "Aren't you going to invite me in? After all, a new level of intimacy has been forged between us by our shared vexations before the holiday, has it not, or have you forgotten so soon?"

This, needless to say, prompted a hearty round of squeeing.

"Has it really?" said the person in question with the usual casual raking of fingers through glittering hair, the card game left forgotten. The girls all turned to him in anticipation. "Ah, is this the sweet drumbeat of camaraderie I feel uplifting my heart? But . . . may I ask who's calling?"

Tamaki started. He dropped his hand and blinked several times. "Heh . . . Nekozawa? Oh, er, I guess our casa is your . . . Sorry, but I didn't recognize you at f—"

Before he could finish, this mysterious stranger whom Tamaki called Nekozawa strode forward and grabbed both of the host king's shoulders, and pressed his mouth to each of Tamaki's cheeks.

Uncomfortable silence descended in the third music room for all of three seconds (as that seemed to be the given interval for such things), before it erupted again in enraptured squeals and the sweet, agonized biting of handkerchiefs. It may have been freezing outside, but inside the third music room was smoking hot. "Wow," said a stunned Haruhi to a furiously scribbling Kyouya. "I know what Hikaru and Kaoru said, but I guess I had to see it with my own eyes. I really thought for sure they'd wimp out at the real stuff."

"You underestimate your own sex," said the other. "No offense."

"None taken."

No one was as surprised as Tamaki, though, who froze and nearly tipped over when Nekozawa let him go. "Happy new year, Suou," the third-year said. At first, with his unusually bright spirits, he had seemed as one possessed—or at very least haunted, over the break, by a certain threesome of ghosts—but the old Nekozawa fire returned when he added, "Seeing as I'm indebted to you and your club for your help, I guess I'll let you off the proverbial hook without a curse. . . . Just this once. After all, it is a new year, and a beginning is a very delicate time. . . ."

"Great," was all Tamaki could form coherently at that moment. Needless to say, he wasn't so sure what Nekozawa said about the hook was true. He could still feel his lips on him . . . Not to mention everyone else's eyes. Tamaki shook himself. "What?" he asked the crowd. "His family's Russian! It's like shaking hands to those people."

"Oh well. It seems the whole school thinks our lord is bi anyway, after he glomped Haruhi at the Christmas ball."

"I guess calling himself Haruhi's father was a self-fulfilling prophecy after all."

Tamaki looked up to see the twins trailing his arch nemesis, one holding Nekozawa's dark robe, the other, Beelzenev, and both grinning evilly. "You! You traitors!" he wailed. "You set me up for this, didn't you?"

"Naa, Hikaru, did you hear something just now?" Kaoru asked, wiggling a pinky finger in his ear.

"Must have been a little bug buzzing in our ears," said Hikaru, while Tamaki went off to lament in a corner, "O twins, my twins, why have you forsaken me?"

Amongst the fawning worshipers of this false idol of an intruder the host club had was Renge, who said when she was able to get a better look: "So, that's not a wig. You dyed your hair, Sempai? Your beautiful golden hair?"

Nekozawa's smile fell under her watery gaze. "Why?" The tone of her voice made him uneasy. "You hate it, don't you? I think Kirimi hates it . . ."

"No, I like it!" she insisted with clasped hands. "Dark-haired characters are so much more mysterious."

"And so sexy!" other girls agreed.

"You said, you're indebted to us," mysterious, dark-haired character Exhibit A—Kyouya—said to Nekozawa. "May I ask for what? After that mock king stunt backfired, disbandment must be looking like more of a reality for your club than ever."

"And who, exactly, was responsible for the bean ballot?" Haruhi muttered out of the corner of her mouth.

Nekozawa, however, looked as though he had no idea what Kyouya was talking about. "Disbandment? I should think not." His skeptical look melted into a broad grin and a decadent glance. "Quite the opposite, in fact. The evening of the ball saw the most purchases ever made from the black magic club in any one day—any one week, in fact. And thanks in part to the host club's drawing power, we actually have a mailing list with addresses besides our own to send our electronic newsletters to now. A lot of interest has been generated in our humble group as a result of the ball. Everyone is starting to realize what a role the dark arts can play in their daily lives. We're even thinking of organizing a costumed, interactive showing of a certain cult film before graduation. Let us know if the host club wants in on the action and I'm sure we can come to some arrangement.

"Yes. . . ." Nekozawa was so taken with himself he failed to see the ungrateful and/or uninterested looks on some of the hosts' faces. No doubt about it: he definitely reminded Haruhi of a certain someone. Same mold, huh? More like twins separated at birth. "I can leave Ouran without a care knowing my club will be in good hands in the years to come."

"They grow up so fast!" Tamaki sobbed in sudden sympathy.

For which Haruhi shot him a look that said she wasn't buying. "Graduation's not for at least another two months," she murmured. "More'n a year for you, Sempai."

That stony look was shaken off her face a second later as Nekozawa suddenly took up both her hands in his. "And I owe it all to you, Haruhi."

"Huh?" said Renge.

"Me?" said Haruhi.

"'Haruhi'?" said Tamaki and the twins, with a wide-eyed Honey catching flies and pointing in horror right beside them, as the girls gathered around to hang on the dark prince's every word.

"Yes," Nekozawa said as he stared into her eyes. Somehow the menacing gleam in his own wide blue ones and the intensity of his breathy voice made the sincerity of his words a little harder in coming across as he told her, "On more than one occasion it has been you who has come to my club's aid—to my aid. When I was in doubt, blinded by the light, you took my hand, showed me to the cool shadows and restored my faith—plunged my spirits back into the deep, nutrient-filled waters of the abyss that I, gasping like a fish on the shore, had been craving, feared dead to me forever—"

"Huh?" the hosts chorused, completely lost.

"Haruhi!" Swiping the hand puppet from Hikaru's hands in one deft move, Nekozawa held it out to her, miming along with his words: "Surely Beelzenev has smiled upon you. We cannot ignore the meaning of his portent. Fujioka Haruhi, we humbly request you allow us to make you an honorary member—nay, a standard of inspiration for the black magic club!"

"You want me to be your cheerleader?" Haruhi clarified in an unenthusiastic voice.

In response, Nekozawa pushed a little Beelzenev-shaped bell into her hand; then, as she stood blinking and holding that, he unfurled the robe that had been lying innocently across Kaoru's hands and, before the twins could object, swept it around her shoulders, gently raising the hood into place over her head.

Haruhi nearly swam in the get-up, but it must have been sufficient for Nekozawa if his reaction were any indication. "How arcanely winsome!" he praised the end product in a truly fiendish way.

The host club's guests might not have understood him completely, but they did have to agree that this cloak-and-dagger (or rather, cloak and bell) Haruhi was truly "win"—whatever that meant.

"I knew this day would come!" Tamaki wailed, going into protective father mode (or was it bastion of morality mode? The distinction was often difficult to make) and pointing a finger at the black magic club president as if to exorcise him from the music room. "I expected someday you mole people would come bargaining for Haruhi's pure soul. What do I always say, Kyouya? Give the devil his due and he'll take the hindmost!"

"When have you ever said that?" Kyouya wanted to know.

"I'm the hindmost?" Haruhi groaned.

"Never mind that, it's the gist of the thing. Nekozawa!" Tamaki cursed his diabolically grinning nemesis with raised fist, "I won't allow you to taint Haruhi's radiant soul with your debauchery!"

"I-I never said I accepted. . . ." Haruhi tried to tell him, extending a trembling hand from beneath the huge black cloak (and who was talking about debauchery anyway?), but it was no use. Tamaki was deaf to the world.

And as the two club presidents exchanged platitudes and the twins mourned for Haruhi's innocence, and Kyouya took notes and Honey and Mori did their best pretending they didn't exist around cups of hot instant coffee, and their guests took it all in like the production it had become, another typical afternoon passed for the host club, proving the year may change but the battle between light and dark would always remain, indisputably, unceasingly, sophomoric.

And on that note let us depart, and Beelzenev bless us—every one.