Fanfic - Congruence [Ouran High Host Club: Hikaru/Kaoru]
Fandom: Ouran High Host Club
Pairing: Hikaru/Kaoru
Rating: PG
Warnings: Obviously, twincest. Don't read if you have a problem with that. =D
Dedicated to the lovely areale who patiently sat through my rantings on the impossibilities of writing the twins in a reasonable fashion, and aided in editing the monstrosity that this was into something more... what was the word? "Reasonable." *grins* Sankyuu!
Congruence
They talked without words when they were alone. Of course, there was the act for the patrons of the Host Club. The girls couldn’t be expected to know the nuances of their behaviour, and so they said things out loud, things that they normally wouldn’t have bothered with expressing. Because, of course, they knew it all already.
Their world revolved around the two of them. There was truly no need for anyone else, let alone any desire for such a person. Their nannies performed brief intrusions into their world and left just as perfunctorily. There were a few they tolerated, one they liked, but none came close to entering their little world. They depended on each other completely. There was a particular structure to their world - Hikaru was there and he would take care of Kaoru, because Kaoru was always there to take care of Hikaru. It wasn’t a structure completely obvious, even to the fans whose cries of “Hikaru-kun’s such a seme!” grated on their ears.
There was no seme, no uke. There was only them.
The duality of their relationship expressed itself in odd ways. They refused to sleep in different rooms, even now. There were times when Kaoru would kick off his covers and worm his way into Hikaru’s futon. Kaoru knew when Hikaru was tired or hurt or angry. He even knew why. And then there was Hikaru, too, who felt his own arm ache when Kaoru had broken his arm back when he was eight. Hikaru had been the one to collapse when Kaoru had been put under anaesthetic. They were always there for each other, that unspoken pledge, the structure that they followed.
And yet, despite all that, they hated being the same. Every time they chorused out an order in unison - unscripted, as it always was - they felt a twinge in their chests. It was an odd twinge, because they felt two emotions at the same time:
1) Comfort (that the other was so close), and yet
2) Discomfited (because the other was too close).
To have a relationship, you needed to have differences; but they were too similar to have one.
Sometimes, Kaoru thought that he and Hikaru shared a mind. Then he wondered what it would be like if one of them got married. If he had sex with his wife, would Hikaru feel it on the other end? And that would make Hikaru a bit of a voyeur, wouldn’t it? Not that he wasn’t already, with the way he always insisted on showering with Kaoru. And then Hikaru would laugh to himself on the other end of the room and Kaoru’s heart would skip a beat.
Too similar, the mantra that constantly ran through their minds. Too alike to have a chance. A single mind that was unfortunate enough to be split into two bodies. On the one hand, the benefit of always having someone with you who knew your every thought. On the other hand -
- Never allowed more.
The twins had never dreamed of being separated. They had come too close to it for comfort once. No one outside of the family knew of those long, agonising months all those years back. Even Kyouya-sempai didn’t know, for the twins could be remarkably close-mouthed about such things. There was simply no speaking of The Incident, because it had almost taken Kaoru away from Hikaru.
Hikaru would have followed, of course, but the point was that Kaoru had almost left.
The doctors hadn’t wanted Hikaru in the room at first, saying that young children often carried germs and that he might make his brother get worse. Hikaru had left his mother to argue with the doctor and snuck into the ward to see Kaoru anyway.
White, of course. It was somehow always the thing to associate with a hospital room. Their money had ensured a large, private room, complete with all the requisite amenities. It only made Kaoru look even tinier, swallowed up against the huge white bed.
Hikaru had kicked off his shoes and crawled in with Kaoru, who immediately turned in his drugged sleep to curl up against his chest. Hikaru carefully manoeuvred Kaoru’s arm around himself, minding the drip as carefully as he could, checking the pain in his own hand as a gauge of what Kaoru was feeling. Satisfied, he settled himself into the bed, holding Kaoru as tightly as he dared, eventually letting the haze of the anaesthetic wash over him.
That was how the doctor and their parents found them, after a frantic five-minute search for the missing Hikaru. Their mother had figured out after those few panic-stricken minutes that there was really nowhere else that Hikaru could possibly be.
The doctor let Hikaru stay.
One day, the twins asked their mother what a wife was. She goggled at them ungracefully before replying that it was what she was.
“But we thought you’re a mother.”
“Well, yes, but I’m also a wife to your father.”
But how do you get to be a wife, mother? How do you know you want to be with this man forever? How can you stay with him always and never want to leave? How do you know he’ll never leave?
How do you know, mother, if you love someone?
(Ask your father, boys. I have to run off for a conference now.)
It is possible, Hikaru theorises later, that you know you’re in love when you can’t imagine life without a person. Or maybe, when you completely adore a person with everything you have. Or maybe even when you realise you know a person inside and out, and they know you inside and out too. And you like it that way.
Like us, Kaoru offers ingenuously.
They don’t pursue the thought.
The twins suspected in a half-angry, half-resentful fashion, that there would come a day when someone would intrude into their world. Maybe one day there would be someone who would know without being told that that was Hikaru and that was Kaoru. That when they were bored, Hikaru drummed his fingers but Kaoru tapped his foot. That when they were thinking of each other, Hikaru touched the back of Kaoru’s hand, but Kaoru would only look at Hikaru - out of the corner of his eye, sly, shy, watchful.
They dreaded and anticipated the day in equal amounts.
When Haruhi had broken through their world with no apparent effort on her part, they hadn’t expected the churning fear. And beneath it, the resignation.
Kaoru glanced at Hikaru and saw sad, golden eyes. Their world was no longer sacred. And Haruhi had no idea what she’d done.
Because now, she’d proven that they were different. That there was someone who could pick out who was who, even if she hadn’t noticed that Hikaru loathed strawberry jam and Kaoru liked it, because both twins liked marmalade even more and therefore always had that instead. She couldn’t be faulted for not knowing the details, but despite it all, she’d managed what no one else had.
“Hikaru! Kaoru! We’re leaving soon, hurry! Oh, my - Kaoru, you’ve got cream all over your face, clean up!”
“That’s Hikaru, mother.”
And in so doing, proven it to them and to the outside world that it was possible. And that more people might eventually figure it out for themselves. Hikaru’s actions were just a little meaner than Kaoru’s, Haruhi said, and she was right. Hikaru had been awake for a week when Kaoru had slept, and he’d had that time to grow resentful of the world without his twin in it.
Then Kaoru had awoken and his dark musings had been thrown aside in favour of relief and joy. But the shades of that darkness still lingered in his eyes. It made itself know, the darkness, in the way Hikaru wouldn’t tolerate anyone around Kaoru for months after The Incident. Even now, they still felt its presence in the way Hikaru was so completely overprotective of Kaoru.
Because Kaoru had slept and Hikaru had stayed awake. And so they had become Different.
“Ham up the whole brotherly love thing, you mean? That’s practically incestuous, you know.”
“Hey, the fans will eat it up. Besides, I figure some of them think that about us anyway.”
“Feed their fantasies, huh?”
“Yeah! Think about it, all we have to do is act ourselves -”
“-Just more idiotic.”
“-Just more vocally loving - and we’ll be raking in the customers. And Kyouya-sempai’s offering a pretty good cut of the money.”
“One act, but two people. If our designations are good, then -”
“Exactly. You in?”
“Sure. But hey…”
“Yeah?”
“Are we going to be completely the same for this?”
“Eh, I’m not sure. I guess the fans will like it if we… hm, speak together or something. You know.”
“The sort of thing storybook twins do, eh.”
“Not like we’re not capable.”
“It’s so idiotic.”
“We think the same anyway. Might as well talk the same.”
“Right. So… we won’t be different at all, huh?”
“That… we can still be different to ourselves, I guess.”
“I don’t want to be the same as you.”
“I know.”
“If we’re the same then…”
“I know.”
“I love you.”
“… I know.”
At the very end, just before the beginning, they decided to forget everything they had learned. It didn’t matter to anyone but them (and maybe the fans) and so who were they to follow socially acceptable norms?
As a fashion designer, their mother took great pleasure in shattering societal norms. She enjoyed dressing Hikaru and Kaoru up in frilly pink dresses, pink and white with shimmering lace. Hikaru never thought that Kaoru looked good in white, but he didn’t say anything. Maybe some of that rebellion had carried over into their mother’s choice of partner, this rather unremarkable, socially inferior man. Not many in the family had approved of his background, even if they enjoyed his company.
Their mother had originally wanted daughters to carry on the family tradition, but had still been more than delighted to teach her sons her craft. And there was that great, life-altering lesson she had taught them: Always break the rules. You’ll definitely come up with something beautiful if you do.
Of course, to break the rules successfully, you have to know them well first, she’d then say, and set them to learning what combinations of colours and fabrics went well together.
The children took to her lessons well, and they never forgot her greatest advice, applying it with great abandon to all areas of their lives.
But when the twins slipped blue hair dye into her shampoo, she rued the day she’d given it to them.
In the end, it came back to the beginning. Despite everything, the twins had never gone so far as to actually act upon their feelings. But there was no time, they agreed, like the present (and no place like the public) to give it a shot.
“Ahem! Attention, all our lovely clients who’ve designated us!”
“We have a small announcement to make!”
“Unfortunately, the two of us will be away for a week from tomorrow onwards -”
“-We’re touring with our mother -”
“-So we thought we’d leave you with something to remember us by!”
“Are they - oh my gosh, they are!”
“Ahh! They’re kissing! For real this time!”
“You demon twins! What do you think you’re doing?!”
They ran out of the room before Tamaki could recover enough to murder them.
~fin
Concrit muchly appreciated!
Cross-posted to hikaruxkaoru and ouranhost_slash.
Pairing: Hikaru/Kaoru
Rating: PG
Warnings: Obviously, twincest. Don't read if you have a problem with that. =D
Dedicated to the lovely areale who patiently sat through my rantings on the impossibilities of writing the twins in a reasonable fashion, and aided in editing the monstrosity that this was into something more... what was the word? "Reasonable." *grins* Sankyuu!
Congruence
They talked without words when they were alone. Of course, there was the act for the patrons of the Host Club. The girls couldn’t be expected to know the nuances of their behaviour, and so they said things out loud, things that they normally wouldn’t have bothered with expressing. Because, of course, they knew it all already.
Their world revolved around the two of them. There was truly no need for anyone else, let alone any desire for such a person. Their nannies performed brief intrusions into their world and left just as perfunctorily. There were a few they tolerated, one they liked, but none came close to entering their little world. They depended on each other completely. There was a particular structure to their world - Hikaru was there and he would take care of Kaoru, because Kaoru was always there to take care of Hikaru. It wasn’t a structure completely obvious, even to the fans whose cries of “Hikaru-kun’s such a seme!” grated on their ears.
There was no seme, no uke. There was only them.
The duality of their relationship expressed itself in odd ways. They refused to sleep in different rooms, even now. There were times when Kaoru would kick off his covers and worm his way into Hikaru’s futon. Kaoru knew when Hikaru was tired or hurt or angry. He even knew why. And then there was Hikaru, too, who felt his own arm ache when Kaoru had broken his arm back when he was eight. Hikaru had been the one to collapse when Kaoru had been put under anaesthetic. They were always there for each other, that unspoken pledge, the structure that they followed.
And yet, despite all that, they hated being the same. Every time they chorused out an order in unison - unscripted, as it always was - they felt a twinge in their chests. It was an odd twinge, because they felt two emotions at the same time:
1) Comfort (that the other was so close), and yet
2) Discomfited (because the other was too close).
To have a relationship, you needed to have differences; but they were too similar to have one.
Sometimes, Kaoru thought that he and Hikaru shared a mind. Then he wondered what it would be like if one of them got married. If he had sex with his wife, would Hikaru feel it on the other end? And that would make Hikaru a bit of a voyeur, wouldn’t it? Not that he wasn’t already, with the way he always insisted on showering with Kaoru. And then Hikaru would laugh to himself on the other end of the room and Kaoru’s heart would skip a beat.
Too similar, the mantra that constantly ran through their minds. Too alike to have a chance. A single mind that was unfortunate enough to be split into two bodies. On the one hand, the benefit of always having someone with you who knew your every thought. On the other hand -
- Never allowed more.
The twins had never dreamed of being separated. They had come too close to it for comfort once. No one outside of the family knew of those long, agonising months all those years back. Even Kyouya-sempai didn’t know, for the twins could be remarkably close-mouthed about such things. There was simply no speaking of The Incident, because it had almost taken Kaoru away from Hikaru.
Hikaru would have followed, of course, but the point was that Kaoru had almost left.
The doctors hadn’t wanted Hikaru in the room at first, saying that young children often carried germs and that he might make his brother get worse. Hikaru had left his mother to argue with the doctor and snuck into the ward to see Kaoru anyway.
White, of course. It was somehow always the thing to associate with a hospital room. Their money had ensured a large, private room, complete with all the requisite amenities. It only made Kaoru look even tinier, swallowed up against the huge white bed.
Hikaru had kicked off his shoes and crawled in with Kaoru, who immediately turned in his drugged sleep to curl up against his chest. Hikaru carefully manoeuvred Kaoru’s arm around himself, minding the drip as carefully as he could, checking the pain in his own hand as a gauge of what Kaoru was feeling. Satisfied, he settled himself into the bed, holding Kaoru as tightly as he dared, eventually letting the haze of the anaesthetic wash over him.
That was how the doctor and their parents found them, after a frantic five-minute search for the missing Hikaru. Their mother had figured out after those few panic-stricken minutes that there was really nowhere else that Hikaru could possibly be.
The doctor let Hikaru stay.
One day, the twins asked their mother what a wife was. She goggled at them ungracefully before replying that it was what she was.
“But we thought you’re a mother.”
“Well, yes, but I’m also a wife to your father.”
But how do you get to be a wife, mother? How do you know you want to be with this man forever? How can you stay with him always and never want to leave? How do you know he’ll never leave?
How do you know, mother, if you love someone?
(Ask your father, boys. I have to run off for a conference now.)
It is possible, Hikaru theorises later, that you know you’re in love when you can’t imagine life without a person. Or maybe, when you completely adore a person with everything you have. Or maybe even when you realise you know a person inside and out, and they know you inside and out too. And you like it that way.
Like us, Kaoru offers ingenuously.
They don’t pursue the thought.
The twins suspected in a half-angry, half-resentful fashion, that there would come a day when someone would intrude into their world. Maybe one day there would be someone who would know without being told that that was Hikaru and that was Kaoru. That when they were bored, Hikaru drummed his fingers but Kaoru tapped his foot. That when they were thinking of each other, Hikaru touched the back of Kaoru’s hand, but Kaoru would only look at Hikaru - out of the corner of his eye, sly, shy, watchful.
They dreaded and anticipated the day in equal amounts.
When Haruhi had broken through their world with no apparent effort on her part, they hadn’t expected the churning fear. And beneath it, the resignation.
Kaoru glanced at Hikaru and saw sad, golden eyes. Their world was no longer sacred. And Haruhi had no idea what she’d done.
Because now, she’d proven that they were different. That there was someone who could pick out who was who, even if she hadn’t noticed that Hikaru loathed strawberry jam and Kaoru liked it, because both twins liked marmalade even more and therefore always had that instead. She couldn’t be faulted for not knowing the details, but despite it all, she’d managed what no one else had.
“Hikaru! Kaoru! We’re leaving soon, hurry! Oh, my - Kaoru, you’ve got cream all over your face, clean up!”
“That’s Hikaru, mother.”
And in so doing, proven it to them and to the outside world that it was possible. And that more people might eventually figure it out for themselves. Hikaru’s actions were just a little meaner than Kaoru’s, Haruhi said, and she was right. Hikaru had been awake for a week when Kaoru had slept, and he’d had that time to grow resentful of the world without his twin in it.
Then Kaoru had awoken and his dark musings had been thrown aside in favour of relief and joy. But the shades of that darkness still lingered in his eyes. It made itself know, the darkness, in the way Hikaru wouldn’t tolerate anyone around Kaoru for months after The Incident. Even now, they still felt its presence in the way Hikaru was so completely overprotective of Kaoru.
Because Kaoru had slept and Hikaru had stayed awake. And so they had become Different.
“Ham up the whole brotherly love thing, you mean? That’s practically incestuous, you know.”
“Hey, the fans will eat it up. Besides, I figure some of them think that about us anyway.”
“Feed their fantasies, huh?”
“Yeah! Think about it, all we have to do is act ourselves -”
“-Just more idiotic.”
“-Just more vocally loving - and we’ll be raking in the customers. And Kyouya-sempai’s offering a pretty good cut of the money.”
“One act, but two people. If our designations are good, then -”
“Exactly. You in?”
“Sure. But hey…”
“Yeah?”
“Are we going to be completely the same for this?”
“Eh, I’m not sure. I guess the fans will like it if we… hm, speak together or something. You know.”
“The sort of thing storybook twins do, eh.”
“Not like we’re not capable.”
“It’s so idiotic.”
“We think the same anyway. Might as well talk the same.”
“Right. So… we won’t be different at all, huh?”
“That… we can still be different to ourselves, I guess.”
“I don’t want to be the same as you.”
“I know.”
“If we’re the same then…”
“I know.”
“I love you.”
“… I know.”
At the very end, just before the beginning, they decided to forget everything they had learned. It didn’t matter to anyone but them (and maybe the fans) and so who were they to follow socially acceptable norms?
As a fashion designer, their mother took great pleasure in shattering societal norms. She enjoyed dressing Hikaru and Kaoru up in frilly pink dresses, pink and white with shimmering lace. Hikaru never thought that Kaoru looked good in white, but he didn’t say anything. Maybe some of that rebellion had carried over into their mother’s choice of partner, this rather unremarkable, socially inferior man. Not many in the family had approved of his background, even if they enjoyed his company.
Their mother had originally wanted daughters to carry on the family tradition, but had still been more than delighted to teach her sons her craft. And there was that great, life-altering lesson she had taught them: Always break the rules. You’ll definitely come up with something beautiful if you do.
Of course, to break the rules successfully, you have to know them well first, she’d then say, and set them to learning what combinations of colours and fabrics went well together.
The children took to her lessons well, and they never forgot her greatest advice, applying it with great abandon to all areas of their lives.
But when the twins slipped blue hair dye into her shampoo, she rued the day she’d given it to them.
In the end, it came back to the beginning. Despite everything, the twins had never gone so far as to actually act upon their feelings. But there was no time, they agreed, like the present (and no place like the public) to give it a shot.
“Ahem! Attention, all our lovely clients who’ve designated us!”
“We have a small announcement to make!”
“Unfortunately, the two of us will be away for a week from tomorrow onwards -”
“-We’re touring with our mother -”
“-So we thought we’d leave you with something to remember us by!”
“Are they - oh my gosh, they are!”
“Ahh! They’re kissing! For real this time!”
“You demon twins! What do you think you’re doing?!”
They ran out of the room before Tamaki could recover enough to murder them.
~fin
Concrit muchly appreciated!
Cross-posted to hikaruxkaoru and ouranhost_slash.