"You want me to wear what?" I glared at the twins, who were showing me a collection of swimsuits to wear to the beach the next day.

"Oh, come on, Jessica, you would look great in this bikini, it really emphasized your curves and makes your boobs stand out!" Hikaru said encouragingly, waving a brown bikini that had emerald colored crystals sewn onto the front. There was only a string connecting the two cups in the front, and though the bottoms were high waisted to cover a bit more of my stomach, it would barely cover my butt.

I shook my head and backed away slowly, "No way in heck, you two; I already have a swim suit, I will not wear the equivalent of a bra and panties in front of the whole host club," I raised my hands to a defensive position just in case I needed to fend off the two over-eager twins.

Kaoru shot me puppy dog eyes and took a careful step towards me, "But Jess, we picked this out just for you, are you really going to turn down what we worked so hard to find?" Hikaru nodded and walked besides his brother, mirroring the expression and position to add to the effect.

Nope, that was just one big huge nope, there was no way I was falling for this trap, "Sorry you guys, but I don't do bikini's, as kind as your thought was, I will turn this offer down, maybe you can convince Haruhi or Risa to wear what you pick out." I walked to the door where my overnight bag sat and pulled out the modest, two-piece swim suit I had packed; somehow, I had convinced my parents to let me stay at the Hitachiin's for the night, so they wouldn't have to come get me early in the morning. "This is what I'm wearing and nothing you two say or do will convince me otherwise." I made my tone as final as I could, but it seemed the twins weren't convinced.

"Not bad," Hikaru murmured as he took the loose, navy blue top that was purposefully baggy looking and the blue and white striped bottoms, "But it could be better."

Kaoru was examining them over his brother's shoulder, then looked at me critically, "What's with the baggy top, do you have body image issues?"

I blushed and looked away, grumbling about overly interested twins, "Shut up, you do realize that if anybody by you guys had asked that, I would have punched them and walked away, right?" Not letting my embarrassment show was a struggle.

"It's okay," I felt a hand on my shoulder, and reluctantly looked over to the twins, who had moved to be right in front of me. Before I knew it, I was pulled into a strong hug by the two overly interested twins, "you can tell us, we aren't judging you, just curious so we can help you better in the future."

They both nodded at that and pulled away to look into my eyes, "It must be really hard to be the only one with your body type in the whole school, but don't worry, we don't mind being friends with a giant." Hikaru said this, which made me turn to him and sock him in the shoulder, so much for them being comforting...

Despite the last comment, I was smiling widely as we continued talking about what we wanted to do at the beach the next day.

***

"Jess, wake up," I struggled sluggishly against that hands that were shaking me, refusing to open my eyes; the twins and I had stayed up way too late the night before playing video games and talking, so I fell asleep as soon as I had gotten into the car the next morning.

I never had been a morning person, and I wasn't about to start now, "Go 'way," I mumbled out, trying to roll away from whoever was still shaking me.

"Come on, Jess, if we let you stay here, you'll sleep the day away! We can't let you miss the fun of being at the beach." Another voice said, though this one was slightly lower, but I was too tired to even think about guessing which one it was.

"Sounds good to me," Finally my eye cracked open and I glared at the two as I said this, but then my eyes immediately closed, and I started nuzzling my face on what I was lying on.

"Would you look at that?"

"She's so cute, quick Kaoru, grab your phone, we need to show this cute Jessica to the others!"

The two kept talking, but I ignored them, content to keep rubbing my eyes with the seat like an overgrown cat; it just felt so good, which was probably why I started doing it in the first place.

"Jess, if you don't get out, we'll be forced to make you get out."

This caused me to open my eyes right away, glaring at them ferociously, "Do it, and you die." The twins shuttered at the threat in my eyes and step back while I sat up and stretched.

Hikaru leaned to Kaoru and started whispering in a totally hearable way, "Okay, maybe she's more terrifying."

Kaoru nodded fervently, though I missed most of it, as I was stretching to wake my body up more, "Yeah, she's a combination of cute and terrifying, like a mini Honey. Do you think she has type AB blood?"

I slid my way out of the limo and shut the door behind us, looking at them curiously, "Why does it matter what blood type I have?"

Hikaru and Kaoru glanced at each other, having a silent conversation, "Because both Kyoya and Honey are horrible to wake up, and they have type AB blood, so it has to be a thing."

My hand hit my forehead as I facepalmed, did people really think like that? "You both are idiots, I'm sorry, but having two examples to prove that it is a trait shared by a whole huge category is incredibly dumb." They extremely uncomfortable, so I started walking away, calling over my shoulder, "Just so you know, I'm actually type A negative, so there goes your theory."

They were silent for a moment before running to catch up to me, "So that's why you aren't as bad to wake up then," Hikaru said, and I looked to the side to see him grinning triumphantly, "You're only half AB, so you are only half as scary to wake up!"

I shook my head at their stupidity and kept walking, ignoring the other questions that began to come my way; well, all of them except one that Kaoru asked suddenly after a minute of meaningless babble, "Say, Jess, where did that scar on your neck come from? It's really big."

I stopped when he said that, reaching my hand up to my neck, and feeling along the seam that had been created only a few short years ago. Crap, I had forgotten to cover it today...

It only took a few seconds for the twins to realize I wasn't with them anymore, and they turned around, looking at me with confusion that turned into concern; I was assuming they saw the panic on my face that I was trying so hard to keep hidden. Normally, I really liked scars, they were so cool and having a scar was like having an automatic story to whip out in basically any situation. That wasn't the case with this one.

I shook myself out of my darkening thoughts and smiled, "Oh, it's nothing really, I just did something stupid, normally I cover it up because it's so big, so it surprised me that you asked, that's all!" Ah, the well-practiced fake happiness was making another showing; I had used this technique enough that it was practically impossible for anyone to ell that my happiness wasn't genuine.

"So, what did you do?" Hikaru asked and I walked quickly to catch up to them, there was no way I was telling them what happened, they would drop me like an overly hot potato.

"Oh, nothing major, just caught myself on some barbed wire a few years back; it's kinda embarrassing, so I don't talk about it all that much." They seemed to by my story and we kept walking as they questioned me about my life before I had come to Japan. It amazed them that I didn't have a bunch of people hired to do the work for us, so the concept of chores came as a surprise.

The moment the sound of the ocean reached my ears, I stopped talking and started running until the beautiful water came into view. I was transfixed by the waves lapping at the shore, and how the water kept going forever until it disappeared beyond the edge of the horizon. The water was a beautiful turquois blue, working perfectly with the white sand. Further out, I could see the water change in color to a deeper blue that the nerd part of my brain couldn't help but state was the cause of different depths of water as well as the mineral content.

I took in a deep breath and smiled at the salty, fishy, and just, fresh smell that was the ocean, the last time I had been to the ocean, I was very young, and it had been a stormy day, so I had never seen anything quite like this, it was breathtaking even with the multiple umbrellas set up, disrupting the view.

My flipflops were proving to be more a hinderance than I wanted to deal with, so I slipped them off and started walking over the sand, wincing slightly at how hot it was. Despite the heat, I couldn't help but analyze the texture, how each grain of sand shifted as it was pushed and how my foot sank at least an inch every time I stepped, making it harder to move. Well, that and I wanted to giggle at the sensation of sand between my toes; I truly was a child at heart.

"Jessi-chan!" A small voice yelled out, and I only had a few seconds to prepare before a small body was thrown against me and we both went toppling down to land in the sand. "I'm so glad you came! This is going to be so much fun!" Honey's smile was contagious, and I found myself laughing along with him over something random that he noticed as we ran towards the ocean together.

"Hey, aren't you two going to put on sun screen on?" Honey stopped short at the call, but I ignored whoever the rational one behind us was, and continued on to meet the gentle waves.

Three feet, I was three feet from being a part of that beautiful water, but no, I just had to be pulled back by the freakishly strong Mitzukuni Haninozuka. You know those anime moments where the person is running, then they are pulled backwards, parallel with the ground for a unreal amount of time? Well, I swear that's what happened in that moment, I'm positive I saw birds flying in real time while I was in the air, but enough of my rational brain trying to understand the physics of living in an anime world, I'll focus more on the story now, I swear (Oops, I'm not supposed to know about that, am I?).

Anyways, the next thing I knew, I was being pulled up and back towards the other hosts while being scolded by a short blond who was over a foot shorter than me; it was a weird experience to say the least.

I wasn't permitted to be near the water again for another fifteen minutes, and let me tell you, that was hard! I could have read something on my phone, but in this case, I had a new view to ingrain in my mind and I was wasting no time to do so.

"Jessi-chan, times up, let's go swim!" I shot a sour look over at the small blonde, who just smiled innocently back at me.

"So, you're permitting me to swim now? Do I need to bark on command as well? Perhaps I should go get a stick to play fetch with everyone to finish it off!" As I said this, an arm draped over each shoulder, obviously trying to calm me down. I wasn't really mad, I understood why they stopped me, that didn't mean I had to like it...

"Come one Jess, we were doing it for your own good! You would have been as red as a lobster by the end of the day if we hadn't." Hikaru said this happily and in sync, they began pulling me towards a makeshift volleyball court.

"Come play a game with us now that you are more sun proof!" Kaoru chimed in and they pulled me a bit harder away from the ocean.

To no one's surprise, I dug my feet into the sand and threw the two irritating parasites off me, "No way in heck. My original intent was to swim, do you two bozo's think I'm going to trade swimming in the ocean for playing a game of beach volleyball? Heck to the no!" With that, I spun around and marched towards the water, the happy little blond skipping besides me.

It was the perfect start to a perfect day... I could never have seen what happened next.