Hey! So, it looks like I'm kinda really back this time? I know, I'm as surprised as you are. I'm not going to move this story like I did with the last one, because it's probably going to be a bit shorter. I think I'll add Mori x OC to the couple tags on this one instead. (It's about time I updated those anyway.) Anyway, enjoy!

Just like that, it was four thirty, and the guests were filing out the door for the day. Ella watched as Kyoya said goodbye to each of them, having said something about needing to stop a few to correct his records. "Go ahead without me on whatever it is you plan to do," he had said to her and Emma tiredly. "I'll catch up eventually."

Despite the strain she seemed to be putting on her boyfriend's nerves (something she only felt mildly guilty about), Ella was very excited. There was something about watching new romance blossom that made her positively giddy. So when she had gotten back from the recording studio today to hear that Emma had a plan to help out Mori, she was put in an absolutely ecstatic mood that no amount of sighing and muttering from Mr. Fuss Budget could put a damper on.

"So first thing's first," Emma said. "We gotta find out some background info from Honey."

Ella chuckled. "You say that like it's going to be difficult." Emma may have been here for a little while now, but she still didn't know the club members as well as Ella did. "Honey! Could you come here for a second?" she called. "I've got a question for you!"

Emma seemed surprised. "That easy?"

Ella laughed at her sister. "He's not Hikaru, Emma. You don't need to do any finagling to get things out of him. Honey's an open book."

"Ellie-chan!" Honey laughed as he ran over to her, practically tackling her with a hug. "We missed you today! I saved you some cake!" he held up a generous slice of white cake that appeared to have coconut shavings on the top. "It's coconut cream!" he declared. "It's pretty big, so you can share it with Emmy-chan, kay?" he smiled warmly at Emma. Though the two rarely had any direct interactions, it was clear that Honey liked Emma quite a lot. Ella had once overheard him say to Mori: "Anyone who can make Hika-chan that happy is alright in my book!"

She smiled at the memory, suddenly remembering the task she had been momentarily distracted from. "Honey, can you tell us about that girl you were with?"

Honey cocked his head and giggled. "Which one, silly Ellie-chan? There were lots of girls here today!"

Ella smiled. "The one who brought the treats, you know, the one Mori kept looking at."

"Oh, that's Hana-chan. She works at the pastry shop, she's pretty sweet, huh?"

"Yeah, we know she works at the pastry shop, her parents own it, all that. What we want to know is, how did you two meet her, how long have you known her?"

"What's going on over here?" a pair of voices chorused on either side of them, as Hikaru and Kaoru appeared on either side of the Flynn sisters.

"Is this a secret meeting?" asked Kaoru.

"No, this is not a secret meeting, this is nothing." Ella said, glancing over to a serious-looking Kyoya by the door. It would probably be better for his stress levels if she could manage to keep the rest of the club out of this…

"I can tell when you're lying, Ella, you make the same face Emma does." Hikaru said wryly. He turned to his girlfriend. "What's going on?"

Emma smiled conspiratorially. "Mori likes the pastry girl, we're trying to find out the deets."

Honey gasped. "You really think he likes her, Emmie-chan?"

Ella looked at him, figuring all was lost. "You really couldn't tell, Honey? He was looking at her and smiling practically the whole time."

Honey looked a bit sheepish. "Well, um, see, Reiko-chan was there, so I guess I got kinda distracted…" he shrugged, still smiling.

It seemed that the whole group let out a collective, silent "aww" at this. Honey's relationship with the former-not-so-goth-anymore girl was continuing to blossom, though largely under the radar.

"That's really great Honey, so can you tell us how—"

Emma was once again cut off by the arrival of a new party. "I will not have any club meetings going on without my knowledge!" Tamaki declared. "What is the meaning of this?"

"Shh!" the entire group admonished him harshly.

"Mori will hear!" Kaoru declared urgently.

Ella looked around, but Mori was actually nowhere in sight. "Honey, where is Mori?"

Honey looked like something was just dawning on him. "Oh yeah, he said he'd walk Hana-chan back to her car! Wow, he really does like her special, doesn't he?"

Tamaki's eyes filled with overly dramatic tears and his hands clasped together in front of his face. "Oh how wonderful, another new romance in bloom here at the Host Club, just in time for summer! Well, I think it's obvious that we must help things along in any way possible, after all, Mori certainly isn't the most forward of men. I propose we come up with a plan—"

"And that's what we're WORKING ON, if people would stop INTERRUPTING ME." Emma elbowed him in the ribs. "Jeez." She turned away from the pouting Tamaki back to Honey. "As I was saying. Can you tell us how this all started?"

Honey nodded. "Sure!" he thought for a second. "Well, it was a little more than a month ago, I guess…"

The day of the Cherry Blossom Ball…

Honey couldn't help but smile to himself as he heard the familiar chingaling of the bell of his favorite pastry shop as he entered. He was especially excited today, because Mori had promised to get him a special treat since they were both going to be staying so late after school to set up for the ball. He grinned, seeing the familiar gleam of colorful pastel icing behind the counter already. But what he didn't expect was the new girl behind the counter!

She was really really pretty, especially in the cute little white dress with pink pinstripes and the white apron that all the employees wore. The matching pink bandanna that was supposed to hold her hair back wasn't quite doing the trick, and some of them fell forward in front of her face anyway. She was about his height, too; her arms were only just barely able to rest on the counter. "Hi!" she said pleasantly. Her voice was very small and cute too, just like her! "Welcome to La Patisserie, what can we do for you today?"

"You must be new here, I've never seen you before!" Honey greeted her with a bright smile. "I'm Mitskuni Haninozuki, but you can just call me Honey."

"Oh, well aren't you just the cutest thing!" she exclaimed. "How old are you?"

"Eighteen," he said proudly.

"Oh!" she was obviously surprised, but it passed quicker than it did on most people. "Well, I guess I can't be that surprised. People are always mistaking me for younger than I am, too."

"How old are you, then?"

"Seventeen," she said. "Didn't you two go to Ouran Academy? I go there too, I'm a third year."

"Yeah, we did go there!" Honey said. "We're actually on our way there now, to help set up for a big ball!" Honey suddenly remembered Mori hadn't been introduced, and was surprised by his own rudeness. "Oh, also, this is my cousin, Takashi Morinozuka."

She smiled at him, seeming to see him for the first time. "I'm Hanako Koubashii, nice to meet you, Morinozuka."

He smiled back, an familiar warmth filling his features. "Mori," he said.

"Okay, Mori," she said back, still smiling. They were still kinda staring at each other for another second before Honey broke the silence. "We're here to order some cakes for the party!" he said excitedly.

Hanako seemed to shake herself out of some kind of trance. "Certainly, we have all kinds of cakes here ready to go, and depending on what time your party is we can also easily have some made to be delivered before it starts.

"The second one, please, right Mori?" Mori nodded in response. "We have a special theme to stick to, it's a Cherry Blossom Ball!"

"Oh, that sounds so fun! Come on to the back with me, I have some catalogues you can look at to decide what you want."

"Okay, sounds great!"

They went to the back of the shop, which was a little crowded to say the least, and proceeded to look through a laminated binder of different cake designs. Honey didn't notice at the time, but whenever Hanako and Mori would accidentally touch, one of them would pull back, as though they'd been shocked. There was one point where Hanako had to shuffle around to pick a different binder off the shelf behind them, and when they ended up turned around to look at it, she had her back pressed into Mori. Honey thought he was blushing because it was kind of hot back there.

In the end, they ended up deciding on three layer cakes, two pink and one white, and a dozen boxes of matching cupcakes, topped with cherries. Honey couldn't wait, just thinking about it was getting him all excited.

"Will that be all?" Hanako asked professionally as she retook her place behind the counter, and they took theirs in front of it.

"Nope! Takashi promised me a special treat for all the hard work we're going to have to do today, didn't you?"

Mori gave a small chuckle and nodded, and Honey needed no further invitation to press his nose to the glass of the display case.

"Wow, I'm so excited that you'll be trying one of these!" Hanako exclaimed. "I actually baked everything in here myself today."

Honey gasped and looked at her with glee. "Really?! Now I'm even more excited to try!" he turned to Mori. "Takashi, you should get one too! I bet they're really delicious."

To Honey's surprise, Mori nodded in agreement. He turned to Hanako. "Do you have a recommendation?"

Hanako's cheeks turned as pink as the stripes on her dress. "Um, well, let's see…I like to think that my, um, chocolate torte is pretty good? I've been working on it the longest, and since you two probably won't get much chocolate at your party later…"

"Sounds great!" Honey exclaimed.

Mori nodded. "We'll take two," he said, placing the money to pay on the counter.

She rung them up, which took a minute, because she was new at the register and making two separate purchases at the register complicated things a bit. "I'm so sorry," she was flustered. "I'm still learning at this. I'm confident in my baking skills by now, but this is still…"

"Don't worry." Mori said comfortingly. "You're doing fine."

"Yeah Hana-chan, I bet that thing is harder than it looks! That's a lot of buttons." Honey agreed.

"Thanks you guys, you're really sweet," she said, still fiddling with the register. "Whatever girls get to dance with you tonight are really lucky."

Honey had an idea. "Hey, why don't you come and dance with us, Hana-chan?" he suggested excitedly. "You go to our school too, and one extra person won't be too much, I'm sure Kyo-chan won't mind." He looked up at Mori to make sure.

Mori nodded in response. "We got enough food for everybody." He turned to Hanako. "It'll be fun." He said sincerely.

Hanako smiled. "That's really sweet, you guys, but I don't have a fancy dress or anything, and I don't get off till right when it starts…"

"That's okay, just wear something you already have! And you can be fashionably late!" Honey looked at her, his eyes big and pleading. "Pleeeeaaaase come!"

She giggled, unable to resist. "Alright, I will, thanks you guys!" And at that moment, she finally got the register to work. "There we go!" she cried happily. She picked up their box of to-go treats and handed it to Mori with a smile. "Thank you for being so patient." She said this to both of them, but she was really only looking at him. "I hope you enjoy these! I can't wait to see you later!"

Mori nodded, still smiling, as he turned to walk out the door. Honey followed, yelling "seeya later!" as the bell chingalinged their exit.

Back to now…

"It was actually pretty silly of me to not see it sooner, huh?" Honey giggled.

"That was more lines than Mori's had in this whole story." Hikaru said in shock.

"Sh, Hikaru, this is no time to be breaking the fourth wall!" Emma said. She still found it unnerving when they did that. "So, she came that night, right?"

They all nodded.

"Yeah, and she put her name in to dance with Mori, didn't she?" Tamaki said.

Ella nodded. "She did. We didn't fake that drawing."

Emma shot her a sidelong glare before speaking. "So, that must mean she likes him too, then."

"I'd say that was fairly obvious, wouldn't you?" came a voice from behind them. Kyoya approached the group, having just finished with his records. "Even without hearing that story, he barely took his eyes off her all day. At least one of the other girls was a bit incensed."

"Clearly, we have to do something about this then, Mommy dear!" Tamaki exclaimed.

"Why?" Haruhi called from her windowsill. She snapped her book shut. "I couldn't help overhearing, and it sounds like things are going to progress just fine on their own. Why push it?"

"Because, my dear, as members of the Host Club it is our job—"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, to make every girl happy." Haruhi cut him off, much to his chagrin. "I just know how this is going to end…"

"But last time it went so well!" Ella exclaimed.

Haruhi made a face at her. "I don't think you and I remember that event the same way, Ella. Besides, I just know Kyoya has a problem with this." She turned to Kyoya, eyes begging for help.

Kyoya sighed and adjusted his glasses. "Much as I do wish we could all just have a relaxing summer vacation, Haruhi, it appears we are outvoted." He flipped open his notebook, clearly resigned to getting started. "So," he said, very businesslike. "What's the plan?"

As a sidenote, my 20th birthday is thursday. I know. I'm old. Once again, no promises as to when I'll be back, but I'm guessing soon. It's easier to continue once you've got a plot rolling. HAPPY HALLOWEEN MONTH, EVERYBODY!

-FeatherSong