And we have
another chapter! Woohoo! Thanks to the people who reviewed so far. I appreciate it. And it’s nice to know that there are other PG
fans out there besides myself. Not enough
people are aware of this wonderful manga! We must spread the PG goodness to the world!
Oh yeah. Disclaimers. I don’t own.
Miwa Ueda does. But the story is
mine! And so is Ms. Edwina. *snickers*
Well…read on!
Chapter One
Point of View
She arrived at the art school ten minutes ‘till seven the next evening, peering cautiously into the room to assess the situation. Most of other students already seemed to be there, arranging their supplies on their desks and chatting amiably with each other. Every single one of them was female, and it seemed that most of them had at least one friend along with them. Momo sighed heavily, wishing that she could only be so lucky. Her friends were few and far between, and of the few she did have, most of them couldn’t really be considered as anything more than acquaintances. Sae, of course, did not count as any kind of friend, whatsoever.
Thoughts of the conniving little witch put a scowl on Momo’s face as she stomped into the room and sat at one of the large desks, opening her new satchel to pull out her sketchbook and pencils. She hesitated and ran her hand along the satchel’s soft leather side, suddenly wishing that Kiley was there with her. She should have asked him to join the class, too. It probably would have given him the wrong impression, but at least she’d have someone to talk to before the class started. She didn’t make friends very easily; given the fact that most people judged her first by her looks before her personality, she found it hard to just go up and talk to a complete stranger.
On the other hand, Kiley would probably be so distracted by all the breasts in this class, he wouldn’t talk to me much, anyway, she mused with a smirk. She did find it rather odd, though, that the only other students in the class happened to be female. Maybe teenage guys just didn’t appreciate drawing the way girls did?
Her thoughts were abruptly interrupted by the sudden arrival of what she assumed could only be her teacher. The door in the back of the classroom suddenly slid open, hitting the wall with a crack that startled the room into silence. With a flurry of glittering beads and fluttering sleeves, out strode a tall, proud woman, who was dressed in a rather unique outfit of a flowing, ankle-length cotton skirt in bright blue, and a wildly-printed blouse with bell-sleeves that hung loose the whole way past her hips. Several colorful scarves were tied about her slim waist, and no less than five beaded necklaces glittered around her neck, some hanging almost to her navel. More beads were fastened around her wrists. She wore a pair of sandals on her feet, never mind that it was the middle of winter, and her dark hair was done up in a series of small braids, strung with even more beads. She looked rather like one of those European gypsies that Momo had once read about, and she was obviously of western origin.
“Hello, my darlings!” she called out gaily, and although she was speaking Japanese, her voice was thickly accented, though not enough to be intelligible. It was also loud, and could be heard quite clearly throughout the classroom…no doubt the entire way down the hall, in fact. The strange woman paused when she reached the center of the room and swept her arms outward and to the sides as though to encompass the entire area, bowing with a flourish. “I am Ms. Edwina, your art teacher, and this is Figure Drawing 101!”
Momo started, looking around uneasily. Figure drawing? Wait a minute…wasn’t she supposed to be at nature drawing or something…?
The other girls were looking uneasily around, although not for the same reasons. Whatever they had expected, it was obviously not this extravagant weirdo who was nothing like the normal teachers they were used to. She seemed more like a drama teacher than an art teacher. How on earth she had gotten this job was anyone’s guess. Ms. Edwina, for her part, either didn’t appear to notice the discontent of her students, or else she was very good at ignoring it. “Now,” she continued, clapping her hands together sharply, suddenly all business. “It is time for us to begin! Take out your sketch pads and pencils and prepare to work!”
“Um…Ms. Edwina,” one of the students murmured shyly. “What are we supposed to draw, exactly?”
“Anyhow! I thought there was supposed to be a model here!” another girl piped up slyly, nudging her friend in the side. Both girls tittered, and Momo’s eyes widened. A model? What kind of a model? She had a sinking feeling that they weren’t talking about a model train or anything like that…
“U-um…excuse me,” she called out hesitantly. “But…um…isn’t this the Study of Nature class?”
Ms. Edwina shot her a startled look. “Why no, my dear. As I said, it is Figure Drawing.”
“But…I signed up for the Study of Nature and…well…the paper said this was the classroom…”
“What is your name, my dear?” Ms. Edwina asked kindly.
“Momo Adachi, ma'am,” she replied, trying to ignore the queasy feeling in her stomach. What if she’d gone to the wrong classroom? Oh, she’d simply die of embarrassment!
Ms. Edwina was checking her name list, and she tsked. “My dear Miss Adachi, there has been some mistake. Your name is listed here with the others.”
“What?!” Momo’s eyes widened. “But…but I thought…I mean…can’t I change it? I…I didn’t mean to sign up for figure drawing…”
“Oh it is much too late now, my dear,” Ms. Edwina said sympathetically, yet firmly. “The other classes are filled.”
“Well then, can I drop this and get a refund?”
The teacher’s smile was bright. “Sorry, my pet! No refunds!” she sang. “Why not simply enjoy the class? It is bound to be much more interesting than…” She wrinkled her nose. “…‘The Study of Nature’.”
“But what about…um…what exactly is it that we’re going to be drawing?” Momo muttered, feeling a blush suffuse her cheeks.
“Why, the human body, of course,” Ms. Edwina replied, and some of the girls tittered. Those who didn’t laugh were looking at Momo as though she was stupid. That was okay, though, because she felt really stupid.
“So…this model is…a person?”
“Of course! We cannot use a horse or a cat to draw the human body!”
The class tittered again. Momo’s face felt like it was on fire. “A-and…I take it that…we’re going to be using a…um…”
“A male model. Yes.” Ms. Adachi’s smile was serene. “Of course, a female model would have sufficed just as well, but then again I believe all the young ladies already are aware of what a female body should look like. No no, we are studying the mysteries of the male body in this class!”
Several snickers and sly elbow-nudges followed that statement.
Momo closed her eyes. Well, that certainly explained why the class was all women. “And…um…I don’t suppose this model will be…” She cringed slightly. “…wearing any…clothes, will he?”
“But, of course not, my dear! Clothes would simply hide the beauty of the male form! No, no, for this class, we shall be drawing our most handsome model au natural!” She tsked. “Didn’t you read the pamphlet you were given?”
Pamphlet? Momo’s brows furrowed in thought. Then her shoulders slumped. Of course, that would have been the pamphlet Kiley had shoved into her book bag yesterday, the one she hadn’t so much as glanced at since he’d put it there. She lowered her head in defeat, wishing the floor would open up and swallow her. Why hadn’t she looked at it like he’d told her to?! Truthfully, after their shopping trip, she’d pretty much forgotten it was there. She whimpered. That stupid pumpkin! When she saw him next she was absolutely going to strangle the pervert! Imagine, signing her up for a class where she had to stare at a naked man for two hours a night! For a whole month! I bet he planned it this way, she thought with a low growl. That…that idiot!
Realizing that the class was still staring at her, she bit her lip and forced herself to calm down. Well, like it or not, she was apparently stuck in this class. She couldn’t just dump it and lose all that money Kiley dished out for it, no matter how mad she was at him at the moment, at least not until she paid some of it back to him again. She’d look really ungrateful, otherwise. Besides, maybe it was a mistake on his part, after all? Things like that happened, right? She highly doubted it, but…all she could hope was that for the next month nobody at her school figured out that she was taking a class like this—especially Sae—or it’d be all over the school and the gossip would never stop. And knowing Sae, she’d find some way to turn it into a bigger scandal than it was, and Toji would never, ever, ever speak to her again…
Her shoulders unconsciously drooped at that. Not that he ever did anymore, anyway…
She was vaguely aware of the door to the classroom opening and a person entering the room, before Ms. Edwina’s scolding voice abruptly proclaimed, “Ahh! There you are! I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show up! You had me a bit worried, young man!”
“Sorry, Ms. Edwina. I couldn’t find the right room,” a male voice explained sheepishly…and Momo abruptly froze in stunned shock. Her eyes flew wide as recognition struck through every nerve of her body, and she slowly raised her gaze to face the young man who had only just arrived. She was horrified—strangely, not all that surprised, but definitely horrified—to see none other than Kiley standing just inside the doorway, dressed in a pale blue robe with a bag slung over his shoulder. Her utter shock drove her to her feet, knocking her chair over backward with a loud clatter, and his eyes snapped to hers as she stood there gaping at him like a dying fish. His own eyes widened in startled dismay when he recognized her, mouth dropping open for a moment before he managed to croak out a single word.
“M-Momo…?”
“I see you two know each other!” Ms. Edwina exclaimed, clasping her hands together. “Are you friends?”
“Yes!” Kiley replied cheerfully, at the exact same moment that Momo hotly proclaimed, “No!” She glared at him. “It’s debatable at the moment,” she added snidely.
Kiley smiled sheepishly and rubbed his head. “Eh…are you mad at me?”
“What do you think?!” she exploded. “You…you tricked me! You signed me up for the wrong class! On purpose!” She pointed an accusing finger at him.
He held up his hands beseechingly. “No…wait…you’ve got it all wrong…” he stammered. “Honest, Momo! I didn’t sign you up for this cla—erm, well…maybe I did, but it was all an accident! I swear! I asked the secretary for the sheet to sign you up for the nature course thing.”
Momo’s eyes narrowed dangerously, her lips pursed as she eyed him suspiciously. “What were you talking about with that woman for so long then, huh?” she asked.
“Well…” Kiley rubbed the back of his head and gave her a weak smile. “She offered me a job here. This one, obviously.” He broke off, suddenly realizing that twenty pairs of eyes were fixed on him intently (including the teacher’s), obviously quite interested in the little soap opera being played out before them. He sighed, walked over, grabbed Momo by the hand, muttered a quick “Excuse us” and pulled her out the door. She stood in the empty hallway with him as he shut the door again and turned to face her. He gulped; she did not look happy, and when Momo was unhappy, he usually ended up sporting a new bruise or two. “Look,” he whispered, “I’m really sorry, Momo. Really! But…see…that money I spent…well…it wasn’t actually mine to spend…”
Her eyes widened, the anger draining from her face as alarm took its place. “Wha-what are you talking about?” she stammered. “Not yours? What did you do, mug some old lady to get it?”
He laughed a little, scratching the back of his head. “No, nothing like that. It was meant for my brother. I owed him some money and he wanted me to pay him back right away so…but then I saw how miserable you were and I just couldn’t refuse to help you, so I kind of…”
“Kiley! I told you not to spend it on me!” Now she sounded distressed. “Will you get into trouble with your brother for doing that?”
“No, I took care of it,” he assured her hastily. “That’s where the job part comes in. See, I’m gorgeous, in case you haven’t noticed…” He flashed an arrogant wink and she rolled her eyes at him. “They were still looking for a model for the class. Apparently, the one they’d had wound up getting appendicitis, so he’s stuck in the hospital for awhile and is definitely in no condition to model. So the secretary asked…well, more like begged me to take over for him. She said it paid well and all, and seeing as I needed to make up the cash I’d spent on you, I thought, why not? But I told her I’d have to be paid in advance, and I guess they were desperate enough for a model to agree. Tonight after class I’m going down to pick up the check, and then tomorrow I’ll pay my brother back.”
Momo pursed her lips, feeling horribly guilty. “Well…that makes sense, I suppose,” she muttered, scowling at the floor. “I guess if you want a bunch of females ogling your body all night then that’s your business.” Her head abruptly snapped up and her eyes were sparking with anger again. “But how the hell did I wind up in this class instead of the one I was supposed to take?!” she questioned accusingly. “You gotta admit, Kiley, that this looks really suspicious…and I know how you are, you pumpkin!”
He held up his hands defensively. “I know how it looks!” he whined. “But I’m serious, Momo! I didn’t do it on purpose! The secretary asked me about the job before she handed me the sign-up sheet. Maybe she handed me the wrong one by accident since we were focused on talking about this class? But you can switch to the other classes, right? Or just drop this one?”
Momo sighed heavily, her shoulders slumping. “No, Ms. Edwina said that the classes are all filled, and if I drop this one I won’t get a refund,” she muttered. Then she perked up. “But since you’re making up the money, anyway, that doesn’t matter anymore!” she added, suddenly cheering up.
His eyes widened. “Oh, no you don’t!” he protested. “I have to sit in that room for a month letting girls eye me up like an ice cream sundae, and it’s all on your account! You’re not gonna back out of this that easily! I did all this for you!”
“Well…well…I didn’t ask you to!” Momo sputtered, obviously flustered at his sudden determination. “And I’d have thought a pumpkin like you would like being stared at!”
He snorted, crossing his arms over his chest. “Shows what you know,” he muttered. Momo’s eyes widened in incredulous surprise. Was he…actually blushing? “Contrary to whatever opinion you have of me, I am not looking forward to stripping in front of a room of complete strangers,” he muttered. “I almost didn’t come tonight. Only the fact that my brother will maim me severely if I don’t pay him back made me show up. But…” He turned large, pleading eyes to Momo. “But maybe it won’t be so bad,” he added hopefully. “Momo, please? At least I know you! And…please don’t hit me for this, but…I won’t mind if you look at me. With you there, I don’t think it’ll be so bad…”
Her eyes widened; she had absolutely no idea how to respond to something like that. She opened her mouth to reply, to yell, to do something, but the sound of the door sliding open, and Ms. Edwina’s head appearing from around it, brought the conversation to an abrupt and timely end. “If you are finished debating amongst yourselves, perhaps you would both like you rejoin the class,” she suggested dryly. “You are on the clock, young man, and I don’t want to deal with a room full of disappointed females…”
Kiley grimaced, and Momo almost felt sorry for him. She sighed, shoulders slumping. Well, there was no help for it, then. She’d never be able to live with herself if she forced him to face that mob of man-eaters alone. If her presence would help him…get through it, then she supposed she owed him that much. She huffed another sigh, then shot Kiley a resigned look out of the corner of her eye and shook her head, before turning to stomp back into the room. Kiley followed, a huge grin lighting his face, making him look like a little kid who’d discovered that Christmas had arrived in the middle of spring break. “Thanks, Momo,” he whispered, squeezing her shoulders a little.
She merely sniffed, but a bright flush had colored her cheeks at the thought of what she was about to do. “When you take off that robe, you’d better be facing the other direction,” she growled in reply.
* * * * *
“Now! Let us finally begin!” Ms. Edwina announced as soon as Momo sank onto her chair again, trying to ignore the irritated glares that the other students were throwing at her. It wasn’t as though she’d been the one to drag him out of the room, she thought sulkily. How did she always manage to get blamed for stuff like this?
A short, metal stool had been placed in the middle of the classroom, and Kiley walked reluctantly over to it and sat down, shifting around to get comfortable. Momo wondered with faint amusement how someone as hyper as Kiley was going to manage to sit for an entire two hours without fidgeting. He was like a little kid sometimes, she thought fondly, always ready to run around and play. She had to laugh a little under her breath at the image.
“No, no,” Ms. Edwina was stating. “That won’t do at all. Don’t be so stiff! Relax! You’ll be up there for quite awhile after all, so you don’t want to be all tense or you’ll get sore muscles.”
Kiley tried to relax, slumping more, straightening more, finally resting his elbow on his leg and propping his chin on his fist, in the classic Thinker pose. The girls giggled at that, whispering among themselves as they eyed him eagerly. Momo fought the urge to roll her eyes at them. And people said she was a playgirl?
Finally, Ms. Edwina sighed. “For heaven’s sake, Kiley, you really must relax! You look like a wax dummy in that position!” she exclaimed. She strode over to him and gripped him by the shoulders, turning him to the left and arranging him this way and that like a life-sized marionette, before finally stepping back with a flourish. “Well…this will do,” she decided. “Now…you are going to remove your robe sometime this evening, are you not?”
Momo’s eyes widened, her face taking on a panicked expression. With the teacher’s arrangement, Kiley had been turned so that he was more than halfway facing her. She was going to get a lot more than an eyeful when he took off that robe. She gulped, discreetly scanning the room in search of empty desks on the other side. They were all filled.
Kiley turned his head enough to look at her, seeing the expression on her face. He shot her a reassuring wink, then lifted the leg closest to her to the lowest stool rung…which unfortunately wasn’t very high, but at least it helped a little bit. Momo shot him a pathetically grateful look in return, and he smiled before reaching to untie the belt of his robe and shrugging it off his shoulders, letting it fall to hang off the stool, and revealing himself to the world. He was immediately set upon by loud whistles and catcalls from the students, a slow blush crawling into his face as he gazed studiously at the ceiling, obviously more than a little embarrassed at the reaction. Momo felt her heart trying to crawl into her throat. His leg was blocking her full view, thankfully enough, but she could still see enough to make her own face heat up like an oven.
“Ladies, ladies!
Please!” Ms. Edwina was calling impatiently,
clapping her hands sharply to get their attention. “This is not
some
Momo took a deep breath and picked up her pencil, setting it to her open sketchpad…and realizing suddenly that she had absolutely no idea where to begin. She glanced at the girl to her left, then to her right; they were both studiously working away, obviously not having any problem finding their inspiration. Momo envied them. She had never done anything like this before. She could hardly draw stick figures that well, and now she was expected to draw an actual person?
“Psst.”
Momo blinked and glanced up; Kiley was looking at her, his expression concerned. “What’s wrong?” he mouthed at her.
She bit her lip. “I don’t know where to start,” she whispered. The girl on her left glanced at her with a smirk, and Momo glared back before turning her attention back to Kiley, her brow furrowed. “Do I start with the feet or the head or what?”
Kiley was grinning. “Start wherever you want to, Momo. It’s your drawing,” he replied.
“Hey! Quit moving!” somebody complained. Kiley rolled his eyes and ignored her. “Relax,” he told Momo soothingly. “Just…start drawing. It’ll come after awhile.”
“You sound like you’ve done this before,” Momo grumbled, tapping a manicured nail against her teeth.
He grinned. “Drawing, yeah, I’ve done a few in my time. As for the modeling thing…?” He started to shrug, remembered the no moving rule, and settled again. He grimaced. “I have to sit still like this for two hours?” he half whispered, half groaned.
Momo had to laugh a little, smothering the sound in her hand. “You brought it on yourself,” she reminded him, and he grumbled a little in reply.
“Hey Cutie, when this is over, want to come to my place?” the girl on Momo’s left suddenly asked. She gave him a flirtatious glance. “I’m pretty slow at drawing, so maybe you could help me get some extra credit or something. I like to make sure I add detail to my work.” The rest of the class tittered as her gaze dropped meaningfully to his lower regions—of which she was getting a fairly good eyeful as he was sitting fully facing her—and Momo had to fight the sudden urge to reach over and jam her pencil into the girl’s drawing hand. See how much “extra credit” that slut earns when she’s picking lead out of her hand for the next month, she thought furiously.
Kiley, for his part, didn’t bother to reply, other than to give the girl a playful wink. He turned his eyes back to Momo then, who was scowling down at her sketchpad, and his heart skipped a beat when he realized that she looked unaccountably…jealous. Even as he realized that, her expression cleared and she sighed, then set her pencil against the thick paper and began a few hesitant strokes. She glanced up suddenly, and froze when she found Kiley’s eyes watching her steadily, thoughtfully…almost as though he was trying to read her thoughts. Her blush returned as she quickly glanced back at her sketchbook, studiously scratching pencil against paper in a vain attempt to concentrate on her work.
Eventually, as
time passed and the soothing scratch-scratch
of pencils against paper—punctuated by occasional whispers by their
owners—began to ease her frazzled nerves, Momo began to realize that it was
kind of fun to draw, and that she really wasn’t half-bad at it when she really
tried to focus. Maybe Kiley was right,
after all, she thought. Maybe it really was a good way to relieve stress to just
sit still and do nothing but focus on creating something beautiful.
Beautiful…
She had to admit, though it was with a blush, that Kiley was definitely one who could be described as beautiful. She took another look at him, surveying him critically as if looking for flaws. She was hardly surprised when she couldn’t find any. The boy was just perfect. Of course she’d already known that his face was pretty, something to be pasted on the front of a magazine or on a billboard or something. But the rest of him was something to be desired; his build was slim and graceful, his arms and legs and chest lightly chorded with sleek muscle, his stomach flat and smooth. She followed the thin line of hair the began below his navel and went downward…and downward…until her gaze was abruptly halted by his thigh blocking her view, and she quickly averted her eyes back up a little, trying not to blush…and to steady her breathing, which had quickened without her notice. She noticed that he didn’t have much hair across his chest, but Momo didn’t care much for hairy men, anyway and…
Okay, wait. She brought her thought process to a screeching halt. Focus, girl, focus. On the drawing! she reminded herself firmly, swallowing hard. She glanced down at her paper again, surprised to note that she’d already gotten as far as his chest. She frowned, tilting her head to one side critically. It wasn’t bad…but she knew it could be better. Kiley’s features weren’t nearly as graceful on her drawing as they were on his face; he looked a little cross-eyed to her, in fact, and the realization caused a sudden giggle to erupt from her throat. She quickly clapped a hand over her mouth and glanced around. Nobody was looking at her. Well…nobody except Kiley. He was obviously wondering what was so funny. She shook her head at him, keeping her lips pressed firmly together to stifle her amusement. He shot her a suspicious glance, but she merely smiled at him and bent her head to continue drawing.
* * * * *
Time passed altogether too swiftly, and before she knew it, Momo’s concentration was interrupted by Ms. Edwina’s loud voice exclaiming, “Time is up, my darlings! Please turn in your sketchbooks by the door so I may critique your wonderful work! And I shall see you all again on Friday evening!” The room filled with the sounds of murmuring voices and books being closed and things being put away. Momo sighed and leaned back, stretching her arms above her head, as her gaze automatically drifted to Kiley. She wondered if he’d managed to survive his ordeal. The idea made her smirk.
But her smirk abruptly vanished and she had to choke back a squeak of shock when she caught the young man in the middle a good stretch of his own, standing tall and lean with arms above his head and head bent forward as he released a huge yawn, silky brown hair falling softly over his eyes. It wouldn’t have been so bad…except for the fact that he hadn’t put on the robe yet, therefore giving Momo a full-out view of everything she hadn’t seen before.
Every. Single. Inch.
Kiley’s closed eyes abruptly opened and he stopped in the middle of his stretch with his arms still over his head when he saw Momo staring at him, taking in her flaming and mortified face with a slightly confused expression. Her shocked gaze was fixed firmly on a certain area…and it wasn’t his head. A slow grin began to spread across his face as he realized just what it was that she was staring at so intently. “Do you like what you see, Pussycat?” he purred, causing her to jump violently, her wide eyes snapping up to meet his own. “Momo! I’m shocked and dismayed!” he scolded teasingly, pretending affront. “Art class is over now! You really should…”
“Shut up!” she yelled, snatching up her bag and stomping out of the room. “The least you could do is put on your robe, you pervert!”
Kiley laughed heartily and threw the robe around his shoulders, belting it hastily and snatching up his bag before running after Momo, who was already halfway down the hall. “Hey! Momo, wait up! I’m sorry, okay? I was kidding! Aw, come on, Pussycat, don’t be like that!” he laughingly protested as he caught up with her. “I don’t mind that you were looking, really!”
“This is so embarrassing!” she groaned. “I’ll never be able to look at you the same way again!”
“And is that a bad thing?” he questioned brightly.
“Yes!”
Kiley laughed again. “Stop here, okay? Just wait…I need to change and then pick up my money, and I’ll take you home.”
“I don’t need you to take me home. I can take care of myself!” she snapped, wrestling her sleeve from his grasp.
“No…Momo, listen, it’s late and there are a lot of not-so-nice guys on the streets right now.” All humor had vanished from Kiley’s tone, and his expression was perfectly serious as he stared down at her. “I don’t feel right letting you walk alone. You’re too pretty; you’re bound to attract some unwanted attention.”
Momo blinked at him in surprise, a slow blush crawling back into her cooling cheeks. His gaze softened, his hand coming up to stroke his knuckles down her cheek in a soothing caress. “I won’t take long, okay? Wait here.” With that, he headed to the restroom.
All Momo could do was lean weakly against the wall and attempt to still her racing heart.