an AU, sappy romance that takes place when Quatre is in high school.

Miss Une walked into the classroom, her posture rigid enough to balance a book on her head. Her hair was pulled back in a severe bun at the nape of her neck. And her lips are drawn in a thin grim line, glasses partly hiding her expression as she surveyed a room full of teenage boys. She looked every inch the no-nonsense schoolteacher.

"Gentlemen, today we will discuss the influence of the industrial revolution on government. And a quick pop-quiz to determine how well you understood yesterday's reading assignment." She began to hand out sheets of paper.

Hisses and groans were heard across the classroom, but the noises were discreet. Miss Une was a strict teacher, and most of the students were intimidated or afraid of her. Perhaps that was the reason why they also call her rude names behind her back, when they were sure that she could not hear them or punish them.

Quatre hummed softly to himself as he read the questions. Unlike his classmates, he found Miss Une's class to be one of his favorites. He enjoyed the subject matter, and he enjoyed her rigorous lesson plans. They made him think, and it was not an unpleasant thing to do.

He answered the questions easily, and let his mind wander while he waited for the rest of the class to finish. Miss Une was sitting on her desk, flipping through her notes. Her legs were crossed at the knee, and Quatre found himself absentmindedly admiring the long graceful curves of her calf and thigh.

"Stop," said Miss Une abruptly.

Quatre nearly jumped and blushed furiously before he realized the admonition was not directed toward him and his wandering eyes, but to the class. The classroom was filled with the sounds of anguished mutters and rustling paper as Miss Une began collecting the tests.

Quatre's heart was still beating double time when Miss Une started the lesson.

I've never thought of Miss Une as being beautiful, thought Quatre when his pulse had settled, but she really is. I wonder if she has a boyfriend.

Once Quatre had noticed Miss Une's innate attractiveness, it was difficult to keep from noticing it again and again. Her makeup was always impeccable. She had a habit of pressing a pencil or finger to her precisely rouged lips that Quatre found immeasurably distracting. How would those lips feel pressed against his?

He found himself making up excuses to talk to her after class, asking her questions about the lessons, or just making small talk. He found reasons to spend time with her after school, when the afternoon sun poured into her classroom and put golden highlights in her rich brown hair.

As they spent more time together, he thought her manner toward him softened slightly. She seemed eager to answer his questions and listen to him talk.

She's letting her guard down, but just around me, thought Quatre. And it made him feel odd in his stomach. But it wasn't a bad feeling.

At times Quatre thought he caught a glimpse of an utterly different Une than the one everyone else knew. Someone who was gentle and kind. Someone who was soft and warm. Someone whom Quatre was falling in love with.

One evening, he mustered enough courage to visit her where she lived. He shed his school uniform and put on something that made him look older: A button down shirt and neat slacks.

Her apartment was a small one, in a quiet neighborhood. She had several magnificent rose bushes growing out of pots on her porch. The curtains were drawn back, and Quatre caught a glimpse of a small but cozy looking living room.

He knocked on the door. Miss Une opened the door. She was wearing a lavender sweater of angora, and darker colored pants. Her hair was down about her shoulders, and she wasn't wearing her glasses. She looked surprised, but not at all unhappy to see him.

"Hello Quatre," she said. Away from the confines of the school, was her greeting warmer, more affectionate? Quatre thought it was.

"I found this book," he said, holding up the slim volume of poetry that was his pretext for the visit. "And I thought you might enjoy it."

She took the book from his hands. "And this couldn't wait until tomorrow?" she asked. But her eyes were smiling.

"Well, I was in the neighborhood..." Quatre mumbled.

"Never mind, Quatre. I'm making some hot chocolate. Would you like a cup?"

"I would love that," said Quatre.

Miss Une disappeared into the kitchen and Quatre took a good look around at the room. It was decorated in subdued earth-tones, with beige walls and green/beige curtains. Two walls were covered with bookshelves full of books, and a handmade rug covered the floor. A dark green sofa and an armchair placed in a corner by a stained glass lamp gave the room a relaxed and inviting feel. When he sank into the soft cushions of the sofa and he felt like he was being embraced by Miss Une.

No one would image that the severe disciplinarian Une could live in a place like this. But Quatre knew the other Une, the one who loved to listen to Lizt and Chopin, the one who loved poetry, the one who smiled with her eyes whenever Quatre spoke to her, she would be at home here.

A picture placed on one of the bookshelves caught Quatre's eye, and he walked over to take a close look. It was Une, with her hair down and without her glasses, much like she was right now, except that in the picture, Une was smiling, and pressing her face against the chest of a handsome young man with ginger colored hair and a perfect smile.

"Here you are."

Quatre turned as Une entered the living room and handed him a mug of hot chocolate. Quatre accepted the mug, and tried to keep his voice nonchalant as he spoke.

"Who is this guy in the picture?"

Miss Une hesitated, and for an instant Quatre thought she would set her mouth in a thin line, the way she did when students displeased her, and tell him to mind his own business. But she smiled instead, and not just with her eyes.

"That's Treize, my fiancee."

The double effect of Une's dazzling smile, and the fact that she had a fiancee left Quatre struggling for words.

"I didn't know you were engaged, Miss Une," he said, after what he hoped was not too long a pause. "Congratulations. When is the wedding?"

Miss Une turned away from him to take a seat in the armchair, when she turned back to face him, her expression was unreadable. "There won't be one, I'm afraid. Treize was killed in an accident some years ago."

"I'm sorry."

A heavy silence hung over the room. Miss Une sat and sipped her hot chocolate, but she seemed to be lost in her own thoughts, far away.

With her Treize, that smiling man, thought Quatre. But he's dead. He left her all alone.

He felt an irrational anger toward the ginger-haired man. Irrational, since really the man probably hadn't wished to die. But his anger gave him boldness, and he put down his mug, and placed both his hands around hers, which were cupped around her drink.

"I really am sorry."

She looked up from her thoughts, and seemed to truly look at him for the first time. Not seeing a student and a responsibility, but a young man.

"Quatre..." Une started to speak, but Quatre for once did not wish to hear her what she had to say. He leaned forward, and stopped her words with a kiss.

She tastes like chocolate, though Quatre. She's warm and soft.

When they broke apart, Une was flushed and breathless. "You should leave," she said. But she didn't look as if she meant it.

"I'll leave, if that's what you really want me to do..." Quatre gently disengaged her fingers from the mug and placed it on a table. He didn't let go of her hands but caressed her slender fingers and began kissing them.

"Quatre, you know this is not right." She was using her school teacher voice, but she did not attempt to draw her hands away.

"Why? Because I'm your student? I'll graduate in three months. Why should it be right in three months, but not now? What difference does it make?" Quatre winced as he heard his own words. I sound like a whining brat, he thought. He stood up.

"Une," he said, deliberately dropping the formality, trying to speak to her as a man speaks to a woman. "I think I love you. No, I KNOW I do. What can be wrong about that?"

Une stood up too. And she's half a head taller than I am, lamented Quatre. She thinks I'm just a kid. But I'm old enough to know that I've found the woman of my dreams.

"Leave, Quatre." The magic of the kiss was gone now. The austere Miss Une was back. "You shouldn't have come here. I hope you won't make the same mistake again."

Quatre wasn't quite sure how he made it home that night. He really didn't remember too much of the trip back from Miss Une's place, except that he was miserable and heart-broken.

Miss Une greeted him in class the next day the same way she greeted all of her students. There was no hint whatsoever of the warm vulnerable woman that Quatre had kissed the night before. When Quatre gave the wrong answer to one of her questions, she reprimanded him as severely and mercilessly as she did everyone else.

When he tried to talk to her after class, her replies were polite but brusque. She did not want to be with him at all.

Quatre began to dread Miss Une's classes. It was impossible to concentrate while she stood at the front of the class, beautiful, tantalizing, and utterly heartless. And Quatre would feel a sharp stab of pain whenever she touched her lips with finger or pencil. His grades, previously excellent, began to suffer.

Will this torment never end? thought Quatre.

Yet, slowly, inexplicably, inevitably, time passed and it was finals week. Then after a blur of frenzied cramming, finals were over and grades were distributed.

After the graduation ceremony, Quatre stood in his commencement gown, shaking hands with students and teachers and parents, and gripping his diploma almost fiercely.

It was late at night before he could pull away from the graduation party, where the newly matriculated celebrated their freedom. Miss Une had not appeared at graduation, the last time he had seen her was at the final she had given, when she sat on the desk with her legs crossed, distracting Quatre with their loveliness.

He approached the house with trepidation. Would she already be asleep? The living room lights were off, but a light was on in her bedroom. He straightened up, and knocked on the door. It was several moments before the door opened. Une stood there before him in her robe, her long brown hair framing her fame, and falling over the exposed line of her collar bone.

Quatre pressed a bouquet of roses into her astonished hands and smiled.

"I'm sorry for intruding on you so late, Miss Une," he said, "But I've been waiting for so long, and I just couldn't wait a moment longer."

He stood there and drank in the sight of her. His kind gentle beautiful Une. The one with the chocolate lips. The one who was sad and alone.

Une seemed too stunned to speak. She was trying to push her hair out of her face, adjust her robe and hold on to the roses at the same time.

She is adorable when she is like that, thought Quatre. And she's not pushing me away this time.

"My feelings haven't changed, you know," he said. "Its too late tonight, but would it be wrong if I came back to visit you another time?"

"No, not at all," said Une. She seemed to regain her composure a little. "Thank you for the flowers, they are very beautiful."

"No," said Quatre, "You are the one who's beautiful."

For a brief moment, Quatre thought there were tears in her eyes.

The End

This story can be read as a stand alone, but there is a sequel, which has a LEMON (sex scene). If you like the fluffy PG romance, you can consider the story ended here.