Writer: Morry & Mani Mani
Editor: Morry
Character list: Isao Hironori (Morry), Yoshihiro Renge (Mani Mani)
Total words: 7306 words
Summary: Out of the blue, Renge asked Hiro to be her model for her drawing assignment. The male classmate agreed, and while he stood for poses, he found more sides of her.
Trigger warning: none.
*Allégro: a ballet term applied to bright, fast or brisk steps and movement.
Cover by Mani.
Editor: Morry
Character list: Isao Hironori (Morry), Yoshihiro Renge (Mani Mani)
Total words: 7306 words
Summary: Out of the blue, Renge asked Hiro to be her model for her drawing assignment. The male classmate agreed, and while he stood for poses, he found more sides of her.
Trigger warning: none.
*Allégro: a ballet term applied to bright, fast or brisk steps and movement.
Cover by Mani.
"Isao-kun, can you be my model for my figure drawing homework?"
It is lunch break when Renge asks Hiro out of the blue. She seems pretty desperate.
"My model suddenly canceled on me and with the tight deadline, it's hard for me find another one..." she explains, clasping her hands together.
"Eh?" Hiro is in the middle of his thoughts, as usual. He is a bit confused when Renge approached him suddenly, until her words came to sink into his mind, now, he is surprised.
"Are you sure? I... don't really mind, though." Then the boy frowns. "But why me?" Hiro asks unsurely. Actually, he is a bit interested, he will finally can see Renge drawing and work on her art. But he is also curious on why the girl ask him from all the other friends here. He guesses it’s because she already seen his body, and, to be honest to himself and smugly thinking, that his body is perfect to be a model for anatomy drawing lesson.
So he wants the girl to say it, even though probably there’s another reason why.
"I need someone with a good stature and nice gesture." Renge says, clasping her hands even tighter.
"Simply put Isao-kun, you have a very nice body and I think you would be the perfect model.” Renge continues in a heartbeat and then she looks at him pleadingly.
"So please, be my model Isao-kun."
Hiro raises his eyebrows at Renge. It seems that she really need him for this, and it seems pretty urgent too. And she also said it. He has a very nice body. And she said it without any shame.
Hiro smirks at her, and after a while, he shrugs. "Of course, Yoshi. When will you need me?" The boy asks with a bit teasing tone.
Renge let out a really big, relieved sigh. She immediately holds Hiro's hand and look at him directly in the eye. “Thank you so much, Isao-kun! You're a life saver," She smiles brightly at him.
"Are you free tomorrow? I am planning to cram everything in a day at the studio."
Hiro's eyes widen considerably and his heart skipped a beat when Renge suddenly hold his hand and stare at him squarely.
He was a bit astonished for a moment, then he snorted and smiled. "I am ready anytime."
"That's great then! See you tomorrow Isao-kun!" She releases her classmate’s hand, still smiling ear to ear. Then she goes to the class door with cheerful steps.
"Once again thank you so much! I'm going to the library for a bit. Enjoy your lunch Isao-kun!" Renge then exits the class quickly, but you can see her skipping a little.
He doesn’t have the chance to reply to her as she quickly goes out from the class. It brings butterflies to his stomach seeing her happy and satisfied face.
Even though he still has some suspicion toward her about the incident at the Dark Hour the other day, maybe Hiro should not bother about it for now. As long as he could interact with her normally without any tension, he would keep it like this... for a while.
He rummages his bag to take out his lunchbox, only filled with several plain breads. The boy took one, bites it on his mouth, then walks outside and goes to the rooftop.
***
The next day, Renge sits on her bed waiting for Hiro's arrival. She's wearing an oversized plain shirt and a mid-length comfy shorts. She's going to spend the whole day drawing, so she needs to get comfortable doing it.
Renge constantly checks her phone to see if the boy has arrived yet.
"I hope he'll arrive soon." She mumbles.
***
Hironori yawns as he arrives in front of Renge's house. He's a bit sleep deprived last night, there's tiny eye bag under his eyes. So he's a bit sleepy and tired. But he had made a promise to Renge, so after he's done with his morning run, he directly goes to his destination. He felt better after the run, but the heaviness of his eyes still persists a bit.
The boy takes out his phone and sends a message to Renge to notify her that he's arrived.
[I'm in front of your house.]
He presses the sent button and lets out another yawn as he waits for her response.
[Okay]
Upon receiving the message, Renge replies briefly and immediately runs downstairs to greet her classmate.
She opens the door and finds Hiro already standing in front of the house. "Good morning Isao-kun!" She greets him.
Hiro throws a small smirk when Renge greets him. "Good morning." He tries to stifles his yawn, but ended up leaving a bit of tear on his eye. He shakes his head to drive his sleepiness away.
"Are you prepared already? I'm a bit anxious, to be honest." Hiro chuckles. "There won't be other students watching, right?"
"Yes! Don't worry, it's only both of us. I'm sure you'll feel uncomfortable with too much eye staring." She says as she ushers him to enter.
"Today we'll be at my drawing studio. Come in, Isao-kun!”
Seeing Renge quite energetic brings shine to his eyes. Hiro smiles at her, "Alright. Excuse me, then." The boy enters the house with his female classmate.
"As much as I'm interested in arts, I never done this before. Becoming a model for figure drawing." Hiro snorts and shrugs. "I'm actually glad you asked me. I'm pretty curious with your artwork, Yoshi."
Renge gets bashful for a bit at the comment. "My artwork isn't that great, to be honest." She walks through the main hall, guiding Hiro to her workspace. Then they finally arrives at a door with the sign, "Renge's Workspace."
Hiro chuckles. "Well, until I see your artwork, I cannot say if your work is great or not. And I don't have a standard on how a good painting should be, since, well, I'm a dancer. Not a painter."
Renge smiles a little and opens the door. "I hope I can fulfill your expectations."
The room smells like paint and papers, canvases are neatly aligned by the walls, but most of them are covered with white cloth. Several books are sprawled on the floor also a little bit of paper and a mug fills with forgotten tea.
"It's a little messy, sorry."
The moment Renge opens her workspace, his eyes widen. He can already feel some kind of artistic sense from the room. The smell of paints and papers are actually pleasant to his nose. A rather messy workplace is understandable to him (though to be honest he has a bit tendency to tidy it at least), but then he frowns when he sees hanged canvases are covered with cloth.
He wants to ask about it, but he thinks the better of it. He doesn't want to ruin her cheery mood. It has to be something related to her insecurities toward her art.
Hiro snorts. "It's fine. Creative minds tend to have a messy room, anyway." He replies with a bit joking tone.
"Usually it's more organized, but with that assignment coming up, somehow it became like this." She laughs a little.
Now that Hiro has entered the room, time to get down to business. Renge drags a stool to an area by the window, then she looks into Hiro's eyes with a serious look on her face.
"Okay Isao-kun, now strip."
Hiro finds himself in a bit shock when he hears Renge suddenly sounds business-like and straightly asks him to strip. Is this what she like when she's working on her art? Hiro surely can relate himself when it comes to dancing, but this side of Renge he sees now, it seems new to him.
But it's not bad at all. Hiro finds it interesting. And a little bit of proud of her.
And a little bit of... well. He should not go there for now, should he?
He smirks a little. "Excuse me." After he puts his small shoulder bag to the floor, Hiro starts to take off his clothing one by one. Scarf, vest, sweatshirt, and his pants, leaving him only on his short thigh leggings. Not to forget to take off his wristbands, too. He usually uses quarter leggings for his dance, but this time, he knows that figure drawing needs to be exposed as much as possible, so he uses the short ones.
He tidy up his clothing and put them on nearby place (chair or table or anything), and he spreads his hands a bit when he faces Renge.
He's showing off his very nice body. His broad body from his neck to his feet is rippling with muscles. Well-build abs, strong biceps, solid thighs and sturdy calves. He never once exposed his almost-naked body to anyone (except for health check by his aunt), so Renge is the first one to witness his very well-toned but not too bulky body.
The boy smirks, "Just tell me what to do next."
Usually Renge would be more embarrassed at this situation, but her urgency to finish this task kind of shuts off her other system.
She can't help but smile when Hiro finishes striping and flaunting his body like that. She eyes Hiro's body for a bit and gives him an approval nod. "I'm very glad I asked you to model for me."
Hiro's smirk widen when he sees Renge just smiles at him. The last time she saw him in the studio bare-chested she looked like she was about to faint. It seems this side of her is more composed and serious.
Renge then gestures him to sit on the chair, then she explains again. "I'm going to ask you to do several poses for me, so let's start with this one." She takes out her phone and inside there's a picture of The Thinker statue.
"Le Penseur, hm?" Hiro mumbles as he stares at Renge's phone. He observes for a moment, then he takes steps to the stool provided. "I hope I can hold my pose properly. I'm a bit... weary today, to be honest." As he sits on the stool, he smiles at her before following the mentioned pose. "But just tell me if I don't get the pose right for you."
"Okay, but do tell me of you're tired." Renge says as she too sits down on her own stool, trying to figure out the good angle for the drawing.
Then she decided to draw it from where she sits. Renge takes her drawing pad and a piece of charcoal then she starts to sketch quietly.
Hiro doesn't know why, but it seems that he's no longer feel that weary. As he's steadying himself posing still, his mind wanders into deep thoughts. Though, as he realizes that, he wants to palm his face because he's un-ironically thinking deeply when he's posing The Thinker.
If she's really the one who Hiro encountered back then at the Dark Hour... Then she must already know that he's a shadow persona-user. Who would give him some snacks and drinks at such time when he's in the studio anyway? It might be the studio attendant, but she's an ordinary person, as far as Hiro know, since he doesn't feel anything whenever she's around. And he also awoke just right after the Dark Hour ended.
But Renge... come to think of it, he does sense the same awareness he had back then right now. And in this room, there's only both of them.
So it is really her. The awareness feeling that keep bothering him days ago.
He might someday confront about it to her. But, of course, not in the near days. Or maybe he'll just let it be until they encounter each other for real in Dark Hour.
The thing is, who is she? Enemy, or ally?
Thinking of it makes him a bit desperate. So he decides to brush it off and think of something else while waiting Renge to finish her drawing.
Renge is really glad that she chose Hiro as her model. He is tall and he has right amount of muscle. Is it from dancing, she wonders as she stares at Hiro intently. Looking at his face, he looks like he's thinking about something. Or maybe he's just trying to put more effort on getting into character.
***
After several paper scrunching and smudges, Renge finally stops. She looks pretty satisfied. "And now we're done! Time for another pose." She stretches a little before coming to Hiro with her phone on hand and then shows him the picture for the next pose.
Hiro shifts and stretches his body. Then he turns to the girl to see the next pose she needs.
The boy hums for a several moment, observing the pose. Then he stands up, following the mentioned pose. "Is this good?" Hiro asks.
Renge observes Hiro's pose, she says nothing and she immediately touches Hiro, correcting his pose.
"First your hand needs to go here..." she lifted his forearm.
"The other one goes here," Renge says as she lowers Hiro's palms.
"Also arch your back more," she pushes his back a bit. "I can get more of the depth like that."
"And lastly...," Renge reaches out for Hiro's chin and lifts it up a bit and looks into his eyes. "There you go! Stay like this!” She says, then rushing back to her stool to draw.
Hiro ponders hard if Renge knows what kind of effect she gives after she touched him like that.
He tries to hold down his blush, but his insides feel warm already. Now he's beginning to think if Renge has the same feeling like him. But before speculating any further, he brushes the thought aside. He cannot think about that yet. Not before he reached his lifetime goal.
Hiro takes a slow, long breath as he's steadying his pose and tries hard not to take a glance at the girl.
***
"Okay! Let's take a break now." Renge speaks, placing down her drawing pad. Her hair is now in ponytail and there are some smudges of charcoal in her hand.
Renge stretches her body and face Hiro again. "Would you like something to eat? My treat!"
Hiro lets out a long breath as Renge says to take a break. Then he swings his hands and stretches his body to relieve the tension. Staying still in a pose like that surely makes his body a bit stiff.
Then the boy stares back at Renge and smirks. "Is that how you pay me for being your personal model for one day?" Hiro teases. Then he chuckles, "Anything would be fine, Yoshi."
"You got me!" She laughs a little as she wipes her hand on a paper towel. "I think I have several brochure for food here, just tell me if you have anything you want." She says as she takes the papers and hands them to Hiro.
"Hmm," Hiro hums as he receives the brochures from Renge and reads them. Hiro is not a picky eater, so when it comes to deciding food, he's not quite sure what to choose. Though, he does have a favorite, but he also doesn't mind to eat any other food... as long as it's edible and not with extreme taste.
When he's about to choose his food, sound of door knocks echoes. Hiro looks up.
"I'm coming in" a deep voice sounded behind the door and when the door opens. A light brown haired middle aged man clad in yukata comes into the room. He has a stern look on his face, and he looks at Hiro.
"Oh, you're not with Yamada today?" The man asks Renge.
"Yamada-san has an urgent business he needs to attend to, so I looked for a substitute." Renge then gestured to her classmate.
"This is Isao-kun, he's a classmate of mine."
As the middle-aged man enters the room, Hiro put away the brochures he holds, bows to the man, and smiles at him symmetrically. "Isao Hironori, sir, Yoshihiro's classmate. Pleased to meet you." All of those attitude brings him back to the past where he was taught to be strictly polite to anyone who older than him. Well, now he's being selective about that, but this one is must do.
"I hope I can be a good substitute to be Yoshihiro's model for today. And I will try my best to not cause any trouble." Despite the situation he's in (with only in his short thigh leggings), his smile's not faltered.
"Hmm," he nods at Hiro. "Thank you for helping my daughter. My name is Yoshihiro Kiku.”
Kiku then looks at the drawing pad on Renge's stool. "Are you done with the assignment?" He asks as he picks Renge’s drawing pad up.
"It's progressing greatly. I only need to do two more poses," She answers. Renge can feel her heartbeat increasing him as her father flips through the papers.
"I-I think I have improved from my last lesson,” Renge stutters, with her fingers playing on the hem of her shirt. “What do you think father?" Renge asks nervously.
But only silence filled the room. Kiku is only flipping the pages without comment. The man observes Renge’s drawing with a stern face.
When the man finishes looking at the drawing, he puts down the pad, still no words coming from him. Kiku looks at his daughter with grim expression for a second. “I will take my leave now. You can continue your work again." He turns to look at Hiro and nods at him, then he exits the room.
Hiro nods back to Kiku when the man takes his leave. As the man exits the scene, the boy turns his head to Renge, frowning.
What was that for? The atmosphere suddenly turns uptight, the tension is rising with the appearance of her rather fierce looking father. Hiro doesn’t quite understand what happens. Why did the man only look at his daughter drawing without commenting anything?
The silence still fills the room for several moment. Then Renge turns to Hiro. "I’m sorry about that, my father is a quiet person." She smiles, but it's pretty clear that she was a bit shaken up. "So what did you want to order? Pizza maybe?"
The boy’s frown deepens. Obviously, her father silent treatment rather affecting her, from the looks of her expression. She tries to hide it, but Hiro can see that the girl is quivering. Nevertheless, he grins back at Renge. "Sure, if that's what you want, Yoshi."
"Okay, pizza then!" Renge takes her phone to call the restaurant, then she orders accordingly.
Hiro only chuckles at Renge's respond. When the girl starts to order the food, Hiro take steps to his stool and sits on it.
Maybe it's time to get work on his plan soon.
After a moment of silence, Hiro looks up to Renge, "Yoshi, may I see your drawing earlier?" Hiro calls with a small smile and tilts his head.
Renge hesitates. What if I disappoint him too? The thought haunts her deeply as she grasps her pad tightly.
But Hiro is her model, so of course he has the right to look at it. Renge slowly hands Hiro her drawing pad, her heart felt so heavy to do this.
"H-here you go!"
Hiro's smile widens when Renge decided to show her drawing. He takes her drawing pad and starts to take a look.
And Hiro find himself stupefied for several moment.
It's a total depiction of him. Although Hiro is not an artist that aced in drawing nor painting, he can clearly see that this piece is... Exemplary.
Hiro opens his mouth, but no words coming out for a second. He's mesmerized by her drawing. "Yoshi, this is...," he stops midway for a second. "It's magnificent. A well-depiction of myself." Then Hiro looks to Renge, frowning a bit. "How can you say that you don't deserve to be called an artist?"
Renge widens her eyes when she heard Hiro's praise. "Re-really?" She asks him in an utter disbelief.
"B-but--," She stops for a little and gives Hiro a small smile of relief. "T-thank you..." It would be rude of her to reject Hiro's compliment.
"It's just... You know, I don't think I'm skilled enough..." She doesn’t know what else to say and hangs her head in shame.
Hiro observes the girl for a moment, then he sighs softly. Is it because her father never comments about her artwork? So she assumed that her art is not good enough?
He stands up from his stool and approaches Renge, and gently smacks her head with the drawing pad. “Don’t degrade yourself. At least have a little pride, alright?” Hiro speaks softly.
Then he hands the drawing pad to the girl. When she receives it, the boy goes to sit down on the stool and stares outside the window.
Renge nods softly at Hiro's word, unsure of what to say back to him.
Another silence fills the room. Renge wonders if she made things awkward. That's when a knock and voice can be heard outside the room.
"Hey sis! The pizza you ordered came!" A chipper voice of a young boy can be heard behind that door.
"Oh! Okay I'll go get it." Renge stand up and opens the door, revealing a teenager with a similar hair color to Renge. He's a little shorter than her and he has a mole under his left eye. The young boy looks into the room and eyes the half-naked Hiro, then he looks at Renge. The boy cracks up a big grin.
"Oohhh it's the guy~," he nudges Renge with his elbow and gives her a meaningful smile.
When his mind wanders to the unknown place and time, Hiro snapped out as a boyish voice caught his ears. He turns his head to the door and sees a boy, identical to Renge.
Ah, so this is her brother. The one who gets his painting to be shown at the gallery back then.
Hiro frowns and tilts his head at the young boy when he teases his sister. Did she told her brother about him?
Either way, Hiro turns his body from his sitting position to face the little boy properly and smirks. "So, you're Yoshi's little brother, eh? What's your name again? Sobaki?" Hiro jokes.
"Hush, Tsubaki! He's just a classmate." Renge blushes a little when she says that.
Tsubaki laughs at her sister's reaction. "Oh really? I believe you then.”
Renge pinches her brother's cheek out of irritation. "I'll go get out food, excuse me for a bit Isao-kun." She says as she about to exits the room. "Eat with us Tsubaki, just wait here."
"Ow! Okay okay!" He laughs and closes the door the door behind him. Then the boy turns to Hiro. "It's Tsubaki! Nice to meet you bro~" He smiles and walks toward the older boy.
"Sooooo what's your relationship with my sister? You can tell me." Tsubaki sits at the floor looking at Hiro.
At Tsubaki's question, Hiro frowns. But then he smirks a little, "Just an ordinary classmate." As for now. He cannot guess what kind of relationship they'll be having in the future. As if they will have one, Hiro laughs inwardly. He doesn’t even know Renge’s feelings toward him yet.
Then he tilts his head, "Did your sister tell you about me? What's with the sudden question?"
"Hmmm okay...," Tsubaki eyes Hiro with suspicion. "Well, it's not like she tells me about it, it's more on, I saw it." He snickers at Hiro.
"What?" Hiro responds immediately. "See what? What did you see?" Hiro is blabbering because of his sudden shock from the boy's respond. He stops himself for a moment and let his mind rewind any moment he could remember spent with Renge that could be seen by this brat.
The last time he went out with Renge... he couldn't remember which. Dress shopping? Arcade game? Chiu's restaurant? Dancing studi--
Wait.
Dancing studio. Not exactly at the studio. But after the dancing studio. Hiro's eyes widen in realization.
"...you saw us." Hiro states, not exactly a question. He deadpans the boy. "You two sure are siblings. Is peeking one of the perks that runs in your family?"
Tsubaki laughs at Hiro's panicked state. "Well it's not like you guys are being silent in front of our house." He shrugs.
Of course. How could he missed that? The boy is right, they weren't exactly silent at that time. He remembers he even raised his voice to her. Hiro kneads his temple with his fingers.
Then Tsubaki perks up,"Sis peeks too? That's sounds like a fun story, tell me about it!"
At Tsubaki's inquiry, Hiro scowls a bit. "Why don't you ask your own sister about that? Well, I'm kind of guessing that she won't tell anything about that either." He shrugs. Then he leans his chin on his hand. "Long story short that is how we start to know each other. The rest of it, ask her."
"Okay, okay, no need to look too grumpy bro--....I think I don't know your name yet." Tsubaki says, a little concerned.
"Isao Hironori." He replies simply.
The boy's face turns into a serious expression. "I just want to say, if you do have some plan... With my sister, I just hope you won't make her cry." Tsubaki explains. "She already have a lot on her plate, and I'm sure you already know that."
Hiro stares at the boy. If there's anything that make her cry, he will also make sure they pay for it, anyway. He already swore that he will hunt down anyone who dares to make her look down on herself. So he doesn't quite understand what the boy is saying.
Hiro shrugs nonchalantly. "I can see that pretty clearly, boy. No need to worry."
"Well, that's great if I can get my point across." Tsubaki gets up, "It's great to be acquainted to you, Hiro-san!"
"Hm," Hiro only grunts at Tsubaki as the boy gets up.
That's when the door opens and Renge came back with two boxes of pizza.
"Sorry for the wait, the delivery guy didn't have change so I had to wait a bit longer!" Renge trots slowly so she won't drop the box. Tsubaki then approaches her sister and opened the pizza box; stealing one piece and eats it.
"Well I'll take my leave now, I won’t meddle with your ongoing courting with Hiro-san," he says in a teasing tone and nudges at Renge, then leaves the room.
"W-what? Hey Tsubaki!" Renge yells at her younger brother. Seeing the boy is nowhere to be seen, she sighs and faces Hiro again, putting down the boxes in front of them. "Sorry about my brother, he's a bit on the eccentric side."
Hiro smirks a little as he stands up. He wants to use his shirt and pants while eating at least.
"So, Yoshi," he calls when he reaches his clothing and starts to wear them. "It seems your brother saw us when we were... having our time in front of your house the other day." He asks with a teasing tone. "So it's no wonder if your brother commented like that." He adds with a chuckle. Little brat knows nothing, anyway. So he's a bit let it be and play with it, he shrugs inwardly.
As he finishes wearing his clothing, he goes back to where he sits. "So maybe we have to be careful next time." The boy inclines his head and smirks teasingly.
"... Yes... He won't stop bothering me to... 'Spill the beans' he says, and he doesn't believe me when I said we're just friends." She sighs leaning her face on her hand. "Quoting him... ‘Friends don't hold each other under the moonlight’," Renge can feel her face redden a little saying that.
Hiro laughs at the quote. "Was the moonlight even there, though? I don't remember." The moment he replay the memory of him holding Renge close, his neck warms.
"Let us eat first, then." Says Hiro as he takes a slice of the pizza and eats it.
"Yeah, I'm a little famished. Thank you for the food," Renge takes a slice of pizza and eats it.
As he starts to eat the third slice, Hiro hums. It's a bit quiet, so maybe he should start some talks. "How many poses left do you need? I take it that you have to finish the assignment by today?"
"Tomorrow actually," she says taking her second slice. "Only two more to go and you'll be free Isao-kun." She looks up, then she notices that there is pizza sauce stain near his lip. Renge is not sure how to bring it up so she just stares at it.
"Two more, hm?" Hiro mutters. And he shrugs, and continues eating nonchalantly after saying, "Alright. I'm sure I can keep up with it. As long as you don't make me do en pointe and hold it for an hour." He chuckles. "Or else I can't attend school tomorrow."
He's oblivious of Renge's stare as he keeps on eating his slice of pizza.
The stain bothers her a lot, she is reminded a little of her brother. Tsubaki is a messy eater. "You have some sauce on your face, Isao-kun." Before she knew it, her hand moves on its own and wipes the stain..
"Hm--" he looks up to Renge, and before he knew it, a hand touches and wipes gently, just near his lip.
Hiro's eyes widen in pure shock.
He stares at Renge intently. Is the girl know what she's doing? Does she ever know what kind of effect she hold over him? Does she ever realize that every of her unexpected action makes his heart stutter?
As every question keep passing through his mind, he keep on staring at Renge with wide, disbelief eyes.
Renge just notices her own actions when she sees Hiro's surprised expression. She can feel heat creeping up to her cheeks.
"S-sorry about that! My hand kind of moved on their own!"
The boy's still staring at Renge for several moment, until he snickers. "That's not fair, Yoshi." Hiro says with rather husky voice.
Without further ado, he immediately yet gently holds Renge's hand which wiped the stain from his face. Then, he opens his mouth and sucks the sauce from her finger.
As he finish, he once again stares at Renge with a wide smirk with his head a bit inclined. Their face is quite close.
"wh---" Renge can't even finish her sentence when Hiro sucks on her finger. It's like her brain suddenly stop functioning. She can only stare at him with dumb expression on her face.
Their current distance and Hiro's smirking face sure isn't helping the situation. Renge felt like she could explode at any second now.
Hiro chuckles softly at Renge's shocked face. Now that he got her too, the game is fair.
But being fair is a bit lame and boring to him sometimes, though in some situation he do must get a fair deal.
This one? He wants to get the advantage.
His smirk widens as he once again bring the girl's hand to him and kiss her palm faintly. Just to add to his satisfaction.
Then he lets go Renge's hand and takes some distance with a wide smirk stills on his face to see her next reaction clearly.
Yoshihiro Renge is completely frozen and red. She totally can't believe what just happened.
Hiro just kissed her hand. What on earth is happening here? How did things escalate this quickly?
Renge can feel herself getting a little bit dizzy from all of this, she can only let out a small meek cry, "w-what..?" She’s holding the place where Hiro kissed her. Renge eyes her classmate with a very confused but intrigued expression.
Hiro laughs heartily when Renge is completely red and chokes out a word. He really does have a certain effect toward the girl. Somehow, he feels glad about it.
"Relax, Yoshi," Hiro says as he picks another slice of pizza. "Don't mind too much about it. We still have time." He smirks softly at her.
"But time won't wait for the pizza from getting cold." The boy adds and starts to eat again.
He's totally messing with her. Yes, he's totally just playing around and it's somehow... Pissing her off a little bit. It takes time and effort for her to be composed around the boy (yes, she needs to mentally prepare herself first to face his half-naked) and now he pulls this kind of stunt, throwing her off the balance again.
Renge pouts and brought out both of her hand and pinches Hiro cheeks, and she pinches them a bit too hard.
"H-hey now--" Hiro chokes a laugh when Renge starts to pinch both of his cheeks. Its hurt and stings, but that doesn't matter because the girl is pinching him while her face is still red and pouting.
She's way too cute.
He puts down his pizza and grip both of Renge's hand in an attempt to stop her from pinching him too hard. "Alwight, I'm sowwy!" Hiro says while laughing, his words kind of make funny sound because of his pinched cheeks.
Renge stops pinching him after he apologizes to her, but she pinches him one last time before letting him go with the pout is still on her face.
"I'm going to wash my hands now, after that we'll continue." She says a bit sternly.
Hiro is still laughing when Renge let go of his cheeks. This whole thing really warms his heart and brighten his mood.
"Of course," he finally says after his laughing calms down. "I need to wash mine, too."
***
Both of them are back to the room after they finished washing their hands. Renge takes out her phone to show Hiro the pose he should be doing next. To be honest she's still a bit annoyed at him, maybe she should really tell him to do pointe for an hour.
"...here's your next pose," she says to Hiro, showing him a photo of a man standing with one of his hand stretched outwards.
Hiro rubs his cheeks with hand. It stings, probably its red now. But somehow he doesn't mind about it.
He observes the pose at Renge's phone. Then he nods and start to strip himself once again. Once he's left to his leggings, he mimics the pose. "Is this fine?"
If she tries to touch him again without warning, he'll make sure to mess with her again, he thinks as he smirks inwardly.
"Hmm, bring your hand up a bit more," as she takes his arm to a better angle, suddenly a flash of inspiration crosses her mind.
Still wanting to get back at him for the thing before and while she's still holding his arm, Renge leans in and bites one of his finger.
She didn't know why she did it, but it sure made her feel a lot better.
Hiro flinches when Renge suddenly bites his finger. He doesn't make a coherent sound, but it sure still hurts.
"Yoshi," he calls with a smirk, his pupils darkening. "Do you want me to attack you?" Hiro purrs lowly. She probably doesn't get it, but if she keeps doing this to him, he might lose his control. Yet her appearance, with those exposed thighs and nape, is surely not making it any better for him.
She laughs a bit at Hiro's reaction and pats his head. "A payback from before! Also, you're not a wild animal, Isao-kun, so don't go attacking people." She replies simply.
Hiro stuns and his eyes widen for a moment when Renge pats his head. Then he giggles softly, "How rude. I'm sure I didn't do any damage to you, Yoshi." Then he brings his outstretched hand and hold her face. "But instead you hurt me, and that's not fair." Hiro cutely makes a pouty face at her.
And he laughs inwardly at her respond about him attacking her. She really doesn't get it.
Well, Renge should have expected Hiro to strike back, but... she didn’t. When the tall boy holds her face and made that pouty face, she doesn’t know what to do.
Hiro currently looks like a really big puppy in her eyes. She's not going to lie, it's pretty cute.
"W-well enough playing around, let’s get back to work." She says a bit stuttering.
"Of course." Hiro answers with a wide smirk. But he's not letting go his hand from her face.
He's not letting go, so Renge separates herself from him. "You may hold my face however you want, but please just do it later, I need to finish this today." She sputters in panic as she flees to her stool and drawing materials.
She isn't even aware of what's she's saying.
Hiro raises his eyebrows at Renge's words, and his smirk widens. "Sure, Yoshi." He'll make sure to continue this fun later, then.
As Renge goes back to her stool, Hiro poses his body back to the earlier position.
***
"Aaaaaaaand done!" Renge cheers as she finishes her last drawing. She lets out a relieved gasp and slumps on her stool. "I just need to submit this at class tomorrow. Oooh I'm beat!"
She raises her head to look at Hiro again, smiling with gratitude. "Good work Isao-kun! And thank you for helping."
As Renge finishes her drawing, Hiro lets out a soft groan and stretches his body. "Probably I need to dance after this. Keeping still for hours really makes my body stiff." He whines as he rotates his neck to relieve the strain.
"Glad that I can be much of a help to you." Hiro replies and about to take his clothing. But he stops midway. Instead, he turns to Renge and smiles a little. "Can I see the result, Yoshi?"
"S-sure!" She answers, handing the pad to him. “I just hope its good enough, the last ones are a little rushed." She adds, still slumping.
Hiro approaches the girl, takes the drawing pad and observes her drawing.
He smiles as he look at the pad. It's still beautiful to his eyes. He's really grateful that she asked him to be his model for today.
Then, he turns his head to stare at Renge. Once again, he brings his hand to hold her face. His thumb's stroking her cheek, the other hold her chin. He tilts her head a bit so he can look straight to her eyes.
"Good work today, Yoshi." Hiro says softly with a little smirk.
Now that the urgency of her assignment is gone, the fatigue is starting to kick in. Renge was thinking of taking a very long nap as soon as possible.
Then a gentle hand is holding her face again. When Hiro looks straight into her eyes, she feels like she's going to explode.
This is absolutely unfair, she thinks to herself. Renge is too tired to give out a proper reaction, so she just closes her eyes. So at least she won’t look too much at Hiro's eyes, it's a bit hypnotizing.
"T-thank you, Isao-kun."
Hiro chuckles softly when Renge closes her eyes. It seems that he should give her some mercy for now.
But he wants to do something for one last time before it's done.
Hiro brings his own face closer to her and plants his lips to her forehead. Just taking a chance that she cannot see him.
He holds it like that for a moment, then he let go of the girl. The boy throws a soft smile at her before he starts to take his clothing and wears them.
She can definitely feel both her heart and brain explode.
When Hiro lets her go and starts to tidy up himself, Renge is just sitting there dumbfounded. She covers her already tomato red face with her hands.
"Isao-kun you are so mean...” she mumbles behind her hands.
Hiro giggles once again when he hears the faint voice of Renge. "A payback from before." He says simply as he finish wearing his vest. Then he takes his small shoulder bag and his scarf in his hand.
"Anything else you need from me, Yoshi?" Hiro asks with a smile before he leaves. He chuckles inwardly as he watch Renge covers her face like that. There is some kind of man pride swelling inside him.
Renge gets up, still covering her face. "N-nothing else!" She answers abruptly. "I'll escort you out."
As they walk to the entrance door of her house, the girl speaks, "A bit of advice Isao-kun, please refrain from uh... kissing." The last part was said very softly. "Y-you're going to give people the wrong idea... And it should be shared with someone you love..."
Hiro chuckles at Renge's words. She still doesn't know that she also holds some kind of effect toward him. And after all of that, he kind of already get a clue of how Renge feels toward himself.
"Of course. I'll keep that in mind, then." He'll have to wait for the right moment. It'll take really long time... So he need to execute his plan soon.
As they both arrived at the entrance, he turns himself to Renge. "Thank you for today too, Yoshi. I'm glad you chose me to be your model. Your drawing is exemplary, and I'm looking forward to your next artwork."
"Thank you too, Isao-kun, for accepting my sudden request." She bows to him as sign of gratitude. "I'll tell you if I have new artworks."
Hiro gives one last soft smile at the girl before he takes his leave, "See you tomorrow."
She waves goodbye to the boy, "See you tomorrow." And when the boy is out of her sight, she goes back to her house and goes to her workshop again to tidy things up.
Looking at her sketches again makes her remember all the small things that has happened today. She blushes again at the memories of Hiro kissing her hand and forehead. What was that for? She wonders. There's no way he's interested in her... Right?
Some imaginations involuntarily crossed her mind, like holding hands and going on a date. She quickly brushes those thoughts, her face is as red as ever.
All of this makes her wonder more about Hiro's other self. The one she senses some days ago. Her heart feels heavy again remembering it.
Renge takes her drawing pad and goes to her room. She throws herself on the bed. Drawing nonstop all day was pretty taxing, she can feel her eyes getting heavy from the comfort.
The warm feeling from her bed reminded her of the times she spent with Hiro. It really does makes her wonder a lot.
How can something so warm feel so sinister at the same time? The question is left unanswered as she drifts into sleep.
It is lunch break when Renge asks Hiro out of the blue. She seems pretty desperate.
"My model suddenly canceled on me and with the tight deadline, it's hard for me find another one..." she explains, clasping her hands together.
"Eh?" Hiro is in the middle of his thoughts, as usual. He is a bit confused when Renge approached him suddenly, until her words came to sink into his mind, now, he is surprised.
"Are you sure? I... don't really mind, though." Then the boy frowns. "But why me?" Hiro asks unsurely. Actually, he is a bit interested, he will finally can see Renge drawing and work on her art. But he is also curious on why the girl ask him from all the other friends here. He guesses it’s because she already seen his body, and, to be honest to himself and smugly thinking, that his body is perfect to be a model for anatomy drawing lesson.
So he wants the girl to say it, even though probably there’s another reason why.
"I need someone with a good stature and nice gesture." Renge says, clasping her hands even tighter.
"Simply put Isao-kun, you have a very nice body and I think you would be the perfect model.” Renge continues in a heartbeat and then she looks at him pleadingly.
"So please, be my model Isao-kun."
Hiro raises his eyebrows at Renge. It seems that she really need him for this, and it seems pretty urgent too. And she also said it. He has a very nice body. And she said it without any shame.
Hiro smirks at her, and after a while, he shrugs. "Of course, Yoshi. When will you need me?" The boy asks with a bit teasing tone.
Renge let out a really big, relieved sigh. She immediately holds Hiro's hand and look at him directly in the eye. “Thank you so much, Isao-kun! You're a life saver," She smiles brightly at him.
"Are you free tomorrow? I am planning to cram everything in a day at the studio."
Hiro's eyes widen considerably and his heart skipped a beat when Renge suddenly hold his hand and stare at him squarely.
He was a bit astonished for a moment, then he snorted and smiled. "I am ready anytime."
"That's great then! See you tomorrow Isao-kun!" She releases her classmate’s hand, still smiling ear to ear. Then she goes to the class door with cheerful steps.
"Once again thank you so much! I'm going to the library for a bit. Enjoy your lunch Isao-kun!" Renge then exits the class quickly, but you can see her skipping a little.
He doesn’t have the chance to reply to her as she quickly goes out from the class. It brings butterflies to his stomach seeing her happy and satisfied face.
Even though he still has some suspicion toward her about the incident at the Dark Hour the other day, maybe Hiro should not bother about it for now. As long as he could interact with her normally without any tension, he would keep it like this... for a while.
He rummages his bag to take out his lunchbox, only filled with several plain breads. The boy took one, bites it on his mouth, then walks outside and goes to the rooftop.
***
The next day, Renge sits on her bed waiting for Hiro's arrival. She's wearing an oversized plain shirt and a mid-length comfy shorts. She's going to spend the whole day drawing, so she needs to get comfortable doing it.
Renge constantly checks her phone to see if the boy has arrived yet.
"I hope he'll arrive soon." She mumbles.
***
Hironori yawns as he arrives in front of Renge's house. He's a bit sleep deprived last night, there's tiny eye bag under his eyes. So he's a bit sleepy and tired. But he had made a promise to Renge, so after he's done with his morning run, he directly goes to his destination. He felt better after the run, but the heaviness of his eyes still persists a bit.
The boy takes out his phone and sends a message to Renge to notify her that he's arrived.
[I'm in front of your house.]
He presses the sent button and lets out another yawn as he waits for her response.
[Okay]
Upon receiving the message, Renge replies briefly and immediately runs downstairs to greet her classmate.
She opens the door and finds Hiro already standing in front of the house. "Good morning Isao-kun!" She greets him.
Hiro throws a small smirk when Renge greets him. "Good morning." He tries to stifles his yawn, but ended up leaving a bit of tear on his eye. He shakes his head to drive his sleepiness away.
"Are you prepared already? I'm a bit anxious, to be honest." Hiro chuckles. "There won't be other students watching, right?"
"Yes! Don't worry, it's only both of us. I'm sure you'll feel uncomfortable with too much eye staring." She says as she ushers him to enter.
"Today we'll be at my drawing studio. Come in, Isao-kun!”
Seeing Renge quite energetic brings shine to his eyes. Hiro smiles at her, "Alright. Excuse me, then." The boy enters the house with his female classmate.
"As much as I'm interested in arts, I never done this before. Becoming a model for figure drawing." Hiro snorts and shrugs. "I'm actually glad you asked me. I'm pretty curious with your artwork, Yoshi."
Renge gets bashful for a bit at the comment. "My artwork isn't that great, to be honest." She walks through the main hall, guiding Hiro to her workspace. Then they finally arrives at a door with the sign, "Renge's Workspace."
Hiro chuckles. "Well, until I see your artwork, I cannot say if your work is great or not. And I don't have a standard on how a good painting should be, since, well, I'm a dancer. Not a painter."
Renge smiles a little and opens the door. "I hope I can fulfill your expectations."
The room smells like paint and papers, canvases are neatly aligned by the walls, but most of them are covered with white cloth. Several books are sprawled on the floor also a little bit of paper and a mug fills with forgotten tea.
"It's a little messy, sorry."
The moment Renge opens her workspace, his eyes widen. He can already feel some kind of artistic sense from the room. The smell of paints and papers are actually pleasant to his nose. A rather messy workplace is understandable to him (though to be honest he has a bit tendency to tidy it at least), but then he frowns when he sees hanged canvases are covered with cloth.
He wants to ask about it, but he thinks the better of it. He doesn't want to ruin her cheery mood. It has to be something related to her insecurities toward her art.
Hiro snorts. "It's fine. Creative minds tend to have a messy room, anyway." He replies with a bit joking tone.
"Usually it's more organized, but with that assignment coming up, somehow it became like this." She laughs a little.
Now that Hiro has entered the room, time to get down to business. Renge drags a stool to an area by the window, then she looks into Hiro's eyes with a serious look on her face.
"Okay Isao-kun, now strip."
Hiro finds himself in a bit shock when he hears Renge suddenly sounds business-like and straightly asks him to strip. Is this what she like when she's working on her art? Hiro surely can relate himself when it comes to dancing, but this side of Renge he sees now, it seems new to him.
But it's not bad at all. Hiro finds it interesting. And a little bit of proud of her.
And a little bit of... well. He should not go there for now, should he?
He smirks a little. "Excuse me." After he puts his small shoulder bag to the floor, Hiro starts to take off his clothing one by one. Scarf, vest, sweatshirt, and his pants, leaving him only on his short thigh leggings. Not to forget to take off his wristbands, too. He usually uses quarter leggings for his dance, but this time, he knows that figure drawing needs to be exposed as much as possible, so he uses the short ones.
He tidy up his clothing and put them on nearby place (chair or table or anything), and he spreads his hands a bit when he faces Renge.
He's showing off his very nice body. His broad body from his neck to his feet is rippling with muscles. Well-build abs, strong biceps, solid thighs and sturdy calves. He never once exposed his almost-naked body to anyone (except for health check by his aunt), so Renge is the first one to witness his very well-toned but not too bulky body.
The boy smirks, "Just tell me what to do next."
Usually Renge would be more embarrassed at this situation, but her urgency to finish this task kind of shuts off her other system.
She can't help but smile when Hiro finishes striping and flaunting his body like that. She eyes Hiro's body for a bit and gives him an approval nod. "I'm very glad I asked you to model for me."
Hiro's smirk widen when he sees Renge just smiles at him. The last time she saw him in the studio bare-chested she looked like she was about to faint. It seems this side of her is more composed and serious.
Renge then gestures him to sit on the chair, then she explains again. "I'm going to ask you to do several poses for me, so let's start with this one." She takes out her phone and inside there's a picture of The Thinker statue.
"Le Penseur, hm?" Hiro mumbles as he stares at Renge's phone. He observes for a moment, then he takes steps to the stool provided. "I hope I can hold my pose properly. I'm a bit... weary today, to be honest." As he sits on the stool, he smiles at her before following the mentioned pose. "But just tell me if I don't get the pose right for you."
"Okay, but do tell me of you're tired." Renge says as she too sits down on her own stool, trying to figure out the good angle for the drawing.
Then she decided to draw it from where she sits. Renge takes her drawing pad and a piece of charcoal then she starts to sketch quietly.
Hiro doesn't know why, but it seems that he's no longer feel that weary. As he's steadying himself posing still, his mind wanders into deep thoughts. Though, as he realizes that, he wants to palm his face because he's un-ironically thinking deeply when he's posing The Thinker.
If she's really the one who Hiro encountered back then at the Dark Hour... Then she must already know that he's a shadow persona-user. Who would give him some snacks and drinks at such time when he's in the studio anyway? It might be the studio attendant, but she's an ordinary person, as far as Hiro know, since he doesn't feel anything whenever she's around. And he also awoke just right after the Dark Hour ended.
But Renge... come to think of it, he does sense the same awareness he had back then right now. And in this room, there's only both of them.
So it is really her. The awareness feeling that keep bothering him days ago.
He might someday confront about it to her. But, of course, not in the near days. Or maybe he'll just let it be until they encounter each other for real in Dark Hour.
The thing is, who is she? Enemy, or ally?
Thinking of it makes him a bit desperate. So he decides to brush it off and think of something else while waiting Renge to finish her drawing.
Renge is really glad that she chose Hiro as her model. He is tall and he has right amount of muscle. Is it from dancing, she wonders as she stares at Hiro intently. Looking at his face, he looks like he's thinking about something. Or maybe he's just trying to put more effort on getting into character.
***
After several paper scrunching and smudges, Renge finally stops. She looks pretty satisfied. "And now we're done! Time for another pose." She stretches a little before coming to Hiro with her phone on hand and then shows him the picture for the next pose.
Hiro shifts and stretches his body. Then he turns to the girl to see the next pose she needs.
The boy hums for a several moment, observing the pose. Then he stands up, following the mentioned pose. "Is this good?" Hiro asks.
Renge observes Hiro's pose, she says nothing and she immediately touches Hiro, correcting his pose.
"First your hand needs to go here..." she lifted his forearm.
"The other one goes here," Renge says as she lowers Hiro's palms.
"Also arch your back more," she pushes his back a bit. "I can get more of the depth like that."
"And lastly...," Renge reaches out for Hiro's chin and lifts it up a bit and looks into his eyes. "There you go! Stay like this!” She says, then rushing back to her stool to draw.
Hiro ponders hard if Renge knows what kind of effect she gives after she touched him like that.
He tries to hold down his blush, but his insides feel warm already. Now he's beginning to think if Renge has the same feeling like him. But before speculating any further, he brushes the thought aside. He cannot think about that yet. Not before he reached his lifetime goal.
Hiro takes a slow, long breath as he's steadying his pose and tries hard not to take a glance at the girl.
***
"Okay! Let's take a break now." Renge speaks, placing down her drawing pad. Her hair is now in ponytail and there are some smudges of charcoal in her hand.
Renge stretches her body and face Hiro again. "Would you like something to eat? My treat!"
Hiro lets out a long breath as Renge says to take a break. Then he swings his hands and stretches his body to relieve the tension. Staying still in a pose like that surely makes his body a bit stiff.
Then the boy stares back at Renge and smirks. "Is that how you pay me for being your personal model for one day?" Hiro teases. Then he chuckles, "Anything would be fine, Yoshi."
"You got me!" She laughs a little as she wipes her hand on a paper towel. "I think I have several brochure for food here, just tell me if you have anything you want." She says as she takes the papers and hands them to Hiro.
"Hmm," Hiro hums as he receives the brochures from Renge and reads them. Hiro is not a picky eater, so when it comes to deciding food, he's not quite sure what to choose. Though, he does have a favorite, but he also doesn't mind to eat any other food... as long as it's edible and not with extreme taste.
When he's about to choose his food, sound of door knocks echoes. Hiro looks up.
"I'm coming in" a deep voice sounded behind the door and when the door opens. A light brown haired middle aged man clad in yukata comes into the room. He has a stern look on his face, and he looks at Hiro.
"Oh, you're not with Yamada today?" The man asks Renge.
"Yamada-san has an urgent business he needs to attend to, so I looked for a substitute." Renge then gestured to her classmate.
"This is Isao-kun, he's a classmate of mine."
As the middle-aged man enters the room, Hiro put away the brochures he holds, bows to the man, and smiles at him symmetrically. "Isao Hironori, sir, Yoshihiro's classmate. Pleased to meet you." All of those attitude brings him back to the past where he was taught to be strictly polite to anyone who older than him. Well, now he's being selective about that, but this one is must do.
"I hope I can be a good substitute to be Yoshihiro's model for today. And I will try my best to not cause any trouble." Despite the situation he's in (with only in his short thigh leggings), his smile's not faltered.
"Hmm," he nods at Hiro. "Thank you for helping my daughter. My name is Yoshihiro Kiku.”
Kiku then looks at the drawing pad on Renge's stool. "Are you done with the assignment?" He asks as he picks Renge’s drawing pad up.
"It's progressing greatly. I only need to do two more poses," She answers. Renge can feel her heartbeat increasing him as her father flips through the papers.
"I-I think I have improved from my last lesson,” Renge stutters, with her fingers playing on the hem of her shirt. “What do you think father?" Renge asks nervously.
But only silence filled the room. Kiku is only flipping the pages without comment. The man observes Renge’s drawing with a stern face.
When the man finishes looking at the drawing, he puts down the pad, still no words coming from him. Kiku looks at his daughter with grim expression for a second. “I will take my leave now. You can continue your work again." He turns to look at Hiro and nods at him, then he exits the room.
Hiro nods back to Kiku when the man takes his leave. As the man exits the scene, the boy turns his head to Renge, frowning.
What was that for? The atmosphere suddenly turns uptight, the tension is rising with the appearance of her rather fierce looking father. Hiro doesn’t quite understand what happens. Why did the man only look at his daughter drawing without commenting anything?
The silence still fills the room for several moment. Then Renge turns to Hiro. "I’m sorry about that, my father is a quiet person." She smiles, but it's pretty clear that she was a bit shaken up. "So what did you want to order? Pizza maybe?"
The boy’s frown deepens. Obviously, her father silent treatment rather affecting her, from the looks of her expression. She tries to hide it, but Hiro can see that the girl is quivering. Nevertheless, he grins back at Renge. "Sure, if that's what you want, Yoshi."
"Okay, pizza then!" Renge takes her phone to call the restaurant, then she orders accordingly.
Hiro only chuckles at Renge's respond. When the girl starts to order the food, Hiro take steps to his stool and sits on it.
Maybe it's time to get work on his plan soon.
After a moment of silence, Hiro looks up to Renge, "Yoshi, may I see your drawing earlier?" Hiro calls with a small smile and tilts his head.
Renge hesitates. What if I disappoint him too? The thought haunts her deeply as she grasps her pad tightly.
But Hiro is her model, so of course he has the right to look at it. Renge slowly hands Hiro her drawing pad, her heart felt so heavy to do this.
"H-here you go!"
Hiro's smile widens when Renge decided to show her drawing. He takes her drawing pad and starts to take a look.
And Hiro find himself stupefied for several moment.
It's a total depiction of him. Although Hiro is not an artist that aced in drawing nor painting, he can clearly see that this piece is... Exemplary.
Hiro opens his mouth, but no words coming out for a second. He's mesmerized by her drawing. "Yoshi, this is...," he stops midway for a second. "It's magnificent. A well-depiction of myself." Then Hiro looks to Renge, frowning a bit. "How can you say that you don't deserve to be called an artist?"
Renge widens her eyes when she heard Hiro's praise. "Re-really?" She asks him in an utter disbelief.
"B-but--," She stops for a little and gives Hiro a small smile of relief. "T-thank you..." It would be rude of her to reject Hiro's compliment.
"It's just... You know, I don't think I'm skilled enough..." She doesn’t know what else to say and hangs her head in shame.
Hiro observes the girl for a moment, then he sighs softly. Is it because her father never comments about her artwork? So she assumed that her art is not good enough?
He stands up from his stool and approaches Renge, and gently smacks her head with the drawing pad. “Don’t degrade yourself. At least have a little pride, alright?” Hiro speaks softly.
Then he hands the drawing pad to the girl. When she receives it, the boy goes to sit down on the stool and stares outside the window.
Renge nods softly at Hiro's word, unsure of what to say back to him.
Another silence fills the room. Renge wonders if she made things awkward. That's when a knock and voice can be heard outside the room.
"Hey sis! The pizza you ordered came!" A chipper voice of a young boy can be heard behind that door.
"Oh! Okay I'll go get it." Renge stand up and opens the door, revealing a teenager with a similar hair color to Renge. He's a little shorter than her and he has a mole under his left eye. The young boy looks into the room and eyes the half-naked Hiro, then he looks at Renge. The boy cracks up a big grin.
"Oohhh it's the guy~," he nudges Renge with his elbow and gives her a meaningful smile.
When his mind wanders to the unknown place and time, Hiro snapped out as a boyish voice caught his ears. He turns his head to the door and sees a boy, identical to Renge.
Ah, so this is her brother. The one who gets his painting to be shown at the gallery back then.
Hiro frowns and tilts his head at the young boy when he teases his sister. Did she told her brother about him?
Either way, Hiro turns his body from his sitting position to face the little boy properly and smirks. "So, you're Yoshi's little brother, eh? What's your name again? Sobaki?" Hiro jokes.
"Hush, Tsubaki! He's just a classmate." Renge blushes a little when she says that.
Tsubaki laughs at her sister's reaction. "Oh really? I believe you then.”
Renge pinches her brother's cheek out of irritation. "I'll go get out food, excuse me for a bit Isao-kun." She says as she about to exits the room. "Eat with us Tsubaki, just wait here."
"Ow! Okay okay!" He laughs and closes the door the door behind him. Then the boy turns to Hiro. "It's Tsubaki! Nice to meet you bro~" He smiles and walks toward the older boy.
"Sooooo what's your relationship with my sister? You can tell me." Tsubaki sits at the floor looking at Hiro.
At Tsubaki's question, Hiro frowns. But then he smirks a little, "Just an ordinary classmate." As for now. He cannot guess what kind of relationship they'll be having in the future. As if they will have one, Hiro laughs inwardly. He doesn’t even know Renge’s feelings toward him yet.
Then he tilts his head, "Did your sister tell you about me? What's with the sudden question?"
"Hmmm okay...," Tsubaki eyes Hiro with suspicion. "Well, it's not like she tells me about it, it's more on, I saw it." He snickers at Hiro.
"What?" Hiro responds immediately. "See what? What did you see?" Hiro is blabbering because of his sudden shock from the boy's respond. He stops himself for a moment and let his mind rewind any moment he could remember spent with Renge that could be seen by this brat.
The last time he went out with Renge... he couldn't remember which. Dress shopping? Arcade game? Chiu's restaurant? Dancing studi--
Wait.
Dancing studio. Not exactly at the studio. But after the dancing studio. Hiro's eyes widen in realization.
"...you saw us." Hiro states, not exactly a question. He deadpans the boy. "You two sure are siblings. Is peeking one of the perks that runs in your family?"
Tsubaki laughs at Hiro's panicked state. "Well it's not like you guys are being silent in front of our house." He shrugs.
Of course. How could he missed that? The boy is right, they weren't exactly silent at that time. He remembers he even raised his voice to her. Hiro kneads his temple with his fingers.
Then Tsubaki perks up,"Sis peeks too? That's sounds like a fun story, tell me about it!"
At Tsubaki's inquiry, Hiro scowls a bit. "Why don't you ask your own sister about that? Well, I'm kind of guessing that she won't tell anything about that either." He shrugs. Then he leans his chin on his hand. "Long story short that is how we start to know each other. The rest of it, ask her."
"Okay, okay, no need to look too grumpy bro--....I think I don't know your name yet." Tsubaki says, a little concerned.
"Isao Hironori." He replies simply.
The boy's face turns into a serious expression. "I just want to say, if you do have some plan... With my sister, I just hope you won't make her cry." Tsubaki explains. "She already have a lot on her plate, and I'm sure you already know that."
Hiro stares at the boy. If there's anything that make her cry, he will also make sure they pay for it, anyway. He already swore that he will hunt down anyone who dares to make her look down on herself. So he doesn't quite understand what the boy is saying.
Hiro shrugs nonchalantly. "I can see that pretty clearly, boy. No need to worry."
"Well, that's great if I can get my point across." Tsubaki gets up, "It's great to be acquainted to you, Hiro-san!"
"Hm," Hiro only grunts at Tsubaki as the boy gets up.
That's when the door opens and Renge came back with two boxes of pizza.
"Sorry for the wait, the delivery guy didn't have change so I had to wait a bit longer!" Renge trots slowly so she won't drop the box. Tsubaki then approaches her sister and opened the pizza box; stealing one piece and eats it.
"Well I'll take my leave now, I won’t meddle with your ongoing courting with Hiro-san," he says in a teasing tone and nudges at Renge, then leaves the room.
"W-what? Hey Tsubaki!" Renge yells at her younger brother. Seeing the boy is nowhere to be seen, she sighs and faces Hiro again, putting down the boxes in front of them. "Sorry about my brother, he's a bit on the eccentric side."
Hiro smirks a little as he stands up. He wants to use his shirt and pants while eating at least.
"So, Yoshi," he calls when he reaches his clothing and starts to wear them. "It seems your brother saw us when we were... having our time in front of your house the other day." He asks with a teasing tone. "So it's no wonder if your brother commented like that." He adds with a chuckle. Little brat knows nothing, anyway. So he's a bit let it be and play with it, he shrugs inwardly.
As he finishes wearing his clothing, he goes back to where he sits. "So maybe we have to be careful next time." The boy inclines his head and smirks teasingly.
"... Yes... He won't stop bothering me to... 'Spill the beans' he says, and he doesn't believe me when I said we're just friends." She sighs leaning her face on her hand. "Quoting him... ‘Friends don't hold each other under the moonlight’," Renge can feel her face redden a little saying that.
Hiro laughs at the quote. "Was the moonlight even there, though? I don't remember." The moment he replay the memory of him holding Renge close, his neck warms.
"Let us eat first, then." Says Hiro as he takes a slice of the pizza and eats it.
"Yeah, I'm a little famished. Thank you for the food," Renge takes a slice of pizza and eats it.
As he starts to eat the third slice, Hiro hums. It's a bit quiet, so maybe he should start some talks. "How many poses left do you need? I take it that you have to finish the assignment by today?"
"Tomorrow actually," she says taking her second slice. "Only two more to go and you'll be free Isao-kun." She looks up, then she notices that there is pizza sauce stain near his lip. Renge is not sure how to bring it up so she just stares at it.
"Two more, hm?" Hiro mutters. And he shrugs, and continues eating nonchalantly after saying, "Alright. I'm sure I can keep up with it. As long as you don't make me do en pointe and hold it for an hour." He chuckles. "Or else I can't attend school tomorrow."
He's oblivious of Renge's stare as he keeps on eating his slice of pizza.
The stain bothers her a lot, she is reminded a little of her brother. Tsubaki is a messy eater. "You have some sauce on your face, Isao-kun." Before she knew it, her hand moves on its own and wipes the stain..
"Hm--" he looks up to Renge, and before he knew it, a hand touches and wipes gently, just near his lip.
Hiro's eyes widen in pure shock.
He stares at Renge intently. Is the girl know what she's doing? Does she ever know what kind of effect she hold over him? Does she ever realize that every of her unexpected action makes his heart stutter?
As every question keep passing through his mind, he keep on staring at Renge with wide, disbelief eyes.
Renge just notices her own actions when she sees Hiro's surprised expression. She can feel heat creeping up to her cheeks.
"S-sorry about that! My hand kind of moved on their own!"
The boy's still staring at Renge for several moment, until he snickers. "That's not fair, Yoshi." Hiro says with rather husky voice.
Without further ado, he immediately yet gently holds Renge's hand which wiped the stain from his face. Then, he opens his mouth and sucks the sauce from her finger.
As he finish, he once again stares at Renge with a wide smirk with his head a bit inclined. Their face is quite close.
"wh---" Renge can't even finish her sentence when Hiro sucks on her finger. It's like her brain suddenly stop functioning. She can only stare at him with dumb expression on her face.
Their current distance and Hiro's smirking face sure isn't helping the situation. Renge felt like she could explode at any second now.
Hiro chuckles softly at Renge's shocked face. Now that he got her too, the game is fair.
But being fair is a bit lame and boring to him sometimes, though in some situation he do must get a fair deal.
This one? He wants to get the advantage.
His smirk widens as he once again bring the girl's hand to him and kiss her palm faintly. Just to add to his satisfaction.
Then he lets go Renge's hand and takes some distance with a wide smirk stills on his face to see her next reaction clearly.
Yoshihiro Renge is completely frozen and red. She totally can't believe what just happened.
Hiro just kissed her hand. What on earth is happening here? How did things escalate this quickly?
Renge can feel herself getting a little bit dizzy from all of this, she can only let out a small meek cry, "w-what..?" She’s holding the place where Hiro kissed her. Renge eyes her classmate with a very confused but intrigued expression.
Hiro laughs heartily when Renge is completely red and chokes out a word. He really does have a certain effect toward the girl. Somehow, he feels glad about it.
"Relax, Yoshi," Hiro says as he picks another slice of pizza. "Don't mind too much about it. We still have time." He smirks softly at her.
"But time won't wait for the pizza from getting cold." The boy adds and starts to eat again.
He's totally messing with her. Yes, he's totally just playing around and it's somehow... Pissing her off a little bit. It takes time and effort for her to be composed around the boy (yes, she needs to mentally prepare herself first to face his half-naked) and now he pulls this kind of stunt, throwing her off the balance again.
Renge pouts and brought out both of her hand and pinches Hiro cheeks, and she pinches them a bit too hard.
"H-hey now--" Hiro chokes a laugh when Renge starts to pinch both of his cheeks. Its hurt and stings, but that doesn't matter because the girl is pinching him while her face is still red and pouting.
She's way too cute.
He puts down his pizza and grip both of Renge's hand in an attempt to stop her from pinching him too hard. "Alwight, I'm sowwy!" Hiro says while laughing, his words kind of make funny sound because of his pinched cheeks.
Renge stops pinching him after he apologizes to her, but she pinches him one last time before letting him go with the pout is still on her face.
"I'm going to wash my hands now, after that we'll continue." She says a bit sternly.
Hiro is still laughing when Renge let go of his cheeks. This whole thing really warms his heart and brighten his mood.
"Of course," he finally says after his laughing calms down. "I need to wash mine, too."
***
Both of them are back to the room after they finished washing their hands. Renge takes out her phone to show Hiro the pose he should be doing next. To be honest she's still a bit annoyed at him, maybe she should really tell him to do pointe for an hour.
"...here's your next pose," she says to Hiro, showing him a photo of a man standing with one of his hand stretched outwards.
Hiro rubs his cheeks with hand. It stings, probably its red now. But somehow he doesn't mind about it.
He observes the pose at Renge's phone. Then he nods and start to strip himself once again. Once he's left to his leggings, he mimics the pose. "Is this fine?"
If she tries to touch him again without warning, he'll make sure to mess with her again, he thinks as he smirks inwardly.
"Hmm, bring your hand up a bit more," as she takes his arm to a better angle, suddenly a flash of inspiration crosses her mind.
Still wanting to get back at him for the thing before and while she's still holding his arm, Renge leans in and bites one of his finger.
She didn't know why she did it, but it sure made her feel a lot better.
Hiro flinches when Renge suddenly bites his finger. He doesn't make a coherent sound, but it sure still hurts.
"Yoshi," he calls with a smirk, his pupils darkening. "Do you want me to attack you?" Hiro purrs lowly. She probably doesn't get it, but if she keeps doing this to him, he might lose his control. Yet her appearance, with those exposed thighs and nape, is surely not making it any better for him.
She laughs a bit at Hiro's reaction and pats his head. "A payback from before! Also, you're not a wild animal, Isao-kun, so don't go attacking people." She replies simply.
Hiro stuns and his eyes widen for a moment when Renge pats his head. Then he giggles softly, "How rude. I'm sure I didn't do any damage to you, Yoshi." Then he brings his outstretched hand and hold her face. "But instead you hurt me, and that's not fair." Hiro cutely makes a pouty face at her.
And he laughs inwardly at her respond about him attacking her. She really doesn't get it.
Well, Renge should have expected Hiro to strike back, but... she didn’t. When the tall boy holds her face and made that pouty face, she doesn’t know what to do.
Hiro currently looks like a really big puppy in her eyes. She's not going to lie, it's pretty cute.
"W-well enough playing around, let’s get back to work." She says a bit stuttering.
"Of course." Hiro answers with a wide smirk. But he's not letting go his hand from her face.
He's not letting go, so Renge separates herself from him. "You may hold my face however you want, but please just do it later, I need to finish this today." She sputters in panic as she flees to her stool and drawing materials.
She isn't even aware of what's she's saying.
Hiro raises his eyebrows at Renge's words, and his smirk widens. "Sure, Yoshi." He'll make sure to continue this fun later, then.
As Renge goes back to her stool, Hiro poses his body back to the earlier position.
***
"Aaaaaaaand done!" Renge cheers as she finishes her last drawing. She lets out a relieved gasp and slumps on her stool. "I just need to submit this at class tomorrow. Oooh I'm beat!"
She raises her head to look at Hiro again, smiling with gratitude. "Good work Isao-kun! And thank you for helping."
As Renge finishes her drawing, Hiro lets out a soft groan and stretches his body. "Probably I need to dance after this. Keeping still for hours really makes my body stiff." He whines as he rotates his neck to relieve the strain.
"Glad that I can be much of a help to you." Hiro replies and about to take his clothing. But he stops midway. Instead, he turns to Renge and smiles a little. "Can I see the result, Yoshi?"
"S-sure!" She answers, handing the pad to him. “I just hope its good enough, the last ones are a little rushed." She adds, still slumping.
Hiro approaches the girl, takes the drawing pad and observes her drawing.
He smiles as he look at the pad. It's still beautiful to his eyes. He's really grateful that she asked him to be his model for today.
Then, he turns his head to stare at Renge. Once again, he brings his hand to hold her face. His thumb's stroking her cheek, the other hold her chin. He tilts her head a bit so he can look straight to her eyes.
"Good work today, Yoshi." Hiro says softly with a little smirk.
Now that the urgency of her assignment is gone, the fatigue is starting to kick in. Renge was thinking of taking a very long nap as soon as possible.
Then a gentle hand is holding her face again. When Hiro looks straight into her eyes, she feels like she's going to explode.
This is absolutely unfair, she thinks to herself. Renge is too tired to give out a proper reaction, so she just closes her eyes. So at least she won’t look too much at Hiro's eyes, it's a bit hypnotizing.
"T-thank you, Isao-kun."
Hiro chuckles softly when Renge closes her eyes. It seems that he should give her some mercy for now.
But he wants to do something for one last time before it's done.
Hiro brings his own face closer to her and plants his lips to her forehead. Just taking a chance that she cannot see him.
He holds it like that for a moment, then he let go of the girl. The boy throws a soft smile at her before he starts to take his clothing and wears them.
She can definitely feel both her heart and brain explode.
When Hiro lets her go and starts to tidy up himself, Renge is just sitting there dumbfounded. She covers her already tomato red face with her hands.
"Isao-kun you are so mean...” she mumbles behind her hands.
Hiro giggles once again when he hears the faint voice of Renge. "A payback from before." He says simply as he finish wearing his vest. Then he takes his small shoulder bag and his scarf in his hand.
"Anything else you need from me, Yoshi?" Hiro asks with a smile before he leaves. He chuckles inwardly as he watch Renge covers her face like that. There is some kind of man pride swelling inside him.
Renge gets up, still covering her face. "N-nothing else!" She answers abruptly. "I'll escort you out."
As they walk to the entrance door of her house, the girl speaks, "A bit of advice Isao-kun, please refrain from uh... kissing." The last part was said very softly. "Y-you're going to give people the wrong idea... And it should be shared with someone you love..."
Hiro chuckles at Renge's words. She still doesn't know that she also holds some kind of effect toward him. And after all of that, he kind of already get a clue of how Renge feels toward himself.
"Of course. I'll keep that in mind, then." He'll have to wait for the right moment. It'll take really long time... So he need to execute his plan soon.
As they both arrived at the entrance, he turns himself to Renge. "Thank you for today too, Yoshi. I'm glad you chose me to be your model. Your drawing is exemplary, and I'm looking forward to your next artwork."
"Thank you too, Isao-kun, for accepting my sudden request." She bows to him as sign of gratitude. "I'll tell you if I have new artworks."
Hiro gives one last soft smile at the girl before he takes his leave, "See you tomorrow."
She waves goodbye to the boy, "See you tomorrow." And when the boy is out of her sight, she goes back to her house and goes to her workshop again to tidy things up.
Looking at her sketches again makes her remember all the small things that has happened today. She blushes again at the memories of Hiro kissing her hand and forehead. What was that for? She wonders. There's no way he's interested in her... Right?
Some imaginations involuntarily crossed her mind, like holding hands and going on a date. She quickly brushes those thoughts, her face is as red as ever.
All of this makes her wonder more about Hiro's other self. The one she senses some days ago. Her heart feels heavy again remembering it.
Renge takes her drawing pad and goes to her room. She throws herself on the bed. Drawing nonstop all day was pretty taxing, she can feel her eyes getting heavy from the comfort.
The warm feeling from her bed reminded her of the times she spent with Hiro. It really does makes her wonder a lot.
How can something so warm feel so sinister at the same time? The question is left unanswered as she drifts into sleep.