A/N: Exchange fic with Snow757, who wrote me D80 and 6927, the KHR ships closest to my heart.:D Based on the 10 genres format, and supposed to interconnect into a one shot, at least before I realized it's sort of impossible to connect crack, AU and crossover with the rest. So those three get entirely separate fics while the rest are interconnected to form a cohesive story. Rating will shift to M later.
Disclaimer: Don't own them.
1. AU (7YL!27/7YL!Fem!59)
She takes one look at the dress offered to her and snorts, going back to her perusal of the latest issue of Scientific American. "You have got to be shitting me."
The assistant handing her the apparently offensive clothing shoots Hayato's manager a nervous look and prudently takes a few steps back.
Pietro Barone, Gokudera's sixth manager in two years, sighs, and rubs his temples. "Look Hayato, it's not like you'll have to wear it for long."
"I'm not wearing it at all."
"Hayato," Pietro says sternly. "The design for this dress was drawn by the hand of Valentino Garavani himself, before his retirement, and made from the finest silk and—"
"—I don't give a fuck if it's hand sewn by the pope and created from the skins of temple virgins- I'm not wearing that trash."
"You don't reject Valentino—"
"Fuck Valentino with a fucking violin bow."
The collective gasps of horror around the room should've given Gokudera a clue as to the gravity of her transgression, but Gokudera just nonchalantly goes back to her magazine, as if she didn't just insult one of the most legendary names in the history of fashion.
Her manager recovers first. "Hayato," he says, voice shaking. "You don't get a say in what you're going to wear, and you don't tell your designers to fuck off- Jesus, have you lost your mind?"
Gokudera's smoky green eyes narrow, and she closes her magazine with a decisive snap. "No," she answers coolly, rising up from her seat. "But they—" She points to the antsy crew and the photographer who looks like she's on the verge of a nervous breakdown. "- just lost their model." Then she pivots on her heel and walks away, ignoring Pietro's apoplectic protests, the hostility in her glare affording her a wide berth as she crosses the room. Just before she steps out the door however, she turns around slightly to look at her manager.
"And you? You just lost your job."
o
Her rebellious glower has graced the cover of every fashion magazine known to man- Vogue, Style, Elle- name it and she's been there. She wears high fashion like second skin and walks like she owns everyone and the room. She doesn't need to make love to the camera; the camera begs and grovels for her affection. She is both every photographer's dream and worst nightmare.
She is Hayato Gokudera, also known as Hurricane Bomb by her contemporaries for her devastatingly good looks and the temper that has gained her infamy throughout the world of glamour and catwalks. She lives up to her name, creating discord where she goes: cameras flashing in blinding succession, people tripping over themselves either to wisely get out of her way and admire her from a safe distance, or stupidly get closer and subject themselves to her disdain.
She's disrespectful and arrogant, with serious anger management issues and a potty mouth that can make a sailor blush, unfortunate personality defects that should've gotten her out of the industry long ago, but for some odd reason, has only added more to her appeal. She's a quintessential example of how fashion is willing to disregard sense and logic, in favour of beauty and the classic and forever inexplicable je ne sais quoi.
o
"Hey- what the hell, did you just rearrange the lights of my set-up?"
"I've already considered the individual positions of your equipment, the diffusion levels of your chosen light ratio, the size of your soft box and the brightness output of your strobes and have thus calculated the optimal arrangement to bring out the colour and shape of this Dolce & Gabbana original," Gokudera replies, gesturing absently at her ensemble, a vivid red, strapless sheath gown with intricate Swarovski crystal detail, that naturally fell on her body on all the right places.
"But—"
"Also I have no bad angles," she interrupts, impatience seeping in her tone. She crosses her long legs, tosses her head to let her silver hair cascade down one shoulder, and casts her latest photographer a haughty, sideways glance. "Now shoot or get out."
o
She poses for many, but she smiles for one alone.
Tsunayoshi Sawada, Tsuna for short, and professional photographer by trade, takes a few test shots with his new 1.8 aperture 50 mm lens, checks the instant feedback on the LCD screen, and then adjusts his shutter speed.
Across the room from him, seated in a bar stool in his humble studio apartment, is none other than the Hayato Gokudera.
"Are you sure this is okay?" she asks, stretching as she tugs the overly large polo down in a half-hearted attempt at modesty. Which is sort of a moot point, as she's not wearing any pants, not that Tsuna's complaining. "I mean, I could wear something from the Chanel shoot if I knew you wanted to take pictures."
"It's fine," Tsuna says, and presses the shutter just in time to capture Hayato looking at him from underneath her long lashes, chin propped under one hand, the dress shirt slipping past one shoulder, carelessly beautiful. "It's an impromptu thing after all; I didn't even bring my tripod."
"Good, because I like your clothes," Hayato says, wrapping her arms around herself, as if to illustrate her point. "They're comfortable. And they smell like you."
Tsuna chuckles, and takes another shot. "And you look better in them than I do," he teases, as he looks at the latest picture on the screen approvingly. His intuition is right, this particular afternoon has the perfect natural light, and the setting sun casts a soft glow around Hayato's slim frame.
Hayato's cheeks flush pink from the praise, and she almost looks shy when she smiles at him. Tsuna ducks his head and smiles back. God. Five years together and he still behaves like a high school girl with a crush.
Five years. Even now, it still boggles his mind that the world's most sought-after model is still so tirelessly devoted to him, since he took his first picture of her and submitted it in his portfolio. Now, she's a supermodel of the highest calibre, while he's still struggling to create a name for himself.
Funny how the world works. Five years ago, Hayato was a nobody, a scrawny teenager who ran away from home and tried to steal Tsuna's newly purchased Nikon D300, as he was walking out the shop. Her escape plan was foiled when she slammed against another pedestrian as she was crossing the road, and she chose to protect the camera with her arms and fall down rather than drop it and run free.
She didn't see the truck.
But Tsuna did.
He lost a very good and expensive camera that day, but what he gained is something beyond price.
"What do you want me to do?" Hayato asks, fidgeting with the hem of the shirt, in a rare display of self-consciousness.
Tsuna stretches across the couch, and holds the camera at a slightly tilted angle. "Surprise me."
Hayato thinks for a moment, one slender finger poised between her lips, and Tsuna's immediately takes another shot. After a few moments, she uncrosses her legs and gets down from her seat with effortless grace. She saunters towards Tsuna, and just the way she walks- deliberate, unhurried, each step smoothly rippling from her feet to her shoulders- exudes pure temptation.
And then her hands reach up to unbutton the shirt slowly, one by one.
Tsuna's mouth runs dry, as heat flares up deep in his belly, but his hands are steady as he snaps away.
Click. Click. Click. Hayato takes her time, and Tsuna captures it all: the sway in her gait, the willowy flutter of the shirt around her hips, the stream of sunlight reflecting off her hair.
Tsuna sucks in a shuddering breath as the last of the buttons is freed, and the shirt opens fully to bare herself to him, and he can only think of one word: Perfect.
He doesn't get to take another shot, because the camera is no longer in his grasp, Hayato's smooth hands placing it carefully back into its case, in the correct order- lens first, then body.
Then she looks back at Tsuna, her eyes carrying the sort of hopeful playfulness that other photographers would kill to capture on film, and shrugs off the rest of the polo to drop to a heap at her feet.
Unable to help himself any longer, Tsuna reaches out, slides his hands along the curve of her hips, and pulls her possessively closer. He skims the tip of his nose along the smooth, taut skin of her stomach, inhaling her shower-fresh scent, as his thumb traces the small scar along the crest of her hipbones, from that fateful near-accident long ago. He wonders for the hundredth time how he could be so lucky.
"I hope you don't do this with all your photographers," he whispers, when Hayato takes a step back to bend down and cup his face in her hands.
"Never. Only you," she replies and kisses him.
~fin~
Post A/N: I didn't bother to change Gokudera's first name because it really has no bearing fic-wise. Similarly, I used the western way of introduction (First name before Surname) as this fic takes place in the Western hemisphere.
This marks many firsts for me- first 5927, first gender bender, and first AU. Also, romance and fluff are not my strong suits so any feedback with how I did with this will be greatly appreciated. :D
Next up, the genre I'm most at home with: Crack