SS- Oh my god, I have another story? What the hell is wrong with me?

Kali- We'd like to apologize to anyone who's been reading our other stories, but the master plans have been lost. Take Broken for example: Shini had nearly every chapter written out, ready to be typed at the end of the last school year, and what does she do?

SS- :small voice: I forgot them in a classroom overnight, and they got trashed. However, this is not the case anymore. Triple Goddess Productions© would like to present!. . .

Athene- Our very first Ouran Host Club story! Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Ouran High School Host Club and all its characters belong to Bisco Hatori-shishou, not me.

WARNINGS: Eh, not much really. Slight WAFF, a bit of implied yaoi. You don't like, you don't need to read.

Rating: M

Title: Portrait of Takashi

She didn't know how this fascination with lines and shapes had started. She didn't know how she could detail every shadow on a rose, or how she could blend the perfect colors to give a single flickering candle flame so much purity against such absolute darkness. She didn't know how she was able to do an exceptionally beautiful portrait from one memory of a chance meeting.

Haruhi did know that she was grateful for it.

It wasn't often that she was able to work, what with her duties to the Host Club. When she did have some time at school, she made sure that the only things her fellow members were allowed to see were the carefully planned out terrible doodles that she drew to draw their focus away from her talents. They already thought that anything she did was divine. If they saw this they would be awestruck. Kyoya would probably try to sell them as a Club thing, and Haruhi didn't want that, didn't want everyone to know about her work.

That's not to say that Haruhi didn't want to sell anything; on the contrary, she actually did portraits of her regular customers, or did on the spot sketches of the males in the Host Club, for a reasonable price. She simply didn't want to become even more of a novelty than she already was. She often went to a customer's house on Sunday, and became better friends with them through the little things she learned while there.

Like the fact that Miss Sakurazawa adored songbirds. She had three separate aviaries/greenhouses in which fifty species of birds lived in a miniature version of their natural environment. Haruhi had presented her classmate with three small watercolors done from memory, as a birthday present.

Miss Kuragano enjoyed classic Western literature. Haruhi had seen shelves dedicated to Shakespeare, Homer, and compilations of Greek and Roman mythology in the young woman's bedroom. An oil canvas addressed to Miss Kuragano had appeared in the Host Club room, depicting the girl as Artemis, the Greek goddess of the moon and hunt, surrounded by her handmaidens. It had shown up a mere week after her break-up with her boyfriend of three years.

And then there was the precious little Miss Kirimi, Umehito Nekozawa's little sister. It had started out as Haruhi's secret project to rid the child of her fear of cats. It had taken a month, working diligently after school and on weekends, to get the little girl acclimatized to feline presence without screaming, running away, or crying. A month later, and little Kirimi was happily playing with the new kittens.

The Host Club knew that Haruhi was doing something secretive, but her customers were wonderful about keeping their "business transactions" under wraps. Interest had died down, until Nekozawa began making a regular appearance for a slice of Haruhi's time. Tamaki had been the most fervent out of all of them to discover why she spent a good deal of time with the strange young man. It took a great deal of time and effort to convince him that his theory of Nekozawa knowing Haruhi was a girl was way off base.

Never mind the fact that it was completely true, but Tamaki really didn't need to know. Really.

Umehito was only one of two other people at Ouran— aside from the Host Club members— who knew that she was really a girl. He didn't seem to mind, and he had once actually offered to pay her remaining debt, back before the affair at the school festival.

However, this story is digressing.

It's true that Haruhi did requests, but she kept her more fantastic work to herself. They were pictures and sketches of what she thought people really wanted from someone, or just drawings that she couldn't bear to part with.

Hunny sleeping in a fetal position, Bun-bun tucked up underneath his chin.

Hikaru giving Kaoru directions on a video game, watching with his head on his brother's shoulder.

Kyoya engaged in a heated kiss with Tamaki. It was an event that had never actually occurred, yet she could tell from the way they acted that it was something they wanted. In truth, the glint that Kyoya would get might mean that he wanted to do more than just kiss the Host Club king, but that was a little more than Haruhi was inclined to imagine at this point in time.

The pictures that Haruhi treasured above all else were those of the ever-stoic Takashi Morinozuka. It was drawing him that allowed her to get down to the very last detail. She spent hours studying him, trying to get every last nuance of his features perfect. Now, even while others were wondering about his robotic qualities, she at least had some thought as to what he felt. Although, her studies of him had brought her a little trouble.

She had developed a crush on him.

It was nothing drastic. A blush or two here, a stammer there. She made sure that no-one knew of her affection; she wasn't like most girls, she kept her feelings secret. It would present a problem if her infatuation affected her duties at the Host Club. After all, it wasn't like they would be able to act like a couple, even if he did like her.

At the moment, she was in Music Room 3, drawing (somewhat guiltily) the sleeping figures of the Host Club. She had slipped tasteless sleeping pills into their coffee. They'd be out of it for at least eight hours, giving her enough time to get charcoal sketches of all of them.

She didn't even need to pose them! They had all gravitated into position, as if telepathy really did work. Hikaru and Kaoru were on the floor, heads cushioned on their arms, creating wonderful, natural symmetry. Kyoya was reclining on the couch with Tamaki snoring gently into his chest. Hunny sat at the table, head tilted back, a smudge of cream on the corner of his mouth.

And then there was her dear Takashi, alone as usual. Didn't matter, because he was set up against the window, which made for a great background. He looked so peaceful, so open in his sleep. It was different from when he was awake. He hid everything when awake, and it was a rare occasion when he smiled. He was extremely attractive when he did.

Minutes passed, turning into hours as Haruhi worked on. Her pencils created long sure strokes of black on the ivory pages. Only a few details, and she would be finished with Takashi. There! She placed her sketchpad inside her binder, safely out of sight of the other members. Wouldn't do to have her hard work discovered by the boys. Goddess only knew what the Ohtori staff would do to her if they ever found out that Kyoya was being drugged and sketched on a semi-regular basis...

Haruhi pushed that thought to the back of her mind with a yawn. Her father was out of town on business for the next two weeks, and she knew for a fact that the boys' parents only did cursory checks every month or so. Maybe she could spare time for a brief nap, only an hour so that she could wake up the others and tell them to go home. Setting the timer on the watch her dad had given her last Christmas, she curled up on the divan and was asleep once her head touched the pillowed arm.

TBC

SS- Constructive criticism is greatly appreciated. Flames, however, will be used to roast marshmallows, and heat milk for hot chocolate.