creation; au. this was actually a request from a loooong time ago that I'm finally fulfilling :D naked Lightning is involved...but I assure you that this is safe for work!

Hope had never considered himself a particularly artsy person. He was definitely more left brain-oriented, he supposed. Facts and figures spoke to him, not art and creation.

And yet, somehow, his best friend had managed to convince him to join a drawing class.

Then again, Vanille had always been pretty convincing.

"I can't believe you're making me do this," he muttered, following her through the hallways of the building. It was a pretty plain place, with just some numbers on the doors littering the walls the only sign of any distinction. It sort of reminded him of high school.

Which just made him even less eager for this. There was a reason he'd skipped several grades, after all.

"Oh, come on, it's not so bad!" Vanille twirled around, practically skipping in her steps. "What if there's a budding artist under all those brains, hmm?"

"I highly doubt that there is. I can't even draw a stick figure."

"That's lie." She stuck her tongue out at him. "You always draw them plenty well whenever we play Hangman."

"Yeah, because I always stump you with the words I choose." He grinned.

"Oh hush, you big smarty pants." Vanille stopped in front of a nondescript door that simply had a '13' etched on the front of it. "Here we are!"

"Lucky thirteen," he muttered.

Vanille elbowed him in the side but otherwise ignored him as she let the two of them into the room. Hope had to admit that it was a pretty nice setup – it was large and open with huge windows, clearly meant to let in a lot of light. There were tables and easels with sketchpads set up in front of an open area that had a couch, a table with a vase of flowers, and a bunch of boxes.

Huh. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad. He could attempt to draw or paint some of the flowers to appease Vanille and pretend to be artistic for a hot minute. Everyone would go home happy.

Vanille immediately took a spot at an easel, while Hope gingerly sat beside her at the table, not feeling very deserving of an actual easel. Truly, he had nothing against artists or artistic people – after all, that was how Vanille made a living. It just wasn't very suited to him. He was sure that whatever he ended up drawing would be a big mess and he was perfectly fine with that.

People were still filing in when a tall, dark-haired woman stepped into the room like she owned the place. It took Hope a moment to realize that in a sense, she did – this was their instructor.

"All right, all right, everyone settle in. This is Advanced Drawing, and if this ain't what you paid for, go on and clear out."

What a welcome, geez.

Hope glanced towards Vanille, wanting to ask if the instructor was always like this, but to his surprise, his friend was ducking her head a little, cheeks as red as her hair. The blush only intensified when the teacher introduced herself as Fang Yun.

Suddenly, Hope realized just why Vanille had been so desperate for him to come along.

"Seriously?!" he hissed under his breath, trying not to get caught. This was like high school all over again, except then, he'd never dare to speak in class. The worst that could happen here was that he'd be out the fifty bucks for this class's fee. "Do you want me to tell you if she's good for you or something…?"

"Shhhh!" was all Vanille replied, the blush still burning on her face.

Well. In this case, Hope was all too happy to commit to this class. He wasn't much for dating himself – despite all the female coworkers that slipped love letters on his desk constantly – but that just freed him up to make him the best wingman Vanille could ask for.

…Which, truthfully, wasn't very good. But at least he tried.

"Everyone here? Good." Fang stood in the middle of the room, in front of the setup with the couch and flowers, and looked around. "I see we've got some new ones in here – don't let this particular class scare you off into takin' more." She smirked, looking amused for some reason, though Hope couldn't imagine why. Surely nothing about a drawing class could scare him off, especially since he'd taken college-level physics in his freshman year of high school. Even though he really couldn't draw, this would be a breeze.

Or so he thought.

"Today's lesson's on anatomy and the way shadows can completely change a character." Fang glanced towards the back of a room, calling out seemingly into thin air, "Oi! You ready yet?"

Vanille didn't bat an eye at this, but Hope was confused – at least until a door he hadn't noticed earlier in the back of the room cracked open. An unfamiliar woman stepped out and Hope's breath caught in his throat.

She was a work of art. Truly, it was as though she'd stepped right out of a painting – she honestly didn't even look real.

"She's a new one," Vanille murmured to herself, just looking curious and not totally, utterly flabbergasted like Hope was.

Somehow, he managed to get his voice to work. "New what?" he croaked out, but Fang was facing the class and speaking again.

"Everyone, this here's Lightning. Goes by Light." Fang gestured to the rose-haired woman, who, despite her utter beauty, did not look particularly thrilled. In fact, when Hope managed to tear his gaze away from her – Light's – face, he noticed that she was only wearing a short silk robe. "She'll be teachin' ya all about anatomy and proportion and all that jazz."

And then it hit him.

Anatomy in a drawing class…

"Vanille!," he hissed, but it was too late.

With a heavy sigh, Light sat down on the couch behind her. After another glare at Fang, she stretched out one long leg on the couch, the other still bent with her foot on the floor. She undid the robe and – oh.

Hope knew this was something that legitimately happened. Judging by all the certifications and awards on the wall bearing Fang's name, she knew exactly what she was doing. In fact, nobody else in the room looked at all surprised or interested in anything except what Fang was saying.

He tried to listen. He did. But it was difficult when the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen was lying on a couch just a few feet away from him, totally nude.

Okay, so she'd strategically draped the robe over her lower half. Fang was going on and on about the folds of the fabric and something about how to create depth in shadows, but all he could think about was not staring at the gorgeous, topless woman in the room.

Honestly, he felt more than a little strange about this. The last thing he wanted to do was leer or be a total weirdo about the whole thing, especially since everyone else in the room wasn't batting an eye. He just took a deep breath and concentrated on trying to listen to Fang. Even though he didn't consider himself all that artistic, surely he could at least get through this class on the technical aspects alone.

Or so he thought.

Putting all of Fang's lecturing into actual practice was something else entirely. It felt like that, once he did start sketching, he erased every other line he made.

Then again, he was actively trying not to look at Lightning, so that made things a little more difficult.

Fang had been going around and critiquing everyone's progress. By the time she got to Hope, he'd gone through roughly ten pages of the sketchbook in front of him, and every single page was a smeary mess.

She barked out a laugh. "All right, who's the one that forced you to take this class?"

At least he could do some good today. "My friend Vanille." He gestured beside him. "She's pretty talented. I told her I probably wasn't good enough for this class, but she insisted."

Fang and Vanille shot each other smiles – with a lot of blushing on Vanille's end – but Fang surprisingly turned back to Hope to instruct him. "Hey, everyone's gotta start out somewhere. Even if you're not gonna use it, might as well get somethin' outta here." She pulled a pencil from her pocket and turned to a new page in the sketchbook. "You're not lookin' at this as a whole. Shadows come into play all sorts of ways. Here…" She quickly sketched out a rough outline of Lightning on the couch – bare breasts and all – and nodded. "Try gettin' in some of those shadows. Make it play off the light and look like something instead of just flat space." She smirked playfully. "Or at least try."

"Uh…yeah." Hope cleared his throat and picked up his pencil again. "Okay."

Fang nodded in satisfaction, then went to Vanille. It may have been Hope's imagination, but he could have sworn Fang leaned in much closer to Vanille than she had with him, and stayed there offering advice much longer.

He smiled a bit, but it faded as he twisted the pencil around in his hands. He hardly dared to look up at Lightning for more than a second at a time, so it was difficult to even try and shade anything in just right.

Eventually, he sighed to himself, wondering what Fang would think – even though she was over there flirting with Vanille, he still wanted to be a good student. It was simply in his nature. Maybe he should just suck it up, because clearly the only one feeling awkward here was him.

The first few times he dared to look at Lightning for more than a second at a time, she seemed a bit faraway, like she was thinking about something…but then, something odd happened.

She started staring at him.

It wasn't a mad sort of stare or anything, like she was trying to get him to look away – oddly enough, her brow was just furrowed a bit, almost as though she was trying to place him.

The second time, their gazes met, and Hope honestly felt like he couldn't breathe for a moment. Good thing they were all just sketching and not painting or anything, because he couldn't imagine anyone being able to completely capture that exact shade of blue.

To his surprise, when she looked away, he could have sworn she was blushing a bit – but then again, that could have been simply from the lighting in the room. There was no way she'd be blushing at him; not when she was nude in front of all these people and they were all looking at her…

Hope ducked his head after their eyes met for a third time, trying his best to shade in the light and shadows. Maybe it was because Fang had drawn the outline, but this particular sketch looked much better than his previous attempts. Of course, that wasn''t to say it was any good, but hey, he could be proud of himself.

"All right then, we're just about done here," Fang announced some time later. "Those of you lookin' for a critique, come and see me."

Vanille, of course, immediately jumped up to go see Fang before anyone else had seemed to even register the words. Hope chuckled to himself and stared at his sketch before tearing it out. He certainly wasn't looking for a critique - not when Fang had done some of the work – but he didn't feel like throwing the drawing straight into the trash, either.

"Can I see it?"

Hope somehow managed not to yelp out loud, though his eyes were still wide with surprise when he looked up. They widened even further when he saw Lightning standing in front of him, the robe now tightly secured over her chest.

"Um - "

"It can't be that bad." She nodded towards the paper in his hands with a smirk.

"I…don't know about that, but if you insist." Maybe Lightning was going to ask everyone to see how they sketched her, and she'd just gone to him first because he was just sitting here like an idiot.

Lightning took the paper and stared at it for so long, Hope had to wonder if she was trying to come up with the best possible insult. "Fang helped you, didn't she?"

"Yeah," he answered quickly, startled by the question. "Um, yes. She did. I'm honestly not much of an artist."

She raised her eyebrows. "Then why did you come here?"

"My best friend has a crush on the instructor." He gestured behind him, where he could hear Vanille babbling excitedly to Fang. "I think she wanted me along as a wingman."

For some reason, that response caused Lightning's shoulders to fall and look visibly less tense. "Looks like it's working."

He smiled. "Good."

There was a beat of silence. Lightning stared at him again in the same way she had earlier – like she was trying to place him. Or maybe…

Nah. Why would she want to look at him otherwise?

"This might sound a little odd, but…" She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear and he couldn't help but stare. "Should I know you from somewhere?"

Yes, he immediately wanted to say, but that was just silly. Surely he would have remembered seeing someone like her before. "I…I'm not sure." He realized at that moment that he'd yet to introduce himself, so he stood and offered his hand. "My name is Hope Estheim, if that helps any."

She murmured his name as she shook his hand. "Wait a minute – are you the Hope that keeps showing up in the news?"

Inwardly, he groaned. Because of his many, many academic accomplishments and otherwise, Hope had indeed been interviewed dozens of times of the years. Though he was always extremely polite to whoever was conducting the interviews, whenever he read the final product they always seemed to make him out as a lot more egotistical than he truly was. He did not want that to be Lightning's impression of him.

"That's me," was all he said, though.

She hummed, glancing at the drawing that was still in her free hand, and too late he realized that their hands were still holding each other's from their handshake. "I only know because my sister's a teacher. She uses you as an example for her students," she explained before looking up at him. "You're basically a genius, and yet you haven't figured out the trick to lights and shadows?"

"Huh?" was all he blurted out, not having expected that.

She smirked. "It's really pretty simple. You're smart. I'm sure you'll get in a few more lessons."

"Are you going to be, uh, modeling for any more?" he asked, but then cringed. He didn't want her to think that that was the only reason he was interested in attending another one of these classes…even if it was.

Lightning went quiet and Hope was afraid he'd offended her, but to his surprise, when she met his eyes, she was smiling at the corners of her mouth. "I just did this one as a favor to Fang. I owed her. But…" And now she seemed oddly nervous, her cheeks tinged with pink again. "…I know a thing or two about what she teaches. Not enough to instruct a whole class myself, but I could certainly give you some pointers if you'd like."

"I would," Hope replied slowly, not quite believing what he was hearing.

"In that case…" Lightning flipped the sketch over and took one of the pencils he'd used earlier to scribblie something on the blank side. "This is my number. Perhaps we could meet up for coffee and maybe talk about some…private lessons or something."

Wait.

What?

"Yes!" he blurted out, but then somehow managed to compose himself. "I mean, um. Yes. Definitely. Should I give you a call?"

"Definitely," she echoed with a little smirk as she handed the sketch – and her phone number – back to him. "I'll look forward to it."

Before he could reply, she'd turned to hurry to the other side of the room, disappearing behind a door. Hope just stared, totally flabbergasted, and barely noticed when Vanille had bounced up to his side.

"Fang really liked my sketch! And she invited me as her plus-one to the opening of that gallery in the town over next month!" Vanille just about swooned. "I just – hey, are you okay? Your face is really red!"

"Oh, uh…" Hope hurriedly hid his sketch, not wanting to share his news just yet. He and Lightning had managed to create something…different during their conversation. Something special, really, and he wanted to keep it to himself for a bit. "I'm good. Really good."

—

Years later, when they'd moved in together, Lightning unearthed the (nearly) nude sketch of her in a pile of Hope's papers. She wanted to toss the old thing, but he insisted on keeping it – after all, he could thank that particular creation for getting them together in the first place.

"I was attracted to your mind, and you were attracted to my nude posing," she replied, totally unimpressed.

"Maybe initially," he agreed, "but it just took one conversation for me to be attracted to the rest of you, too."

"Which means that we don't need to keep this," she said, holding up the sketch.

Hope stared at it quietly for a moment before leaning in for a kiss, unable to hide his smile. "I guess you can get rid of it, if you want…on one condition."

"Which is?"

"That I get to draw an updated version." He kissed her again. "One that stays between us."

"Hmm…" She kissed him in reply. "Deal."

Of course, despite her many pointers over the years, Hope hadn't quite developed any sort of artistic ability. Every single attempt was a smeary mess, and finally, he just set the papers aside and stared with a look of utter adoration.

Lightning arched a brow, having no urge to cover up despite his gaze. "Gave up already? That's not like you."

"No." His gazed softened.

"Then what is it?"

The words out of his mouth sounded like something he'd wanted to say since the beginning. "You're already a work of art."

Oh, Hope. So smooth LOL

Three more to go! Please review so I have something to think about during these last three~