Beginning Song: "You and Me" by Lighthouse

Ending Song: "Never Be The Same" by Red

Chapter Fifteen

Hate At First Sight

Morning.

Her phone chimed, vibrating its way across the table beside the sleeping Hyuga's bed.

A text message. Her alarm clock for the day.

Hinata picked it up without any second thoughts after her eyes fluttered open. Her heart screamed of Naruto-kun once she checked her phone.

Saturday morning couldn't start off any better. Her mind was still fresh from last night's drama and she couldn't help but feel her face flush red once his name popped up on the text message.

Good morning beautiful :)

A smiley? She bit her lips and blushed. Hinata stretched herself in bed whilst typing her reply.

Were you serious last night? About Maths?

She held her breath, waiting for his response. But instantly, he replied.

Absolutely serious.

Uzumaki Naruto was already up, preparing cereal for breakfast at the table while texting. One of his hands clutched the phone tightly, waiting for Hinata's response as he took in one spoonful of cereal using the other.

It was only eight hours ago that he was in the throes of passion with the ever-angelic Hyuga Hinata — playing Truth or Dare and kissing, cuddling together in a warm fleece blanket with a cup of hot chocolate. Just two new lovers enjoying the beautiful romantic evening until Hanabi's text message interrupted their cuddling last night.

Damn interruptions.

Hinata's response took twenty agonising seconds. But it was worth the wait.

Father isn't home.

Oh. Naruto smiled.

Is that an invitation? ;)

Once again, another lengthy pause.

No. He won't let boys in the house without his permission. Sorry.

Right. As if. His smile faded.

Her father probably assigned snipers on the roof, ready to shoot Naruto on sight once he takes a single step inside the Hyuga mansion.

He was about to type up something, but his phone instantly chimed before he got the chance to.

Maybe we can study at your place?

Here?! In my apartment?! He almost dropped his phone on the bowl.

NO. Definitely not an option.

"Who's Hinata?"

Jiraiya suddenly appeared from behind him, reading the text message over his shoulder.

Naruto choked on his cereal.

"Jesus," the blonde coughed up. "What the hell is wrong with you?!" He reached out for the carton of milk and drank some to clear his throat, "You shouldn't scare me like that! And she's none of your business."

"What? I wasn't sneaking up on you." Jiraiya was already in his business suit as he walked towards the fridge to grab some tuna sandwich that he made last night.

"Where exactly are you going in that get-up?"

"Work." he said.

"But it's Saturday." his voice was questioning.

"I know." Jiraiya sat on a chair opposite to Naruto on the table, reading a newspaper while munching his sandwich. "Tsunade was kind enough to give me an extra day. You know what weekend work means — double pay. More money to pay for rent."

"Wait. You're not taking the car with you, are you?" the blonde got up from the chair and placed his empty cereal bowl on the sink.

"I am. How am I supposed to get to work without it?"

Shit. The blonde cursed himself with a deep sigh. He strode towards the living room and slouched heavily on one of the sofas. He grabbed his phone and quickly swiped his thumbs across the letters.

My old man's taking the car to work :( I can't pick you up.

It took half a minute before the Hyuga texted back.

It's ok. I can have someone drop me off. Where do you want to meet up?

Hinata had never been to any ordinary restaurants before such as this one now:

The Ichiraku's Ramen Restaurant.

An odd choice for a place to study.

But it was Naruto's choice to meet up here.

Plus, she'd also love to experience new things as well. Her father would usually take their family to dine in one of those classy and exorbitant restaurants which served food that probably costed as much as some people's week's worth of salary. Luckily, there were no other customers except them and the owners of the place seem to know Naruto pretty well considering the fact that he works here. As a result, they were allowed to use one of the tables for their study date.

"C'mon Naruto-kun, you can do it." said Hinata with encouragement.

She watched Naruto glare blankly at his maths textbook as they both sat in one of the tables beside each other. The blonde had a blank piece of paper in front of him with a sharpened pencil clenched in between his fingers.

And a murderous expression on his face.

"You can't hate Math that much, can you?" she leaned close to his shoulders to check on what he was working on.

"Trust me. I can." he glanced up and gave her a quick kiss on her cheek. "You hungry, Hinata-chan? I can order us some food. I've got free ramen coupons."

"I'm fine, Naruto-kun. I just want you to quit stalling."

"Stalling? Look, I'm not —"

"Yes, you are." she interrupted.

It's been five minutes already and the blonde Uzumaki still hasn't written anything on the paper in front of him. He had been wasting his time talking to her and stealing kisses at every chance that he'd get.

His voice dropped. "Well, I feel sorry for you — for having such an idiotic boyfriend to begin with."

"Don't say that. You're not an idiot, Naruto-kun."

Hinata took the pencil from his hand and started writing equations on the blank paper in front of him.

"All you need is practice and someone to guide you along the way. Maths can't be that threatening."

"What are you writing, Hinata-chan?" The blonde reached out an arm around her waist whilst resting his head on her shoulder.

Her face felt warm.

"It's the Cosine Rule." she felt his arm pulling her waist closer towards him.

This whole 'intimacy thing' was still new to her.

But there's always gotta be a first time for everything. Right now she can't seem to figure out whether Naruto was even listening to her whilst she explained this whole trig stuff, or if his mind was wandering off in Lala-Land on a fantasy journey.

"There's only t-ten more questions to go." she said, breathless. "I'll help you work through these and w-we can go hang out and d-do other stuff afterwards, Naruto-kun." God, the last bit sounded serious.

Other stuff? Now that woke him up.

He grinned but sighed in disappointment as he lifted his head away from her shoulder and glared back at the math papers in front of him.

Oh yeah, can I please buy one of those napkins that cost about y = $27x — 9/3? Thanks.

No. Seriously. Who needs this shit?

It's not like he'd be using algebra in real life any time soon. He glared at the papers like he wanted to set them on fire so badly. Or he could probably use these maths stuff as tissue paper so that he could just wipe them off his ass goodbye.

But no.

For Hinata's sake. And his own.

The first question took an unbelievable fifteen minutes to work through, enough to cook at least five instant noodles at the given time. It would've taken double the amount of time, if not for Hinata who helped him get through the struggle. Naruto was missing the fundamentals that he's supposed to have covered in basic Algebra. It was like trying to teach English to someone who has never heard of English before. And as the blonde got more frustrated, he started randomly transposing numbers, much to Hinata's disappointment and confusion.

It made her wonder if her boyfriend actually has a learning disability.

The second problem took ten minutes.

Progress.

And after about half-an-hour, they've managed to work through seven problems out of ten. By the time Naruto was about to start solving the eight problem on the paper, Hinata reached out and slammed the textbook shut.

"But we're not finished yet, Hinata-chan."

He glanced up like he was suddenly super interested in doing more maths.

"Time for a break. You're improving really well, Naruto-kun and you deserve some rest." She suddenly leaned closer to his face and planted a kiss on his cheek.

Naruto grinned. "Was that a reward just now?"

"You'll be Einstein in no time." she smiled and gave him playful poke on his chest.

He stood up from his seat and stretched.

"God, I'm so hungry that I could definitely finish six bowls of miso ramen. I'm gonna go order some. What ramen do you like, Hinata-chan? I've got free coupons here."

"I'll have whatever you're having." she replied.

"Alright, I'll be back in two minutes! Wait here."

He padded off towards the cashier to take their order. Naruto's sneakers scuffed on the overly mopped and sanitary floors of the Ramen Restaurant. Teuchi Ichiraku was on duty and the old man took his order for him.

"Hey Naruto," Teuchi leaned in and whispered. "Is she your girlfriend?"

"Uh — yeah. Why?" As usual, this old man loved to pry into his business. But he was like his second father after all.

"Nothing." he glanced at the Hyuga then back to the blonde Uzumaki. "She's the first girl that I've seen you bring here. She must be very special, isn't she?"

"She's one of a kind. Believe it." the blonde winked.

"Meals are on the house today." Teuchi punched him lightly on the shoulders. "Good luck with your date."

"Thanks, old man."

"Here you go. Enjoy."

Naruto took the two bowls of ramen each one on separate hands, really, really carefully in a supercalifragilisticexpialidociously cautious kind of way so that they won't spill. He balanced them like he was some sort of circus freak struggling to juggle ramen bowls. It's not that Naruto couldn't juggle. He just didn't have the balls to do it. (pardon the pun)

But as he turned around, he wasn't expecting what's next.

Bump!

SPLOSH!

Ramen contents spilled on Naruto's shirt once-clean shirt, now stained and smeared of ramen soup and beef. Well fucking done, Naruto. Fucking well done.

"What the fu—"

Immediately, he glanced up to see the face of the one who dared to ruin his day by spilling his ramen.

Cold and heartless onyx-black eyes met his cerulean blue ones. This piece-of-shit, ramen-spiller, son-of-a-bitch, gaylord stood in front of him, his eyes mysterious onyx eyes set deep within their sockets staring at him in mutual surprise. Luckily, this piece-of-shit didn't get any ramen spilled on his punk ass shirt.

"Dude, what the fuck?" Naruto swore.

But this 'dude' who acted so calm and cool, brushed past him and proceeded towards the cashier without even apologising like nothing ever happened just now.

"A bottle of water please." the onyx-eyed guy said to Teuchi, who was also caught in surprise by the sudden turn of events.

"Hey man, are you deaf or what? I was talking to you."

He ignored the blonde.

"Motherfucking piece of shit." Naruto punched him on the shoulder, earning his attention. "I said what the fuck?! Were you blind?"

"Hn." the guy grunted as he turned to face him.

Hinata heard a roaring sound of ceramic bowls shattered on the floor somewhere near the cashier area.

Immediately, she got up to her feet and rushed to the scene, expecting Naruto to have done something careless as usual such as slipping on the floor or just being clumsy.

But she arrived only to find her boyfriend in a heated argument with someone else.

"N-Naruto-kun!" said Hinata whilst running to the blonde Uzumaki's side. He was about to land a pummel on this guy until she came on time and grabbed Naruto's arm before their argument would escalate any further and develop into violence. And she wouldn't want that for sure.

Naruto snapped his head towards her.

"This asshole here ruined our lunch, Hinata-chan! He deserves to be taught a lesson!" his breathing was rapid, irritated and angry.

She shifted her gaze to this fellow, whom the blonde Uzumaki so eloquently branded as a 'butthole'. Then a glint of familiarity suddenly flashed across her eyes once she saw him.

No way. There's no mistaking it.

Hinata knows this guy.

This guy in front of him is very same one who went to the same modelling school with her back when she was still active in her modelling career. She had vivid memories about those moments. And one of her talents included barely forgetting a face.

This man in front of them is no other than him.

Uchiha Sasuke?!

Author's Note: There you go, folks!

What's Sasuke doing in Konoha?

What do you think will his role be in this story?

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Reviews please :) Thank you and stay tuned.

HEY GUYS

TAKING ONE WEEK HOLIDAY OFF! I'LL BE BACK NEXT WEEK! :)