After being dead for quite some time, I'm finally back, and I come bearing gifts! For anyone waiting for my other stories to be updated, please go see my profile. For anyone new, hi!

All these oneshots are requests by The Great Naxa using, obviously, Sasuke and her OC Naxa. I really love this couple anyway. They're so cute! Go read her stories Everlasting and it's sequel I'll That I'm Living For. Anyway, each one will be different, story line or AU, doesn't matter; they have no connection save for the fact that it's all Sasuxa fluff and love. With this first one I had to get accustomed to the characters since I never really liked Sasuke, so go easy on me. For this one at least.

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.

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There was one ring. Then another, and another.

Was his alarm always this loud? Is that what it sounded like? Always up before the clock went off in the mornings, he didn't know what his sounded like. Why start now?

Something tapped the back of his head, and repeated, harder. Sasuke sat up, blinking down at the desk twice before turning dark eyes toward the cursed object of his rude awakening.

"Hey!" Naruto blared near his ear. "Bell's rang! Wake up!"

Cursed object indeed.

Sasuke slowly gathered his papers, placing them inside a notebook to file in the next class, watching as Naruto stuffed his assignments inside his backpack, speaking quickly and loudly with the bowl-cut Lee waiting for them.

Sasuke filed out behind Naruto and Lee, catching bits of their conversation, not paying attention to the rest, and wondered why he'd fallen asleep. His teacher stopped him before he escaped, and reminded him the consequences of sleeping in class, to which Sasuke answered semi-truthfully that it would never happen again. Home trouble? No, Itachi wasn't necessarily the greatest thing to live with, but only time built that callous.

Slipping to the right once outside, Sasuke nearly missed Lee and Naruto calling to see him later; he waved his hand without glancing behind. His sleeplessness could be subject to the teases of the thunderstorms; they've been crashing the city loudly for the past few days, and the sky hadn't been clear in nearly a week.

When he sat down in fourth hour, ignoring everyone's chatter and dancing comments sent his direction, Sasuke knew. He knew when she walked through the door like every other day, long brown hair swaying playfully with her stride, backpack slung over a shoulder, and the largest grin on her face. Kiba stood beside her, grinning also, hand scratching the back of his unruly head while he laughed. Quickly, glancing at the desk where the elderly woman sorted papers over the rim of her glasses, Kiba concealed a protruding white ear of his dog, Akamaru, into his jacket.

Somewhere something struck a cord, and Sasuke turned away, closing his eyes until the bell rang again. Seats were swiftly filled, the din softening to a dull roar.

"Hey, Sasuke," she said from behind and to the left of him.

He shifted slightly, slowly, catching her smile and looking away, missing the dimming in her blue eyes morph into a morbid yet controlled curiosity before she settled back into her chair. Naxa guessed she couldn't blame him; she'd obviously somehow screwed up again. Giving the back of his head a sadden glare, Naxa wasn't sure whether to expect an answer or not.

She really hoped he would.

"Hey," he replied, and she nearly missed it over the sudden rise in voices since class hadn't officially begun yet. He hadn't faced her, hadn't tried to, but more than any little detail was that simple and very gruff answer. It surprised her, actually, and she smiled. It'd taken her a good week to muster the courage to speak to him. And to get a reaction almost lifted her spirits completely.

The 'incident', as others began to call it, much to her chagrin, had been exactly a week ago on a very crowded staircase, involving herself, Sasuke, the press of the crowd, an untied shoelace, and extremely bad luck. Worse, the shoelace wasn't even hers. When she fell, she took him down right with her, backpacks and a muffled, "Oof!" included. Right before Naxa began to apologize he snarled, teeth clearly clenched, "Get off me." With his head down, eyes shaded, Naxa was stuck slightly amazed and extremely embarrassed as he stalked his way to disappear in the crowd.

She didn't do it on purpose, but it quite obviously upset him. He avoided her like the plague after that, veering out of her way only slightly, but enough. For Naxa, that little space grew into a gorge, something uncrossable. Everything had just fallen to tiny pieces, but she always did wonder if something had ever been there to break in the first place. If she knew that, if anything could be broken between the two of them, then that would mean something. Things broken can be fixed. She might've been a bit happier because of that.

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That pang…Sasuke felt it again, each time growing stronger than the last.

With Kiba in fourth hour, that was small and ignorable. With Lee when he slapped Naxa's shoulder friendlily in congratulation in his exuberant fashion, it was worse but still easily put aside after a while. But what grated him the most unfolded before his eyes as the group walked home after school in the drizzling rain. Naruto, shouting, jumping like a damnable blond rabbit, overzealously leapt at the unexpecting Naxa, embracing her briefly, long enough for her to yelp in surprise. Laughing, he bound away from her, his backpack jerking around.

It didn't take long at all for Naruto to tune into the smoldering glare, face Sasuke, and holler for everyone's attention with a pointed finger.

"Hey! What's with the look, Sasuke?!"

All eyes on him, including hers, Sasuke snorted, jamming his fists deep into his pockets, looking away with disinterest.

"What's it to you?" he replied conclusively.

Naruto refused to let it go. "You were givin' me some dirty look, Sasuke, and I wanna know what it was for! Tell me!"

Face twisting in annoyance, Sasuke searched a small patch of tall trees when someone blessedly distracted the blond long enough for him to forget about it for now. Watching them all walk away, still irate, Sasuke mulled his jealousy over in his mind, churning it, examining it, and not finding he liked it particularly much. But also knowing there wasn't much he could do about it, from his view.

The drizzle began to fall harder, a choking rumble rattling in the distance, and most of the band broke off for home. Sasuke left Naxa, Naruto, and Neji behind, heading down a detour for home instead of continuing with them.

She was still upset; he could tell by the way she refused to look at him during the little tiff with Naruto. In all honesty, he never considered the 'incident' a big deal. Which triggered his testy reaction a week ago. With her so damn close he hadn't known what the hell to do, not with all those people around, so he reacted not first way he thought of but the safest way. To get the hell out of the situation.

Sasuke couldn't say he regretted dismissing the opportunity—it wasn't quite the opportunity he wanted, and he often found himself searching for more anyway—, but he knew he could have treated her better than that. As for how to fix it, well, too bad there wasn't some way to learn that in books because he was more than clueless.

His front door stood waiting when Sasuke stopped, thinking, a light frown on his face. Placing his back pack inside the foyer, he stepped back out into the rain and began walking. As long as the lightning waited, he would be fine. The rain was cool, and the air heavy and warm, perfect rain weather.

Backtracking, the rain began to pour in sheets by the time he reached his destination of the trees tucked in the first bend of the neighborhood street. He liked to think there, sit up in the branches and work on studies in the sunlight.

Today, for seemingly no reason, he wanted to visit them.

Under the canopy the rain slowed to a light splash here and there, sopping his soaked clothing further. Eyes wide, surprise took him when he searched further through the wet trunks.

Hair nearly black with moisture, Naxa stood between two fairly separated tree trunks with an abundance of spilling water cascading down, but not overwhelmingly. Her bag rested semi-safe from the rain underneath a low tree branch. She hadn't gone home yet.

In utter silence Sasuke contemplated leaving, arguments for his behavior forgotten, words lost, but as he watched her he felt it again. That jealousy. Facing the feeling against unknowing Naruto and the others boiled small and frail next to the coarse irritation against the raindrops. He envied the rain for the easy closeness, clinging to her, brushing down her hair, over her face. He envied the rain's ability to envelop her in his arms, wrap around her completely. He envied the small contented smile on her lips as the taunting rain traced patterns across her skin.

Serenity gone, Sasuke wondered absently if he had made a sound when she suddenly looked at him, her blue eyes surprised, and then wide with shock, her mouth parting as if to say something, but nothing came.

The pure look in his dark, black eyes startled her, yes, but when Sasuke realized what he was doing, the piercingly sweet grip in his chest loosened as his own shock built up instead. But when Naxa smiled, that clinching hand returned, tugging at him wildly. The brilliance in that smile whispered so much more than anything the rain could ever ask for, and Sasuke took it. He took it greedily.

"Sasuke," she said, her smile in her voice.

He didn't say anything, and his hands moved automatically for his pockets. He turned his face upward, shifting forward to spy above them through the autumn-turning leaves. He schooled his face, pitch black eyes shut, but her lips still quirked upwards. Something still shone through when he reopened them, finding her.

"You should go inside," he said at last, turning sideways, ready to lead the way. "Too long out here and you could catch a cold."

Naxa watched him leave, her smile more playful than before. "Alright. I won't be long."

He paused, casting a single-eyed glance over his shoulder.

She sighed, rolling her eyes. "Alright. I'm coming."

When she reached for her bag, his hand appeared. She looked up. Calm and collected, eyes betraying nothing anymore, he picked up her pack.

"I'll walk you home."

Grinning Naxa agreed, knowing it too late for hiding like that again. She'd seen something in his eyes just now, that something she hoped for. He could have screamed it and still not been any clearer. Now she had the perfect timing to bring up a week ago and apologize, and did so cheerfully. When Sasuke looked at her broodingly, her conjured smiled faded.

"What?"

He shook his head once and continued forward. They crested the hill leading to her house in complete silence, him thinking of something to say and cursing the moment he so stupidly wasted as it passed them by, her wondering what she could have possibly done wrong this time and slowly becoming agitated.

Naxa reached for her bag over his shoulder, ready to just stomp in the puddles into her house when he surprised her yet again by taking her wrist, halting her movement. Looking away, that brooding frown on his face still, Sasuke slowly spoke, "You don't have to apologize," he glanced at her but not for long. "I apologize for the way I acted."

With that over with, Sasuke finally looked her in the eye, gave her the bag, placed hands in his pockets and turned away with a very small upturn of his lips. He nearly breathed a sigh of relief when Naxa called, her voice wavering at first.

"Sasuke!" She smiled at his one-eye over-the-shoulder glance. "I-I'll see you tomorrow?"

Standing to the side, Sasuke glanced at the wet ground. Tomorrow was Saturday, the weekend, and he didn't really have anything important going on either.

"See you tomorrow," he confirmed with a slight nod, heading off with a bare wave, looking at her the whole time. Naxa smiled at his back, his chaos of black hair plastered to his neck, and her expression turned thoughtful. She couldn't wait.

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