Sasuke pulled the blanket up over top of him and let the black and white cat walking in front of the couch jump up. "Hey Jynx, are you as tired as I am?" He scratched the cats little white ears and smiled to himself when she purred with joy.

Jynx, his ex-girlfriend's cat who'd taken a liking to him, kneaded the blanket on his chest happily and spoke to him, "Purr-mew!" In her own odd little way Jynx talked with him a lot, she never really told him anything thought. Just sort of reminded him that she knew when he was addressing her.

Sasuke leaned his head back against the suede couch and for once let himself just enjoy the night. He'd been dating the same woman for 4 years, since he was 17, and on the night he intended to propose to her, she decided to tell him that she was leaving him for another man.

The last Uchiha was nervous, it wasn't visible but he definitely was. He kicked his feet up onto one counter and sat on the other. Joyce scuttled around the kitchen, cleaning and cooking at the exact same time. He took a deep breath and let his girlfriend's scent wash over him. Strawberries, she always smelled like the small red fruit.

He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her flush against him. "Joyce, I have something we need to talk about."

Joyce tensed, she flicked her long raven hair out onto her left shoulder and looked over her right to meet Sasuke's onyx eyes with her baby blue ones. "Good because i have a topic too."

"Ladies first," He smiled and kissed her nose. She probably wanted to go back to University - even though she was already toting 2 degrees - and felt guilty because he was often working so they couldn't get together.

"Okay, give me one second." She went away and when she came back there was a man on her arm. "Sasuke, you've met my assistant professor Rendon."

Sasuke stood up. "Yes, I've met him. Why is he here Joyce?"

"Let me put this very plainly for you Sasuke." Rendon spoke up. "Joyce is leaving you, she's coming with me."

"You. Shut up. Joyce, if you want to go, tell me. Don't let him." Sasuke's senses were reeling, Joyce wasn't like this. They'd been together since they were teenagers and she'd been the one to tell him that she'd never cheat on him so long as he didn't. So he never did, and he'd thought she'd done the same.

"I've been with Rendon for a year now Sasuke and I can't keep stringing both of you along. I don't want you anymore; you were just something to keep me on my feet until someone better came along."

Sasuke nodded. This was her house, and he would not allow anyone the satisfaction of seeing how badly that hurt. Bow out with grace, hurt them back that way.

"I understand Joyce, I'm glad I could be of service. I wish you both as many happy times as you and I have had and more." He left the apartment, got on his motorcycle and didn't stop riding for the next 10 hours.

He paid for it later, his ass was sore for a week. But for those ten hours he didn't have to think about anything. Not Joyce, not the pain, not anything. For those glorious ten hours he was simply Sasuke Uchiha out for a ride not Sasuke Uchiha recently made ex-boyfriend. Everything was pretty peaceful after that, he lived his life as normally. Completely destroyed at home, but professional everywhere else, it wasn't hard to fake happiness. For three months he heard nothing from anybody then Joyce showed up at his door with Jynx in her arms.

"Sasuke!" She sobbed and put Jynx in his house then clung to him sobbing. He held her up but did nothing more. No words of comfort would pass his lips for her ever again. He'd made that resolve while out with Naruto a couple months back. "Oh Sasuke, I missed you so much! Rendon he said I couldn't call you or anything..." Joyce went on and on about how horrible Rendon had been and Sasuke could feel his heart melting.

"Joyce," He murmured to try and get her attention, "why are you here?"

"Because I love you, because I made a mistake." She leaned up and kissed him. Sasuke felt one single tear roll down his cheek and remembered that he'd never cried over the loss of his once-love. Dimly Sasuke realized that Joyce was still kissing him and he pushed her away.

"We can't be together again, please leave." He gently pushed her out the door and shut it. Then he leaned his forehead against it and held himself in check. Joyce would not hurt him again.

She never did. Jynx stayed with him, even though he left his door open enough times for her to run out and go find Joyce. Jynx was a really smart little thing, she'd find Joyce if she looked. He checked his watch, his shift started at 8:00am and it was 1am now. 7 hours sleep was better than nothing, the raven rubbed his purring cat absently as he fell asleep slowly.

Sleep...he'd been missing it for a while...

..

Beeep...Beeeep...Beeeeep...

Sasuke jerked awake with a small exclamation and Jynx growled and jumped onto the coffee table. He ran a hand through his hair and began trying to control his breathing. That same dream, he shrugged it off and stood up. The alarm started going off again and he turned it off. His alarms were set minutes apart from each other to ensure he stayed awake.

He stretched slowly and made his way into a shower. Cleanliness was incredibly important for him, what with where he worked and all. Hospitals were based completely on their ability to stay clean if the doctors working there weren't perfectly spotless they ran the risk of passing along deadly germs and viruses to the patients within them.

Like Olivia and Tammy. Olivia and Tammy were two sisters in the pediatric ward he was in charge of taking care of. He ran his hands through his hair to push shampoo through and began lathering the raven locks as his train of thought continued its journey. Their parents were upstairs on floor seven, the coma ward, because of the car accident they'd been in. Also the reason that the young sisters were in his ward. As far as they were aware the car accident was rotten luck. Sasuke was one of a select few made aware of the fact that Olivia and Tammy's parents were upstairs because the hit man sent to kill them botched the job and put the whole family in the hospital.

Not dead.

Luckily the Tramers were well-off money wise and could afford to stay in the hospital without either working. Stock markets could sometimes be a wonder, they were constantly making money. So Olivia and Tammy would not ever go into foster care, if they did ever feel like leaving the ward it was when he got permission from the hospital to take the whole ward out somewhere nearby.

He finished rinsing out his hair, got dressed in his usual black and navy blue scrubs - one of about 2 doctors at the hospital who wore scrubs - and left the apartment. He snatched his umbrella from near the doorway as a second thought and locked the door behind him.

The walk to work was just like normal, the same people he saw every morning waved hello to him and he nodded back with a warm if false smile. He strolled into the hospital lobby and immediately passed off his umbrella and coat to a nurse.

"Good morning Harriet, off to buy breakfast for us?" He smirked and she sighed as she pulled on his coat. "Of course you are, my coat is in the ward is it?" He raised one eyebrow and she nodded.

"Sasuke Uchiha it worries me how you do that, sometimes I wonder if you know my thoughts before I do." She giggled and left with his coat and umbrella. Sasuke walked towards the elevator hit the little button and frowned. When the hell did he become so comfortable with everyone at the hospital that he could let someone walk with his coat.

In his old lifestyle he wouldn't have even let her within a foot of him. But then again, in his old lifestyle he never would've let anyone within a mile of him.

Harriet had reminded him so much of Joyce. They both had the same kind and open smile, and their senses of humor were the same. Which actually had caused problems with his relationship for a while. Joyce had been concerned that he was cheating on her with Harriet, now he considered that ironic. She'd been concerned, then went ahead and screwed Rendon behind his back for a while before leaving him.

Sasuke shook the thoughts from his head as the elevator chimed softly to alert him to the fact that he had arrived on floor five. He took a deep breath and ran through his mental list of things he needed to do...damn there was a lot on the menu for today.

"Good morning all." He greeted with a grin as soon as the door opened. Sure enough 9 faces smiled up at him. "Deromi, you shouldn't be out of bed." Sasuke scolded softly and the little boy graced him with a guilt ridden smile. Sasuke knew the boy didn't speak, ever, and that he suffered from night terrors, but it helped his sleep habits if everyone treated him like he was totally normal.

"Ladies," He greeted the 5 women of the ward, "Let me put Deromi back in bed and then I will deal with all of you." He tucked the little boy back in then ran through the usually checks he performed on their equipment and took a seat in front of everyone. "So, what do we want to do today? I got permission to go out after lunch. I can I pick up all manner of things at the grocery store if we want to do lunch or something?"

"Lunch, definitely lunch." Olivia nodded hastily, her purple hair swinging in every direction with the motion. Recently cut too, he had taken the two sisters to get their hair cut when they asked last week and they were both still enjoying the new freedom of short hair.

"Can we have fruit? Like strawberries and blueberries and apples?" Tammy tossed him a hopeful glance from beneath her own short purple hair, those bright brown eyes shining with hope, Sasuke nodded. "Maybe kiwi's too?"

Sasuke outright laughed and nodded. "Yes, kiwis too. But those are snacks. What do we really want?"

And the day continued like that. Sasuke was a doctor, he'd gotten into the medicine field under the recommendation of the doctor he'd met so many times, and he was damn good at it too. Sakura, the woman responsible for him being where he was, was much better at then him but he was he good with kids so Sakura had placed him there the moment he was done getting his PhD.

Sasuke scowled at himself in the mirror. The kids thought it was a good idea to plan a sneak attack on him while he was finishing off a file on Deromi. So while he'd been in the middle of writing out a rather tediously detailed description of his current situation, the children had been gathering up all the cans of whipped cream they could get their hands on.

So he got doused in whip cream.

He wiped the remainder of the now melted cream from his face and threw out the napkin. A quick glance at the time told him that his shift was over. Sasuke sighed miserably, straight from here to his other job, then home.

He gathered his umbrella and coat then left, walking back outside into the miserable rain.

Well, he thought, at least it let up long enough for me and the kids to have fun.

After walking for 6 blocks Sasuke got sick of the rain, sick of the wet and sick of the day in general. Time to hail a cab, he thought as he leaned out and began trying to wave a cab down.

Cabs, in this city? Sasuke mentally calculated his odds of getting a cab, deeming them to be around 45%, and waved a little more desperately. The water slapped into his skin and chilled him to the bone, fueling his determination to get one of the annoying yellow cars to pick him up.

A black car, simple in design but Sasuke recognized money when he saw it, pulled up in front of him. The man in the driver's seat smiled warmly and spoke, "Hey, would you like a ride? I'm going wherever you are."

Sasuke hesitated. On the one hand he'd never seen this man before, didn't know if he was a crazy killer, and he'd never heard a ride offer like that before. On the other hand it was a nice, warm and comfy looking car. Sasuke was a black belt, he could handle himself...

Sasuke ran through a few more pros and cons before sighing and getting in the car.