This is gonna is my first multi-chapter and it's SasuNaru, but the Taka memebers will be in it too, especially Suigetsu becasue I adore him. Oh, and as for schools having facilities for mentally ill kids, well, my school in CROATIA is advanced enough to have one, and it's not exactly a great school. It's pretty tiny, actually, and in Dubrovnik. So, if my school can have one, so can other schools.

As far as you get

Sasuke leaned against the cold stone of his Konoha High School and lets his black backpack slip over his shoulders and carelessly fall to the ground. It makes a small noise against the black dirt soil and Sasuke doesn't really care about how dirty it's going to get. Its black isn't, it?

Instead, he rummages around in the pocket of his baggy jeans and pulls out a lighter, grimy with dust and a pack of cigarettes. Sasuke pulls one out and looks disdainfully at the box. He's running low. With graceful movements that made girls giggle and blush, no matter how much Sasuke hated them, he lit the cigarette and put it in his mouth, the tip already smoking. Balancing the drug between his middle and index finger, he took one long drag, filling his lungs with smoke.

Breathing out, Sasuke brushed bangs away from his eyes and sighed in irritation. He needed to get these cut. And he didn't have any scissors or knives or anything right now so he'd have to wait. Suigetsu usually had one, though. He needed it for all the fights he got into. Sasuke brushed his hair away from his eyes again and waited for Suigetsu silently, upping the volume on his iPod to drown out all background noise.

He turned his head slowly to the right. There was a basketball court there and a group of Sasuke's classmates gathered around on the sidelines, not there for playing basketball, but just for hanging out, joking and laughing. Sasuke had never understood why they hung out there, of all places. He'd tried to play basketball more than once with Suigetsu there and couldn't because of these assholes.

He took another drag and watches the group more closely, searching for a mess of blonde hair and bright sapphire eyes. Smiling when he found them, he lowered his arm and momentarily cool clean air rushed into his lungs before they were filled again with smoke. He watched Naruto for a few minutes, scowling when he saw the tanned, scarred arm hanging around a slim girl's neck and smiling when Sakura slapped it away.

The idiot was forever trying to seduce Sakura, a girl as colorful as her hair. Karin had griped for hours why anyone would dye their hair pink and Sasuke had fond feelings entwined with that memory, feelings of amusement and relaxation as he ignored her and beat Suigetsu at poker. At the end of the day, well, Sasuke couldn't remember what happened in the end, all he remembered was loud Linkin Park music and the pile of coins.

Now, Naruto was telling a story to his group of friends, people Sasuke preferred to avoid. He was waving his arms and Sasuke could hear that loud voice from over here. He was saying stuff like "water" and "magazine". Sasuke supposed it was some prank from the way Inuzuka was roaring and rolling on the ground.

"Uchiha!" a shout came from his left. "Come on, bastard, turn off the iPod, we're already late."

Sasuke rolled his head to the side and found Suigetsu standing there, long silver escaping that black beanie he wore, escaping all the way down to his shoulder. An annoyed expression flickered on his flushed face and he waved his cell phone around sporadically, the purple flashing in bursts of color on the gray walls behind it.

Sasuke frowned and his cigarette twitched in the corner of his mouth. "Late for what?" He had a photographic memory; Sasuke was fairly sure he would have remembered whatever it was they were late for.

"Juugo had another attack." Suigetsu informed, frowning. "It's mild, but he's looking for you. Karin's keeping him calm until we get there." Suddenly he leaned forward and peered over Sasuke's shoulder curiously. The frown disappeared and simple pleasures replaced it with a smile for a minute. "Watching Blondie again, huh? Sasuke, you've got to do something about that. After we go save Juugo and I tell Karin, she'll want to hold a conference or something, you know."

"Well, don't fucking tell her, then." Sasuke snapped irritably, his mood already worse. He picked his backpack off the dirt and let the cigarette fall to into the soil, which he then put out with his shoe. "Let's go." The school had its own special facility for kids with mental illnesses; in Juugo's case, DID-dissociative identity disorder and Sasuke appreciated that, or he'd have to go all the way across town to visit Juugo when he had one of his anger attacks. Suigetsu started walking with him, at a quicker pace than normal.

Sasuke trailed a few paces behind him, thinking of messy blonde hair and a loud voice. He erased that picture then, thinking of Juugo's caring eyes and sweat-soaked skin. The 2 images stood side by side next to each other in his mind, and Sasuke, in his selfish, jealous way, wondered if Naruto would be proud of him taking care of a mentally sick person. Then again, Juugo would hate him if he told anyone about his condition.

Sasuke grunts and starts walking faster, suddenly remembering his previous annoyances. "You wouldn't happen to have a knife, would you?" He asks Suigetsu. "I need to get these fucking bangs out of my eyes."

Suigetsu nods and draws out a common pocketknife, nothing fancy. In 1 swift stroke little clumps of obsidian litter the ground. "You look retarded." Suigetsu comments. "Your hair's all scraggly now. Well, where you cut it it's all scraggly. The rest of your hair did always look like shit, though."

"You're the only one that thinks that." Sasuke says, thinking of squealing girls and jealous boys. "Maybe I'll get rid of some girls this way."

"Some boys, too." Suigetsu chuckled. His voice changes and he frowned at Sasuke's face. "You know, Sasuke, most people would want to have your looks?" Suigetsu answers sarcastically. "Do you have any idea how many people want to sleep with you? Like, me included?"

Sasuke scoffed. "No way in hell I'm doing you. Or anyone besides Naruto, actually." Truth be told, he's never actually thought about sex in which Naruto wasn't present. The word itself was just automatically connected with fantasies of feverish blue eyes, tanned flushed cheeks and coarse blonde pubic hair. And besides, Suigetsu just wanted him because of his looks and it was some sort of game with him, nothing serious.

Suigetsu scowled. "Yeah, yeah, we all know about yours and Naruto's undying love for each other, especially Naruto's who's never even kissed you." Suigetsu rolled his eyes and one of his swinging arms hit Sasuke in the stomach. "And, " Suigetsu continued, much louder and not even looking at him, "I'd be on top."

"The hell you would."

"I WOULD, goddamit!"

"Yeah, whatever. Are we there yet?"

*************

The school had never been some sort of great expert on decoration, it was impossible not to notice, walking through their courtyards. They were bare, no trees or bushes or flowers. Just lots of bugs, as far as Sasuke saw. The dirt in front of them seemed limp and uneven, stomped on by too many people too many times. The lack of green seemed somehow much more important here than it should be, right in front of the mentally ill kids' facility. There should be more life, Sasuke feels and wonders when he got so sentimental.

Probably since he met Juugo.

Sasuke isn't really sure how he feels about the whole thing, about how whenever Juugo goes ballistic, which isn't the official medical term the doctors use, which is very long with lots of ys, about how whenever Juugo goes ballistic he needs Sasuke to calm him down, not fancy medicines or some weird sort of therapy or even Kimimaro, who isn't here anymore. Sasuke has just come used to the doctors, his friends and that little but somehow increasingly loud voice in the back of his head telling him it's the right thing to do, and who is he to know what the right thing to do is?

The white doors in front of them, Sasuke can't believe the courtyard is that short, and Suigetsu pushes away carelessly with one white hand of his own and Sasuke is presented with a hysterical nurse, her uniform rumpled and ruffled and she's screaming in his face like some sort of goddamned bird, literally just screeching, with no coherent words thrown in. Two hands are flying around her head and little tufts of charcoal hair are escaping what Sasuke thinks might have started off as a bun.

"Hey, hey, Shizune!" Suigetsu manages to raise his voice over Shizune's fucking birdcall and he grabs both arms and leans into his face near hers. "What room is Juugo in?" he asked, attempting to look soothing. Sasuke can't believe what he's hearing.

"He's in 212, you idiot. How do you not know after all the times we've been here?" Sasuke demanded incredulously and he grabbed the back of Suigetsu's purple shirt roughly and uncaring about the nail marks appearing on his white neck. Suigetsu does, though, and he's yelling "Ow!" and other profanities so Sasuke lets him go and runs down the hall, unnerved by Shizune's lack of usually calm and cool demeanor. His backpack bumps rhythmically against his back and slows him down a little bit, but Sasuke ignores it, and Suigetsu still hasn't caught up with him.

He skidded to a stop outside Juugo's room, roars increasing in volume, and wrenched the door open angrily. Fucking Juugo and his fucking attacks is the angry thought he's thinking, but it shrivels away and dies when his eyes adjust to the scene in front of him.

Juugo is in his room, Sasuke's relieved to see-but that's about it for normality. His shirt is wildly torn so much it's not a shirt anymore, just a limp piece of gray cloth, his hair is disheveled and dirty, the orange speckled with some sort of black stuff, his pants are ripped as well, not just at the knees like how Karin and Suigetsu like their jeans, but all over so they're pretty much shorts and Sasuke can see a little fuzz of orange at the top. His eyes, and this is the worst part, they're so, so, so wild, so dangerous Sasuke finds it hard to believe one word from him will calm this monster down, the way it always does. Sasuke's photographic memory absorbs this image immediately on sight and later it's one of his nightmares.

"Juugo!" he shouts and Juugo's arms, that are hitting the wall over and over again, to absolutely no effect except his own skin breaking and bleeding stop momentarily, and big, unnatural orange eyes that Sasuke has only ever seen on his forced-on friend seem to flicker a little bit, a tiny, minuscule bit, but then that's how it always works.

Juugo's eyes keep flickering in and out of conscious, the wild side and the gentle side throwing themselves at each other, each trying to gain control. Sasuke waits a few seconds and when the gentle side doesn't win, he starts to worry and desperately wishes for Kimimaro.

"Juugo," he calls out again, his voice lower and more controlled. "Juugo, it's me. Sasuke," he stretches the last word, making an effort to pronounce it clearly and slowly. Juugo blinks at him, his bleeding arms useless and dumb at his sides.

Sasuke sees Suigetsu panting toward him out of the corner of his eye and the arm Juugo can't see he holds straight up, palm rigid in the universal sign for stop. Suigetsu nods, understands and stays put. Sasuke turns his full attention back to Juugo. "Juugo," he called warningly. "Juugo, it's Sasuke," he repeated himself again, because he was out of ideas now.

Juugo glanced at him, blinking slowly and more slowly still. Sasuke could see distrust building up there, distrust spilling over.

"Juugo," he gasped as a last resort. Why wasn't he going back to normal?! "Juugo, remember Kimimaro?!"

Sasuke's head and heart seem to pump and throb with blood and exhilaration as his too-accurate memory spins scenarios of what Kimimaro's name will do to Juugo. There are only 2 possibilities, though, really. Either it works and Juugo remembers and calms down or it's the exact opposite-he remembers and just gets angrier.

Juugo stares at him and Sasuke thinks for a blessed second he didn't hear Sasuke, but then he's charging toward him, big legs propelling him faster and faster toward him and Sasuke panics, naturally, thinking of how his toss-up idea didn't work, but that's all he has time to think, that and something along the lines of Shit!, but all in all Sasuke's screwed and he barges blindly to the side, his right side and gets maybe about 1 step when Juugo's arms close around his midsection-

-and do nothing else.

Sasuke freezes, wondering why Juugo didn't try to kill him yet; God knows how many people he tries to hurt for no good reason.

"Juugo?" he says testily, because now that Juugo isn't trying to kill him the danger's past and Juugo's arms wrapped around his torso (and his backpack) feels suspiciously like a hug. "Juugo, get your arms off me."

Juugo, obedient as ever with Sasuke, unravels his arms and they drop uselessly to his sides. Sasuke turns around, stands on his tiptoes and peers over Juugo's shoulder and sees Suigetsu watching the 2 of them warily with one arm on the white-washed wall next to him to steady himself. Suigetsu raises his eyebrows. Sasuke moves his head up and down a couple times. Suigetsu breathes out in relief and walks forward, into view.

"Hey, Juugo," he said tentatively, raising one hand in a hello.

Juugo turns around. "Hello, Suigetsu-san." Sasuke can tell from looking at his relaxed, loose back he's back to normal and embarrassed.

Suigetsu grinned at him, laid-back and easy. "Good to see you're alright and sane. Now if you wouldn't mind getting some new shorts, Juugo, and I'd be very appreciative. I mean, I'm bi and everything, but still, checking out one of my friends is weird."

Juugo blushes uncontrollably, brighter than his hair and hastily hightails into his ripped-apart room, hands covering his groin. Sasuke snorts. "What kind of bullshit is that? A few minutes ago you were trying to get into my pants."

Suigetsu scowls at him and Sasuke can't believe the ordeal is actually over to the part that Suigetsu is being an idiot, which is the same as normal. "You're an exception. The entire world wants to get into your pants, Sasuke."

Sasuke rolls his eyes and Suigetsu glares at him some more. "It's true!"

Sasuke shakes his head, dismissing the matter altogether and thinks of Naruto and his friends on the basketball court. "Wanna play basketball?" he asks Suigetsu, ignoring how it's inconsiderate to Juugo and how he only wants to because Naruto is there.

Suigetsu shrugs. "Yeah, sure, some other time," and Sasuke realizes that Suigetsu thought he meant afterward, when Juugo was alright, Shizune converted back to her normal calm and collected self and all Juugo's furniture replaced. Although…Sasuke stares at the boring wall in front of him without interest and he smirks, struck by a new idea.

Sasuke starts to speak, his mouth forming words: "No, I mean wi-" but he's cut off by Suigetsu.

"Hey!" the swimmer is yelling, inside Juugo's room already. "Hey, where's Karin?" Barely a pause. "Juugo, fuck, where's Karin!?"

Sasuke dashes inside the room, too, remembering Suigetsu's original announcement: "Juugo had another attack. It's mild, but he's looking for you. Karin's keeping him calm until we get there." Karin, he thought and felt his stomach lurch in unpleasant directions.

Juugo stood up, shirtless and only clad in new jeans, ones that weren't destroyed. "Karin-san?" he said slowly, not understanding.

Suigetsu's in front of him, jumping up and down in the most ridiculous display of agitation Sasuke has seen in a while. "Karin, Juugo, Karin! She texted my about your attack, that she's keeping you calm until we get there! Come on, where is she?"

Juugo's eyes flashed in remembrance, he gasped and whirled around, running into the bathroom, yelling "Karin-san!" Suigetsu's right next to him, and Sasuke follows, mind racing with pictures of blood-soaked hair and skin.

It's nothing like that, though, nothing that bad. Karin's slumped over the bathtub, glasses off and broken in the tub, hair spread messily just about everywhere and she's just unconscious, with no wound or cut anywhere. Juugo's face is as white as Sasuke's ever seen it.

Suigetsu pushed his way angrily past Juugo and turned Karin's limp face around roughly, so that it was facing his own. He stared at her closed eyelids for a good 5 seconds and Sasuke leaned over the tub, drawing out her glasses. Suigetsu snatched them from Sasuke's hand and balanced them carefully on Karin's nose and ears, rubbing his pale hand over her pale face.

Sasuke glanced at Juugo. He looked devastated. "Karin, Karin," was just about all he could get out, eyes locked on her. "Karin-san, I'm so sorry," he apologized shakily, hands trembling, never mind how Karin couldn't hear him. Sasuke feels a small burst of compassion toward him. Juugo was a nice guy, much better than Sasuke was. Sasuke would not be sorry enough to apologize to someone who couldn't hear him, even if it was Naruto. Juugo, though, it seemed was just too nice.

Not that that would be such an important factor in Suigetsu's mind, Sasuke knew.

Suigetsu crouched even further down and he somehow managed to maneuver his arms around so he could scoop Karin up, bridal style, with her legs dangling off his arms. Sasuke wondered briefly where he had the strength, since he complained for an hour when he had to carry 3 bags.

Juugo moved his bulk out of the doorway and into his room so Suigetsu could get Karin out without bumping him. Sasuke followed him out. "Get her to the infirmary," he told Suigetsu. "I'll go tell all the nurses and doctors that Juugo's back to normal."

Suigetsu nodded tightly. He wouldn't look at Juugo and Juugo could do anything but take his eyes off the two of them, mumbling stuff to himself that sounded like: "Sorry," and "Karin,".

Once Suigetsu leaves, Juugo sits down on the floor since his chair's broken and cries into his hands.

Sasuke does his best to cheer him up, which consists of standing on the other side of the room and letting unfinished sentences hand in the air.

He, Juugo, and Suigetsu don't play basketball that day.

************

Naruto propped his arms up lazily and watched with mild interest as Sakura and Ino shrieked at each other, the 2 of them disagreeing about some homework Naruto hadn't even looked at. There were a lot of papers flying about and Naruto was half-sure one of them would fly away, blown by the wind and then land in some puddle. Then they'd just argue a lot more and Naruto and his guy friends would probably leave, except maybe Lee, who would do almost anything for Sakura. Naruto felt almost bad for him. The guy had the perfect personality to be a slave and would most likely become the victim of some over-manipulative girlfriend.

Sakura, maybe.

The mental image intruded in Naruto's brain and he snickered to himself, thinking of Sakura standing kilometers tall and yelling down and ordering around a centimeter tall Lee, who was forced to carry all her books and do all her homework and stuff like that. Kiba, lounging next to him on his stomach, poked him in the shoulder and raised an eyebrow, asking for the joke.

Naruto leaned in and whispered his prediction and Kiba let out a bark of laughter, not being as discreet as Naruto. Hinata turned his head questioningly toward them for a few seconds but everyone else ignored the two, too used to their dumb pranks and jokes.

Naruto grinned to himself and leaned over to Kiba again: "That was such a funny prank," he classified, thinking of all that water and all those pictures, but most of all, the red-haired girl's angry, sputtering face and furiously pumping legs failing to catch up with them and punch them. Not very original, but still funny.

Kiba grinned at him and said happily: "Hell, yeah."

Ino overheard. "I don't think it was very funny," she sniffed, hands on her hips. "That was a perfectly good magazine, and you idiots had to ruin it. That girl just wasted money because of you two." Ino glared at them for a few minutes, long blonde hair dropping into her eyes.

Sakura glanced at them and nodded. "I agree. Poor girl… Naruto, Kiba, you can really be a jerk sometimes." She huffed at him and a strand of cotton candy jumped up before falling back down.

Kiba smiled, unfazed. "Yeah."

Naruto has much more pride than Kiba, though, and stared. "Weren't you two just screaming at each other? How'd you manage to hear that? And what do you care anyway, it was one harmless prank and you don't even know the girl!"

"I do too!" Ino screeched back. "She's in my English class and she's a little weird, but she's nice enough! I mean, she likes Sasuke so that automatically means she's normal and cultured, unlike A FEW OTHER PEOPLE I could name!"

Sakura backed her up in a second. "Yeah, and, Naruto, if you were paying any attention you would have KNOWN that Hinata explained the homework thing to us a few seconds ago!" She crossed her arms and Kiba howled with laughter next to him.

"Just because a person's in a class with you doesn't mean you know them!" Naruto screamed, waving his arms around him and not quite believing how he got dragged into this. "Do you even know her name? And what's so great about Sasuke, anyway?!" he finished proudly, thinking of 9th grade summer and the times since then.

"Oh, please, Naruto," Ino rolled her eyes, Sakura knowing him too well not to breach this subject too far. "Just because you had some fight with him or something doesn't make him Satan, for God's sake. And on the name thing, I do know hers, but I'm not gonna tell you! I am not an idiot and I see how you pulled that prank on her just because one of you secretly likes her. Well, you 2 are losers who don't even know her name and she doesn't know you're alive! So there!" Ino sat back down triumphantly and began to rummage around in her bug for something.

Kiba finally reacted. "WHAT?! Me? Liking her?! Oh, please, if it's anyone it's Naruto. I'm fucking going out with Hinata, Ino!" he yelled and wrapped one arm around Hinata's slim shoulders, and kissed her deftly on the lips for a few moments, during which Hinata's face flared up.

Naruto turned away from the scene. "Uh. I don't like her either. You're making crap up, Ino. And I've gotta go now, anyway. We've spent, what, 2 hours here?"

Kiba jumped up from his embrace and pulled Hinata up with him. "Yeah, we better leave, too. Hinata, you've got that thingy, right?"

Hinata smiled, blushed and looked up at him. "No, Kiba, its Neji's birthday," she reminded him shyly. "I need to buy his present and meet up with Tenten."

Kiba scowled. "Oh, yeah, that prick. Oh, well, I'll come with you as long as I don't have to do anything." Hinata giggled and whispered: "Okay."

Naruto frowned and stood up, stretching. "Neji's not that bad," he countered. Lee looked up from the conversation he was having with Sakura and immediately defended the material artist, his best friend. "That is very true, Naruto. Because why Neji has indeed been corrupted in the past by his angry memories of winter and hate, he is now most youthful and has embraced springtime, which is the never-ending season of youth!" Lee nodded wisely and Sakura erupted into giggles next to him.

He's so gonna end up a slave Naruto thought.

"Is anyone else coming?" he asked the rest of the group. He turned his head to the left and frowned a little bit. "Think we should wake Shika up?" There, splayed out on the court ever since school had finished, lay Shikamaru, ponytail undone and in a messy waterfall around his shoulders, mouth obnoxiously open.

Ino waved one hand. "You don't need to, I'll wake him up when the rest of us leave. We've still got that homework to finish, now that Hinata's so kindly explained it to us." The last one was directed at him. Naruto stuck his tongue out at her.

"I will stay with Sakura!" Lee announced boldly, eyes glued to her face. Sakura winced away and tried to smile.

Naruto smiled, thinking of his mental image and caught Kiba's eye, who noticed the direction Naruto was looking at and understood immediately, chuckling again. Hinata still looked confused, but she was a good sport about it and silently tugged at Kiba's arm, leading him away from the court.

Kiba waved to the rest of him, hollered "Bye!" and Naruto copied him, waving 2 arms instead of one. Hinata just twittered her hand nervously.

"What bus is it, Hinata?" Kiba asked her casually, arm still slung around her shoulder.

"My fathers is picking us up and dropping us off, remember, Kiba? Naruto, would you like us to drop you off or are you going to take a bus?" Hinata looked at him kindly with nigh-colorless eyes and her eyelashes fluttered against the creamy expanse of her skin.

"I'm taking 7, but thanks anyway." he answered and looked at her with interest. "Whaddya getting him, Hinata?"

"I don't really know yet. Tenten and I had a deal that we'd pool our money for something really expensive and nice, but we don't really know what the expensive and nice thing will be yet. I guess we'll see at the store. What did you get him?"

Naruto's mouth stretched into a wide smile across his face. "Porn. My uncle's porn."

In one, swift, careless motion, Kiba whirled his body around to stare at him and his eyes widened before he broke out into long, bone-breaking guffaws of laughter. Hinata's face skyrocketed into the customary strawberry red.

Naruto laughed too. "He needs it, doesn't he?"

"Yeah," Kiba gasped beside him. "He does, oh my God, he really does!" One arm clutched his stomach and he was practically bent over. Hinata giggled a little bit then, one pale hand covering her lips delicately.

"I," Kiba groaned, "Cannot wait to tell Shino about this, this is gonna so be good it's gonna break even his cool. Never mind how he's sick, he's gonna be laughing so hard and coughing so much you won't be able to tell the difference."

Hinata smiled at her boyfriend, way too nice to be completely side-tracked like him. "Let's go," she said softly and pulled him along in the direction of the designated meeting site.

Naruto watched them go, Kiba eventually straightening up and Hinata holding his hand and talking to him in that low voice of hers only select people understood without needing to ask her to repeat herself. He smiled a little bit and felt his stomach lighten at the sight. They made a good couple.

Naruto didn't have anyone like that.

It wasn't just that he didn't have a girlfriend or even a boyfriend since he was bi, but he wasn't interested in anyone. At all. He didn't have a crush on anyone, didn't really specially like someone, the way Hinata and Kiba did for each other.

He didn't have anyone he really wanted to ask out, or anyone he would try like hell to score a goal in front of just to impress, didn't have anyone he would buy chocolate and flower's for and spend a good long hour picking out a present for, the way he knew Tenten would want to do for Neji.

Naruto had felt like this for a while, a while that seemed much, much longer than it really was.

He walked to the bus stop slowly and blindly, with hands thrust deep into the pockets of his favorite orange jacket Sakura and Ino had tried to get rid of, and eyes downcast on the grey pavement and mind splitting between the carefree part of his brain that was saying he had nothing to worry about and the serious part that said how this was unnatural and how he should have felt more than the small bout of puppy love for Sakura in a span of a year.

He slouched his way ever to the stop, leaning against the metal streetlight, the jacket attracting stares from some women and girls, more somber now, since everyone had left and these thoughts had taken over. Naruto did not, as a general rule, function better alone than he did in a group.

He stayed that way for a while, blue eyes closed, instead listening and smelling for the noises and gasoline odors the buses always made. He thought of Neji's party, which was in, what, 3 days, and how that would be like, and how Kiba and Neji would get along or tear each other's throats out. Hinata would have to be the peacemaker, as usual. Her and Lee…Oh, and him.

The thought was not a good one, but then most things tied with Neji and his other friends usually weren't.

Eventually, the great blue bus rolled over and Naruto opened his eyes once he heard it coming, and even when he opened them it was still a good few meters off, such was the noise it was making. He jumped off the streetlight and straightened up, walking over to the point in the pavement when it would stop, and felt a slight breeze rustling his already messy hair. Mentally, he tried to do a few calculations about when'd he have to leave his apartment again to meet his uncle, since the time of actually getting there took a while, his uncle living in the rich part of town. The bus ride to there would be around half an hour, and just waiting for the damn machine…All in all, he couldn't do math standing up. He'd figure it out when he got home.

A chair in the back, black and nearly invisible seemed to call out to him. From this point he could do some people-watching, a hobby Naruto had whenever he was bored. There was no one else in the back lane and he settled down comfortably, throwing his backpack on his feet.

They all had the same hair, the people getting on. Brown, brown, black, brown, oh, look, one blonde, brown, brown, black again…

Naruto bolted upward, and leaped to his feet, bouncing up and down, struggling to get a good look at the guy he'd just seen. He knew that hairstyle, he knew it really well.

There.

6 lanes down form him, talking furiously into a black cell phone, was Sasuke.

Naruto stared at him with a sort of fascination, unwanted memories storming his mind now and him unable to stop them, hot and blue memories, of summer and of the beach, and everything that came after it, and those memories were falling autumn, and cold winter, so cold that even the next summer was chilly.

He swallowed loudly, gulping down some spit, thinking of what he should do. Go say hello or just sit here? Although, why should he go say hi to him? He saw Sasuke every day in the corridor and had never said anything, so why should he be saying something on this stinky, smelly bus?

Naruto sat back down with a huff, various scenarios unfolding. Sasuke would see him anyway, he was sure those black eyes would definetly see him when they were getting off…

That's how he spent the ride, huddling in the back, and time passing by much faster that he anticipated.

Eventually, it screeched to a halt and Naruto slowly clambered off his seat, now in full don't-let-him-see-me mode and completely abandoning go-up-and-say-hi mode. Sasuke was already walking down the aisle, still talking lowly but angrily into the cell phone and Naruto was behind him. Sasuke would still see him, though, once they got off…

Breathing evenly, he stepped off the bus carefully, and watched anxiously as Sasuke finally turned his whole body around, the matte black bangs swinging in his face. He saw Sasuke's eyes give the slightest widening, saw the hand in which he was holding the phone tremble a minuscule bit that you wouldn't notice unless you were really looking for it, saw the surprise (not shock) flicker briefly.

Saw Sasuke turn away, mouth still moving and hair still swaying.

Naruto felt something cold and hard settle in the bottom of his stomach and it crushed everything else, whatever it was.

Clutching the insides of his jacket pockets tighter, Naruto walked home, leaves scattering around his feet and Sasuke's last look locked firmly in his mind, as much as he tried to forget it.

TBC

Uh, this is kinda like a prologue or something. A really long prologue. In the next chapter there'll be more Sasuke and Naruto interaction, though, I swear. And I'll try my best to NOT make it the usual cliché high school fic, with Naruto being unpopular and Sasuke being popular or vice-versa. I do need a setting, though, and high school seemed to be the best one. The real plot won't have much to do with it, I promise. Reviews please!