Title: 'What' is More Appropriate

Chapter: Prologue

Chapter Title: This City

A/N: This first chapter is in Sasuke's point of view but I intend for the others to be in 3rd person most likely.

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Sasuke's POV

This city. It eats all of us up. We spend every day running and scheming and evading. We hide behind others, from ourselves, in costumes. People throw themselves into the thick of it and hope to come out victorious or run for all their worth to evade the inevitable. But eventually everyone stops running, stops throwing themselves into it. Eventually people just let go and let the beast take over and drag you into it's underbelly. Tokyo is a living breathing creature just as much as any person in it. And here I am, in the thick of it, trying to just breathe.

My name is Sasuke Uchiha. I'm sixteen years old, male, debatable. And I dress like a woman. When I was born the doctor told my parents I was a hermaphrodite. He said we wouldn't know for sure until I hit puberty what the full extent of that would be. He insisted that corrective surgery wait until that time so that I would have a say. My father didn't agree but my mother put her foot down. So there I was, a premature he-she and the light in my mothers eyes. The older I got, the clearer it became that I wasn't like other boys. I was always tiny, slim, delicate. My father hated me for it and I just couldn't understand. I was born that way. I just was. I couldn't understand my father's hatred for something entirely beyond my control. When my breasts started to grow, I realized he was more angry with himself. The thought that I was his; that I was anything less than normal, let alone perfect, angered him.

Before puberty it was a matter of denial. I was young and riddled with baby-fat. My looks could easily be passed off by my youth. But when I started growing breasts instead of facial hair my father lost all regard for me. When I insisted on keeping my breasts instead of getting reassignment surgery he lost some of his sanity. He hit me and eventually he threatened to cut them off of me himself. That was the first time I felt like my body wasn't right. Not long after though my mother filed for divorce. I went to live with Itachi while it got finalized. Itachi made things...not right, but better. I like my body. I feel at home in it. I don't want surgery at all. I don't want to be male or female. I just want to be Sasuke. In Tokyo I can more of Sasuke than I ever could have been in Kyoto.

In this city a boy in girls clothing isn't much of an oddity or much of a constant. It's a gray area, just like me. It's been almost three years since I've seen my father. It's been almost three years since I've moved to Tokyo. It's been almost three years since I've dressed like a boy, since I've admitted to anyone that I'm a boy. It's hard work. In school I can feel the thrum of the beast eating me up. All of my peers are so curious, so fresh to the world around them. The girls want to know more about me. They're torn between wanting to be my friend and wanting to tear me down for being aloof. The boys want to see more of me. They're torn between mocking my tiny breasts and tripping over themselves to ask me out. I'm always beautiful until I turn them down. Then I'm just some stuck up no-tit bitch.

That's why I die for Sundays. For an entire day I can be one more faceless it in the crowd. I can roam the busy streets, push and shove, and sprint across the street without people paying attention. I feel free. I'm one of the runners. I don't want to be eaten by this city but I want to be in it. I want to get out and be. I want to run up and down it's roads and through its buildings. I want to see its people and its sights. But I don't want to get involved. I don't want to grow roots. I don't want fight the city from the city. I'm afraid of being eaten up. I'm afraid to fight, to take an active roll. I'm afraid that if I do people will see me. Really see me. I like me. Other people don't. And that's a problem for me. I can't hide forever and when the time comes I want to be able to run right out of here. But I know the only way I'm running out of here is if I get my ankles bit first.

Today it's rainy. The drops patter down on my clear plastic umbrella and distort the skyscrapers around me. I'm standing still, my palm up, fingers out, catching the rain. The businessmen and commuters part around me like a sea. Their hurried footsteps splash water onto my ankles, soaking my stockings. It chills me to my toes but it's nice. It's been so muggy lately. The heat is my enemy at school, it makes my gaffing1 uncomfortable. Almost unbearable. But I wear the girls uniform so I can't risk going without and have to deal with a sweaty crotch. It's time like that, that I wish everyone knew my secret. Boys wouldn't be so eager to watch my shifting thighs if they knew what I was trying to cool off. It's the price I have to pay though. I don't want them to judge. I don't want them to get angry. I don't ever want to feel what my father made me feel. Not ever again. Maybe someday one of my classmates will step up and sweep me off my feet and love my body as much as I do. But more than likely I'll never find love. Maybe I'm destined to be one of those freakish drunken experiments. I'm a conquest. Part of a sexual checklist. Yeah, that's much more likely than love. And that's what makes me sad.

"Oof..."

Businessman, he's in a hurry. I shake the clinging drops of rain from my fingers and merge back into the crowd around me. I don't know what to do. I could run home now and make it in time for a good lunch with mother. Or I could wander a bit more. The air feels amazing, crisp, fresh, and wet. But sooner or later water is going to soak through my shoes and numb my toes. Mm, maybe I can manage a quick circuit around the next block of buildings and still make it home in time.

I hear the thud and squeak of sneakers behind me, screams too. Teenagers on the rampage. I tuck my elbows close to my sides and scrunch up my face to make myself smaller. It doesn't work, that never really does, does it? I just barely manage to catch myself before my face smashes into the wet concrete. My knees and palms aren't all that thankful though. And my umbrella's skittering away. It's getting kicked along by faceless people, too focused on their own selves to help me. Aren't the Japanese suppose to be humble and helpful?

Hands lock around my upper arms and hall me up. Before I can even offer a thanks or tell him to back off he's gone. A blur of black and orange in the rain, hunting down my umbrella. I cross my arms over my chest and huddle under a nearby awning and hope he comes back quickly. Mother is not going to be happy about this. She'll go on and on about how I could get sick and how easily I could've been accosted on the rainy streets. Home is defiantly the only option now. I take a deep breath and close my eyes. The smell of rain is suddenly doused my the smell of miso and I feel a cold metal bar tapping my shoulder. I automatically reach out and curl my fingers around my umbrella. Before I can open up my eyes and focus on him properly he's gone, chasing after those boys that knocked me over. Or maybe he's not. Maybe he's just a good, decent person. Wouldn't that be a miracle?

"Thank you, whoever you are."

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Below is a link to view the umbrella Sasuke has. I'm considering doing fanart on my own but it may take a while. This is just the prologue. If I get good reviews I'll add more chapters.

In case it isn't clear: Sasuke is a runner, so the people who throw themselves into the city are people who say they're gonna do this or that then they end up a desk worker. Someone replaceable and faceless. He wants to get out of Tokyo and go places and avoid the 'inevitable'.

1: Gaffing is the use of tapes and/or glue, along with creative tucking, to hide the penis and make it appear that the man is flat in front.

Remove the spaces.

http:/ cn1. kaboodle. com/ hi/ img/ 2/ 0 / 0/ db /d / AAAAAvwydBMAAAAAANvbUA. jpg