All of my memories seemed like a parachute.

Ever since I joined the Akatsuki, or I was forced to, all of my memories jumped out of the corner to greet me and cause me pain. And that guy seemed to notice it.

"Deidara, are you high on something or?" Sasori said once. I looked at him. He was placing senbon in his Hiruko puppet. He doesn't know how it feels to see him every day and remember her. "No."

Every week it would be the same question. "Is something wrong?" Even though his face was blank as paper.

Then one day I have up I told him. "You reminded me of someone." He raised his eyebrow.

"Is it a good memory?"
"Yes."

"Should I be glad or something?"
"I guess."

"Who do I remind you off?"

"A girl."
"You were close?"
Nod.

"She was your girlfriend?"

Nod.

"She broke up with you?"

"It's not like that."

"You broke up with her?"

"It's not like that."

"Don't tell me you are still together."

"It's not like that."

"Then? Tell me."
"What is it to you?"

"I'm bored."
"Great."
"Tell me."
Sigh. "Fine."

O O O O O

"A guarding mission?"

"Yes. You are going with a girl from our village. You need to protect her while she finishes her mission. Your mission is classified as B" I nodded. Surely, this doesn't seem hard.

"You called for me?" some girl said when she opened the door. I looked at her. Wow. She's pretty, very pretty. She had long, lightly curled red hair and pretty dark blue eyes. She was about a head shorter than me. She wore a few numbers to big light blue t-shirt and the matching color skirt. She was small and all in all cute.

"Ouh here you are. Deidara meet Manami." The girl bowed for a second and smiled.

"So Manami you are going with Deidara to The Hidden Mist Village to restore paintings there. You are ready?"
"Of course. I'm bringing my own colours and brushes" she said and lift her white backpack. I saw one brush sticking out.

She's a painter. But why does she have our headband around her hip?

"Alright. You have four months." The Tsuchikage said. "Alright." I said and she, without a word, went out. I followed her. "You need guard, ha little girl?" I said to tease her. How weak is she to need help?

I got my answer soon enough. She hit me in stomach. Fuck, it hurts.

"I'm not a little girl and surely I do not need your guard. I can be fine myself. The damn kage doesn't want me to be alone that's it." She said, glared at me and went out. I just followed her.

No way am I going to fail my mission.

In the streets I noticed it. Everyone was staring at that tiny girl like she's something awful. It confused me a bit; still I never meted her before. She's probably few years younger than me, probably 15. She turned around at me. "What?" she said.

"You are my mission and surely this will not be my first mission I will fail."

"I'm fine on my own!"

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I am! Leave me alone, all of you!" she screamed and I saw the big tears in the corner of her eyes and the she ran for it. I followed her.

I can't fail this mission! She ran out of the village. I've let her have the lead, a bit of place for herself. After sometime she stopped but didn't turn. "Alright. If you already want to follow me, follow me. But as hell do not come near me" she said. That made me mad.

"Look it's not like I want to guard a spoil brat like you. So shut the hell up."

She turned. "What did you call me girly-boy?"

"S-P-O-I-L-E-D B-R-A-T."
"Ouh bitch." She said and took out her kunai and came close to me. I smirked. "What can you do to me, baka?" I took her kunai and she jumped away. It had a paper bomb around it's handle.

I let go of it and jumped away. It exploded, but I got without getting hurt.

"So you are supposed to protect me? You can't even see a paper bomb."

"You little! You tried to kill me!"

I got into her face.

"No. I just tried to injure you so you can't follow me no more." I wanted to kill her on the spot. She smirked and started walking again. I clenched my fist. Why, for the love of, do I have to protect that spoiled kid? Is she kage's daughter or something? No, of course not. Not even the Kage could stand her. I sighed. Well I could avoid her most of the time on my mission and then again I really do not need to talk to her or anything like that. I started walking towards her again. The small girl went into the forest that led to the Bridge. I continued following her, quietly. Annoying girl.

When it got dark she still continued. Damn.
"We should stop" I said.

"What you tired girly-boy?" she turned her face to me.

"No. It can get dangerous around here."
"So you are scared?"

"Ouh, for the love of. NO! We are camping here, un." I yelled at her and grab her backpack. She stared at me for a bit then sighed.

"Yeah, sure whatever." She said. I let go of her backpack and went to sit down. Well, I am a bit tired. I didn't eat much or anything. Shit, I even didn't brought food. Just great.

She took of her backpack. "I'm going to look for some wood for the fire" she said.

"I can do that, you stay here."

"It's not a problem." She said and went a bit into the darker parts of the forest. I smirked. Why is that spoiled kid being nice? She tried to blow me off! But she returned in about five minutes with her hands full of debriefs. She sat on the ground, moved bits of the grass from there placed rocks in a circle and place debriefs in it. "We got lucky. This is dry oak. It burns nicely." She said and took out her matches from that white backpack of hers and lightens it up. She smiled when the wood got quickly on fire. She putted her hands in front of it and smiled.

Even though, she tried to kill me, I must say that she looked pretty damn cute. She looked at me then. She frowned and took her big backpack into her arms. I heard a bit of rumble when she was going through the stuff in it. She threw a small box at me. I caught it with my hand.

"I'm going to go to that stream over there" she said and took out her kunai "to get us dinner. You rest, girly-boy."

She got up and left. Tch. Like I care.

I looked at the little box then. It was a simple box but it had something written on it. I turned it closer to the right. 'For burns' was written with beautiful handwriting. I touched my wrist were the explosion burned my skin. I blushed.

She noticed.

So that's why she was so nice! That two-faced girl!

Still, it was kind of nice. Was this heir way of saying 'I'm sorry'? I don't know. She came back in another twenty minutes, her legs and arms wet. She held four fishes stabbed on kunai's. She smiled for a second.

"Good catch, spoiled-brat"she raised her eyebrow.

"Really, nice thing to say to someone who caught you dinner girly-boy." She sad and placed the kunais in the ground for so the fish can be barbecued. I heard in her voice that she was hurt.

"Thank you... for ointment... and the food." I whispered. She heard it and nodded without saying a word.

Well maybe she isn't that bad. We didn't say anything until the fish was ready. We didn't say anything when we ate it. We didn't say anything before we both fell asleep.

The next morning I woke up she was still sleeping near that small bush. Light was falling on her cute face and she look like she was ten years old. It made me want to protect that little two-faced-spoiled-brat. I sighed and looked at my wrist. It was completely healed, except the thin, pink line going across my bone. Wow. When I got it, it was covering my whole wrist and a bit of my hand. That's some great ointment. I got up. Well, I should return the favour. I picked some fruits around us, a little bit of strawberry and blueberries. When I brought it to the tiny camp she was still asleep and I didn't have the heart to wake her up. And it surely seemed like I didn't need to. She woke up almost a minute after I've put one blueberry in my mouth. She looked at me and nodded.

"How's your burn" she said, her voice even.

"Great, thank you." I said my voice exactly like hers. She noticed the strawberries. She bit her tiny, pink lip. "Take it, if you like it." She looked up to me and simply said thank you and ate almost 10 strawberries. On her tenth she stopped and looked at me. "Do you want some?"
"No need. I like blueberries more." She nodded and finished all 12 strawberries. After she ate it, she got up took her backpack and said "You going?"

Wow, she didn't say girly boy.

I nodded and got up. We walked again, without saying a word.

At one point, I looked at her face. It was still, not peaceful but gentle and somehow smart. I didn't want to admit this, but I'm starting to fall for this girl.

O O O O O

"So Menami was your first crush?"

"Yes, I guess so."

"But she tried to kill you."

"Ouh. I think, that by that morning I forgave her. It was really that simple. A bit later, when we got to the Mist village I understood why she did that."

"Why did she?"
"Why are you so keen to hear the story, um?"

"I like good stories"

"So you think that this is good."

"I wouldn't be listening if it wasn't good"

"Thank you?"

"No problem. So why did she tried to kill you?"

"It was a bit after we got to the Hidden Mist..."

O O O O O

"This picture, it's one of our greatest treasures and it's dying!" that man was over-dramatic. One corner of the picture just broke off and the whole thing is dying? Sheesh.

Menami just nodded and continued looking at the picture, ignoring the tiny men.

"It's not that bad" I said. The man was astonished and he started rumbling about national treasure, on and on and on. I sighed. I really shouldn't say anything.

"I can fix it" she said, interrupting the fat guy.

"Reaaaaly? Oh thank you, thank you!" Menami just smiled.

The little fat guy gave a huge tour around the closed part of the national gallery. She had this nice sparkle in those deep blue eyes. I never saw any girl this into art. Usually, all of the girls in our village don't care about art. This really is a nice change.