Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine.

Pairing: Mostly SasuNaru

uhhh... I don't really know...

Uchiha Sasuke wasn't the type of man to be flustered by anything.

Really.

In fact, he prided himself in being so abso-fucking-lutely aware of every aspect of his being, that to be honest, it was a bit unfair for anyone who wanted to get to know the guy. He knew how to hide the parts of himself that he wanted to hide, and he knew how to use his wits to get him the things he needed. And if that required some artful manipulation of people, then so be it.

That being said, it was really unfortunate that as he numbly walked out of the gaudy jewelry store with a smooth tiny box in one hand and the other clutching a crinkled receipt, he couldn't seem to shake off the strange twitch that his neck had started to take on or the otherwise disconcerting thoughts running through his head.

Why, you ask?

Well, Uchiha Sasuke – as convincingly aware of himself as he was – seemed to have realized one little itty bitty fact that he'd never considered before in his life. And that fact was that he just might have become a flaming homosexual in the course of the last 10 minutes.

A shocker, to be sure.

He'd always pinned himself to be asexual – after all, no amount of women did anything for Sasuke Junior down south and neither, in fact, did any amount of men. In times of stress, sure, he jacked off with no other thought in mind except of when he'd finish, but the whole process of actual sex was just so messy and involved, and he didn't want to deal with things like the fragile emotions of flaming fruitcakes or damsels in distress. So instead, he just as easily made good friends with his right hand and his work, and paid his asexuality no heed.

And it would've all stayed that way too, if it hadn't been for his older brother's diabolical plot to ruin his life.

Oh, sure, some people said that the younger Uchiha was milking it for all it was worth and acting like a damn drama queen, but they didn't understand the pain he was going through. Couldn't, really. After all, most people weren't asexual.

Itachi had been slated to marry one Haruno Sakura for the sake of the family business and the bonds it had with the medical hospital that the Haruno's owned, and while most people had written Itachi off as being just about as asexual as Sasuke, the truth came out one night in a short note.

A month before the wedding (so as to be polite, he'd said), Itachi had eloped to some faraway country with his friend (or rather lover) who looked suspiciously like a fish, claiming they were in love.

'Foolish little brother,

I have fallen in love with Kisame and am now leaving to pursue my love in a country that will accept our relationship. It'd be quite callous of me to leave Sakura at the altar considering our family and the Haruno's family's ties, so I write this now so that you and Sakura may be happily married and continue on the family legacy with little baby Uchiha's. Unfortunately, I cannot add to that legacy as male pregnancies appear to still be in the works. However, I wish you the best of luck with your marriage, and please invite Kisame and me to the wedding. We'd be delighted to come.

Love,

Itachi.'

And oh, that'd been the clincher! Invite the damn bastard to the wedding, he'd said!

Sasuke had been inwardly seething at the note when his mother snatched the paper away and read the words. She wailed to Papa Uchiha that this would be all over the news in no time if actions weren't taken immediately.

So at that moment, Papa Uchiha turned around and stared at Sasuke straight in the eyes for the first time in his little life, gripped the boy's shoulders so tightly that bright red imprints of fingerprints were still stinging on his skin, and said the words that just about killed him.

"Sasuke. My son. Do the Uchiha family proud; marry Sakura,"

Sasuke nearly peed his pants. Papa Uchiha just smiled.

.

So, with the hasty remedy of switching one brother with the other, (which Sakura seemed absolutely elated with) the cogs for the marriage were set into place. Sasuke would of course have to buy a presentable ring for the young woman and propose (or did he? It was after all, an arranged marriage. Maybe the rules didn't apply…), so he had set out to one of the more famous of jewelry stores to buy a semi-decent ring for the pink-haired woman. After all, Uchiha's did everything in style –even things they really didn't want to do. Like marrying.

But this, this, was where he realized he had erred. If he had just picked a different store, the results might have been different and maybe the marriage wouldn't have seemed so terrible. But alas, it had not, and he had entered that fateful store that would turn his life upside down.

It was called Godaime Jewelry – owned by the Hokage company – and was notoriously known for being extravagant in its design and well known throughout the world for its beautiful rings. As a future Uchiha, Sakura needed to make sure her fingers were at least in fashion, even if her garish pink hair completely dispelled any image of couture. She'd been wearing an elegant engagement ring from Itachi, but obviously, the younger Uchiha had heatedly decided he would quash that ring and one-up his brother in jewelry choices by choosing from one of the best stores available.

When he entered, the lights were blindingly white and glowing. That should've been his cue to run. The counters sparkled with gleaming perfection and the diamonds glinted under the lights. There weren't many people inside – in fact, only one man was manning the entire store with incredible efficiency. And Sasuke really shouldn't have looked at the man but then he did and the rest was history.

The man in question had been helping out a funny little couple, sweet in its quirky inappropriateness with one savage like brown haired boy with tattoos running down his face, and a sweet mild woman with long black hair and violet eyes, when he turned to greet Sasuke.

"Oh, hello! How may I help you?"

Had Sasuke been a lesser man, he would've fainted. He hadn't realized at that point that he had just fallen in love – no, that couldn't have been it. But the employee that had just spoken to him had to have had the most melodically wonderful voice Sasuke had ever heard: not quite masculine enough to be considered gruesome but not high and feminine like the obnoxious women that followed him around. It was… in one word, perfect.

And God, that face and the hair and the body and the way his clothes hung-

"Hello. I need to buy a wedding ring."

He wasn't known as the epitome of self-control for nothing, after all. His voice was flat, and he tried to look anywhere but the Adonis-like figure standing on the other side of the counter. The figure smiled brightly –oh God, the white teeth and the smile and the- and nodded vehemently.

"Right! Well look around and call me if you need anything." 'I'll call you whatever you like, you sexy-… wait, what?' "I'm just going to finish up with this adorable couple here" Here, he shot a breathtaking smile at the Uchiha with a vague motion towards the couple, and leaned back to look down at the ring they were currently inspecting, speaking in fast, excited tones.

Sasuke breathed slowly 'Ok, ok. What the hell is wrong with me?' and glanced back at the blonde god before quickly looking away. 'Ok, so the guy's attractive. Ok, I'll give him that much.' He tried to steel his mind by imagining Itachi and that stupid fish-man and picturing the ugly sort of engagement ring Itachi had given Sakura, to try to focus his attention on defeating his evil older brother. The price tags for the rings here were pricy and substantial, and the rings were so over the top to the point of being burlesque. He had the sinking feeling that Itachi had already won this battle. ("… you bought a gaudy overbearing ring for far more than I did… Foolish little brother, you have no taste for aesthetics.")

Sasuke stared, burning holes into the countertop to try and combat with the nonexistent Itachi face that had appeared in reflection on the countertop. Said Itachi face was currently burning under the heat of his glare and-

"Hey! You look like you found something interesting, yeah?" He glanced up and breathed deeply at his sudden close proximity with the blonde man. The tag on his broad chest read Uzumaki Naruto, and he smelled like he was doused in semi-cheap cologne and a tub of ramen. Somehow, the mixture of the clashing scents was more alluring than anything he'd ever smelt before.

"Yes, that one." He pointed randomly at a ring. The man stared quizzically at Sasuke before pulling it out from the glass display case. It was… actually not that bad. Not as blindingly bright as the others and not as pricey either. A gold band with a set of three diamonds, the middle of which was intricately carved with inset emeralds.

"Eh? Really? Don't you want one with more.. hm… oomph?" 'I'll give you oomph, right up your-'

"No… This looks good." And it really did. He mentally cheered himself on for winning against Itachi in the battle of rings, then bent down to inspect the diamond closely. Naruto leaned in slightly as well and pondered over the small piece of jewelry with a loud 'hmm', leaving Sasuke hypersensitive to the warm breath ghosting over him. He jerked back instantly.

Then somewhere in that black hole he called a chest, a heart began to beat faintly.

"I'll buy that one."

"HUH? You don't even want to look at the other rings?! What about this one?!" He shouted indignantly, pulling out the largest rock Sasuke had ever seen from another counter. "This is like, the prettiest ring ever, ne?" He waved the ring around ecstatically, the smile on his face widening as he brought the thing close to Sasuke's face. It hurt to look at, it was so big. He didn't even want to imagine it on anybody's finger. Picking what appeared to be perhaps the most burlesque of all the insanely large rings there, the blonde seemed to be completely unaware of how absolutely hideous the object was.

"... It's not bad..." He muttered calmly, then at a half-assed attempt at a smile which looked more like a smirk than anything, he repeated his request.

"Mahhhh~ you don't understand real beauty, huh?" The blonde man shoved a strong tan hand through his golden hair, springing the locks back into a lively display, as he gave a wry grin, crinkling his perfectly tanned cheeks into that whiskered grin. He started up conversationally again in that beautiful perfect voice of his. "So, got a picture of the lucky girl?"

"Huh?"

"The woman you're marrying of course!" The blonde grinned so widely that his tanned cheeks completely concealed his luminous blue eyes and he raised his arms to his hair awkwardly in a half scratch of the top of his head. "Not gonna lie, most guys look nervous when they come in here. But you- hah! – you look like someone's going to eat you!"

. . .

So much for the self-control.

"No, I don't have a picture of her."

"Aw, that's a shame… I bet she's really pretty!" He said with a laugh as he maneuvered his dexterous fingers around the ring that Sasuke had chosen. He pulled out a hand mannequin and placed the band on the ring finger gingerly before holding it out to Sasuke. "So what do you think?" Naruto leaned back and stared straight at Sasuke, practically burning a hole in his face with the amount of happiness in his smile. Sasuke barely glanced down at the ring before staring at the impossibly blue eyes of Naruto and nodding slowly.

"Y-… I-It's perfect."

---

-

And that's how he came to this sad sad state, vacantly wandering the streets with a wedding ring in one hand and a crumpled receipt in the other. In his starched white shirt and suit jacket, he looked confused and lost, which, of course, he was. After all, one did not just realize one was attracted to a gender after having believed that one was asexual. It just didn't happen.

And now, NOW, Sasuke had to deal with the fact that he was indeed following Itachi's misguided footsteps by falling in love with a man who looked suspiciously like an animal (because really, Naruto did look like a fox with those whisker-like scars on his face).

But even more pressing was the fact that Naruto must've been under the delusion that Sasuke was a straight man ready to marry a beautiful woman and Sasuke would probably never see the blonde ever again. Something fluttered in his chest at that thought and he growled at himself to shut up. Never mind the fact that growling to oneself might have been a sign of insanity.

Sasuke decided at that moment that he'd have to do anything to get out of the marriage – after all, the honeymoon wasn't going to be good if he couldn't get Sasuke Junior up because it wasn't a blonde man but a pink-haired girl he was bedding.

Either way, he had a feeling he wasn't going to be making little baby Uchiha's anytime soon.

...

Oh, his father was going to kill him.

Yea... like I said, I don't know.

But review if you liked it! :)