Friends Are Forever…

I woke to the sound of my alarm clock ringing. After the dizziness of waking up, it was relatively easy to get out of the bed. It had been a cold night and nothing could help me escape from my cold surroundings. "Hello world why does today have to be the first day of school?" My family had just recently moved to Konoha from the land around it. Up until then, home schooling was how learning went for me. Moving was hard, and all of the new surroundings were bound to be hard for me. When someone is raised in the middle of no-where with no brothers and one sister, you don't know about all the ways people act. At this new school, however, I would have to learn about everything. This public school business made me wonder. I really didn't know. I got up and did the daily hygiene stuff. Brushing my teeth came first, then a shower, and combing my hair. Finishing with that was easy and getting ready for school seemed pretty simple.

The stairs in my house were pretty long, so my trip down consisted of tip-toeing down all of the steps except for the last six. Those were extremely easy to jump down. Breakfast was ready and it smelled great.

"Hello daughter." Dad had always been one for short hellos. He was a no-nonsense type of guy.

"H-hello dad." Who's t-taking me to school today?" My mouth was full of food so he could only catch pieces of what I said. Dad still seemed to understand.

"I think you are going to have to walk to school today. I have to leave for work early today. Do you mind? If you do, I could get your aunt to drive you to school." He was often worried about me now. Before, he had never really worried. For a few years, concern was following me all the time. Everyone had been worried about how my sister was doing, but since I began working harder, my family was noticing me again.

"It's okay. Walking to school has been on my to-do list. I'll get going in ten minutes to make it on time." Dad just nodded, and moved on. I finished the rest of my breakfast, and grabbed my bag. The time was 20 minutes until school started. The weather was cold so all that was needed was a jacket. The school provided two uniform jackets for each student at my new school. One was hanging on a rack near the door, so that was the one I grabbed. The jacket was pretty comfortable, so it was the smartest thing to take to school. The outside of my house was freezing. My knee-length skirt felt like it wanted to freeze stiff. The school was not very far from my house and it was freezing, so jogging to school was my best option.

When the school grounds were in sight, I got my first look at the different groups of people. There were people hanging out together that looked like complete opposites. A felling came over me. Something that I could only be describe as comfort. For the first time in my life, different was fitting in. By the way, my name is Hinata Hyuuga.

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The first people that I saw looked like complete opposites, yet they were acting like really great friends. They were three girls. One had short bubble-gum pink hair, another had dark brown hair in buns and the last girl had long shiny blond hair. The girl with pink hair caught my eye. I immediately looked away, blushing. Attention was something that never had gone well for me. When my eyes shyly looked up again, all three of the girls were looking at me. My fingers were twitching, trying to fight a childish habit of mine. Old habits die hard, and my fingers came up and were shyly pressed together. Suddenly, a yell came from their direction.

"Hey: You!! Are you new? COME HERE!!!!!!!" My face felt hot. This was way more attention than I ever had. I quickly scurried over to them. When they were right in front of me, my head briefly shot up. All of the girls were smiling warmly. All of the shyness that was in me washed away and a laugh took over my frame. The girls looked at me in shock. My laughter subsided when they stopped smiling and they were looking confused.

"Is something wrong?" The girls just laughed at my question.

"No, you just have and adorable laugh. For a second we were scared you were going to be the most boring person to set foot on this school." The brown haired girl was speaking to me.

"I'm Tenten, by the way. This is Sakura, and Ino." Tenten pointed from the pink haired girl to the blond haired girl. My Hyuuga social skills kicked in and I stood straight.

"My name is Hinata Hyuuga, it is very nice to meet you." The silence came, and crickets could have been heard. Blinking rapidly, my explanation quickly followed. "Sorry, I live with strict parents; I guess stuff gets imbedded in your brain when you hear it so many times." The girls started giggling, and the reason behind the giggles was lost. Tenten spoke up first.

"Your parents are really strict. Anyway, this is the girl population of our group. The school is basically separated into different groups of friends. Look here, here come the guys. Oh…Naruto's early. Get ready for an ear full."

My face must have looked puzzled. "Who's Naru-?" My words were cut off by a loud excited voice.

"HEY: SAKURA, INO, TENTEN!!!!! WHO'S THE NEW GIRL!!!!!?" A blond hyper-active line came rushing up to the group. Looking into the face of the new arrival, I felt my face get red. This kid was CUTE! He had spiky blond hair and the most pretty, deep, cerulean eyes I had ever seen. There were odd whisker marks on his face, but those only made him look all the more cute. My inspection was cut off by a bunch of other people coming in at a much slower pace. There was a serious black-haired, black-eyed kid, and a tired-looking kid with what looked like a pineapple on his head. There was also a brown-haired, feral looking kid with a dog, a kid with a boring neutral expression who wore dark glasses, a slightly chubby kid munching on a bag of chips, and a kid with and extremely plastic smile. Naruto was the one who introduced me to everyone… Not that I minded.

"The emo-looking kid is Sasuke, the kid who looks like he could pass out on the spot is Shikamaru, the one who looks like he should be in a pound is Kiba, Glasses over there is Shino, the fa-one eating over there is Choji, and the emotionless jerk over there is Sai. Oh, and I'm Naruto Uzumaki, future Hokage. I shall remember to put you all in my acceptance speech." I blinked a few times. He had said the whole introduction in one breath. I stuck out my hand automatically.

"My name is Hinata Hyuuga. It's nice to meet you." He took my hand but only shook it quickly. In that millisecond I felt almost a magnetic pull. No, that could have been my imagination. Naruto wasted no time.

"You don't have to be formal Hina-chan! We are friends now." My words were lost again. After a second of blinking, the words returned.

"Why do you want to be my friend? All of you hardly know me." Before Naruto could answer, Tenten spoke up.

"It doesn't matter why. We want you in our group. Naruto is an excellent judge of character, and if he thinks you're cool, then you are." I smiled first at Tenten, then at Naruto.

"Thank you." School life wasn't going to be too difficult.