AN: Well, here's a new one! This has been rolling around in my head for a few days, but every time I sat down at the computer, my brain would freeze up. (Must have been feeling shy... XD) So. Tip for the day! Sometimes it helps to sit down with a notebook and write things out by hand! (At least, it does for me!) I find it gives me a chance to slow down and really think about what I want to say. Computers are great for typing it up quickly, but sometimes I think I feel like I have to write quickly, and it just doesn't work.
Well, whatever. I'm sure you all have your own methods of madness!
Pause for a disclaimer: Image courtesy of "Paul" / "FreeDigitalPhotos . net"
Now, read... and review!
A midday sun shone down on Konoha, warming the Village Hidden in the Leaves with its bright summer rays. The streets were busy with people hurrying to and fro as children ran, shrieking and calling to one another playfully on a rare day off from school.
On a grassy field in one of the training grounds, a group of young men lounged, the remains of lunch scattered about. They talked amongst themselves as they enjoyed the aftermath of a good meal, some relaxing in the shade of a couple lonely trees while most basked in the sunlight.
Naruto sighed in contentment, ignoring the prickle of the grass in favor of the sun beating down on his face, complimented by an occasional breeze through his hair. Sometimes he thought he must be a cold-blooded creature, like a reptile, since he enjoyed the heat so much. He absolutely detested the cold.
He felt his muscles slowly relaxing in the face of the summer sun. Someone had thought it would be a good idea for the guys in their age group to get together for some training and/or bonding. Thinking that it would be good for them to learn to work with others outside their comfort zone, the Hokage had agreed. This was how they'd found themselves spending the better part of their weekend, and if it worked out, the village would implement it among all ninja on a regular basis.
The group had finished their training exercises and enjoyed a quiet lunch, and now they were procrastinating as long as possible before heading home to write up their individual reports. Shikamaru, the leader of their group for this little trial, was particularly disinclined to move, for which Naruto was grateful.
"Naruto," came Sai's voice from somewhere to his left.
"Hmm?" he responded lazily.
"Why is it that you never eat your vegetables?"
"They're disgusting," was the simple response.
Sai frowned. "Why does it matter how they taste? They are nutritious."
"It just does. I can't eat something that tastes gross."
"Perhaps if you did," Sai said thoughtfully, "you wouldn't be so short—"
"I'm not short!" Naruto protested. "I've grown six inches in the last three months!" That was a bit of an exaggeration, but Sai didn't need to know.
"—and you wouldn't have such a tiny dick," Sai finished, as if Naruto hadn't said anything.
Naruto's eyes flew open and he sat up. "I do not have a tiny dick!" he shouted.
Kiba snorted and rolled over to his stomach, propping his chin on a hand. "You know it doesn't count if you're looking through a magnifying glass, right?"
Naruto spluttered wordlessly, face growing red as the boys around him laughed.
"Whatever," he groused. "You're just jealous because, even if it is tiny – which it's not!—" This was met with more laughter. "—it's still bigger than yours!" He folded his arms triumphantly and glared at Sai as there was a chorus of 'Ooh's.
Sai was unfazed. "But it isn't," he said calmly. "Kiba's, however, is a different matter."
"What?" Kiba hollered, jumping to his feet. He glared at the pale boy. "I'll have you know I'm hung like a horse!" Akamaru barked from where he lay on the ground, head resting on a foreleg and tongue lolling as he panted to cool himself.
"That must be a small horse," Shino commented quietly from his spot under one of the trees.
Kiba nearly choked in rage as the others directed their laughter toward him this time.
From a tree branch, Shikamaru cracked an eye and muttered, "Troublesome. And noisy." Then he attempted to ignore them in favor of some z's closing in.
Kiba finally sat back down, huffing angrily to himself. Naruto remained sitting upright, looking around at his group of friends fondly.
To his left, Sai reclined in the shade of a tree, feet poking out into the sunlight. He was silent, for the moment.
Kiba and Akamaru were to Naruto's right, enjoying fully the warmth of the sun. The brunet had settled down and was scratching idly behind Akamaru's ears, causing one of the dog's hind legs to twitch.
Unable to keep still, Rock Lee was a few feet away, doing some one-handed pushups and muttering something about handstands and buckets full of water.
Naruto shook his head silently and looked past him, only to catch Neji's gaze as the quiet young man looked back at him steadily from his place against a tree trunk.
A little unnerved, Naruto shifted his eyes, catching sight of Shikamaru napping in the tree above Neji.
How does he stay up there while he sleeps? Naruto wondered.
Shino stood idly under the other tree, silent and unmoving behind his sunglasses. Naruto puzzled over him for a moment, as well, trying to figure out how the guy could stand to wear a trench coat in this weather.
His eyes moved to Choji, who sat in the sun near Sai's feet, finishing off some cold, barbecued pork ribs. As Naruto watched, he licked off his fingers and pulled a bag of chips from out of seemingly nowhere.
Sensing the blond's gaze on him, the round boy looked up. "You know," he said, opening the bag, "not all vegetables taste bad."
"Sure they do," Naruto replied easily.
Choji crunched a chip thoughtfully. "Have you tried them all?"
"Don't have to. They're vegetables."
Sasuke, lying in the grass between Choji and Naruto with a knee bent and an arm over his face, snorted. "Moron."
"Bastard."
"Have you ever even eaten a vegetable in your life?" Sasuke wanted to know.
"Of course I have!" Naruto answered indignantly.
"Yeah? When?" Kiba challenged.
"It was… There was that one time when… Gah! I don't know!" The blond huffed, exasperated. "I can't remember off the top of my head!"
"That's not good," said Choji.
"You should eat your vegetables," Shino concurred.
Neji spoke up. "They're good for your brain development. Without them, you'll be stupid."
"I don't think Naruto could get any dumber," Kiba said, snickering.
"I'm not dumb!" Naruto shouted, jumping to his feet.
Sasuke moved his arm to his forehead to watch Naruto. "What are you, then? Scared?" he taunted.
"I'm not scared of anything!" Naruto protested.
"Way to go, Naruto!" Rock Lee cheered, jumping to his feet enthusiastically. "Show him that you are in the Springtime of your Youth! You can do anything!" He gave a big thumbs-up.
"Indeed," the Hyuuga said dryly. "Show us your 'Youthfulness'."
At the obviously confused look on the blond's face, Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Prove it, idiot."
Naruto's face lit in understanding. "I will prove it," he said, fist clenching. "Believe it!"
"Here," Choji said, leaning forward. He grabbed the tomato next to Sasuke's head and tossed it to Naruto before the dark-haired boy could protest.
Naruto caught it reflexively. He stared at the red globe in his hands.
"We're waiting," Sai said, rolling onto his side and propping himself on an elbow.
Naruto gulped.
"Don't tell me you've never had a tomato before!" Kiba laughed.
"Of course not!" Naruto said in a reasonable tone. "They're poisonous love apples of doom!"
Silence reigned.
"You— you're kidding, right?" Kiba asked, his voice strained.
"P-poisonous love apples…" Choji stuttered.
"Of doom?" Shikamaru finished from his tree. Underneath him, Neji had covered the lower half of his face, attempting to look solemn.
Naruto looked around. "What?"
Sasuke's snort seemed to open the floodgates, and in seconds, everyone was laughing helplessly. Tears leaked from Kiba's eyes as he pounded the ground he was rolling around on.
"That was a good one, Naruto!" Rock Lee called.
Naruto rolled his eyes at his friends. "Whatever," he said, sitting. He tossed the tomato back to Sasuke, who caught it with ease. Sasuke tossed it right back.
"Eat it," he said.
"Don't wanna," Naruto pouted.
"But Naruto!" Rock Lee exclaimed. "You gave your word!"
"You never go back on your word," Shino said.
"It's your ninja way, is it not?" Neji asked, smirking.
"But… it's the size of a grapefruit!" Naruto protested.
"Eat it!" Choji hollered.
"Forget grapefruit; it's nearly the size of Pakkun!"
"Eat it, Naruto," Sai said calmly.
"But… But—!"
"You should eat your vegetables," Shino said darkly. Naruto shivered.
"Fine, fine! I'll try a bite."
"The whole thing," Sasuke said firmly.
"What?!" Naruto looked at the tomato in his hand. It seemed to grow to the size of a watermelon even as he watched.
"What's the big deal?" Neji asked. "Technically, a tomato is a fruit, anyway. It shouldn't be that hard."
"The… the whole thing?" Naruto squeaked.
"Just eat it, Naruto," Shikamaru said tiredly.
"Even the seeds?" Naruto asked, shuddering.
"YES!" everyone shouted.
"Okay, okay! Sheesh!"
Naruto stared at the vegetable-fruit-thing – Poisonous love apple of doom, his mind supplied helpfully – for a long moment before taking a deep breath, closing his eyes, and biting into it. He came away with the tiniest, most miniscule bite he could manage, having barely broken the skin.
"What? Come on!" came Kiba's protest. "Even I eat tomatoes!" He turned his head and muttered, "Sometimes…" to Akamaru.
Naruto glared at Kiba before turning back to the tomato and taking a vicious bite out of it. Juice sprayed across his cheek and dribbled down his chin as he tried not to choke on the large piece of tomato in his mouth. The others laughed.
"That's what you get for dissing food!" Choji chuckled.
Sasuke snorted at the other boy's comment, locking his fingers behind his head. This was proving to be more amusing than he'd thought.
Naruto wiped the juice from his face with a hand and made to wipe his hand in the grass, but Shino's quiet voice stopped him.
"All of it," he said with frightening intensity. Naruto froze, wide eyes flicking up to meet sunglasses that promised a dark demise. He looked back to his hand, hovering over the grass, and lifted it to his face. Carefully, he cleaned all the tomato juice off, tongue swiping over each finger deliberately while the others laughed again.
Two, however, were silent, going unnoticed by the rest. Sai took note of the way Sasuke's eyes followed Naruto's every move, and the pale pink that suffused his cheeks. Interesting, he thought.
Done with cleaning his hand, Naruto looked once more to the tomato of doom. He leaned forward and took a cautious bite.
Sasuke swallowed, unable to help noticing the way Naruto's lips caressed the flesh of the tomato. He glanced away, feeling distinctly uncomfortable with the way his thoughts were progressing. He missed when Naruto took his next, more confident bite.
Again, juice sprayed out of the fruit, but this time, it landed on Sasuke's face. Naruto gaped while Kiba laughed. "Better get that back, Naruto!"
Naruto flushed bright red, but set the tomato aside and moved forward, hovering over Sasuke on his hands and knees.
"I-idiot! What are you doing?" Sasuke said nervously.
"You told me to eat all of it," Naruto said.
"Yeah, but—"
"Shino will kill me," Naruto said in a hushed voice. Sasuke stared at him, eyes wide. He wasn't serious… right?
Apparently he was. Naruto leaned down, face as red as the tomato. His tongue darted out, licking up the juice from Sasuke's cheek.
Neither of them noticed how quiet it had gotten.
Naruto licked Sasuke's face again. "Wh-what are you doing?" the dark-haired nin stammered breathlessly.
"Missed one of the seeds," Naruto answered softly. "Hold still."
By this point, Sasuke's face was just as red as, if not redder than, Naruto's. He held perfectly still as Naruto leaned close again and placed his lips at the corner of Sasuke's in an attempt to lift the tomato seed from the other boy's face. His tongue flicked out, running along Sasuke's lower lip.
Sasuke's skin was on fire. "Don't—" he whispered. Don't tease me, he meant to say, but Naruto's tongue swept over his lips again as he opened his mouth, and Sasuke groaned, giving up all pretense of imperviousness.
He reached up, grabbing Naruto's head between both hands, and kissed him fiercely, tangling his tongue with the blond's. Naruto's wide eyes met his dark gaze before both pairs of eyes slid shut.
Naruto leaned on one hand and slid his other through Sasuke's dark hair, gripping a handful of the dark strands. As Sasuke's tongue slid over his, he moaned, feeling as though his rasengan was alive in his belly, swirling, dancing, burning. He wrapped his other arm behind Sasuke's neck and tugged, pulling the other boy up and over him as he rolled onto his back.
Sasuke's hands released Naruto's head. One slid down his face to rest against his neck where his thumb rubbed circles of fire on the sensitive flesh, while the other slid lower, over his arm and chest, fingers defining Naruto's tense muscles.
A sudden clearing of someone's throat brought them stumbling forcefully back to reality. They broke apart, flushing madly.
"Well, I see the bonding part of this exercise is coming along nicely," said Kakashi's mild voice.
Sasuke and Naruto looked up to see the rest of their group with red faces, looking anywhere but at the two of them. Well, except for Sai. He was staring at both of them with a look of fascination that had Naruto shifting uneasily while Sasuke glared.
"W-we were just – I was…" Naruto stammered. "Tomato!" He jumped up and grabbed the offending piece of fruit from the ground.
"Good grief!" Kakashi said wonderingly. "Are you sure that's not some mutant grapefruit? It's nearly as big as Pakkun!"
"That's what I said!" Naruto exclaimed, feeling justified.
"Are you all about done here?" Kakashi asked, looking around at the group. He smiled cheerily. "The Hokage is looking forward to your reports!"
There was a subdued chorus of affirmatives, and with one more weird eye-smile, Kakashi was gone, a swirl of leaves taking his place.
"Well," Shikamaru said as he dropped from the tree, "it's been fun, but I've got that report to write." He walked off. Shino followed, but as he walked past Naruto, he paused.
"Every bite," he said, glancing at the blond from the corner of his eye. Naruto swallowed hard, nodding.
Ignoring Sasuke's glare, Sai smiled. "I must go, as well," he said. "There is some research I need to do."
Sasuke decided he did not want to know what Sai needed to research, and he kept his glare trained on the pale nin until he was out of sight.
Lee cartwheeled away, hollering something about 'Youthfulness' and 'Springtime' and 'Beauty' as tears streamed down his face, while Choji gathered up leftovers and walked away with an awkward wave. Neji had disappeared without a word.
"Man, I need some brain bleach," Kiba complained. Akamaru woofed in agreement. Hands in his pockets, Kiba sauntered away, the dog prancing playfully about his feet.
For the third time that day, silence reigned. Sasuke looked at Naruto. Naruto looked at the tomato.
A bug buzzed past his face, and Naruto watched it warily. "Well, better finish this," he said, and with three chomps, the tomato was gone. He carefully licked the juice off his fingers – again – and the bug flew off.
Coincidence? I think not! were Naruto's paranoid thoughts.
And then it was awkward.
"Look, Naruto," Sasuke said at last. "I – uh… I didn't mean to… Hm."
Naruto turned to face him, trying in vain to raise one eyebrow questioningly. His face went through some rather interesting contortions, before Sasuke interrupted.
"What are you doing, you moron?"
"Moron!" Naruto raged. "You're the moron, you bastard!"
"Wow. Excellent use of a comeback, as always," Sasuke said in a very unimpressed voice.
Naruto turned away, crossing his arms and pouting in a manner reminiscent of their Academy days.
Sasuke slapped a hand over his face, trying desperately to contain his laughter. But first a snort escaped, then a snirk, and before he knew it, Sasuke was chuckling outright.
Naruto turned just enough to glare at Sasuke from the corner of his eye, but this only seemed to set the dark-haired nin off more. At last he settled down, with another snort or two, and sat on the ground. He patted the grass next to him.
"Come here," he requested.
Naruto huffed, rolling his eyes, but did so.
The two boys stared at their feet. "I really am sorry," Sasuke said seriously. "I shouldn't have— I shouldn't have kissed you."
Naruto wiggled his toes at a caterpillar in the grass. "It's okay," he mumbled finally.
"I mean, it was wrong and— Wait. It is?" He looked over at Naruto.
Naruto wouldn't meet his eyes, choosing to watch the caterpillar wrap itself around a stalk of grass as it attempted to climb. He shrugged and nodded, wrapping his arms around his knees.
"R-really?"
"You sure are stuttering a lot today, bastard."
"You can hardly blame me for—!"
"Do it again," Naruto mumbled into his knees.
"What?" Sasuke asked exasperatedly.
"Do it again," he repeated.
"Stutter?"
Naruto gave him a look out of the corner of his eye. "Yes, stutter," he said sarcastically. Then, looking away again, he said quietly, "Will you kiss me again?"
"Oh. …Oh!"
Naruto rolled his eyes at Sasuke's slowness, but his thoughts flew out of his head when Sasuke knelt next to him and cupped his face gently in his hands.
"I've wanted to do this for a long time," he said quietly, leaning forward.
"You have?" Naruto said, just as quietly, his breath ghosting over Sasuke's lips.
"Yes. Idiot." And then he kissed Naruto again.
End
AN: In the end, I hope you found some amusement out of this. Did you think the characters were in character? It really feels like it's been such a long time since I've written fan fiction, and I'm worried that I'm out of practice.
What do you think I can improve? I'll take all suggestions into consideration; I like to hear what you have to say.
I don't know if I led up to the kiss(es) very well. Did you find the tension believable? Could it have been better? How?
Please let me know! And thanks in advance!
BH =^.^=