Life Sell-Out Chapter One

Okayyy. So I know I have Three Words Can Change It All going but this idea came to me in sociology class and I was really inspired to write it. I need help though. IT WILL BE A YAOI! I do not know who to pair Naruto with. He is uke. So someone xnaru. Read what I have and tell me what you think. I'll talk more about that at the bottom. Moving on, this story is based on family life in Pre-Industrial Society. I don't have all my facts straight so forgive me if it isn't historically correct. Very me if you want an update or if I should just leave it as it is... which is at nothing lol. Okie, erm here goes.

In a home much to small for the seven people it housed, a woman of maybe 30 years of age lay, alone in a small bedroom doing her best to give birth to a child no one knew was coming. The baby wasn't due for another three weeks, and as such she was home alone while her husband and their five children went to work. The times were rough, children were a necessity just to survive. The more children you had, the more help on the farm or in the factories. Even with five children they still struggled to make ends meet. Their small house of three bedrooms, a bathroom, and a conjoined kitchen and living room was a luxury for most during this time period. Perhaps she should explain from the beginning...

Born in a noble family, rich in title but poor in wealth she was sold to the highest bidder for marriage. Maybe farther back...Yes much farther is needed to understand the significance of this story. For it is a story of great significance. About who, that is for you to judge. Her father was desperate for money, her mother ill and the only thing to their name the small shack of a house and the two daughters they had. Two daughters, no sons and as such they thought perhaps they had done something to anger God. So they sent their second daughter to a church and had the eldest daughter attend to the plantation their father worked at alongside him. Two years later their third child was born, a girl as well. The father was distraught. He had prayed everyday for God to bless him with a son to help out on the plantation and take over the family name. "Why? God why have you cursed me so? Surely I have done something of great disappointment to deserve such injustice!" he cried. But life continued, he went to work with the eldest daughter, the second daughter stayed in the monastery to become a nurse, and the mother stayed home with the new baby. Life spiraled down from there. By the time the third daughter was ten years old they were close to bankruptcy. The plantation had closed so the father was forced to work in the factory for a smaller wage and more hours. The eldest daughter had died the first month in the factory, unable to bear the harsh working conditions and physical stress of labor. This had the mother distraught, for she knew not how to cope with the death of her daughter and loss of the income provided by the eldest daughter. The father continued to work by himself in the factory and they barely had enough to eat. The father briefly considered taking the second daughter out of the monastery but this would only prove to further anger God and make their chances of having a son even lower. Not only this but the second daughter was not used to working and would survive even less then the first daughter did. The third daughter was now eleven and the mother still refused to let her work in the factory with her father. This caused a rift between the father and mother, who stopped trying for a child and would barely talk to each other. The third daughter could see the pain she was causing her family and volunteered to go to work in the factory many times. This only angered her mother more, making her depressed about the loss of the eldest daughter and blame the father even more. It was when the third daughter went to the market with her mother that she heard the local women talking of the lack of marriage appropriate women. Many of the men were looking to marry and would even offer to pay a large fee to a family for their daughters. The little girl then decided that she would offer herself for marriage and upon returning home propositioned her father, Her father could no fault in her proposal and even though he did not hesitate to agree the third daughter did not mind, for she understood there was no room for love in such a horrible place. The mother was against it at first, she protested but gave up easily enough. The daughter knew it was all a show. Her mother was trying to ease her guilty conscience, not show love for her child.

Now at the age of twelve she knew more about life then most others would hope to understand before death. She knew of suffering, pain, and loss. But most importantly, she knew there was no such thing as love. The world was far more harsh and to survive one needed alliances. Love was something made up to keep people in line, a tall-tale told to raise hope but impossible to achieve. Even family love did not exist. The love between a mother and her child was an not love, it was an alliance. She needed that child to work and earn money. In a time when people died everyday in the factories of from starvation, loss was inevitable so attachment was just a later pain. Surely she could say she loved her eldest sister, but it would be a lie. She did not love her sister, she relied on her sister. She did not care about her sister, she cared about the money her sister would bring home and whether or not she would eat that night. No, this world was much more cruel, one of alliances for self-benefit. She knew all of this... So why then, did she sell herself as a wife to earn her family money? Easy, she could see they were dying. Slowly they would drown in their poverty. Her mother could not bear children and her father was old pretty soon he would no longer be able to work in the factories. They would fall and she would fall too. So she found an escape. Most good things are done for bad reasons. Her sacrifice, seeming selfless was actually very selfish but she could not bring herself to regret her decision. This is partly because after she married her parents lived on to have three sons who all worked in the factory, earning a lot of money. The success of her parents brought with it a depression so deep she often wondered why she went on. Maybe her sacrifice was not necessary. Looking back decades later she could not delude herself into thinking perhaps they would have survived had she not done what she did. She knew how strained her parents' relationship was, her sacrifice saved them; it was necessary. But this is not her story...

Marrying to a boy with an honorable family and a modest wealth they purchased a nice home and set about life. She gave him three sons in a row, something she found humorously ironic. These boys all worked in the factory with their father. She did not attach herself to her sons nor her husband. For she knew how unfair life was in a world of death and self-gain. Next she had two girls who after getting back from work in the factory made clothing alongside her. This made five children and even with all of the earnings it was still hard to live with seven mouths to feed. When she became pregnant for the sixth time she knew it would cause financial problems. She thought of killing the child in her womb many times, but she could not. For some reason she grew attached to this child, singing gently to the unborn baby and worrying for the child's future. Perhaps this is because the baby was the first person she was reluctant to harm for her own benefit. The baby grew steadily until three weeks before it's due date it decided to come out. She gave birth to that baby, all alone, and after wards shakily stood up and grabbed a basin to bathe her baby. It was a boy. Her husband was overjoyed to have another son. She was depressed, knowing he would want the baby to work in the factory with the others. Could she not have one? Could one not keep her company during the days, clean, and sow clothes with her? Slowly the child got older. He was a small boy, much smaller then the boys his age, hell the girls too. This worried both the mother deeply. He was a very beautiful boy, unlike plain and work-hardened children. They were all made for work, strong bodies and minds. Her son was different. Small and fragile, a little angel. A fragile mind with an even more fragile body. Such a happy boy, and he made her happy too. Always smiling, even when he would get no food. He would not mind because he wanted his sisters and brothers to eat for they had work the next morning. The other children constantly picked on him and she could not bear it when he cried. Surely a world like this would destroy him, just like it destroyed her. He was ten now, older then the rest were when they started working, but she would not let him go. He was hers, she would not lose him. Her husband stayed quiet knowing his wife would not calmly let the boy go. Another year passed and the husband grew impatient. The third son had died and money was harder to come by. He demanded the last son go to work in the factory. She refused, which worked for a little while before the husband grew hostile, dragging the younger son away form her. That day the boy came back from work with a smile on his face and a huge wound on his leg. She was distraught and knew she must do something. In the middle of the night she took the boy and stole away, bringing the small boy to the near by lord's mansion. The would pay a large sum of money to take the boy in as a servant. She dressed the boy up as a girl, knowing he would be forced into hard labor if they knew he was a boy. She told him to be a good girl, listen to orders, and never let anyone know the truth. The world is a hard place...do not let it destroy you, young one. Kissing his face, she tucked a small pouch of money she had been saving for him and a letter addressed to him in his coat pocket. Taking him in her arms for the last time, she took the offered money and departed leaving him with the third of her brothers. Take care of him she ordered and just like that she was gone. She cried the whole way home because she now fully understood how horrible the world really was. She was right in saying it's a place of self-benefit and harsh realities. But was wrong when she said it is a place where love does not exist, it is a place where love can not exist. For she had learned something valuable, love does exist. She truly loved her son. She had nothing to gain by doing what she did, but many things to lose. The harsh reality was she had lost the only thing she had ever loved in life, her baby, her Naruto.

A.N: New idea. YAOI! Vote on main pairing and I will allow other pairing suggestions. Who should be the family Naruto works for? Uchiha, Hyuuga, Sabaku, or perhaps someone else? Ultimately who will be with Naruto? Itachi, Sasuke, Neji, Gaara, or someone else? Vote and I will write the next chapter based on what you guys wanted within reason. I will definitely not have something like KabuNaru or OroNaru cuz eww. Also, tell me if you guys want it written all old and stuff I was only thinking about doing it for this chapter and modernizing everything else? Just keeping main plot points like the harshness of life in those times, the struggle to live, how common poverty is (obviously they won't be poor in a Lord's castle but on the outside world), struggle for homosexuals and other plot-essential things. VOTE AND REVIEW PLEASE AND THANK YOUUU!