Okay, SERIOUS NOTE ON KIDNAPPING, from which Luisanna originates:
I've decided that during the school year, I'm going to focus on school. Through long weekends or holiday brakes, I'll do my best to update Kidnapping but Icannotpromiseanything. I'm going to do my best to upload one-shots and such; I'll even write chapters of Kidnapping but if it isn't done, I won't put it up on FF. I'm so sorry.
On to the ItaAn.
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Of course. Damn straight, right? Right. What friends I had. Wonderful, beautiful, trustworthy friends. Damn sarcasm right there. If anyone knew sarcasm, it was I; I was the goddamned queen of sarcasm.
My nails dug into the palms of my hands, rope burn scraping against the part of my hand that wasn't being stabbed by my fingernails. My black Pumas squeaked on the blue and white tiles under the force of my anger. The denim of my jeans felt odd on my skin; anger had every nerve on a goddamned wire. She knew; she goddamn knew. What a friend, what a friend.
Fuck it. I give up. God knew if he was gay. And if he was, well then let him be happy. But that didn't give her the right to flirt with him when she goddamn knew.
I planted my feet in front of Tomoko. "Hey, Tomo," I muttered, glaring at nothing at everything. Tomoko had curly, unruly dyed red hair. Naturally, it was brown. She'd dyed it a brown-red mix. It suited her well. "Took your pills?" She also had anger-management problems and was on a sugar rush. Her grandmother had visited from Tokyo yesterday. Anger, sugar, and medication did not mix.
"Yup," she answered, slumping against the puke-white-yellow wall. We had to wait for the Sex Ed teacher here. Her brown eyes took me in—all of my messy, short black hair, angry brown eyes, tight muscles, and puncturing nails of me—and frowned. "What up, An-chan?" she asked, dyed brows knitting together.
God I loved her. She knew me so well, and she wasn't even my "best friend." What a best friend she was, that bitch.
My eyes darted behind me. I snorted. Yup, there he was—all five foot eight of him. He was always there, standing right behind Tomoko and I, pretending he hadn't been waiting behind Tomoko knowing I'd go straight to her. I'd always done my best to ignore him; I refused to hang onto his every word as if God himself had spoken them. My brown-eyed glare refused to stay pinned to his perfection. "That," I said pointedly over my shoulder.
"But don't you like him?" she wondered aloud, not bothering to lower her voice. He knew that I liked him. He goddamned knew too;goddamn knows.
My scowl slipped off my face as I thought of all the wonderful reasons I liked him. It reappeared as quickly as it'd gone. They goddamn knew. "Yes," I growled out. One thing wasn't going to make me dislike him that quickly. What kind of person would I be if it did? A sell-out, that's the kind of person, and I wasn't a sell-out. "But he and Akane are seriously pissing me off," I explained, saying the last part loudly even though I knew his sharp ears would catch everything.
Tomo frowned, worried. Did I mention that I loved her?
The bell rang. The sound of stomping footsteps echoed within the hallways and the sound of Hatake-sensei's cartwheels rolling on the linoleum tiles came up the hall. Kakashi Hatake was the most perverted teacher in the history of teachers. Here in Japan, there were no rules about teacher/student relationships so he flirted with anything and everything in a uniformed skirt. He'd even tried flirting with Sasuke Uchiha's girlfriend, Sakura—wrong move, so I'd seen when the young Uchiha almost had a fit and punched his teacher straight in the face during lunchtime.
I frowned as the class strolled into the science room that we occupied for health. My seat was in the back of the classroom with him, the flirting bastard. Who'd ever heard of Itachi Uchiha trying to flirt? Seriously? And with Akane, a tenth grader, for the love of God? I plopped my feather-printed—awesome—backpack onto the empty chair between us and ran my fingers through my short black hair, glaring ahead of me as the silver-haired gym-slash-health teacher rolled his cart in.
Itachi sat down beside me, silent as a ghost. "Hello," his melodious voice greeted. I couldn't resist, even as mad as I was at him—I had to turn. There was a soft, almost invisible smirk on his face. His blue-black bangs hung in front of his onyx eyes. His diamond-shaped face was slick with sharp bones. His beautiful thin-lipped smile had butterflies crowding my abdomen, their wings fluttering against the mucus walls of my stomach.
I did my best to ignore it as I said a clipped, "Hi."
Hatake-sensei stood in the middle of the room, blue facemask covering half of his face. I had no idea why he covered it, but I was afraid that if he took it off, you'd know exactly when he was giving you a perverted leer. He had a stack of papers in his hand, penis side facing him. He started to pass them out. "I'm giving back your tests," he announced, giving us a talking freebee.
Normally, I'd turn my whole body in order to face Itachi and start an animated—at least, on my side—conversation about failing subjects, family matters, and whatever else I could think of. Not today.
Today, I opened up my English copy of Blood Magic—a very had thing to find in Japan, an English-printed book—and did my best to ignore the wonderful scent that was coming off Itachi's skin.
I was about two pages into the fortieth chapter when a penis picture was shoved in my book. A 100 was circled on the top. I looked up, only to see Hatake-sensei, the side of his one visible eye crinkling in what I supposed was a perverted grin. He opened his mouth to say something, looked over my shoulder to my health partner, and frowned as he walked away. I let a gust of air through my inflated cheeks, relief coloring my face.
"Yet another hundred?" the same melodic voice from before solicited sarcastically.
Embarrassed, I shoved the test of scrotums and vas deferences inside my purple folder. "And you?" I wondered. It was the first time he started a conversation; I had to answer. He was good at everything but Sex Ed. He really didn't like paying attention in this class, just like I didn't—the only difference was that I was afraid to fail.
Itachi smirked. It was a sight that could have had angels falling from heaven just to glimpse it. The butterflies reappeared. He pulled the test out from his blue folder. Seventy-six. His smirk turned impish, displaying the small dimple on the left side of his pale, picturesque face.
I rolled my eyes at him. "What am I going to do with you, Itachi?" I snorted. A natural-born Japanese girl would've added a -kun or at least a -san, but I didn't. Most saw it as rude and ill-mannered; Itachi saw it as a part of who I was and didn't take offence; he himself hardly used suffixes. Just one of the million reasons I liked him.
"I can think of a few things…" he countered suggestively. It was part of the daily routine he and I shared—a few perverted jokes here and there, discussions here and there, and silence everywhere else.
Any other time, I would've laughed. Today, I wondered if that's what he'd said to Akane. What else did he say, knowing I liked him, knowing that Akane was my "best friend"? I had no right to be jealous or angry if he'd flirted with anyone that wasn't my friend. Or so I tried convincing myself. Instead of giggling, I opened my book back up.
I got two words into it before Itachi's elegant hand landed on my shoulder.
"Are you mad at me, Luisanna?" he asked in his beautiful voice. His navy-colored brows were knotted together in confusion. The worry-wrinkles that traced down his cheeks were more defined when he spoke that last sentence.
I snorted at him. "No, not at all. You flirt with my best friend when you know damn well how much I like you, but, no, I'm not mad, Itachi!" I growled at him through my teeth, holding my book open to the page. I pretend to keep reading it, but all I could do was repeat my last words to my crush over and over again in my head. I looked up, and Itachi was there, expectant, knowing there was more to come. He knew me well. "Not at all, Itachi! You flirt and flirt with Akane—a tenth grader for the love of anything holy—and you expect me to not be mad at you, Uchiha? Do you even know me? Here I thought you liked me back—letting me touch your face and pinch your cheeks, letting me call you babe, letting me hug you when you won't even hug your own brother—but I couldn't be more wrong, could I, huh, Itachi?"
Wide dark brown-black eyes stared at me, disbelief overt. I'd long since learned to read his expressions through his eyes even when his face didn't change; this one was, beyond doubt, incredulity. Then a small, almost invisible grin spread across his face. "Are, you done, An-chan?"
"No, I am not don—" My anger deflated in a sudden burst of shock. "Did you just add an honorific to my nickname?"
The invisible grin spread a bit wider. "Indeed I did, An-chan. Would you prefer I didn't?"
I blinked, astonished. "No, no, it's…it's fine…" I stuttered, brown eyes wide.
I caught a peek of his once-in-a-lifetime, fallen-angel smile. His hands were cupping my cheeks in his weather-roughened hands and his lips were so close—too close. Was he…? He wasn't—?
Itachi's lips were on mine in a second, soft and warm on mine. I could hear Hatake-sensei whoop in the front of the room; girls gasp in horror; guys whistling in approval—but I couldn't process it. All I could think about was Itachi—Itachi's face, Itachi's personality, Itachi's lips, Itachi's lips kissing me—
And then it was over. The warmth of his lips was gone and to replace it was the cool conditioning of the room. Dazed, my jaw floundered for words. "Does that mean…?"
"I sure do hope," Itachi smirked.
Hatake-sensei's whooping stopped. "Now that our brief session of a soap opera is over," he teased, "who wants to tell me what a prostate is?"
A blush covered my face, both from our teacher's words and what just happened.
Itachi's hand grabbed mine and the warmth of his large callused hand engulfed mine. "Choose better friends, An-chan," he whispered to me. "Akane isn't the best one."
I smiled at him. No matter what he said about Akane—who I was still pissed at because she'd said something like Itachi had flirted with her, because Itachi doesn't flirt and I don't know how I could have ever thought he did; I knew him better than that and longer than Akane—he was just looking out for me.
I gripped his fingers tightly as he held my hand.
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