Uzumaki Naruto pounded back another round of tequila, letting the alcohol burn his way through his body. Taking away the stress of the day, finally, blissfully finished.
"Baa-chan!" he hollered, drunkenly waving his arm in the air. "Ov'r here! 'ne more –" he stuttered, then laughed drunkenly. "—'ne more ssshot!"
The woman to whom he was gesturing hardly had the appearance of an 'old lady'. Her face was finely boned, with intelligent brown eyes and pale blonde hair tied loosely back. From the neck down, however, was what commanded immediate attention. Her stupendous curves with deeply plunging cleavage was reminiscent of the covers of old romance novels where the male character, usually a vampire with flowing black hair and rippling muscles, ravished said bosomy female on bedspreads of red silk satin before plunging his fangs into her dainty neck.
Back in the days when he'd been a randy teenager, Naruto had taken one look at that awe-inspiring cleavage and proceeded to very loudly, lewdly hit on her. She'd casually sent him flying into a wall, all but breaking his collarbone. After laughing about it for a week, Jiraiya had told Naruto her real age and how obsessively she applied every anti-aging cream on the planet to keep her youthful good looks. From there, they'd settled into a comfortable relationship of loud-mouthed hothead and cranky sort-of-aunt. There had been times, when the three of them had been sitting around a table downing bottles of sake and hollering at one another, that Naruto had felt like he'd finally had a family.
Then Jiraiya had died in that car accident, and that happy illusion had been shattered.
The sexy blonde woman sauntered over, taking in the sight of her favourite customer nearly passed out on the bar. "You're cut off, brat," she said.
Naruto hiccupped. "N-not yet," he slurred. "'m fine, Tsunade old ladyyyyy." And with this, he promptly slumped over, cheek slamming into the sticky wooden surface. His fingers loosened their grip, and the glass began to fall towards the floor, almost in slow motion – only to be swiped mid-air by the lady with almost ninja-like reflexes. She rinsed it quickly and tossed it behind her; it flew in a smooth arc and landed perfectly on top of another glass. It was almost comical how perfectly executed it was. Not that Naruto was conscious enough to bother admiring it.
When loud snoring began emanating from the blonde head resting on the bar, Tsunade sighed, then, grabbing a much larger glass, filled it with cold water and dumped it all over his face.
Most people would have been shocked with the deluge of water, but Naruto had had this action performed on him many times in the past, too many for it to have that sort of effect. He simply cracked one blue eye open and looked at Tsunade reproachfully.
"Ahh… granny… seriously? 'm awake, awake." He creakily pushed himself up to a sitting position, a sour expression on his face more suited for a barking elderly man than on a for-the-most-part healthy 24-year-old. Tsunade placed another glass of water on the table alongside a lone pill of Tylenol, the simple gesture laden with an unspoken threat. A brief, rebellious expression flashed across Naruto's face before he sighed, popped the pill in his mouth and downed the contents of the glass in one swallow. He'd happily been drunk mere minutes prior, but Naruto was already feeling the buzz of alcohol rapidly dying away.
Tsunade snapped her fingers in his face. "Go home, Naruto," she said. "You've had more than enough for tonight. You drink anymore, you're going to pass out on the floor and I will throw you out with the trash in the morning." As much as Naruto drank and as much as he enjoyed it, Tsunade knew he had never been able to handle too much liquor. And tonight, seemingly stressed, he'd drank much more than his usual limit. Tsunade was actually surprised he'd managed to become awake and conscious, but the brat had always had a stubborn amount of willpower. Probably making up for his lack of common sense.
Naruto would have argued in favour of a few more drinks, seeing that he was awake and not vomiting down someone's shirt, but he knew more than to argue with Tsunade when she used that tone. After the first few times he'd gone flying into a wall, he knew when he reached his limit with her. "Alright, old lady, keep your panties on –" he jerked out of the way when he saw her fingers curl into a fist, " – I'm going I'm going. Just –" and here, he smiled his most charming smile. "One more for the road, ne?"
A minute later, Naruto, having been slapped out onto the sidewalk, began his trudging journey home.
Through the back alleys and rough streets of Konoha he walked, weaving his way past drunken couples and college kids out on a weekend night out. He was sure his set of friends were also out, wreaking havoc at some club or another. Normally he would've been the center of the party, slamming down bottles of vodka, dancing wildly on the countertops, stripping off for body shots – but for the past few months he'd avoided socializing.
He reached his old, dilapidated apartment building and walked the few flights up, opting to bypass the creaky old elevator – it tended to shut down, leaving the unfortunate soul trapped for hours with very little in way of ventilation. The residents of the building had tried, many times, to get the landlady to fix it for them. In the first month, they'd religiously rung on her bell or messaged her, only to be told by an automated machine that she was away – and was suspiciously around only on the day that rent was due. As for Naruto, he was decidedly on a budget and though the building was generally on the decline, it was cheap and serviceable. So he kept his mouth shut and took the stairs.
He opened the door to his tiny bachelor unit. It was a small, rectangular room with an adjoining bathroom. A few pieces of furniture dotted the space, with a large mattress on the floor. Colorful piles of instant ramen littered his countertops. The walls around his bed and desk were tacked with sheets of paper, illustrations, odds and bits of scrawled writing. Pulling off his clothes, he dropped it on a pile of clothing on the floor and stumbled over to his bed. He sprawled out and waited for sleep to claim him.
He'd have liked to be so drunk that he could fall boneless into bed and immediately pass out, but the Tylenol combined with the walk in the cool autumn air had unfortunately left him dead sober and with the tell-tale sign of a post-drinking headache. Well, never mind. He'd always gotten over hangovers with just a few hours of sleep, always had a hyper immune system, and most bruises and minor scratches faded away within a day. Lucky for him, as he'd spent a good chunk of his teenage years roaming wild on the streets. His old, uncontrollable, and – though he hadn't realized it at the time – halcyon days.
Suddenly restless, he got up, and – feeling locked in the same constant battle with himself, went to sit at his desk.
He powered up his laptop, and pulled up a blank document. And sat, with his fingers on the keys.
He stayed like this for the next half hour, staring determinedly at the screen. Several times, his fingers twitched, but the page remained blank.
Rrrrrrrrring.
Only a peek of golden hair was visible from underneath the thick orange blanket. As the phone continued its incessant ringing, a tan hand finally stretched out. Groping for the source of the extremely annoying sound, his finger poked about until it finally, blessedly hit the mute button.
Five seconds later, the phone rang again.
Naruto groaned. He had a good idea who the caller would be and knew that unless he picked up at some point, the caller would have no problem redialing over and over. And if he solved the problem by simply turning off his phone, he'd soon be hearing a banging on his door.
He swore and this time jabbed the green answer button. The screen sprang to life with an image of a shaggy-haired young man with a barking dog on his shoulder.
"Dude, Naruto!" boomed out the jovial voice.
Naruto didn't bother replying.
Kiba snickered. "Shieeetttt, how long you gonna sleep man? Weren't you the one having tea time and knitting with your auntie last night while the rest of us got fucked up?"
Naruto swore. "Shut it, mutt. This is my one day off and it's been a helluva week." His voice was deep and scratchy with fatigue; he wanted nothing more than to hang up and sleep all day.
Kiba's voice turned mock soothing. "Aww, does the widdle baby fox need a cuddle this morning? Want me to kiss your forehead and tuck you into your nappy?" He snickered as he used the schoolyard epithet that had haunted Naruto for a good portion of his childhood, on account of the whisker-like birthmarks on his face.
"I swear to god, Kiba, get to the goddamn point or I'm hanging up – "
"It's Z1 time, man! Fucking finally!"
Naruto paused.
"It's here?"
"Fuck yeah, just got here this morning. Still in its box. So get your ass down to the shop, pronto."
The shop was Kiba's bike repair joint, the one he had wrangled Shino into opening together with him a few years ago. Kiba's obsession with bikes ran in a different direction than Naruto's. Kiba loved the tinkering, the building, the mechanics side of it, pulling apart the motor and engine and jimmying it back together with his own special brand of engineering know-how.
Naruto, though, was more obsessed with the feel of riding. In his irrepressible teenage days he'd been a complete adrenaline junkie, always looking for the latest dare or thrill. And his greatest joy had been in piloting stolen – borrowed – motorcycles for A.M. joy rides to the coast, blasting through empty roads and sharp mountain curves at 140 miles per hour. He'd always loved the beating of his heart and the feel of blood pumping as he teetered between wild escapism and incredible danger.
When Naruto and Kiba had been dicking around online and had stumbled on the Kawasaki Z1 in the vintage valuables auction on eBay, they'd literally started drooling. A few days of an intense bidding war (complete with a mountain of crumpled beer cans chucked around the room, the constant stream of the word 'fuck' and incessant hair tearing, not to mention spending more money than either had spent on a single item in their lives), with a month-long wait for shipment, and they'd both been crawling out of their skin with nerves and impatience.
"I'll be there in twenty minutes. Don't you dare open that fucking box without me."
Kiba crowed in excitement and Naruto frantically hung up. He bounced out of bed and ran into his dilapidated bathroom. Brushing his teeth and scrubbing his face clean at the same time, he whipped on a shirt, shoved his legs into a pair of holey jeans, and ran out the door. He could still taste the toothpaste in his mouth but he grinned wide, in a better mood than he had been for weeks.
The sun glinted off the chrome caps of the two-seater as he and Kiba reverently stripped away layers of cardboard and slowly unveiled it. They peeled off the last layer of protective covering – and stepped back in awe.
"Dude…" Even Kiba, who was physically unable to shut up, was speechless at the sight.
The vintage bike was absolute perfection. The burnished silver surface gleamed. The graceful curve of the handles were encased in the same smooth black rubber of the perfectly aligned wheels. The metallic frame ran in a smooth, fluid line, so expertly crafted he could weep. And – the piece de resistance – the bright yellow fuel tank, with the words 'Kawasaki' stamped proudly across.
Naruto reached out a finger and ran it across the throttle, itching to jump on and squeeze, revving the engine into motion. "Kiba, I'm dying. Let me take it out for a quick spin. I'll be back in half an hour, tops."
Kiba laughed. "We gotta do some serious maintenance work first, man. Clean out the carburetor, maybe even replace the cylinders. And a million other things to fine-tune. I'm not having this blow out the first time it's taken out for a ride."
Naruto groaned. "I can wait a few days. A week, tops. The past month nearly killed me."
"Then shut up and hand me those screwdrivers, and a pair of pliers."
Naruto handed Kiba the tools and brought over the whole tool box. A jumble of bearings, clutch plates, circlips and other assorted small parts were inside. He ran his fingers over the spiny surface of the sprocket, flicking it with his nail and watching it turn. It was cool to remodel or build bikes from scratch but Naruto had never had the patience for it; for this bike, though, he was willing to put in the time and diligence.
For the next hour, the two worked with companionable chatter, as Naruto helped Kiba slowly remove the carburetor and begin pulling apart the outer layers. Both grimaced as they saw the remnants of old fuel within.
"See," Kiba said. "It looks great on the outside but this model is old. It needs some care. You'd have gone for a ride and the engine might have blown up and set your ass on fire."
Naruto snorted. "Like you wouldn't have paid good money to see that." Kiba saluted him, a wide grin on his face. "Seriously, mutt, let's just do the absolute essential today. I need to drive it down to the coast tonight; it's torture, looking at this thing." He shook his head, already feeling the sea-soaked wind running through his hair…
Suddenly, his phone rang. Naruto wiped his oil-greased fingers on a rag and dug through his pocket.
"Yo! Uzumaki Naruto speaking."
"Naruto!" It was the desperate voice of one of Naruto's part-time employers, cracking with stress as always.
"Tatsuyu-san, how can I help you?"
"Naruto, are you free tonight?" the man said. "There's a big event happening over at the old City Hall ballroom. One of the waiters pulled out and we can't risk it being understaffed." The man drew in a deep breath, sounding like he would keep over right then and there. "We have the city's elite coming. And a very, very important guest of honor."
Naruto grimaced. "I'm not sure I can help you tonight, sir. I'm in the middle of something and it's going to take all day…"
"Just five hours! The event will run from 7-10, and I need you an hour before for set-up and one after cleaning. I'll pay you 1.5 the usual rate for the trouble."
The blonde wavered, running mental calculations in his head while looking longingly at the bike. Rent was due in a few days, and he'd been tired of subsisting on store-bought onigiri and boiled eggs. An extra bit of cash to tide him until the next payday was always welcome.
"Alright, I'll be there."
The man sighed with relief. "Wonderful! Be at the back entrance of the old building by 6 p.m. I appreciate it, Naruto!"
He hung up and saw Kiba glance at him inquisitively. "You taking on another job tonight?"
Naruto blew out a breath of air. "Yeah, another waiter gig. Couple extra bills to rub together, it's always good."
"Dude, why don't you just get a regular job? I mean you scraped through college but you've got a degree. You're a capable guy and you can do a hell of a lot better than these random jobs for cash. You know you're more than welcome to come and partner with us here, too."
Naruto clapped his old friend on the shoulder. "Thanks man. You know I appreciate it. It's just, riding bikes has been… a way for me to get away from everything else in the world. Besides, I was never into building or fixing them like you. It'd drive me crazy, sitting here and smelling the oil all day and not getting to drive them." He got up and stretched, working out the kinks in his neck.
"Then what about a 9-to-5? Some office? It might not be what you want but it's a better way to pay the bills."
Naruto grinned. "It's not for me. Remember that internship I did right after graduation? The work wasn't bad but being stuck in a tiny cubicle all day and some old pervert calling himself your boss – I knew I could never do it. It's fine, for now, these part-times."
Kiba knew he was heading into delicate territory. "How's your writing going?"
"It's… going." Naruto said stiffly. His friend shook his head.
"Dude, you used to write some crazy shit. I don't read much, you know, fiction, but your stuff was damn good. I thought you'd be published by now and living some rockstar writer life. Like that Harry Potter chick. Why aren't you writing, man?"
Naruto rolled his eyes. "You nag just like Sakura, and Ino, and pretty much everyone except Shikamaru."
Kiba snickered. "Shikamaru would do it too, if he weren't so damn lazy. Even when we were kids you used to write. Everyone was into your shit, even that stuck up bastard, Uchiha –"
Naruto's breath stopped at the mention of that name. Aware that Kiba was watching him, he picked his words carefully. "I'm still writing. I just – I need some – inspiration," said Naruto, feeling lame. "I sit and stare at the screen but there's just nothing. It's been like this for months, years, really…"
"Inspiration?" Kiba sniggered. "When's the last time you've gone out? And I don't mean your hot aunt's bar, but to meet people. You don't need inspiration, you need to get laid."
"Take your own damn advice, dog-breath. When are you gonna stop being chicken-shit and ask Hinata out?"
At Kiba's defensive expression, Naruto snickered. He held out the now-sparkling engine. "Don't worry about me, Kiba. Besides, I only have a few hours before I gotta run. Let's get this baby back in one piece."
Naruto plastered on a smile and proffered his tray of champagne forwards. God, this was dull. He'd spent the past hour with a cheesy grin on his face, observing society's finest sipping their expensive alcohol and trying to seem like they'd had personalities. He caught snatches of the conversation, ranging from networking chit-chat to the far more indecent – "investment capital on behalf of issuing debt securities"… "Can you believe that bitch spent seventy grand to copy my snakeskin Birkin"… "if I marry her, it's like betting that she's half my net worth"… He nearly groaned out loud. Three more hours, he told himself. Three more hours and I can sink into my couch with Netflix and a bowl of ramen…
He was mentally slurping on the noodles – sweet ramen, food of the gods – when he felt a sharp nudge on his side. It was another waiter, a perpetually sour guy that Naruto saw around these events, scraping together cash while badmouthing the millionaires he waited on.
"Three o'clock," hissed Kozue – Koizumi? "That's the guy who's the guest of honor. Worth $37 million at twenty-four. His brother's worth at least twice more, and that's just them, not including the whole family fortune."
Naruto shrugged. "So?"
"Fuck them," he murmured jealously. "We're here scraping the bottom of the barrel while those rich bastards don't work a day in their life. Look at all those chicks swarming around Mr. Perfect."
Though Naruto couldn't care less, he begrudgingly turned to look across the room, at least to appease K-whatever his name was. It was true, the man was literally circled by a wall of overexcited women, their cheeks stained pink and hands fluttering delicately as they drank in his words. He could barely see him with all the surrounding women.
Naruto shrugged, moving to turn away – until a woman blocking his view stepped out of the way and he had a clear, dead-on view. Naruto looked – and froze.
Standing less than thirty feet away was none other than Uchiha Sasuke.
He hadn't laid eyes on the prick for ten years, but there was no mistaking him. It was Uchiha motherfucking Sasuke, who was looking both completely at ease and utterly pissed off at the same time as he stood in the center of his admirers. The facial expression on his face was one Naruto intimately knew – it was the very one that Sasuke had worn all those years as they'd grown up together. That exact damn look, the one that told you that you were worth less than the speck of dirt on the bottom of his shoe and if you would just go fuck off and die already.
As Sasuke looked/glared at yet another socialite foaming out of her mouth with excitement, Naruto nearly laughed out loud. God, they were those same eyes – dark and arrogant and domineering, eyes that had made Naruto go crazy with a combination of spitting anger and an almost insatiable longing for the boy to just once acknowledge him as a peer, as a rival. Which, of course, the too-fucking-good-for-you Uchiha had never once deigned to do.
They'd frequently gotten into scuffles when they were young which veered off into athletic competition as they'd grown older. They'd competed fiercely at just about sport offered at school – basketball, volleyball, track and field, swimming. Naruto had always, always infuriatingly come in second, though he'd obsessively trained for hours a day and neglected his studies (his grades had never been much to talk of to begin with, while the Uchiha had maintained a perfect 4.0 GPA throughout – another reason to hate the bastard). Naruto had revelled in the fact that he seemed to be the only one to get under the stoic Uchiha's skin and provoke any sort of reaction from the boy. Sasuke had been thronged with fangirls and boys since kindergarten, but he'd consistently shown as little interest in the collective group of them as he would a garden slug.
During the summer break before freshman year, Naruto had spent all hours training outdoors in his quest to finally outdo his dark-haired rival in at least one sporting event. But on the first day back, the rumors had circulated that Sasuke's parents had died in a freak car accident and that he and his brother had been sent to be cared for by distant relatives in another country. Aside from vehemently denying to himself that he felt – hurt – that his old rival had disappeared without a word, Naruto had pretty much lost his motivation for academia. Instead, he'd spent most of his high school career either holed up in his dingy housing unit while scratching out numerous pages of odd, eclectic stories, or brawling on the streets and riding bikes. It was a wonder he'd been able to graduate and even been able to go on to college – that had been with no little part due to the persistence of one of his old teachers, Umino Iruka. He'd been one of the few teachers at the school to look upon Naruto with any sort of fondness.
Naruto had often thought of Sasuke – less, as the years went by, but still wondering – wondering about his life, what he was doing – wondering if Sasuke ever thought of him – but the Sasuke in his mind had remained a stubborn, stuck-up fourteen-year-old brat. There had to be some kind of witchcraft involved, because for some reason his conversation with Kiba earlier had conjured up the man out of thin air, after not having seen or heard a peep about him for ten years.
And the worst thing was: he hadn't figured that Uchiha Sasuke would have grown up to be so insanely sexy.
Sasuke had always been good-looking, a child with perfect porcelain features and silky strands of hair. Naruto had frequently taunted him about his 'pretty' looks, often earning a punch to the gut. But really, even as a child Naruto had known that Sasuke was attractive (the hordes of screaming girls were tantamount) … but there was this sinful aura about him now that riveted Naruto. Sasuke stood tall and confident, black hair perfectly mussed, the clean lines of his body in an expensive tux cut to perfection. Every inch of him was flawless, just stupidly perfect. Naruto swallowed as his eyes fell down Sasuke's form, lingering at the elegant drape of his fingers around the stem of a champagne flute. Holy gods, Sasuke had grown the fuck up. Naruto didn't want to admit to himself how good he looked – and judging from the cocky posture the asshole absolutely knew it, too – but bastard was hot as hell and there was no denying it.
And here he was in a waiter's uniform, serving at the event that his old rival was a guest of honour at. Fucking shit.
Luckily for him, Sasuke had not noticed him gawking at him from the distance. Sasuke was probably too used to the constant burning gaze of admirers to even notice being stared at. And, Naruto told himself, Sasuke wouldn't recognize him even if he were to see him. He would have no recollection of some idiot from his youth who'd never been able to beat him at anything, at another deadbeat loser who was an utter and absolute failure at life…
Naruto tucked his empty tray under his arm and turned around abruptly. He took a step forward, ready to dive back into the kitchens and hide until the end of the night – until one well-heeled, well-dressed, well-inebriated guest lurched into his path and spilled the contents of her glass all over him.
"Whoops!" she giggled. She hiccupped, and stumbling forward, placed her hands on the chest of the now-drenched waiter. "Omigod, I don't even know how much I drank – " she looked up into the face of the waiter and momentarily stilled.
"Wow, you're cute!" she gasped. "Can I like, hire you to be my butler? Or – " her fingers began caressing the collar of his shirt. "I can help you clean up, like right now…"
Naruto groaned inwardly and began inching away, trying to get her hands to stop wandering further down his body. "Uh, it's okay, ma'am, if you'll excuse me…" He swept his dripping hair off his brow and tried to politely, deferentially, push the woman back from leaning on him. He glanced around haphazardly, hoping that no one had noticed. With the size of the room and the majority of the guests still focused on the Uchiha, barely a few people were paying attention to the pair. Through the gaps of people, Naruto could see Sasuke's back was inclined away from him. Thank fucking god.
Despite his soft rejection, the woman was holding fast onto his shoulders and was unfortunately growing louder. "Ugh, I just love your eyes, they're so pretty I can just drown in them… and omigod, you work out, don't you." Her hand slipped down Naruto's chest.
"Ma'am, please – " Naruto was at a loss. He was working this event and she was a guest, and a woman at that; he couldn't exactly use force to get her off, potentially causing a scene. He brought his own hands up to once again try to loosen her grasp on him, but she was surprisingly strong for a drunk, malnourished socialite balancing on spindly stiletto heels.
"Mmmmmm," she brought her face dangerously close to Naruto's, who was seriously cursing his bad luck. "You smell sooo good too. Come home with me, gorgeous." She pressed herself up against him, pushing her cleavage forward and batting her eyes.
Naruto had had enough. "Ma'am – I think you should be heading out – and call your driver." This time, firmly gripping her arms, he pushed her off. He shook off her attempts to clutch onto his hands. An increasing amount of people were turning their way and he needed to run back to the kitchen, like now. His glimpsed K-whatever his name was in the background, smirking. Asshole.
The woman wasn't used to rejection. That, combined with alcohol and arrogance, pushed her over the edge. "Omigod, how dare you! I told you! You're coming home with me!"
Her words rang across the room as every guest in the vicinity turned towards them. Naruto froze, mortified. It seemed as though an eternity passed in that awful moment, as all eyes fell on him.
And then he felt it boring into the side of his face, a burning intense gaze that sent shivers crawling down his spine. As if pulled by an inevitable force, he turned his head and looked back – straight into the pitch-black eyes of Uchiha Sasuke.