The first boy I fell in love with, wasn't a boy at all. Just a stain on paper.
His hair was gold, his eyes were blue. But when I first met him, his hair was white, his eyes were gray.
I read about him all alone in the corner. His adventures were wild and his friends conflicted, the weak strong and the strong weak. I liked his world. It was strange and loud and confusing, but it was also familiar and quiet and beautiful.
He was brave and reckless. He protected his special people and was loyal, and yelled a lot. I liked that. That he was loyal, I mean. Not many people in my world were. Not many people protected me. I was enthralled by the possibility.
My friends told me he wasn't real. I told them he couldn't be fake. They said he was a drawing. I said he was kind. They told me he wasn't even in color. I showed them the front cover. They just shook their heads and introduced me to a boy my age.
Eventually, I discovered anime, and he became a boy with a rough voice and a loud snore. His hair moved and his seals were fast and real. I became even more convinced when he cried and when he talked so confidently to others- of course he was real. Haven't you seen him smile?
I went to school in my dreams, ate dinner at home and talked to friends who told me to snap out of it, because three years was a little too much. I told them that I would stop.
They didn't believe me.
They introduced me to boy after boy. Some were blond. Some had blue eyes. But none of them had scars, none of them screamed 'dattebayo!' and none of them protected me. They all said I love you but they never fought for me. They all told me they would protect me, but when he went flying across the hall, they stayed in the crowd. I picked up my book in silence.
They said I'm sorry and I lied, I know. They asked for my forgiveness and I told them of course. When they left me, I brushed off the colored cover and I went home.
My friends cheered me up in my room, jumping off of my shelves and trashing my room with misplaced jutsus. Her pink hair flowed long and she told me quietly that the quiet ones were always the strongest. Sasuke just scoffed and said that bullies- and I- were annoying. Naruto just yelled about how he would beat them all up, but I reminded him with a smile that he didn't know where they lived.
He collapsed comically to the ground. I laughed.
When my parents stormed into my room to see what all the noise was and asked me why my room was destroyed- desks tipped over, lamps shattered, bed ripped apart, papers scattered across the floor- I told them that my friends had been angry for me. Everything but the bookshelves, with their meticulously organized volumes, was either tipped over or broken or gone. Naruto had punched a hole in the wall.
They just yelled at me and left. I picked up my pen and joined him for ramen.
Years later I was seventeen, and my friends were gone, but I still had my friends. I caught another boy kissing somebody else and wasn't surprised. He said he was sorry, and I borrowed his bravery- I twitched and told him to Fuck off.
They were stunned. I went home that day and told him with a written word, and he showed me a new jutsu and told me how boring training was. He reminded me that I was strong.
I dreamed that my grades were failing, and that I hadn't spoken in a while. I met up with my friends during classes and between them and after them. Sakura chided me and told me that studying was important. My grades improved.
He asked me out, finally. My pen flew and I grinned wide, but when I told my parents, they just cried.
He taught me ninjutsu and how to throw shuriken. Afterwards, we had ramen at the stands and stayed up late with popcorn and horror movies. He screamed, but told me it was boring when I asked if he was scared. We wore our headbands and played truth or dare with two people, and we learned that we loved each other.
The next day, Sasuke abandoned us, and I punched a nameless somebody who told me again that I was crazy.
Another year passed, and Naruto and I were going strong. I was happier than I had ever been. I learned to speak Japanese and that's what I spoke. I forgot English- I almost didn't understand my parents anymore, which was fine, because they never said anything to me that I could love them for. Dinner was instant ramen eaten alone at an empty table.
We went on so many dates after that. Naruto ventured into my world for a while and we went to the movies and the mall. Naruto said my world was, no offense, ugly and weird. I laughed and told him he was right.
I graduated. When my parents didn't show up, Sakura, Naruto, Team Guy and I walked together to my house because I didn't have a car. We laughed and Naruto kissed me, and Guy and Lee yelled about youthful love and Sakura gushed. Naruto said he loved-
Something happened.
A harsh sound filled the air, loud and screeching like a banshee. Twin lights bore down on me and I screamed. My pen clattered across the pavement, and my binder fell. Miraculously, they were unharmed.
The impact knocked me far away. I spiraled.
Wake up, Naruto said. Wake up.
My eyes opened. I felt the air brush through my clothes and heard it rush past the grass. When I sat up, I could sense my own power, my own chakra. The messenger bag on my hip holding explosive notes and kunai shifted. Naruto grinned and Sakura sighed. Her hands faded from green to normal. Lee and Neji and Tenten and Guy and everyone she'd ever made friends with all exclaimed loudly in relief- maybe not Neji, actually, but Lee did.
"Hey," Naruto said. "Welcome home."
Sometimes I wondered about the world of homework and parents and manga, but most of the time I was fighting for my life or eating ramen or training. A lot of times I was kissing my boyfriend. I forgot how to speak English, and ninjutsu became my second nature.
I was home.
...
I crunched on an apple, plopping down on the couch.
School sucked and I really wasn't sure about my life, aside from the next anime convention. I was personally more into Bleach, but my friend had gotten me slightly interested in Naruto, so I watched the English dub sometimes.
This time, when I flicked on the TV, the gory scene in front of me was enough to make me flinch and drop the remote. I cursed lightly, but before I could reach down to grab the remote, the television caught my attention. I listened.
"Eighteen year old girl hit by car," a reporter was saying. "The injuries were declared fatal, and she was declared dead on scene. We were unable to reach her parents at the time-"
I hurried to flick the TV off.
I knew that girl. Not personally, but I'd seen her in the hall. Her nose was always in a manga or the binder she was always drawing in.
The next day I drove out to the stretch of road I had seen in the background. The police were all gone, however there was still some stray yellow tape, and skid marks still marred the pavement. I shivered.
Ducking under the police tape, I made my way over the side of the road closest to where the accident had occurred. Awkwardly I squatted in the tall grass beside the road to stick the metal wire into the ground. It was crudely taped to brightly colored flowers picked from my backyard. When I sat back to check over my work, my foot caught on something and I fell backwards with a yelp.
I sat up and combed through the tall grass with my hands, grumbling under my breath, until my fingers caught on something.
I gripped it and pulled it up to eye level. A car zoomed by on the highway and blared it's horn loudly. I blinked and stared at my find: a worn, black four inch binder stuffed with papers. My hands shook. After a few minutes of fevered searching, I found the pen about six feet away, farther in the grass, away from the road.
I scrambled back into my car and carefully placed the binder and pen in the passenger seat. Then I pulled back into the street and hit the gas back to my house.
Slamming the door to my room, I put the binder on my desk after brushing away a few of my Bleach drawings.
For a few minutes I paced in my room, and then reached out to open the binder. Then my fingers paused, and I paced again. I locked the door to my room, I turned on music, I put away my pictures in a folder, I turned off the music.
Finally I forced myself to sit down. I put the pen on a stretch of empty desk and took a deep breath before opening the binder's cover.
The first thing I saw was a familiar, scarred face beaming up at me.
After that I saw the girl- the one who died. A few others I recognized- they were standing, watching each other. The girl's face was curious. At first glance, it looked like they were in a bookstore, but when I looked closer I could see the leaves in the woodwork and the trunks undertoned in light colors. They were in a forest as well.
I flipped through the pictures and saw a story.
The girl grew up with bad friends and parents, and she made friends with these characters. I watched as she fought with bad guys and learned how to use jutsus, and then as Naruto stuck his tongue out at a history teacher. Her friends told her to just give up while she sat alone reading a manga, but in featherlight shading, she was dead in the center of what looked like a squabble between Sakura and Naruto.
The girl grew up, surrounded by it all, falling in love with Naruto. Her real friends joined her after rough days, and they were both training with Kakashi and demolishing what appeared to be her bedroom. Posters and bookshelves lined the walls.
I saw her discover anime, and she seemed to be both in the anime and watching it at the same time.
Always, there was that light background, like she was living in two universes. I turned pages, astonished. The penmanship was amazing, and it seemed to follow important and unimportant parts of a life. I saw her first date- both real and fictional- but she only kissed Naruto. Maybe that was why she found her real boyfriend kissing someone else.
It took me two weeks to finish reading it.
The last image was incomplete- the few panels leading up to it were lighthearted and sweet- a group of friends walking and talking together. Her and Naruto kissed and were laughing and blushing as the others laughed and teased-
Naruto leaned close. In the final panel, he had opened his mouth. His face was half completed, the mouth and eyes and some of the hair and shoulders and one scar were there, but the rest was absent. The speech bubble was half filled: the words said
"I love y-"
At that point, the pen slashed wildly across paper, tearing it in some places. A shiver ran down my back as I realized I was witnessing the death of a person, frozen in time.
Carefully, I turned to the next page, which was, of course, blank.
I stared at it for a minute before picking up the pen. Something about it seemed to pulse.
I knew enough now from almost three weeks of reading to know the girl almost as well as I knew myself. I also knew enough about Naruto: Shipuuden to do what I was thinking. Suddenly the images were rushing through me.
I drew the girl's still body lying in that tall grass, still and straight. Naruto was kneeling next to her, along with Sakura, who in another panel touched her glowing hands to the girl's chest. The rest of Team Guy, along with a few others- Kakashi, and every person she'd seen in this girl's life. They almost seemed to bust out of the panels.
Panels seemed to blur, and the girl stirred.
"Wake up! Wake up!" Naruto yelled. The girl sat up, wide eyed.
"Hey," he said, grinning. He helped her to her feet. She looked down for a second at her clothes, then reached up to touch her konoha leaf headband, and then looked back up at Naruto.
She smiled.
"Hey," she said.
There was no underlying background- she was finally home.
...
So yeah... that happened. If you're confused, please review or PM me and I'll answer your questions. Right now its past midnight and I'm sleepy. G'night!
Oh yeah, I do not own Naruto.
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