AN: I haven't written anything, let alone fanfiction, in a very long time. I didn't even realize how much I'd missed it until I started having crazy intense Team 7 feels. I've definitely gotten a little rusty, so I apologize for any awkwardness you might come across while reading. As far as the actual story goes, here's the debrief:

Pairing: None (unless you want to interpret it that way - that is completely fine); Sasuke + Naruto friendship.

Sasuke centric with some minor psychoanalysis.

Setting: Genin days / pre-time skip.

Rated: T for some language, but that's about it.

Additional notes: This oneshot has a distressing lack of Sakura. I'm going to have to write her a separate fic, I think. Other than that... I've just always been in love with the dynamic these two share. I hope I was able to convey at least a fraction of its complexity.

Enjoy!

Leave the Mess for Tomorrow

"I lost my keys."

Sasuke gives the digital clock above the oven a quick glance - two thirty in the morning - but stays silent.

"So... you gonna let me in, or what?" It's a little hesitant, and comes out in a voice that's much too soft.

Ultimately, it's the unsettling quiet, and not the multitude of cuts and bruises that mar Naruto's face, that drags Sasuke's feet from the entranceway, allowing his teammate to stumble in.

"You lost your keys." Sasuke echoes as Naruto eases himself onto the Uchiha's pristine sofa with a hiss of ill-concealed pain. It's not a question - it's a dare.

"Haha, yeah." he rasps a chuckle, avoiding Sasuke's eyes, suddenly finding a small spot on the coffee table fascinating, "I almost don't wanna tell you, 'cause you're a bastard and you'll laugh, but I tripped over a rock by the bridge. Landed on my face. Keys went flying into the river. 'Got no clue where they ended up."

Sasuke's dark eyes narrow on the back of Naruto's head. Though the other boy is facing away, he seems to unconsciously stiffen under his friend's gaze.

"So I thought I'd crash here tonight." there is a sense of finality in these words, making it clear that Naruto wants no further discussion on the matter.

"Did you now." Sasuke's tone is flat - controlled.

"Yup." Naruto turns to look at him for the first time since sitting down, and Sasuke is a little taken aback by how much the blond's injuries have diminished already. "You're a jerk, but you're not a big enough jerk to throw me out in the middle of the night."

Sasuke considers his teammate for a moment. He takes in the blond hair, ruffled and messier than usual, the blood, the bruises, and the flatness of Naruto's normally bright eyes. Sasuke knows well enough by now that the mask is on - Naruto's trademark facade. Any attempt to push for the truth would be met with fake smiles and a forced exuberance so sickening Sasuke doesn't even want to think about it.

"Clumsy idiots shouldn't take midnight strolls alone. You obviously can't handle yourself in the dark." he delivers his line of their well rehearsed two-man play flawlessly, and Sasuke knows that this is the reason Naruto has chosen to come to him; Sasuke knows that the last thing Naruto wants is to be interrogated. He knows because, were their situations reversed, he would feel the same.

When it came down to it, their inexplicable understanding of one another, and not so much their verbal communication, was what had always drawn them together. Despite this, Sasuke wonders for a moment if he will be able to keep from grinding his teeth in frustration. Because if Sasuke Uchiha had ever had a reason to doubt the fact that he was a coward, it was quickly squashed by situations like these; people like Naruto.

"Run, run and cling to life..."

A sudden wave of intense bitterness washes over Sasuke, and he clamps down on his jaw just in case.

"Shut up." the indignation in Naruto's retort is there, but it's lacking.

The moron is quiet. Too damn quiet. Sasuke hates it.

Sasuke hates himself a little more when he shrugs his shoulder off of the wall he's been leaning against and inclines his head towards the bedroom, effectively dropping the subject.

There's a short pause in which Sasuke knows that both of them are thinking the same thing:

This is Naruto's win.

"You must kill..."

This is the one victory that Sasuke will hand over to Naruto time and time again. Because, if truth be told, he's terrified of winning. Terrified of caring too much. Terrified that he might already.

"Your closest friend."

Naruto clambers unsteadily to his feet and saunters down the hall after Sasuke, each laboured breath he takes as he follows making the hairs on the back of the dark-haired boy's neck stand on end - his teeth itch.

"I'll be able to get a spare set of keys from my landlady in the morning." Naruto shrugs off his oversized jacket and mesh undershirt with a wince, "Damn is she gonna be pissed, though..."

Collapsing to the bed in only his boxers, Naruto grabs a fist full of blanket, and in one pull has completely destroyed Sasuke's well-made sheets.

With a small 'che', Sasuke moves to the other side of the mattress and sits himself down. He doesn't offer Naruto pyjamas - the blonde, while a few inches shorter, has a broader frame and stretched out the last shirt the Uchiha lent him. Sasuke also doesn't elect to sleep on the couch; the two have been forced to share beds on nearly every long-distance mission they'd ever been assigned, and, Sasuke's breath hitches in his throat, he certainly doesn't offer to bandage the gigantic gash across his teammates right shoulder-blade - a sickening red peeking out from beneath the bedsheets that he hadn't noticed earlier. The cut will probably be gone by tomorrow. The image of the mark will be burned into Sasuke's memory for a lot longer.

Yanking at the covers, Sasuke manages to re-claim what he deems a decent amount of blankets from a complaining Naruto before squeezing his eyes shut and willing sleep to come.

Sleep did not come. For Sasuke, it rarely does. And by six o'clock, even though Team 7 had been scheduled a day off, he can no longer lie there listening to Naruto's heavy breathing.

He goes through the motions of preparing breakfast more out of a need to distract himself than out of hunger. One fried egg on dried toast and a small portion of rice and fish left over from the night before. The food crumbles like ash in his mouth, and Sasuke remembers, as he does most mornings, the way his mother used to prepare breakfast - remembers that even if his father and brother had been quiet, that it had been nice to have company at the table. His stomach turns at the very thought. When the nauseating churning refuses to subside, Sasuke tosses his practically untouched meal into the trash, but takes care to place the dishes gently in the sink. There had been a time when a younger Sasuke had emptied his apartment's cupboards of anything breakable and spent nearly a half an hour smashing plates, glasses - everything he could get his tiny, shaking hands on, before concerned neighbours had arrived to find him bleeding and shivering, surrounded by glass, in the middle of the kitchen floor. Their looks of pity had been infinitely worse than anger. Sasuke's cheeks had burned with embarrassment as the building supervisor had helped him up and lead him away from the disaster he'd created, telling him that she'd hire someone to come and clean up the mess.

Sasuke hasn't acted out since; he washes and stows the dishes neatly away.

He is nearly out the door, one foot already jammed into a well-worn sandal, when he remembers Naruto.

Sighing, Sasuke returns to the kitchen, throws together another breakfast comprised of leftovers, frowning slightly at the bareness of his fridge, and scrawls out a quick note which he leaves next to the food on the table:

Going out.

Eat this and don't leave until I get back, idiot.

Narrowing his eyes at the last word in the message, a word which he hadn't intended to write, Sasuke turns again for the door.

As he steps out into the warm, summer morning, Sasuke wonders just what it is about that dropout that makes him act like such a child.

A half an hour later finds Sasuke evaluating the mounds of fresh produce positively bursting from the Leaf Market Place's front bins. It's a Sunday, and Konoha's main-street is already abuzz with morning shoppers and children enjoying their precious day off. The crowd becomes ever larger as newcomers join the throng and, normally, Sasuke would have done everything possible to avoid such a mob, but today he is content to bask in their idle chatter - he finds himself comforted as their bustling drowns his over-active thoughts, allowing his mind a rare moment of relief.

He is scanning the vegetables splayed out in front of him, in search of something to fill his pitifully stocked refrigerator, when Sasuke notices them. Brilliant red and shining in the early morning sun are large bunches of his favourites. Sasuke can't help but gravitate towards the sizeable mound of tomatoes stacked near the end of the vender's stand. Though they were a year-round fruit, as a child, Sasuke had always sworn to his mother that they tasted best in July, right before his birthday; like they had been grown specially for him. And indeed, with only two days to go until the start of the month, their sheen is beautiful - they look nice and firm, though it is the smell emanating from the crop - fresh, with a hint of something pleasantly sour and tangy - that is truly telling of their quality.

"Would you like me to bag some for you then, dear?"

Realizing that he had been leaning rather close to the fruit in order to get a sniff, and embarrassed at being caught off guard, Sasuke straightens himself quickly, only to meet the eyes of a squat old woman, staring at him with only a hint of amusement and a considerable amount of warmth. He knows her face, but not her name; one acquaintance of the many that make up Sasuke's every day life. He makes it a point not to learn names unless absolutely necessary. No attachment, no mess.

"Ah, yes." Sasuke mentally curses himself for stammering, but fights down the flush he can feel creeping up his neck and on to his face; a skill he has worked hard to cultivate over the years.

"Your lucky," the old woman crows as she deftly swipes a paper bag from beneath the counter and begins placing the delicate fruit inside, "farmers say it's been a bumper crop this year, so they're a little bit cheaper than they would have been otherwise." she offers him the bag as well as a wink.

"Ah." Is the only reply Sasuke offers as he takes the bag gently into his arms.

"That can't be all then, can it? Surely you need something to go with those tomatoes?" She spins with the energy of someone half her age and begins putting together a second bag containing a more diverse selection of vegetables.

As she mutters something under her breath about the absolute necessity of buying cucumbers with tomatoes, Sasuke realizes uncomfortably that he likes this woman. He watches her and is reminded of the way his mother would fuss over his Academy boxed lunches, assembling them just so. Yes, he likes this woman. And for that, Sasuke begins to resent her a little.

"There." She faces him again and extends a second bag nearly bursting with greens. "Tell you what. You pay for this one, and those tomatoes are on the house."

To his credit, Sasuke only hesitates a moment before calmly extracting his money from his shorts' pocket and exchanging it for the second bag. What he really wants to do is snarl at her to leave him alone. He wants to wipe that smile off of her wrinkled old face, because maybe that would help to quell the grin growing on his own.

I don't even want to know your name. I don't want your kindness.

"Take care of yourself, Uchiha-san." she calls to his already retreating back before moving to help a group of new customers now flocking to her stand.

The murmurings of the crowd around him now feel anything but comforting, and Sasuke thinks that if he doesn't escape to a more secluded place, he might lose what little breakfast he has in his system.

Clutching his shopping bags to his chest, his feet carry him down a side street and onto a road he knows well. It's a little out of the way of his apartment, but Sasuke couldn't care less. He continues on autopilot, distracted by the whirring in his head, until his eyes focus on a familiar landmark. The small, friendly red bridge that Team 7 has practically adopted as an official meeting place stands out against the brilliant blue sky. Though the path is not as devoid of people as Sasuke had hoped.

A group of three boys stand, laughing rather obnoxiously, underneath the shade of a well-matured tree, just next to the bridge's edge. It takes a while for Sasuke to place them, recognizing them after a moment as upperclassmen from his academy days, graduating two - or was it three? - years earlier than himself. They are still genin, though older and significantly bigger.

"Serves the little shit right. It took dad ages to get that graffiti off of our storefront."

"You still have the kid's keys though, right?" The shortest one asks through a bit of a snigger, his eyes shifting between his two teammates.

Sasuke stops dead. He feels his fingers tighten around the delicate luggage in his arms, but can't seem to loosen his grip.

"'Course." The first boy replies, extracting a small ring of keys from his pocket and spinning them showily around his index finger, a green frog charm dancing in the light.

"Then you know what we should totally do?" The short one's eyes grow squintier.

The burliest boy of the group, who Sasuke now notices is sporting a rather swollen black eye and bruised cheek smirks through his injuries, "Oh, I like where this is going. I'm in. Who are we inviting?"

"Uh, anyone we want? It's not like we have to clean up or anything!"

There is a chorus of chuckles at this, and the burly one chokes out, "I'm pissing in the kid's sink! Gotta pay him back for kicking me in the fucking face."

"Hah, forget pissing in his sink - I'm taking everything in his cupboards and smearing it on the walls. Let's see if he likes my graffiti art!"

Sasuke's hands are shaking. He doesn't notice as both his shopping bags slip from his arms and fall to the ground.

"What are you looking at, kid?"

It's as though Sasuke's ears are lodged with cotton. All sounds are muffled and distorted. His body moves forward of it's own volition.

"Does this look like an open conversation to you? Get lost!"

Sasuke doesn't even realize he's pounced until he hears screams.

"I found your keys."

Naruto stands next to the sofa, draped in sheets stolen from Sasuke's bedroom, blue eyes wide and mouth agape. A few faint lines and one small bruise above his left eye are all that tell of last night's ordeal.

Naruto's confusion ebbs away as he catches sight of the large, still bleeding gash stretching its way down Sasuke's calf; to Sasuke Naruto is transparent, and he can see the poorly controlled scowl forming in the creases of the other boy's eyes and pulling at his lips.

"Who did that to you?"

"No one." Sasuke deadpans as he places his two wrinkled and torn grocery bags on the kitchen table, "Your clumsiness must be contagious - I caught myself on a bush."

Even with his back turned, Sasuke can practically see Naruto's face darkening.

"I'm not clumsy."

They both know this is far from what he had wanted to say.

Sasuke calmly collects the dirty dishes still left on the table from Naruto's breakfast. While wiping the numerous stray crumbs scattered all over the table's surface into his hand, he notices a crumpled sheet of paper vaguely resembling the note he had written his teammate earlier that morning. Upon closer inspection, Naruto seemed to have scribbled out Sasuke's initial message and, instead, doodled himself making a very rude gesture with both hands.

"Cute." Sasuke holds up the paper for Naruto to see before dumping it unceremoniously into the trash along with the crumbs.

Naruto's only response is a derisive snort.

Limping slightly, Sasuke crosses the room and extends his hand. Naruto stares unamusedly for a moment before Sasuke sighs in exasperation and shoves his open palm directly under his friend's nose.

"Oh." Naruto seems to both deflate and soften as he takes his ring of keys from Sasuke's grasp, thumbing the tacky frog charm almost tenderly.

There's a distinctly awkward silence as Naruto carefully pockets his keys, his eyes trained on the floor.

"Sasuke," still avoiding eye contact, his name comes out of Naruto's mouth as a mutter.

"Hn?"

"Thanks for... looking for my keys."

Sasuke understands, and he nods.

"Sure." Feeling suddenly uncomfortable, Sasuke starts to retreat back to the table to unpack his groceries. On a whim, he pauses mid hobble and glances at the blond over his shoulder, "One thing..."

Tearing his eyes from the floor at last, Naruto quirks his eyebrows quizzically, looking more than a bit ridiculous still draped in Sasuke's blankets and sporting an impressive mane of bed-head.

"I know it's incredibly hard for an idiot like you, but try not to trip again."

It takes a moment, but before long, Naruto's face is split into an enormous, goofy grin.

"Only if you promise to be more careful around bushes, you jerk."

A pause, and then, " I don't think that will be a problem."

They share a rare moment of comfortable, friendly silence before, predictably, Naruto ruins it.

"Okay, what reeks in here?! It's been driving me crazy since you walked through the door - like nasty rotting vegetables or something." He levels an accusatory finger at Sasuke, and the dark haired boy resists the urge to give his friend a new set of bruises.

"What are you talking about-" and that's when Sasuke notices the gigantic, wet stain growing rapidly on one of his two grocery bags. He stifles a groan.

Sasuke reaches into the bag and, grimacing, removes a hand heavily coated in tomato guts.

"So a bush did all that, huh?" Naruto's question comes off as a bit roguish, and despite his annoyance, Sasuke feels more relieved by the return of Naruto's cheeriness than he will ever admit.

Emotionally drained from the morning's events and miffed over the loss of his tomatoes, Sasuke falls fast in to the kind of petulant mood only Naruto can coax out of him.

"Oh, these?" Sasuke pulls his ruined tomatoes out of the bag and into plain view, their innards gushing messily onto the edge of the table, "No, I bought these exactly as they are."

Naruto can only stare on in abject horror as Sasuke very deliberately raises a gloppy finger to his mouth and licks.

Emitting a long, low sound of disgust, Naruto wrinkles his nose. "You are one messed up bastard, you know that?"

Sasuke smirks and takes another taste of tomato.

Through Naruto's scrunched face and indignant grumbles, Sasuke catches the smile the other boy is trying to suppress, and can't help offering a small one himself.

He glances down at his bleeding leg, up to his tomatoey fingers and finally back to Naruto, and his smile threatens to grow wider.

No attachment, no mess.

But there certainly is a mess now, and it looks as though it will be nigh on impossible to clean.

Perhaps it is only the fault of the amicable mood engulfing his kitchen as he and Naruto begin to throw practiced insults back and forth, but Sasuke starts to think that maybe, even if Naruto makes Sasuke act like a child - even if Sasuke is a coward incapable of having just one open conversation with his best friend, and yes, even if Naruto is his best friend, maybe it would all be okay. It wouldn't always be; even boys burdened with significantly less than killing their last remaining family member had to grow up eventually. But maybe he could enjoy this for just a little while. Maybe he'd allow himself to get a tiny bit attached. Just for today. He could clean up the mess tomorrow.