The author's note is at the end.

Chapter One

After a night of intermittent sleep in a bed I have yet to be unworried in, I crawl out from underneath my lilac-colored sheets and, sitting on the edge of my bed, stare down at my bare toes. Today is Monday...or is the day Tuesday? I have a paper due for my economics class this evening, one that has been assigned for almost two weeks now, and that I have yet to begin. My grades, which were once pristine, are now slipping through my fingers.

I don't want to get out of bed today. In fact, I didn't want to wake up. Sleep has become my new best friend even if the bed I sleep on is less than satisfactory. My bed, with her solid box spring and worn fabric protects me from the outside world. I don't have to fuss over my hair when I'm here, nor do I have to worry about how others view my outfit choice of today. My stutter isn't a problem when I'm in bed because I don't have to speak. Here, I can be myself: miserable.

"Hinata?" comes Sasuke's voice and a small rap on my door.

I clear my throat, head snapping up. "Yes?"

"It's five past seven. You need to come out if you want to get a shower and make it to class on time."

I sigh, forcing myself up from my bed because Sasuke's right. We went through the horror of communal showers last year as mere college freshmen, and this year, as sophomores, we know better than to wait until last minute to try to find a shower for a morning class anytime after 7:30 to almost noon.

We head to the showers in silence because that's how we are. We understand that neither of us are much talkers, especially not so early in the morning, and neither of us have been feeling well lately. We may look fine, smooth skin not bothered by the troubles of acne or blemishes like moles; we don't work out on a regular, but our bodies, for the most part, are in shape. The main physical concern for Sasuke and I are the dark circles under our eyes; mine from sleepless nights, his from studying too long. We both, however, have solutions to these: CC cream.

And so, to the average human eye, we are fine specimens who talk little and don't do much other than study and, when we can find the peace to, sleep. Yet, after spending an entire year together as roommates, and then a blessed second year, I know now that Sasuke and I are anything but perfect, although, I couldn't imagine rooming with any else because Sasuke is good for me. He doesn't pry or make me feel uncomfortable in any way-we know each other like the backs of our hands. I know when Sasuke is blaming himself for his parents' deaths. He knows when I am feeling suicidal. And, when the time comes, we are willing to talk one another out of our pain before we continue with our day like nothing ever happened.

"You didn't write your paper," Sasuke points out as we enter the showers. There are three kinds on campus: the women's, the men's, and the co-ops. I don't know just why our college decided they wanted a co-shower for both girls and boys that was sure to be a cesspool for orgies, quickies, and any other heterosexual acts by horny students, but the co-shower is convenient for when Sasuke and I want to shower and feel safe (I don't worry as much about my outward appearance around him and he doesn't worry about his). Also, the co-shower is hardly ever crowded because of its current reputation as Sex Ed. The only times students in the masses venture here are when the regular showers are crowded and they have to be at class in the next twenty minutes.

"Yeah," I breathe, going into a stall and undressing.

"May I ask why?" I can hear him undressing to. To anyone else, the sounds of someone else undress may seem erotic. For me, however, that someone else was just Sasuke.

"I haven't felt like working on it." Knobs turn. Showers are on.

I'm hit with the warm-on the verge of hot-water, and, although I'm used to the pressure of it, feel as if I'm being drilled by thrown rocks.

Sasuke snorts in the stall beside me. "Figured."

We clean ourselves in peace for a few moments. I bask in the feel of the heat, turning to allow the force of the water to pound a heavy-handed massage into my achy back. Then I tilt my head back, eyes on the molding ceiling, to let the water slide through my hair. Since I forgot to bring my own shampoo (or rather, since I didn't feel like bringing my own), I use the shampoo in the stall to wash my hair; it's watery and smells of chemicals unnamed, but, as the stuff strips my hair of its natural oils, further damaging my strands, it gets the job done of removing any grease or dandruff that may be lurking on top my head, so for that, I am grateful.

I'm rinsing my hair when Sasuke throws a travel-sized bottle of conditioner-Pantene-over the stall divider. I watch it hit the ground, then bend to inspect the label. This conditioner is for strengthening, and I have to laugh because both my hair and my emotional health are weak at the moment. Pouring the last of the conditioner he saved for me into my palms, I slather it through my hair, imagining that the strengthening ingredients in this conditioner will strengthen my mind, too.

Time seems to slow and ghost past. By the time Sasuke and I get ready to leave our stalls, my water has gone cold, and I know I'm going to be late for my first class: developmental psychology.

"Don't worry about that economics' paper," Sasuke intones, existing his stall with an old towel wrapped around his waist.

"Hm?" I'm adjusting one end of my own towel against my chest.

"It's due at 12, right?"

Hope spawns in my chest. "11:59."

"I'll have it done by then. Just make sure you give me your student user and pass before you head out tonight."

A small smile stretches across my face for the first time all week. We walk side by side back to our dorm room, leaving watery foot prints as we go. "Who says I'm going out tonight?" I ask once we reach our door.

"Neji and Ten." He grimaces as well as unlocks the plain, wooden door to our dorm room. As returning students, I would've thought we would have received more flattering dorms this year, but I guess I was, as usual, wrong to imagine having anything nicer than I am given.

Wait. I'm going out with Neji and TenTen? "I don't have a say in this?"

Sasuke stops what he's doing to stare back at me, giving me his best, 'c'mon now' look.

Whatever, my genuinely agonized frown says back to him.

We head into the room to get dressed, and all I can think of is how I'm going to survive this night out of the comfort of my own room.

"TenTen here is the best in her class," Neji brags as we sit across from each other at a red booth in a relatively unknown restaurant. His lavender-grey eyes are cool, yet expressive as he goes on and on about how his fabulous girlfriend earns perfect scores for exam grades and has gained the favor of doctors who she might have the honor of working beside in later years of med-school.

TenTen sits beside him, eyes closed, grinning from ear to ear.

"Wow," I hum, totally disinterested.

"Yeah," Neji agrees, oblivious to my apathy. "Doctor Spade says she's one of a kind! He's the best doc at the hospital and he thinks she'll surpass his own genius."

"So cool."

TenTen catches ear of my annoyance and gazes at me with surprised eyes. What? Am I the first person to not give a damn about her success in her presence? "Hinata," she says, caramel brown brows furrowing. "What's wrong?"

"And-Huh?" Neji pauses, glancing back from me to TenTen and back.

TenTen's sea shell pink lips fall into a petulant frown. "I would've thought you'd be more accepting of my achievements," she murmurs, doe-like eyes focusing onto the waxy tabletop. Dear God.

Neji frowns, too, and he glares across at me as he wraps a lean, muscular arm around TenTen's broad shoulders. Of course he buys her bullshit. "Hinata...if you don't want to be here, you can go."

I lick my lips and my hands clench up in my laps. I've never been much of a fighter, but I really want to punch Neji. My older cousin and I have never gotten along. And although, when we were much younger, I dreamed of the day he would invite me out with his friends and speak of me with love and pride, right now all I want is for him to get out of my life. Or for me to get out of his.

"Did you hear me?" he asks, voice rising, indignant.

TenTen's lips quirk into a smug grin. She buries her face into the crook of Neji's neck, avoiding the the murderous glare I'm giving her.

Before I can say or do anything I know I'll regret, I force myself up from my end of the booth and exhale sharply. "Neji, TenTen. I just remembered I have an assignment due before the end of the night. If you'll excuse me..."

Slipping my tote bag over my arm, I slide out from the booth. I wait for Neji to scold me on either my rude behavior to his beloved girlfriend or on my procrastinating ways, but when he says nothing to me, I turn on my toes and leave the two love-dumb idiots where they sit. I hope they have a nice dinner.

I'm on my way home to the dorm. As I walk through the campus courtyard which lies in the center of all the dormitory halls, I can't help but imagine Sasuke diligently writing my Economics paper for me. I visualize the stern look of concentration on his face as he furiously types a fifteen-page research essay. Idly, I wonder if he even knows the requirement for my paper, but then I realize I don't care.

I don't care if he turns my paper in for me and I receive one hundred out of one hundred or a bright red zero for my grade. I don't care if he misses the deadline and turns my paper in a second too late, or if my professor recognizes that Sasuke's style and tone of writing are not the same as mine and calls me to talk about dropping his class.

I'm tired. That's the truth. I'm tired of school work, drained from it really. I don't know how Sasuke puts up with all his classes and their neediness so effortlessly, but if there's one thing I've learned in my year and a half of knowing him is that Sasuke is a machine. He works almost selflessly, devoting all his time to his studies, barely paying attention to his own basic needs like eating, exercising, or even sleeping. And while Sasuke is such a hard-working student who's sure to become something in life, I am lazy and I need to take my time when writing. I don't like reading specifically for my classes, and I hate, over everything school-related, lectures. If I can't learn in the privacy of my own space, I guess I don't want to learn at all.

And this little slice of acknowledgement only makes me feel more worse about my current mental situation.

I am a selfish worker and learner both. And there's nothing I can do to be selfless like Sasuke or tenacious like TenTen or even cunning and a cheater like Neji. I am...useless, unimportant, the opposite of driven. When I really think about it, I have no reason to live. I offer nothing to this world but constant moping and insecurity, and I...I...

My lips creak open like worn steel being pulled apart. A cool whiff of air in an inhale, and then, through a shaky exhale, I tell myself the truth that I've longed to hear for these past couple of months, "I don't want to be alive." Especially when I can't remember how to live.

And I don't mean for this statement to sound dramatic because, in actuality, I know it's not. In past studies, I've read the suicide statistics in the States, Japan, and so-on. I know that, living in America, the suicide rate is supposedly a lot lower than that of Japan, but even here, I still feel inexplicably useless and, even with Sasuke, a former Japan-native and a genuinely good guy, I still feel alone.

I guess, in the end, there's just a void in me that no one can feel. Maybe I was, like my father used to tell me long ago, a mistake. Maybe I wasn't meant to be alive. Or maybe, like Sasuke told me the first time we really spoke last year, I am just too sensitive for this world.

I don't know. I just find myself, on a daily basis, wanting to be anywhere but here. Moving from Japan, I thought I would finally open up here. In the seasonal state of Pennsylvania, I foolishly believed a change of scenery would mean nicer people and inspiration to succeed better in life, but I was wrong...as always.

Before I approach the dormitories, I make a swift left and make my way through and out of campus. I have no idea where I'm going, and I'm as cold as can be, but I make like I'm alive until I'm out on a main road and standing beneath a ramp that swirls up to the highway, and for the first time in my life, I feel weightless, like a feather in a zephyr.

Locking my eyes on the speeding bright lights of semi-trucks, sedans, and SUVs alike, my breath seems to leave me, and no longer do I feel the harsh chill of the November air, but a great warmth.

...I suppose you know what I am going to do.

Lifting one foot at a time, struggling to walk in a straight line, I make my way up the ramp, staying inside the breakdown lane, not truly ready to feel the impact of a thousand pounds of steel slam into my body.

A chill runs down my spine...I've made it up the ramp, and can now look back and stare down at where I started.

Feeling has returned to my legs, and shaking, I edge along the side of the highway. People acknowledge my presence by pressing down on their horns, hoping to either scare me off or make me jump out in front of them faster.

I've never been one for prayer, but as there is a break in the rushing cars, and further down the lane closest to me I see the shining armor grill of a truck, I allow my eyes to close and whisper to whatever benevolent being there is in the sky that this death is quick, painless, and permanent.

Right leg back, hands balled into fists, I inhale sharply, savoring my last breath of air. And then, I run.

The events that were so solid, tightly coiled in my mind, unravel in seconds. The truck swerves to the right, its large silver head dodging my frame by a millisecond, and just when I'm about to curse my fate, the tail end of the truck swings in my direction, hitting me in my chest and knocking me up, up, up, before gravity yanks me back to the ragged asphalt slick with black ice.

My vision falters, but only for a second. Blinking rapid-fire, I notice the trunk has flipped and is smoking in a ditch. My gaze is weak as I watch the smoke curl and rise. I'm so close to the truck, having been dragged in the direction of its crash when the bed of it slapped me forward. And, strangely enough, as I lay still and feel a sick pain in my lower back, a random thought crosses my mind. I wonder if Sasuke's finished that paper yet.

I wish I could say I blacked out now, that darkness consumes me and I feel nothing, but I don't feel like lying tonight.

The truth is everything hurts. My legs feel mangled, as if they've been chewed up and spit out. My torso screams something incomprehensible. My head is ringing and I hear high pitched sounds in the back of my mind.

There are still tires squealing, and all of a sudden, someone screams as if they've never seen a single-car wreck before...or were there more? Did a car crash into the back of the truck? Did someone, trying to avoid the spinning truck, swerve themselves into a ditch, too?

A horrible feeling gnaws in the pit of my gut.

I've caused this. Whatever tragedies occur tonight, I'll know they've all been my fault.

Thick tuffs of white fall from the sky, and for a moment, I wonder if they're ashes. And then I realize they're snowflakes.

And while I'm wishing to pass out, for everything, all this pain and these thoughts and that nasty acrid smell of leaking gasoline coming from the truck to be over, something else falls from the sky...Well, no. It doesn't fall, but it floats. A thin sheet of black and white and purple and blue. An image of a collar and shiny silver bell hanging off of its side.

I'm aware of the word "submissive" flashing in bold on the center of the page, and yet another random thought crosses my mind. I'll read that tomorrow, I tell myself, as if somewhere deep in my psyche, I know I'll be alive.

You can breathe now. That was a heavy first chapter, and I'm not sorry for it. There have been numerous frustrations clawing into my heart these past couple of months, and after a series of self-doubts and idealizations, I've decided to post this fanfic and work it from the ground up. I don't know if it'll be anything great or if loads of people will love it and read it and love it some more. All I know is this is the story I've been dying to write and I'm going to write it.

Leave positive feedback if you will.

Be safe,

~LSNSs