Disclaimer: Naruto is not mine. It's Masashi's. The one who went off killing his characters. :P -Peace! :D


AU. SasuSaku. Sasuke's life seems to be going downhill lately. Until a person from his past came back to change it all, just when he decided to be content with his life. That would just be the cherry on top of his sundae of misery.


Under Wraps
By: Vanity-chan

A/N: Okay… This chapter's short, I tell you. This has not been planned. I just found this chapter while I was rummaging through my long-untouched files… Oh well. Have a nice read. The story's a bit… odd. But… I am willing to take the risk. :)


"Just clean up and close the bar, okay, Sasuke?"

Rolling my eyes, I grunted in response to Kakashi and leaned back against the counter. The slow clicking of his shoes against the marble floor was the only sound in the room. Bored, I listened to it until he opened the door, stepped out and was gone.

I sighed, glancing at the bottles and glasses on the counter, some empty, some half-filled and that was the moment I completely realized the time and effort I would be wasting for the task Kakashi left me.

I knew I had no choice but to agree. From now on, I would be doing this every night anyway. Besides, Kakashi had been my guardian-slash-mentor-slash-father for half of my life. When my family died in a plane crash (and my brother just disappeared), Kakashi adopted me and treated me pretty much like his own son.

He sometimes told me that I reminded him of his younger self, but after eight years of living with him, his past is still nothing but a mystery to me. It's as if I knew a lot about him yet at the same time, I knew only a little.

Sigh. I guess that's the way life will go on for us until we die.

I slid off the chair and walked behind the counter to gather all the used glasses and bottles in one corner, my mind unconsciously wandering off thinking different trains of thoughts.

The door opened, pulling me back into reality. I frowned. Kakashi told me to clean up, so I shouldn't be entertaining any customers. I raised my head and turned away from my chores to look at the door. Maybe I had just been hearing things. I was hoping that no one was there, so I could leave the place instead of standing around like a moron cleaning a bar I did not even own.

You could say that I was surprised by what I saw.

It was a young lady, probably around my age, wearing the uniform of the school I was going attending. Her short, pleated black skirt reached down inches above her knees, and she was wearing knee-high socks and black shoes. The top consisted of a white long-sleeved shirt and a black tie. The typical high school uniform for girls.

The strangest thing about her though was her short pink hair that reached just below her chin, and her bright green eyes that struck me with an odd familiarity. The pale girl looked flustered and unsure, but her stride was delicate.

I furrowed my eyebrows, watching as she walked to the counter and directly bypassed me. Silently, I racked my brain for any names of pink-haired girls that I knew of.

Her eyes weren't focused on anything at all, because when she looked at me, it felt as if she was staring right through me and at the bottles of wine on the cupboard.

Dazed, I opened my mouth to speak. "Hey—"

"I want to drown in a bottle of vodka and forget about everything. Tonight."

The moment she spoke, the searching in my head stopped, and I immediately recognized her, getting rid of the mystery of the familiarity that struck me. Her voice was soft. Uncertain, and nervous in tone.

But I chose not to tell her that, to remind her about herself, since she wanted to just "drown herself in a bottle of vodka" and forget about every single problem she had. I was—no, still is a part of that problematic world she wanted to escape from.

"Why would you want to do that?" I asked in a quiet voice, almost hesitant.

She shrugged, placing both her arms on the counter lazily. She probably thought that I was probing her with that question, and chose not to reply.

Well, whatever. I shouldn't care about her problems anyway. Why shou—

"If there was one thing I would never do, it's to cry."

Her answer didn't even give anything away. She was really good at this.

"And this seems to be the easiest alternative."

"I see…" I walked to the corner, still behind the counter and took a glass and a bottle of vodka and opened it. The resounding pop made her eyes flicker towards me, but I was sure, even if she stared at me for a long time, that there was not even a single flash of recognition in her green eyes.

Quietly, I placed the glass on a napkin and let it slide down to where she was sitting, and she took it just as wordlessly, staring at the melting ice in the glass.

I walked in front of her and poured alcohol in her glass. She didn't drink the vodka, and instead, shook the glass with her hand and listened to the cubes of ice clinking against it.

I lost track of how long she was shaking the glass and simply staring at the ice cubes. I was beginning not to care anymore, when she suddenly spoke again.

"I want to drink, but I can't." Her soft voice had been merely above a whisper, and I had to lean in to hear it.

"Would your parents have wanted that?" I asked, almost conversationally, as I turned to get a stool to sit on. I grabbed one and sat on it, clasping my hands together and placing them on the counter.

She flinched. "W-Well… no. They wouldn't have," She paused, watching me play with my fingers as I clasped and unclasped them together, probably as an excuse to look at anything but the glass of vodka. Her fingers were shaking as she pushed the drink towards me.

"So, you're not drinking anymore?" She nodded, staring in my eyes for the first time, not seeing through me.

Somehow, this made her cry. I wonder if she had recognized me judging by the odd stare she gave me, but even if she did, she didn't show it.

"Why? They wouldn't know. They're not here to see it." I said in an expressionless voice, my mind taken over by the soft breaths she was making. I didn't realize her leaning in, or me leaning in. Her hands clenched at my shirt, successfully pulling me towards her. The glass of vodka toppled over and fell down the floor. But I ignored it.

I couldn't think clearly. All I knew was that something, even though I did not know what it was, had to be done. This was quite the scene, and I was glad no one was here to see it.

"Yes… They're not here. They wouldn't know. They're dead."

This sudden revelation pulled me out from my hazy thoughts and I gazed on awkwardly. She cried harder. She had tried her hardest not to, and this made her cry even harder.

Hesitantly, I put a hand on her shoulder. "Um, Sakura?"

I realized my grave mistake a bit too late.

Her hiccups stopped abruptly, her wide green eyes stared back into mine.

"S-Sasuke-kun?"


tbc.


A/N: Prologue, that's why it's short, so don't go on asking me about the length. :) Also, don't hurry me up with this, I have to recall my plans for this fic since it's been buried for too long. :P

Oh. And REVIEWS make me WRITE. So without reviews, I don't have the strength to update! Go on and review please. :)