Naruto in neon.
Naruto is seventeen years old. He has no parents, no money and no friends to support him. With his rent three weeks overdue and a frustrated landlord, Naruto realises that he needs to get a job. But there isn't many jobs available in Konoha for a seventeen year old. Except in the red light district.
Extended summary: Naruto is seventeen years old. He has no parents, no money and no friends to support him. With his rent three weeks overdue and a landlord who, despite his fondness for the boy, is becoming rather frustrated with the absence of the owed money, Naruto realises that to keep a roof over his head and food on his plate, he needs to get a job. But there isn't many jobs available in Konoha for a seventeen year old with little education. Except in the red light district. There, Naruto finds a rather friendly man who agrees to employ him in his strip club, 'Orange Tequila', but on one condition. He will learn from the best dancer there, a long haired, creamy eyed beauty, proud and silent. But he is told that he needs to make the man warm up to everybody around him. This proves to be a challenge, but the sunny boy takes it on with a smile on his face, and had even gotten the creamy eyed man to smile and talk a little. Naruto payed his overdue rent, got some good quality food on his table and even made a few friends in his workplace. Things seem to be going fine until a tall, blond haired man turns up to the club demanding to talk to his long lost son. And Naruto finds out that his entire life has been one big sham…
A/N: Please enjoy this weird little fiction about absolutely nothing. Also, I have decided to write this fiction different to all my other Naruto ones by only having Naruto's point of view. Enjoy the drabble!
Naruto sighed, and slipped the small silver vest over his bare, tan chest to join the small orange hotpants and thigh-high silver boots that hugged his legs. This was his third week working at 'Orange Tequila', and he was beginning to become used to the whole routine. Every night at ten thirty, he turned up at the club, reported to his boss and changed into one of his many outfits for the night. There seemed to be a large crowd out tonight, and Naruto smiled inside at the thought of collecting a large amount of money. Maybe now he could buy that new bed he'd had his eye on for a few months now.
Stretching like a feline, he spotted his 'mentor' walking towards him, dressed in his usual black and silver and looking like a creamy eyed god. Neji had become quite fond of Naruto, and had taught him the sorts of tricks (apart from his looks) that had made Neji rather famous in the club.
Naruto was still a little shaky on stage, and as he walked over to the bar and was lifting his leg up in order to climb atop it, he very nearly toppled over in fright when a man grabbed the top of his thigh in a strong, sweaty grip and tipped him off balance. Neji was over there in a flash, yanking the man's hand roughly off of the blond and catching Naruto as he fell before placing him gently on the bar.
He laughed heartily, throwing a hand behind his head carelessly, and thanked Neji for his help. The long haired man smiled a tiny, barely noticeable smile and told Naruto not to worry about it. The man that had grabbed his leg smiled apologetically and handed over a twenty dollar bill in condolence. Naruto gave him a wide smile.
Music started blaring, grungy and sexy, and the patrons swung their heads towards the various places in the club that they knew the dancers would be, waiting in place to begin dancing. It was custom in Orange Tequila for the patrons to keep their hands to themselves unless they were handing over money, or unless the dancer invited them to touch. It was mainly for this reason that Naruto had agreed to take this job when he had propositioned Jiraiya and had been briefed by the man about what would be expected of him and of the customers.
Naruto believed that he was one of the more lucky and privileged dancers in the area, as the crowd they usually got at Orange Tequila was a small, rather mild mannered one. The men would get a little raunchy and overstretch their limits sometimes, but they always respected the dancers when they said 'no'. The men that came to this bar each night were easily identifiable and were all regulars. Naruto now knew them all by name, and greeted them sweetly and friendlily as he prepared himself to dance. He waited for his cue, and got it straight away as Neji started to gyrate his hips excruciatingly slowly, teasing the well built, dark haired man directly in front of him.
Naruto smiled, and swivelled on a foot so that he could sway his hips to tantalise his dozen customers with a backside that was clad in nothing but tiny orange hotpants that only barely covered half of it anyway. They whistled, and Naruto felt the satisfying touch of money sliding into the tops of his boots. He knew that his customers were generous to him, and were sliding fifty dollar notes in there, and not just ten dollar notes or twenty. That was why he danced extra special for them. Equivalent exchange.
A grungy, heavy song washed over him, drenching him in it's heavy and slow rhythm and drawn out lyrics. As he turned, he noticed that a few of his clients were not looking at him, and instead had their heads turned toward the back of the room where a tall figure stood, scowling from within his hood. Naruto smiled coyly at the man, despite the glare he was receiving, and continued to dance, stripping his vest off as he did so. The man who he knew to be Paul slipped a one hundred dollar bill into his boot. Naruto smiled.
The song came to a close just as Naruto was about to pull off his shorts to join his boots and vest, and he sighed, knowing that this was planned for tantalisation of the customers. Shooting a nervous glance at the still glaring man, Naruto whipped his shed clothing up, careful not to spill any of the money out of his boots, flashed a brazen smile at his customers, and skipped out back to meet Neji, who was changing into his next outfit just as he entered the room.
He told Neji of his worries, earning a concerned glance from another dancer, Kiba, as the wolfish man overheard the conversation, and Neji told him to just ignore the man. Naruto replied that he wasn't so sure he could do that, as the man had begun to argue with Jiraiya as Naruto was leaving the room, pointing enigmatically at the sunny little blond dancer as he did so. Kiba said that the man had probably just confused the club as a whore house, and wanted Naruto to fuck him out back, and Neji threw a heeled boot at him for his trouble.
Their conversation was cut short, however when the man himself stalked into the room to face a half naked Naruto, who was now dressed only in some horribly ripped jeans that were undone at the top, came to stand in front of him and grabbed one of his shoulders with a tanned hand. Naruto's mouth dropped open and he only had a few seconds to notice Neji being held back by a frantic Jiraiya, the rest of the dancers staring at the scene.
Then the man said something that immediately explained the situation and added confusion to it all at the same time. And Naruto realised that his entire life had been mislead.
"Uzamaki Naruto?" he let his hood drop back, to reveal blond hair, bright blue eyes and tanned skin just like Naruto's own, and Naruto gasped loudly before the man continued, "You are my son."
Naruto froze, his skimpy shirt falling from his hands in shock as he blinked huge eyes up at the man.
"Naruto doesn't have a father, sir," Kiba felt obliged to say, "He told us so himself!"
Neji spoke after him, "Exactly. And even if you are his father, he wants nothing to do with a man that has abandoned him and stayed away all his life."
Both of them received a loud warning growl from Jiraiya, who was still holding Neji back, and they shut their mouths in fear of losing their jobs.
The man licked his lips nervously, and Naruto noticed absently that they were shaped like his own; full, a soft pink and generous. With a start, he also realised that their hair was almost exactly the same shade, their skin identical in colour. Their eyes could have come from the same man. Either this man was just some uber freaky stalker that had gotten surgery to look like him, or he was Naruto's father, like he said he was.
Naruto was at a loss for words. He said what came to his mind first.
"You look like me." He swallowed, "You so totally look like me!"
The man smiled nostalgically and nodded slightly, "You would think so."
Naruto thought that the man was a little too good to be true. His father, coming into his life after a long seventeen years alone? And for some unexplained reason that probably was stupid anyway?
"How do I know that you're actually my dad?" he queried, biting a lip, "I mean, like, why would my dad just come back like that after he dumped me at the orphanage for no damn reason? And seventeen years later? It's stupid. You're just some creepy dude who I danced for and you're obsessed with me so much that you got millions of dollars worth of surgery so you could look like the underage stripper that you were perving on and giving money to last week! Well, go home pervert! I don't do old guys!"
The man looked affronted, and shook his head violently at Naruto. "No, I'm not a pervert Naruto! I haven't been around becau- Look, let's discuss this someplace else. Your apartment, perhaps?"
"Rape! No! You'll rape me! Freaky stalker man!"
Jiraiya handed Neji over to a couple of the stronger dancers, and stepped forward, "Naruto."
The blond ceased flailing, and whipped his head around to look at his boss.
"Naruto," he continued, "This man showed me identification. His name is Namikaze Minato."
Naruto looked unimpressed, "My sir-name is 'Uzumaki', not 'Namikaze'. Your argument has no grounds."
Minato sighed, "'Uzumaki' was your mothers' name. Uzumaki Kushina. (1) She died just after giving birth to you."
Naruto rolled his eyes, "I know how she died! They told me at the orphanage."
Minato smirked. "You can't deny that I'm in favour of the argument right now."
Silence was his only answer from Naruto.
Minato sighed, and reached into his pocket. Naruto wondered briefly if the man was going to pull a gun on him. His thoughts were scattered as Minato pulled out a small photograph and held it up to Naruto's face.
"Look. This is you, you're mother and I. You were just born."
"But-"
"No, just shut up and look."
Naruto's curiosity overwhelmed him, and he peeked at the photograph. Minato sat on a hospital bed next to a fiery haired woman, looking at their new-born son. The baby had three small parallel lines on each cheek, identical to Naruto's own, and his large blue eyes could have been taken from Naruto's own skull. Naruto had no doubt that the child was him. And he had no doubts now that this man was his father.
He stared at the photo until Minato tucked it back into his pocket, and continued staring after it.
Jiraiya spoke up to break the tension, "Be reasonable, kid. If the man wanted another lap dance, he would've just joined the rest of the crowd."
Minato shot Naruto an absolutely horrified look, and squeaked, "You've been giving people lap dances!? Naruto!"
"Don't try to father me when you haven't been around for seventeen years!" Naruto fumed, his eyes blazing, "If I wanna give someone a lap dance, I'll give 'em a freakin' lap dance!"
Minato grinned wolfishly, exactly the way Naruto grinned, and he held triumph in his eyes, "You're not objecting that I am your father."
"Fine. You're my dad." Naruto pouted, "But you can't boss me around, mofo.(2)"
"Don't use that kind of language, Naruto!"
"Don't tell me what to do, Minato!"
"You will call me 'father', you disrespectful little shit!"
"I think 'baka-sennin' is more appropriate!"
"You are grounded for the rest of your life!"
"Daaaaad!"
"That's better."
A/N:
(1)
As far as I know, Kushina is Naruto's mother's name. I didn't
just make it up. =)
(2) 'Mofo' is an abbreviation for 'mother-fucker.'
Naruto slid his key into the front door, ignoring the shouts from his landlord for no loud sex and the equally loud shouts from Minato to leave his son alone. Sighing, he pocketed his cell phone after reading a message from Neji that explained his foul mouthed opinion on the whole matter, and he walked into the apartment, his father on his heels.
Minato let loose a low whistle as he stepped inside to survey the place where his son lived. Naruto rolled his eyes as the taller blond raised an eyebrow and shook his head at the scattered clothing and various pieces of paper that lay in the room as though they had been discarded there by a snow storm.
"…Nice place."
Laughing, Naruto went to the kitchen after slipping his shoes off at the front door, and filled the kettle for tea. He heard Minato take off his own shoes, exclaim in mild disgust at something he had to move off the couch, and sit down. Grinning widely, he filled the cups and stirred the tea in slowly, relishing in making Minato kill time by doing a total of nothing while he waited.
"How many sugars do you have in your tea?" he shouted from the kitchen, "Two?"
The received his answer shortly, "One, thank you. I don't like sweet things very much."
Naruto muttered "Stupid old man with old taste buds. Must've gotten my awesome taste in foods from my mother then" and added four spoons of sugar to Minato's tea, the same as his own. Stuff the old man, he was having what he was given.
Walking back into the room, stifling a mischievous grin, Naruto gave the tea to Minato and sat down next to him.
"Here you go, Pa."
"Pa?" Minato stared at his son, thinking something along the lines of 'Oh God, he has a sense of humour like his mother's'.
"Daddy."
"Naruto, be reasonable."
"Old man."
"At least I don't work in a whorehouse!"
Naruto bristled, "It's not a whorehouse! And I'd have an honest living if you were around to pay for stuff for me!"
Minato took a sip from his cup, probably hoping to console himself, and instead earned a mouthful of tea with four spoons worth of sugar in it. Gagging, he wiped a hand over his mouth, scowled at Naruto and set his cup on the coffee table in front of him.
"I said one spoon, not fifty!" he threw an exasperated look at Naruto, who was laughing boisterously next to him, "What is wrong with you? Did the people at the orphanage drop you a few too many ti-Oh my god, is that a futon? I would've thought you slept on the floor."
Naruto stared.
Minato smirked.
"What are you, five?" Naruto blurted, "Grow up, dad."
Minato clapped his hands together and held them near his face his eyes sparkling, "Aw, you just called me 'dad'! My baby said his first word!"
"I've been speaking to you ever since you waltzed into my work!" Naruto took a deep breath, "And I started talking years ago, freak. My first word was 'ramen' and my second work was 'Fuck you'."
"That's two words. And did you really say that?" Minato was disbelieving, "Who taught you to say that?"
Naruto sighed, "I was kidding, you idiot. I just felt like saying it to you. Fuck you. That feels good. You should try it."
It was Minato's turn to role his eyes, and he did so to the best of his ability. "My son is a complete moron."
"And he swears a lot. So get used to it."
"Just make me another cup of tea. And I don't want sugar this time."
Naruto chuckled, "Sure, old man."
Minato watched his son fuss about in the kitchen with eyes warmed with the relief of seventeen years of separation and as many years that he had not seen his son grow up. Since Naruto had been born, a tiny infant, cheeks soft and marred with strange whisker marks, Minato had loved him. Since then he had not seen him.
Forced to leave his son for reasons that were extraordinarily difficult to explain to this seventeen year old Naruto that was so foreign to him, Minato was faced with a young man, independent and strong, intelligent and motivated. This was no longer the delicate infant that he had cradled in his arms all of those years ago. This was a grown man. A young one, but mature indeed.
Naruto looked frighteningly like Minato himself. He harboured the same bright eyes, the same white blond hair that fell in wisps to frame a tanned, youthful face. The very same half grin favoured by both men graced the youngers' face as he glanced over to see Minato scrunching his nose up at a large tub of sugar. Even the same slender, fine boned hands and wiry slim frame; agile and athletic. As the younger blond flitted to the cupboard to fetch something, Minato thought he caught a glimpse of the same vaguely eagle shaped birthmark on his right shoulder blade as Naruto's jacket slipped off his shoulder and dragged the loose shirt with it. He briefly recalled his joy of long ago upon having discovered the mark on his new born son, of sharing a proud, teary eyed smile with his wife.
The only things that he had obtained from his mother were her enormous sweet tooth and her feminine and beautiful looks that lent a twist on Minato's more masculine features.
As the younger version of himself served him tea- that Minato fervently hoped was void of any sugar- the older man noticed a sheen of something glittering faintly on Naruto's eyelids. His eyelashes looked a little longer too…
"Naruto, are you wearing make-up?" Minato set down his cup of tea before he could taste it upon the realisation that his son was indeed wearing make-up, "Why are you wearing make-up?!"
Naruto rolled his eyes in a way that agonisingly reminded Minato of Kushina and sat down next to his father, taking a sip of his own (probably sugar infested) cup of tea before he bothered to reply.
"I don't see the point in you asking me something when you've already come up with the answer on your own," Naruto rose an eyebrow at Minato as if to tell him that he was an idiot, "Seriously. Like, you just wasted about four seconds of your life asking me that."
Taking a deep breath at his son's insolence, Minato repeated his last question, albeit less shrilly, "Why are you wearing make-up?"
"It makes my regulars like me more," replied Naruto matter-of-factly, "Which means they pay more. Which means that I can pay for my rent and my food and not have to go without eating because I had to pay my agro landlord."
Minato took a very cautious sip of his new cup of tea and sighed with relief on discovering that it had no sugar to speak of in it, and sighed before responding, "You don't need to work at a place like that, Naruto. There's plenty of places around that'll pay you more and have better working conditions than some…strip joint!"
"Hey!" Naruto was indignant, "They pay me lots! I get paid 150 a night for dancing by Jiraiya and then I get lots of tips from the customers! Easy money, Minato!"
"Didn't I tell you not to call me by my name?"
"Yeah, well," Naruto shot back, "I don't feel comfortable calling someone 'dad' who hasn't been around for all of my fucking life!"
An uncomfortable silence ensued, consuming the last angry words and magnifying the malicious intent until the silence could not be had any longer. Naruto looked up hesitantly from his seat next to his father and apologised in a small voice for his angry words.
Minato shook his head and swallowed before he spoke, shifting in his white cloak, "No. Naruto, you are right. I shouldn't be here, trying to win you over after being such a lousy father. Actually, I haven't been a father at all and I understand if you want me to leave, I just…I wanted to see you, see what kind of a man you turned out to be. And when I saw you dancing for…for these sleazy men, taking you clothes off, it just-it made me angry. That I wasn't there to stop you from doing that, that I've never been there to stop you from doing anything or to hold you when you cried or to teach you how to talk to girls and everything…And you won't ever be able to comprehend how apologetic I am. I do have my reasons for not being there, Naruto. And when I think you're ready to take it all in without your head exploding from the knowledge, I'll tell you. But for now –if you'll let me- I'd really like to get to know the son that I wasn't there to get to know as he grew up. Would you let me be the father that I've been aching to be for seventeen years?"
Naruto sat in silence for quite some time after Minato's speech, fiddling with the edge of the table cloth and not meeting the older man's eyes. Minato didn't blame him.
"It was the only job I could get…" the seventeen year old finally spoke in a small voice, so unlike his usual energetic and vibrant one, "There's heaps of students living around here, so most of the other jobs are already taken…The only reasons I got the job with Jiraiya is cause I'm small and I'm pretty and I can dance. And I was willing to do it. I…I can't even afford to go to school, I really needed the money! I wasn't even eating! Iruka only has so much patience when it comes to overdue rent, I didn't want to put off paying it forever. It was an opportunity that I just had to take up. You understand, don't you?"
After a brief nod from Minato, Naruto continued with his speech, still in a small and subdued voice, "You don't need to be sorry, Minato. Just…explain to me soon, cause it's gonna drive me insane trying to figure you out. You can be my dad, but I don't want you to go all Nazi on me and give me curfews and shit, okay? I can look after myself. I've been doing it most of my life."