II.
Renge curls over the book in his lap and shoos away the sunlight with a hand at the top of the page. He's squinting down at the words and mumbling them to himself when he hears the rustle of grass being disturbed nearby, and although he doesn't look up to see who's there, he groans aloud. "Go away," he tells them.
"Why?" Naruto asks defiantly, settling down beneath the tree Renge has claimed for the day. "Aren't you bored?"
Renge rolls his eyes and flips the page pointedly. "Nope."
Naruto twirls his fingers over his knees before letting his legs sprawl out in front of him. His hands tug his shorts down absently. "Don't you wanna play with the others?"
"Not really," Renge grumbles. He shrugs his too-big jacket back over his shoulders when it threatens to fall past his twig-thin arms. "We don't like playing together," he admits.
Naruto's face scrunches, faded white scars on his cheeks crinkling in the sun. "They always wanna play with you," the blond argues. He bites his lip and glances across the lawn at the other kids giggling and tackling each other; playing ninja. "Not me."
At last, Renge lifts his head from his book and shoves his loose curls out of his face. "They don't wanna play with me, dummy," he tells Naruto, scowling. "They don't like me." He shifts his moody glare towards the orphanage and slams his book shut, folding over it protectively. "I don't care. They're stupid."
Naruto's blue eyes are wide with disbelief when they skitter over towards Renge again. "But they played ninja with you before!"
Renge scowls and stares at Naruto like he's sprouted three heads. "You're an idiot," he tells the younger boy decisively. Naruto sputters and opens his mouth to yell, but Renge doesn't feel like listening to him screech like a baby today. "They just wanted to hit me and take my stuff."
The younger boy lets his gaze flitter from Renge to the other kids across the lawn for a few seconds, and then asks, "Like bandits?"
"I guess," the dark haired boy allows.
Naruto pulls his t-shirt up over his chin, biting at the collar of it nervously. "Bandits aren't nice, y'know," he mumbles into it.
"No duh."
"Why aren't they nice to you?" the blond wonders, tugging his shirt back out of his mouth when Renge glares at it in disgust.
Renge sighs, annoyed. "Why are you so nosy?" he retorts, dropping his book back onto the grass in the middle of his half-crossed legs and flipping it open to the page he'd last read. Naruto squawks in protest, hands reaching out and fluttering indecisively around Renge's shoulders and legs and the book between them, but not touching. "My name is Renge."
Naruto stops moving, tongue caught between his teeth. He stares for so long Renge wonders if he's fallen asleep with his eyes open. The matron sometimes did that. "I know," he whispers. "I'm Naruto."
Renge scoffs, bending his head down and dragging his fingers across the page. "I know, idiot," he says, then mumbles a few words off the page to himself. "They think my name is girly, and they don't like it. Me."
Naruto flushes and digs his hands into the grass between his legs, tugging at it as the edges of his shorts flop slightly in the wind. "Is it?"
The curly haired boy glares at him, affronted. "No!" Then, he deflates. "Maybe. I dunno. I don't like bugs."
Naruto glances at the older boy and bites his lip. "I don't either," he tells Renge. It seems like it's only half of a lie, and so Renge doesn't do much more than spare him a wry look. "Who cares, anyway? Bugs are ugly, y'know!" the younger boy declares so loudly a few birds twitter angrily out of the trees behind them.
"Yeah, I know," Renge groans. He thinks if he keeps hanging out with Naruto, he'll be saying that a lot. He glances across the lawn to where the other kids are roughhousing, paying them no mind, and wonders if it's really worth it. Trading one big dummy for eighty small ones seems to even itself out more than it tips the balance in his favor. "It doesn't matter. I'm not a girl."
Naruto grins. "Yeah, I know," he snickers. Renge's face and ears burn red, and he shoves his face back down into his book. "They're really not your friends?" he asks after a few quiet minutes have passed. He's hesitant, again, and the dark haired boy thinks of how Naruto's bravery really does seem to come and go in short bursts. Annoying.
"Nope," he responds, distracted. He flips a page in the book and continues mumbling the words to himself softly.
"I'm not friends with them either," Naruto tells him, as though that's news.
Renge looks at him from the corner of his eye, shoving some of his curls back behind his ear. "You're not friends with anyone," he says. It's not cruel if it's true.
Naruto, who usually begins yelling and stomping away when someone says something honest, falls deathly silent. His fingers don't even tug any more of the grass out of the lawn. Renge almost asks him what's wrong, but then he realizes he doesn't actually care, so he turns back to his book and waits for the younger boy to either say something or run off.
"Aren't we friends?" Naruto eventually whispers. Renge stops reading his book immediately, mouth halfway through sounding out the next word on the page, and while he doesn't look at Naruto, it's obvious he's paying attention to him. The blond stares at the side of the older boy's head boldly, even though his face is so pale he looks nearly dead.
Renge lifts a hand to his lips and tugs at them anxiously. "Are we?" he asks. He'd meant to say no.
"We hugged," Naruto answers, as though that means anything. Renge still won't look at him.
"Like girls," the older boy grumbles. His ears are tipped with red.
"Like friends," Naruto corrects, all-knowing. He's only five. What does he know about friends? It's not like he's ever had any.
Renge purses his lips and doesn't say any of that, though. "You're dumb," is what he settles on.
"Am not!" Naruto screeches, tackling him into the grass. Renge's book gets squashed beneath their bodies and the older boy gasps in horror.
"Are too! Get off! You're gonna squish my book!" He jabs a hand into Naruto's stomach and rolls them over until they hit a tree. Naruto giggles stupidly and pulls at Renge's hair as Renge jerks his head to make sure his book isn't ruined, sitting on Naruto's stomach to keep him down. His book looks okay from there, so he turns back to the blond and rips his hand out of his hair before using it to smack at the scars on Naruto's cheeks.
"Stop hitting yourself," he tells the boy.
Naruto twists his hand around until he's gripping Renge's fingers hard enough to break them and holds their hands far away from his face, stubbornly ignoring the twitch of them as Renge tries to pull them back to hit Naruto again.
He's grinning, though, and he looks so happy Renge thinks he might cry. He's probably an ugly crier. He's not very cute in the first place.
They wrestle until the caregivers say it's lunchtime. Renge cradles his book close to his chest, doesn't bother to brush the grass and dirt off of his overalls, and ignores the new rips and tears in his hand-me-down jacket. He checks and double-checks that his book has received nary a crinkle in its pages and eyes Naruto warily as the younger boy tries and fails to whistle while skipping back into the orphanage.
He spots and pulls a twig out of the blond boy's hair to use as a bookmark. Naruto looks over his shoulder at him and laughs.
No one bothers them as they eat. Renge smiles into his peas.
