Halfway down the stairs in the main corridor, it occurred to her she'd taken off without indulging in slamming the door—right off the frame. Juvenile, maybe, but satisfying. It was only with the greatest exertion of self-control that she didn't turn back and do just that.
There was no reason to add property damage to this week's "misconduct report". It was a little surprising that he didn't call after her, not even to threaten that her guardian would 'be hearing about this, too.' She supposed it went without saying at this point. Hell, she'd give them one for free—at least storming out of that room could be considered a legitimate, intentional breach of etiquette on her part.
Better that than to be chastised for writing a paper too factually.
Libel? As though she was some rumor-mongering housewife chatting away at a corner store, trying to hurt the Uchiha's collective feelings. Writing about the noble clans in terms unclouded by politics or history didn't make her a slanderer—it made her a, a scientist. Plenty of people would draw the conclusions she had, if they bothered to think. With their presence on the council, their policing, their prodigies in ANBU, were the Uchiha really so fragile that they could be hurt by a strongly-worded school assignment?
She had been no kinder to the Hyuuga, whose policies of interfamilial sealing bordered on legal slavery, or the Akimichi, whose fading relevancy saw them withdrawing from the political landscape in recent years. She had not even cast the Aburame, whose birthrates have not seen significant improvement in a decade, in a particularly flattering light.
But of course Tanaka-sensei had only seen an upstart badmouthing a rival clan.
Fumio leaned into her walk, slouching and predatory. Her hands were shoved aggressively into her pockets, and her threadbare scarf was trailing behind like a warning flag. Not that there was anyone to witness her mood—the younger classes had already been sent home for the day, and the upper classes were still eating outside in the training yard.
There was still some time left before lunch ended, if she wanted to get a quick meal in, but she dismissed the idea. She was too wound up to rejoin her classmates just yet. Going in agitated would just invite further trouble.
Her kikaichu scurried frantically under her skin and in her coat, sending out concerned pulses of chakra, ready to burst from her body at the slightest command. They soaked in her norepinephrine and shared in her dismay. Sensing no enemy nearby, and confused about the nature of the threat to their host, they were prepared to spring to action at a command. She saturated her body in chakra to keep them close but didn't give them the all-clear signal. Their panicked activity scratched soothingly at the inch in her brain that always wanted to fidget, to pace, to wring her hands and bite her lip.
The halls flashed by in a pattern of educational posters and children's drawings. She felt she'd outgrown this place. Already the desks were just a little too small, and with a year and a half of the academy still remaining, they would only become smaller. Provided, of course, she graduated at all. And with her grades fluctuating so wildly, who could say with certainty that her graduation would come to pass? What a disappointment she was.
Shibi-ojisama was going to love hearing about this when he got back from his field mission in two days. Nothing better than to hear that a child in your care were trying to start a school-paper-based blood feud in your absence.
Damn, damn, damn. Tanaka was never supposed to have seen that paper.
She was such an idiot.
A bloom of kikaichu poured out of her sleeves onto the surface of her jacket. She quickly pulled them back. This behavior was unbecoming. Control. She needed to exert control.
Fumio half-heartedly attempted her breathing exercises and imagined how disappointed Shibi-ojisan would be, to see her losing control from so minor a confrontation. The thought sat like a chunk of ice in the pit of her stomach, but her insects were calling for blood and retribution—she wanted to let them at it. Anger was more comfortable than shame, but no less familiar.
There were spars after lunch. It might be prudent to channel this frustration into a quick fight.
She thought of the time she'd broken Yoko's arm during practice. She'd been in a mood like this then, too. It was surprising how much damage you could do before the teachers pulled you off your opponent.
Fumio had reveled in the violence of that moment. And here she was, ready to do it all over again. Shibi-ojisama, Kazue and even Shiase-shishou, all those years ago—hadn't they talked about exactly this? The same conversation, a hundred times. She felt sick.
More than that, she was incensed. At sensei, at herself, at everything.
"You know, you're kind of scary when you're mad."
Fumio turned back, fingers tensing into fists, a snide remark already forming on her lips.
But it was just Hana. Well, Hana and the dogs.
She was wearing a tan blouse that sat comfortably at the crossroads of fashion and function, and standard issue blue pants. No jewelry, but as it was, she didn't need any to stand out. Her long brown hair was tied back, likely in preparation for the coming taijutsu exercise. Her large coal eyes crinkled. Hana was beautiful, even when she was frowning so severely that it was pulling at her clan tattoos.
"I'm not mad."
"I could hear you buzzing from halfway across the academy. You going somewhere?" Hana asked, the three puppies in her arms matching her probing look for intensity.
Fumio realized they were standing in of the side entrances of the academy, the one that let out nearest the commercial district. She'd walked here without even thinking about it. But now that her head had caught up to her feet…
If she was breaking the rules, she might as well go all the way.
"I seem to have missed lunch," Fumio said, forcing a bit of a smile. "Provided you aren't too full already, do you want to join me?"
And with that, the pointed concern on Hana's face blunted considerably. It was a relief to see.
"You'll pay?" she asked, a fang glinting through painted lips.
"I'll pay."
"Yakiniku?"
"I'll leave the choice to you," Fumio said, approximating graciousness.
"Yakiniku," Hana confirmed.
Hana walked over and with familiar, fussing hands, yanked down Fumio's hood and rested one of her dogs inside like a sling. She handed Fumio another, then used the moments it took Fumio to settle the puppy under her arm to mess with the Aburame's slicked-back hair. The right side now flopped down over her glasses.
"Now you don't look like such a thug," Hana chirped, and so saying, wrapped her free arm around Fumio's left and pulled them forward into the street. Fumio felt man-handled. Really, Hana was the second grabbiest person she knew.
"Thanks," Fumio said, half in sarcastic response to the jab at her appearance, and half in sincere gratitude for the distraction. Hana stuck her nose in the air and smirked.
"I could do worse than you for a boyfriend-of-the-day."
What a thing to say. Audacious. And only half true.
Fumio knew Hana could aspire to do a whole lot better than her for a friend. It wasn't as though the Inuzuka was disliked by their class. Rather, Hana was frankly quite popular among their age group, and there was always someone or another following her about. Any one of them might make a better choice.
The ninken in her hood chuffed once in her ear as if in agreement, then curled up in her hood, resting his small head on her shoulder. The dogs wouldn't have tolerated this treatment back when she and Hana had first met. No, they hadn't taken to her for years—not until Hana had made it clear Fumio weren't going anywhere.
A lot had changed since then.
They made their daring escape from the academy by walking casually in the opposite direction. Still, someone was likely taking note of their truancy. The building did double as the Hokage's office, after all. It only looked unguarded.
It wasn't a very long walk to the restaurant—just called "Yakiniku," it was a simple establishment, good food without pretention. The dining room was open air and spacious, and it was easy to see the entire room no matter where you were sitting. Ninja-friendly. Everything was light-colored wood and cream cloth. The smell, enveloping the block, was divine.
It was high noon, so there was a bit of a line developing. Luckily, she and Hana ate there often enough the young Akimichi couple who owned and operated the place knew them on sight, and fast-tracked them to a small table in the corner, giving them each a tall glass of water to start. The perks of being a preferred customer.
They made a game of eating at Akimichi restaurants and attempting to reverse-engineer their favorite recipes. Fumio had some limited success with this. Hana, less so.
As they settled in, depositing the dogs—who were already gearing up their best begging faces— beneath the table, Akimichi Harui meandered over to take their orders. For Hana, honeyed steak slices with just a hint of garlic and green onion. For Fumio, curry-spiced back roast, marinated for over twenty hours with some of the hottest, mouth-melting peppers she had ever been graced to eat. Certainly the product of a personal garden, Fumio hadn't ever been able to find spices that potent for purchase. The stuff made wasabi paste taste as mild as mashed turnips by comparison.
Already, Hana was pulling faces.
"Oh god, anything but that. Why do you do this to yourself?" she said, one of the dogs giving out an agreeing yip.
Harui-san grinned conspiratorially at them, having known what Fumio would order already, being that she was a creature of habit who rarely strayed from confirmed favorites.
"Same as always then," Harui-san said, her spiral cheeks were puffing up with something close to a parental sort of fondness. She turned and went, very nimble for a woman of her size, and quickly put in their order.
Fumio noticed a spiral of flypaper hanging above the waitress' station and wrinkled her nose. She took a moment to harmlessly and subtly disperse the local insect population, redirecting them to the bountiful feast in the dumpster out back. Her good deed for the day.
Finally, Hana asked the inevitable question.
"So what did you do this time?" Hana asked, waiting until the Aburame across from her had put her glass to her lips. Fumio took the sip, and her time. Gently, she set the glass back down, cushioning the bottom with the pad of her little finger so as not to make any sound. There was noise enough in the restaurant that they wouldn't be overheard, but Fumio still leaned forward, motioning for Hana to do the same. Her companion leaned in, and almost nose to nose to Hana, she spoke.
"Tanaka read my paper," Fumio said.
"No," Hana whispered, looking a bit dismayed. They always edited one another's work, so she knew very well what their sensei might take offense at. "Tanaka-sensei never grades papers."
"Apparently, Kimura is out this week," she revealed. Kimura, Tanaka's aid, was generally very receptive to Fumio's work.
"You clearly know the curriculum back to front," he'd said to her once, smiling conspiratorially at a particularly scathing critique of recent trade embargos between the lands of Fire and Stone she'd written. He'd appeared to agree with most of it, and yet…
"The issue is, you don't have a bit of tact, Aburame. Just none at all."
"It was the Uchiha thing, wasn't it?" Hana asked. Fumio simply nodded, content to not revisit that particular set of arguments any time soon.
Hana tapped her red, lacquered nails against the table.
"You already weren't doing too well in that class, were you?" Hana asked.
"I wasn't." A combination of obstinacy on her part and loathing on Tanaka's generally insured Fumio took enough academic penalties that she rarely broke average in the class rankings, even though she'd never scored lower than third place on tests.
"And… Shibi-sama comes home in two days."
"He does," Fumio confirmed.
Hana seemed to ponder this, her face contorting in sympathetic anxiety. Fumio could feel Hana's breath on her cheek as her friend slowly exhaled, the latest of many sighs she released on Fumio's behalf. It smelled like rice vinegar and mint. Of course, Fumio reminded herself, Hana had already eaten. And still Fumio had dragged her here to whine about the latest grave she had dug for herself.
Hell, even as they discussed Shibi-ojisama, Hana would later have to tell her mother that she'd skipped out on afternoon class. Shibi-ojisama was one matter, all quiet disappointment and subtle barbs. But Tsume-sama? Fumio would take just about any painful scolding from Shibi-ojisama to avoid Tsume-sama's wrath.
"Tanaka-sensei is an ass," Hana said.
"He thinks I'm a bad influence on you," Fumio replied, and to be honest, there wasn't much in that statement to refute. "Should a clan heir really be skipping class?"
Will you get in trouble for this, she wanted to ask, too late. Will Tsume be angry at you? But Fumio found, in her selfishness and shame, that she couldn't quite say the words.
"Don't worry about it. Inuzuka are supposed to be wild," Hana said, flashing Fumio a feral grin. It wasn't a look Hana wore too often.
"Is that so?"
"It won't be a problem. No doubt Kiba's done ten things wrong in the last minute, and by the time Mom's done with him, she won't have a thing to say to me."
Fumio tried and failed to imagine Tsume-sama running out of things to shout about.
"Really, Fumio, it's fine," Hana said, placing one of her soft hands over Fumio's wrist.
"Besides, Mom likes you."
On what planet that was true?
"Like I said the other day, you really should come around my house more often. We're having a big dinner in two days. Maybe, if you say I invited you, you can skip out on the Shibi-sama's lecture and come join us?"
Hana's offer was, in its way, tempting.
The last time she accepted an invitation to the Inuzuka household for dinner, it had been quite an event.
She had sat in a sort of detached stupor as the Inuzuka feeding maelstrom unfolded around her—tiny cousins grabbing directly from plates, puppies running around table legs and under chairs, a handful of aunties smacking at children who crossed the line from merely messy to full-ondisaster. Aged dogs sitting listlessly about begging for scraps with their eyes. Their clan head Tsume-sama, tipping back a saucer of sake, leaning back in her chair as she let the chaos wash over her, occasionally embarrassing her son and daughter with alternating exclamations of praise and criticism. Young Kiba pouting into his bowl of meat and rice. And finally, Hana, like a princess, resting primly at the center of it all, eating delicately, her table manners perfect, smiling at Fumio with her eyes even as she took up pleasant conversation with a number of her relatives. She was a point of sanity in the frenzy that had seemed crazy by contrast.
Fumio had enjoyed it, really, in retrospect. But she wasn't quite ready to throw herself back in. Not yet.
"Thank you, Hana. But it would only delay the inevitable."
Hana squeezed her wrist a little harder. Fumio actually hadn't noticed she was still holding on until then.
"Oh, you two are precious."
It seemed that Harui-san had returned.
She and Hana broke apart, the brunette across from her staring wryly into her empty glass. Her expression was too ambiguous to process. Harui set down her burden of meat platters and bowls of dipping sauce and deposited hot charcoal in the table-mounted grill with a pair of tongs. The charcoal was likely homemade as well, seeing that it gave off a sweet smokiness as it burned that Fumio had never seen replicated elsewhere. There was an excited flurry of activity at their feet, as the puppies scratched at their legs and made piteous sounds, which Hana quieted with a click of her tongue.
"You two remind me so much of my Saito and me at your age," Harui said, placing the lattice back over the grill with a well-practiced flick of her wrist.
"Do we?" asked Fumio, for lack of anything else to say. Hana checked out of the conversation and daintily placed a single slice of raw meat on the grill, simply watching it cook. It sizzled satisfyingly… a bit mesmerizing, really.
"He's a keeper, isn't he?" Harui chuckled, smiling at Hana in particular. Fumio stiffened, the despicable humiliation of being the last one to understand the implications of a conversation traveling up her spine and into her face—which was likely quite red.
Hana looked up from her meat and into Fumio's eyes for a fraction of a second, just long enough to communicate don't say a word.
Fumio obliged, even as her social awkwardness gave into indignant vexation. This again. Really.
"Please, enjoy your meal," said Harui, oblivious to their plummeting mood. She parted from the table, heading off into the kitchen and the company of her Saito.
"Son of a bitch," Fumio said. Hana's hand snaked across the table and smacked her on the forehead for using the word "bitch" derogatorily. It was a bit of culture clash between the Inuzuka and most everyone. Fumio knew she hated that, but had said it anyway.
"Don't you start," Hana ordered, flipping over her single cooking slice of steak, revealing that the browned side had cooked for just a little too long.
"I can't believe it's happened again," Fumio continued, placing the curry-red slices of beef she'd ordered on half of the grill, the unoccupied side. She was famished, idiotic misunderstandings or no.
"It really isn't a big deal."
"Maybe not to you," Fumio replied, becoming increasingly irritated.
"Is the idea of it really so terrible?" Hana asked, stealing Fumio's half-finished water and draining it.
"I can't imagine you would take kindly to someone mistaking you for male," Fumio said.
"Wait—that's what you took issue with? She thinks you're a guy?"
"Yes?"
"And not that the waitress thought we're an item."
"No," Fumio said, attending to her meal and browning the other sides. "Though… that idea is equally preposterous." It just didn't offend her.
Hana lifted her single slice from the grill and dipped it once, twice, in the bowl of ginger sauce. She lifted it to her mouth, enveloping it in a single bite. It looked a bit chewy from being overcooked, but flavors like these were difficult to ruin.
A silence stretched between them as they focused on the food before them. Fumio wondered what she'd said wrong, considered apologizing, but just found her thoughts going in circles until they came back to where they were to start.
And that was, another stranger thought she was a boy. She didn't look like a boy. She didn't dress like a boy.
"What sort of man walks around wearing a lilac scarf?" Fumio asked.
"One secure in his masculinity," Hana replied. It was a good answer. Fumio reassessed her claim. Sure, her mother's scarf had gone a bit grey over the years, from sun damage probably, and repeated washings. Still, the accessory, like her oval glasses, was distinctly feminine. Her other attire perhaps didn't scream "girl" the way Hana's often did. But it was practical. All soft browns and dark blues. Her short hair was a bit of an issue, maybe, but really—gel was the only way to get any kind of obedience out of it. It wasn't her fault.
She was sure her mother had never had this problem.
Fumio's meal had finished cooking, so she rescued it from the heat and stowed the slices on a clean plate. The color was striking—a sort of dark crimson, striped attractively where it pressed into the lattice of the grill, with light red flecks of pepper. She lifted a piece to her face and inhaled for a moment, enjoying the sting of zest just from proximity, but lowered it back to her plate instead of taking a bite.
"I don't look male. I don't."
Fumio wished, not for the first time, that she'd inherited her mother's willowy looks and soft black hair.
"Is it my face?" she asked, her voice shrinking a few decibels.
Hana sighed for the second time that afternoon.
"You've got a lovely face, Fumio. You're just tall. It's the height difference between us that gives people that impression," Hana said. She still seemed annoyed. Ah, Fumio was selfish, wasn't she? Always turning the conversation back to herself.
There was nothing else for it, she supposed, but to wait and hope puberty would be kind to her. She ate a slice of meat. It burned in her mouth—so good. She would have to forgive Harui-san, if only because she couldn't stand the thought of not eating here again.
"I think… anyone might look like a boy next to you, Hana," she said. It wasn't so much her looks, really, but a sort of grace her friend had.
Hana leaned away, her eyes watering. For a bizarre moment, Fumio thought her words (which in terms of compliments, hadn't been stellar) had moved Hana to tears.
"Ugh, you stink! That stuff is noxious. Don't breathe on me," Hana barked. Fumio frowned, but whatever oddness that had fallen between them seemed to have been lifted.
Besides the racket she was making about smells, Hana seemed pleased.
The conversation swung back to food, then school. They stuck to light topics and gossip, and everything was alright between them again.
An hour passed comfortably. Fumio ate all of her food and split whatever Hana hadn't eaten of her own meal with the dogs. If you left anything uneaten, you had to pay triple—Fumio's wallet couldn't quite take that strain. The Akimichi took food deadly seriously, and not without reason.
"We'll pick up the slack for Hana. Is that not correct," Fumio said, hesitantly addressing the puppy pushing its nose against her knee, "…Heimaru Sekitan-san?"
The first time she had politely referred to one of Hana's Ninken with the honorific '-san,' Hana had been quick to assure her it wasn't at all necessary. The dog had seemed so pleased with the address, however, Fumio couldn't quite bring herself to stop.
"That's Kemuri," Hana said. The dog in question nipped at her trousers.
"Ah."
Surely she'd get it right one of these days.
Fumio payed for the meal, enduring more gushing from Harui-san in the process. She and Hana parted amicably in the street, each heading to their respective clan compounds. The moment Hana left, Fumio's cheer deteriorated. She hunched her shoulders and increased her pace, taking the long route home—a series of twisting back allies. Eventually, the allies became gardens and the streets narrowed. There was no wall that marked off the Aburame's clan compound, no high fence, no gates. Simply a prevalence of nature, muted colors, and finally, the largely undeveloped forest at the center of their land.
The dirt path was well tread. And there it was: the main house. It retained its traditional architecture, though it had been rebuilt several times during their clan's existence—most recently, during the Kyuubi attack.
Fumio felt a bit warn out somehow, though the fast-paced walk hadn't come close to winding her. She had calmed down, of course. Hana always had that effect on her. But there was still plenty of energy to work off.
She decided to get some training in before starting dinner. It was a good idea, if she wanted a decent night's sleep.