The UsThem Complex Chapter 2: My Oh My, a naruto fanfic

The Us-Them Complex, Chapter Two

Pairings: NarutoSai

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Notes:

This is a double first-person point of view story. In other words, some of it is told by Naruto, and some of it is told by Sai.

Naruto

Sai

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I'm glad that no one said anything to me about Sai's kiss. I was embarrassed enough as it was, and I sure as hell didn't need someone else to point out the fact that I had been kissed by a guy in public. There was the possibility that everyone who'd seen the kiss kept their mouths shut because they'd already jumped to conclusions and decided that they didn't need to hear me refute what was blatantly obvious. I get no respect.

Sai, of course, didn't think he'd done anything wrong.

We were talking to Kiba when Sasuke strolled over. "Naruto," he said, drawing my attention away from Kiba.

I turned to face him, glad that I could concentrate on something other than Sai or the gross shit that Kiba was telling me about for a moment. "What' up?"

"I'm throwing a party at a place I rented out," he said. "You can bring Sai too, if you want."

I DIDN'T want but I had to.

"Sure," I said to him. Before he left, I added, "Thanks for inviting me."

He gave me a look, and I realized that he still wanted to talk to me when Sai wasn't there. I started to feel angry again, not just because of the coffee kiss, but because Sai had become an albatross around my neck and I wanted to be able to talk to my damned friends for a few minutes without him.

Kiba grinned at me. "Naruto, I'm glad that things are still okay between you and Sasuke. Everyone was freaking out around the end of senior year. I thought that you two were going to kill each other."

The combination of the words Naruto, Sasuke, and kill sets off little alarms in Sai's head, and I know that Kiba has said too damned much. "Kill each other?" Sai asked, looking at me in surprise. He smiled at me and turned back to Kiba. "Why would they ever do that?"

"Oh, Naruto didn't tell you?" I glare at Kiba, but I'm invisible whenever I'm next to Sai so he didn't catch my hints. Instead, Kiba took a deep breath and started to tell Sai one of the stories I'd never wanted him to hear.

"It's actually a pretty funny story. Naruto liked Sakura ever since middle school, but Sakura liked Sasuke for just as long, and it was pretty obvious to everyone."

"Oh," Sai said, "Sakura was that pretty girl with the pink hair, wasn't she?"

I glare at him. He has no right to call Sakura 'that pretty girl'. I'd prefer it if he didn't look at her, as I don't want her to get infected by his Sai germs and go crazy like him.

Kiba nodded and grinned as he continued. "Sasuke came out in senior year, and Sakura actually confessed to him AFTER that. He turned her down, of course, and the whole school heard about it because, well, it was a really strange thing for Sakura to do. Then Naruto over here--"

"You can shut up now, Kiba!" I growl at him.

Sai pats me on the back. "Settle down, it's getting good."

Kiba ignored me. "Naruto confessed to Sakura, and she turned him down. Then Naruto got pissed off, and none of them talked to each other until graduation day."

"Then what happened?" Sai asked. I don't get why he thinks this is so interesting. If he was a normal person he'd realize that this story was depressing and that it wasn't normal for him to want to hear it.

"Sasuke actually jumped Naruto right before graduation. They got into a fistfight and they walked across the stage with bruises all over their faces."

Sai frowned. "I don't get it. Why would Sasuke do that?"

I've had enough of this. "He wanted us to still be friends, okay? He didn't want all that stuff to get in the way of that and he was mad that I was alienating Sakura for turning me down. So we punched each other's lights out until Sakura found us, and we talked for so long that we were late to the ceremony. Everything turned out FINE after that, end of story."

"Calm down, Uzumaki," Kiba said. He looked at me like I was crazy, but Kiba did not understand that it was unsafe to trust Sai with that kind of information. "It's not like it's a bad story or anything. Hell, it's pretty damn interesting. I and Shino were talking about it earlier."

"This makes you feel nostalgic, doesn't it?" Sai asked him. I frowned at Sai. He had no right to talk about nostalgia, not MY nostalgia and memories.

He didn't belong at the reunion, but there was nothing I could do to get rid of him.

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I drove Sai over to the party at Sasuke's place soon after that. Sakura handed out directions to almost everyone in the gym, and I suddenly didn't feel so special for being invited by Sasuke.

Sai hummed along to the song on the radio as I drove. He has a nice singing voice, though I'll never tell him that, and he told me once that he was thinking about trying the music industry. Sai never followed up on it, though.

Besides his singing, he was pretty quiet in the car. I was glad that he was holding back whatever he wanted to say to me then, because it would be dangerous for me to argue with him while I drove.

"Hey, Naruto," he said as I pulled into a parking spot near Sasuke's place.

"Yeah?"

Sai turned to me, and he watched me for a moment, as if he wasn't sure of what it was that he wanted to say. The blank look was back on his face, and I knew that that look sometimes meant that he was thinking, or that he wasn't sure of what to do.

He smiled at me after a moment. "It's nothing."

I rolled my eyes at him, and when we were out of the car I said, "Don't get my attention and act all serious and then not tell me anything."

"I'm sorry, Naruto."

This caught my attention. Sai almost never apologizes, and I realize that maybe he had caught my hints through the day, and they'd piled up on him and he couldn't stand it anymore, even if I'd only acted that way towards him because of the way he acted towards me.

I stared at him before narrowing my eyes. "For what?" The question is really more like, 'Which thing are you apologizing for' but I don't want to word it that way.

Sai walked around the car, and to my surprise he said, "We'll split up at the party. I want you to talk to your friends without me there."

I blinked at him, and he just smiled back.

"Thanks," I said, not sure if anything else was appropriate. I was somewhat confused by his behavior, but hell, he'd given me a chance to talk to my old friends alone and I wasn't going to waste it by getting into a lengthy, annoying conversation about him. I figured that if he had decided to let me do what I wanted to do, that it would be best for me to take that chance and make the most of it.

He followed me to the building, and he was silent in the elevator, too. This disturbed me, but I tried to not let it ruin the mood. I was also curious about what Sakura and Sasuke wanted to talk to me about, especially since they didn't want Sai to be there when we talked about it.

As soon as the elevator opened I knew that my respect my Sasuke up to that point had been seriously lacking. He'd really gone all-out with this party; there was special lighting, a DJ, dessert tables, a Jacuzzi, and I think I even saw a few of his actor friends sitting in little clusters.

Sakura found me when I stepped out of the elevator, and Sai smiled at me before walking off by himself. I let Sakura drag me away and I forgot about Sai.

She took me to the bar first. "You like Sasuke's party?" she asked. I looked around and laughed. "I haven't been here long, but it's better than any party I've ever been to. Where's that ugly bastard anyway?"

The bartender popped out of nowhere, and Sakura tugged on his sleeve. "I'll have an apple martini," she said. I flinched, my natural reaction to anything that reminds me of Sai, before turning to the bartender and saying, "Anything not girly. Beer, vodka, sake, whatever, just no girl drinks."

He turned around and I repeated my question. "Where's Sasuke?"

Sakura shrugged. "He's, you know, making the rounds and stuff. There are a lot of people for him to talk to, but he said he'd free himself up soon so that he can talk to us."

"Oh," I said, slightly disappointed. I thought that I'd been chained to Sai, but Sasuke had other obligations as well. I realized that they may have been talking to each other, and I scanned the floor, looking for the color black.

The bartender set our drinks down, and Sakura began to sip hers gracefully. I took my shot of vodka in one hit before slamming the glass down on the counter and she laughed, giving me her big smile for the first time that evening.

"You're still…you," she said with a laugh. My chest started to feel warm, and she probably got the same feeling too, because we're not drunk yet but we're still grinning at each other like idiots. I feel like I've come home, and all the tension I've acquired from my time with Sai drains away and I laugh, putting my head down on the counter.

Everything is…good.

"I missed you."

I look up and Sakura's still smiling at me. She looks like she's about to cry and I'm getting the same feeling too. All of those feelings and memories from high school come back, and I'm far too immersed in them to care about anything else.

There was a Frisbee club back in high school. Ultimate Frisbee, of course, not the kind that people play with their dogs. Most of the members were guys, but there were a few girls there too, including Sakura and Hinata. I was the one who invited Sakura, and she came when I dropped Sasuke's name.

She really sucked at Frisbee.

I always made a point of passing her the Frisbee when I had it, even if I had to throw it really softly, and she almost never caught it but she always looked so happy when I turned to her. No one else on my team threw to Sakura. Hinata probably would have, but the girls were always separated to keep the teams 'even'. Hinata was much better than Sakura, though, so they COULD have been on the same team now that I think about it.

I remember the time that I confessed to Sakura. She was sullen after Sasuke turned her down, but I still liked her, and I thought that it would have been really pathetic for her to have the courage to ask out a gay guy and for me to not have the courage to ask out a girl who plainly didn't like me. I stopped her in the hall one day after school and she listened to me.

When I was done, she shook her head and hugged me. I took this as a good sign at first, but I felt something wet on my neck and I realized she was crying. The first thing she said was, 'I'm so sorry, Naruto,' and I pulled her off of me and I didn't talk to her for months. Those were some of the worst times of my life, but looking back I enjoyed those years and I'm glad that I confessed to her.

Sakura hugged me again at the bar, and I hugged her patted her on the back. "I glad that we could see each other again," she said.

"Me too, Sakura," I whispered. I'm getting choked up, but it still feels good somehow. I held on until she pulled away.

I'm never going to push them away again.

Sakura laughed when we separated. "Well," she said, wiping tears from her face, "wow. I didn't think that would happen."

I tap my shot glass on the bar. "If we're crying, we're not drunk enough," I say through my old goofy grin.

"Naruto," she said, laughing at me, "you're a dork."

And I am.

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I watched Naruto's old friend Sakura pull him away, and I sighed as I thought of ways to occupy myself until I could go back to the hotel with him later. I know that he might drink himself into a stupor tonight, so I've decided not to drink tonight, even if a White Russian might help to take the edge off.

I did not see Nara Shikamaru at the reunion, or if I did I didn't recognize him. I didn't want to bother Naruto any more by asking him about the designer, so I held back my questions and just listened for his name.

I've caught a few eyes since my entrance, and there are people staring at me from all sides, some wondering if I'm really Sai, others wondering why I'm here. I know that some of the alumni here probably think that I came with Sasuke.

Sasuke. I've honestly wanted to meet him for quite some time, and I wonder why Naruto never told me he knew him.

There's a possibility that there was some kind of relationship between Naruto and Sasuke that has not come to light yet. Naruto has never shown an interest in men, though, so it's doubtful. Still, it's a possibility, and I'd like to look into this.

I found Sasuke rather quickly. He was talking to a lazy-looking man with brown hair and a few ear piercings. The man was dressed rather casually, considering that he was at a party thrown by Sasuke; he was wearing a black shirt, khaki pants, and a green vest.

Sasuke spotted me and he smiled at me welcomingly. I accept this peace offer and walk over to him. I know that he took the kiss as a hit, and I eagerly await to see his next move. If I'm not mistaken, he took the kiss as I intended it: a challenge. Sasuke is smart, so I don't expect him to strike soon. He'll probably wait until I've forgotten the kiss, and then he'll make his move.

"Hello, Sasuke," I said as I joined him and his lazy-looking companion. The brown-haired man was drinking a beer and he narrowed his eyes when he saw me. I knew what he was thinking: 'Where have I seen him?'. This is most men's reaction to seeing me, and I think it's rather funny.

Sasuke pointed to me. "Shikamaru, this is Sai. Sai, this is Shikamaru."

My eyes lit up and I held out my hand. Shikamaru shakes it and I grin at him. "Nara Shikamaru, the designer?"

He nodded. "You're that actor, right?"

I laughed at him. "Yes, but I'd like it if we could talk about you. It has come to my attention that you haven't started a men's line, and I'd like to persuade you to, if that's at all possible."

He gave me a strange look, and I know that he thinks I'm cocky and arrogant and a big-headed actor. I look over his clothes and, against my better judgment, I say, "Seeing how you dress, I understand why you haven't started the men's line."

There is something very wrong with me. I seem to be unable to differentiate 'rude' things from interesting things. I personally think that it is very interesting for a famous fashion designer to dress badly. When I think about it, and I have to think for an extended period of time, I see that some of my comments may sound rude, but I always have the best of intentions.

Shikamaru glared at me and I find myself laughing. "Who the fuck do you think you are?" he asked.

"Come on, Shika, you know you actors are…" Sasuke said, trying to calm down his high school friend. I realize that I may have made things hard for him, too, so I bow my head in apology.

"I'm truly sorry," I said, though I know that Nara doesn't believe it. "I simply thought that the reason for the lack of the men's line was interesting, once I found it."

"Well, it's not all that interesting," he spat.

I smiled at him. I don't want to let this opportunity go. "If it would help, I'd like to work on the line with you. I myself have been anxiously awaiting your men's line," I said.

He looked shocked. "You…you were waiting for it?"

"Yes, of course."

I'm thankful that I managed to say something decent for once, because Nara's animosity and his scowl were immediately replaced with a look of smugness. "Well, we'll exchange numbers and I'll see if we can do something," he said.

My name, the name I have chosen since I became an actor, is really quite useful. If I was still Airisagawa Satoshi, no one would care if I was waiting desperately for the Nara line to come out. No one would stare at me from across the room. No one would ask for my autograph.

And there would be no grumbling blonde following me around, making sure that I didn't screw up my life with the things that I am oft to do.

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Sasuke found us at the bar about fifteen minutes later. I was on my fourth drink, and there was no way I was driving home that night. Sakura had paced herself, and she was sipping her second drink casually when Sasuke tapped both of us on the shoulder.

The warm feeling came back into my chest, and I smiled at him like the drunken idiot that I was when he pointed over his shoulder.

"There are a few rooms we can talk in," he said over the music. Sakura and I followed him across the dance floor, and I saw Sai for a moment. He was talking to Shikamaru and they were both laughing.

Well, what do you know. I guess the jackass actually CAN get along with some people.

We found an empty room and I locked the door behind us. Sakura sat down on the bed, and Sasuke pulled up two chairs, one for him and one for me. I turned my chair around and sat in it backwards, waiting for someone to say something.

"You're both drunk," Sasuke said as soon as he'd had a good look at both of us.

Sakura pouted at him. "That's not fair! And I didn't even finish two drinks! Naruto is another story, of course."

I slumped forward and let my head fall and I raised my hand in the air and waved obnoxiously. "Uzumaki, present!"

They both fell silent, and I looked up, confused. Why weren't they talking? My fear that they're dating comes back suddenly, and I swallow nervously, waiting for one of them to say something.

Sasuke turned to me. "Naruto, seriously, what are you doing with Sai?"

"Doing with him?" I frowned at him. Hadn't I made that clear already? "I'm his assistant. You know what that means."

"How'd you meet him?" Sakura asked, completely serious.

I looked at both of them. They must have lost their damned minds, or maybe there was something going on that I wasn't aware of. I couldn't find one reason for their concern over my employer's identity.

He was just SAI, for god's sake.

"I went in for an interview, you know," I said to Sakura after I decided that they really, really we asking me about this. "And I got the job, and it turned out to be for him. That's it."

She frowned at me. "So, you didn't know that you were applying to work for him?"

"No, I didn't. I answered an anonymous ad in the paper after I quit working for Sasuke." I stole a glance at Sasuke, and his eyes narrowed a little. He hasn't told me what's bothering him yet, and it's pissing me off, watching him get worked up without saying anything.

"Spit it out, Uchiha!" I growled at him.

He glared at me. "If you wanted to work as an assistant, why didn't you keep working for me?"

I sit back, thinking that over. Sasuke looks away, and I know he's uncomfortable and that he feels vulnerable. I hadn't realized that Sasuke might have wanted to have me close to him, and that he might have preferred having a friend work for him over a stranger.

"Look," I said, trying to not give him the wrong idea, "I just couldn't let you pay for me all my life. If I was still working for you, that's how it would be. I'd rather see you on a daily basis, than see Sai, but I can't work for you."

I know he's not satisfied with that, and I probably wouldn't be either, but at the same time I can't let them carry me. Sakura and Sasuke always made sure my grades were decent in school, and Sasuke gave me rides all the time, and Sakura even invited me as her not-boyfriend-date on a few of the group date Chouji and Ino went on before they started go out for real. They always made sure that I was doing okay, but I learned how to take care of myself during college and I wasn't ready to go back to being their needy friend.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, and I was afraid that they would just walk out of the room. I was afraid that they were fed up with me, and I've always known that they never liked the way I lived my life.

"Okay," Sasuke said after what felt like hours. "If that's why, then it's okay."

Sakura nodded. "And you didn't…try to work for him."

"Of course not!" I spat. "I hate Sai. My life is decent because I work for him, but I would never try to make a friend out of him."

"Well," Sakura said, "if you hate him, then why are you working for him?"

I glared at her and Sasuke, because I know what they're thinking. "Like I said, the money is good, and it's something I can handle."

"You could do better," Sasuke said. I open my mouth to ask him what that means when he hands me a business card. "Look, if you ever want to quit working for him, just call me. You don't have to work for me or anything, but we can hang out. You shouldn't have to stick around Sai if you don't want to."

Sakura nodded and drew out her own business card. "Same here. I don't make as much as Sasuke, but you can come live with me."

I took the cards and shoved them in my pocket. "Are you going to call all your friends over for a sleepover?" I asked, trying to lighten the mood.

She smacked the side of my head. "Don't get any perverted ideas."

"Well," Sasuke said as he stood up, pushing his chair to the wall, "I need to go tend to my guests."

Sakura stood up, steadying herself on her feet. Maybe she was lying about how much she had to drink? "I'll go find Ino," she said.

Sasuke threw me a glance. "You coming, Dead-Last?"

I waved them off. "I'll stay here for a minute. Just to settle my head, you know."

"Whatever you say," he said as he left the room.

To my surprise, Sakura ducked down and kissed me on the cheek before she left. "Take care of yourself, okay?" she asked.

I watched her leave before I flopped down on the bed.

I dozed off for a while, and I was woken up when some drunk chick wandered into the room. She smiled at me.

"You're Naruto, right?" she asked me.

I sat up in bed and looked her over. Damn, she looked like a model, with long black hair and pale skin.

"Yeah," I choked out.

She sat down on the bed next to me. "You're cute…"

I liked where this was going.

"What's your name?" I asked her.

"Akuri," she said. "Just call me Akuri."

I was rather drunk at the time, so I don't remember exactly what happened during the next ten minutes, other than the fact that it ended with me naked and tied down to the bed and her straddling me. Things were going really well.

She smiled at me. "Little Naruto, you've been a bad boy and I've come here to punish you."

I smiled back. I was so drunk that I couldn't even remember her name.

She slipped off of me and started to put her clothes back on. I strained against the ropes holding me down as I tried to figure out what was happening.

"Why are you getting dressed?" I asked in horror. She slipped her shoes back on and said, "Because I'm leaving."

"WHAT?"

She laughed. "Someone wanted to pay you back for something. You did some mean things in high school, didn't you?" She walked over to the bed and kissed me on the forehead before walking right out the door. She didn't even close it all the way!

I started to panic. I did not want to get caught like this, not by anyone other than Sasuke or Sakura that is, because they'd just help me out and laugh at me later, when I'd think it was funny too.

I heard the door open and I panicked when Sai entered the room, a look of genuine surprise on his smug little face.

FUCK!

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