Disclaimer: I own nothing but the story. If I did own Naruto (That would be awesome!) Naruto and Sasuke would have gotten together long ago and Itachi would have never died!

"Itachi! Give me back my tomatoes!"

"You'll get them back when you start getting ready for the Academy," the older raven's voice droned as he kept his younger brother at bay.

"I lasted just fine without you until I was eight years old! So, stop being such a mother hen!"

It had been three whole years since Itachi had asked him to move in with him and Sasuke, for the first time in his life, felt like he belonged somewhere. He was now eleven years old and had just graduated from the Academy yesterday. His brand new, unscratched headband gleamed on the table top, but Sasuke was far too busy trying to steal back his tomatoes to notice.

Despite living with his older brother, Sasuke had kept up his act with the other villagers and shinobi. Itachi had requested (begged) Sasuke to lose the act, but something like that, something that had ruled most of his life, is harder to break than Itachi thought.

Since the night of the kidnapping, Sasuke's life had turned more peaceful and, dare he say it, happy. Everything seemed perfect to him. "Give me back my damn tomatoes, Itachi!" Well, almost perfect.

*The Choices We Make*

Today was the day. Naruto flashed himself his signature smile through the mirror. Today was the day that he joined the shinobi ranks and got put on a four-man squad. He was excited, maybe too excited, but none of that mattered to Naruto Namikaze!

Naruto grabbed his gleaming headband from its spot on the sink countertop and fastened it to his forehead. He struck a pose in the mirror and then headed downstairs for some ramen. Naruto listened to the silence in his house as he waited for his beef ramen to heat up. His father was mostly away with Hokage business and his mother had died during child birth.

His blue eyes darkened slightly at the thought of his dead mother. His dad had always told him it wasn't his fault that his mom had died, but Naruto couldn't help but feel small guilt and sadness every time he thought about her.

Naruto's timer dinged, signaling that his ramen was ready and was pulled out of his depressing thoughts. He shook his head; he shouldn't be thinking such awful things on one of the best days of his life! He broke apart his chopsticks and dug into the ready-made food. While Naruto was slurping up his noodles, his mind wandered to the Academy. Would he be in the same team as Kiba? Or Sakura? Or Ino? He had hoped that his father would have been kind enough to place him on a team with, at least, someone he knew.

I wonder what Sasuke would do if we were on the same team? Naruto wondered. Two days after asking the Uchiha about forming a friendship, he had sensed that Sasuke wanted to talk with him, but never did. I mean, if he would actually talk to him he could introduce Sasuke to Kiba, Sakura and Ino. His father, for some reason, asked him how Sasuke was doing at the Academy. How weird was that? His own father would want to know about a classmate before even asking about how his own son was. Naruto knew that his dad had a lot on his plate and Sasuke was currently living with his older brother who was barely reaching his twenties, but still! You should ask how your own son is doing first after not seeing him for a whole day!

Speaking of his father, last night, after getting home late doing paper work, Naruto had snuck a peak at the scores of all his classmates had gotten on the exam. Naruto, of course, had scored the highest. Although it wasn't surprising, Naruto couldn't help but feel a small pang of sadness when he noticed that Sasuke had gotten the very lowest score on the sheet. At least he passed, Naruto mused.

He finished up his beef ramen and Naruto pat his stomach in content. He checked the time on the small frog clock on the stove and grinned. It was time to get going to the Academy.

*The Choices We Make*

Sasuke had been early; way too early. Itachi had kicked him out of the house an hour and a half before the actual start of class. Graduates were allowed an extra hour in the morning before the other students and then started the ceremony that happened for each graduating class. Apparently, Itachi had forgotten this fact from his own Academy days and left Sasuke with his current predicament.

He sighed and made his way over to the small courtyard at the side of the Academy. This courtyard was barely used and Sasuke had come here often to be alone when he was in the Academy. Sasuke then walked over to a small cement bench resting underneath a large sakura tree and sat down. The tree wasn't in bloom, but looked about ready to burst with small tan buds. A slight breeze pushed his bangs in front of his face and made the leaves of the trees sway and rustle.

Sasuke closed his eyes and relaxed in his seat on the bench. Maybe it wasn't so bad that he had come so early; now he could relax and think over his time in the Academy. A flash of a small yellow bird taking flight over head drew Sasuke to think about a certain blond classmate. Sasuke knew he had promised Kyuubi to form a friendship with Naruto, but every time he tried to talk to the blond he was surrounded by his little groupies. He had promised to be friends with Naruto, not his little admirers; there was no way he would talk to idiotic Kiba and fangirls Sakura and Ino. Not to mention most of the time the girls gave him splitting headaches with their constant screaming and fighting over Naruto. Fangirls, Sasuke shivered, were the only species known to man to kill you with affection.

His last three years of the Academy weren't as bad as his first two. Itachi had kept his promise of training him and now he had more knowledge about the Sharingan than he had previous believed was even possible. Did you know that it was possible to create a giant warrior named Susano'o that would protect and even attack for you? Or that you could even make a dimensional hole in midair? Sasuke had first thought Itachi was pulling his leg until the older raven actually brought forth Susano'o. Now that had been hard to explain to the ANBU watching them.

The reason for the ANBU was quite simple really. The Fourth Hokage would allow Itachi and him to live together… with some conditions. Since two of the most skilled shinobi in Konoha were going to live together, one the Kyuubi's jinjuriki and the other an ANBU captain, Minato had requested (ordered) at least one ANBU to watch each one of them. Even now Sasuke could feel his ANBU protector, rabbit, watching him from the sakura tree above him.

Other than learning about the Sharingan, Itachi had taught him genjutsu since Kyuubi wasn't very fond of the technique. Sasuke had become so efficient using genjutsu that sometimes he played little practical jokes on his brother. Like, the other day, Sasuke had made Itachi think that strawberry jelly was really his shampoo. That hadn't gone well with Itachi, but at least it made Itachi do one his rare smirks. Not only that, but his older brother had finally gotten him to learn the fire ball jutsu. Apparently Kyuubi had given him an extra hand sign for the jutsu and, after very much yelling between Kyuubi and him, Sasuke had learned and mastered the jutsu.

"Awww man!" Sasuke reopened his eyes and saw Naruto walking down the opposite side of the courtyard towards him. His eyes widened; maybe this was finally his chance to talk to Naruto. "I completely forgot we had an extra hour before the ceremony!" Naruto complained loudly through the clearing.

The blond had almost pasted Sasuke by now and hadn't even noticed the raven sitting literally two feet from him. Sasuke felt his eye twitch and calmed down his annoyance before speaking out to get the blonde's attention. "Dope."

Naruto stopped in mid-step and quickly turned around to face the raven. "Sasuke-teme! I didn't even notice you were here!" Obviously, Sasuke thought. "Why are you here so early?"

Sasuke sighed and rubbed his temples as he felt another headache coming on from Naruto's loud yelling. "Itachi kicked me out of the house."

A foxy grin found its way onto Naruto's face. "So the great Itachi forgot about the hour late start today, huh?" Sasuke glared at the blond. It was so like Naruto to make fun of other people when he did the exact same thing himself.

"Apparently the great Naruto Namikaze did the same thing." The blonde's blue eyes widened slightly and Naruto's foxy grin disappeared and a sheepish one replaced it. Naruto was such a dope. Why had he wanted to become friends with him again? Oh, yeah… Kyuubi said he needed a friend. Damn fox needed to mind his own business.

"Yeah," he looked away and fixed his blue eyes on the budding sakura trees. "I guess you're right." They fell into silence and Naruto leaned back against the bench. He would never admit it, but sitting like this, with Sasuke, was oddly… nice. He was usually in the middle of constant noise; whether it be the big-mouthed Kiba or having Sakura and Ino all over him. He never got a moment of silence. He enjoyed how Sasuke and him could sit with each other in complete silence and having it not be awkward in the slightest.

Sasuke was so much different than any person he had ever met. He didn't fawn over him like everyone else. Sasuke treated him as an equal. He didn't see him as Naruto Namikaze, the son of the Hokage. Sasuke saw him as Naruto. Just Naruto and no one else. This was what Naruto admired about the Uchiha the most.

One thing that Naruto didn't get though was that Sasuke had such an air of superiorly around him. The raven had the lowest score on the exam and, yet, it felt like he held himself above everyone else around him. Naruto may admire some attributes about the Uchiha, but Sasuke was just plain confusing… and mysterious.

Mysterious… That was a good word to describe Sasuke Uchiha. There were other words to describe him; smart, antisocial and… a bastard. However, mysterious would always be the one word that would stick to Sasuke in Naruto's mind.

May it be that Sasuke was mysterious or quiet; something drew Naruto to Sasuke like a moth to a flame. Naruto couldn't describe it even if he could. There was something about the Uchiha that had Naruto drawn to him. He didn't know if this feeling was a good or bad thing, but it wasn't a bad feeling. No, it was like a small warmth inside his chest that grew the more he talked and was with Sasuke.

"What are you looking at, dope?" Sasuke's deeper voice asked, cutting Naruto out of his deep thinking.

"Nothing!" The blond squeaked. He quickly turned away so he could hide the deep red blush traveling across his face. Had he been staring at Sasuke?

Sasuke huffed and let the whole staring thing go. Naruto's staring had been quite obvious and it had gotten pretty annoying after about ten minutes of it. Not to mention the dope had this weird look on his face the entire time and Sasuke wouldn't have been able to describe it even if he could. Naruto… was Naruto. There really wasn't any way to describe the blond. He was Naruto Namikaze; end of story.

Sasuke felt a chakra signature on the other side of the courtyard and small squeal came from said person. He felt the newcomer jump into the overhead tree and smirked when the hidden ANBU was forced to move into another tree. Sasuke glanced over at Naruto and held in a groan when he saw the blond in deep thought once again. Well, it would be the dope's fault if he got attacked by the hidden newcomer.

Three… Two… One… "Naruto-kun!" Right on cue, Sasuke mused. A sudden flash of pink and red glomped Naruto from above. Sasuke growled when he is pushed off his seat on the bench and his back meets the gray pavement.

The raven flinched at the loud, pig-like squeal the pink fangirl lets out once she got her arms around the blond. "Oh Naruto-kun! Us! Meeting like this! It must be fate!" Sasuke could practically see the hearts floating around the girl.

"Ah, yeah, Sakura-chan," Naruto said as he unfolded the girl's arm from his body. Sakura turned red at her crush's touch and giggled slightly. She leaned her body against the blonde's and Naruto flinched slightly at the forward actions the pink-haired girl was giving him. So, it looked like Sasuke wasn't the only one who disliked the fangirl actions from his peers.

Sasuke rolled his eyes; how did she even pass the exam? It was obvious that the girl only became a shinobi to be with her 'crush'. You shouldn't even be called a kunoichi of Konoha with that being the reason to become one. You became a ninja to protect your village. You became a ninja to protect your family and friends. You became, well, there were thousands of good reasons to become a ninja. If you became a ninja just because your crush is, is not a legit reason.

The raven got up from the ground and dusted himself off. He was going to spend as little time as he could with any type of fangirl. His time with Naruto had been short and quiet, but it was the best he was going to get with the blond.

After his clothing was free of dust and dirt, Sasuke turned on his heel and walked back towards the Academy. As he was walking away he heard a shout of protest and a 'wait up, Sasuke!' from a loud, male voice. He didn't even turn to look, he knew it was Naruto. The blond caught up with him in no time and wrapped his arm around Sasuke's shoulders. "Do you want to sit next to me in class?"

Sasuke shrugged off the offending arm and massaged his temples. Couldn't Naruto tone down his voice? Just once? Or was he not capable of such a feat? "Leave me alone, dope. I'm sure Pinky would be overjoyed if you sat next to her." Yeah, that was a good excuse. He wanted as little attention as possible in class and sitting next to the loudest, most annoying and most loved person in the classroom would be the exact opposite of what he wanted. Especially since sitting next to Naruto would mean one less seat for the fangirls and Sasuke, even though he could beat them all in a millisecond, did not want to suffer their wrath.

"Come on, Sasuke! I just want sit next to you!" Naruto whined, but kept his arms at his sides. "Why are you such a teme?!" Naruto's loud voice echoed through the courtyard and Sasuke's eye twitched as he tried not to throttle his annoying classmate.

"Asking why I'm such a teme is like asking why you're such a dope," Sasuke murmured. He picked up his pace, but Naruto was right at his heels. Arguing started in the courtyard behind them and Sasuke guessed that Naruto's other fangirl had arrived. That got rid of angry fangirls… for now. However, Sasuke somehow had to get his blond stalker off him or else he would have the fangirls on him in the classroom.

In the end, Naruto was grinning happily in the seat next to Sasuke in the classroom. So far no one had given the raven any trouble with the seating arrangements, but he knew it was only a matter of time with the stink eyes he was receiving.

Ten minutes before the start of class the bomb went off. "Ha! I beat you, forehead girl!"

"Dream on, Ino-pig. Everyone here saw my foot, at least, half an inch ahead of you." Sasuke inwardly groaned, Naruto's two biggest fangirls had finally made it into the classroom. A loud gasp echoed through the room and Sasuke is jerked out of his seat by Sakura. "Move it!" She sneered.

Sasuke allowed his butt to hit the ground and he stayed where he landed as all the other girls rushed over to their crush. Apparently, as soon as Sakura made her move, this gave the rest of the girls courage to move forward as well. Naruto was immediately surrounded by the girls as they argued with each other on who would sit next to the blond.

"Need a hand?" Sasuke turned his head and found… Naruto.

He smirked, "Shadow clone, huh?" He should have known that Naruto would use his signature Shadow Clone Jutsu. The blond reached out his hand for Sasuke to take and he pulled the raven back to his feet. At least, that was the intention.

Instead, halfway through pulling Sasuke up one of the fangirls was pushed back by another fangirl and she was knocked back into Naruto. This caused the blond to be pushed forward and into Sasuke. They tumbled forward and once they hit the floor Naruto was on top of Sasuke and both of them were in lip lock.

It was just their luck that the shadow clone had disappeared in a cloud of white smoke seconds after the bump and the fangirls had seen Naruto and Sasuke fall. Now, the whole room stared in silence at the two lip locked boys. No one moved until Naruto pulled back from the young Uchiha as if mesmerized. That was when all hell broke loose; the fangirls squealed in terror and anger at the sight of their precious Naruto being taken by a monster, the rest of the room just continued to stare and even some of them murmured 'that was so wrong' to each other.

Sasuke seemed to take in the whole situation in a glance and landed a large kick on the blond hovering above him. Naruto, as if in slow motion, shot back and into the horde of girls. The fangirls would have been happy about the turn of events if their kiss hadn't just been taken by the loser of the class.

A heavy, dark aura surrounded the girls and Sasuke, at a loss at what to do besides giving away his secret, looked on in slight terror. Nothing was worse than the wrath of angry fangirls except for the wrath angry mothers, but since he didn't have one, this was the worst he could encounter. The girls cracked their knuckles, their eyes started to twinkle with anger and large, unpleasant smiles crept onto their faces and Sasuke knew he would just have to take the pounding like a man.

Well, they would have if Iruka-sensei didn't walk in and shout for everyone to take their seats. The girls murmured a couple complaints, but listened to their sensei's orders. Naruto slid into the seat he was in before and Sakura giggled and sat down next to him. Seeing no other seats open, Sasuke got up from the ground, shrugged and took the outside seat beside Sakura. The pink haired gave him a small stink eye before completely ignoring his existence. To Sasuke, this was better than what he hoped for after taking the seat beside her.

Everyone in the classroom gave their sensei their full attention; each one of them eager for the brown haired male to let them leave and start their new lives as full-fledged shinobi. Iruka cleared his throat and looked down at his famous clipboard. "All right, attention everyone," he said even though he already had everyone's full attention. "I would like to congratulate all of you on passing the exam, but you are only genin. So, I will now group each of you into three man squads led by a jounin."

A three man squad, huh? Sasuke mused; I'll pair up with anyone, but just don't let me be with pinkie or her partner in crime. I'll even pair up with the dope just don't let me be with them…

"I will now list off the teams," Iruka said and skimmed over the names on his clipboard. "Squad one…."

Meanwhile, Naruto kept glancing over at the silent raven two seats from him. So far, he wasn't at all interested in what team he was paired up with. No, he was far too busy thinking about the accidental kiss he and Sasuke had shared. It wasn't so much the kiss he was thinking about, but the feelings he had felt during and after. He feel of the young Uchiha's lips on his own, the warm, bubbling feeling in his chest, and… the need of going further with Sasuke. If they hadn't been in public and if other people weren't watching, Naruto was scared to admit that he would have gone farther. He was so much stronger than the raven and would have done what he wanted even if Sasuke had tried to resist. That scared him more than anything; the animistic desire he was feeling for his classmate, his friend, another boy. Naruto felt sick inside.

"Squad seven, Sasuke Uchiha," said raven lifted his head up and listened eagerly to the brown haired male. Finally, the moment of truth. "Sakura Haruno," Sasuke felt or rather heard the scream of anger and disappointment from the girl beside him. However, his own depression started to take over as he learned he would now spend a majority of his time with one of the worst fangirls in history.

From behind Sasuke heard the slight laughter from the blond fangirl and a small 'I knew you would get stuck with that loser, now I'm going to be with my wonderful Naruto and we'll live happily ever after' to Sakura beside him. "And Naruto Namikaze." He then felt pinkie next to him give the blond girl behind her a peace sign and heard a growl from blonde. How unattractive, a girl growling.

Naruto was ecstatic, not only would he have one of his friends on his team, but Sasuke as well! His father had been more than nice to him he had been absolutely god-sent! He looked over to see how the raven had taken the news and saw the slight cloud hovering over his new teammate. Naruto chuckled, Sasuke would get over it soon enough and see how great a team he had just been placed on.

Sasuke, however, wasn't anywhere near as ecstatic as Naruto. He had just been placed on a team with a huge fangirl whose crush was on his other teammate. Naruto was a plain dope with massive amounts of strength that he couldn't even control and he was a jinjuriki, one of the most hated and feared people in the entire Five Great Nations. This was just a recipe for disaster. Sasuke slammed his head down on his desk, he could just see Kakashi the pervert being their new sensei and everything would be complete in causing Sasuke the largest migraine in history.

The rest of the teams were then said and the lunch bell rang right on cue. Before Naruto could ask the raven to eat lunch with him, Sasuke had already jumped out of his seat and bolted out the door. Sakura, of course, then asked her crush and new teammate to eat with her, but Naruto replied with a small 'no thanks' and ran after Sasuke.

Outside of the Academy, Naruto looked around for Sasuke and sighed when he didn't see him anywhere. How could have Sasuke gotten away so fast? He only had a couple seconds head start on him and he should have easily caught up to him, so… why didn't he see Sasuke anywhere?

Sasuke, meanwhile, was watching the frantic blond looking for him from above in a sakura tree. Of course the dope had run after him, he wouldn't have been Naruto if he didn't. Sasuke just couldn't figure the blond out; he had hundreds of friends that would be at his beck and call whenever he wanted it, so why did he always seek his company? Sasuke softly sighed and rubbed his temples; there was no point in trying to figure out the complex mind of a dope.

Once Naruto was a safe distance away from him, Sasuke jumped out the tree he was hiding in. He grabbed his lunch and returned back to the courtyard. Sasuke sat down in the same seat that he sat in when he was with Naruto before pinkie had shown up. He opened up his bento and started eating the tomatoes that he had stolen back from Itachi earlier that day.

Halfway through his meal, Sasuke realized that Kyuubi had been unusually quiet that day. Usually the kitsune would have had a field day with how things had been going so far and his curiosity got the better of him. Sasuke placed his bento on the bench seat next to him and activated his Sharingan and closed his eyes. He concentrated on the foreign chakra in his stomach and let it take over his mind. Kyuubi's red chakra traveled slowly through his body until it reached the desired location on his forehead. Sasuke let the red chakra lull him to sleep and when he next opened his eyes he was standing in front of a large cage containing Kyuubi. Sasuke stood in ankle deep water and he waded through it until he reached the front of the cage.

Sasuke peaked inside the cage and laughed slightly at the large puffball curled up in the middle. Calm, easy breathing reached his ears and Sasuke concluded that the demon was fast asleep. He had never seen the great and fearsome Kyuubi asleep before and it was a great sight to behold. He softly laughed again and released the chakra on his forehead. Sasuke returned back to the courtyard and leaned back in his seat. Now that made this awful day a lot better.

Moments later, Sasuke felt another chakra across the courtyard. He sighed, why didn't Naruto ever give up? Sasuke turned his head and found… Sakura. You have got to be kidding me. Why is Naruto transformed as Sakura? He sweat dropped, of course he could sense it was really Naruto, but at the level he was pretending to be, he wouldn't. However, there were many other ways to tell; like how he was holding himself up and how he walked. A girl did not walk like that.

Naruto walked over to him and sat down next to him on the bench. "Hello, Sasuke-kun." He felt his eye twitch slightly; Sasuke knew it was very low chance that the real Sakura would know his name let alone call him Sasuke-kun. "May I sit with you?"

It took everything in his willpower not to pummel his teammate. Fine, Naruto wanted to play he could play along as well. "Sure, but I didn't know you knew my name, Sakura-san. We never did get introduced." Naruto stuttered for a bit and Sasuke inwardly smirked at the squirming boy. Oh, he was going to have so much fun with this.

"O-of course I know your name, Sasuke-kun," Naruto stuttered. "We're in the same team now after all." Sasuke could actually see the nervous sweat running down Naruto transformed as Sakura's neck. Luckily for Naruto the end of lunch bell decided to ring. The transformed blond jumped out of his seat and took a step back. "I-I'll meet you in the classroom, Sasuke-kun. I-I have to get to the bathroom before I come."

Sasuke waved Naruto off and the blond ran down the courtyard and to the bathroom. He would let the other go, there was no point in letting his teammate know his real power… yet. Yes, he had planned to tell Naruto his secret after he got approval from the Hokage and when the blond would finally be able to hold his tongue.

Itachi and Minato-sama had gotten him to finally open up a bit. Sasuke trusted his older brother almost as much as he trusted Kyuubi. Besides the playfulness of the Fourth, Sasuke had also started to see the Fourth Hokage in a very different light; like as a father. Sasuke had refused to acknowledge these feelings for quite a while, but he eventually had to confront them as what they really were and accept them. He never had a family before; it was like an awkward comfort. It wasn't a bad feeling; it was like an abnormal soft warmth in his chest.

*The Choices We Make*

Back at the classroom team seven were the last ones there; even Iruka had left long ago saying he had somewhere to be. Sasuke sighed and leaned back in his seat; there was no reason to be excited anymore if their sensei was this late. If their sensei was this late on the first meeting, it was only plausible that he or she would always be late. He glanced over at Sakura and rolled his eyes at the lame flirting the girl was giving Naruto. It was so bad that Naruto didn't even see it was flirting. Of course, this was Naruto he was talking about he won't even know love if it came and bit him on the butt.

"Ahhh! When is our sensei going to get here?! I can't wait any longer!" Naruto whined and slumped himself across his desk. Sasuke shook his head at the impatient blond. How were they supposed to know when their sensei was going to get here?

"I'm sure he's on his way over, Naruto-kun," Sakura encouraged.

However, Naruto got out of his seat and marched over to the chalkboard. What was the dope doing now? Naruto grabbed the eraser and smirked. "If he's going to be late then he needs to be punished," and placed the eraser in between the cracks of the slightly opened door.

"Naruto-kun, are you sure that this is a good idea? He is a jounin and going to be our new sensei after all," Sakura asked the blond and walked up beside him. Sasuke just shook his head at the blonde's antics; why did he have to be stuck with such a dope for a teammate?

"Sorry I'm late, you see an old lady," and the eraser fell. Their new sensei, a silver-haired about twenty year old male, looked down at the object that had hit him on the top of his head. Sasuke groaned, why did Kakashi have to their sensei? Of all the people Minato-sama could have picked, why did it have to be him?

Sakura squealed at the sudden appearance of their sensei and bowed. She apologized over and over for the, in quote, 'inappropriate actions of her teammate.' Naruto rubbed his nose and grinned widely in triumph. "Looks like I got you this time, Kakashi! What until dad hears about this!"

Sasuke groaned again; life was too cruel.

Sorry about the long wait on this chapter, but I worked on it whenever I had the chance to. :)

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