part ii-a; rhineland
naruto
I'd dozed off shortly after I returned to my room, but I woke up with heavy, tired eyes, a slightly wet pillow and feeling worse than I had been prior to falling asleep. The sun had crept up fully, filtering into the room from behind the shades and draperies that adorned the windows. It was currently silent in the wing. I didn't hear the noisy squeak of nurse's shoes pacing up and down the corridors, or anyone whispering checks into rooms. I rubbed at my eyes, letting my flannel blanket fall off my shoulders and turned to look at the clock that rested on the nightstand.
7:25 AM.
I don't know how long I had slept for, but I'm pretty sure it hadn't been too long. I looked over to Sasuke's side of the room to find him missing, his bed already made. He was probably off being weird and shit, so whatever.
Sighing, I fell back into bed, cocooning myself within my blanket once again, making sure that it blocked out the sunlight that was steadily traveling across the bedroom. I was so tired, and freezing. As much as I tried, I couldn't find it in myself to sleep anymore. Because when I closed my eyes again, I saw numbers. I saw those numbers.
87.4. 87.4. 87.4. 87.4.
Seeing those numbers, seeing that stupid fucking scale rising back up, knowing that it wasn't going down was freaking me the fuck out. What's more is that I knew what the numbers were, and it was driving me fucking crazy.
It was like I was right back in the psychiatric ward of the hospital. They controlled everything; I was powerless against them as they sought to take my control, my body. Not theirs, mine. It wasn't there choice; they had no right doing this to me. That fucking feeding tube, all those stupid fucking supplements that I had to take, everything that they had forced me to do.
87.4. 87.4. 87.4. 87.4.
I had tried to do something, anything to lose what I had been forced to gain, but Jiraiya and Dad had been on me like hawks.
The minute I had been discharged from the hospital, after gaining back some weight, the two of them put me on lockdown until I was finally shipped out to this place. I wasn't allowed out the house, I had time constraints on bathroom time, I wasn't allowed to go to the bathroom after I ate, I had to sleep with my door open, I was up at a certain time, asleep at a certain time. All of this, just to take away the one thing that truly mattered to me, which was mine, my one source of stability.
"Fuck!" I groaned, pushing my face into my pillow and shaking my head.
The door to the room opened a not a second later, and I turned to see Sasuke come in, smelling faintly of something that resembled cold water and vanilla. He dropped something in a bin by the foot of his bed, and then left the room, leaving it partially open as he had gone.
A few minutes later, I heard Kiba's loud voice float in through the partially opened door. "It's too early for this! Why the hell are we the only ones with group so early in the morning? At least let me eat first before I have to sit down in a room with equally crazy people and talk about how I 'feel' about shit!!"
"Shh, Kiba, are you trying to wake up the entire floor?" That was Chouji.
"Let them wake up, I don't care!" He snapped.
"Of course you wouldn't." Shikamaru said, sighing loudly.
I sighed, pulling my pillow over my head, flinching when the door flew open a few seconds later. I turned slightly, to see Kiba standing in the doorway, face lively and bright. "Yo, Naruto! You up?"
"I am now." I mumbled, pulling the pillow off of my head.
"Well, get a move on it! We've got group in an hour or so."
"Group?" I asked, picking my head up from the pillow and sitting up in bed.
He motioned for me to come with him, and I got out from underneath my sheets, dragging the flannel blanket with me as I crossed the short distance between my bed and the door. Once outside, Kiba pointed to something written under my name on the side of the door. "See, right there, under your name. It says group leader Umino Iruka, you're with us." He rolled his eyes, "I'm guessing Sasuke didn't bother telling you anything."
"He doesn't talk." I said, rolling my eyes at the thought of my incorrigible roommate. "Of course not."
Kiba laughed, "Well, anyway, come on with us. We were just on our way to the bathroom before it gets all full of guys and gross and shit."
"Alright, alright, let me get my towel and I'll be right with you guys." I said, turning around and heading back into my room. I threw my flannel on to my bed and sighed, dragging my duffel bag out from by the side of my bed and ruffled around in it for one of the three towels I'd brought with me.
So much for sleep.
xXx
Our room for group therapy was this moderately sized room, a bit bigger than our bedrooms, on the first floor of the building. It was littered with couches, bean bag chairs and the types of recliner chairs that would swallow you whole when you sat in them. The windows in the room were abundant and gave view to what lingered behind the facility, a large lake littered by an expanse of trees.
Kiba, Chouji, Shikamaru and I were among the last to arrive. Just as we had taken residence on a large sofa by the door, in came a short, tanned man with a distinctive scar across his nose, and hair pulled up into a ponytail atop his hair. He was carrying a large manila folder in his arms, and a coffee cup in his other. He smiled gingerly at the rest of us as he walked in and sat down heavily in his chair.
"Alright, good morning everyone …" He set his coffee down on the table beside him and flipped the folder open. "…Just going to make sure everyone's here."
"Sakura, and Ino are here …" He looked at the two of them, seated together on the floor and then turned to look at the dark haired girl, "Hinata, Sasuke," He moved past her to three boys to the right of Sasuke, who was seated underneath the window on a chair, not bothering to acknowledge anything that was going on. "Lee, Gaara, Sai …" and then he turned in my direction, "Shikamaru, Chouji, Kiba …well you're a new face." He looked down on his list and then looked back at me, "Naruto Uzumaki?"
I nodded, "Yes."
"Well it's good to finally have you with us, Naruto." Iruka said, smiling at me as he closed his folder, "I'll take this time to briefly go over what group therapy stands for."
I shrugged, "Uh …okay."
"The purpose of having group therapy is to form a safe and confidential place where you can talk amongst your peers without fear of being judged or rejected. Anything said in this room remains within this room." Iruka began, speaking more so to me than anyone else in the group. "Naruto, since you're new to the group and not everyone may know you, and you may not know everyone else, why don't you introduce yourself and maybe tell us a little bit about yourself?"
I surveyed the room, looking at all the faces that stared right back at me. Kiba was sitting down on the floor on the left of me, looking up expectantly at me, as was Chouji who was seated at my right. Shikamaru, who was sitting next to Chouji, just shrugged, fending disinterest in the whole thing.
Ino and Sakura were seated on the other side of the room, both of them on the floor like Kiba was. Both of them were looking at me just as Chouji and Kiba were. The dark haired girl, Hinata was sitting on a bean bag chair next to them, shooting shy looks at me, and looked away before we even made direct eye contact.
Next was Sasuke, who was sitting next to the dark haired girl, and still wasn't paying any attention to what was going on in the room. He was busy looking out of the windows, arms crossed, with a lost look on his face. Next to him, sat a boy that was even paler than him with eyes just as dark, but less haunting and tired looking. He smiled gingerly at me, and I nodded back. That must have been, Sai.
On the other side of him was an auburn haired boy with heavy black eye liner, who held no expression on his face, his arms crossed and was looking menacingly at me. Gaara, was it? And I thought Sasuke was bad when it came to the looks he gave people, sheesh. Lastly, there was a boy next to Mr. Death Threat Eyes who was beaming at me, his smile so wide, I thought it might break his face if it got any wider. That was Lee.
I looked back to Iruka and he nodded again and I sighed. "Uhm, well, my name's Naruto, I …uhm …" Honestly, what was the point in throwing me on the spot like this? I crossed my arms, sighing loudly, "I just arrived here last night and I'm not really looking forward to being here …" I looked at Iruka, "Because honestly, I think me being here is a waste of time."
"You're not the only one." Kiba mumbled in agreement, snickering gingerly. At that, a small murmur went through the room, until Iruka silenced everyone and spoke again.
Iruka sighed, shaking his head, "Well, you all seem to be in agreement on one thing, for once." He turned to look at me, "Why do you say that, Naruto?"
"Because it is." I said, grimacing. "I was forced into this stupid place because my dad decided that I had a problem, and I supposedly needed help, and no one seems to believe me when I say there's nothing wrong with me, I'm fine."
"Naruto brings up a valid point in feeling like he was forced into being here," Iruka said, turning to look at the group, "Would someone like to add their opinion on what he said?"
The room was silent for a moment, before Kiba spoke up, "He's right," He said, crossing his legs and sitting up, "Okay, so I broke a couple of people's faces in, can't seem to watch my mouth or can't seem to react to certain situations in the right way. That doesn't give anyone the right to tell me, 'hey, you belong in a fucking loony bin' and put me away for the summer. That's just saying to me that you're trying to avoid the problem."
"I don't want to be treated like a problem; I want to be treated like a person, right?" Chouji asked Kiba.
"You bet your fucking ass I do." Kiba replied, crossing his arms and leaning against the chair he was propped up against.
"The matter is, most of you did not choose to be here," Iruka said, "But the fact is, whether you think so or not, most of you do belong here. People in your lives, your loved ones, families, friends, guardians, anyone who cares for you and your well being have felt like something you're doing at this point in time is detrimental to your health, and they don't want to see you hurting anymore. Since this is only our third group session, maybe some of you would like to share your stories of how you came to be here if you're ready and in result, perhaps, will learn something about each other in the process."
"Well, since I was already talking about breaking people's faces in, I'll go first." Kiba said, shrugging. "I'm here because supposedly I have 'severe anger issues'. I've stolen shit, gotten into fights, sold drugs, anything you could possibly think of to break the law. I got sent here after being expelled for the fifth time because I held some kid at knife point in my last school, got sent to juvi for a little while, and eventually they forwarded me here."
Hinata's hand flew to her mouth instantly, and gasped at the end of what Kiba said. The first sound out of her, and it was a gasp. He got no reaction out of Chouji and Shikamaru; I'm guessing they'd already heard the story before. For some reason, despite him saying all of that, I wasn't in the least bit afraid of him.
"Seriously, Kiba?" Sakura whispered, looking a bit shocked if not as much as Hinata.
"You're crazy." Ino said, frowning a bit. "With a knife, Kiba?"
"Yeah, and?" Kiba challenged, leaning forward with his hands on his knees. "Why don't you tell us why you're here then, Ino?"
Ino shrugged, "All of you can pretty much tell why I'm here just by looking at my physical stature, so there's not much to tell." She eyed me especially. "I had a heart attack a few months back and flat lined at the hospital. I shouldn't even be alive at this moment, and yet here I am in all my emaciated eighty pound glory. I'm here so they can fatten me up and then release me back into the wild."
"As if you were hardly fat in the first place." Kiba muttered under his breath, or at least he tried to. Pretty much everyone in the room had heard it. I found myself frowning, even though the comment wasn't even directed at me.
Ino's face instantly flushed, "What the hell would you know?" She snapped, rising up out of where she was sitting, balling her hands, so that her nails pressed tightly against her palms. Sakura's hand gently went to Ino's back, gripping the thin girl firmly in an attempt to calm her down, "You have no idea what its like."
"Stop." Iruka commanded sharply, "This isn't a place to antagonize one another." He began, looking between Ino and then at Kiba, "It's a place of understanding, to get to know someone else that's struggling with their demons just as you are. Ino, why don't you tell us what it's like for you to struggle with your disorder, and in turn, Kiba maybe you can tell us about what makes you so angry?"
She looked away from Kiba, then at Iruka and her face scrunched up as she bent over to hold her ankles, "I'm a prisoner in my own body." Ino started, looking up at Iruka through misted eyes, "I can't focus on anything else but what I'm going to eat, what I'm not going to eat, how much I eat, when I'm going to eat. It's in my mind all the time, everywhere I go, and I feel like I'm powerless to stop it." She sighed, "Then it's the scale, how much am I going to be when I get on the scale? Did I lose any weight because I restricted all day yesterday? Should I exercise more? Of course I have to exercise more, don't I want that number on the scale to go down? Don't I want to get rid of these bulging thighs, this fat stomach, these flabby arms, this double chin, this bulbous ass?" She looked up at Iruka, her blue-green eyes sharp, though still slightly misted, "Everything needs to be perfect, it has to be perfect. I have to be in control."
It was like she was reading my mind.
"And since while you're in here, you can no longer do any of what you just said, what does that feel like for you?" Iruka asked.
She looked at him like he was crazy, "What the hell do you think?! I have no control in here!" She threw her arm out in gesture to all of us, "None of us do!"
Iruka nodded, "How many of you agree with, Ino?"
"I do." Sakura said softly. She glanced at Ino first, who had drawn her legs up to her chest and wrapped her thin arms around them and buried her face into her knees. Sakura looked down at the floor, her expression a bit sad as she spoke, "I agree with her whole heartedly." She gazed up at the ceiling, "I don't think I have a right to complain, because it was actually my decision to come here, no one forced me to. But …but, I just want to say that …I agree with her that we have no control in here. Everything is decided for us, we're told what we can and can't have, we have to follow rules, guidelines, things that we otherwise wouldn't have out there." She nodded behind her at the windows. "But …but I guess it's to help us establish a healthier degree of stability in our lives. Maybe that's what they're trying to help us do in here."
"Sakura is right," Lee said, smiling brightly at the pink haired girl, and giving her what looked to be a thumbs up. "I agree with her as well as Ino."
"You would." Ino muttered under her breath, looking up at Lee, irritably. Kiba snickered, glancing at Lee who seemed unperturbed.
Sakura sighed, "Shush."
Iruka cleared his throat, looking to the other side of the room, "Do you have anything else you'd like to say, Lee?"
He thought for a moment, crossing his arms and then nodded, "It's not that we don't have control in here, we just have a different form of control in here, correct?"
"Something like that." Iruka said.
Chouji cleared his throat and a few heads shot his way, "Uhm, it's like …we're learning to deal with our problems in a different way, correct? We're learning a different method of control …or like Sakura said, gaining a healthier degree of stability in our lives?"
"Exactly. Does anyone else have anything they want to say before we have bring our session to a close?" Iruka asked, writing something down on the top of the first sheet of his thick manila folder. When no one said anything, he wrote something else down and nodded, "Good work group, I'm happy with the discussion we had today. To those of you that opened up, I'm glad you did, to those of you who have yet to talk; I hope to see you participate soon. You may all leave, we're done for today."
xXx
"And that's group." Kiba said, as we walked out of the room at the end of the session, me, him, Shikamaru and Chouji being the last. "Well?"
"It's not that bad." I said, rubbing the back of my neck as we left the room. Pretty much everyone had left the room already and were all heading in the direction of the dining room for breakfast, probably. "When do we have group?"
"Monday through Friday, same time as always. Same room." Shikamaru answered, cracking his neck slightly and stretching gently.
"Hmm." I looked down the hallway to see Sakura and Ino coming out of the bathroom. Ino's face was red and blotchy and Sakura was holding paper towels out to her for her to take. I guess, as bitchy as Ino acted, she was still human, still prone to getting her feelings hurt.
Having turned to see what I was looking at, Chouji turned to Kiba, crossing his arms over his chest. "Ino's looking a little worse for wear; I think you should apologize to her, Kiba."
"For what?" Kiba snapped, gritting his teeth, his prominent canines barred.
"We're all struggling in here, you know that. Take it easy on her." Shikamaru said, pocketing his hands.
Kiba muttered something underneath his breath, turning to look at me, "What do you think, Naruto?"
"I agree with Shikamaru and Chouji." I said, looking at Kiba and then back at Ino and Sakura who were about to turn away from the bathroom and head toward the dining room like everyone else had.
"Tch." Kiba turned to us, Chouji and I nodded and Shikamaru shrugged and he was off down the hallway, catching up to Sakura and Ino.
"Oh, Naruto!"
I turned around to see Iruka rushing out of the group therapy room looking relieved to find that he had caught me before I went anywhere, "Yeah?"
"I have a note from Dr. Tsunade. She says you're to report to her office right after group …can't believe I almost forgot to give it to you." He adjusted the folder in his arms, and went to close the door, "Here, I'll escort you."
I turned to look at Chouji and Shikamaru who nodded knowingly, "We'll catch up with you later, Naruto."
Iruka motioned for me to follow him as the two of them headed off to the dining room. He was mostly quiet, as was I as we headed for the elevator for the second floor and headed past the nurses' station and down the corridor that Shizune had previously taken me to earlier that morning.
He knocked twice on the door and I heard a gruff voice call out, "Come in." A few seconds later. Tsunade was seated in her office, flipping through papers in a folder. She nodded silently to Iruka who left me in the room, and then motioned for me to come forward and take a seat in the chair opposite her desk.
"How are you, Naruto?" She asked, folding her hands together on top of her desk.
"You asked me that this morning, and I remember telling you that I don't want to be here." I said, folding my arms as I sunk lower into the chair.
"Mmm." She scribbled something down on the papers in front of her. "I want you to fill this out."
I looked down at the paper she passed across the table and picked up the pen she pushed along with it. It was an assessment sheet, something to gauge my eating habits, how I felt about food, that sort of thing. I looked up at her and she nodded to it again. When I was done, I passed it across the table and she looked it over.
"Well?" I asked her.
"Are you allergic to any foods?" She asked, writing something down on the end of the paper.
"No."
She nodded, "Do you have any particular foods you never restricted no matter what the circumstances?"
Well that was different. "Ramen." I said, "And red bean soup, and milk."
She nodded again, "Alright then, there's one more thing." Tsunade looked past me and I turned around, "You can come in, Kakashi."
The door opened, and a lazy eyed man came walking through, with unusual fly away grey hair, despite barely looking a year past thirty. I couldn't see any other part of his face because it was obstructed by a surgical mask that covered the lower half of his face. …They didn't perform surgeries here, did they? What the hell?
He gazed at Tsunade, and then down at me. "Naruto, this is Dr. Kakashi Hatake. He'll be your individual therapist in the time that you'll be spending here." Tsunade said.
He nodded at me, and I nodded back, albeit a bit hesitantly, at him.
"Kakashi, you can take Naruto for the time being. On the way out, can you please leave this with Tonton to forward to the kitchen, please?"
He stepped forward to retrieve the paper from Tsunade, looked it over and nodded, "Right away. Naruto, follow me, please."
I got out of my seat to follow after Kakashi, "Naruto, I'll see you tomorrow morning." Tsunade said.
xXx
Kakashi He didn't say anything else as we walked down the hallway from Tsunade's office and headed to one of the nurse's stations on the first floor. He dropped the piece of paper off with a stout, chubby girl at the window and we continued down another side corridor.
He opened a door and instructed for me to take a seat on the couch opposite his desk. Kakashi flicked something on by his desk and I heard a low hum resounding outside. "Naruto," He began, looking down at a paper on his desk, as he took a seat and exhaled gently, "…tell me about yourself."
I frowned, irritated by the whole course of how today was running. It was doctor, after doctor, after doctor, and I was getting sick of it. "I'm pretty sure they gave you a file to read. You probably already know everything there is to know about me. I've got nothing to say."
Kakashi nodded, "If you don't want to talk, that's fine." He rummaged around in a desk drawer of his, and pulled out a book that I recognized in an instant. It was my grandfather's, as in; it was the adult series that my grandfather wrote. He was always going on about how great it was, but personally, I never found anything interesting in it. He told me I didn't appreciate, 'great literature'. Pffttt, great literature my ass. It was popular, but I didn't care for it.
I took the time to flop back down on the couch I was sitting on, looking up at the ceiling. It's clean and white, simple, in contrast to the polished mahogany walls that encase the office. I look down at the carpet. Grey and hard. It's not like the semi-plush grey carpet in our rooms; this one is matted and grey, with material more like an area rug. There are three small windows at the top of the room for light to filter in, but that's about it.
I look at Kakashi. He's currently engrossed in that stupid book of my grandfather's and I sigh irritably. It gets his attention, but he doesn't look at me. "Hmm?"
I crossed my arms, "That series is horrible, I hope you know." I finally say after some time.
"Oh?" Kakashi asked. He's looking at me, his eyes going into mere slits as I presumed, he was smiling at me.
"Yeah," I say, "You're wasting your time."
"How so?" Kakashi asked, setting the book down on the table.
I shrugged, "You just are. It's boring."
"How much have you read of it?" Kakashi asked.
"More like forced to read it." I mumbled, "The whole book, and I hated it. He hardly ever makes it interesting; at least …I think so. I don't get some of it anyway, so whatever."
"He?" Kakashi asks.
"The author." I replied, "He's my grandfather."
"I know." Kakashi began, "He brought you here, correct?"
I looked at him, raising an eyebrow and sat up, "And you know that how?"
"It's on your records." He stated, looking at the paper on his desk. I bit my lip, looking away from Kakashi, and falling back onto the couch. And off he went with the smile I couldn't see. "Looks like you did have something to say after all, Naruto."
xXx
"Naruto! Hey, over here!" Kiba waved me down the minute I entered the dining room and got my food. Shikamaru and Chouji were also there. I walked over to them, sitting down in the vacant seat between Kiba and Chouji. "Where've you been? You've been gone nearly all morning!"
"I had to see Tsunade for a little while." I said, frowning as I looked down at the pancakes, strawberries and milk on my plate. I looked to the side of my tray, eyeing the butter and syrup tablets the chef had added to them. As if I would eat them. "And then I went to go meet my therapist."
"Who do you have?" Chouji asked, leaning onto the table.
"Kakashi?" I asked, looking at the rest of them. "Kind of odd? Wears a surgical mask despite the fact that he's not operating on anyone."
Kiba looked behind me and the whispered lowly, "People say his face is horribly disfigured, that's why he wears it."
"Kiba." Shikamaru said, rolling his eyes.
"At least, that's what I heard from… you know, from people."
"Most of us have Asuma or Yamato. I think you; Sai, Sakura and Sasuke are the only ones with Kakashi." Shikamaru said. "What's he like?"
"He was okay." I said, poking at my food and grimacing. "Didn't really ask me much, I didn't really feel like talking."
After that, the conversation turned away from me to Kiba talking about his dog Akamaru, and how his sister had sent him a picture of him for his room, and how big he'd gotten since he'd been away. Kiba asked me for my input from time to time, distracting me from looking at the food that was in front of me.
I was hungry, I wasn't going to lie. I had barely eaten anything since I'd arrived last night, and prior to my release from the hospital, I'd been forced into eating on a constant while I had been on lockdown at home. But without sitting down at a kitchen table with my father and Jiraiya all the time, it was much easier to make it look like I had eaten, rather than consume what was in front of me.
I had taken the time to cut up my pancakes into the smallest possible squares that I could, leaving the syrup and butter alone. I picked at the strawberries, forcing myself to take a few bites, but no more than that. I only thing that I really touched on my plate was my milk, and that was gone in two seconds flat.
"Not hungry again?" Chouji asked, looking down at my plate.
"No." I replied, a bit unnerved that he was watching me eat. Kiba and Shikamaru seemed to have tuned in on our conversation also.
87.4. 87.4. 87.4. 87.4.
"They won't let you leave until you eat it. Either that, or you get a mark." Shikamaru said, grabbing a toothpick from out the dispenser.
"Mark?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Well, there's a level system here. We all come in at level one, meaning you basically can't go anywhere by yourself besides group, or unless you've got an escort of some sort whenever you go somewhere or else you get marks. Certain marks are more severe for certain people, such as with you, in your condition…if you don't finish that, you'll get a pretty bad mark." Shikamaru explained.
"You can get them for the stupidest shit." Kiba said, rolling his eyes, "But Shikamaru's right, you might want to finish that and save yourself the hassle."
Chouji nodded, "It's hard, I know. But at least try. If they see you're making an effort besides out rightly not caring, they'll be more lenient with you."
I looked at Kiba, Chouji and finally Shikamaru and then looked down at the cut up pancakes in front of me. I grasped the plastic spork in my hand and with it, dipped the utensil into the warm, plush pancakes watching them sink underneath the weight of my hand. I hesitated for a moment, and then took a bite, chewing it with much effort, before swallowing.
Kiba nodded at me to proceed with eating, so I stabbed the next small piece of pancake by me and proceeded to eat it also. It took some time, but after awhile, I had cleared the entire plate of pancakes and the small amount of strawberries in the cup on the side of my plate.
I pushed the plate away when I was done, looking to Kiba, Chouji and Shikamaru who all gave me an approving look. I returned the look with a slight smile, all the while, in the back of my mind, I knew very well where the food would end up the minute I got back upstairs.
xXx
I've always hated throwing up.
I've always hated the gagging feeling you get when nothing comes up, I hate the tears that blur your vision when you're trying so hard to get anything to come up at all. Most of all, I hate the acidic taste of bile that always fills my mouth whenever something first starts coming up.
The attendant for the boy's bathroom was asleep when I got upstairs making it easy enough for me to slip into the bathroom and do what needed to be done. Shikamaru, Chouji and Kiba had all retired to different areas of treatment for the moment, so I was alone. Shikamaru in individual therapy, Chouji in physical therapy and Kiba went to art therapy.
It took a little time, but I finally got the pancakes up along with some of the strawberries. I never looked into the toilet when I threw up; I always kept my eyes closed. It was more than enough for me to feel the food passing back up out my mouth to know that I had gotten it out, than to actually look at it.
When I was done, I flushed the toilet, and stepped outside, frowning at the smell of vomit that dispersed into the air. It wasn't heavy, but you could definitely smell it. I picked up a can of air freshener that rested on the metal plank that rested just beneath the long mirror mounted onto the wall and sprayed it over the bathroom. Pretty soon the bathroom smelled like a horrid flowery mess, but it was enough, it covered up the smell.
I sighed, leaning down to rinse my mouth out with water and spit out into the sink. I turned to look at the bathroom attendant. He was still sleeping.
I left the bathroom, winding my hands into my sleeves as I headed back for my room. I was actually feeling tired, and desperately wanted to curl up into my bed and take a nap. Thankfully, Sasuke wasn't in our room when I returned, so I took the opportunity to get back into bed, kicking off my black chucks and curling up within my flannel sheet and resting my head on the pillow.
I let sleep claim me.
