Go with me on this or it won't work. This is my reality and I can bend it any way I see fit.
-:-
Hinata awoke the morning of December twenty-seventh not excited at all. So it was her eighteenth birthday. She wouldn't celebrate until she moved out. And since she'd counted the money she'd been saving up last night, that day, was not today. She still didn't have enough money despite ten years of saving.
There were no presents or birthday wishes from her father or sister. She'd hadn't gotten one from her father in ten years and had never gotten one from her sister before and didn't expect one this year.
At school her friends wished her a happy birthday. Ino and Naruto had given her gifts. Nothing big, just a small journal from Ino and coupons for free ramen from Naruto. Kiba and Shino said they were giving her her gift later. She wasn't close enough to anyone else at school to merit receiving a gift. Not that it really made a difference to her.
"So, Hinata-chan, meet me at my house tonight at seven, okay?" Ino put an arm around Hinata's shoulders.
Hinata looked at Ino out of the corner of her eyes suspiciously. "Why?"
Ino giggled. "It's a surprise, just come, please."
Hinata huffed but nodded her head. She then spun out of Ino's hold and headed off to English. Ino turned around and gave her other friends a thumbs up before going off to English.
At six-thirty Hinata left her house. Her father wasn't home, so she left him a note saying she'd be home before curfew. She headed through the night towards the bus stop. She wasn't sure what her friend was planning but whatever it was, she was sure she wouldn't like it. She made it to the bus stop, but the bus wasn't there, which meant she has to stand in the dark and wait, joy. She spent about ten minutes standing there until the bus came. She walked on expecting to see a familiar blond. Thank Kami-sama she didn't. She wasn't in the mood to deal with his new clingy attitude. 'Freak doesn't even begin to explain the dude.' she thought.
'Ah, that's mean.' her inner voice whined. It didn't know when to shut up did it?
'So? Its the truth.' she told the voice.
The voice and she argued of how much of a freak Deidara was the entire bus ride. Her inner voice was pointing out all of his good points while Hinata would point out some bad thing that nullified each good point. She was so engaged in the argument with herself that she would have missed her stop, had the voice not pointed it out.
'Oh shit.' she mentally yelled. She ran off the bus and tripped on the curb because of her rush. "Fuck." She sat on the sidewalk and pulled up her pant leg. Squinting in the minimal light she examined her knee. Hinata had enough experience with bruises to know it would indeed bruise. 'Hey look, I've got a bruise my father had nothing to do with.'
'Whoppe for you. If you'd look at the time, you'd see you're going to be late.' her voice told her sweetly.
Hinata growled, but glanced at her watch. It read six-fifty-five. 'I'm not running, so that girl can just wait.' She pushed herself to her feet and began walking down the sidewalk towards Ino's house. Her knee hurt but she hardly noticed it considering she walked around covered in bruises almost constantly now. Ten minutes later she made it to Ino's house.
"There you are. You're late, ya know." Ino scolded her as she walked up to the group. Yes, group. All of her friends were there, including Neji, Tenten, and Lee. It seemed Ino had planned something to celebrate. Hinata hated surprises.
"Sorry. What are you planning Ino?" she asked suspiciously.
Ino grinned. "Oh, nothing." Her voice sounded innocent, but that grin spoke otherwise. Ino grabbed Hinata by the wrist and dragged her along behind her. Hinata turned her head and saw everyone else was following. So they were going somewhere.
Ino lead the group towards the entertainment district by the university. By this time Hinata had a pretty good idea of where they were going. Her birthday was the last one of the year. Ino pulled her through the door of the bar and the others filed in behind the girls. ((This is where you should start to use your imagination!)) Hinata got one whiff of the place and already didn't like it. It smelled like her father's breath when he got drunk.
Ino sat Hinata down on a bar stool, as if she was already drunk and couldn't do it herself. Ino sat on one side of her and Naruto sat on the other. Chouji sat next to Ino. Sasuke sat next to Naruto and Sakura sat next to Sasuke. And much to Sakura's dismay, Lee took the open seat next to her. Kiba and Shino sat at one of the tables with Shikamaru. Gaara, Hinata noticed, had neglected to come.
Ino ordered Hinata an assortment of beers, saying she had to give everything a try. Then she bought herself a couple shots of Tequila. She didn't drink them though. She watched Hinata intently. Hinata figured Ino was waiting for her to drink, so to appease her friend and get her off her back, she took a sip of the bottle nearest her. It was as bitter tasting as the first time. Ino nodded and downed her first shot.
After a short while everyone was too immersed in their own cups to notice Hinata. Even Neji, who usually refrained from drinking much at all, seemed to have let himself go for her birthday. She'd sampled all of the beers in front of her and hadn't really found any of them to appealing.
"Hina-chan." came a familiar, but unwelcome voice from somewhere behind her.
She lowered her head into her hands. "Shit."
Deidara sat down next to her in the chair Naruto had vacated when he'd gone to the bathroom to throw up she guessed. "I thought I told you no swearing?" He raised an eyebrow at the number of beer bottles behind her. "And aren't you underage?"
Hinata fronwed angrily. "Not as of today."
Deidara nodded. Somebody called to him from a table. He turned and grinned at the person before dragging Hinata over towards the table. Why did everybody seem to be dragging poor Hinata around today? Hinata was sat down at a table where three guys already sat. "Guys, this is Hina-chan. Hina-chan, these are the guys." Deidara sat down next to her.
"And do these guys have names?" she asked.
"Kisame." the one with blue skin introduced himself.
"I'm Sasori." The one with silver ((He dyed it again)) hair nodded in greeting.
She turned to the last one and her eyes narrowed in anger when she recognized his face. "You." she hissed.
The guy grinned. "The name's Itachi." He held out his hand but Hinata just stared at it. Deidara watched this exchange and kept thinking Hinata was going to bite the hand. She didn't and Itachi retracted his hand.
Hinata then turned to Deidara, still angry. "So, if you and Itachi here are buddies. You must have had something to do with that little stunt he pulled at my school." she mused.
Deidara cowered back in fear for a second, before clinging to the girl. "It was their idea Hina-chan. I had nothing to do with it, I swear. I didn't even know what they were planning until it happened." Hinata just glared at the four guys.
Kisame laughed at Deidara's antics. "You must be an angry drunk." he said to Hinata.
She pushed Deidara off of her and smirked. "More like sarcastic."
Deidara tilted his head to the side and looked confused. "But you're sarcastic all the time." he pointed out.
Hinata turned to him and grinned. "Exactly, and who said I was drunk?"
Deidara pouted. She had a point. Hinata decided to stay with Deidara and his friends, considering her friends had all drunk themselves silly. She found out more about Deidara and his friends during the couple hours they talked. She decided he was even more of a freak than she gave him credit for. She excused herself at eleven-thirty saying she, unlike them, had a curfew.
She walked up to the bar to pay for her drinks and found that Kiba and Shino were paying. That was her present from them she assumed. She looked around at all her friends spread out around the bar, drunk. She decided to just leave them there. It was their own fault after all.
She made it home just before her curfew. Thankfully her father wasn't home. So he wouldn't ever have to know where she was tonight. She took the note she'd left him, crumpled it up, and threw it in the trash. She went to bed early that night to sleep of any effects the alcohol had on her. And for once in a very long while, the only new bruise on her body was inflicted by the curb.
