"Who's Sakura?" Naruto started at the unexpected question. From his propped up position on the bed, he gave Minato a blank look (A/N: you know the one when someone says something that goes completely over his head.) before returning to devouring his favorite food.
"Why do you want to know?" The question was slightly muffled as it was spoken through a mouthful of ramen but
Minato heard it all the same. Minato rolled his eyes and stretched in his favorite chair.
"You talk a lot in your sleep. Anyone who wanted to know anything about you would just have to wait until you go to sleep and just listen to your ramblings." Minato laughed at the amusing sight of his young son trying to glare menacingly at him with ramen hanging out of his mouth. The week following that first traumatic day of Naruto's stay here had been accomplished in a kind of relative awkwardness. With neither blond willing to bring up anything that might trigger another episode from the other, they had, unknowingly, accomplished an arrangement that was balanced on the edge of one of Minato's 3 bladed kunai knives.
Naruto rolled his eyes and swallowed his mouthful of ramen.
"She's part of my team. She's also one of my very best friends." Naruto glanced at his father and frowned at the sly grin that was slowly spreading across his features.
"What?" Naruto had a bad feeling about this. In the week he'd been there, he'd learned that the Yondaime had a great love for teasing him about anything, and, Naruto realized with dawning horror, he'd just handed the man something to annoy him with for days.
Perhaps Yondaime saw the look of horror on his son's face because he assumed an expression of innocence that Naruto didn't quite believe was genuine.
"Oh, nothing. I just think it's cute you have wet dreams about your girlfriend." Naruto's eyes widened in shock and when he blushed, Yondaime snorted.
"My…my…girlfriend? No no no no no…she's not my girlfriend." Naruto scowled at the falsely mournful look on his father's face.
"Aw…poor boy…guess you didn't inherit my amazing charm."
"Amazing charm? Yeah right." This time it was Minato who scowled.
"Humph. So tell me about this team of yours. You're still a genin?" Naruto grinned to himself. He'd finally have something to brag about.
"Well, my two teammates are Sakura Haruno and Sasuke Uchiha. Those two started dating after we all passed the Chuunin exams. Our sensei is Kakashi Hatake and…" Yondaime, who'd frowned when he'd heard the bitterness in his son's voice when he mentioned his other teammates dating, stared at Naruto with wide eyes.
"Wait…your sensei is Kakashi?" Naruto almost missed the alarm/excitement in his father's voice. He frowned at him, confused.
"Uh, yeah, he's our sensei. Why?"
Minato grinned happily at Naruto who was even more confused by his apparent happiness.
"Kakashi was a student of mine when I had my own team. I'm glad it was his team you were put on. Tell me…does he still wear that mask?" 'He kept his promise…'
Naruto grinned, happy they had something safe to talk about.
"Yeah and…wait…if you were his sensei then…it's your fault he's such a pervert!!" Naruto pointed an accusatory finger at his father and would have laughed at the look of horror on Yondaime's face if he hadn't been so horrified by the revelation that his father, the 4th Hokage, was a pervert.
Minato gaped at his son in dismay. He couldn't believe Naruto thought he was a pervert!! The thought of his son exposed to another person like Jiraiya made him lightheaded and faintly nauseated. If Kakashi was anything like Yondaime's sensei then poor Naruto's innocence had been doomed from the start.
Gulping Yondaime looked at his son and managed to feebly whisper, "H-how…((sigh))how big of a pervert is he?"
Naruto gave his father a long-suffering stare that really concealed his delight: he would finally get one up on his evil father.
"Oh he once made me read those Icha Icha books to, in his words, 'make me a man'." Naruto closed his eyes, hoping that he would avoid whatever comical expression of horror that he was sure would be on his father's face. He waited, eyes closed, for the tell-tale sounds that would indicate he had reacted.
He waited.
And waited.
Silence…
Naruto opened his eyes and was surprised not to see his father. Where the hell had he gone? Pushing himself up, he was able to see the floor and the sight nearly made him burst out in hysterical laughter: the shock of hearing that his son had read the Icha Icha books had made the fearsome Hokage faint. And there he lay now, foot twitching, mouth agape, passed out.
Naruto shook his head: his father was such a dope, and Naruto thanked God he hadn't inherited that from his father…
"Guess the shock of finding out that his son knew about his perverted escapades finally did it." He shook his head again as he fell back on the pillows.
"Shouldn't have been such a closet pervert, Dad…"
-
-
--