Ok dears! This is going to be kinda short. I was getting ready to type up the Halloween chapter, and well, I suddenly remembered that Naruto's birthday was October 8th… ^^' At first I wasn't going to do this, but then I thought, I really need to because we all love Naruto and there needs to be a special chapter for him! So, without further ado, I bring you Naruto's (extremely belated =.=) Birthday chapter!
Oh, it's also from his point of view.
Enjoy!
October 8.
Naruto really, really hated that date.
It was a painful reminder of all the hate and pain he endured as a kid, the unfair treatment that he had been given for so long. It seemed that everyone would glare harder, speak angrier, insult harsher on that day. No one had ever told him the reason why they hated him. Not even his own foster parents, Jiraiya and Tsunade. They just looked at him sadly and patted his head, or held him tightly and told him it was nothing.
But Naruto couldn't buy that.
How could an entire city hate someone who was barely old enough to understand the world around him, without having a reason to do so? So he went looking for that reason, and he found it.
And he'd hated them for it.
He'd hated his foster parents for not telling him anything, for making him believe for ten years that they were his real parents. He'd hated the city for blaming him for something he had no control over. He was only a baby, he hadn't meant any harm. He'd hated everyone. But the one person he had hated more so than anyone else, was the father he had never gotten to meet, who had been so beloved by everyone to the point of adoration. That man had had everything that Naruto had been deprived of, had had everything that Naruto wanted most. And when he had come home that night, as his so called "parents" were scolding him for being out so late without telling them, he snapped. He lashed back in anger at all the hate he had endured for the past ten years of his life. Every bit of pent up rage and frustration he'd bottled up over the years came flooding out, all in a torrent aimed straight at the two people he had ever known to actually care about him.
Jiraiya had found him at four in the morning in front of the Fourth's statue, half unconscious from the exhaustion of yelling his frustrations at it, eyes red and bloodshot from crying. It wasn't until later when Naruto had been brought home and safely put in bed that he bothered to ask Jiraiya why. Why he had cared at all, when everyone else hated him. Why he didn't hate him for taking away the man that was like a son to him. Why he wasn't angry for the things Naruto had said to him. Naruto had expected a "I had to" or "someone had to do it" or an "It's nothing."
He'd never expected a "because that's what your father would have done."
Jiraiya had told him then, all about his father. He'd told him about what kind of a person Minato was, how he cared for everyone in the city no matter who they were. He was always trying to make things better. Jiraiya told him about the Fourth's dreams of peace and how for a long time, he had achieved those dreams. He talked about how his parents couldn't wait for Naruto to be born and how much they had loved him already.
Jiraiya had also told him how much his father couldn't stand to see people hate. Minato had said that hate was a terrible thing and acted just like a virus. Once it got a hold of someone, it would spread like wildfire until it consumed its host. That was when Jiraiya handed Naruto a folded up piece of paper. It looked worn and faded and the creases looked ready to tear themselves apart from being opened so many times. Jiraiya told him that it was a letter that his father had written him long before his death, hoping that one day he could give it to Naruto himself. As Naruto had silently read the letter to himself, Jiraiya had quietly left the room.
Naruto couldn't help but smile sadly as he walked towards his sixth period English class. He had memorized the last few lines of his father's letter by heart and he knew that he would never forget them.
Naruto, there's not enough paper in the world for me to write down every bit of advice I can think of to give to you. But there is enough space left for me to tell you the most important thing I've learned in life. Hopefully you will always remember it and live your life by it.
Don't live your life full of hatred towards others. Hate is something that can ruin your life if you let it. I've seen what hate can do to people. Believe me, you won't be happy if you let hate control you.
He remembered going back to the statue of Minato after he had read and reread that letter a dozen times that first night. Naruto had sat in front of it for what seemed like forever as he watched the sun rise and tried to sort out his thoughts and these new revelations.
In the shadow of his father's memory, Naruto had vowed to live a life free of hatred, just like his father wanted. Naruto would follow in his father's footsteps and love Konoha the way he did. He didn't care how long it would take, but he'd make everyone see that he was more than just a bad memory of what the city had lost. He would be the type of person that anyone could rely on. He'd made a promise to protect everything he held dear and he would never go back on that promise, or any promise he made.
The people of Konoha still treated Naruto pretty badly and it was hard for him to not hate them for their unfair treatment. But as he walked through the door of the classroom, Naruto couldn't help but think that it was all worth it as he saw his friends gathered around a single desk grinning madly and a short, pink-haired teenager standing in the center, holding up a cake in the shape of his namesake*, all bombarding him with shouts of "happy birthday" and "surprise!".
And maybe this day wasn't so bad after all.
Alrighty! This took me three days to write (mostly because I had absolutely no time to do it), and I'm kinda unhappy about the ending. I had it in my head yesterday, but now it's gone and I want to get this chapter over with. I have less than one week to make a total of four more chapters. Hopefully I can get them all up so that fourth one will be posted on Christmas Eve! I'm not sure when I'll be able to get it up that day though, because I'll be at my grandma's until the afternoon and then at my aunt's the rest of the night. But will just see where we are at that time.
Anyway, you guys know the drill! Read and Review, plot bunnies are welcomed, and I hope you guys are all enjoying the holidays!
Also:
*in regards to what I meant by Naruto's "namesake". I have no idea how widely known this bit of information is, or how many people that are reading this fanfic know this, but "Naruto" is the name of a type of fish cake commonly found in ramen (Other details about his name can be found in the Shippuden chapters of the manga and/or online). So basically, the group made Naruto a birthday cake in the shape of a naruto.
~Cherry