Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, I only borrow the characters for my entertainment, and I hope that you too find some small amount of joy from my musings… So please do not sue me, I have nothing, I no longer have my cat even so you can't get anything out of me other than more musings…
A/N: A very special thanks goes to all those that review, favorite and alert… thank you! A special thanks goes to Joyous emo… for inspiring this chapter! This one is for you!
Tic… Tic… Tic… Sitting on the sofa, Naruto waited for Iruka or Baki or someone to come home. Gaara was sitting next to him, neither one spoke, they were each lost in their own thoughts. The sound of the Grandfather clock in the foyer sounding louder than the music had coming from the speakers earlier, each time the clock made the tic sound just reminded Naruto that they were indeed alone in the house.
"We gotta take down the Halloween decorations soon." Naruto commented out of the blue.
Gaara looked at him, "Should we do that today?"
"I don't think we have time…"
"What time is it?"
"Last time I checked it was seven." Naruto leaned against Gaara's shoulder, "I am getting a little hungry though."
"How about pizza? They deliver."
"Sounds good. You can call, whatever you want is fine with me." Naruto had a fear that Gaara would soon have to leave him and Naruto kept having to suppress the urge to curl up like a babe and bawl. He had to come up with a plan, the best one he could think of. It had to be so good that Gaara and the others would be staying here even if Baki left. At the moment though, all he could think of was that he needed them to stay, it was not that easy to admit, in fact it shocked Naruto how much the thought of losing them affected him. When Iruka had said that they were moving here with them, he hadn't cared, so why did he care so much now?
Gaara pulled out his cell phone and dialed Pizza Hut's phone number, he ordered a large pepperoni and black olive pizza along with some wings and bread sticks. Naruto smiled and realized that that was all of his favorites. Gaara knew what he liked, and it touched him that the red head had thought about him.
Snuggling up to Gaara even more, Naruto was content to just hold him, he knew that he would need to resolve the issue of them later, for now though he just wanted this moment to last as long as possible. He was no longer worried about Iruka or the troubles that were going on with him, he just wanted to have Gaara with him.
The Grandfather clock in the foyer tolled out eight p.m. before the pizza got there.
As Naruto went to go pay for it and get it, he said to Gaara, "We will take it upstairs and eat it, so go grab some pop and meet me up there."
Gaara nodded his head and went to go get the pop and headed upstairs. Within a minute, Naruto had joined him and they were sitting on the sofa in front of Naruto's large TV. "What do you want to watch?" Naruto asked as he put the food on the coffee table in front of the sofa, absently pushing the PS, X-Box and WI controllers off onto the floor.
"I don't care…" Gaara said as he dug into the pizza while Naruto started in on the wings.
"Then I get to pick!" Naruto jumped up and headed to the shelf where all his movies were. Absently chewing on the wing as he scanned his dvd's. "Here is a good one that you haven't seen. At least I don't think so. I warn you though, it is interactive." Naruto opened the case and plucked out the gold disk. Once it was inserted into the dvd player, he sat back down next to Gaara and leaned against him while on the remote he pushed the button to go directly to the main menu.
"Rocky Horror Picture Show, huh?" Gaara said as the main menu was displayed. "I heard about this movie. it's a musical right?"
"Yeah." Naruto said, "One of the best ones I think." The song Science Fiction Double Feature came on and almost immediately Naruto sang along.
By the time Tim Curry was singing the Sweet Transvestite song, Gaara was enjoying the movie immensely due to the fact that Naruto was indeed making the movie a interaction by singing and dancing. By the end, Gaara smiled to himself as he noticed that Naruto had tears in his eyes from Rocky carrying Doctor Frank-n-furter in his arms as they died together.
"I love this movie." Naruto said, his voice was a little dreamy. "I wish they would do a midnight showing now, and I would go dressed up as the doctor. Tim Curry is such a good actor."
"He was good in It too." Gaara commented.
"What is it?" Naruto asked.
"A good movie. You want to watch It? I have it somewhere here." he started to rummage around his movies and pulled out the movie.
"What's it called?"
"It."
"It? That is a weird name."
"Yeah It's a Stephen King movie." the way Gaara said that, made it sound as if that explained everything.
"Oh…" Naruto said as they began watching the movie. "So what part does Tim Curry play?"
"The clown." Gaara smiled at the blond and pointed to the demonic clown.
Naruto leaned against Gaara and watched the movie, jumping up when the clown turned demonic. They had fallen asleep before the movie ended so they didn't hear Iruka come home or notice that Temari and Kankuro returned and chuckled over the fact that they had fallen asleep in each others arms once more.
The following morning, Naruto woke up with a stiff neck, disentangling himself from Gaara, he stretched his muscles before heading into the bathroom. While he was in the shower, he heard Gaara getting up also. With nothing but a towel on, he went back into the room, Gaara was gone, so he hurriedly got dressed and headed downstairs too.
Gaara was fixing some cereal and toast when he entered the kitchen, Temari was rubbing her puffy eyes, while Kankuro was busy texting on his cell phone.
"Don't forget," Temari said, "After school today we go to the old age home."
"I can't." Naruto stated.
"Why not?" Temari wanted to know.
"I have to practice for the winter production of the Nutcracker." Naruto was about to complain about not having his favorite cereal, Trix, when Gaara pulled it out for him. "Thanks Gaara."
"Well if he is getting out of it, so am I." Kankuro stated.
"No your not, you have to go." Temari argued.
"I can't." Kankuro complained, "The cookies that I promised Eustace got burnt so no, I refuse to go."
"God Kankuro, are you a idiot? Just buy some he wont know the difference."
"Like hell he will."
"Morning kids." everyone was quiet when Iruka walked into the room. He seemed tired still, yet he was no longer puffy eyed. Baki was nowhere to be seen.
"Morning Iruka." Naruto smiled at him.
"Naruto, I hope you and Gaara are practicing safe sex." Iruka sternly said to the two youngest boys.
"What are you talking about?" Naruto was more than a little confused.
"Yesterday Kankuro said that you two were sleeping together and last night when I got home I went and checked on you and you were both sleeping on the couch in each others arms."
Naruto turned beet red, "We h-h-have not had sex though."
"Yeah…" Gaara added, he too was more than a little scarlet from embarrassment.
Iruka looked between the two boys over to Temari who was trying not to laugh at the way her little brother was blushing, to where Kankuro was holding his side from the laugh that was coming out of his mouth. "So what is the deal?" He asked.
"They are in denial." Temari smiled at the older man that she had grown to respect.
"Yeah," Naruto added, "What is the deal with you and Baki?"
"I ask the questions here." Iruka said.
"I can ask too. What's good for the gander is good for the goose." Naruto crossed his arms in front of him.
"Uh Naruto," Iruka chuckled, "It goes the other way around… uh- never mind."
"So where is Baki?" Naruto ignored Iruka's comment.
"He moved in with his new 'friend'," Iruka softly said, he didn't want to talk too much about it at this moment, last night it had taken Gai and Kakashi almost all evening to get him to calm down.
"Naruto," Gaara said tactfully, "We gotta go to school. Come on."
Naruto nodded his head, unsure if he should say more or not. He relented and allowed Gaara to lead him out the door, on their way through the house Kankuro said in amazement, "Wow Naruto, I honestly didn't think you knew what a gander was."
"I don't." Naruto mumbled, "My granny says it all the time about people though so it must be true."
Temari softly laughed and told Naruto, "A gander is an adult male goose. And I think the way she said it is what's good for the goose is good for the gander."
"So I just called Iruka a goose?" Naruto laughed as he left the house with the others.
Iruka had heard them and also chuckled, Naruto thought he was so wise, that was how drama queen's usually were though. They would say something and assume it was fine, then they would find out it was wrong and just laugh about it.
Sitting down at the counter, Iruka contemplated the past few nights and what it meant for him. He had assumed that Baki was the one, the one that would be forever. How wrong could he have been?
He could forgive Baki, he would even take the cheating fool back if that was what Baki had wanted, no Baki wanted to go off with this new guy and leave Iruka behind. The new guy though hated kids and only had a studio apartment, in other words no room for kids, so Baki had left the three siblings here with Iruka. That was what bothered Iruka the most, how could someone say that they wanted to be with someone that didn't even like your kids? He knew that Temari, Kankuro and Gaara were not biological children for Baki, hell Naruto was not his biological kid, however he loved him just the same. Baki had said that they were old enough now to be without him, how foolish was the guy? No child should be treated so callously.
Cleaning up the mess that they had made, Iruka contemplated what Kakashi had said to him last night. That no matter what age, a child needs their parent. Baki was their parent just like he was Naruto's, much to his dismay. Well he should be proud of it, he was, it was just that Naruto wore his patience thin. I guess that was what being a parent meant though, Iruka mused to himself.
Once the kitchen was clean, Iruka went back downstairs and nearly stumbled into Kakashi, he had forgotten that the man had stayed the night, sleeping on the sofa down in the family room.
"I'm sorry." he told his childhood friend, "I made some coffee, if you want some." Iruka stepped aside, "Let me shower real quick then we can go grab a bite to eat, unless you want cereal that Naruto just may kill you over."
Kakashi laughed softly, "He is just like you."
"Hell no," Iruka said, "He is just like his mom."
Kakashi laughed, "You were a drama queen just like Naruto."
"No I was not!" Iruka denied, "My sister was, not me."
"You were just like your sister." Kakashi smiled at his friend. "That's what I loved about you." with that, Kakashi left a stunned Iruka at the bottom of the basement stairs.
With those words echoing in his head, Iruka went into the bathroom and turned on the water in the shower, wondering where that statement had come from. How could Kakashi know that even when they were in school that it was he that Iruka had liked? That the only reason he hadn't been forward about how he had felt was that he was unsure of how the pale headed Kakashi felt.
Hope sprang to life in his heart, Iruka didn't want to think of it, but maybe, just maybe he could get closer to Kakashi. He did not want to rush into anything though, and so he had to calm his beating heart.
With a new lightness in his step though, Iruka showered and got dressed. Even if the future only showed that they would remain only friends, he knew it would be okay as long as he always had Kakashi with him in some way.