Lovely #11 [The Early Years]

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In middle school, Sasuke played baseball. And he loved it. In particular he loved catching. Swinging the bat was all well and good but it seemed like any decent sized young man could swing and hit. He was aware that some people, the clean up batters with the important jobs, put a lot of effort and skill into their swing, but Sasuke didn't have that sort of job so he just did what was required of him. Swing, make contact, wait on the ball, lay down a bunt, squeeze, hold, strike out, advance the runner.

Whatever.

But catching was so… different. Honestly, it was the power he held that got him. As catcher he got to call the way the pitcher pitched. It was tactical, exercised his brain. And he was good at it. He hardly ever took signs from the coach in the dugouts. He loved the even rhythm of the ball colliding heavily with his mitt as he struck player after player out.

It may have sounded weird for someone like Uchiha Sasuke, but it gave him shivers when he was catcher.

In middle school, that was why he loved baseball.

When he came to highschool, Sasuke obviously signed up for the baseball team. He raised his hand with a polite "yes, I am" when the coach called for a catcher and was pleased when no one else raised their hand. The job was easily his. And then the pitchers had raised their hands. A few with wobbly "kind of"s and "I've never pitched a game"s. And then:

"Yeah me! I'm a real good pitcher! I'll do it! I was the ace at my middle school!"

The others had lowered their hands and, having obviously witnessed the boy's pitching either on their own middle school team or at games, agreed this boy, 'Uzumaki Naruto', should pitch.

When they began testing out everyone's positions, Sasuke decided he hated this boy. His pitches were too fast, too hard and they snapped right past Sasuke's mitt and hit him square in the chest making him double over, eyes watering, muscles spasming.

"Too fast for ya?! Sorry about that, Princess!"

He hated him. He hated that reckless pitcher. Uzumaki Naruto.

And then one day, he didn't.

The Uchiha didn't know when it happened. Was it when Shikamaru had grumbled out to him "this noisy guy is gonna sit with us at lunch" and the pitcher had joined them on the roof, suddenly loud and joking? Was it when Sasuke had thrown him against the locker room wall, demanding the boy stop throwing such wild pitches and Naruto had held his hands up and agreed with a shaky nod and apology? Or when he'd first shown Sasuke an honest smile when the raven turned to him in the showers as Naruto swiped at a runaway soap sud between the other's shoulder blades?

He didn't know. But at some point Sasuke had realized that whenever Naruto came to pick him up to walk to school together with him, whenever a pitch went just the way they wanted and they exchanged satisfied grins, whenever Naruto looked his way and smiled that smile, laughed, snorted, spat milk, ate as he spoke, Sasuke's heart began to beat fast. Any little thing.

When Naruto; straight as an arrow, skirt-flipping, chest- leering, "girls are so sweet" Naruto, snuggled up to his 'best friend' Sasuke in the cold weather, hands sneakily trying to slip into the warmth of Sasuke's coat pockets, Sasuke's cheeks flushed. He tripped over garbled insults and Naruto just laughed and called him a 'strange guy'.

He hated it.

Because Naruto was straight and Sasuke had known for a while now that he was anything but.

Because when they hung out they watched baseball games together and played catch. They went shopping and ate meals together but somewhere there was always a baseball comment, the underlying knowledge that all their relationship really was was pitcher and catcher. And Sasuke couldn't ignore it. Because as much as he thought it was so stupid to fall for someone so infuriatingly dumb, so idiotic…

He couldn't help it.