Chapter 11 – Long Road To Recovery
A few days later, Itachi woke up. Of course, Sasuke's mother had started crying again as soon as she found out – tears of joy this time, though. Sasuke was immediately hustled into his father's car and they were on their way to the hospital again.
Sasuke couldn't help spending the car trip thinking about his conversation with Hikari a few days ago. He could also feel his face heat up when he thought about the kiss he'd given her before he'd left her at her front door yesterday. He couldn't say he didn't know what he was thinking, because he hadn't really been thinking at all. His only thought had been of how grateful he felt to Hikari for telling him what he'd needed to hear, and more importantly for not balking when he told her what he'd found. Put simply, she'd been amazing, and so much different compared to the girls at school who spent all their time wanting to get into his pants instead of wanting to get to know him.
He'd never felt like this about anyone before now, not even when he'd dated Sakura and then Karin very briefly until he realised they only wanted to obsess over him rather than know him. He liked feeling like this, like he could forget about his problems just for a little while. It was nice. Probably very uncool of him to outwardly feel this way, but nice nonetheless.
When they arrived at Itachi's room in the hospital, it was to see two police officers working under Sasuke's father sitting in the room and talking with Itachi. He seemed to be answering their questions easily, though Sasuke could never tell when his brother was lying or telling the truth. He felt he could no longer read his brother at all after what he'd found stashed in that drawer in his brother's bedroom.
Had he taken some of it before he went out the night he was nearly killed? Was that why he was attacked? Why didn't he try harder to defend himself? Did he have an even larger stash in his private apartment across town? All Sasuke felt was confusion, but he didn't dare let his father see as much.
Sasuke made himself as comfortable as possible leaning against the wall opposite the door to his brother's hospital room as his mother rushed inside with his father following behind her. All Sasuke could think about was how much this bullshit was affecting his life in a bad way. First his brother was nearly murdered, now he's a drug addict who was nearly murdered. It didn't help that the only people in town that you could even procure drugs from was the local gang – the Akatsuki. That meant that Itachi definitely had some sort of affiliation with that gang, but what did that mean? Did he just buy drugs from them, or was he an actual member of the gang itself?
Sasuke rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. All this thinking was beginning to give him a headache. He looked up from glaring at the floor to see his mother was standing in the doorway, looking at him worriedly.
"Don't you want to come in and see your brother, Sasuke?" She asked him tentatively. Sasuke looked at his mother in silence for a moment before shaking his head and breathing a small sigh.
"I have a bit of a headache right now, I think I'll just catch the bus home." Mikoto nodded wordlessly and left Sasuke alone again to return to her bedridden son. With another loud exhale, Sasuke turned and began his slow trek down to the hospital bus stop.
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An hour later Sasuke was nearly home again. As he walked up the street towards his house, he looked across the road to Kurenai's house. He blinked in momentary surprise when he noticed Hikari sitting at her desk by the window, with a distant, whimsical smile on her face.
Sasuke almost questioned his sanity when his heartbeat sped up at the sight of that smile. He looked away from her when she blinked herself out of her daze and returned her attention to whatever was on her desk in front of her. Sasuke questioned his sanity again when he had the passing thought of stopping in at Kurenai's just to see Hikari. They were neighbours and went to the same school, he saw her plenty enough already, for crying out loud! Shaking his head briefly, Sasuke strode determinedly the remainder of the way up the street and into his own house. Was he crushing on Hikari Kobayashi? Maybe. Not that he'd openly admit that to anyone.
Once he was safely inside, he stopped, leaning against the front door, and put a hand to his chest where his heart was still beating frantically away. Seriously, why the fuck was his heart beating like he'd just run a marathon? Not cool at all. After standing there a while longer to compose himself, Sasuke made his way through the house and into the kitchen to hunt and gather some sort of lunch. Determined not to think about Hikari at all. Yet he thought about her anyway, and couldn't seem to get his heart to stop pounding no matter what he did.
It was almost like his body was determined to make him uncool where Hikari was concerned.
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Kira was at the shopping centre again enjoying a Saturday out by himself. It was a nice day in Konoha and he was bored of sitting around the house. Kari was just sitting at her desk and playing Sims 3, and he didn't feel like sitting on her bed watching her play Sims for the next four or five hours, which is how he ended up at the shopping centre browsing through the stores he liked.
After he had managed to wander through the whole complex, he decided to stop in at a coffee shop nearby to get something for lunch, since his stomach was starting to growl at him for food. After ordering his food and coffee of choice, Kira sat down, and – out of habit from coming to coffee shops with his sister – started to people watch. He looked around at the people who were sitting in the coffee shop table by table. As he watched, he imagined how each person's day was going based on their facial expressions, the way they were sitting, and other little tell-tale signs like those.
He was almost too distracted by people watching to notice the vaguely familiar blonde walking towards him. Key word being almost. By the time Kira noticed the guy, he was already sitting in the chair opposite him. Kira stiffened as he recalled who exactly the person was – the guy who had chased him all the way out to the parking lot the last time he had come here by himself. Kira was about to make a break for it when the guy reached out and gently grabbed hold of his wrist.
"Wait, un. I wanted to apologise to you for last time." This made Kira pause in surprise. He turned to look at the blonde with a questioning eyebrow raised, before he slowly sat back down to give the guy the benefit of the doubt. The guy across from him slumped with relief and slowly let go of his wrist. It was silent for a little bit longer before the blonde spoke up again. "I shouldn't have freaked you out like that, un. My friends have told me before I need to stop coming on too strong." Kira nodded.
"Yeah, coming on strong is a bit of an understatement though, don't you think? I mean, you did chase me out to the parking lot after that." The blonde's visible blue eye widened, and he nodded miserably.
"Yeah. I'm sorry about that too, un." Kira sat and contemplated the apology for a moment. He guessed this guy was being genuine enough, as far as strangers go anyway.
"Kira." The blonde blinked confusedly.
"Huh?" Kira chuckled.
"My name. It's Kira. What about yours?" The blonde blinked in surprise, then grinned at Kira, relief clear in his eyes.
"It's Deidara."
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When I saw Sasuke at school on Monday, he still looked more stoic than usual, which made me wonder if what he'd found out about his brother was still bothering him. I was starting to think it was becoming normal for me to not say anything and wait for Sasuke to come to me when he was ready.
Lunch was its usual affair, with another appearance from the trio of Sasuke's fangirls who continued to annoy the shit out of me. Even though I wanted them to leave all of us alone, I didn't want to say anything in case it ended up being something I would regret. Lunch passed by with me just barely managing to keep from hitting the girls, at least until they started trying to pull Sasuke out of his seat, sit in his lap, and shove me out of the way all at the same time. Of course, Naruto and Kira weren't going to be any help – Naruto was gobsmacked once again by the pink haired girl of the trio, and Kira was trying to gain his attention. I growled and slammed my hands down on the picnic table.
"That's it! Enough!" I grabbed Pinkette, who had been trying to shove me out of my seat, and none-too-gently pulled her off Sasuke so that she landed on her arse on the ground. I turned to glare at the red head, sitting in Sasuke's lap with her boobs half squished into his chest. Sasuke looked very uncomfortable also, but was apparently too gentlemanly to say or do anything. I got out of my seat and grabbed Red and their other companion off Sasuke and away from the picnic table. "It's a fucking Monday, we're all trying to enjoy our lunch here, and then you stooges," I levelled a glare on all three of them, "are too busy trying to get into Sasuke's pants to notice how uncomfortable he is or the fact that you're ruining everybody else's lunch because you're trying to push half of us off the damned picnic table. Why don't the three of you just run along and ruin somebody else's day now that you've ruined ours?" Red was glaring at me, and so was Pinkette, they didn't say anything though, thankfully. They did continue to glare at me until they couldn't anymore as they ran off with their tails between their legs. Well – strutted away in their stiletto heels and denim underwear.
I crossed my arms over my chest and huffed, shaking my head in disapproval before I sat down again, grumbling about rude people to myself as I picked up my sandwich to finally eat the rest of it. I was about to take a bite out of said sandwich when I opened my eyes and looked up when I noticed how quiet it was – the reason being that everyone at the table was looking at me with wide eyes. I raised an eyebrow when I noticed that even Sasuke's eyes were slightly wider than they normally were. I blinked in confusion and lowered my sandwich from my face.
"What?"
"Wow Kari…" Naruto murmured, actually freaking murmured, in surprise.
"Yes Naruto?" I asked again.
"Since when have you been a Mama dog protecting her pups?" Kiba asked more bluntly. I coughed in surprise, a slight blush coming to my cheeks at his analogy.
"Ask Kira, maybe he'll tell you." I answered as I got up to throw out my rubbish before going back and finishing my sandwich. "It's more my brother's story to tell than my own anyway." I shrugged, before grabbing my bag and making my slow way towards my next class, leaving a stunned group of teenagers behind me. At least I thought I had, until I noticed somebody walking next to me. I raised an eyebrow at Sasuke as he looked at me for a moment before turning to face the direction we were walking in.
"You know those girls aren't going to let you get away with that?" He asked me.
"Let them try. I'm sick of them already and I don't have to put up with anywhere near as much shit from them as you do." I sighed after I said as much, hitching my bag higher onto my shoulder. I looked over at Sasuke curiously. "How do you manage to sit there and let them do that to you?" Sasuke shrugged and grunted his usual 'hn'.
"I figure if I ignore them that they'll go away eventually."
"How long has this been happening?"
"Since we all hit puberty."
"And just how long do you think 'eventually' will take when they've already proven that they won't give up on you so easily?" Sasuke just grunted in answer again. I shook my head in disbelief.
Boys.
"Itachi's coming home this week." Sasuke murmured. I nodded and hummed an affirmative.
"And that other problem he has?"
"He doesn't have access to it in the hospital and can't have it in his system while he's under surveillance, so by the time he gets home, he'll go looking through his drawer and won't be able to find anything."
"So…you're going to let him find out his stash is gone before you tell him you were the one who threw it all in the fireplace?"
"That's the plan."
"Good luck with that. Trust me, you're going to need it." We walked in silence to our next classes after that. I spent the rest of that week worrying about how his brother would react to his secret home stash being completely gone.
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Well, that's another chapter over and done with. I hope I'm not getting progressively worse without my beta around to do her job ^_^;. Oh well, hopefully I'll manage as long as I follow my predetermined plot. Hopefully. Fingers crossed everybody!
So! Itachi will be back at home next chapter! Get excited 'Tachi fans :3 And the fluffiness will also be commencing! So get ready for some pretty cliché romantic crap also x3 Because remember, after the few chapters of fluff and relationship development, oodles more plot is yet to come!
(The above is old, and I'm an evil bitch for leaving this alone as long as I have! But I blame that more on my gradual slide into anxiety and depression, and also my life basically going to shit at the same time. Anywho!)
Kudos~