Chapter 14: Unwanted Surroundings

~Fuck the way I feel right now
I'll never feel this anymore
Shut the feelings all right down
I'll never need them anymore~

A/N Here's the next chapter for you guys, thank you for the reviews. Sorry for not updating sooner, I have been a nervous wreck lately, but here's the next chapter for you guys, hope you like it.

Recap:

The teen laid on his bed and curled up into a ball, images of his friends flashed in his mind, but lingered on one person in particular. The one he loved and left heartbroken in Konoha, the first girlfriend he had. He tried to hold back the tears, but they surfaced as they had every other time, not ready for what was about to occur later that night once that man he despised most arrived. With a weak voice, he uttered a name, a name that belonged to the one person he missed most.

"Sakura."

It wasn't until about nine when Fugaku returned to the house, his clothes were in their disheveled mess like every other time he came home drunk. Sasuke was still lying on his bed as he heard the car door slam outside. The music player long since forgotten, rested on the nightstand. His heart race quickened, as the sound of the front door flying open and then slamming shut, filled his ears. That point in time was coming closer, and it was coming more quickly than he wished.

Sasuke's heart seemed to beat out of his chest as he heard loud footsteps come up the stairs. The footsteps were stomped as if in an angry manor, and Fugaku probably was angry, getting drunk always caused him to be like that. And when he was an angry drunk, that meant a more brutal beating on Sasuke's part. The first night at his new house was surely going to be hell. Fugaku had no sympathy for him whatsoever, he just took out all his frustrations on Sasuke and didn't care what happened to him. Sasuke truly believed he would be killed by his father's hand soon enough.

In all honesty, he didn't really care if he was killed right here and now. Anything was better than having to suffer through this torment every single night. It just wasn't worth it, besides his friends would be safer too, once he was gone, they couldn't be used as a threat and they wouldn't have to worry anymore. His eyes soon shot wide when his door was busted open and the one man he didn't want to see, stepped through the doorway. Sitting up quickly he jumped to his feet as he prepared himself. The last thing he felt was searing pain through his already bruised body as he tried to tell his father he was sorry for what he was to blame for.

Sakura sat in the living room of her home with her friends and parents surrounding her. A police officer stood before them in his dark blue uniform, his badge pinned proudly above his heart. They were contemplating what they should do, it was already getting late and the police have been trying to get the school to give them Sasuke's records. They first needed a certain permit that would allow them to receive those records so that might take a few days.

"I'm sorry we can't do anything sooner, if your claim is accurate on child abuse, we have to find him quickly."

"Thank you sir."

Keiji shook the officer's hand as the authority figure left the house. Mana looked to her husband as he turned to face them. He sighed deeply after he gazed at his daughter, she was afraid for Sasuke, who knows what his dad would do to him. There were just so many other possibilities, more beatings, more yelling, but their only questions was how much worse was Sasuke going to get it.

"Sakura, have you tried calling Sasuke's cell phone?"

"Yeah, but it said it was disconnected."

"Damn it."

"Maybe if we wait he'll come into contact with us. It's a long shot, but it's all we can hope for right now."

Sakura nodded and stood from her spot on the couch and began to walk up to her room. Ino, Tenten and Hinata quickly followed her, as the others watched them disappear up the stairs. Naruto sighed sadly, he was in as much pain as Sakura but he tried to be strong for her sake, if he fell apart then that might give her the wrong idea that Sasuke wasn't going to come back.

The pink-haired teenaged girl sat on her bed as the other three stood in front of her. Ino wanted to try and make her feel better but she didn't know what to say, so she opted to go with her usual teasing about the whole crush on Sasuke bit. But she didn't know she was taking a step a little too far. And Sakura would show her just what she was feeling soon enough, and it probably wasn't going to be good.

"Sakura, don't worry, we'll find your boyfriend and I can go back to teasing you about your whole relationship because I know you guys have kissed," Ino teased as Tenten and Hinata stifled a laugh.

"Why don't you just fucking shut up Ino, I'm getting sick and tired of you always teasing me about Sasuke, why don't you go embarrass yourself with comments about Shikamaru."

Ino looked at her with wide eyes, she muttered a fine and stormed out of the room. Tenten chased after her as Hinata looked surprised at Sakura, but Sakura just turned her head away from her gaze. She seemed not to regret what she said, she didn't care what she said to Ino, but in her mind it was a different story.

Tenten tried to stop Ino but she had already ran out the front door, slamming it shut behind her. The occupants in the living room turned to look but Shikamaru was the one that walked over to Tenten. His eyes questioned what was going on and she just sighed before explaining the situation to him. Nodding in understanding he too walked out the front door and found Ino sitting by the street on the sidewalk. He strolled over to her and took a seat next to her.

"Ino."

"Just leave me alone Shikamaru."

"I heard what happened."

"So."

"So…."

"What do you want me to say Shikamaru? That I'm a loud-mouthed bitch who doesn't take into consideration what others are feeling?"

"What did you think was going to happen? Sakura is hurt right now, you have to be careful with your words, anything could set her off and you just happened to be the one that did it. She didn't mean it Ino, and you know she didn't."

Ino glanced at the boy next to her; she has never heard him say so much, she just thought, in all honesty, that he was too lazy to actually make someone feel better. He was always sleeping, watching clouds and sleeping were his hobbies. She was thankful to him for what he said to her, she knew Sakura didn't mean what she said and if she had been more attentive to Sakura's feelings, she wouldn't have reacted the way she did.

"Thanks Shikamaru," Ino told him as she turned her head to look into his eyes.

Shikamaru gazed back at her and before he knew it, he leaned his face closer to hers as she did the same. A blush was evident on her face, but soon was wiped away when his lips met hers in a gentle but fiery kiss. Ino never thought this moment would happen, but it had.

Sasuke laid sprawled on the floor of his room, eyes half lidded, as blood stained his chin and just under his nose. Taking a breath was difficult, swallowing was difficult, nothing was easy, his whole body was just sore. He felt like he was hit by, not necessarily by a truck, but something pretty close to it. Moving didn't seem possible at the moment, but he forced himself anyway. The bones that held him together felt brittle, he believed the wrong move would crush them completely.

The beating was much worse than anything he had felt before. Even the abuse he suffered back in Konoha was nothing compared to what he felt at this very moment. He stumbled his way into the bathroom like he had every other time before that and looked at the damage to his face. He spit out some blood that lingered in his mouth and grabbed a towel to clean up the wounds and then to take a shower. It was a never-ending cycle, even in this place, he moved but the cycle was never broken, he was cursed with the entrapment within it as long as his father had the upper hand.

Tomorrow would surely be a nightmare; the school he knew would just be filled with fights and drug abusers. He didn't even know what kind of teachers would be at this school, would they be crude and mean? What about the students? Was there even such a thing as normal to them? Those thoughts plagued his mind as the water from the shower rained onto his skin. But no answers came to him, none to answer his questions.

He stayed up again that night, just staring out the window into the cold desolate streets, hoping something would come his way and help him figure out what to do. He knew one thing for sure, he was giving up on his emotions. He didn't want them, he was going to lock them away, no more tears, no more sadness, no more anger, just no more anything. Only would he write in the journal, and now was a good time to start. There were no tears in his eyes, only the feeling left from the stinging he felt behind his eyes. He grabbed the journal and wrote down everything he felt at that very moment, this was nothing compared to anything he has ever written before, and he knew one thing for sure, he couldn't ever let this journal out of his grasp.

The next morning came quickly and Sasuke found himself walking to school, his dad had left earlier before he even came out of his room, and to him that was a good thing. Sasuke wore a black long-sleeved shirt, with a white short sleeved over it, once again to hide the bruises, he had his black jeans on, with his chain hanging down his left side. A pair of fingerless gloves covered his hands, and a skeleton key hung from a sliver chain around his neck. His lip pierced through with his favorite black lip rings. It wasn't long until the school came into his sight, just from where he was walking he could see how trashed it was, there was even graffiti, which told that the city didn't care what happened to its buildings.

As he walked through the gates, he received stares from all of the student that stood out in front of the school. These kids looked dangerous, they even wore sleeveless shirts that revelealed all of the tattoos that littered their arms. He continued on his way through the school doors, unaware that someone was watching his every move. Sasuke came to the office and asked the woman behind the desk about a schedule, she merely snapped her gum and tossed him a folded up piece of paper and then resumed flipping through her magazine. His schedule was as follows:

1). Calculus

2). English

3). History

4). Physics

Lunch Period

5). Music

6). Creative Writing

Sasuke sighed as he glanced over his schedule, his was in this for the long run, and as long as he was here, he would have to suffer through everything this life threw at him. The bell finally rang and Sasuke managed to find his first class, he walked inside and found that there weren't very many kids in the class, there were about ten, if that. The teacher hadn't arrived yet so Sasuke just took a seat at the back of the room. Once the teacher arrived, a worksheet was passed out.

"Complete the worksheet, then do whatever."

Sasuke breezed through it with ease, it was basic math to him, not difficult in the least. What he hadn't noticed was that most of the kids stared at him when he set the worksheet aside. Apparantely no one did the work in this class, and they began muttering "teacher's pet" and "nerd" though he ignored it there was one student that took notice that he did his work. And he was the only other kid that did the work as well.

The teen who had taken notice of Sasuke's efforts had a tattoo of his own, it wasn't on his arm or neck, but instead was on the left side of his forehead. His dark red hair was cut short and partly covered his ears. He watched Sasuke set his work aside as he propped his elbow on the desk and rested his chin on his hand. A common position for him, it was his way of thinking and trying to clear his thoughts. He blocked everyone around him out and didn't hear anything except what was within his own mind.

The bell rang and Sasuke left to go to his next class. It wasn't long until long lunch period came around and he found himself sitting alone under a tree out on the field. Lucky for him, no one decided to mess with him, whether it was because of his dark appearance or they didn't want to waste their time on the new kid. Either way he really didn't care in the least about it. He only wanted to be left alone and it seemed that was what he was going to get. The red haired kid on the other hand decided he wasn't going to be left alone and he slowly approached Sasuke. His black jeans and red t-shirt were spotted with small specks of dirt, probably just some old clothes.

As soon as a shadow loomed over him, Sasuke looked up to meet the boy's eyes. They just stared at each other until the boy said something to him, something he never thought anyone here would have guessed about. It just wasn't possible for him to know, but he had.

"Your father beats you doesn't he?"

He said it in a smooth voice that held no emotion at all. Sasuke's eyes widened as his heart race quickened, he hadn't been at the school for a day and someone had already figured out what he had been trying to hide. His question was, how did this kid know? He didn't think his appearance gave anything away, so what had he done to tip this boy off about his father and what happens at home? He decided to play it off and responded in a way he hoped would get this kid off his back.

"I don't know what you are talking about."

"You're lying."

"How would you know? You don't even know me."

"I know your father beats you, I can see it in your eyes, the hatred and the pain, it hurts doesn't it?"

"Why are you wasting your time with me?"

"Because I know what it's like, my father beat me too."

Sakura wasn't taking anymore of the waiting, so she did what she had never thought she would do in her entire life. She had snuck into the office of her principal when lunch period came around, and went through the remaining records that were left of Sasuke, and she had found his location. He had been transferred to another school and that's where she was going to go. What she had done was completely illegal and she could get into serious trouble, but she didn't get caught so she didn't care, she was going to find her boyfriend, no matter what it cost.

She ditched the rest of school and ran home as fast as she could go, soon enough she arrived and scurried up to her room. From her closet she grabbed a small bag and filled it with two shirts and two pairs of pants along with some under clothes. She packed a little bit of food and grabbed money she had saved up from her dresser drawer. she had his put away to buy a new camera but she as going to use it to get to Suna, she was going to take a bus there so she would need the money.

Grabbing a black hooded jacket, she slipped it on and put the hood over her head. She wrote a quick note to her parents and stuck it on the fridge with the help of a magnet. Then just like that she left the house and headed to the bus station, lucky for her the ticket to get to Suna was pretty cheap and there were very few people on the bus with her. Not many people traveled to Suna, it wasn't exactly a vacation spot to go to so most people avoided it, especially after they heard the horror stories from that place. Sakura seemed not to have taken that into account, and she must have thought there wouldn't have been any trouble she couldn't handle there on her own.

She may as well get some sleep, she wouldn't get there until late anyway, the bus had a few stops to make, which meant picking up more people for the trip. More people she had hoped would leave her alone, knowing what could happen on the bus at night. There would always be those certain people that would decide to mess around with other passengers and she didn't want to be the one in their line of fire.

As soon as Naruto and the others left from their classrooms, they met out front, when they discovered Sakura hadn't come out to meet them they were about to go find her until they heard a car horn honking. It was Sakura's parents, they hurriedly got out of the car and the teens ran over to greet them half way. The look on their face made them realize something was wrong, nothing good was going to come out of what they were about to say.

"What is it?"

"It's Sakura, she's gone."

Sasuke looked at the boy in front of him, shock was written on his face as the red head held out his hand for Sasuke to take, which he hesitated before grabbing his hand and was pulled to his feet. The boy took the liberty of introducing himself first since he knew Sasuke wasn't going to do it.

"I'm Gaara."

"Sasuke."

Sasuke couldn't explain it, but there was something about this kid that made him feel connected to him in some way. Maybe it was the fact of finding someone who knew what it was like to be beaten by the one person who you saw as a hero, someone that you used to love. He would play it safe for now and see what this "Gaara" had to say and then go from there, he had a feeling that he would be able to help him in some way.

"We can leave you know, no one really stays for classes after lunch, even the teachers leave."

Sasuke shurgged and grabbed his stuff, him and Gaara left the school grounds along with all of the other teens. Gaara was right when he said no one stayed, he saw that most of the school was becoming deserted fairly quickly. Sasuke had only one thing on his mind, why would Gaara bother wasting his time with helping him? He didn't even know him, but them again, he didn't know Sakura either and she was the one that got him to talk to his friends.

'I guess I can't always shut people out.'

A/N I apologize again for the late update, personal issues and all, please read and review, the more I get, I'll update quicker next time, I promise.