Author notes: I'm sorry! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!! (x5) Sorry for taking so much to update this! SIGH. If you want to blame someone, blame the other fic I'm writing!! YEAH!

Tora-tenshi said to me to stop writing filler parts but…what can I do? I'm getting addicted to the relationship with the characters. I love writing the friendship between Sasuke and Neji as well as Naruto, Shikamaru and Hinata. It's funny and fulfilling. And I felt extremely proud when I saw that the friendship that I portray inside this fic fits to the friendship that I saw in the latest chapter of Naruto manga. I was correct about this, Naruto is the hot-blooded dumbass of the trio, Shikamaru and(or) Hinata are the ones who halts them down and give words of wisdom. XD Yay!

Disclaimer and Warning: OH MY GOD, have you guys seen the latest ed of Naruto Shippuuden?? PLEASE KISS ME?! LOL!! The animators have already surrended to SasuNaru fandom…XD

Yes. Finally. Naruto's past. (a little)

Lesson 21 – Break ME

Flew, soft, smooth…undulating with the fresh wind…a cascade of silk auburn strands fluctuated along with the white cotton curtains on the pried open windows…She sat proudly on the worn chair, vivid green eyes gazing with wary but soothe towards him. Her simple dress didn't minimize the beauty of her form, on contrary; it showed her raw exquisiteness without any artificial makeup that he saw with other parents of his classmates. This, was his strongest impression of his mother.

His small fingers struggled against the gigantic white keys of the instrument. The enormous wooden box frightened him, like it would engulf his tiny body in any moment. The chair was extremely uncomfortable, completely unlike his fluffy couch that he liked to sit to watch television. Not to mention that her mother needed to put some telephone lists among with other thick books, since he couldn't reach the piano keys. Any attempts of moving or struggle made the paper pillar tremble, threatening to make him fall, atop those fragile hitched breaths.

Concentration was inevitable, as he slowly typed each white and black input, just like he had heard from his father, long time ago. His determined sapphire beads frowned as his chubby little hands touched them to make those enjoyable sounds that came from that gigantic wooden box. He must be doing something correct, because his mother smiled warmly and proudly as he pressed each part making a melodious music.

Though, even he himself admitted that he was an infant, he could see that the happiness curving on her lips, was mixed with guarded emotions that a child couldn't identify. But what he could certainly feel was the sadness blinking after her unshed tears.

Later, when older, he understood and always wanted to blame his father for abandoning her mother, was the feeling of longing. No…not only longing. Reminiscing. Recalling. Something deeper, just like her enigmatic smile, whenever she heard his performance on the old oak piano.

Saudade.(1) It was Portuguese term that he later had found in a j-pop song that fit her perfectly. With his tiny steps mimicking her every move daily, he saw whenever she would sigh in the middle of activities and abandon him to enter on her own world. Sometimes, the nostalgia corroded her soul so excruciatingly that he could hear some choked sobs that she tried to hide from him.

She blamed herself for "killing" her husband. It was strange, since he knew that his father died due to some kind of work accident. And she continued to look far away, the opaque white sheets blowing softly concealing his tiny alive form away from his mother's gaze.

However, whenever he pressed the white and black thingies, or the sounds of that gigantic box remind him from his father, he always felt that this was the moment that he was the closest (but also the farthest) from his mother. His beautiful mother, who always smiled sorrowfully, encouraged him to continue to play.

Piano was everything for Naruto. Was everything for Uzumaki Kushina(2) too. The last live connection of her dearest husband.

He currently played one of the Clementi's Sonatina (3) under the watchful eyes of her mother and a guest. The man kept hearing his performance serenely, wearing a careful smile on his chocolate eyes. Since his childhood days, Naruto loved that man visits, his kindness and their play time. The young boy didn't have a lot of friends in his kindergarten school, so he was glad he could have fun with that man, whenever he could.

"Iruka-sensei, don't you think that Naruto played piano amazingly well? You should come here more times to give him some classes!" Kushina joyously chirped at him.

Iruka sighed, his expression for once unreadable for the blond child. Naruto felt something pang inside his heart, when he saw that feeling was horribly unsettling if a mere brat couldn't identify it.

"Kushina-san…I believe that we've already talked about this." His normally warm voice felt colored with somber lines, only the wind broke the motionless moment, flipping the score in one continuous soundtrack.

The curious cerulean eyes peered over the two adults, their eyes settled in a distant memory again. The clean sheets blocking their vision again.

His mother broke her reverie when she saw his small hands halting the music and peeked shyly to her. She gave a broad trademark Uzumaki grin, reaching her hand to softly brush his smooth cheeks.

"Well? Show to Iruka-niisan another music you've trained!" He nodded with his spiky head cutely, before starting all over.

Iruka made another tired sigh.

Rejection…?

"Dobe, you're early today." Sasuke looked slightly apprehensive towards the glazy eyes of his classmate.

Naruto didn't acknowledge his presence. He just kept looking forward, sitting on his piano, playing softly some music that Sasuke couldn't identify due to many holes on his play.

"Dobe." He came closer to the spiky golden hair in front of him and bonked hard. "Hello…?"

"That hurt." A mumble, though the tanned hand merely scratched lightly the wound place he previously knocked, continuing to run his hands on the keys, in trance.

Okay…he heard hoax about weird pianists where their concentration on the instrument were so high that they closed themselves from the outer world, but sincerely…for him, it would be a severe case of schizophrenia. While he wasn't in the mood to take care of loony persons, what his friend was experiencing was something that Sasuke was determined to cut off from the apparent dazed state presented.

By stretching the soft cheeks from his tanned moron, of course. Followed by another loud 'thunk' directed on the upside head of that obnoxious idiot.

While his fingers were still pinching hard the whiskered face, the brunet directed the cerulean gaze to his graphite ones. He murmured quietly:

"Naruto. I'm here." Not exactly showing his presence, but making a point. His usually not caring voice was laced with concern and apparently this was what woke the blonde's up form his momentary stupor.

"Huh? Sasuke?" Blue eyes blinked owlishly as his gasps lifted up, coming more alive.

Satisfied with the partial response, Sasuke slightly retracted his hands from Naruto's cheeks, before slapping again in a playful way and squishing them hard.

Currently, the poor boy's cheeks were reddened due to the extended time of pinching, though the proximity of them gave him a funny look, his lips sticking out in a very protruding pout, resembling a dead fish, gaping open-mouthed outside the water, with the squishy and icky drool running through his chin as an added extra.

All in all, it wasn't a very beautiful sight to see.

"Faufuuki?" Does the Uchiha have a fetish on cheeks? It wasn't the first time that this had ever happened. The boy lifted a blonde eyebrow suspiciously.

"Pffft…it's a blow fish this time!" Sasuke suppressed the urge to laugh outloud. But Naruto's face looked so hilarious that he had to gather all his Uchihaness in his nerves (this product was exclusively made to preserve stoic and cold attitude to any emo-boy) to maintain his icy image intact.

Yet his curiosity won over any chance to sustain his pride in check, as the brunet wanted to see how far he could stretch those fluffy amends of flesh. He continued to extend, gather, push up, push down, crab face, doggy face, fox face, oh, is that a lion? Quite similar. Those, accompanied with the background "music" of the dobe whining: Oww! Stop it! Bastard! Urgh…Ouch! And all sorts, while the blond teen flailed his arms randomly trying to interrupt the careful "inspection". The jerk definitely stepped aside all kinds of reservations or shyness to torment Naruto personally and physically.

In all through, Sasuke had to admit that he was fairly impressed by the elasticity of the bullied tan skin and its softness.

Raising his head slightly (and ignoring the protests placed far away from his attention), his brain opened the long catalogued list of sensations that could be compared to this, concluding at last that, from the fluffiness and smooth texture of the material, it surely resembled a mochi(4), freshly baked and stomped by wooden pillar. He stretched some more, to reassure his "conclusion" (followed by another: TEME! IT HURTS!) and yep, it's mochi.

If the caramel color could complement on his investigation, he could conclude that the dobe's cheeks equals a burnt mochi. Isn't the usuratonkachi supposed to be 16 years old?! How the hell did he ended up having such "pinchable" children type of cheeks?! The Uchiha could even bet that the blond must be the favorite victim of doting grandmas all around the world for such activities.

Case concluded, file archived to be contemplated on later use. The brunet suddenly freed the abused tanned face in an audible plop. Sasuke gave a sardonic grin when he heard a non-subtle mumbling cursing from his friend, puffing childishly while his hand caressed the swollen cheek. His smirk widened as the brilliant cobalt eyes narrowed dangerously trying to conjure any kind of deadly weapons in vicinity with the force of his glare. It would be obvious that such strategy would be unsuccessful, as the Uzumaki didn't have a drop of Uchiha's blood.

"That fucking hurts teme! Ow…why did you have to do that?!" Still ineffective, the glaring, Uzumaki. Go train somewhere else will you?

"Hn." Sasuke answered, clearly showing that his lucid and comprehensible word was enough to quench its doubts.

The "Hn" was the universal word suitable to any kind of problem or inquiry, the clarification to any type of question, from simple ones to Physics and existential ones and is granted only by people with the Uchiha blood and that have bought the Uchiha glare ®. 'Nuff said.

Though mostly it was used to conceal and avoid any kind of tight situation that he didn't want to be bothered to retort. So Sasuke skillfully avoided the puzzled gaze that was imprinted in Naruto.

"Play. Hanon." He growled. For a certified genius such as Sasuke, the brooding teen surely used a very eccentric choice of language, caveman style.

"Me. Naruto. Don't wanna. You. Bastard. To hell." The fox look was back mischievously.

Another loud 'thunk' vibrated inside the room.

"Bleeeh…" the blond boy stack out his tongue petulantly while his hands rubbed at the wound part of his spiky head. Graphite eyes rolled tiredly from his friend's silliness.

Naruto folded upwards his sleeves, preparing for practice again. Everything fell back to the old routine, everything was alright.

It was at this moment, widening his eyes, when Naruto thought that his safe feelings were, somehow, off-place. After meeting Temari's brother and realizing that his friends knew him…all along, consequently having that outburst, why…?

"Why…why am I here?" The sentence prophesied almost as a whisper.

"What the hell are you talking about? You're here to train piano, right?" Sasuke lifted an eyebrow amusedly, slightly questioning his friend's sanity.

"Uh…yeah yeah! You're right 'bout that…" The blond laughed humorlessly, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. He tilted his neck to observe the score, though his cerulean eyes were gazing at a distant memory again.

"Usuratonkachi, what's wrong with you now? Did something happened to you?" The brunet circled around the seat, analyzing Naruto's weird behavior, as his classmate froze from the apparent innocent question.

I thought…that there wouldn't be anywhere for me to go, to refuge…why?

"Nothing happened." The usual warm hue turned colorless substituted by hard sapphire eyes as the tanned body stiffened tensely, closing himself from Sasuke.

As the critique dark-grey eyes observed that the response was a very blatant lie, for Naruto to abandon his sunny disposition, he understood that, whatever had happened, his friend wasn't ready to give clear answers. The brunet just gave the wrong question at the wrong time, so naturally, he received a wrong reply.

He sighed, combing his black hair with his fingers exasperated. Troublesome dobe…

"If…if he question any further, I…" Naruto probably would feel broken. Whatever strange reasons that made him go to here, he knew that, at the moment, this place could be his only last solace.

Suddenly, he felt a gentle hand ruffling his spiky golden head disorganizing the already unruly hair.

"Just start playing then."

Naruto's body stiffened again, but in this case, it was because he didn't know how to respond to such situation.

"Hum…" Was everything he could respond to the brunet. Sasuke continued to idly playing with the blond locks after murmuring again.

"Just play." Forget whatever bad thing had happened to you.

While the blond went again to his strange Ramen land, he was awakened again by a sharp handchop upward of Naruto's head.

"Well? Start training! We don't have all the day to lazy around, dobe." Uchiha's ways of sympathizing are certainly…peculiar.

"Do you enjoy ordering me around, teme?" Naruto growled, massaging at his abused part. First his cheeks, that were still swollen, now his head?? Fucking asshole and his sadist tendencies.

"I'm merely pushing you to the right direction usuratonkachi. A dumbass like you won't ever appreciate my selfless acts of aiding that grey organ that it's located inside of your skull, your poor excuse of calling it a brain, to do some exercises." A flash of another smug smirk.

"Bastard!"

"Page 50."

"(grumbles, mumbles and a lot of censored words.)" The blond teen straightened himself and started to train.

All the parts that he was currently playing were more tricky to breach than he ever trained before, however, the satisfying feeling that he could grow and eliminate his weak points step by step, did made the blond to temporarily forget his current ordeal for now. Sasuke's face softened up when he saw at his friend expression, the enthralled look when he was playing piano. At least he could ease the worries of the dobe, for now.

His wild golden hair had some kind of smoothness that the brunet had a slight bad knack that he was starting to get addicted to run his fingers through it. (He blames the alcohol in the jazz classes in that time, that's for sure) Therefore, when Naruto finally ended the exercises, the tanned teen felt again, some warm hand ruffling disorderly his head.

"Good boy." His 'teacher' mumbled in a toneless voice. The other young man almost grinned before:

"I'm not a dog, Teme." He crossed his arms in a playfully rebellious way, waiting for the response from the pale skinned friend. The onyx eyes kept staring at him before something clicked inside and he used the Uchiha Smirk again:

"You're correct, you're not. You're a monkey. Should I give you a banana as a prize for your successful trickery…?"

"TEME!"

Nowhere…?

Maybe not.

Monday had started and, for the first time in his life, Naruto wanted to avoid his friends at all costs. He still wasn't ready to talk to them. It's not easy to open his feelings, when he was afraid that they would reject him, or worse, meet him with pity in their eyes.

At Sasuke's and his first recital, when the brunet told his family's problem, the cerulean eyes identified that the other teen wasn't soughing for shallow emotions and empty words from him. Both of them weren't looking for petty sympathy, though in Naruto's case, he didn't want for this expression flitting inside of his friends' image. There's a different case when you gaze such feelings from strangers, where you can cope and simply shrug it away. However, to watch his close people looking him down, even though it wasn't intended, pierced his lonely heart the most. He wanted to stand with equal pride with them; he didn't want any pity coming from his friends.

"Why…? We're fine that way, aren't we? There's no need for me to talk about it to them." Naruto contemplated, while he stood inside the bus, going to his school.

"Everything went fine until now. That's how our friendship should run between us. Why does they need to know about my past when we're happy not knowing it?" He exited from the vehicle in one swift jump and walked towards the, currently on his eyes, horrifying building.

It's not that telling to them would give any kind of benefit from now on. Not to mention that if all of them could keep up this farce, they won't need to carry the huge burden of discovering his bad side. He shouldn't bother his friends into confessing his difficulties, when they already have problems on their own, right? After all, those are the meaning of friendship, concea—, no, forget about sad things in benefit of his dear people and only leave happy memories between them, correct?

Unfortunately, the blond teen knew his own true intentions behind those excuses. He was trying to protect himself from them.

"Not now…I'm not ready yet." He sighed when he could already spot recognizable forms in front of the gate. Each of his step trembled more and each inch closer his feet were melting into a mush.

Hinata had blood-shot eyes, probably due to crying too much in the past few days. Another pang of guilt went inside the blond system. Naruto knew that the brunette always had delicate stranded feelings towards anyone and it hurt him inside the most that he was the one who broke her and made her concerned over insignificant things like him. She didn't deserve this.

"See? There's no positive point if we continue like this! I've already hurt Hinata, I'll hurt more people…what useless problems." His sky blue eyes were filled with determination that whatever interrogation they would start now, he won't back down.

Shikamaru, on the other hand, substituted his usual lazy eyes into perceptive ones. Naruto inwardly gulped. Whenever his friend would use this expression, any victim wouldn't be able to fall back. The blond just wished that everything would be alright by the end of this conversation.

"G-good mor-mor-n-ning Na-na-ruto-kun." The Hyuuga heiress gave a watery smile. Her friend hesitantly smiled back.

"Morning Hinata-chan! Shika." He glanced over his friend, waiting for another perusal stare.

"Naruto, I know that I shouldn't have done that, but I talked over about last Saturday to Hinata. You know that we both worry about you and want to help you in any way."

He instantly swallowed dry.

"Naruto-kun…we…"

"Naruto, I'm sorry for saying harsh things about it, and I know that you didn't want to show the feelings which you thought that we wouldn't notice it. We intended to talk over this in due time, though last Saturday…well, slipped out." The ponytailed teen sighed apologetically. "So…I'm sorry."

The blond wanted to apologize back, however, something rushed more dangerously than the safe words:

"Since…when?" This time, both of his friends tensed at the present question and voiced cautiously.

"Since…we first heard you playing piano, Naruto."

Then! It's when they first saw him in the end! They knew it all along?!

"We know well how you express yourself when you play. No one, who had a normal past, would play with such sad emotions Naruto-kun. But it was beautiful. Whatever you played was ethereally heartbreaking and that's what made us wanting to be your friend, to understand you…even if by little." The young beauty whispered clawing lightly her chest, before looking to the ground shyly.

"And we understand that, if you don't want to talk about it now, Naruto, we won't press back. Though we are showing that…whenever you want to open yourself to us, we'll be waiting. Anytime." Shikamaru ended.

"I…" The guilt flowed in his veins again, pushing his coward feelings to the surface, the caged box rumbled, waiting to be opened.

However…

"I'm…sorry. I…" He numb body only awoke when he felt a pair of warm arms hugging him slightly.

"Don't worry about it. Don't be sorry about it. We understand." Is that really Hinata-chan whom he always overly zealously protected her? The kind girl who wouldn't even dare to hurt an ant? So strange…her arms doesn't look delicate anymore.

"I'm sorry…I'm really sorry." He returned the embrace with equal gentleness, not ready to put trust on that warm slender shoulders, neither could put trust on the apologetic watchful eyes, feeling hurt for not deserving such good friends.

"I…w-was afraid that I would l-lose Naruto-kun fo-forever…" Hinata finally released her friend and took a step back. Shikamaru, on the other hand, shook Naruto a little bit and smirked:

"This time we'll let it slide for your sake but don't expect us to be that nice afterwards."

"Okay…I can even picture a Hinata-chan applying one of that lethal cool karate tricks while you use the most terrifying instruments of torture to make me confess. God, I've only met sadist people."

"But even though you kept complaining about us, why are you still hanging around with us then…?" Another smirk from his friend. Naruto shrugged.

"Dunno. Probably I'm more a masochist than I thought. Ah…hey, you didn't have to laugh at my expense Hinata-chan!" The girl stopped giggling when she saw the pitiful blue puppy eyes and patted lightly his golden hair.

"I'm not laughing at your expense Naruto-kun…I'm happy that we returned in our usual way…" a slight somber aura returned to the trio and the young woman quickly changed the subject "Coming to think about it, did you go to Hatake-sensei's house after you helped Temari-san out?"

"Hm? Yeah, how did you guess?" The pair of cobalt orbs looked a tad confused.

"Simple. You looked more stabilized today with us then we originally had thought." Both of Naruto's friends mused about though they astutely didn't voice it out.

"Oh, I just shot blindly about it, Naruto-kun."

"Well, then I guess you have an excellent sixth sense, Hinata-chan! I did go to the bastard's class and man, that guy is another certified sadist. Can you believe it?! He made me train Hanon!"

One person nodded politely while the other started to clean his ear with his fifth finger lazily annoyed.

"Not to mention that he forced me to play the most yawning exercises that I've ever met, using that arrogant smirk of 'I-know-that-you-wouldn't-be- able-to-accomplish-it-anyway' that I had to train it just to shove in that conceited face of his!"

They returned to walk towards their class while the blond boy continued to make uninterrupted curses towards his brooding friend. However, he failed to see small content smiles sporting on his friends' face. The usual let's-badmouth-the-teme lost its potency and he was talking more out of habit than with the usual venom tone. Not to mention that Naruto couldn't notice by himself that his mood got increasingly better when he returned to talk about Sasuke and they surely wouldn't want to point it out…for now. The hyperactive teen would probably freak out if they told him so.

Perhaps Naruto's encounter with Sasuke did have some benefits after all. They lightly wished that the brunet would be able to heal Naruto in the parts that they failed to help him out.

"Oh yeah, what happened to Temari-chan's brother after I left?" Shikamaru lightly grimaced at the memory.

"Nothing. He barely answered to her questions and quickly sent her off. I've never saw her looking so defeated." The brunet sighed afterwards.

"Hm…and hey, do you know in which days he goes to the conservatory to train?"

"Fridays and Saturdays…why?"

"Because…it's bad enough for one more person to have that type of style like mine…" He entered in the classroom before giving a sad grin and closed the door interrupting any kind of retort from them.

Explanations:

(1) Saudade: In case that you guys are wondering, the music that Naruto mentioned is from the band Porno Graffiti, the same one who sang "Melissa" from FMA. "Saudade" was their debut music, the first one that made them so successful in Japan. Well, I'm gonna write it down according to the dictionary Houaiss:

A wander feeling of melancholic incompletion, linked by the memory of situation where suffered the deprivation of someone presence or something, the regress from a place or a thing or the absence of certain experiences or determined contentment already had lived and it is considered by the person suffered by such situation as a longing moment. Etim lat. solitas, atis, singleness, loneliness, helplessness, withdrawing, nostalgia.

Hey! It almost sounds like it's an entire bad thing, but it's not exactly like that! But I'm not in the mood to properly explain it, so I'll end it for now.

(2) Uzumaki Kushina: to the people who are not following the Naruto manga, (spoiler) this is the official name of Naruto's mother. She had long red hair, used to be a whirlpool ninja and Naruto's personality came from her.

(3) Clementi Sonatina op. 36 no. 6: In case you guys are wondering, usually, a child, if he or she started to train piano since 5 yrs old, would play this music around 10, or 11 years old. Well, I've made Naruto play it with 7 years old, just to show that he's a badass…even though he didn't knew it. XD Oh yeah, the link:

http : / / www . Youtube . com / watch?v(insert the symbol of 'equal')b17QJi1JHtE

remove the spaces plz.

(4) mochi: it's a Japanese style of sweet, made by, well, basically, rice. First, they would soak it overnight and cook it. Then, they would throw the contents inside some wooden mortar and they kept softening and grind it with a pillar, until it become really smooth and elastic. If you guys catch the opportunity to eat a traditional hand-made mochi such as the description above, I highly recommend to eat it. It's delicious. Yum…damn, I'm getting hungry now.

Author notes: (readers: kyaaa kyaaa!!) Ow…my ears.

Sorry. I couldn't resist. I HAD to put a comical part when Sasuke stretched Naruto's cheeks. It seemed…natural to do so! I dunno. Maybe 'cuz I also had a curiosity to pinch Naruto's cheeks too. It seems to be soooo fluffy!! XD Um…I know that he's a fictional character…

Oh yeah, before you guys misunderstand, Kushina and Iruka DIDN'T have ANY kind of affair. After I finished this chapter, I saw that the way I wrote had dubious meanings, but I assure you that it was unintentional. Sigh.

And now that I've been stupidly writing a new story (headbangs on the desk) my brain got even more confused than the usual. Hooray…

Leave reviews…? (puppy eyes)

I'll answer the older ones afterwards...sorry!