Me? Own? I only on the girl who mooches off Deidara. She was sort of originally an author nsert, now she fills that role AND provides sometimes-off-color-comic relief and general how-is-the-authoress-feeling-today. Rotten, I'll tell you that much. The Deidara Mooch sums it all up...

"Why is she here?"

"I don't know, but she won't leave."

"How long has she been sitting in our kitchen?"

"A half hour maybe?"

"Have you informed her that Deidara doesn't live here any more?"

"Four times."

"GET ME ANOTHER BEER!"

"You know, she drinks like you…"

"Shut it," Temari snapped, stalking across the linoleum floor and finding a beer in the cupboard.
"Here." She handed the bottle to the person currently occupying their floor. "Want to tell me about it?"

The person looked up. "Women. I hate women. Best one in the world, she broke my heart."

Temari blinked. "Does that mean you're going to go after guys now?" There was a certain distaste in her tone. The Deidara Mooch glanced up again.

"No, I'm going to be celibate! Not that I don't look at guys too, but after this, never looking at another person again, you know?" She swung her beer around, nearly breaking the bottle against the cupboards she leaned against. Temari sat down opposite her.

"What happened?"

"Best girl I ever met, she broke my heart into a million little pieces because, I dunno, she didn't swing that way? Stopped returning my calls? I don't even know any more." The dark-haired teenager on the floor began to cry. "She doesn't love me anymore!"

Temari patted the girl's back sympathetically. "I'm sorry honey," she crooned, wrapping her arms around the girl who, come to think of it, she barely knew. "You'll find someone else." The blond woman patted her back. Somehow, random teenage girls who somehow get into your house and started crying over lost loves trigger maternal instincts in Temari. So, hug.

"You know, I don't drink a lot…but still…got vodka?"

And then she passed out.

"Well," Neji said from the doorway, surveying the brunette girl passed out on the floor in a puddle of gold, fizzing liquid, "we should probably move her out of the kitchen before the rest of her beer spills."

"Indeed, indeed."

Sasuke hated scrabble. More specifically, he hated scrabble with his 'family'. Scrabble with Naruto was dull and boring, seeing as he had to wait forever for Naruto to make a word and once he did, it was usually simplistic and easy to build off. Scrabble with Temari was difficult to concentrate on over the waves of hate that radiated off the woman when the game didn't play in her favor. When playing scrabble with Gaara, it was important to move all the sharp objects away, file down the points on the tiles, and sit as far away from him as possible. Neji was always so difficult to play with because he just sat there and made weird words that no one knew how to spell. Shikamaru made words no one understood and would often call people on words like 'angsty' that aren't technically words. Kiba consistently tried to pass off fake words and therefore usually angered Shikamaru, only making their tense friendship tenser. Kankuro…he was just perverted and this usually ended up making poor Hinata blush and causing distractions. Hinata was too shy to actually take any risks and always played on the safe side with her tiles, meaning Sasuke had less chances to actually play well. So in short, playing scrabble with his family was not on his priority list.

But he had taken to seeing the insane eight teenagers as his family (as strange as this struck him, it was true) and since they were all playing scrabble, he knew they would be angry if he refused to play. Rather, Temari decided it would be bonding, and therefore she threatened him with cleaning the entire house (with the exception of, of course, her closet). If he didn't, she had warned, there would be dire consequences that would apparently make Orochimaru's stuff look like child's play. Sasuke doubted it at first, but once the blond woman had held up the toilet scrubbing brush and 'The Little Baby Pony Goes To Fairy Land: The Movie!', he suddenly decided that scrabble was the greatest game ever played. Screw golf, chess, baseball, whatever, scrabble was god.

"Hey! We can play tourney style!" Temari shrieked happily. "I mean, seriously! The Deidara Mooch said she'd play a round with us too, but then she has to go home and work out. She says she does that when she's stressed. Go figure." Temari had five scrabble boards out. "You can lose the first round, but after that, you're out."

And so it began. Sasuke ended up playing Neji the first round. It had started out with nice words, like 'farm' and 'kitten'. Then Neji started playing stuff like 'cherubically' and 'obtunding' and Sasuke just sort of hung on for dear, dear life. He ended up winning, but only because Neji had a streak of really, bad luck. Sasuke rubbed his forehead. Somehow, ending up with three 'r' tiles and two 'x' tiles seemed almost rigged. Neji had gotten mad at that and had ended up running off to sulk until he ended up playing Temari.

Sasuke sat across the board from Gaara, listening to Temari shout. Neji and Temari were always equally matched in scrabble: Temari was a creative writing major and had a massive vocabulary, Neji was nearly a genius. Thinking about it, Sasuke wondered how Shikamaru and Temari would match up. By the way the games were going, there was a good chance they would all find out. Sasuke reasoned that that would probably be a memorable scrabble game, to say the least. For great swearing there must be great vocabulary. Of course, Temari won that round (Neji? Traumatized. He and Naruto had trauma-counseling in the bathroom. It involved marshmallows).

"You know what? It is a word! It said so in that one book about scrabble I bought last year! So if I want to expand 'mother' into 'motherfucker' and take that triple word space, I can damn well do it." Temari bit her lip and stared harshly at her fiancé. Shikamaru looked mildly afraid under her glare.

"Troublesome. Fine, it's a word," Shikamaru groaned, moving a few more tiles around the board. Temari stared hard at the board for a few minutes, then glanced to her letters, then back to the board.

"Is death wish one word or two?"

Temari leaned against the couch. She had won the scrabble tournament, and Shikamaru had demanded a rematch, so now everyone was playing all over again. Kankuro had been shot down at least six times for a date with the Deidara Mooch, making him a little moody. One supposed spelling out suggestive words in scrabble tiles was not the brightest idea.

"I'll be leaving now," the Deidara Mooch said. "Thanks for the beer and the hang-over shit and the self-esteem boost." She started for the door. "Why must all the hot people be…people?" she muttered under her breath. Then she slammed the door and danced outwards, onto the sidewalk and down the block.

It wasn't until later that anyone would realize she had stolen six Kurosawa films: three by Kiyoshi and three by Akira. Temari was radiating annoyance. She was vaguely annoyed. She loved films by both Akira Kurosawa ("Five decades of film!") and Kiyoshi Kurosawa ("It's scary! SCAREH!"). The Deidara Mooch could have them, so long as she brought them back, only because the poor girl was so traumatized. Actually, deep down, Temari it was secretly sure it was because of how sad Kankuro looked, shriveled in a corner. It was sort of funny. Got back at the make-up wearing boy for smashing Temari's sixth grade project. No, Deidara Mooch wasn't the one who got the short end of the stick. Ha. Taking back vengeance for those cheerios spilt on the floor in a flurry of death-of-a-sixth-grade-project. Ha.

"Hey, you guys, did you want dinner?" Temari smiled gently, leaning against the doorframe, one arm crossed over her stomach. "I have soy beans and Ahi tuna." She felt serene. Beating a whole group of teenagers at scrabble was fulfilling. It made her happy. 'I wonder what my family,' she paused in her contemplation, casting a quick glance down at her stomach, 'will be like?' She glanced around the room at the teenagers who occupied it. 'I hope it's like this.'

"That's mine!"

"Give it back!"

"I-- mrph!"

This resulted in Gaara making out with Neji for several minutes, followed by some whacking of Kankuro, a small yelp on Hinata's part, more making out, Sasuke running upstairs, Naruto running upstairs, Shikamaru inching his way towards the iron vase, and Kiba sitting there looking dumbly around.

'Okay, maybe not exactly like this.'

Wow, Temari, you have scrabble issues. Technically (I was reading this book about scrabble a while back), you can use 'motherfucker' in scrabble. Someone did use it, actually.

I'm so witty...Akira Kurosawa and Kiyoshi Kurosawa are both directors, only Akira was...well, Akira Kurosawa, and Kiyoshi directed horror films. Both Japanese. Both directors. Oh, bask in my wit-ness.