A/N: My first fan fiction in a long time, its amazing what a cold, and having to stay home from school will force you to accomplish. I figure that I'll never finish some of my other fics, even though I should do my shaman king ones, eventually, but not now. Maybe this summer...

~*~

The crisp autumn wind blew through the trees causing a rhythmic rustling sound. A tall blond man adorned in the traditional Hokage robes walked down an old trail leading to a lush forest; In the crook of his right arm he carried a bouquet of a dozen beautiful roses. Truth be told he didn't even know if the object of his affection even liked roses, but it was worth a shot wasn't it? She had already rejected him on numerous occasions, but unwavering determination always prevailed, or so he had always thought, and here he was walking down that same dirt path as he had every day for the past month and a half.

He continued following the trail until he came to a small clearing, and stopped and stared love struck at the figure sitting in one of the trees near the edge of the glade. The girl chuckled "Arashi Ku----n you're a little late today." The woman's long black hair fell a little past her waist, and her dark eyes sparkled with the amusement of a laughing child.

A soft blush crept onto Arashi's face; had he stepped into that much of a rut? He walked over to her, cleared his throat, and presented to her the bundle of red roses. "Eiko-Chan, will you please do me the honours of going out with me on a date." As he said this he dropped to the ground, in the universal begging position.

Eiko looked at him, then at the flowers, then back to Arashi again. Her face turned pensive and she turned her attention towards the blue sky. She sat there staring, and after several seconds of quiet contemplation, her face broke out in a wide grin. "Nope, sorry Arashi Kun not yet." She sang. The blond sighed, and with slumped shoulders left the peaceful clearing, muttering, and cursing the whole while. Eiko shrugged, and then fell into a restful position on the tree branch, by hanging off of it with her knees.

Now fall slowly turned to winter, the normally green trees lost their leaves, flowers, and other foliage withered and died, and a soft blanket of snow covered the ground. Never the less each and every morning, one could always expect to see the blond Hokage marching down the street, a box of chocolates, or bouquet of flowers in one hand, and look of sheer determination glued permanently on his face. How a busy man like the Yondaime managed to do this every morning was anybody's guess, and nobody cared to ask, although some speculated that he had a clone running things in office, and doing all the boring paperwork.

This morning was different however, instead of his normally calm, even dazed look, he wore very peeved features. Arashi marched into the clearing, and pointed a finger at a now shocked Eiko. "Why wont you got out with me?" He demanded, obviously extremely irritated.

Eiko, who was sitting crossed legged with her back against her favourite tree looked at him curiously. She hadn't seen him so upset before, and honestly, it was quite funny. She blinked a bit, and cocked her head to the side like a clueless animal, and shrugged. "I don't know." She finally admitted. "I never really thought about it."

Yondaime's blue eyes widened, and stared at her mouth agape. That was the stupidest reason he had ever gotten. Sure many women had turned him down in the past, but at least all of them had an adequate, or semi-adequate reason. He was too short, he was too tall, too quiet, too loud, to wild, too plain. Everybody had some sort of excuse, but never had he gotten an "I don't know, I never really thought about it."

Eiko giggled, "You know that stunned look really works for you." She grinned at him. "You look really adorable when you look pathetic like that. It sort of reminds me of a little fox kit that I once saw."

At mention of this Arashi instantly perked up. "So, pathetic is a good this?" He asked cautiously.

"Ummmm," Eiko thought as if she had already forgotten their little conversation. "Oh, yeah, I guess so." She smiled impishly and stuck her tongue out at him.

Arashi's eyebrow twitched, 'gawd was this women ever frustrating, but her smile was so, so, cute.' Then suddenly out of the blue, an idea struck him, like lightning strikes a golfer on a rainy day. "Hold that thought!" He yelled as he ran into the forest leaving a very confused Eiko to sit in the snow, and try to register what had just happened.

Several minutes later Eiko was stunned to see a soaking wet, slightly blue, and very muddy Hokage emerge from the forest. In front of him he held a tremendously annoyed fox whelp. Now Eiko just didn't have the heart to tell the Yondaime, whom she just realised was only wearing his boxers in –15- degree weather, that there was a fine line between pathetic and just plain sad. "Fine," She sighed defeated, "Ill go out with you, but nowhere fancy." Ah yes, Unwavering determination will always prevail...

A loud triumphant cry echoed throughout the village, and perhaps several other neighbouring villages as well. The fox kit squirmed out of Arashi's grip and scampered hurriedly into the bushes while Eiko covered her ears, and started to doubt her wisdom in finally accepting his offer; It defiantly wasn't of her better judgement.

"So, ah, where are we going?" Arashi asked, scratching the back of his head, slightly embarrassed.

Eiko just grinned, "Have you ever heard of Ichiraku." Arashi nodded, still grinning stupidly at his luck. "Lets go there, it's my favourite, and has the best ramen in the world!" Some guys may have been disappointed if the girl that they had been trying to ask out for the past three months had just declared that they were only going out for instant noodles, but not Arashi, oh no not him, for at this particular moment he would have eaten out of a trash can if it meant that he could "dine" with his darling Eiko- Chan.

"Alright," She laughed, "Lets get going!" And she skipped energetically down the worn trail towards the village, dragging the blissful blond behind her.

Arashi sneezed and scratched his nose. "Um, Eiko-Chan, can I go get changed first."

"Ummm, nope. You have to come like that." The girl giggled before remembering that the blond was sopping wet, and wearing nothing but a pair of boxers with spirals on them, and it wasn't like the spirals would keep him from catching hypothermia. "But I'll lend you my jacket." She added, grinning like a mad woman. Perhaps she was, but the Yondaime didn't care, he was content with this for a couple of seconds, until he snapped out of his personal heaven and remembered that Eiko's jacket was a stunning shade of pink. This in turn got him thinking that perhaps asking Eiko-Chan out was not of his better judgement.

~*~ Did you like it? I'm sorry if it disappointed you. Personally I don't really know how to feel about this fic. I think that my writing has improved immensely since I started writing fanfics about two years ago, starting with DBZ fanfiction, but at the same time I know that most people don't like Mary Sues, and Eiko seems well Mary Sueish. Sorry, maybe you can e-mail me with tips on this. Well this fic was lots of fun to right, and helped keep my mind off of my stuffy nose and sore throat. Actually I wrote this while listening to the new Naruto ending repeatedly. It's a cool song ne?

The name Arashi seems to be a popular name for the Fourth, so I decided just to stick with it, and I named the girl Eiko...well just because I liked the name. *grins*. Maybe I'll write another Naruto fic sometime, I have some ideas...I just need to figure out how to put them in words. I have a very strange thought process. I normally "watch" fanfictions-to-be in my head, sorta like a very random episode/movie, then I go through, and choose the ones that I like best, and actually make sense... trust me most of em don't. I tend to do this whenever I'm doing something solitary, like running/walking, or drawing or something.