People are Troublesome

Disclaimer: Naruto isn't mine.

Although Hidan had been in school yesterday, he didn't show up that morning. Shikamaru found this hard to worry about too much; he'd been in a foul mood since that talk with Asuma. As predicted, he'd had a headache all night and felt like doing nothing at all this morning.

"You ok Shika?" Choji managed to whisper this through a mouthful of crisps.

"Yeah… Just had no sleep." He never liked talking about Asuma problems with most people. The main reason for this was probably because he didn't want someone to tell him that he was over-reacting.

"Oh." He held out his bag of crisps. "Want one?" Shikamaru just stared. Choji never shared his food. It was more likely that he would growl at you if you even looked at it for too long. "What?"

"You're sharing food."

"Yeah?"

"How often do you share food Choji?" There was a pause as both of them tried to recollect. All they could come up with was that they had once shared a bowl of popcorn back in the days when Choji didn't eat an entire bowl by himself. Many, many years ago.

"You looked like you needed it."

"Thanks." He took one simply because he felt he ought to. It was an unusual occurrence.

"And if you're worried about anything, you can tell me." This should not have been a surprise to him. Choji was his best friend; he knew Shikamaru better than anyone. This fact didn't stop him from being surprised that someone had noticed.

"I… I will." Once this awkwardness was over, they resumed pretending to care about what they were learning.

Shikamaru was so irritated with Asuma for making his day shit that he decided to pull a Hidan and skip his class. He could just say he was ill if anyone asked.

Once he got to the place he'd once skived in with Hidan, he found that the other boy had had the same idea. He was staring into space with a blank expression and so didn't realise that he now had company.

"Hi Hidan." The guy jumped to his feet and spun around, a sudden glare on his face. When he saw who it was, the tension disappeared.

"Why're you here?" As he had nagged Hidan a lot for doing this exact thing, his confusion was understandable.

"It's biology." If he can be awkward, so can I.

"Oh. Avoidin' the beard asshole." Hidan jumped onto that very quickly.

"Basically." It seemed he was going to have company for this lesson. He went and sat near Hidan, who sunk down next to him. "Have you been to any classes today?"

"I was late. Then I didn't feel like it."

Shikamaru didn't really feel like talking today since he was too busy dwelling on Asuma. The only person who seemed to really know how much it got to him was Choji. He'd thought so anyway.

"Did beard fucker do somethin' yesterday?" He was too good at that piercing stare of his.

"No."

"Lies."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Surely he wasn't that obvious?

"Hn." Hidan did seem to be good at noticing things around him when he could be bothered so Shikamaru shouldn't have been surprised.

"…Aren't you going to make me tell you what's wrong?" Aside from Choji, who understood him well, most people wouldn't just leave it at that.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Well no-."

"Why would I make you then?" Hidan rolled his eyes in exasperation at this idiot.

"…Thanks."

It was pretty nice actually. They sat in complete silence for the rest of the lesson and even lunch staring at the sky. Other people didn't seem to want to bother them either and so Shikamaru ended up going without much contact until the last lesson. Yamato would be really pissed if he skipped. He stood up to go and Hidan gripped his arm.

"Where are you goin'?"

"Maths."

"Why?"

"Yamato is a prick. Plus we can head to Naruto's after." He didn't mind that since being in a large group meant that he was distracted from thinking.

"Oh." Hidan's grip loosened and he looked kind of blank.

"Is that a problem?"

"No." His voice was dull.

"…Are you coming?" The main reason he'd wanted to go was to encourage Hidan to socialise more.

"Do you want me there?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll go." He let go of the smaller boy's hand. "Not goin' to maths though. Yamato can suck it."

"I'll tell him you said that."

"Good."

-Page Break-

"What's wrong with that guy?" Kiba leant over and whispered this into Shikamaru's ear. It was clear who he was referring to.

"He's just awkward?" This seemed the most likely reason.

Hidan was extremely quiet when around Shikamaru's friends. After maths, the strange one had gone and waited by the front door for Shikamaru. He didn't even say anything when they got there; instead he just fell in behind them, staring blankly.

"Is he gonna be like that all night?"

"I hope not." It would be had for him to get along with them if he was scared of talking to anyone.

"At least you'll have company in your corner of misery." He flicked Kiba in the side of the head. "You only do that because it's true."

Ignoring dog breath he looked back at Hidan. The guy was staring ahead. It seemed like he was bored at first glance but there was a barely noticeable tension on his shoulders. As subtly as he could, he dropped back until he was walking level with Hidan. The other boy didn't even look his way.

"You're quiet." Technically he rarely spoke in front of people so this was 'normal' but something seemed wrong.

"Am I?" He sounded quite apathetic about everything. Even his face looked unbothered.

"Yes. You definitely want to come tonight, right?" For a second Hidan seemed to freeze, and then he hesitated. Clearly he wanted to say something. "If you really don't want to you can leave."

"I-."

"Oh my god Shika! Guess what!" Damnit Ino. She wasn't doing this on purpose but it was bad timing.

"What?" Hidan seemed to have retreated back inside of himself again so it was unlikely he was going to speak anymore.

"You have to guess!" Ugh.

"I've told you so many times that I hate doing that."

"It's fun."

"It isn't. Really." Usually she was excited over the most mundane thing possible and it was normally so vague that it irritated him. "Does it involve two guys?"

"No."

"Then I don't know."

"Spoil sport. I was going to tell you that Kurenai is pregnant!"

"Oh…" She had seemed to be gaining weight lately. "Good for her."

"Didn't Asuma tell you yesterday? He kept you behind right?"

"It didn't come up." Just thinking about yesterday had his migraine threatening to start up.

"Weird. Isn't it time you started talking to him again?"

"Maybe you should mind your own business." No way was he going to talk to the condescending asshole.

"Wow. You're moody." At least this meant she left him alone. Although now Hidan was staring at him.

"What?" He was pretty uncomfortable with that particular look. It happened too often recently.

"Nothin'." At least he had stopped staring at him. Although there were still occasional glances from the humanoid on the right.

Once they got to Naruto's, everyone fell into their old habits. Naruto and Sasuke sat on the main sofa in the centre of the room. Most people could fit on if they wanted but nobody liked to share a space with the touchy feely couple.

Kiba sat on the floor in front of them, with Choji on the beanbag next to him. Hinata and Shino both took the two chairs with Ino and Sakura at the table by the window. And Shikamaru headed to the old sofa by the side wall that he normally lazed on. Hidan, after a moment's hesitation, followed. It was odd having company in his space,

I am not going to be able to lie down like this. He couldn't tell him to move though. Hidan didn't know anybody else.

"Before anything else happens, we're not watching any of those crappy 'horror' films again." Sakura aimed a particularly pointed glance at Kiba who flipped her the middle finger.

"Agreed. I think Kiba should just not be allowed to pick any films. Ever."

"You guys are dicks." Sasuke ignored him and started picking through the magazines and DVDs piled up by the chairs. Naruto's parents were used to these invasions so left a lot of the things lying around.

Gradually they all settled into the usual. Hinata, Kiba and Shino ended up talking. Ino and Sakura went through all the magazines and occasionally threw things at people. Choji stuffed his face, Naruto and Sasuke were uncomfortably close and Shikamaru… Normally he'd be sleeping but today things were different.

"…Are you ok there?" Hidan was just staring into space.

"Hn."

"Excellent conversation there. Absolutely riveting." The silver haired one looked at him with an eyebrow raised. "Don't you want to talk to anyone?" This was why he'd wanted Hidan here after all.

"No." Well this isn't easy. Luckily Kiba decided to be useful at this point.

"Hidan?" He did freeze under the sudden glare. "Do you want to play this?"

"…Ok." It seemed the lure of games was strong enough.

As Hidan was now distracted elsewhere, Shikamaru could relax a little and so laid back in the chair. He ended up zoning out since it was so peaceful. It started out that way anyway. Every now and then he glanced over at the rest of them to see that Hidan, although not sociable, was at least responding to people when talked to. Admittedly with one word answers but it was a start.

For a few hours, all things were peaceful. Obviously his friends could be pretty vocal but he'd learned to zone out very quickly. Shikamaru knew he'd been out of it for a while when a sudden slamming noise occurred and his eyes flew open. The room was also weirdly silent.

"Wow…" After hearing that from Ino he looked over to see that everyone was staring towards the door and Hidan was nowhere to be seen.

"I didn't do that much did I?" This from Kiba who looked particularly dazed.

"No, that was just a major over-reaction."

"What happened?" All eyes turned to him. "Don't do that, it's creepy."

"Your psychotic friend flipped out because Kiba touched him."

"Touched?"

"He was getting all tense so I just asked him if he was ok. I literally just put my hand on his shoulder and he told me to fuck off."

"And stormed out the front door," added Naruto.

"Oh…" And that plan was a great success.

"Are you going after him then?" He gave Ino a scowl but she barely batted an eyelid. "You'll lose him."

"Don't start." This did make him feel uncomfortable though. He couldn't believe he'd missed it. "…Goddammit."

"Go Shika go!"

"Fuck off Kiba." Hidan probably had the right idea on that part.

Shikamaru had no idea where Hidan had gone, but as there was a bin knocked over to the right, he decided that there would be a good place to start. After a while of walking (and following debris), he saw a glimpse of silver turning a corner at speed and hurried up.

Hidan was practically marching to get to wherever it was he was going. As he walked, Shikamaru couldn't help but be partly relived that the guy hadn't punched anyone. Up ahead the boy started to slow and Shikamaru realised they were getting close to his flat.

When the boy was inside, Shikamaru had a bit of a dilemma. On the one hand, the guy was clearly pissed off about something; but he was now in his own home. Possibly he'd be more annoyed at having someone invading his privacy. This decision was made for him by, of all people, Sasori. The redhead was leaving his own home when he spotted the brunette.

"Go and talk to your boyfriend please, he's trashing things and it's noisy as hell."

"He's not my-." And he's not listening. As he'd been told, he sighed and reluctantly walked up the stairs to Hidan's front door. There were banging noises until Shikamaru knocked. After a very long silence the door was yanked open. Hidan was pretty surprised to see him and for a moment he expected to have the door slammed in his face. Instead, Hidan silently moved back and let him walk in. The table had been flipped over and a lot of things were scattered around the room. As this was normal for here, it was hard to tell if he'd done it out of anger or laziness.

"Why are you here?" Hidan looked both annoyed and confused.

"I wanted to make sure you were ok." More staring. "Why did you flip out?"

"Why did you want me to go?" His voice was kind of wobbly.

"I thought you'd like to get to know people."

"Why?"

"You seemed kind of lonely."

"So you feel fuckin' sorry for me?" Oh dear. "I'm just somethin' for you to fix? Well, fuck you!"

"Hidan-." He spun around and headed to the bathroom, locking the door behind him.

…Well. What am I supposed to do now?