Warning: Swearing and a little Shounen-ai, I guess would be the term. :p

I did try to make this story not so much like my other ones but… Fail. I think my writing style is too ingrained by this point… I am still trying.

Thank you everyone who reviewed.

I'm trying this out with different points of view, starting with Sasuke, I'm not sure how well it will work. I think it's technically third person… third person omniscient… or something.

I'm sorry, I know I always take way too long to update… Love you guys ;)

Helping People

It's So Much Harder When They're Cranky

He looked at the piece of paper, Uchiha, it said. He just stared at it uncomprehendingly, dazed that after all this time he would so randomly discover Sasuke's family.

Chapter 3

A pale black haired young man stood close to an occupied table in a small Italian restaurant, he seemed to know the occupants of said table but he was not communicating with either of them. His black eyes seemed very far away, maybe even lost in a scene only he perceived.

Flashback

(Again… )

(around nine years previous)

Ragged sobbing sliced through Sasuke's soul like a thousand senbon needles as he sat holding his head in the otherwise empty hallway of the mental health ward. The sound was muffled through the wall behind him but the ghost could hear every whimper that Naruto made. Intermittent whispers of 'please, please come back' left emotional wounds that were brutal but still preferable to a few hours ago when the incarcerated blond had been screaming Sasuke's name as if he were the only thing separating Naruto from a lifetime of pain and loneliness.

Staying in the hallway was the single most difficult thing Sasuke had ever done.

A couple days ago Tsunade had overheard Naruto and him having a vehement argument about Sasuke leaving and just investigating on his own for a little while since the blond was getting nowhere. When she heard Naruto arguing loudly with an invisible person, she understandably became very worried and placed him in a mental care facility. They arrived and Naruto was fine until the ghost told the blond he thought it would be best if he disappeared for a while.

Sasuke had thought it was best for Naruto to simply forget about him, the blond would get over it eventually right?

So far… not so much.

He hadn't thought Naruto was so attached to him already but he was wrong. It had been two days. From what he'd heard from the personnel as they'd walked by him, Naruto has been refusing to eat anything since arriving and the nurses were planning on giving him an IV. He'd also heard Tsunade was planning on visiting in the morning to talk some sense into the blond or to bring him somewhere else.

Sasuke had just wanted to know how Naruto would cope when he left. Now it felt like he was just being mean. The ghost couldn't handle it anymore and stood, going to Naruto's door, he concentrated on slipping through.

The room was almost completely devoid of all color, sterile white walls and white tiles on the floor. Even the bed was completely covered in white sheets. The only spot of color was a large dark brown teddy bear sitting on the dresser looking decidedly out of place. The overall atmosphere of the place was not really conducive to mental health.

Naruto was huddled in the corner behind the bed with his eyes shut tight and his arms wrapped around his knees, clutching them to his chest. Tears rolled down his cheeks and occasionally he would let out a whimper.

Seeing Naruto like that so… distraught made up Sasuke's mind for him. Screw his past and everything that went with it, from now on he didn't fucking care how he died or why; all he wanted was for the blond, who missed him so much he couldn't even function, to be happy. He made his way to the blond and touched his knee gently; Naruto jumped a bit but then smiled up at his friend through his tears.

"You came back," Naruto wiped his eyes on his sleeve as Sasuke sat down beside him on the floor, wrapping his arms around him and resting Naruto's head on his shoulder.

"I'll never leave you again."

"Promise?"

"I promise."

Sasuke released the blond and stood, holding out his hand for Naruto, "Come on dobe, you need to get some sleep, I heard that Tsunade is coming to get you in the morning." Naruto took his hand and he led him to the depressing bed, pulling back the sheet for the blond to get under.

"I'm not gonna be able to sleep Sasu." Naruto got under the covers and pulled them up to his chin.

"Just try, okay? I'll be here all night so don't worry."

"Will you hold me so I can fall asleep?"

"Alright, scoot over." Sasuke settled in behind Naruto scooting in close so the blond could sense him better and feel safe. Sasuke embraced his waist in a light hold and rested his head on the pillow above the blonde's head. "Now sleep."

Naruto soon fell asleep, unaware that he was being watched closely through a nanny cam.

End of flashback

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Sasuke had held Naruto while he slept that night and for years after as the blond could not seem to sleep without him.

Tsunade had come to get him the next morning and had just taken him home, no explanation required. Since then she had not been as concerned by his peculiarities although the blond was much more careful around her. Which had always struck Sasuke as bizarre behavior for a psychologist; weren't they usually troubled even if their patients weren't hurting anyone with their crazy?

As Sasuke stood close to Naruto's table at the restaurant, catching the last part of their conversation since he had decided to come into the restaurant anyway. He was as frozen by the realization that he would apparently be breaking his promise quite soon.

He'd never planned on breaking it and because they hadn't been actively looking for any clues to his past in quite some time he'd thought he was safe but he was sure he would never convince Naruto to just let it go, the blond took his commitments very seriously.

"Uchiha," Sasuke heard the blond say. The word seemed to echo in his head. Sasuke had a bad feeling about this whole thing, like there was something he really didn't want to remember.

Memories have the strangest triggers sometimes though, and Sasuke could feel a bad one coming toward him with the speed of a bullet train.

He was in the dark. Almost absolute darkness surrounded him like a shroud. An unidentified banging and a strange discordant noise echoed in the emptiness and they frightened him; then he realized the banging was his own hands hammering at damp metal cage bars and the discordance was his own harsh screaming. He had to get out… he had to get out now or they would come back. They would hurt him again. He heard mocking laughter phantom-like from everywhere yet from nowhere, followed by a deep voice that made his skin crawl with revulsion. "No one is coming to rescue you Uchiha, nobody gives a shit about you."

In the restaurant Sasuke fell to his knees with his hands covering his ears, eyes tightly shut, a whimpering mess. "Stop… Stop it!"

A chair clattered to the floor as Naruto threw it backward in his haste to reach his best friend who was breaking down within feet of him. "Oh shit, Sasuke what's wrong? Where are you?" Naruto's voice seemed to come from very far away.

"I'm in the dark… I can't get out… it hurts." The voice was low and broken, Naruto could barely believe it had come from his seemingly strong friend.

Unbeknownst to Sasuke, his appearance had also changed drastically since his remembrance had begun, his mind had traveled back to the time right before his death and his body unconsciously assumed the condition it had been in. The stylish private school uniform the ghost usually wore was ratty, torn, and covered in blood and dirt. His stunningly pale skin was bruised and battered, peppered with scrapes some still leaking blood. His normally silky black hair was matted to his skull with more still more blood.

Naruto was appalled and a little scared, he'd never seen Sasuke in such a state. Fear gnawed at him as he tried to figure out what to do. "Oh fuck, what happened to you?" He fell to his knees in front of the ghost, not caring at all what people might think and gathered the trembling apparition into his arms. "They can't hurt you anymore, I'm here they'll never hurt you again. Come back to me baby, please come back."

Sakura stared in shock as her boyfriend sat on the floor apparently rocking and talking to nothing. Then she heard him say 'baby' and became very jealous, he'd never called her baby, not even during sex. She felt a hollow feeling in her stomach then a burning anger. She had known, deep down she'd always known, that he had never given his whole attention to her and that she was never his most important person.

Remembering the way his eyes lit up when he was looking at or talking about the painting on his wall, Sakura now wondered if there was something to it, that it wasn't just pride in his accomplishments as she had originally thought. Who makes a painting of a random stranger and puts it on their wall anyway? Did he actually know that man? Had they been friends? They definitely weren't friends anymore; if she had been introduced to him she would have remembered it.

"Um, Naruto? Can you get up? People are staring." Sakura walked around the small round table they had been sitting at to pull him off the floor bodily if she had to.

"I don't care Sakura." Naruto continued to croon to Sasuke softly, rubbing his back comfortingly and resting his cheek on the top of the brunet's head.

"Naruto!" Sakura stomped her heel, "Stop that this instant! You look like a crazy person."

Naruto looked down as Sasuke's trembling abruptly stopped and he was incredibly relieved to see the ghost's clothing was back to normal. It seemed that Sasuke's hatred for Sakura had snapped him out of his funk if his glare was anything to go by.

"Dobe, your girlfriend is such a fucking bitch. Why couldn't you have stayed with the other one? The one in high-school, Hinata? I liked her better. So what if she caught us, she would've believed you if you'd explained." Sasuke pushed Naruto off him and got up, "I'm leaving. See you at home."

Sasuke was understandably upset, this was the first death memory he'd had so far, and truthfully it didn't bode well for the rest of it. He hadn't really been expecting a nice death but did it have to suck that bad? For the longest time he could remember nothing about his life before death as it were, then there were small things he could remember; the crisp hint of snow in the air, the color of a maple tree just before its leaves fell, the subtle scent of cinnamon in freshly mulled apple cider. Why couldn't his memories have stayed pleasant? He didn't want this. He was happy the way things were.

He was just about to try to talk Naruto into being with him again, trying to get him to dump his bitch of a girlfriend and realize that he was much happier when he was with him. It was so much easier before Naruto had decided that he had to pretend to be straight, before the blond had put this infuriating distance between them.

He'd always cared about Naruto in his own way, sort of like a brother. They'd been best friends, or so Sasuke had thought. Around the time the blond turned sixteen though Sasuke realized he liked him as a little more than a friend, or maybe a lot more. They'd been dancing around the issue for some time, he could tell Naruto had feelings for him too; Sasuke would see the blond watching him strangely and sometimes staring at his mouth as he talked. Sasuke had no problem with Naruto being attracted to him and that made him realize he had always known he was gay, both when alive and now.

TBC

I'm going to end it there for now… seems as good of a place as any. Hope no one's confused. Sasuke turned out to be a little more sappy than I originally intended, it got away from me… I blame him. Stay tuned for another flashback and… (drumroll please)… a make-out scene! Yay!

Mwahahah! You have to wait (Yes I am evil)

Comment? Questions?

Reviews keep me going. Seriously… I love complements. They're sort of like clothes, you can never have too many!