A/N: Removed draft from chapter 43

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#6

Removed draft – Wardrobe Malfunction

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Feeling increasingly desperate Naruto held up her Chūnin vest in one hand while dangling a tattered jumpsuit jacket in the other. Glancing back and forth between the two she wondered how the fearless and brave Uzumaki Naruto could have been reduced to this.

Giving up on the task she threw both garments onto the bed and turned towards the three trousers she owned. All of them in various states of patched and torn.

This was not an obstacle she had ever imagined she'd be faced with. Usually when she grabbed clothes to wear her biggest concerns were wether or not the garments was patched up enough to not fall clean of her body during training, or if she'd remembered to do her laundry on time so they'd dry before the morning hours.

When picking something to wear she had never cared much of appearance, instead she valued practicality. Naruto wasn't even sure why she was stressed about not having anything but worn clothes, but a voice in her head - one that sounded eerily like Sakura - demanded she wear something "nice" for her first date.

But what could be categorized as "nice"? Naruto had never wasted money to buy a fashion magazine in her life, and didn't feel inclined to start now. She didn't know what the general public received as stylish, and even if she did Naruto doubted she owned any such garments.

Since moving out from the orphanage Naruto had never been able to shake off the survival mode she'd lived in the first few years. Where every penny was carefully divided between equipment, food and rent, while whatever was left was saved for a rainy day. If she ever bought clothes it had been because there was no other choice, and because her current wardrobe was literally falling apart at the seams.

Even before falling back in time Naruto had never spent her carefully saved money on frivolous pleasantries such as dresses and ornate objects. She didn't even spend money to go to the hairdresser, and had instead taken advantage of her numerous kunai to cut her hair to various disastrous results. Ino had once said a ninken could do a better haircut with only their fangs for scissors, which admittedly might have been true seeing as even Kiba had a neater hairdo than Naruto back then.

It had been a constant grievance Sakura had taken personal offense to. And when they became teammates the pink haired girl had constantly been correcting Naruto's attempts, until the medic finally had enough and taught Naruto how to properly cut her hair herself.

Shaking away the image of Sakura making imaginative threats including suffocating her with a hairband while using the scissors to cut off her eyebrows just to make her sit still, Naruto picked up her only remaining orange jacket from the bed.

She usually wore the Konoha uniform on training and missions. It was supplied regularly and could take a lot of strain without Naruto having to patch it up constantly. Which is why the orange jacket currently looked in better shape than all her other clothes. Combined.

Shrugging Naruto slung it over her shoulders and looked around the room, catching her reflection in the glass of her bedroom window. Pursing her lips she studied the bird nest she referred to as hair.

Just as a curtesy to Sakura's many lessons she felt obligated to do something about her hair for the date. It felt like a disrespect to Sakura's memory if she didn't. After all the girl had sacrificed an awful amount of hours in training Naruto for this.

Rummaging through her drawer she fished out her hairbrush. It was around a decade old and Naruto wasn't entirely sure where she'd gotten it from, though she suspected she might have stolen it from Hitomi during her days at the academy.

Resolved to the upcoming torture Naruto dragged it through her hair and grimaced as the brush stuck on iron hard knots after barely moving it an inch. Instantly she regretted having left the hairbrush behind at home for the month long mission through the Elemental Countries.

Twenty minutes later she had barely managed to brush through half her hair, and was cursing the fact she had inherited her father's stubborn hair instead of the flowing red locks of her mother.

"It doesn't matter." Naruto muttered to herself and threw the hairbrush onto the bed the moment she finished unknotting her hair. Feeling the night was already ruined before it even started thanks to a few tatty clothes and a really useless brush.

It was downright unfair, because boys had it so much easier than girls when it came to dressing up. She was sure Shisui didn't have to deal with this sort of crap at all!

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"You can't?" Clarified Itachi confused.

Large, dark eyes turned on him and were pleading for the Uchiha heir to understand. It was an old trick Shisui had picked up from his teammate years ago. The worst part was that the puppy eye no jutsu was frightfully effective when Shisui used it on an unsuspecting target. Not that Itachi was that naive. At least not anymore. "I'm so sorry, Itachi! I completely forgot we were supposed to train, but I sort of made… plans, with Naruto, which I can't back out of. Not today. Please forgive me?"

Itachi tilted his head, looking from the large pile of clothes sprawled over the bed to the open closet which was barren of clothes. "Does these plans include renovating your closet?"

Shisui's head tilted in confusion and gave a stare that said clearly enough; "what the hell are you talking about?"

"Since you have emptied it." Itachi clarified and pointed towards the open doors revealing the bare interior walls of his closet.

He thought his point had been pretty self-explanatory, as the function of a closet in general was to store clothes, but all of Shisui's garments were currently sprawled across his bedroom. Most had ended up covering every available surface of his bed, but some had made their way across the floor and halfway out the window. A pair of trousers were even swinging around in circles while stuck in the rotating ceiling fan. It was slightly surreal actually, because Shisui was no slob, and Itachi had not been aware his cousin was capable of making such a mess.

"Um, no. I'm just looking for a shirt."

Itachi's eyes narrowed. His cousin was acting… stressed? He was looking for a nice shirt and he had bailed on their plans because he'd promised to meet up with Naruto. Could it be…?

Itachi had wondered about the possibility for a very long time now. After all, Shisui went out of his way for one person in particular. He always had. During her years traveling Shisui had talked his ears off about Naruto, and though she'd been back for over a year it was still not much better these days.

"Have you finally asked Naruto-san out on a date?" Wondered Itachi aloud. Shisui had been hurriedly looking through his shirts, but at the words his shoulders stiffened. Itachi took the time to jump up and grab the hem of the pants stuck to the fan, yanking them down to prevent them from slapping him in the face for each cycle.

Slowly Shisui glanced over his shoulder, ignoring Itachi's fight with the ceiling fan and looking anywhere but directly into his eyes. Itachi took that as confirmation enough, and the small "yes" Shisui added a moment later wasn't necessary.

"I see. I wondered when you would."

Shisui gaped. "W-what? Why would you think that?"

"I know you like her."

The older boy gaped at him for a moment, before he shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. "You knew? How the hell can you have-… you know what? Forget it. If you have time I could use some help here. What the hell do you wear for a date?"

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Fin.

A/N: Please forgive any mistakes. English isn't my native language and this was not beta'd.

Also, this was just some fun portraying more of Shisui and Naruto's respective preparations for their date. I cut it out because it wasn't really necessary in the chapter, but I still kept some of it, mainly Itachi giving Shisui a thorough explanation of what a date entails. I keep comparing Itachi giving dating advice to a bird telling a fish how to swim. You can learn through observation but that doesn't really mean you have a clue what you're talking about.